Why We Worry

Hump Day Hijinks: Hipster Edition

Jordan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 20:22:00 +0000

Because it’s Wednesday afternoon and we don’t take ourselves seriously all the time.

Maybe 93% of it.

Where The Dirty Hipsters Are (Wild Things Spoof)

Wes Anderson’s “The Fellowship of the Ring”

Cold War Leftovers

Jordan — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 21:13:50 +0000

Yesterday was the celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall, a symbolic event in the dissolution of the Cold War stasis that had divided Europe since the end of World War II. Many countries of Central and Eastern Europe have emerged from that past to adapt well to market economics and prosper. There have been some nations left behind from the fall of Soviet-led communism in Europe.

Belarus – After leaving Russia, this country did not really know what to do and has remained the only remaining dictatorship, headed by Alexander Lukashenko since 1994. It remains one of the poorest countries in Europe, its population still suffers effects from the Chernobyl accident, yet it is also a major conduit for European energy.
Transnistria – This is a strange little breakaway republic situated between Moldova and Ukraine broke away after a short war in 1992 and is a relic of the Soviet past much as Belarus is. It uses Moldovan written in Cyrillic and recognizes Russian and Ukrainian as official languages as well. Not much really goes on there other than sporadic border problems yet it still insists on full independence from Moldova proper.
Kaliningrad – This is an exclave of Russia situated between Lithuania and Poland on the Baltic sea and continues to be held by Russia to maintain its Baltic Fleet. It was formerly a part of the Hanseatic League then became the capital of Prussia. It remains one of the Russia’s few possessions left over from WWII.
Bosnia-Hercegovina / Republica Srpska – This Serbian republic within the Bosnian state remains a tough and now ignored political issue within the Balkans. Whereas Kosovo was recognized around the world on the day of its nationhood announcement, the Republica Srpska has been hindered in its efforts to move away from the Bosnian Federation and towards merging with Serbia.

Why the House health care bill might suck

Chris — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:23:07 +0000

Since Congressman Dennis Kucinich is considered an a deeply un-serious person by the mainstream media, I doubt you’ve heard or read his excellent liberal critique of the health care legislation passed by the House of Representatives this weekend. Well now you can say you have read it, the bolds are mine:

We have been led to believe that we must make our health care choices only within the current structure of a predatory, for-profit insurance system which makes money not providing health care. We cannot fault the insurance companies for being what they are. But we can fault legislation in which the government incentivizes the perpetuation, indeed the strengthening, of the for-profit health insurance industry, the very source of the problem. When health insurance companies deny care or raise premiums, co-pays and deductibles they are simply trying to make a profit. That is our system.

Clearly, the insurance companies are the problem, not the solution. They are driving up the cost of health care. Because their massive bureaucracy avoids paying bills so effectively, they force hospitals and doctors to hire their own bureaucracy to fight the insurance companies to avoid getting stuck with an unfair share of the bills. The result is that since 1970, the number of physicians has increased by less than 200% while the number of administrators has increased by 3000%. It is no wonder that 31 cents of every health care dollar goes to administrative costs, not toward providing care. Even those with insurance are at risk. The single biggest cause of bankruptcies in the U.S. is health insurance policies that do not cover you when you get sick.

But instead of working toward the elimination of for-profit insurance, H.R. 3962 would put the government in the role of accelerating the privatization of health care. In H.R. 3962, the government is requiring at least 21 million Americans to buy private health insurance from the very industry that causes costs to be so high, which will result in at least $70 billion in new annual revenue, much of which is coming from taxpayers. This inevitably will lead to even more costs, more subsidies, and higher profits for insurance companies — a bailout under a blue cross.

By incurring only a new requirement to cover pre-existing conditions, a weakened public option, and a few other important but limited concessions, the health insurance companies are getting quite a deal. The Center for American Progress’ blog, Think Progress, states “since the President signaled that he is backing away from the public option, health insurance stocks have been on the rise.” Similarly, healthcare stocks rallied when Senator Max Baucus introduced a bill without a public option. Bloomberg reports that Curtis Lane, a prominent health industry investor, predicted a few weeks ago that “money will start flowing in again” to health insurance stocks after passage of the legislation. Investors.com last month reported that pharmacy benefit managers share prices are hitting all-time highs, with the only industry worry that the Administration would reverse its decision not to negotiate Medicare Part D drug prices, leaving in place a Bush Administration policy.

During the debate, when the interests of insurance companies would have been effectively challenged, that challenge was turned back. The “robust public option” which would have offered a modicum of competition to a monopolistic industry was whittled down from an initial potential enrollment of 129 million Americans to 6 million. An amendment which would have protected the rights of states to pursue single-payer health care was stripped from the bill at the request of the Administration. Looking ahead, we cringe at the prospect of even greater favors for insurance companies.

Recent rises in unemployment indicate a widening separation between the finance economy and the real economy. The finance economy considers the health of Wall Street, rising corporate profits, and banks’ hoarding of cash, much of it from taxpayers, as sign of an economic recovery. However in the real economy — in which most Americans live — the recession is not over. Rising unemployment, business failures, bankruptcies and foreclosures are still hammering Main Street.

This health care bill continues the redistribution of wealth to Wall Street at the expense of America’s manufacturing and service economies which suffer from costs other countries do not have to bear, especially the cost of health care. America continues to stand out among all industrialized nations for its privatized health care system. As a result, we are less competitive in steel, automotive, aerospace and shipping while other countries subsidize their exports in these areas through socializing the cost of health care.

Notwithstanding the fate of H.R. 3962, America will someday come to recognize the broad social and economic benefits of a not-for-profit, single-payer health care system, which is good for the American people and good for America’s businesses, with of course the notable exceptions being insurance and pharmaceuticals.

Now I disagree with Kucinich in so far that insurance companies aren’t the only problem. Another big problem is that our system is setup so that doctors make more money by doing more stuff (ordering tests, performing surgeries, etc.) rather than by making us better. This leads to a bloat in unnecessary health care spending. Unfortunately no legislation on the table addresses this wacky pay model. Doctors, unlike insurers, are a popular group and will be hard to take on.

But Kucinich is right that insurance companies are nothing but a useless middle man between Americans and their doctors. They take our money, then try to deny us service so they can make a profit. That’s their entire model and it’s not going to change without onerous regulations. The better option is to move away from for profit health insurance entirely.

Health care: Good & bad news

Chris — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:56:22 +0000

Good news:

Health care reform passed the House this weekend.

Consumerist has a good summary of what’s in the bill:

Insurance mandate - Uninsured Americans will pay a penalty; low-income people exempt. House bill charges a penalty of 2.5% of adjusted gross income: that’s $500 on $20,000, for example.
Employer coverage – All employers with a payroll above $500,000 must help pay for some kind of health insurance for their employees, or pay a tax. The Senate Finance Committee version of the bill does not have this requirement.
Insurance exchange – Allows people who are not covered to buy health insurance in nation- or state-wide markets. Available to employees of small businesses, and others not eligible for coverage.
Public plan – Would create a new federal government-run insurance plan with its own physician and hospital rates, separate from those negotiated by Medicare. Senate Finance Committee instead offers nonprofit insurance cooperatives in each state.
Subsidies – Households earning up to 400 percent of the federal poverty level would be eligible for subsidies of health insurance premiums when they buy insurance through the exchange.
Small business subsidies – Tax credits for small employers that provide health care coverage for employees.
Coverage – House and Senate Health Committee versions require plans to pay for 70% of all health care spending that the plan covers; Senate Finance Committee version requires 65%. Insurers cannot deny coverage because of pre-existing conditions, and premiums may not vary according to age on the individual insurance market as widely as they do now. People receiving federal subsidies for insurance may not enroll in a plan that includes coverage of abortions.
Medicaid – Households with incomes up to 150% of the federal poverty level would now be eligible for Medicaid. Senate Finance Committee would expand to 133% of the federal poverty level, starting in 2014.

Bad news:

Health care reform barely (by 5 votes) passed the House where Democrats have a commanding advantage. In order for the reform bill to become law it still has to pass the Senate where Democrats have less of an advantage and need 60 votes to overcome filibuster threats from Republicans and Joe Lieberman. That means the bill that comes out of the Senate will likely be a lot more watered down than the House version. So, don’t get too happy yet.

Sanity Saturday: The Real King of Late Night

Jordan — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:45:22 +0000

It’s Craig Ferguson.

Really, that’s all I have to say.

Oh, why?

Well, there are many reasons.

For one, he doesn’t go with the standard late night show format. There are two openings, the first usually involving puppets, the second with his patented catchphrase “It’s A Great Day For America” followed by whatever pops into his head. It’s not scripted, it’s not boring and it’s damn funny. Far funnier than Conan’s predictable patter or Jimmy Fallon (his rival at the same time slot). I won’t even go into the Olds, Leno and Letterman, who I’ve never found funny.

Craig Ferguson does throw in a few sketches, typically off the wall and starring some of his guests. Lately, he has had guests read pages from his new book and somehow even having people read brings out the laughter. Check out this one with his friend Gerard Butler:

Why would his guests do this? Probably because they seem more relaxed and themselves than on any other late night talk show. Most there do have a product to do PR for but hardly ever talk about as Craig’s conversations with them are informal and tend to veer off in strange directions.

Another point in the show’s favor (at least in my book): He has fiction authors on. No other network late night show has writers in general on, the Daily Show or Colbert Report only have nonfiction, yet Craig reels in a pretty large amount of writers (such as Salman Rushdie) to come on his program and discuss their books. That is a great thing for America.

I’m sure I’ve rambled about the show before in comments or elsewhere but between the puppets, the sometimes out-of-control cold opens, and the set falling apart, there is always something worth watching on the Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson. It’s a great way to end your day with a bit of genuine laughter based on wit and a taste for the strange versus the canned jokes and barely there sketches and stunts of other shows.

Nidal Hasan, Specious Reporting, And Islam

Jordan — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:34:36 +0000

The murders at Ft Hood yesterday were horrible. The subsequent coverage by major newspapers was deplorable.

I did not hear about the killings until later in the evening. When I went around the the web checking the major news outlets, one thing stuck out for me. Most, in having found some information about the shooter, had begun to create some causation between Nadil Hasan, the shooter and his religion, Islam.

There was no clear evidence at this point as to Hasan’s motivations behind the shootings yet, once they found out his name and that he came from an immigrant Muslim family, the papers seemed to run with it.

The New York Times, in their profile of Hasan, mentioned pure speculation rather than doing actual reporting:

The Federal Bureau of Investigation earlier became aware of Internet postings by a man calling himself Nidal Hasan, a law enforcement official said. The postings discussed suicide bombings favorably, but the investigators were not clear whether the writer was Major Hasan.

In one posting on the Web site Scribd, a man named Nidal Hasan compared the heroism of a soldier who throws himself on a grenade to protect fellow soldiers to suicide bombers who sacrifice themselves to protect Muslims.

“If one suicide bomber can kill 100 enemy soldiers because they were caught off guard that would be considered a strategic victory,” the man wrote. It could not be confirmed, however, that the writer was Major Hasan.

If it could not be confirmed, why are you giving us three possibly untrue paragraphs? If we the public are supposed to sorry for the vaunted and professional journalists at the ‘dying’ newspapers why are you participating in conjecture.

Another alluring headline on the part of the media was produced by the Washington Post last night:

WaPo Headline

Seriously?

Whenever a Christian goes on a shooting rampage, be it at work, school, or just local multiple homicides, I have never seen a headline that read “Shooter is Native of North Carolina” then subheader “John Johnston, the shooter of ten people, is a Christian”.

Why, when there was very little information coming out about what happened and the man in general, is the point that the news organizations wanted to make that he is a Muslim? Did the editors think this would scare up more views online? It would definitely set the right wing blogosphere afire and drive traffic to their sites.

It is possible that Hasan’s beliefs had something to do with the shootings – he had reported being harassed by soldiers about being a Muslim in years past and, from what reports say, was actively trying to get out of service. Religion though, is used as an excuse to cover other problems many times.

What the news organizations should be asking is what could drive a middle-aged, well-educated, and long-serving officer of the military to do something like this before deployment. Would his working with PTSD cases on a daily basis have anything to do with it? Would the general environment of Ft Hood have anything to do with it?

The Guardian, a UK newspaper, is the only one seeming to bring up these topics. There is an article about ten suicides at Ft Hood this year as well as one about officials in Washington that had been discussing the possibility of such an incident this week.

Whatever happened at Fort Hood goes further than the simplistic suppositions that the papers are putting forward creating causation where none exists between his religion and the shootings. When Eric Rudolph was committing his atrocities, the papers did not slap ‘Christian’ on the headlines despite family links to supremacist Christian movements or being a Catholic.

How about the ‘professional’ news organizations stick to the facts that they can confirm.

You failed me

Chris — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 13:13:19 +0000

All I wanted was for you to ensure the Yankees lost in the World Series. All I asked was for you to root against them “every single play of every single game.”

That’s all I asked. It wouldn’t have been too hard.

But, clearly you didn’t root or you if you rooted, you didn’t do it hard enough. So now here we are: The Yankees have won the World Series 27 times.

P.S. If you’re on the Phillies don’t even talk to me. I can’t even describe the depths of my disappointment in you.

Maine voters = jerks

Chris — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:31:26 +0000

Maine has now joined more than 30 other states in proclaiming their ignorance and bigotry:

In a stinging setback for the national gay-rights movement, Maine voters narrowly decided to repeal the state’s new law allowing same-sex marriage.

With 87 percent of precincts reporting early Wednesday morning, 53 percent of voters had approved the repeal, ending an expensive and emotional fight that was closely watched around the country as a referendum on the national gay-marriage movement.

Oh and screw these guys too:

The Catholic Church was a leading supporter of the repeal campaign, even asking parishes to pass a second collection plate at Sunday mass to help the cause.

I’m not even gay and this sort of stuff pisses me off to no end. Why can’t these folks just mind their own business and stop denying homosexuals the right to live the kind of lives we as a country venerate. You know, the loving, monogamous responsible kind.
______

P.S. I would have rather quoted the NPR story for this post – since that’s where I first heard this news – but they didn’t have a good lede.

What it’s like in Gaza for the Palestinians

Chris — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:51:30 +0000

It’s easy to dismiss the Israeli/Palestinian conflict as a battle between civilized Westerners and barbaric terrorists. However, it’s better to think of it as a battle between the relatively rich Israelis and slum dwelling Palestinians. The Israelis live a lot like us and the Europeans whereas the Palestinians live like this:

Israeli patrols tightly enforce a three-mile limit in the Mediterranean and fire on boats that approach the line. [...]

The Israeli blockade includes a ban on toys, so the only playthings available have been smuggled, at a premium, through tunnels from Egypt [...]

Many of Gaza’s sports facilities have been destroyed by Israeli bombings, including the headquarters for the Palestinian Olympic team. [...]

Israeli authorities maintain a list of about three dozen items that they permit into Gaza, but the list is closely kept and subject to change. Almost no construction materials—such as cement, glass, steel, or plastic pipe—have been allowed in, on the ground that such items could be used for building rockets or bunkers. [...]

According to Haaretz, the I.D.F. has calculated that a hundred and six truckloads of humanitarian relief are needed every day to sustain life for a million and a half people. But the number of trucks coming into Gaza has fallen as low as thirty-seven. [...]

Until Operation Cast Lead, there were several concrete plants, a flour mill, and an ice-cream factory, but they have all been bombed or bulldozed, and the mixing trucks for the concrete have been knocked over. Houses and mosques and shops lie in rubble; entire neighborhoods have been demolished. [...]

Most economic activity came to a halt in 2007, with the Israeli blockade of Gaza. Now, according to the U.N., about seventy per cent of Gazans live on less than a dollar a day, and seventy-five per cent rely on international food assistance. [...]

[T]he tanks that line the border do lob shells into the territory, causing many random casualties. While I was there, a teen-age girl was killed, and her young brother injured, in such an incident. The Israelis maintain a buffer zone along the border about half a mile deep, which places at least thirty per cent of the Strip’s arable land off limits. [...]

The Deputy Defense Minister, Matan Vilnai, warned that Gazans were “bringing upon themselves a greater Shoah, because we will use all our strength in every way we deem appropriate.” [...]

(h/t Yglesias)

Now imagine you were a Palestinian in Gaza. Wouldn’t you be angry? Would you be willing to end the struggle or even contemplate peace before your life improved?
_________

If you’d like to read/see more about what it’s like in the occupied territories, I can’t recommend Joe Sacco’s Palestine enough. It’s a comic book based on Sacco’s trip to Gaza and the West Bank in the 1990s.

Didn’t they get the memo?

Chris — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 15:21:42 +0000

It’s only terrorism if someone else does it:

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton faced sharp rebukes from Pakistani audiences Friday, including one woman who accused the U.S. of conducting ”executions without trial” in aerial drone strikes. Slapping back, Clinton questioned Pakistan’s commitment to fighting terrorists.
…
During the visit and talks with Pakistani leaders, Clinton found herself repeatedly on the defensive from ordinary Pakistanis brimming with resentment toward U.S. foreign policy.

During a live broadcast of an interview before a predominantly female audience of several hundred, Clinton struggled to avoid describing the classified U.S. effort to target terrorists, and still try to explain the efforts of American foreign policy.

One woman asked Clinton how she would define terrorism.

”Is it the killing of people in drone attacks?” the woman asked. Then she asked if Clinton considered both the U.S. missile strikes and militant bombings like the one that killed more than 100 civilians in the city of Peshawar earlier in the week as acts of terrorism.

”No, I do not,” Clinton replied.

To be fair, I don’t think the drone attacks fit the classic definition of terrorism (even if it certainly fits the American definition which includes anything we don’t like). Definitions aside, the drone attacks that have killed hundreds of civilians must be terrifying to the population in Pakistan and Afghanistan. And anything that pisses them off – radicalizes them – makes attacks on Americans more likely.

Just another reason we should wind down our full scale occupation of that area…