On the right, in the past few days we’ve seen a Facebook poll asking “Should Obama die,” followed by a Republican representative declaring that Obama is “an enemy of humanity,” followed by a columnist at NewsMax declaring the only solution to the “Obama problem” is a military coup.

Where I come from, the United States of America, that’s called sedition (The Smith Act of 1940 makes it “a crime to advocate or teach the desirability of overthrowing the United States Government, or to be a member of any organization which does the same. It was often used against Communist organizations.”). Perhaps that’s why NewsMax pulled the column (closing the barn door after the horses are gone). Apparently our time honored tradition of democratic elections that has worked for over 220 years is just not good enough for some on the right.

I feel like I’m witnessing the Republican Party committing an ugly bloody suicide, perhaps seeing who they can take with them. I do know this; until I see some repentance for obvious sins, or at least acknowledgement the fringe has gone too far, this Independent Voter will not vote for a Republican for dogcatcher. The party seems to have not only completely lost its way, but has moved on to endangerment, of itself and others.

Or, in wonkese:

Politics is generally viewed as a zero-sum game: When one party gains, the other loses. But Republicans have pursued a strategy turning politics into a negative-sum game: Both parties lose. They have effectively harmed the Democrats’ agenda but done so at great cost to their own favorability numbers […] In 1994, Republicans managed to obstruct Clinton’s agenda in a way that effectively established them as an alternative. In 2009, they are battling Obama’s agenda in a manner that’s totally discrediting their party.

They even root against America, and cheer when she loses, because their hatred of Obama blinds all else. Apparently they love America during the four to eight years their party controls it, but when they are out of the Oval office, she can’t lose enough for their liking.

Even Joe Scarborough can’t help but see it:

Chicago is a beautiful city that would have made a perfect backdrop for the Olympics. The President was right to fly to Copenhagen to try to land the games, not for the sake of his city, but for the good of his country. The fact President Obama failed makes me respect him more for taking the chance, and the fact many right-wing figures opposed the President’s mission shows just how narrow-minded partisanship makes us all.

For the better part of 20 years, a bitterness has infected our politics that has weakened our country.

We Republicans spent eight years trying to delegitimize Bill Clinton.

Democrats spent the next eight years doing the same to George W. Bush.

Now that a Democrat is in the Oval Office again, it is the GOP who is trying to delegitimize a sitting president.

Some of the rhetoric is dangerous. But what we saw from some conservative corners regarding the President’s failed Olympics bid was just plain stupid.

Punishment at the voting booth is the only option. That is, for those who still believe in democracy. Those who think assassination, secession, or a military coup are solutions, I invite you to move to a country more suited to such attitudes. Perhaps Libya or Somalia. Maybe you could go knock off Castro and take over Cuba. Here, we vote, and accept the outcome, at least until the next election.

Not try and tear down the country for the next 4 years, like some giant hissy fit by a poor loser.

But on the left, We, The People weren’t really served any better this past week. In the Senate Finance Committee, the public option was shot down, not once, but twice. Both times, all Republicans voted against it, as expected, because that’s all The Party Of No has to offer on health care.

But it was truly defeated by Democrats. Five of them. Max Baucus (D-Mont), Kent Conrad (D-ND), Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark), Bill Nelson (D-Fla) and Tom Carper (D-Del). These five Democratic Senators represent states that contain, in total, less than 8% of the US population. Oh, and they apparently also represent the insurance companies that have collectively given them over $19 million dollars in “political donations.”

Furthermore, “The industry and interest groups have spent $380 million in recent months influencing healthcare legislation through lobbying, advertising and in direct political contributions to members of Congress. The largest contribution, totalling close to $1.5m, has gone to the chairman of the senate committee drafting the new law.”

Let’s call a spade a spade. These contributions are bribes. Perhaps not in a prosecutable sense. But just the same, they are huge multi-million dollar bribes of multiple public officials. And they worked.

We, The People, no longer control anything that happens in DC, left or right. We are so very screwed. I don’t have $19 million to bribe Senators, or a third of a billion to lobby/advertise in favor of a public option. Hell, I don’t even the $35,000 a year it would cost to buy health insurance for me and my wife.

Back in July I twittered, “I don’t want to lead you to believe the people debating our health care policy are self-interested idiots. I’d hate to ruin the surprise.”

It’s no surprise anymore.

On the left, I am at the mercy of the elected & bribed non-representatives, who band together in tiny numbers to gum up the whole works, perverting the idea of “majority rule.” In a country where 65% favor a public option, representatives of less than 8% of the population defeated it. And on the right, I am at the mercy of those who no longer seem to believe or participate in the democratic process, they are too busy rooting for America to lose. At anything, as long as it might make Obama look bad.

We are collectively covered in the bipartisan bullshit they’ve been slinging. And they’ve been slinging it so long, we don’t even notice the smell any more. They have to let loose with some truly noxious offal for us to even notice.

Which is exactly the way they want it. They are winning. We, The People, are losing.

Clicking any link below within [brackets] will show you an old photo in a pop-up window:
0 – [At Rex Hospital] [In Mom’s arms]
1 – [Busted my head chasing pidgeons] (related story) [Dec., 1959, with Dad, Mom, and Granddaddy and Grandmother Stott]
2 – [a handful, I’m sure]
3 – The first of [many ties] (that was Susan’s comment while looking through these old pictures; “Look, another suit and tie! What happened to you?”)
4 – Another year, [another tie]
5 – [kindergarten]
6 – A real slice of Americana, the 1964 portrait of my [first grade class] (I’m on the right, in red vest and bowtie, of course).
7 – [check out sister’s hair!]
8 – [Star Trek audition] (hey, we all dressed silly then)
9 – Summers at Atlantic Beach, North Carolina, [catchin’ fish]. Well, hangin’ around Sportsman’s Pier while my Granddaddy [caught fish].
10 – [cub scouts] [class photo, Oakland, NJ, 1968]
11 – Lived in St. Johnsbury, Vermont. Revelled in 5 feet of snow, as only a child can. [class photo, St. Johnsbury, 1969]
12 – Went to Gettysburg, my first [photo trip]
13 – Class book reports, [in character] (I’m Patton, with the revolver)
14 – Since I had my [first girlfriend], I also had to have [some wheels].
15 – Called out my high school principal in the local newspaper.
16 – Misplaced virginity (sorry, no photo). [Played Trapper John in MASH]
17 – What should have been my Senior year of high school became my [Freshman year at Wake Forest University].
18 – Full time Sophomore, part time DJ at WKZL-FM, Winston-Salem, NC.
19 – Full time DJ at WKZL-FM, ending my time at Wake Forest, and beginning my detour into a Career For The Young.
20 – Graveyard shift, WRBN-FM, Macon/Warner Robins, GA, [occasionally seen in daylight hours]
21 – Program Director [with Playboy Centerfolds] of WRBN-FM, Macon/Warner Robins, GA. [Big fish, small pond]
22 – [Got married]. The first time. Got my [first camera].
23 – As Program Director (second-in-command), I outlasted 3 General Manager’s in one year (out of a total of 9 in five years), one of whom fired me, hired me back on 30 days probation, and then got himself fired before that probation was up. Radio was such a blast. Well, other than the Playboy Centerfolds above.
24 – Got separated. I mud wrestled women, played Donkeyball, and got my butt kicked by the Harlem Globetrotters, all in the name of my “job.”
25 – Broke my neck (spiral fracture of the C-2) and got a DUI. In one 18 hour span, I was in an accident, in jail, in court, did an airshift, then went to the ER, who zipped me to the Surgical Intensive Care Unit, where the neurosurgeon’s first words to me were “you have a very interesting fracture.” It was a day worthy of Jack Bauer on 24.
26 – Got divorced. Got out of radio. Into photography (breaking your neck can be a life altering experience in more ways than one).
27 – The first part of a two year program at the St. Alban’s Academy for the Visually Illiterate, also known as the Portfolio Center.
28 – Watched yet another relationship spontaneously combust during the Holidays (which was once a disturbing long term trend for me).
29 – Entered the freelance world of advertising photography.
30 – [Camping] in the Smokies (cue banjo music).
31 – Went to Yosemite for the first time.
32 – Move into a loft. Wonderful space, but very costly.
33 – War and recession make the loft even more expensive.
34 – Adopted [my child]. Called out the President in the local (alternative) newspaper.
35 – Moved out of the expensive loft.
36 – Went back to Yosemite. Became a homeowner. Got blood poisoning. Had knee surgery (torn medial miniscus). Met my future wife, on the night the Braves won the World Series.
37 – Got my first computer. Built my first web page. Covered the Olympics online.
38 – People start paying me to make HTML products.
39 – Went on a spirit walk, Red Rock Road Trip.
40 – Big Boom Times in the photo biz, as well as in web design.
41 – My future wife moves in. I start a weblog (entirely unrelated, I promise).
42 – I get my first digital camera. Started a photoblog (added 2,088 photos since then).
43 – A year of darkness and change. On the night of my birthday, the President told us “to uphold the values of America, and remember why so many have come here. We are in a fight for our principles, and our first responsibility is to live by them.” I’ve done my part. Can’t say the same for him.
44 – I get married. And a Canon D60, too. Launch PhotoDude Labs.
45 – Totaled my wife’s car. Mistakenly identified as [pony-tailed lawyer]. Claimed a Google crown. Consummated our marriage with Leap Year Bisquits.
46 – Made a local pilgrimage in search of closure. Went on a sabbatical from politics (85 days so far). Finally Got A Mac. Started making music songs noises you can download.
47 – Bought my name. Met A Girl Named Caroli, built her a web site, and took hundreds of photos of her. Went through 32 Dark Days, during which I first lost Fuji, and then lost Dad. Found The Digital Grail, and a new form of Togetherness.
48 – Lost my father-in-law. Gained two new family members, and new working conditions. Published my 2,000th Pixel Pile, evolved this 11 year old site, and rebooted PhotoDude Labs. Took my favorite photo of the year.
49 – I worked. Got a Tivo and it made my head explode. I worked. Our kitties got big (19.5 lbs). Both of them (14.5 lbs). I worked. Got Alex and Sarah hitched. I worked. Got an iPhone. And then I worked some more (incredibly busy year, client-wise).
50 – It was an emphatic 50th year, as I joined AARP, acquired an age related disease, and gained a granddaughter (subject of many photos). Message received, Mother Nature.
51 – Don’t know. Starts today. I’ll let you know next year.

Many thanks to Mom and [Dad], not only for bringing me into this world, but also for saving all those pictures from decades ago.

We, as a country, follow the examples set by our left/right leaders-celebrities, and regurgitate the ad hominem talking points they give us, or that we heard from some guy on the Internet. We try to shout each other down.

Because volume is a winning policy.

So many very angry people seem perfectly happy with the system we have. I know the majority of people have always been fully employed at a medium to large company that provides them with access to moderately priced insurance coverage. I know the majority of people have never run a small business, or been self-employed (two activities that allegedly cause this country to “thrive”), or wrestled with a COBRA payment after being laid off from their full time job, or worse, tried to convert COBRA to individual coverage. I know the majority of people have not encountered a major medical issue that strained or exceeded the limits of their existing coverage.

I know I may not be among the majority of American people on this topic. So I might have some differing insights to provide. And I am very very angry, too. It comes from two sources, both of which ought to anger you, too, even if you have moderately priced insurance.

The Insurance Surcharge

Imagine if you went to a store, and the item you purchased cost $99. Then the guy in line right behind you pays just $39 for the very same item. Would you be angry? Now, convert that “item” to a medical procedure. That is the difference in cost between someone who has insurance (gets the big bill) and someone who is “self-pay” (pays a fraction of the big bill).

I wish every American could go through the process of having a required treatment that is not covered by insurance. Meaning, one that you have to pay for out of your own pocket.

Then they could watch the doctor’s “cashier” total up a bill of $1,906 for that treatment, as I did in June. Thankfully my loud gulp was drowned out by her continuing, “now, give me a minute to apply the discounts for ‘self-pay’.” (“self pay” is the office euphemism they use for those who do not have insurance).

Actual price paid after “self-pay” discounts? $786. A difference of $1,120.

Yes, for those with the insurance coverage, that very same treatment costs 2.5 times as much. That’s when you notice, hmm, the doctor’s office seems to have multiple full time people who handle nothing but insurance filing and billing…

The hospital employed a group of about 30 people whose job it was to get authorizations from insurance companies before planned outpatient visits & procedures. (There was a different group who worked on the inpatient side.) Here’s a day in the life of one of those employees:

1. Pull up a list of upcoming appointments, along with the code for the expected procedure.
2. Find Patient A’s record.
3. Locate the phone number for their insurance company (this is why they photo copy your insurance card – it’s on there somewhere).
4. Call the insurance company and wander through their phone tree.
5. Sit on hold.
6. When the person on the other line answers, identify the patient and recite to them the code of the procedure.
7. Wait until the insurance company representative decides if they will pay.
8. If they agree to pay, the insurance company representative recites a different code back indicating their approval.
9. Write down the insurance company’s code and hang up.
10. There’s a system that actually records these phone calls so the hospital has additional proof that the insurance company agreed to pay. The employee now writes down yet another code from the voice recording system – the “receipt” for that call, essentially.
11. Input all of this into the hospital’s record keeping system.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Of course we know that just because the insurance company says they will pay, it doesn’t mean they really will. There’s a whole different team of people who have to pick it up on the back end in that case.

Andrew Sullivan: “The View From Your Sickbed“

And then you realize, hmm, I bet if I was paying the 20% co-pay ($380), it might be another 120-180 days (i.e., half a freakin’ year) before the doctor’s office sees an actual payment from the insurance company for the remaining 80%. If at all…

That 11 step approval process doesn’t just apply to hospital outpatient procedures; it is also the same method by which all private practice physicians must attempt to verify benefits and coverage for every one of their office visits and procedures. At the end of that 11 step process, the insurance company has one final trump card: that entire process is hypothetical anyway. Without fail there is a disclaimer at the end of every one of these conversations, “Actual benefits may vary. Verification of patient’s coverage does not guarantee payment.” Can you imagine any other business operating with those uncertain payment conditions?

Andrew Sullivan: “The View From Your Sickbed 2“

This is a huge part of the reason why US healthcare is twice as expensive as other modern countries. Our privatized insurance industry makes it that way, forcing medical vendors to take on entire staffs devoted to trying to collect for covered procedures and treatments.

Now you may think, not my problem, I paid my $380 co-pay and the rest of the $1900 cost is covered, no matter how ridiculous it might be. Well, you pay for that excess as well. In the form of increased premiums taken from your paycheck, and the raise you don’t get because your company had to pay more for their employee health plan. In the form of a higher bill at the doctor or hospital, to pay for those extra full-time employees who do nothing but process your insurance and procure eventual payment.

It’s a vivid illustration of the fact we pay twice as much per capita for health care than other industrialized countries, yet get statistically worse care as a result. I’m a self-employed capitalist who believes in the marketplace, but can we afford for this one to be so grossly inefficient, and be one seventh of our economy?

Not anymore. Not me & my wife, anyway. Which brings us to part two…

Bankrupting The American Dream

From the above you might be asking, but Reid, how did you get to this uninsured place? Don’t you work for a living? Damn hard, yes I do, and always have. Between 1977 and 1985 I worked as a full time employee for four companies in three states. And not a single one of them ever offered me any opportunity to purchase health insurance. Tangentially, the owner of two of these companies drove a Rolls Royce. Oh, and in 1983, I broke my neck (spiral fracture of C-2).

Since 1987, I have been self-employed, which means you are buying into the individual policy market, i.e., you are screwed and will be paying far more than anyone else. A lucky self-employed person has a spouse who has a full time job at a corporation, and can get coverage through their policy.

That’s the status my wife and I held about a year and a half ago, with both of us covered under her policy at the real estate company where she worked as an accountant. The monthly cost was in the neighborhood of $300.

For most people, that’s where the story ends. They have moderately priced insurance that they rarely have to test beyond routine care, so what’s to complain about?

Well, you might remember the real estate industry hit a few bumps in their business plan last year, and my wife was laid off from her company. They had less money to count, so to speak.

Now, just because you’ve suddenly lost your job doesn’t mean you suddenly don’t need health care. But in the US, the two are tied inextricably. However, the law does require that you be given the chance to continue the same coverage under something called COBRA, and we were given the pricing for that.

$980 per month to continue the same coverage for two people; coverage that had cost less than one third of that the month before. Yes, you get to lose one of your two incomes, and face a tripling of your insurance premium.

And that’s when the first cut happens, the first “death panel,” if you will. I’ve been blessed to be a healthy guy for a long time, other than arthroscopic knee surgery in 1995 (back then I had a “catastrophic” insurance policy … which would not cover outpatient procedures … Yea 4 Insurance!). My wife, however, had one of those lovely “pre-existing conditions” that pretty much mandates continuing coverage, while I didn’t have even a single prescription to be filled.

So we opted to cover her only, at a cost of $495 per month. That was a big enough increase to absorb. And Susan picked up a lot of contract and temp work, but nothing that offered any kind of coverage. We had to stick with COBRA.

Of course, during that time my own pre-existing condition chose to reveal itself in an ugly way, and lacking insurance, I now fully expect to be paying out of my pocket for any treatments for that condition until Medicare kicks in.

Anyway, you get 18 months of COBRA eligibility. And when that runs out you get the opportunity to convert that same coverage to an individual policy. Well, Susan has hit the wall on COBRA, and we got the pricing chart for conversion:

That’s the conversion option we’re given: a jump from $495 to nearly $1500 per month, just to cover Susan. And we’re lucky that we are grandparents of a young child rather than parents of one. Because that family policy that cost us $300 a month a mere year and a half ago would now be nearly $2900 a month.

$34,649.28 per year, for family coverage.

$17,707.56 per year, just to cover my wife.

There’s your “death panel.” It’s just got a dollar sign in front of it, and it’s entirely privatized and capitalist.

And if you want to be a pure capitalist about it, there’s your small business death panel as well. Go ahead, go out on your own and be self-employed, or start a small business to market your innovation. You know, pursue The American Dream.

Just put back a whole lotta jack for insurance before you do. Tens of thousands of dollars per year. Or pray you stay healthy.

It’s our Health Prayer System. That’s what my wife and I are left with, at this point. But the story has a (hopefully, prayerfully) happy ending. My wife has been working at a “temp-to-perm” position that should convert to “perm” in a month or so. And then there’s a 90 day waiting period. Then, maybe we can both be insured at an affordable rate once again. And just pray that we don’t have a major illness between now and, oh, say, January.

Yeah, this whole issue has me quite angry and no longer too understanding of the opposition.

If this has become such an ugly red/blue partisan issue, then I have to ask those who oppose this reform a question. Surely you believe in The American Dream, right? Work hard, play by the rules, and you’ll get ahead. Well … when two hard working citizens who are in above average health for their age are completely priced out of the health insurance market, as we have been, exactly which part of The American Dream is that?

Finally (if we simply must put the bottom line in partisan political terms), if the Republican President and GOP Congress were allowed to deficit-spend over $3 trillion on a “war of choice” that has in the end cost far more American lives than were taken on 9/11/2001, then I’m perfectly OK with a Democratic President and Congress spending $1 trillion on reforming our health care system to benefit millions of Americans.

However, I have little hope for real reform efforts coming out of Congress. At best, we will get a version so neutered and watered-down it may do more harm than good. Because we’ve just become a very dumb country, led by partisan boors, obsessed with minutia, and distracted by the next shiny thing they flash in our face.

There will sadly be many who try and use today as a platform to push their own agenda, pro-this, anti-that, red, blue, etc. Take special note of such people. Remember that on a day for the thousands who still mourn, they could not wait for Sept. 12 to try and sell their wares. They could not simply keep quiet in the face of such “opportunity.”

Today is not about them. And it’s not about me. In fact, thinking about this, and reviewing the links above to what I’ve written on this day in the past, I’ve decided this is the last new posting I will make on September 11, of any year. In the future, on this day this site will have a link to one of the articles of which I’m proudest: “‘I’m OK, I’m with the firemen’: In Memory of Bill Biggart.”

But otherwise, on September 11, this site will be silent. In honor of those who still mourn.

Silent, in memory.

Then you hit fifty, and your bifocals still work well at distance, and up close (about 12 inches or less), but your eyes have developed a new range (18”-36”) that simply isn’t covered well at all by your bifocals. Except this very narrow portion of the bifocal’s progressive transition, if you tip your head back just right.

That 18 to 36 inch range is where my monitors sit. Yeah, it became a real pain in the neck. So off I went to the eye doctor, to get a new prescription, and some new glasses. But the last time I did this, the wife and I went together and $1,000 later we both had new glasses. This time, I wanted to get more for my money.

And I did. For roughly the same amount of money ($561.65), I got four very nice pairs of glasses; one set by visiting a local optometrist, and three sets ordered online.

Druid Hills Eyecare

My first stop was my local optometrist at Druid Hills Eyecare, Dr. Grigoriy Solomon. Dr. Solomon and his staff treated me well, set me up with a new prescription, and placed my order for some computer glasses (single vision, tuned to that 18-36 inch range).

Cost: $335 ($110 frames, $125 lenses, $95 glare/scratch/UV coatings)

Glasses: Perfect. So much lighter than my previous pair, and perfectly tuned to the environment where I need them, at my computer.

Experience: Obviously the most expensive pair of this group, but I am more than willing to pay a fair price for specialization. These are the glasses I’d be wearing much of the day while working at the computer. I wanted them to be right, and I wanted the vendor to be local (with the online vendors, your options for corrections are not as good).

Turnaround time: 24 hours. Yes, they told me it would be a week, and then called me the next day to say they were ready for pickup.

Armed with my new prescription (plus the crucial pupil distance), I proceeded to a site I bookmarked some time ago, glassyeyes.blogspot.com. There I found links to most of the popular options for online glasses, and I began my shopping spree at two places.

www.eyebuydirect.com

Here I chose the a frame named the Purapel, with progressive bifocal lenses, Anti-Reflective coating, and UV Coating. Just a basic replacement for my old glasses.

Cost: $78.85. I added 2nd day shipping, but I also had a 30% discount code I found at glassyeyes.blogspot.com that essentially paid for the extra shipping cost.

Glasses: The glasses are great, prescription very accurate. No complaints.

Experience: The online order process went smoothly, and you’re then able to log-in to your account and check the progress of your order. After one week, the site said my order was completed, my glasses were undergoing a quality check, and would ship shortly. I was supposed to get an email when this happened. For a full week the site claimed my glasses were still undergoing that quality check. And on the day I was about to call them to see what the problem was, they arrived at my door. Two weeks to the day after they were ordered.

www.zennioptical.com

I choose two items here. One, some progressive bifocals, with photochromic lenses (they darken in bright sunlight automatically), with Anti-Reflective coating. And a certain retro-cool look.

Cost: $76.90

Glasses: I like these a lot. Lightweight, fit well, and look good. They don’t adjust to brightness changes as quickly as I would like, but that’s always been the case with this type of lens, and the reason I’ve always avoided the extra cost in the past. But at this price, I decided to go for it.

The other choice I made are described as “Wind Goggles.” They have progressive bifocal lenses, Anti-Reflective coating, and the sun/wind shield flips up.

Cost: $73.90

Glasses: I love these. The full wrap of the sun screen is nice, and the ability to quickly flip it up when needed is great.

Experience: It had been a couple of days past the suggested two week delivery time, so one Monday I called the support number they list on the site. A guy nicely informed me that my order was due to arrive late that week at his location in California, from their factory in China. I would then get an email when it shipped from there and I should have it by early the following week.

48 hours later I got a DHL package direct from China with my order. Shipping cost? $4.95 … from China. Total turnaround time, 19 days.

All in all, I was very pleased with all of the glasses I got. I can definitely tell a notch of quality difference between my locally purchased glasses and the ones bought online. But I would describe that “notch” as the difference between an A and an A-minus. And the price difference was substantial.

If you go to these online sites expecting to get quality glasses for $12, as some claim they can provide, you will likely be disappointed. By the time you pick some decent frames, add extras, etc., you may well end up in the $50 to $80 range. I averaged about $75 per pair, and there was not a “dud” in the bunch (it’s easy to find complaints about many of these vendors). But in my experience, it’s a very good value for your money.

I think my parents probably paid more than $75 for my first pair of glasses back in 1972. And they were way uglier.

That is all.

Who are you?
Who’s askin’?

I am a beachball on the river of life.

I am the “fun” in “malfunction.”

I am the puff of wind in your ear just before some Willie inserts a wet finger.

I am the last bubble on top of the best mug of coffee you’ll ever have.

I am obviously not going to really answer the above question, but I can do this all day.

Zombies – undead monstrosity or the next logical step in human evolution?
From Reid’s Point of View, zombies are merely further proof everything is distributed 80/20. In this case, 20% of movies about zombies are entertaining, and 80% are awful.

Young Elvis or Fat Elvis?
Tort Elvis (I actually did this whole quiz just so I could give that linked answer)

If you were a superhero, what would your name be?
Whatever, Man

Yes, you would have to include the comma.

You are the last man on earth, and it is your job to perpetuate the human race, whether you like it or not. Your choice of potential mates is between Wonder Woman, the Bionic Woman or Super Girl. Which one do you choose?
Gosh. Can I maybe have a choice that might not break me in the process of trying to procreate? I mean, what’s the goal here?

What was your first car?
1970 Volkswagen Beetle, handed down to me by my parents, who bought it brand new for $1,995. When I sold it a dozen years later for $300, I feared going on the test drive at the used car place, because the passenger floor had rusted out so bad you could see the road going by in places.

Last seen about three weeks after I sold it, broken down on the side of the road in Warner Robins, Georgia.

If you were going to show me around your city/town, where’s the first place you would take me?
Centennial Park. The Atlanta skyline surrounds you, the Georgia Aquarium is on the north edge of the park, and on the south edge, CNN. In between I could show you the brick I bought to help build the park (has my name on it) and then we could douse ourselves in the Olympic Rings fountain.

What’s the last album you bought?
Prince, Lotusflow3r/mplsound

Do you have an arch enemy? Would you like one?
No, and no. I have more than enough problems, thank you very much.

What’s the title of the movie they are going to make about your teenage years?
Why is the last question always the hardest? How about … “Generic 1970’s Disaster Movie”?

When I wrote about ridiculous claims back in April, I included this one:

The Atlanta Falcons claim they are going to trade Michael Vick. The thing is, in the NFL, you are actually trading a contract with a player, not so much the player himself. And in 2004, Vick signed a 10-year, $130 million contract with the Falcons. Now, how many NFL teams do you think are willing to swallow about $13 million per year for the next five seasons, just to take a chance on a convicted felon fresh out of jail? Shortly after June 1, you’ll see the Falcons release Vick and take the salary cap hit (about $7 million for 2009 alone), because they will have no trade takers.

Well, here we are shortly after June 1, and the Atlanta Falcons have indeed released Michael Vick: “We spent a significant amount of time this off-season trying to trade him to another NFL club, and we had some conversations with a few teams, but nothing materialized.” What a surprise!

And so a sometimes ugly era comes to an end. Mark Bradley at the AJC writes about some of Vick’s “brief shining moments“ (“He was the biggest athlete this city has ever seen.”). But over at atlantafalcons.com, J.Mike writes:

Dimitroff and Head Coach Mike Smith were not around when the team drafted Vick or during the turbulent events of 2007 sparked by his federal indictment. Less than a dozen Falcons on the current roster played with the quarterback.

That can’t be said for others in the organization, some in their second or third decade with the team. We’ve all witnessed part of history and grown from the frustration, hurt and confusion.

But this isn’t a time of reflection.

This is a time of closure.

The Falcons are a playoff football team again with a new quarterback and a new blood as bright as the team’s red jerseys.

The Michael Vick book remained open through all the re-building and success, but got pushed to the far corner of the desk.

Now it’s closed.

It was really closed a long time ago, because, as Jeff Schultz points out, team owner Arthur Blank was never going to allow Vick back: “Blank writes his office e-mails in red. The man who writes in red e-mails was lied to — and he doesn’t like being lied to. Blank also knew that for every dollar he made if he brought Vick back by selling jerseys and season tickets to Vick fans, he would lose far more dollars because of the fans who would leave and the corporate sponsorships that would go away. And did I mention he was lied to?”

When I wrote my concluding piece about Vick nearly two years ago, it was titled Michael Vick is a Lying Dog Murdering Team Betraying Anti Role Model. I detailed each of those charges. I’m not sure how many of those things are or aren’t still true. I doubt we’ll see another arrest on that particular charge, he could prove loyal to a new team, and could again become a decent example for kids of how one can rise from your mistakes. One has to wonder, though, particularly about the lying.

But that’s an issue for others. There is no doubt that Michael Vick has served his time, paid his debt to society as determined by our judicial system, and deserves a second chance at freedom. Whether Michael Vick deserves a second chance at his chosen career, well, that seems a separate matter, and one that is up to the NFL Commissioner and 31 other NFL teams.

Here in Atlanta, he’s done. Right down to the final paperwork.

We debate these semantics and keep getting diverted from the basic issue. Probably on purpose.

Diversion One: But wait, don’t spend too much time worrying about the semantics of “what do we call this,” that’s not the proper measurement. Let’s talk about whether it was effective.

Diversion Two: But wait, that’s not important either, the real crux of the matter is what did Nancy Pelosi know, and when did she know it?

Diversion Three: And if we’re going to close Gitmo, do those hundreds of terrorists really have to move into that foreclosed house in the cul-de-sac around the corner? I find that somewhat scary…

After years of no motion, the past few weeks have brought a lot of fast talk, culminating in Thursday’s “dueling speeches” from President Obama and former VP Dick Cheney. I watched all of the President’s speech, and watched Cheney’s until I was overcome by the urge to shoot myself in the face to make it stop. And I once again feel the need to address publicly muddied issues that seem crystal clear to me.

Diversion One. When I wrote The Torture Debate, Part 5150, I responded to the idea that torture yielded information, and therefore the argument should be “are these techniques effective?”:

I hear that robbing a bank yields cash. I hear that rape yields some sick satisfaction for one of the parties involved. Yet these acts are considered both repugnant and illegal, despite the apparent yields. Go figure.

Diversion Two. I want to establish up front, I’ve never thought much of Nancy Pelosi. Or any of the Senators or Representatives who allegedly lead their party in Congress. Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, John Boehner, Mitch McConnell; all seem pretty useless to me.

When Pelosi did her public tap dance about what she knew and when, topping it off with accusations against the CIA, here’s what I heard…

“I was informed. I was not briefed.” Perhaps this semantic difference helps you parse your personal filing system, but down here in the public, we see those as pretty much the same thing.

“I was told what they were considering, not what they were doing.” If someone tells me they are considering doing something, I assume it is because they might actually want/need to do it. If someone tells me “I am considering kicking you in the nuts,” you’ll see me physically react as if they were actually going to do it. Again, Pelosi is parsing a semantic difference so finely that it sounds like a weasel-worthy excuse.

“They misled Congress.” Ah, yes, Ye Olde “they lied to me, so it doesn’t matter what I knew or when I knew it.” There is a long history of Congress claiming it has been misled by those charged with informing it. There are times it has proven to be true. I have no idea if this is one of those times, but as “The Final Excuse” in the string issuing from Pelosi’s mouth, it rings especially hollow.

So, Pelosi’s performance was atrocious, without a doubt. But here’s the point missed by most in this debate. When you are a ranking member on the Intelligence Committee, and you are “briefed” (or “informed” … whatever) by the CIA about either what they are doing or what they are planning, they have not come to you for approval.

They have not come to you for a vote, or official consent. They are just informing you. And, in turn, you cannot tell a soul what you now know. Sure, I guess you can write a strong letter to the President. But over the past 8 years, that man was someone who would add signing statements to laws Congress passed that essentially meant “I’m going to do what I deem necessary regardless of this law.” So what impact would a strong letter from Pelosi have had? Well, I guess she could have held it up at her press conference to say “yes, I knew, and I complained.” But other than covering her ass, it would have had no impact.

Her knowledge, whenever it occurred, would not have changed a thing. She never had that power, no matter what she was told or when. Which makes her “performance” all the sadder.

Diversion Three: The approximately 250 detainees who will be moving into your neighborhood. Not! The scare-mongers speak as if these detainees will be set loose into the US, like a felon released from prison on parole. The truth is that the public would be at no more risk from these detainees than they are from Charles Manson. Or Eric Rudolph. Or Ted Kazinski. Or any number of convicted murderers and rapists in their own home state, who are in high security custody.

In fact, if you think about it, the ones who will be placed at the most risk are those “terrorists” who might be released into general prison populations. How long do you think they would last in that environment? Who exactly is it that should be scared of this … if you pause ten seconds to actually think about it.

But pausing for thought would just make too much sense. And there isn’t a whole lot of that to be found. That’s why Rove and Cheney are able to make the ridiculous claim that Obama and the Democrats want to “criminalize the policy choices” of the previous administration.

This is not about criminalizing a policy dispute! This is about potential violations of decades old international law, the Geneva Convention, as well as US law. When you make policy choices that knowingly violate the law, yes, you have opened yourself to criminal prosecution, by your own actions.

You say “policy choice,” I say “war crime.” We just don’t seem to live in the same reality any more. Just look at the similar cases of the torture memos and that of the torture photos. The release of both is mandated by court ruling, in cases filed long before Obama was even the Democratic nominee.

Obama decided to obey the court ruling to let the memos out, and was castigated by the right and congratulated by the left for doing so. Then Obama decided to further fight the court ruling to let the photos out, and was castigated by the left and congratulated by the right for doing so. Meanwhile, Cheney says there are other documents he’d like to see released … but just the two that allegedly support his position.

Not only is it a “no win” situation, it’s a gross distortion. People act as if the problem, the offense, is paper memos or photographic prints. The problem, the offense, is the historical acts they represent and depict. And hiding paper or pixels does not change those offensive acts or that history.

History. That has been the last refuge of folks like Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Bush. They firmly state that, when all is known, history will be the ultimate judge of their actions. They seem quite comfortable with that. And, credit where it is due, Bush and Rumsfeld have largely avoided the spotlight since leaving office. Cheney, not so much. He’s been keeping his thumb on the scales of history quite heavily in the past few months.

And despite Obama’s professed preference to avoid investigations and/or prosecutions, it seems that this argument isn’t going away. It’s just getting more grossly distorted.

I’ve become convinced the best way to resolve this is via a very narrowly constructed Truth Commission. Emphasis on “Truth.” After all, who can argue with wanting to know the truth? And in my opinion it would only work with two major stipulations.

One, the commission should not just be “independent,” it should be complete outsiders. No one who has ever held elective office. Choose from a pool of some retired military officers (no generals, maybe some NCO’s instead), retired judges, public defenders, doctors, clergy, cowboys, Indian chiefs, etc. Decidedly non-Beltway types.

Two, there would be no prosecutions for information revealed to the commission. You could compel people to testify via subpoena, you would give them blanket immunity in exchange for full disclosure under oath. The only potential charge would be perjury, if it is revealed that even with complete amnesty, they failed to tell the whole truth.

The goal would be The Whole Truth, a final report that was not politicized or diverted by either the authors, or the potential outcome. A final report that lays it all out.

For history.

So that you know, and I know, and the world knows … exactly what was done in our name. We have that right.

This country has been “debating” torture much of this decade, and I last summed up my feelings in November of 2007, with Becoming The Thing We Hate.

One would have hoped that a new administration would put this to rest by denouncing those “enhanced interrogation techniques” and banning them. Which they did. But now we have to endure the likes of Karl Rove and Dick Cheney engaging in this bizarre form of public projection in which they now decry the very actions and strategies they used to practice religiously every day of the week. Others chime in to say the most outrageous things about this country and torture.

And it has become more than I can bear.

Torture supporters got a woody yesterday from, of all places, The New York Times

“High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa’ida organization that was attacking this country,” Adm. Dennis C. Blair, the intelligence director, wrote in a memo to his staff last Thursday.

So, torture yielded information? I hear that robbing a bank yields cash. I hear that rape yields some sick satisfaction for one of the parties involved. Yet these acts are considered both repugnant and illegal, despite the apparent yields. Go figure.

But nevermind the logic, this statement caused many torture supporters to claim the Obama administration is selectively releasing information that supports their position and smears their critics. Perhaps they got so excited by the above comment they failed to read the rest of the article:

“The information gained from these techniques was valuable in some instances, but there is no way of knowing whether the same information could have been obtained through other means,” Admiral Blair said in a written statement issued last night. “The bottom line is these techniques have hurt our image around the world, the damage they have done to our interests far outweighed whatever benefit they gave us and they are not essential to our national security.”

Oh. So, we might well have gotten that info anyway, and the practice turned into a recruiting tool for those who wish to kill us. Well, that’s a minor point to someone like Karl Rove:

“What they’ve essentially said is if we have policy disagreements with our predecessors…. [W]e’re going to turn ourselves into the moral equivalent of a Latin American country run by colonels in mirrored sunglasses and what we’re gonna do is prosecute systematically the previous administration, or threaten prosecutions against the previous administration, based on policy differences. Is that what we’ve come to in this country?”

That’s a nice ploy, calling our violation of decades old international law a “policy difference.” You see, a “policy difference” does not beget prosecution. But a violation of the law might. It’s called “accountability,” which I know is an endangered species in this country, but that’s all the more reason for people to stand up for it.

And this wasn’t done on a whim. As Paul Begala notes:

…the president was compelled to release them by a lawsuit, a lawsuit that his lawyers, the Justice Department and the White House counsel, decided they could not successfully defend.

We have a Freedom of Information Act. I know it’s — it’s an adjustment, but we now have a White House that lives under the rule of law and obeys the laws. So, he released them because he was compelled to release them.

This is very different from the Bush administration, which selectively leaked national security information, top-secret information, in order to build what I think the record shows was a dishonest case for war, or, in the case of Valerie Wilson, to destroy the career of a covert CIA agent.

That’s the politicization of intelligence information and — and top-secret information. This was the president obeying the law.

A president obeying the law has absolutely astounded his critics. How could he? Well, he could have done much more, but directly chose not to:

“Obama knew he could not stop Congress from doing whatever lawmakers decided to do but he was reluctant to give a presidential imprimatur to a national commission that would keep the controversy alive for months and months and months. Obama had his own agenda and wanted to move on. Putting out the memos was the cleanest way to accomplish his goal. […] In his comments Tuesday he tried to steer lawmakers away from partisan investigations, arguing that if anything were done, it should be with the cooperation of both parties.”

He’s been trying to tamp this down, and releasing the four memos was the least he could do to satisfy the lawsuit. Rather than quietly acknowledge this, and allow the issue to die down, many on the right have gone on the attack.

OK, so then let’s take a closer look, since you insist. Maybe a truth commission really is what you need, but for now, how about this?

According to several former top officials involved in the discussions seven years ago, they did not know that the military training program, called SERE, for Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape, had been created decades earlier to give American pilots and soldiers a sample of the torture methods used by Communists in the Korean War, methods that had wrung false confessions from Americans.

Even George J. Tenet, the C.I.A. director who insisted that the agency had thoroughly researched its proposal and pressed it on other officials, did not examine the history of the most shocking method, the near-drowning technique known as waterboarding.

The top officials he briefed did not learn that waterboarding had been prosecuted by the United States in war-crimes trials after World War II and was a well-documented favorite of despotic governments since the Spanish Inquisition; one waterboard used under Pol Pot was even on display at the genocide museum in Cambodia.

They did not know that some veteran trainers from the SERE program itself had warned in internal memorandums that, morality aside, the methods were ineffective. Nor were most of the officials aware that the former military psychologist who played a central role in persuading C.I.A. officials to use the harsh methods had never conducted a real interrogation, or that the Justice Department lawyer most responsible for declaring the methods legal had idiosyncratic ideas that even the Bush Justice Department would later renounce.

The process was “a perfect storm of ignorance and enthusiasm,” a former C.I.A. official said.

These are just a few of the things that “The Deciders” did not know when they did the deciding. Despite this lack of knowledge, they used torture to try and squeeze blood from a rock:

“There was constant pressure on the intelligence agencies and the interrogators to do whatever it took to get that information out of the detainees, especially the few high-value ones we had, and when people kept coming up empty, they were told by Cheney’s and Rumsfeld’s people to push harder,” he continued.

“Cheney’s and Rumsfeld’s people were told repeatedly, by CIA … and by others, that there wasn’t any reliable intelligence that pointed to operational ties between bin Laden and Saddam, and that no such ties were likely because the two were fundamentally enemies, not allies.”

Senior administration officials, however, “blew that off and kept insisting that we’d overlooked something, that the interrogators weren’t pushing hard enough, that there had to be something more we could do to get that information,” he said.

Got that? They were so motivated to attack Iraq after 9/11 that they used torture (and pushed for more torture when it didn’t work) to create a connection between Saddam and Al Qaeda that never existed. But they were certain if they tortured enough, someone would admit to it.

Torture me enough, and I’ll admit I’m both the Anti-Christ and Sasquatch, and will agree to wash your car for the rest of my life as penance.

Even more maddening is the fact the prime proponent for torture is Mr. 13%-Approval-Rating, the man America most wishes would return to his undisclosed location (except for Democratic leaders, who want him to continue as the voice of the GOP), Dick Cheney. This is not unlike having the OctoMom endorse a fertility drug.

Or, as Robert Gibbs puts it, “We’ve had a at least two-year policy disagreement with the Vice President of the United States of America. That policy disagreement is whether or not you can uphold the values in which this country was founded at the same time that you protect the citizens that live in that country. The President of the United States and this administration believes that you can. The Vice President has come to, in our opinion, a different conclusion.”

Why isn’t that considered an outrageously shameful position? We defeated Imperial Japan, Nazi Germany, and the Soviet Empire without resorting to torture. But America is not strong enough to retain its basic character in the face of an attack by cave-dwelling extremists? Who is it that has so little faith in this country, its traditions, and its people?

Dick Cheney, that’s who.

To me, that position is downright un-American. At the very least, it betrays a severe lack of faith in this country and its people. And that should be loudly pointed out.

By the way, Cheney never served in the military (five exemptions during Vietnam), so let’s hear from some who have. How about James Joyner:

When I was being trained on this issue as a young cadet a quarter century ago, in addition to the legal and moral factors explaining why we must treat captured enemy combatants humanely — even risking our own lives and the accomplishment of our immediate mission to safeguard them — was a practical lesson: The other guy was a hell of a lot more likely to surrender to you if he expected to be treated well. Americans were more likely to keep fighting in Vietnam even against overwhelming odds because they knew they enemy would treat them as subhumans, whereas NVA and VC soldiers would surrender to us knowing they’d get three hots and a cot. Certainly, that proved to be the case in both the 1991 Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq; Saddam’s soldiers couldn’t throw their weapons down fast enough.

That’s not likely to be the case for some time now.

Or you could take the word of one of the senior interrogators in Iraq:

I learned in Iraq that the No. 1 reason foreign fighters flocked there to fight were the abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Our policy of torture was directly and swiftly recruiting fighters for al-Qaeda in Iraq. The large majority of suicide bombings in Iraq are still carried out by these foreigners. They are also involved in most of the attacks on U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq. It’s no exaggeration to say that at least half of our losses and casualties in that country have come at the hands of foreigners who joined the fray because of our program of detainee abuse. The number of U.S. soldiers who have died because of our torture policy will never be definitively known, but it is fair to say that it is close to the number of lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001. How anyone can say that torture keeps Americans safe is beyond me — unless you don’t count American soldiers as Americans.

Gosh, will someone please read that last line to Dick Cheney?

Or, if you find the phrase “fair & balanced” comforting, perhaps you’d prefer the view from Fox News’ Shepard Smith:

“I don’t give a rat’s ass if it helps. We are AMERICA! We do not fucking torture!!”

Well said. It confounds me somewhat to say so, but well said.

In an ideal world, I’d like to see the Justice Department go after those who made the decisions to implement these “harsh interrogation techniques” … not those who followed the orders passed down. Accountability should start at the top, not the bottom. We’ve already seen the latter at Abu Ghraib, where only non-coms got prosecuted.

But we don’t live in an ideal world. And accountability, well, frankly, we don’t have that in our society anymore, except for you and me. For our elected leaders, the leaders of failed companies bailed out with public funds … there’s no accountability. In fact, if you try, they squeal loudly.

But just once, I’d like to see one of them shut up with a subpoena and threat of prosecution.

Let’s start with Cheney. Maybe we can then get him to agree to a plea bargain: you stop torturing us with your asinine opinions, and we’ll let you live out the rest of your miserable life in freedom.

Pretty please?

Update: Ali Soufan, who was an F.B.I. supervisory special agent and handled part of the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah, says the claims that “enhanced interrogation techniques” garnered information are “false claims”:

Defenders of these techniques have claimed that they got Abu Zubaydah to give up information leading to the capture of Ramzi bin al-Shibh, a top aide to Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and Mr. Padilla. This is false. The information that led to Mr. Shibh’s capture came primarily from a different terrorist operative who was interviewed using traditional methods. As for Mr. Padilla, the dates just don’t add up: the harsh techniques were approved in the memo of August 2002, Mr. Padilla had been arrested that May.

The debate after the release of these memos has centered on whether C.I.A. officials should be prosecuted for their role in harsh interrogation techniques. That would be a mistake. Almost all the agency officials I worked with on these issues were good people who felt as I did about the use of enhanced techniques: it is un-American, ineffective and harmful to our national security.

Fortunately for me, after I objected to the enhanced techniques, the message came through from Pat D’Amuro, an F.B.I. assistant director, that “we don’t do that,” and I was pulled out of the interrogations by the F.B.I. director, Robert Mueller (this was documented in the report released last year by the Justice Department’s inspector general).

My C.I.A. colleagues who balked at the techniques, on the other hand, were instructed to continue.

And then there’s the story of Alyssa Peterson, an Arabic-speaking interrogator in the Military Intelligence section of the 101st Airborne:

Peterson objected to the interrogation techniques used on prisoners. She refused to participate after only two nights working in the unit known as the cage. Army spokespersons for her unit have refused to describe the interrogation techniques Alyssa objected to. They say all records of those techniques have now been destroyed.

Peterson was then assigned to the base gate, where she monitored Iraqi guards, and sent to suicide prevention training. “But on the night of September 15th, 2003, Army investigators concluded she shot and killed herself with her service rifle,” the documents disclose.

It’s important to remember, at the tip of the spear, there were many who objected to the techniques because they knew, in their gut, they were wrong. And some of them were ordered to continue anyway. Others simply could not bear the pain.