Quote of the Day -- On Wealth Inequality and Inequity

"Advocates of capitalism are very apt to appeal to the sacred principles of liberty, which are embodied in one maxim: The fortunate must not be restrained in the exercise of tyranny over the unfortunate." --Bertrand Russell

Said so many years ago but still so applicable today. Hear this, Mr. Bezos? Waltons?

Quote of the Day -- Truthful Edition

"More cranks take up fashionable untruths than unfashionable truths."

— Bertrand Russell, "Principles of Social Reconstruction." Mind you, too, he said this in 1916, amazingly enough. True then. Still, sadly, tragically so very true today. So explains Fox.

A Republican -- On Republicans

Don't take it from me, folks.

So many former Republicans. This man, David Jolly, Bill Kristol, George Will. So many.

Donald Trump, USA President, Today

From former NPR reporter Jacki Lyden today, from her Facebook page.

What did you do with your morning?

Kiss the kids, hug the spouse, walk the dog, pour coffee for the friend, chat to the neighbor?

Phone abroad, pull a weed?

In some way, be glad you were alive?

The leader of the free world (I’m fairly certain) did none of that.

In a 15-tweet-tweetstorm, the day before a UN roll-out, amid N Korea threats and Prez Taunts (now we’re down to taunts like Rocket Man) and post-Irma & Harvey, he woke up with tweet indigestion.

He put misogyny into the mix, re-tweeting from an anti-Semitic account fantasizing that this oaf could possibly swing a golf club hard enough to Hillary Clinton in the back, without getting a hernia. The meme splices in a clip of Clinton visiting Yemen.

Jealousy over Clinton's book reception likely triggered it (as well as raging jealousy over her accomplishments as a female Secretary of State-- (heaven help Ivanka) but -- racism and misogyny and paternalism/white supremacy are absolutely at the core of Donald Trump's id. (I would never reflect on the state of his soul. That remains to be developed.)

Every single day, Americans who worry about the myriad obliques and angles threatening modern life, must additionally worry that this unstable man will further undermine what remains of our democracy, society, and civility.

Every hour.

Columnists write columns about their rising blood pressure (see Dana Milbank, "Trump is Killing Me).

The best antidote, of course, is to prevail with those principles Trump cannot affect -- morality, civility, decency, and courage. It's not about "moving past" Trump's latest outrage -- it's burned into our psyches already. Short of removing this completely unfit human from public office, we must do all we can to hang on to our own characters, which are, of course, already going to be tested by the ungrateful kid, horrid neighbor, food poisoning and dog that bites. 

My point being that life is a series of intended and unintended feints and parries, an equilibrium forever poised on the precipice of eclipse, but with this president we can count on poison and only on poison. 

There are no legislative political accomplishments, and of course, he is politically impotent. 

And knows it. 

Remember we need health care, mental health parity, community need, a fight against ethnic cleansing, fairness for the the frail amongst us, an environment and planet health we must improve. 

Perhaps the test for us is that in addition to never overlooking his sickness--for he is a sick man, very sick--we must expand our empathy gene in direct opposition to Trump’s failure to affect anything except hatred. 

We must speak out. 

That to me is indeed but one good reason to get up in the morning and carry on-- because someone this sick and desperate can make everyone a little more sick and desperate and would revel in doing so if it made him feel powerful. 

There is no moral compass there, just an id. 

So onward friends, in the engagement of your best self, best talents, best friends, best heart. We struggle, but at least, we struggle together.

Links:

Jacki Lyden

President Trump is killing me. Really

Another Thing Our Far-Too-Expensive "Healthcare System" Is Getting Us Americans

Another thing our far-too-expensive "health care system" is getting us Americans.

Dead.

It's getting us dead. It's killing us. Literally killing us.

From today's Sunday New York Times:

Editorial: America's Shocking Maternal Deaths

A bit from the article:

The rate at which women die during pregnancy or shortly after childbirth has fallen sharply in many nations as maternal care has improved. The United States — and particularly Texas — is a glaring exception.

In Texas, for instance, according to a study in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology, the maternal mortality rate doubled from 17.7 per 100,000 live births in 2000 to 35.8 in 2014. Compare that with Germany, which had 4.1 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2014.

In California, the rate fell from 21.5 in 2003 to 15.1 in 2014, but in the remaining 48 states and the District of Columbia the rate increased from 18.8 in 2000 to 23.8 in 2014. The United States as a whole had the second-highest maternal mortality rate among 31 members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Only Mexico had a higher rate.

A big part of the problem is the inequality embedded in America’s health care system. The 2010 Affordable Care Act made health insurance more available, but millions of families still cannot afford the care they need.

Further proof of our obscene, outrageously high, outrageously expensive, even obscene, unconscionable, immoral, heartless, inhumane, extremely poorly named health care system and why we needed the Affordable Care Act. It's also why we need a "single payer" health care system. It's why all states, even those overseen by Republican legislators and governors need to expand Medicaid to their citizens.

Medical Bills Are the Biggest Cause 

of US Bankruptcies: Study

Medical bills prompt more than 60 percent 

of U.S. bankruptcies

Make no mistake, too, our health care costs and expenses are killing other groups of Americans, too.

Chart of the Day: America's Health Care 

System Is Killing You

American Health Care Killed My Father

For-Profit Insanity Is Killing Americans

The Myth of American Health Care: The Lies 

That Are Killing Us

Even the people on the inside of the health care industry know this. Here's from the doctors themselves.

Obamacare isn't enough: Physicians explain 

why America needs single payer universal 

health care

Physicians for a National Health Program

It's also why Republicans are wrong, deeply wrong, on fighting improvements on our health care system.

News man and Midwesterner Walter Cronkite, who died in 2009, it should be kept in mind, said it best about America's health care system.

We need to fight to change this. We are the only nation on the planet that ties health care to profit, and with horrible, literally lethal results.

Links:

EpiPen Soars and So Does Bosses' Pay

EpiPen Price Rises Could Mean More Riches for Mylan Executives

Mylan CEO's Pay Rose Over 600 Percent

Why in Heaven's Name Aren't Teeth Considered Part 

of Our Health?

Really, Think About Those Ten Commandments

Quote/Question of the Day -- on morality

Like

Quote of the day -- Sunday edition

Like

Quote of the day -- on American institutions

Quote of the day -- on unions and power

America's priorities

Quote of the day

True then.

Still sadly, tragically true today.

Statistics you won't believe about our American health care system

It's worth your time:



God, we're stupid.

We're stupid to have let this develop.

We're stupid to let this continue to take place.

We're stupid to let this go on.

Is this that complicated?

Whatever happened to being moral in business?

The problem--and a solution--of our health care system

I've written here many times on how our American health care system is, insanely and without morals, the most expensive health care system in the world.  I think it too important not to keep repeating and writing on until we do something about this ugly, gross, inhumane injustice.  So here's another. I'll keep it brief.

It was spawned by an excellent, even important and enlightening article from Sunday's New York Times:

The Cure for the $1000 Toothbrush

Here is a basic fact of health care in the United States: Doctors and hospitals know what they charge, but patients don’t know what they pay. As in any market, when one side has no information, that side loses: price secrecy is a major reason medical bills are so high. In my previous column, I wrote about the effect of this lack of transparency on the bills patients pay out of pocket.

We know about these bills, which hit us directly. What most people don’t know, because the costs are hidden, is that the same imbalance exists with insurance. The employers and employees who buy health coverage have delegated vigilance over health care costs to insurers — but insurers, for the most part, have gone AWOL...

Fortunately, but by necessity, a company in Texas found a bit of a solution to the obscenely high costs of our health care system by sourcing it out themselves.  As it turned out, they saved many, many thousands of dollars in expenses and were then able to offer even better care and at a far lower cost to their employees and the company:

Under Blue Cross’s P.P.O., the company had been paying $10,000 per visit for dialysis patients. Now it was paying $975. Other costs dropped commensurately. After the first year, the company lowered premiums by 3 percent and increased coverage, providing free vision, dental and life insurance to all its employees, including part-timers. “We saved so much money we were able to hire a third-party contractor to establish a medical clinic in our office,” said Marrs. “We provide a free primary care physician in our office to all employees and their dependents.”

So, basically, now we're getting to the end of our financial ropes regarding health care, some good, old fashioned communication and yes, even some Capitalism and competition is bringing prices and costs down, drastically.

And thank goodness.

It's long, long overdue.

It's not a "big picture", long term, widespread answer and solution but it's a good start.

Quote of the day--on another inequality

The churches should be screaming bloody murder.

And coordinating and organizing protests.

People on food stamps are the problem?

Some facts and one moral truth:

It's not the poor man that's the problem with our nation or debt or deficits, ladies and gentlemen.

The news we TRULY need about the Royal birth this week

Here's what's important about the new addition to the Royal Family:

The royal birth cost $15000. The average American birth is billed at $30000.

Elisabeth Rosenthal of The New York Times put it this way, on Twitter:

British royal born in fanciest ward :$15000. Average US birth: billed $30,000; paid $18,000. What's wrong here? http://www.
lth/american-way-of-birth-costliest-in-the-world.html?pagewanted=all lth/american-way-of-birth-costliest-in-the-world.html?pagewanted=all 

If the obscenity of that doesn't occur to you, I don't know what to tell you.

Link:  American Way of Birth, Costliest in the World

Oddball billboards in Southwest Missouri

I'm telling you, this is one very different part of the country this Southwest Missouri.  I see things and I keep seeing things I can't even imagine prior to being here, let alone not seeing them before now.

Here's the first one I'll mention so far-- it's a billboard, apparently by and from the Catholic Church and it's in Springfield.  It says:

"CATHOLICISM:  THE BIGGEST OBSTACLE TO SOCIALISM"

Because, after all, isn't that--Socialism--one of the biggest ongoing fears of most Americans, in general, but Right Wingers and Republicans, more specifically, since the core of Communism died with the old Soviet Union and China as we knew them?

God forbid we have Socialism, right?

Except I can't think of a more fair, just, moral and even "Christian" or "Christ-like" political system than Socialism, personally, when you think about it.

These, after all, are the definitions of the big, ugly Socialism:

1)  any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods

 

2) a : a system of society or group living in which there is no private property

b : a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state

3) : a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done.

 

And face it, we're never, ever going to have total ownership of anything in this country, let's be real here. No one's talking about or realistically promoting anything like total Socialism or, again, total ownership of production by "the state", by the government.

 

That said, Socialism, in various degrees, exists over much of the free world and it's certainly in existence here, now, in America, much to a lot of people's dislike and even though, to others of us, there isn't near enough practiced here.

The only things we'd push for in this country is that the gross inequities and inequalities of, as a best comparison and example, the obscenely wealthy vs. the horribly immorality of the extremely poor.

And it was Jesus Christ himself who ran the "money changers" out of the temple, as a reminder and said things like

--"It is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God"

--"...go, sell what you own and give the money to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven..." and this one:  "

--"Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days”

Suffice to say, Jesus was well known as anything but a fan of the wealthy. Keeping "safety nets" for the very poor of us is the only decent, humane, moral and yes, even "Christian" thing to do. And sure, it shouldn't be set up so it makes for an "easy ride" one can be on perpetually but our current systems of assistance to the poor and food stamps and unemployment insurance is anything but.

And Catholicism? 

What a Capitalist racket that's turned out to be. No wonder they want to fight "Socialism."

Congress' continued work for the wealthy. And corporations

From The New York Times today, news that the Senate and House can keep in millions and billions for war and defense and weapons of war we don't need--or even use--but nothing for "the least of us":

Missing: The Food Stamp Program

As the Times said:  "By brutally stripping food aid from its farm bill, the House ended a tradition of decency."

Then, on top of that, this one:

Pain on the Reservation

"Legislation specifically exempted many programs that benefit low-income Americans, but virtually none aiding American Indians were included."

Not that we, as Americans, ever really showed that we gave a collective damn about Native Americans, though, right?

One last note. This same group of government legislators also want to strip out two tax deductions:

Two Tax Credits That Work

 It seems these two tax credits that help build up and rejuvenate poorer neighborhoods--and so, the poor--are being considered for elimination.

Nice, huh?

Our legislators just keep heaping benefits on the wealthy and corporations while they take from the poor.

Yay, us, huh?

How is it the churches and religious people--the ones who are supposed to be "moral"--aren't screaming about these atrocities?