We've Gone Too Far

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

"No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

"No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb, nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

"In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed; which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defence.

"In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

"Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

"The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Does it sound like a dream? It shouldn't. It's the first 10 amendments of your constitution, the Bill of Rights from the American Constitution, the Federal Constitution, the limits and powers of your supposedly constitutional federal government. When read like this, it's pretty clear what it says, but we never read it like this. We read the amendments by themselves, and thus we don't get it. We don't. We zero on one little piece, and pretend that the rest doesn't exist.

I realized this when I was looking at the Ninth Amendment (the ninth paragraph above) just now. It seemed so vague, so out there, so pecuiliar and unclear, but it talked about an "enumeration," which may not technically be a pronoun, but might as well be. It occurred to me that, while they may have been passed as 10 amendments, it is ONE bill of rights.

And then something else occurred to me. This amendment, this ninth amendment, is a direct response to exactly what the current "health care reform" is trying to do. There are people out there who want you to think that the founding fathers were playing a game of Simon Says, that because they didn't specifically say that you have right not to buy something, that the powers of "regulating commerce" could extend to every walk of your life, that the constitution is naught but a game of trick questions like those on an IQ exam. But the Founding Fathers, here's what they said:

"The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

"The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

"The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

That is what you call a rebuttal, a rebuke.

When we cross the line of deciding that we may decide what people buy, not to support something else that they own as in the case of environmental requirements against power plant owners or even accident insurance for car owners, but simply because they, the government, have "the power to regulate commerce," which to them means all your money, property and labor, not any freedom of yours, not any individuality of yours, just the all important interstate commerce. No life, liberty and pursuit of happiness for you, just the Commerce Clause. What will come next? What will come next? Will they order us to spend money at the mall during deflation? Will they order you to buy stocks and bonds when the market tanks to avoid "panic?" Will they force people to buy calculators to make checkout lines run faster? Will they force consumption at failing shops and restaurants? Will they make us burn our money and delete our bank accounts to counter inflation?

And when will it end? What happens when they decide that a baby cannot be born because a genetic defect would hurt the economy through the cost of caring for them?

We've gone too far. We need a new amendment. We need to strike down the commerce clause. Obviously the courts cannot be trusted to understand the intricacies of our own bill of rights, their sacred duty, so we must give them something plainer, something easier, something that they'll get, something that doesn't require the intelligence they appear to lack. Here's an idea:

"In the realm of commerce, the Federal Government may regulate only transportation and only those actively transporting goods or state agencies and for-profit businesses that deal directly with them and in no manner indirect."

This has gone too far. We are about to cross the line to unlimited government power, in the name of money, money, sad worthless money, not life, not happiness, not freedom or even decency, but money.

The Road of a Million Forks - the unsung benefits of cancer research

In a time when people are increasingly questioning the good of spending money on healthcare, I think it is useful to remind ourselves that cures and safety are not the only gain. Science, like any discipline worth pursuing, creates new avenues for exploration with every discovery made. Today I'd like to tell you about the potential benefits of cancer research that you probably would not have thought of immediately.

Follow this for a while, for you will not see its relevance at first, but it is there I assure you. All organisms have a death clock, a preprogramming for death that ticks on every second of your life, and of the life of every other thing currently alive, waiting for the time when life shall terminate. This clock is in your DNA, a huge molecule. See, all of your chromosomes have a long tale of unnecesary DNA called the telosome that every time one of your cells divides, loses just a few pieces of that DNA off the end. For most of your life, what it loses is not neccesary, is not used in the encoding of any of the stuff that makes you up, but eventually, it runs out of excess rope, and then it starts cutting what you need. This starts with the cells with the highest rates of replication, the blood, the skin and the hair. As the materials that make up your body and the chemicals required for your bodies processes are miscoded, and made improperly, your bodies reactions spin out of control, resources are wasted, cells die quickly, and finally, the whole organism (you) dies.

Recent studies however, and I will get citations soon from my professor, have shown that cancerous cells actually relengthen their telosomes, reversing this clock. It has long been known that aging partially exists as a defense against Cancer - the wasteful and excessive multiplication of cells eventually starving the body of resources - but now we have far better knowledge as to where structurally in the body, the connection lies. Through cancer research, we may find a way to cure aging as well as cancer.

Cancer by its nature is actually very regenerative, organs like the brain that do not normally produce new cells will mass produce them in a tumor, and not only do such ability hold promise for aging, but when properly tamed, cancer may also help to alleviate the suffering of stroke victims, paralysis victims, liver disease, sever ulcers and ulceration, flesh eating bacteria and many other ailments where the body either never produces new cells after birth, or cannot produce them quickly enough. The very thing that makes cancer so dangerous also makes it potentially a valuable tool for ALL healthcare needs, if the ways to handle it properly could be understood and mastered by science. We could even regenerate limbs and eyes, if only the cells could find again their function and cease multiplication when appropriate. This is exactly what we're trying to do with Stem Cells, and with a modified and controlled cancer, this could be done using a patients existing cells as they already are in the body. I know that's a big "if," but it is a good example.

But beyond the healthcare business itself is the nanotech industry, the industry of building things at the molecular level, of creating out of a chain of carbons the strongest material on earth or an engine that can power a tiny robot. Such machines exist in cells, and have forever, and are among the very things a sequence of DNA encodes for. Your body produces such things automatically, without a hand being laid to it, chemically, wasting hardly any chemicals at all, producing its own energy from the sun or from sugars produce by those that use the sun, and multiplying in great number to create a being, out of these tiny machines, weighing between 90 and 250 pounds and standing 4" 10' to 7" 8' with infinite comlexity and abilities. Cancer creates the highest rate of replication, and thus for industrial purpose, producing vast chains of carbon, superfuels, tiny engines and robots, the optimal process for this manner of manufacturing.

Cancer research may also involve radioactive materials, chemicals of every kind, viruses, machinery, imaging, and all manner of things useful outside of cancer and outside of medicine entirely. Through the research, we understand not only the cancer better, but also the machine, as in the case of CAT Scans and medical x-rays adapted for scanning bags at the airport, and also can learn better production methods for existing technologies with the investment put in for treating a deadly disease and improving the lives of millions.

For the ecology and ecosystem, humankind has much to learn about recycling its own resources and conserving for its own needs from the greatest recycler of all, the mother Earth. From mother nature, through medical research, we can find the ways to live on less, and master much more fully on resources, producing strange new materials out of familiar ingredients, not needing mines or finite quantities of fossil fuels, themselves the product of nature now past, and even, in some limited circumstances, reducing or reversing entropy.

"You have much to learn from your friends, and even more to learn from your enemies." (Chinese folk saying) In our fight with cancer, we may win battles we did not realize were part of the same war.

I wanted to get this article out quickly, but revisions will be made over the next few days. If you find it unclear now, come back in a week and if this message is gone you know its better.

A Conservative Plan to Help the Poor

For about 50 years now, liberals have held dominance over the issue of helping Americas least fortunate and reducing poverty. With this dominance, they have done little, poverty has declined minimally, and perhaps, when adjusted for the level of economic growth, even gone backwards, and the states they have dominated the most (like California) have seen their middle classes shrink from some of the largest in America, to some of the smallest.

There is an inherent assumption that economic conservatives, being somewhat less directly interested, cannot help the poor, as if unintended effects of decisions never happen, and yet, it seems to me some of the most vital reforms required to break the ceiling for our poor are, in fact, economically conservative things to do:

1) Eliminate Property Taxes - it is very difficult to help the poor at the neighborhood or small town level when the minute the neighborhood improves, the poor can no longer afford to live there. Not only do current home owners face the potential of eviction if their property values go up, or their income goes down, but the change in rental prices is magnified, leading to those who rent apartments or houses being driven out much more quickly then they need be.

2) Simplify zoning - Simpler zoning laws lead to more walkable communities, by allowing nearly any business to open anywhere that is logical, that can support small, family owned business, and allow the natural expansion of industrial development in poorer areas. Not only does such industry provide jobs for the poor, but it stabilizes land prices by creating small nuisances to couple with gains in more meaningful areas, like education, and provides a tax base for communities that otherwise will receive little taxation.

3) Improve railbanking regulation - Currently, to reopen a closed rail line you must perform an entirely new environmental study and face major injunctions by the local community. Allowing any former line (it was there before, and the world didn't explode) to be reopened at any time, we can improve American freight handling, lowering distribution costs for consumer goods and freight, and increasing the profitability of American industry and the kind of jobs that CAN pay well: an assemblyline worker can easily produce a hundred grand a year of revenue for his business. In addition, the rail construction itself will also increase employment for underskilled workers, as it is largely manual labor.

4) Nuclear energy - Nuclear energy will lower electric bills nationwide, lowering the cost of American made goods, both for our people, and for export. Washington State built an entire industrial economy off of cheap electricity, one that is still growing today.

5) Eliminate ethanol and other subsidies, and pharmaceutical tariffs - These subsidies lower the availability of food and other economic goods that the poor need to survive, while tariffs against foreign drug manufacturers increase the price of health insurance and perscriptions for the people who can already barely afford them.

6) Simplify accounting standards - If you hire an accountant at $20 an hour to oversee the work of five productive workers, for your business to be as profitable, you must effectively take $4 an hour off of those five workers paychecks, as the accountant contributes nothing to the businesses profitability. This also, by lowering the maximum profitable wage, causes layoffs at a lower wage level.

7) Free trade - You have a choice, make the poor buy more expensive goods from ineffective producers who hold a relative monopoly over the market, and retain jobs that produce less, lowering the wage ceiling for the entire country by causing layoffs when the wage gets too high, or allow a few ineffective businesses to go away, and allow those workers to be hired by the companies that are willing to pay a higher wage as the workers here in the US will actually produce at that level, while lowering the price of goods, and thus the effective wage, for all.

There are likely many other examples, but these come to mind.

By focusing on the individual factors that actually hurt the poor and make them in need of help to begin with, we may find that their interests lie in liberty rather then theft that, in the end, finds itself stealing from them as well.

Guest Post - The Irate Dog

A real live Englishman has been kind enough to write a post on English culture for this blog. Tom Jardine-Smith is a good friend of mine and quality journalism student in England who I've stayed in contact with over the past year or so, debating, contributing, exchanging guest posts and getting to know one another on BlogCatalog. As you will later see with the sheer number of tags on this post, he really has covered all the bases and in a fantastic way.

In addition to his current blog, Thomas Bobs, he used to run the Irate Dog.

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British Culture, and Where to Find It

When Jeremy asked me to write another guest post for him I was of course delighted. Through the BlogCatalog we have debated on many things; well, mostly politics and God’s existence. But here we have something completely different. British Culture! Enjoy.

Visit my blog for more: http://thomasbobs.webs.com

British culture is, in many people’s views, one of the richest in the world. I’m not talking about Pop here. There’ll be no references to skinny Oompa Loompas who think they can sing because that isn’t culture, that’s a horrifying disappointment. When I say we have a rich culture I am referring to a fantastic variety we have; from people who actually are pretty good at singing to those who can do pretty awesome things with a city wall and a can of spray paint.

That is not to say that we are the masters of Culture; a vote announcing us the official “Most Yobbish” country in the world would reveal that much. But we are proud of it none the less. Sometimes, unfortunately, for entirely the wrong reasons.

No talk about the British and their culture can be said without mentioning our Empire. For example there are a great many people in my country who are still proud of our now ex-British Empire which, in 1922, covered over 13,000,000 sq miles - a full quarter of the Earth’s surface.

Personally, and with my predominantly left-wing mind at work, I find the idea of an Empire cringe-worthy. To go to an entire continent (i.e. Africa) and label the entire population as “animals” and ‘uncivilised’ was, in my view, despicable and I would like to grab this opportunity to apologise on behalf of my country to anyone who’s family has the words “slave” in their history.

However, (and there must be a “however”) I also believe strongly that if it weren’t for us effectively owning a quarter of the planet we wouldn’t be nearly as diverse in culture and demographic as we are today.

In the last few hundred years our country has grown in other ways; not just geographically. We have learnt to respect other nations and, most importantly, we have learnt to laugh at ourselves. An American comedian whose name I’ve annoyingly forgotten said recently that “that is a very advanced thing y’all do”. And it is. It is a sign of a matured and laid back society. We don’t take ourselves too seriously anymore. The majority of us don’t have faltering hopes that the ‘once great Empire will rise again’. That isn’t what we’re about anymore.

One of the hardest questions I ever had to answer during my college studies was this; What is ‘Britishness’? I imagine this is a much easier question for foreign people to answer but, as a British citizen, I don’t have a clue. I would be tempted to sway towards the traditional politeness and sense of ‘good manners’ but let’s be honest, that’s not really the case anymore. Not when you look and see the sorts of prejudiced hatred of ‘immigrants’.

So perhaps ‘Britishness’ is our political system? Unique in the world for being completely and utterly mad. We have no written constitution and the law effectively changes after each and every judicial decision. Our Prime Minister effectively holds Parliament by the balls if his/her party holds a big enough clout. Our electoral system has been proven to be unfairly weighted in the larger party’s favours. And our Queen is the head of State but ‘Her’ government could, if it wanted to, over throw her at any time. Why don’t they? Because she’s a shell of power anyway; little more than a tourist attraction. There hasn’t been a threat to sovereignty coming out of Buckingham Palace for a long time and I doubt there will ever be again.

Maybe ‘Britishness’ is the NHS. Yes, I mentioned the NHS is a guest post for a right-wing American. I imagine if I said the same thing in some places in the US of A I’d have signs depicting me as Hitler scattered about. But I truly do not understand what the Americans have against the NHS. It is a medical marvel. Free at the point of use (mostly). The saviour of countless lives; including Steven Hawking who, I was delighted to find out, apparently became American over night when anti-Healthcare reformers thought his American-accented computer was his actual voice. Hilarious.

In short, British culture is a combination of our nation’s age, a generally progressive nature, and immigration. And I wouldn’t have it any other way. Thank you.

The Shortage of a Critical Resource

Picture of a Mosquito Net Tent, public domain byWikimedia user Malte

With all the attention on Haiti, there has been a tendency to forget other human tragedies, including one that takes more lives every year then the Port-Au-Prince earthquake took once.

According to Amazon.com, a Mosquito net manufactured by Coleman can be purchased retail for 15 dollars over the internet, and no doubt even cheaper in bulk, but millions in Africa die ever year, including a child every 30 seconds according to Nothing But Nets, for want of a Mosquito net. Stretched over a year (2*60*24*365) that equals an absurd death toll of 1 million children, just that age group.

If any country should have Malaria, the Southeastern United States would be an ideal infection site. Hot, muggy swamps, massive populations of mosquitos, and vast stretches of underused lands, but somehow with our many resources, industries, cities, railways and factories, we have paved a path away from such ordeals from the sweat of our brow, the nerve of our spirit, and the cleverness of our mind. But in Africa, something that you or I could buy for not more then a meal at a restaurant is unavailable... to save children.

In this perverse world, a man is valued below a meal at a diner. But here's the other thing, can people from all over the world worry every second of every day about stuff happening on the other side of the earth? And just, exactly, how did Africa become so perverse and cruel to its inhabitants? Wasn't it where humanity originated? How did the Southeastern US, of all places, with its little more then 400 years of history under its current inhabitants, outpace a land with a several thousand year headstart?

Those are very complicated questions, and I am not asking them to discourage you from giving or caring. And, by the way, some (though not all) of the answer can, possibly, be traced to your own ancestors, if you are of White, Hispanic or Arab descent, your ancestors may have been the slave traders who ruined Africas economy by draining it of people at a ridiculous rate and destroying productive industry to instead fund and establish as business one of the most bizarre and horrifying of human cruelties, and even if they weren't, they have aided and abetted the society that did. Instead, I am asking these questions to make a point.

They need nets, but even more then this they need the industry to make their own nets. If you wish to support charity, also support free trade and getting the word out there on a need for an African renaissance, so that someday, just maybe, when all their troubles are through and our African friends hold good steady jobs at the mosquito net factory or the steel mill, Africa can help somebody else.

Helping the Elderly and Eliminating the Home

WWII Morale poster, source: Northwestern University Poster Library (via wikimedia), public domain.

Nursing homes weren't as common in the past. The elderly used to be an important part of communities, and you can still see this in many books written from a previous time.

My Grandma has told me about the people in her neighborhood who fix things around the house, make her meals, drive her places she needs to go, especially at night, and are available if she's in trouble. Her church is always there for her, providing her a tight web of connections from which she can draw every form of support, and in exchange, she uses here substantial finances to take good care of the church as well, and can lend her support and aid of every sort that she is able to the people around her. She's 86, has been in a major car accident, and has very limited energy. But she's kept her house.

She still lives there, just as she did when she was young, and people still visit her from around the neighborhood. It's a friendly neighborhood, upper-class, in a large city where most people know a decent neighbor of their neighbors. She's lived there almost her entire life.

She has told me many times that the biggest reason she has been able to stay in her house is because people help her.

Now to business. A society that utilizes people for 40 years and then discards them when they are no longer of use to it will, in the end, lose it's humanity, it's individuality, it's respectfulness and lawfulness, it's spirit and cultural soul, it's inner strength, and it's touch with any deeper emotional connection among human beings. A society that does not value those who have worked for it, lived for it, loved for it, and in some cases, fought in wars for it, even sustaining injuries, will, in the end, value no one. If we burn whatever is of no use, we will be left with ashes, no loyalty, and no dignity. These people provided what you have, why do you deny them a small portion of it?

What do they do in nursing homes? They make food, they clean, and they check on people. Nothing they do in a nursing home has to be done in a nursing home, and very little of what they do in most nursing homes requires a paid professional. Now, I understand the burden of boarding your grandmother in your own house (though I also see the beauty of it, having three generations of a family in one place together, the young benefiting from the wisdom and care of the old, and the young taking care of the old) but as a community, each and every one of us by ourselves, we can take care of just a little bit of what each and every one of these beautiful, valuable citizens and people need to stay independent, healthy, and in a way, productive, while enriching our own lives through true community and relationships that can last forever. Even something as simple as helping an old man who has trouble up a staircase can, even, save a life, a limb, or the health of a man with osteoporosis or serious disorders of that sort. Merely feeling like they're able to ask for help can keep these people out of homes with disrespectful employees, low standards of living, and isolation from a real, balanced, diverse community, and destroying the finances of a family that must pay for care that, honestly, it usually doesn't need.

I'm not saying that every single person can be kept out of a nursing home, but these people have given their lives, their labor, their love, for a lifetime to all of us around them, and continue to give even today, and just helping them occasionally when they need it will make them feel like they can ask for help. And our society as a whole will benefit not only from their presence, and their lives, among us, but from the better attitude created by actually taking care of people. With that attitude comes respect, reverence, dignity, honor, all the things that you see none of in our human-hating modern world.

Guest Post - The Irate Dog

This logo is exclusive property of "The Irate Dog," authorized for use ONLY on this site. Use this image, and I will kill you, with my own two hands.

Our guest, who is also a regular reader and a follower of this site, has chosen to speak about health care, and in particular, health care in the UK. The name of his blog is "The Irate Dog."

After talking at lengths on BlogCatalog, Jeremy and I decided I should write a guest post for his blog. After flicking through his posts and editorials I landed on one particular post that caught my eye; “Healthcare Co-ops - The Third Option”.

We all know that healthcare has been the subject of heated debate over in the USA in recent months - coming to a peek at Obama/Hitler posters being brandished (that scene still confuses me. How can Obama be compared to a fascist when his idea for national healthcare takes him to the left...in the opposite direction ideologically?). Unfortunately a lot of public outrage at the idea of a national healthcare system is based on a distinct lack of knowledge. For example that classically ignorant argument that came out of the US that said that if Stephen Hawking were treated by the NHS he would be dead - a case clearly made in the heat of the moment because Stephen Hawking was and is in fact treated by the NHS and has said himself that he owes them his life.

I’d like to take this opportunity to explain my own country’s healthcare system. For me it is the crowning jewel of the post war Labour government. It is not, as apparently many Americans would describe it, an institution of Death Panels and inferior-quality healthcare. It is not a last resort. It is not an example of a Communist or Socialist victory.

It is, in short, magnificent. It is, excluding dentistry and some prescriptions, free at the point of use. You go in, you see a personal General Practitioner, you go out. Not a penny has left for wallet, your bank account or your insurance company. This means two very important things. 1)Diseases can be caught earlier and 2) Poorer people can get the same healthcare as everyone else.

Think about it. In a country where there is an economical dis-incentive to seek medical attention people will tend to leave things be and see if they get better. If they don’t get better, they then go to the doctors and find out they have something “that wouldn’t have been a problem if only you’d come to us sooner”. Here in the UK, you can have a slight sniff, maybe a cough, and go straight to your GP without any monetary worries at all. That means serious diseases, cancer etc. are caught much earlier and things can be done about them much more easily.

People say the NHS is a Socialist, even Communist idea as if that was supposed to be insulting. Well, if it was so terrible, wouldn’t the various right-wing political parties in the UK want to get rid of it? The Conservative party (who are likely to gain power again next year) are doing no such thing - just like always. They have in fact pledged to fund it better and make it more efficient. Even the BNP (the most right-wing party we have) isn’t talking about getting rid of the NHS. Why? Because it is a genuinely genius idea and there would be public uproar if it were taken away.

Here in the UK you see a lot in the news about long waiting lists and patients having to wait on trolleys for days on end before they get a bed. But the fact is, at least those instances are unique enough to warrant their own news headline. It is not a trend but a hot topic that sells newspapers. Like all teenagers being anti-social and a terror to society - yes, a great story, but totally inaccurate and frankly insulting.

That’s all from me. I hope Jeremy and I continue to trade posts like this. It’s been a very good experience.

Bye!

Tom

Visit my blog at http://theiratedog.blogspot.com

(For your personal convenience, the post that caught Tom's interest can be found here.)

Ahn Cao (R - New Orleans)

Image Courtesy of the Office of Congressmen Ed Royce, public domain

There was exactly one Republican congressmen who voted in favor of Obama's healthcare bill. Ahn "Joseph" Cao of Downtown New Orleans, a district more liberal, on average, then Seattle, Washington - populated almost entirely by African Americans and hyper-urbanites who live in 500-square-foot lofts and go to parties all the time. The devil-may-care attitude of his hometown has led at once to a brilliant and sophisticated culture, utter extravagance and excess, and monstrous levels of poverty, crime, general sleaziness, and finally, corruption. He was elected as a pro-business, moderate, no-nonsense, relatively innocent and squeaky clean Vietnamese immigrant Republican against a Democrat who had been caught with 85 grand in his freezer.

His district probably has a lot of people without medical insurance. We know his district is generally very economically liberal, and so his conservative votes on the Stimulus and Cap-and-Trade likely had serious repercussions for him back home. His election was entirely the product of a two-party system and the lack of competition it creates. In short, something had to give.

I know a lot of conservatives are very angry at Mr. Cao, but they should realize that if he does not occasionally throw his constituents a bone - especially one that, from the special interests viewpoint alone, would be so delicious to them - he WILL lose this seat. If he keeps this seat, the GOP may have the opportunity to expand its presence not only in New Orleans, but in Inner City America in general, the kind of frontier expansion that Republicans have not really engaged in for a long, long time. May I remind you that we are not in the majority right now.

Beyond this, it may indeed have been a vote of conscience. Follow this link to see for yourselves. In particular, he used his bargaining power to arrange for an amendment, Stupak-Pitts, that will prevent federally funded plans from covering elective abortion, producing an effective abortion tax. Consider also that this fellow is VERY Vietnamese, and as such probably has a more collectivist view of life then is normal here in America. To him, denying some people medical freedom to protect the vitality of the whole probably (though I will emphasize probably, as I cannot see in to the mans head) does not seem quite so bad, and if he can get an anti-abortion amendment doing it, well that's just twice as good now isn't it?

So no, I do not believe Ahn Cao is a "traitor." Reagan himself said "you only have to vote with your party 80% of the time." I continue to follow his career with special and keen interest and to recognize the unique constraints on his power as a legislator as a result of his district. Like it or not, America is a democracy. Ahn Cao continues to provide a more clear and business friendly and hardwork oriented path for the people of New Orleans and to promote Conservative interests across America through his cooperation from a group of people (the inner-cities) that so far no other Republican has really reached out to. He voted with us on the Stimulus and the Cap-and-Trade, and this is a vote (Downtown New Orleans) we normally wouldn't have.

Teaching Cowardice - The Gruesome Morality of ObamaCare

I had a suicidal thought today. As I lay waiting in the 16th floor lobby of a G-I specialty institute at Emory Atlanta, I looked out the window, saw the great height, and for a moment, longed to run and jump to my death. I cringed at horror at the vileness of my own mind, and in reflection, I realized why.

I've always considered myself a tough, strong person. I've always considered myself a survivor, a child of the frontier and the high north, an adventurer. And on a level I am. But there is something about a condition that had troubled your life for as long as my ulcer that was supposed to go away 2 months ago and now you face the possibility of a much grimmer prognosis. There is something that destroys your very image of yourself, cuts your own roots, salts your own soil, makes you shrivel before the threat in front of you and takes away even those whose faces should be in front of you.

But I withheld myself. I remembered my God, and his will, and certain prophecies I had inherited, and I knew it was not my time, nor would my God ever let me die that way but either through the process of nature, or natural consequences, or the dignity of good martyrdom. I withheld myself and held strong in my seat. And it's good I did, and God was righteous to avise me beyond and teach me once again who I was, a strong young man in his hands, a reasonably okay servant, but still a servant nonetheless, and beyond that, someone who had, one way or another, touched the lives of many people, and would defile the affections and loyalties of many if I were to take my own life. See, I am a human being, a real living person, who has friends, relatives, classmates, churchmates, a cluster of loving people all around me. I don't appreciate them enough, not nearly enough, if I had this horrid thought would've never come to my mind, but God was there for me, even as I was alone there, and pulled me through it through his righteousness and justice.

I also realized that, if I had betrayed God like that, I would not just receive Hell, I would deserve it.

But there are some who would want me to jump. There are some who are worried about cost, and see me as a number, an expense, not a familiar face or a friend or a family member. There are some who, for the sake of the economy, want me to give up.

Of course, then again, this is too narrow of a view, because in general (healthcare cost being, perhaps, the only exception) all sectors of the economy do better with people who don't give up but have iron resolve. Adventurers. Conquerors. Goldminers. Frontiersmen. These are the people who built cities, and, to a point, still build them. Those outcasts who parouse the streets in their cockeyed hats with a stint in their step, a smirk on their face and a dream in their eyes, the people who don't fit all the "roles" that society has for them but forge their own trail. You know, the guys (and Annie Oakleys) who can face the freezing cold and through their own innate toughness, stubbornness and everything not societyness, make it back to camp with their own honor and life in their hand, and can head 1500 miles west from home against the better advice from all their friends and build the Golden State.

But back to the point. So I didn't give up, and my friends couldn't be happier. So what about this VA Death Book we keep on hearing about? I know many consider it to be encouraging the self-destruction of the weak and disabled -how very Spartan- and I will say, while in general the pamphlet does aim to be non-partisan and balanced (maybe,) there are some suggestions in it (like requesting to not be revived with CPR, which causes no harm and has no cost later on) that seem odd and out of place and a few lines of logic (like "Even if you are conscious, you will not be able to talk very well or at all."(35) Ever heard of writing and typing? Worked well for Steven Hawking all these years!) that are just plain stupid and perhaps even manipulative. Perhaps "If you have a terminal illness, a mechanical ventilator will only prolong dying." (35) is the most cynical line of all. How about "prolong living"!

While there is no single quote that you can point to in this book and say "this advocates giving up," the basic attitude of anybody finding simply having to write instead of talk reason to give up wanting to live another few weeks is disgusting. Further, as any good English student knows, putting this phrase, "even if they might not have wanted it" (34), after a comma is an element of irony, telling the reader that this is not a good situation rather then letting him decide for himself. In fact, really, it's not aiming to be non-partisan and balanced, it's aiming to look non-partisan and balanced while, discreetly and quietly, handing them something completely different under the table, "even if they might not have wanted it." (34)

Healthcare Co-ops - The Third Option

On healthcare, the debate is set on extremes. Do we continue a private healthcare system with EVEN LESS regulation to drive down cost, or do we create public healthcare, either by edict, by government advisory board, or by trojan horse. Is it going to be for-profit businesses, or a theoretically non-profit (though the very nature of democracy would seem to suggest otherwise, the "profit" should be different but equally self-serving) public health board/organization/government corporation/service. But why must it be one or the other?

Why not do for healthcare what groups like the BECU (Boeing Employee Credit Union) have done for banking? Have non-profit heatlh NGO's that sell premiums, administer care, and have their guidelines, procedures, rationing (if any) and exact benefits dictated democratically through the election of "board members" by the people who own the plans? Why must, to avoid for-profit business, we resort to government rationing and tyranny? Why must it be either a corporate beaureacracy or a government beauracracy that manages our care? Why not put it in the hands, to the maximum extent possible, of the premium holders?

People flee countries like Canada and England to nations like the United States that have private healthcare when they become truly sick. Some folks will try to fool you in to believing that our healthcare sector acheives worse results then those of other nations using statistics like life expectancy as indicators. Problem is, those "indicators" are indicative of forces outside of the system, forces like genetics, cultural habits like eating and transportation, and our large immigrant population, that affect life expectancy by way of the entire general public more then the occasional cancer victim. Fact of the matter is, most Americans (85% insured in 2006, US Census, probably dropped a little since then but likely [unemployment 4% -> 10%, 6% change] still above 75%) do very well under our current system, and because of existing regulations, if you have the insuracne, most things will be covered.

Now I understand the problem of the other 25%, and yes, we do need competition for the corporations to bring prices down and hold them accountable. But why does it have to be the almost always tyrannical hand of government? Why not more charitable, credit union type organizations, that can still receive some government start-up funds to compensate for their lack of size (just as the BECU received funds from Boeing) and then be governed not by some far away beaureacrat but instead by the very people who hold the plans? And if you're not pleased with your group, you can find a new coop. We could have a different coop for every kind of need!

The Almighty Dollar -- or Why we SHOULD spend more on Healthcare

From InvestorBizDaily, "The Attack on Doctor's Hippocratic Oath":

Ezekiel Emanuel sees the Hippocratic Oath as one factor driving "overuse" of medical care. He is a policy adviser in the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and a brother of Rahm Emanuel, the president's chief of staff.

Dr. Emanuel argues that "peer recognition goes to the most thorough and aggressive physicians." He has lamented that doctors regard the "Hippocratic Oath's admonition to 'use my power to help the patient to the best of my ability and judgment' as an imperative to do everything for the patient regardless of the cost or effects on others."

Of course, that is what patients hope their doctor will do.

But President Barack Obama is pledging to rein in the nation's health care spending. The framework for influencing your doctor's decisions was included in the stimulus package, also known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

Now, I, being a fallible human being like most other Americans, do not understand completely Obama's health care plan. This is very suspicious, especially since, while I may not like the man's policies, I would generally accredit him with being a decent communicator. But, there is one particularly disturbing aspect of Obama's plans, the algorithms.

Although not quite as sinister as the SkyNet from Terminator, it too may terminate you. If your care is found to be too expensive, your cancer too aweful, you not worth it, it will let you die, not even granting you the dignity of a bullet to the head, another blood offering at the altar of balanced budgets in a manner of cruel neglect.

This is being done in the name of economic progress. Although Obama does not even have the certainty that this will work, he has bet his presidency, his country, and the lives and dignity of many vulnerable people on the idea that through reducing health care expenditures, we can save our "economy." But what is an economy anyways? Why is it so sancrosanct? Why are we willing to sacrifice ourselves and our loved ones for the sake of dollars? And why do we even trust this fellows plan?

In fact, why do we even have an economy? Why do we even have wealth? If we're not even going to take care of our own people, why are we even trying? Why don't we just go home?

Look, I know of fewer better spendings of our wealth on this earth as human beings, our petty dollars, then saving peoples lives and keeping them well. Why are we calling medical research and cutting-edged treatments "waste?" Because they don't make us more money? And is that even true...

The really sad thing is how many people seemed to have jumped aboard this bandwagon. I, as an American, have never felt this discouraged at my own people. That my own fellow citizens cannot seem to see what they are creating through their desire for, I don't even know what, is one of the most striking blows I have ever received when looking back at my own country.

And further, even from the practical side, what happens if we face a new threat? What happens if there's a big virus outbreak, like the Spanish flu, and this entire society we have sacrificed so much for crumbles before us, disgracing us and spitting on our name for our own lack of foresight.

For the sake of the fourth most basic human economic need (after clothes, shelter, and food), 20% (about where it lies) is not unreasonable. But I fear many people do not even realize what they've done. I don't think they even see that it could be their loved one, or themselves. I support making coverage more universal, but this is not the right way to do it. We just need to accept that a little more money to cover the remainder of our population is both right and justified, and seek other, more worthy, places to scratch out a balanced budget.