health insurance reform – Page 6

Twist the Facts

Yesterday morning, I wrote a post over at Age Against the Machine on British research showing that oral contraceptives reduce women’s risk of death from cancer and cardiovascular disease. Those happen to be the top two causes of death for American women, so it’s a big deal. And we aren’t talking about some teeny study, but over 46,000 women in a study that went on for 39 years. I think this is good news for the vast majority of women!

Yet I could not help but think that this news might not be welcomed by all. After all, there is a segment of our society that might think this encourages promiscuity. When I ran this past my partner, he thought that was just nuts.

But unfortunately, we live in a society where parents withhold vaccines that could someday save a woman’s life not because of safety concerns with the vaccine itself, but because they think she might think it’s ok to have sex (because good girls don’t like sex, good girls are never sexually assaulted, and good girls certainly never have cheating husbands). We live in a society where pharmacists who should know better are arbitrarily deciding not to dispense oral contraceptives because of “moral objections” and/or the mistaken belief that they can cause “abortion” of an embryo that has not implanted (never mind the other medical indications for oral contraceptives, and never mind that these pills prevent pregnancy rather than end it; arguably they prevent abortions by preventing unwanted pregnancy). We live in a society where the so-called-pro-life crowd thinks abortion causes breast cancer. We live in a society where some people value the lives of embryos more than the lives of full-grown adult women and their families.

So yes, I expect this study to be either ignored, mis-quoted, or mis-used by the Religious Right. They will focus on the small but unexplained increased risk of death by accident or violence — See? The Pill increases your risk of [violent] death! — if they acknowledge the research at all.

Mere minutes after posting, I found this article at the Christian Science Monitor — hardly a “liberal media” source — with the headline “High divorce rates and teen pregnancy are worse in conservative states than liberal states.” It turns out that educated women and access to contraceptives lead to greater family stability and fewer unwed or teen mothers than “that old time religion.” Yet the Religious Right has hamstrung both trends by getting the Feds to go along with “abstinence only” sex ed, which not only doesn’t work, fails to teach about contraceptives and disease control, and outright lies to children, but attempt to reinforce very outdated gender roles.

And then I read about how the Texas State Board of Education has decided to re-write history, decreeing what may and may not appear in textbooks. Sure, the Civil War was about “states rights” — specifically the right of states to say it’s ok to own other human beings! Sadly, Texas is a large enough textbook market that students around the country may be subjected to this ultra-conservative, highly Protestant, reinterpretation of reality.

You can say what you like about reality, but you can’t change it.

In Closing: 30! 30 bank failures this year, ah ha ha ha! (reference); fattiest fast foods; mortgage insurance providers say “sorry, we won’t cover this fraudulent claim“; obligatory health insurance reform items (notice I don’t call it health care reform, or worse yet HCR which always makes me think HRC instead) includes Go Grayson Go! Put them on the spot of either saying yes to a real public option, or going on the record as being against Medicare!; oh sure, let’s make it more complicated; what recovery?; Oh No! Obama’s Liberal base is “disengaged!” Could that be because they’ve kicked it in the butt at every opportunity?; most Americans think Wall Street needs better (i.e., more) regulation; for that matter, most Americans would like to see the Government make some progress on anything; don’t take the battery for granted; median wealth, $5; and Blog Against Theocracy weekend is coming.

They Don’t Like Baths

Complimentary water bottle, courtesy of the Cashman Cougars of Cashman Middle School.

In Closing: Anybody know where we can score 11 million jobs?; women need to stay the heck out of Utah; aw, poor banks may have to write down some “assets” to what they are worth!; obligatory health insurance reform would be incomplete without pointing out that Rep. Grayson has written a brilliant, 4 page law that would let anybody buy in to Medicare at cost — but only if they want to of course; “Today, Richard Nixon would be considered a flaming liberal. In Nixon’s day, Barack Obama would have passed as a typical conservative….” (my, how the labels have shifted since Archie Bunker’s day!); a picture worth a billion dollars words; poor effing babies; and finally, can everybody shut up about overpaid doctors now? That’s a load of crap! Now CNN tells us the obvious, that some nurses make more than your typical family practice doctor — the guy you actually need for your sore throats and blood pressure meds — and I bet they have lower student loan debt too.

Shorties of Riddick

Let’s start off with the Health Insurance Reform bits: Many thanks to Florinda for noticing this item, the story of the mom who was the only person in the whole Emergency Department with health insurance. However, don’t think that mandatory health insurance would have changed that. And here’s a moving piece on health care — particularly mental health care, as it fits into our nation’s Christian traditions.

Continuing the Bush Economic Tradition: Huzzah, they are now proudly telling us that GDP went up 5.9% in Q4 of 2009. Isn’t that great? The Great Recession is officially over! Of course, that’s only if you ignore the reality of fewer jobs, higher unemployment particularly among people under 25 (many of whom don’t show up in the official statistics), collapsing consumer confidence, and stuff like that. In fact, the Christian Science Monitor has gone as far as to say that the recovery is a scam. Oh well, some jobs cost more to create than others. Real worry that the Senate decided it was more important to go home than to make sure that people on unemployment would be able to pay the rent next month.

Going to the Vitamin Store?: Not sure what to make of this chart of what science really knows about the various supplements you could buy there.

Huh, Maybe Blackwater is Out Of Control: Duh, Senate.

From the Department of WTF: The military thought it important to take time away from 2 overseas wars to spy on… Planned Parenthood? And white supremacists? Why, recruiting?

New USDA Rules on Organic Food: summary here.

“You never know who it used to be”: A local Buddhist temple is in trouble with the city. Why? Too many cats hang out there and the temple is kind enough to see to it they have food and clean water.

Sad but true: The bullet is still mightier than the restraining order. My heart goes out to everybody involved, including the students of the slain teacher. There is still a lot we don’t know about this situation yet. But ladies, one thing I do know is that you don’t owe anybody a “mercy date” or an explanation about why you want nothing to do with them. Stay away from guys that scare you! Stop answering the phone, stop talking to them, stop seeing them, cut them off cold turkey! Telling them more than once that you don’t want to talk to them is still talking to them!

And Now We Know

It’s official. The Obama plan for health insurance reform has been released. Anybody care to take a guess what’s not in it? The public option.

And what is in it? Mandatory insurance and an excise tax on plans that cost more than $27,5oo annually. “The plan includes a provision that allows low-income people who cannot afford health insurance to receive a waiver from the mandate,” as opposed to some way to help pay for insurance, so basically it’s little better than what we have right now from the standpoint of covering the uninsured. Particularly in a recession, where states are cutting Medicaid because they have to balance the budget somehow.

Wow, Mr. President. Three strikes. As far as I am concerned, it’s outa there!

Now, to the plan’s credit, it does protect against insurance companies declining people with pre-existing conditions, but if it doesn’t regulate how much extra those people pay, say hello to the excise tax. It does regulate how much insurance companies can jack up the rates, and it does have an insurance exchange. I am unclear on how this “exchange” will be any better than websites like eHealthInsurance. It does close the Medicare prescription “donut hole”. Update: here’s a handy comparison chart; the President’s plan does prohibit rescission, which is an improvement over both House and Senate plans.

However, there is a very good likelihood that this bill will place limits on abortions. Since it’s very hard to know when an abortion will be a medical necessity, this is very shortsighted. Unless you want to be the dad who loses his wife to complications of pregnancy or the parents of a child doomed to die by his 4th birthday, this is a no-go.

In closing: secrets of the ER; credit card rules change today; on the job loss numbers; it’s not terrorism when a white guy does it, only brown people can be terrorists; even terrorists deserve a fair trial and even John Ashcroft says so; already up to 20 bank failures for 2010; and an update on the school that decided to spy on its students in their homes. They had better hope there are no outraged dads who decide that the courts are too slow for justice.

Public Option: Resurected or Zombie?

Let’s put the pieces together and see if we have something functional, or some kind of Frankenstein’s Health Insurance Reform. Americans are rightly disgusted by the thing that Congress has brought forth, mostly because it includes such odious things as mandatory coverage and taxing of “decent” health insurance plans. There is still a big health care reform “summit” next week, which is looking more and more like a circus the closer it gets. Health insurance premiums are continuing to rise steeply, and health insurance company profits are rising too, even though they managed to increase “political giving” — that’s legal bribes — 14% in 2009. Add the fact that more Americans are depending on Medicaid, while there is less money for the states to cover them.

Gee, no wonder Americans are disgusted by the idea of mandatory coverage and taxing plans that the tax code decrees too expensive.

Amid this backdrop, the President has finally announced that he will throw an official, Presidential seal of approval health insurance reform bill into the mix, and is planning on stapling it to a budget bill so it can’t be filibustered. He’s even indicated that he’s willing to back a public option — but only if Senator Reid will jump with him. Harry’s in a tough re-election race this fall, and could really use something to bring his polling numbers up. Ah, the real reason for his Nevada visit is out — it’s certainly not because the President feels he owes the Mayor a martini.

Perhaps the feds should start by killing two birds with one stone. If they fully fund Medicaid, the states will have an easier time making their budgets balance and all those extra people on the rolls (see above) will be proof that a public option can work!

But what about this new public option that might be under consideration? We don’t have any real details, so it’s hard to support it. Is it going to be a decent plan? Is it going to be cost competitive with the for-profit insurance companies or will it be a higher priced insurer of last resort? Is it going to have gutted provisions for women’s health so as not to offend the far religious right? Is it going to be available to all Americans, or only to a small percentage of us? Is it going to be saddled with triggers and means tests and all sorts of other crap that will cripple it?

In short, is it some variant of Medicare For All, or is it just another favor for insurance companies?

If this is the real deal — a resurrected public option — I will preach the gospel for it. But beware, if it is a zombie, I will be ready with my blogging boomstick to blow its head off.

In Closing: Getting ahead at the office and getting head at the office are mutually exclusive (I love the story of what was found in a certain executive’s office); a great t-shirt; there has to be some balance between what the community thinks education should be and what the educators think education should be; Japan has overtaken China as America’s biggest creditor; more people trying to ditch “too big to fail” institutions; Dude, where’s my stimulus funds?; class, race, and the War on (some) Drugs; TrueMajority; “Rich people create jobs, all we have to do is cut their taxes enough”? Might just as well wait for Santa to put one in your stocking; if this is true, the dumbest school administrators in the nation thought it would be a good idea to spy on students in their homes using the webcams in their school issued notebook computers; Catholic Charities has decided that politics is more important than that “helping the poor and the sick” crap that Jesus was on about (one more reason my charitable giving is secular whenever possible); and why people pirate DVDs.

Reform. For Freedom.

We have officially gotten to the point where corporations control us.

They control how much money we are allowed to make. They control our finances on the national, international, and personal level — badly. They control our health care in a system that is doomed to collapse under the weight of its own expense real soon now. Worst of all, they play by whatever rules they like while squeezing ordinary people to desperation. Now they have a green light to even more openly control our government.

And unless this worthless Congress remembers that the one thing corporations can’t do — yet, anyway — is vote, things are going to get worse rather than better. We desperately need real financial reform now, the kind that restores rules that worked through most of the 20th century and not the kind so riddled with loopholes as to be a gift to the financial services industry. We need insurance reform that puts more of our health care dollars to work providing health care and curtailing the abuse of patients who foolishly want the care they think they (or their bosses) are paying for, not a “reform” that forces everyone to participate in a broken system through mandatory coverage.

“I’m proud to be an American, where at least I know I’m free,” the song goes. Free to do what? Free to get involved in staged protests of issues we don’t understand? Free to loudly proclaim “facts” with no basis in reality? Free to watch propaganda dressed up as news? Free to owe everything to the companies that hire us, care for us, and mis-manage our money with no hope of anything else?

If you don’t mind, I’d prefer a different flavor of freedom.

In Closing: Roman Army Knife; “Um, because it was the right thing to do and we didn’t want any lawyers saying we did wrong later? Was the 5th Amendment repealed while I wasn’t looking?”; nice to see that we are going to count job losses more honestly, but it’s a shame that Mr. Obama will be blamed for “losing” these jobs when he merely counted Bush Administration losses correctly; I couldn’t have said it better either; at least child abuse is down!; where genetic testing and “pro-life” collide; trees are loving global warming (much more so than the polar bears); and Americans are drinking more, but we’re not paying for the Good Stuff. So, uh, maybe the price of Scotch will return to rational levels? No? I thought not.

Thankfully, Murder Will Not Be Tolerated

Today, the terrorist who killed Dr. George Tiller was convicted of murder and assault. It took the jury 37 minutes to come to a verdict. The soonest he could possibly see parole is in 25 years — and given his age, it’s entirely possible he won’t be alive then. Thankfully, the judge did not allow this trial to become a circus, did not allow abortion to become a central issue, and did not allow the defense to argue voluntary manslaughter, because Dr. Tiller never posed any sort of threat whatsoever — not even an imaginary threat — to the defendant. It’s hard to argue that the someone you admit you’ve been stalking for 10 years posed a danger to you.

I will not glorify the terrorist by naming him. Let him die forgotten.

Now if we can only do something about the thousands of other people so mentally ill that they think murder for God is acceptable.

In Closing: we had positive GDP growth last quarter, but you’d never know it to look at reality (more evidence that the way it is currently measured is flawed); David Sirota on Disaster Porn; must read item on jobs and economic justice; now Ezra Klein says Rahm Emanuel makes him very pessimistic about health care reform! Gee, really Ezra? Rahm made me pessimistic a good solid year ago. Sometimes wonks can be insightful, but sometimes they can be nearsighted.

Silent Night, Deadly Shorties

Merry Christmas! Here’s a little Christmas history for you.

Ok, let’s start off with obligatory items on health insurance reform. The Senate has officially voted on the accursed thing. Here’s the rational case for kill the bill, and push back in conference. The real problem is that this, like many bills, is so long that nobody knows what’s in it, even the Senators.

I have a soft spot for education. Here’s an item on schools that work.

Surely the economic worst is behind us. So saith the President. Unfortunately, he thinks small business is going to lead us out of this mess. That can’t happen as long as banks won’t lend to small businesses (or will only make home equity loans to them), and certainly won’t happen if that small business can’t get affordable health insurance for its owners and employees — who will all be required to have “mandated” insurance under the new bill. Maybe what we really need is some manufacturing, instead of pretending we can build an economy on selling lattes to one another.

Go ahead and tackle that kid, but don’t do any science! You might get hurt! Yeah, maybe we have gone a little wacky on the safety thing (oops, unintentional football joke!). But the point is well taken that the Dangerous Book for Boys isn’t, and most kids aren’t doing any real science in school for fear of lawsuits.

What a great idea! Boy sees problem. Boy asks why problem exists. Boy comes up with solution. Food banks for pet supplies!

SHHHHHHH! Most censored news stories of the year.

Must be nice. Fannie and Freddie’s CEOs are taking home 7 figure paychecks this year. Where do I send my resume?

Schneier on the Predator Drone hack. Short version, it’s not that big a deal. Find out why!

And last…

I think he’s on to something: The grand unifying theory of progressive frustration.

Sorry for anybody who was disappointed that I didn’t cover the Emperor’s birthday. I had net outages yesterday.