Tag Archives: Politics

9-11 2001

No, I will not be using any picture taken that clear, awful, morning eight years ago today. We have the images burned into our brains, the horror is scarred into our retinas. The world changed and we need no mementos to remind us.

The impact of that terrible attack has been vast, terrible, and the final effects are unknown. We are as blind to the final effect of that act as anyone in 1914 trying to foresee the effect of their terrible terrorist action the assiassination of the Arch-Ducke.

In the years that have passed since 2001 a lot of people have passed a lot of words tryning to assign blame for the three thousand murdered in New York and Washington D.C. that morning.

Clinton and his administration have been blamed, Bush and his administration has been blamed. Mistakes were made by all sides, but it is unseemly to seek to find Americans to blame for that particulart horror.

The blame rests solely and forever on the murderous fantaics who planned and carried out the attacks.

PERIOD

Share

The Sharpest Shiv

Back after the 2004 election President Bush famously announced he had earned some political capital adn he was going to spend it.
he wanted to overhaul out social security and retirement system.
I think the system is in need to reformation and expect without intervention we’re going to have some rough seas ahead. (that”s not to say I endorsed any particular Plan of Bush’s, just that I agree with the need.)
The Democratic party fought Bush tooth and nail on the plan and managed to kill it by pulling out the sharpest shiv in the cell block known as American Politics, Scare The Seniors.
Once they had scared the seniors, the Democrats had won their war.

Now it’s 2009 and President Obama is trying to reform the Health Care system in this country. Again I agree it needs to be done with agreeing to any particular plan out there right now.

The Republicans are now the ones fighting tooth and nail and they have taken the weapon sharpened by the Democratic party and used it to their own ends. It’s another round of Scare the Seniors.

Neither party is made of principles and both parties are more interested in killing the others legislation than in really solving the problems we face.

Share

The mendacious postings of Instapundit

I have a number or friends who trust Instapundit as reliable and non-partisan source of information on the web.
Just due the prodigious number of link and the vast number of subjects they cover his site is a valuable site as a jumping off point to the wild and wooly web.
However, he is not a non-partisan source of information when it comes to things political. Here’s a classic example of how his post can be tilted in their wording.

IT’S ONLY WRONG WHEN BUSINESSES DO IT: VA workers given millions in bonuses as vets await checks. “While hundreds of thousands of disability claims lay backlogged at the Department of Veterans Affairs, thousands of technology employees at the department received $24 million in bonuses, a new report says.”

If you just read the post – and given the number of posts per day at his site people will rarely if ever follow each and every link — you get the impression that someone is defending the bonuses given out at the VA. After all it’s only wrong when businesses do it. I suspected that there was more to the story than his quip and one quote. (My guess would have been just a large number of employee bonuses over the course of a year.)

If you click through to the story — which I recommend — on CNN.com, you’ll find the that the tone of the story is very different than the tone presented by Instapundit.

A report issued by the VA’s Office of Inspector General said the department issued millions of dollars in awards over a two-year period in 2007 and 2008.
“The frequent and large dollar amount awards given to employees were unusual and often absurd,” the report stated.
The reports also called the payments “not fiscally responsible.”

and

The VA said it is pursuing a thorough review of the situation and it “does not condone misconduct by its employees and will take the appropriate corrective actions for those who violate VA policy,” according to a statement provided to CNN.

So while Instapundit posts it with the tone that Liberals and Democrats and other outraged by the huge bonuses recently given out on Wall Street are being hypocritical when it comes to government bonuses, the story itself is about how these abuses have been discovered by the inspector general and are being investigated and reviewed for action.

Instapundit is a cool site to visit and he presents lots and lots in link and information, but he is far from a non-partisan unbiased source.

Share

The Future of Medicine.

So I gave my thoughts on health care reform, now some quick thoughts on the future of medicine. (I am a science-fiction writer after all.)
Three basic scenarios in my opinion. All of these are looking at the state of medical science about the year 2050.

Scenario One: The Conservative Nightmare.
Financial crash due to bloated spending and regulatory overload kills innovation and development. We haven’t progressed much beyond where we are now. Very little research being done as nearly all medical science dollars are consumed in treatment. With or without healthcare reform the government is buried under a crushing load of debt and bills to care for its population.

Scenario Two: The Liberal Nightmare.
Breakthroughs lead of significant advances in health and life extension, but the costs are high. The processes can not be made cheaper by economy of scale or mass production and only the well-off can afford top-end care. For the wealthy life is very good. Disease and morbidity are things that happen to other people. As side from trauma, there is little to fear health-wise and maybe even aging itself can be prevented. For the poor and most of the world it’s a game of watch as the rich go on and on while you get sick and die. Expect vast social upheaval and disruption as this is not a stable system in my opinion.

Scenario Three: Medical Transformation.
The way computer sciences changed our world, advances in medical science make the world of 2050 as unlike todays as our computers are to roman numerals. Quick and easy genetic testing and treatments means that everyone get treatment and drugs designed for their unique genome. Treatment of disease is cheap and plentiful. Healthcare for all is taken for granted because it costs so little. People live long and productive lives without the infirmities and indignities of old age today. Our decedents look upon our medical treatments of today the way we look on witch-doctors and leeches.

The question is — which scenario will it be?

Share

Thoughts on Health Care Reform

I work in the healthcare industry in my day job. I help drug companies get their products to market. Some of you might read those words and think I work in some kind of advertising and you would be wrong. Most of my experience in this field has been helping doctors and patient get their drugs via their health insurance. Currently I help uninsured patients get access to certain medications. (I am not at liberty to say which drug companies I work for or which products I assist with, but I only bring it up as background on my experience with the subject.) Continue reading →

Share

I expected better from Jerry Pournelle

Over at his blog Jerry wrote the following.

In Italy, Mussolini built the Fascist movement, but Mussolini was a socialist from the beginning, and died a socialist.

Quoted verbatim from The Doctrine Of Facism, by Benito Mussolini the author and founder of Fascism.

Granted that the XIXth century was the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy, this does not mean that the XXth century must also be the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy. Political doctrines pass; nations remain. We are free to believe that this is the century of authority, a century tending to the ” right “, a Fascist century.

The Fascist negation of socialism, democracy, liberalism, should not, however, be interpreted as implying a desire to drive the world backwards to positions occupied prior to 1789, a year commonly referred to as that which opened the demo-liberal century.

Such a conception of life makes Fascism the resolute negation of the doctrine underlying so-called scientific and Marxian socialism, the doctrine of historic materialism which would explain the history of mankind in terms of the class struggle and by changes in the processes and instruments of production, to the exclusion of all else.

Fascism is therefore opposed to Socialism to which unity within the State (which amalgamates classes into a single economic and ethical reality) is unknown, and which sees in history nothing but the class struggle.

Mussolini died a socialist? Really?

Share

Good Bye Sarah

Palin QuitterSo yesterday was Sarah Palin’s last day as Governor of Alaska. I, for one, will not miss her and I feel she has now, happily, taken herself out of any serious running for President in 2012 and hopefully beyond.
I listened to her interviews. I listen to her speeches and I have come to the conclusion that she does not have the intellectual chops for higher office. This is all besides and beyond personal issues I have with the woman and her election methods and style.
I realize that there are readers of this blog who are and remain Palin supporters. That is a choice you are free to make and I would defend against all attackers your right to make that decision.

h/t to The Daily Show for the wonderful photomanip for her send-off.

Share

Wait a minute Mr. Stewart…

Last night (Monday July 27th) Jon Stewart had Bill Crystal editor of The Weekly Standard on as his guest for The Daily Show. This promised to be a lively show as Mr. Crystal is a big supporter of Sarah Palin and is often credited with bring her to the attention of the McCain campaign. (So you can curse or praise Mr. Crystal as you see fit.)
The interview was long and it was lively. In fact they have placed the entire interview on-line as it would not fit within the time constraints of the program.
After the expected Palin back-and-forth Mr. Stewart and Mr, Crystal got into health care. Jon Stewart was in favor of a public option for health care, that is government run health plan, and Mr. Crystal was against the concept.
During the back and forth the military’s health care came up and Mr. Crystal basically agreed that the health care enjoyed by our military is top-notch health care. Jon Stewart leapt for the kill like comic-con fan on a copy of Action Comics #1. It seemed, Stewart pointed out, that the government can< run a top flight single payer health-care systems since it is already doing that for the military. Mr. Crystal tried desperately to get away from the point, going so far as to say the American people do not deserve the quality health-care system that the military gets. This of course is the wrong counter argument entirely. Naturally since neither Mr. Stewart nor Mr. Crystal have served in out military they do not understand how it's health-care actually works. It is free and it is very good. (Oh there are horror stories and I know a few personally, but those are the exceptions and not the rule.) But it removes all freedom from the patient. I'm not just talking about choice in doctors or hospitals or even treatments -- though all those decision are removed from the patient -- I'm talking about how the patient gets to live their life. In the military they can make you lose weight if they think you are too heavy. They can make you exercise if they think you need it. They can ban activities that they think are a cause if injury. (Such as motorcycle ownership.) The trade-off for such an expansive health-care system is the loss of freedom. This is exactly why I do not like the idea of a single-payer health care system, and why I am against the Public Policy option being debated now.

Share