THE FEED
Short CutsLOS ANGELES 12 March 2010 |
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Wake up early go to barbershop for haircut.
Barbershop is soon to close, I am informed.
Going out of business.
(Recession = long hair back in style?)
Much discussion of health care bill in barber shop.
Quiet realization of limited understanding of public policy.
Quiet realization that almost no one actually understands public policy in detail.
Quiet realization that there are strong convictions about public policy across the spectrum.
Quiet realization that it is probably absurd to have strong convictions about something one does not understand.
Quiet realization that I do not understand.
Quiet realization that strong convictions vis-à-vis thorough understanding would almost certainly be ideal.
Quiet reflection on “power quote” posted at HTML Giant recently, attributed to painter Gerhard Richter:
“I don’t want to be a personality or to have an ideology. I see no sense in doing anything different. I never do see any sense. I think that one always does what is being done anyway (even when making something new), and that one is always making something new. To have an ideology means having laws and guidelines; it means killing those who have different laws and guidelines. What is the good of that?”
Quiet reflection on response comment by Henry Vauban on HTML Giant comment board:
“The declaration ‘I don’t have an ideology’ already implies ideology and an ideological point of view. Aligning oneself against whatever hegemonic cultural ideology reifies that ideology. Ideology is inescapable. What Gerhard Richter is engaging in here, I think, is just a bit of cynicism and then some wishful thinking. He may as well say, ‘I don’t want to be a human being made of flesh and bone. I want to be a holy art spirit thing. I don’t want to be judged in the way people judge other human beings.’”
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Was gonna say. You were looking a bit shaggy, you hippie.
You shall know the Antichrist by this sign: that he shall try to make sure that all people have access to affordable healthcare.
You know, I am usually one who strictly follows the law to the letter. But I am beginning to get a little bent out of shape by some of the new guidelines and laws that have been enacted and what I am wondering is what exactly is the government trying to accomplish. The new Cobra laws are enough to make me feel my ignorance of my limited high school education. Every time the house passes a new regulation on Cobra it corresponds with more and more administrative time and research and confusion. If this is the way health care reform is headed….I don’t want it. And would someone please tell me why there are deals being cut with the unions in order to pass certain measures of the bill while the small business man in construction with more than 5 employees is being required to offer health care regardless of the small business exemption of fewer than 20 employees? If the plan is so righteous why is there a need to cut deals with big labor?
I am ranting now. Sorry. We should all know a lot more about what is going on in health care reform behind the house and senate doors. That’s all I’m sayin’.
Ha! I just read Greg’s comment and I needed a laugh after my rant.
Here’s a little look into how health care reform will effect our taxes. This is an email I received from Congressman John Flemming this morning.
FLEMING HEALTH CARE REFORM UPDATE
Guess how many taxes are in this bill??!!
March 12, 2010
As a citizen concerned about our nation’s health care system, I thought you’d like to know that the health care bill being rammed through the House contains 10 years worth of tax increases to pay for only 6 years worth of benefits. These taxes total $500 billion dollars over 10 years. Many of these taxes will affect Americans earning less than $200,000 a year, despite the President’s promise to avoid such taxes.
Here are just a few of the taxes contained in the bill:
$750 penalty per worker charged to employers who fail to provide government-sanctioned health insurance
Tax on brand name drugs—totaling $2.3 billion
Increased penalty for early withdrawal from your HSA (from 10% to 20%)
Tax on medical devices—totaling $19.2 billion
10% tax on indoor tanning services
WHAT THIS MEANS FOR YOU: Some of these taxes may affect you directly. Others, like the employer mandate, will cost our economy desperately needed jobs. Others will have ripple effects through the system that will raise prices for everyone.
THE DOCTOR’S DIAGNOSIS: America needs common sense health reform, not job-killing taxes. Future Congresses will be under pressure to raise taxes even further to pay for future years of an expanded government-administered health care system.
As this process unfolds, I will continue to work to represent you, bring common-sense to this debate, expose abuses of power and do all I can to prevent bad policy from becoming law.
Sincerely,
JOHN FLEMING, M.D.
Member of Congress
THEY ALL NEED CALCULATORS! EVERY LAST ONE OF THEM!!!!
I am personally amused when people compare our country to, say, Canada and speak of how well socialized medicine works there. Canada only has 20 million or so citizens, people! We have over 300 million-the third largest population in the world! Finances aside, you’ll forgive me if I’m skeptical about the government’s ability to responsibly run and maintain health-care, especially for something that large and unwieldy. I think a better option would be to lean in on the insurance companies to lower rates and pay up in full when it is required.
Oh, I so should know better than to engage in this, especially as I will be incommunicado for the next day or two (or more) but this is precisely the point I made in Quenby’s post about healthcare. We do not understand the problem but everyone demands a response. We are arguing about how to divide up the check but no one is questioning why we were charged $129 for a cup of coffee. We are focusing – and deliberately being focused – on the wrong issues so that politicians can make themselves feel good and maintain – if not expand – their control over our lives and over private business. “Government” has rarely touched anything they haven’t utterly FUBBed and, if they haven’t managed to F it UBB, it’s because they’ve found a way to use it as a personal cash cow for other and often unrelated projects.
Master of understatement: Brad Listi! And I loved those Richter paintings.
Here’s the start of a brief Paul Krugman Op-Ed column in the NYTimes. Krugman is a 2008 Nobel Prizewinner in Economics, and here he directly tackles “Health Reform Myths”:
“Health reform is back from the dead. Many Democrats have realized that their electoral prospects will be better if they can point to a real accomplishment. Polling on reform — which was never as negative as portrayed — shows signs of improving. And I’ve been really impressed by the passion and energy of this guy Barack Obama. Where was he last year?
But reform still has to run a gantlet of misinformation and outright lies. So let me address three big myths about the proposed reform, myths that are believed by many people who consider themselves well-informed, but who have actually fallen for deceptive spin.
The first of these myths, which has been all over the airwaves lately, is the claim that President Obama is proposing a government takeover of one-sixth of the economy, the share of G.D.P. currently spent on health.”
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
“The only part of health care in which there isn’t already a lot of federal intervention is the market in which individuals who can’t get employment-based coverage buy their own insurance. And that market, in case you hadn’t noticed, is a disaster — no coverage for people with pre-existing medical conditions, coverage dropped when you get sick, and huge premium increases in the middle of an economic crisis. It’s this sector, plus the plight of Americans with no insurance at all, that reform aims to fix. What’s wrong with that?”
For the article: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/12/opinion/12krugman.html?scp=1&sq=Paul%20Krugman%20%22Health%20Reform%20Myths%22&st=cse
Wait… I thought Democrats = smart = good, Republicans = dumb = bad?
No?
Oh.
That’s what we get told over here.
OK. I really need to educate myself more about this stuff.
Be not ashamed. Your understanding of American politics, as described here, is at least as sophisticated as most Americans’
Republicans = Nazis and Fascists.
Democrats = Communists and Socialists.
Or at least that’s what you’d figure by turning on Fox News or MSNBC in America.
Me? A little socialism could help this country more than hurt.
Would you believe I let my hair grow for two and a half years because I simply dislike barbershops? It’s true. I believe the economy could feasibly contribute to hair growth. It would be a terrible circle, because it’s not easy to get a good job with long hair…
A little Korean trivial: Barbershop means “brothel” in Korea. If you ever see a barbershop in Korea or Koreantown you’ll find yourself quite surprised.
David, how about explaining that whole “Barbershop means ‘brothel’ in Korea” thing. What does “beauty parlor” mean, I wonder?
Only in S. Korea (Seoul) for 3 days, I determined that their cuisine’s awesome. If I could choose only one country’s cuisine it would be theirs.
I did manage to halt several lanes of major traffic in midtown Seoul by crossing the street at what seemed to be the right traffic signal. As I walked, there arose hundreds of horn-honkings, so I ran the rest of the way. Later I found out that there was a pedestrian tunnel under the street and that no one *ever* walked across the street. Hoo noo??!!!
Regarding the brothels… In Korea prostitution is rife. It’s an incredibly conservative country, but every single male over the age of about 20 frequents these seedy places. Some of them are “disguised” as barbershops, and some are a little less subtle. Either way, you go for sexual relief. There are no haircuts there.
If you see barber poles (thered, white and blue spinning ones) stay well away. Find somewhere that say “hair shop” or some such thing. If you actually see people having their haircut, you’re fine. Otherwise, stay well away.
Korean food is something I’ll miss when I’m gone (leaving in a few months)but it’s pretty boring for the most part. Everything tastes the same. Historically Korea has been very isolated and its climate isn’t condusive to a diverse range of crops. So there are a handful of ingredients that they use. Consequently you’ll find yourself eating various levels of spice, with animals that are often alive when you consume them, or just dead.
Roads in Korea are actually far better than most Asian countries, but they’re still death traps. I ride a motorbike here and it’s a miracle I’m still alive. The problem is that in Korea life isn’t seen as terribly important. It sounds awful, but it’s just as big a deal as it is elsewhere. People don’t care about hit and runs… Deliberately running someone down on the road is just what you do on your way to work. The police don’t care, the drivers don’t care… no one fucking cares.
Seoul is pretty hectic for traffic, but once you get into the countryside it’s nicer.
David, it sounds a lot like Taipei, Taiwan, re traffic and sex. Having little money during my first visit, I stayed in an inexpensive hotel with foot-long cockroaches, listening to the desk clerk escort a blind “massage woman” to the man in the room next door.
For me, the best meals in Taiwan were either Korean, Japanese, or Buddhist (i.e., veg and grains very creatively cooked).
And, yes, if you can get out of the high-density areas, into the glorious countryside, both nations are breathtaking, and—thankfully—slower-paced. I haven’t been back to Taiwan since 1989 when it was more sleekly modern and urban-sprawled. I remember with much more fondness my first trip in 1968. But, then, re the unaesthetics of urban growth, I feel the same way about the USA which has grown more mini-malls, big box stores, and relentless unattractiveness between mid-sized cities. Can’t compare the USA to other nations bcuz haven’t seen them “develop” through the years.
Taiwan is certainly gorgeous, and has aged elegantly, from what I’ve seen. Taipei is a beautiful city. Korea can be nice in places, but I never found it breathtaking.
My brief travels in the US were pleasant, but I’m not a city guy. I loved the Rockies and the mountains of California.
I’ve been cutting my own hair since 1996…. mainly because I grew up in an area heavily populated by redneck hairdressers. The last haircut I got in 1996, I left from the shop and a friend of mine asked if I’d signed up for the Marines. I’ve never gone back.
On the subject of healthcare reform, there needs to be reform in the insurance industry as well as with the pharmaceutical companies and hospitals. Will it ever happen? Probably not. We can’t get shit done in this country politically. I think a lot of what’s missing in the debate is the hospital’s role in the matter. Hospitals are big business in the U.S., charging up to 50% more or less depending on who your insurance is with regardless whether it’s the same procedure or not. There too needs to be more competition. Depending on where you live, your insurance market is most likely dominated 80% by a single company.
There also needs to be reform in an individual’s eating and exercise habits which leads to increased risks of unnecessary cancers and preventable diseases. Meant to tack that sentence on above.
Along those same lines, Brad, during a recent haircut, my pregnant stylist told me she was reading “Jenny McCarthy’s book about being a mom because all the other parenting books scare me.”
I don’t know what the big deal is about the health system. It’s become the battleground because politicians always have to please everybody – impossible, of course. My solution: If you have some money and a job, you pay something when go and see a doctor. If you don’t have money and are not working, you don’t pay.
I have never bothered with private health insurance. If I do ever get seriously ill I’m going to rely on the kindness of strangers.
I agree with the first comment, the one by Gerhard Richter. He is not opting out, he is stating his case clearly. We have to create our own debate and make politicians speak on our behalf. We need to cut the dominance of media and start thinking in new ways. We have to make our own ideology, make our own news and make our own politicians…