Blogomatic 5200

Question:  “Should government be intimately involved with healthcare, beyond simple regulation?”

Actually, before we can really talk about healthcare, we first have to agree on another, very fundamental question:  “What is the role of government?”  Most of the arguments I’ve heard about during the healthcare debate are actually related to this second question.

So I posit that the primary role of an ideal government is as a mediating entity; that is, governments exist in populations of any size mainly to make sure that one person’s (or group of people’s) actions do not impinge upon the rights/freedoms of another person or group. Essentially, we have laws to keep people from injuring, defrauding or harassing one another.

In some cases, when evidence shows that an overall net good will result, certain policies may be followed to improve the standard of living of the population; however, care must be taken when implementing such policies, lest you actually end up with a socialist or fascist state.  Examples of such policies might be social security, medicare, control over crop pricing via farm subsidies, tariffs on international trade, and the control of narcotics.  Understandably, people often disagree over where exactly the line in the sand lies with regards to these policies.  Thankfully, our government structure and Constitution gives us some flexibility in this regard; as our culture changes we can, with some effort, change government policies to better fit our society.

Although I do believe that government has a place in ensuring that a minimum standard of workplace safety and workers rights is enforced, generally speaking I endorse a laissez faire approach when it comes to government interaction with business and the markets in general.  (When it comes to the financial sector, my feelings diverge from this significantly, but that’s a whole other topic…)  So why do I support healthcare reform?  Why let government get their hands all over a sector that (as I have heard all too often in the past few months) makes up around a fifth of our economy?

The basic (and commonly accepted) laws of economics revolve around supply/scarcity and demand.  Essentially, greater supply or lower demand of a given commodity drives the cost down for that item, while greater demand or lower supply for an item drives the cost up.  Under a given set of constraints, these forces ensure that items are somewhat fairly priced.  For this to hold up, it is generally accepted that buyer and seller are operating on a level playing-field:  Buyers and sellers must compete with other buyers and sellers in the marketplace;  All parties are at least somewhat informed and are assumed to make decisions that are in their own best interest;  Either party can walk away from a transaction that is not to their liking.

Now then, there are certain commodities for which this breaks down rather quickly.  Water, food… and to a lesser extent, energy related items like electricity and petroleum.  These are things that you can’t really walk away from;  If you don’t have them, your situation degrades rather quickly.  If a single supplier, or a small group of suppliers, can gain control over a resource such as this, they can pretty much name their price, and the idea of a fair capitalist market collapses.  It is fairly common to find such commodities heavily regulated or even directly run by governments in the interest of consumer protection.

I believe that basic healthcare is such a commodity.  If a person has a serious illness, or a condition which severely impacts their daily life, that person doesn’t really have the option to just walk away if the price of treatment is outrageous.  Not only can the health-insurance industry name it’s price, but they’ve shown time and again that they have no problem maximizing their profit margins by cutting off benefits to patients in need for the most spurious of reasons:  They’ll take your money without asking too many questions, but when it comes to paying out they’ll drop you for a typo on your application, or an improperly filled out medical record.

I’ve heard people say that this is the end of the USA as we know it; that we’re turning into a socialist state.  I just don’t see it.  We have public schools, and public libraries.  We have an effective military, (which has a pretty good publicly run health care system for it’s members and veterans!).  We already have medicare and medicaid.   As any industry does, these institutions are not without flaws, some of which can be pretty serious, but I don’t view that as somehow reflecting on government ineptitude as much as human nature in general.  Where there are people, there are going to be problems.  Just as we are struggling with our education system, we are going to have to struggle with healthcare.  But is anyone arguing that it’s not important to guarantee each child an education?  Why then is there so much controversy with guaranteeing each citizen in the most prosperous nation on earth a basic standard of healthcare?  Is being poor somehow a sin?  I know that we have this perception in America that everyone who works hard should have no problem being successful, but if you stop to actually think about that, it’s nowhere near reality.  For every welfare-queen out there, there’s someone who worked for years developing a skillset that was abruptly replaced by a technological advancement.  We all take different paths, and often the only difference between success and failure is a roll of the dice.

A successful modern society is a blend of capitalism and socialism.  Like most things in life, when you stray too far from the center, you are going to run into problems.  Somehow, we’ve adopted this idea that capitalism is the only way to go, but I don’t see that as any more healthy than adopting a purely socialist approach.  Both capitalism and socialism have their strengths and weaknesses.  We should use a mix of the two to best serve both our society as a whole, as well as each individual citizen.

I like to explore.  I have an inquisitive mind.  When something new comes along, I want to find out about it.  I’m not Evel Knievel or anything, but I don’t want to breath my last breath thinking, “you know, I wish I had had the guts to do that one thing…”   You get the idea.

Being inquisitive is not without consequences.  You learn pretty fast that in order to stay alive/unharmed, sometimes you should use a shovel or a stick to poke things instead of just picking them up with your hands.  Still, there are some moments which are pretty boolean.  You either open pandora’s box, or you don’t.  Learning to drive;  Eating a new food;  Skydiving…  There are just some things that you just tend to have to jump into wholly, or not at all.  I’m happy that I live in a country that affords me the opportunity and freedom to make such choices.

Now then, about those consequences…  If you play the game long enough, they eventually get you. This post is for the most part about my getting my comeuppance.

Last week I went and got a prescription to buy and take marijuana.  I have suffered from lower back and ankle pain for years, and I figured that it would be better to take some marijuana for that pain rather than popping Vicodin and muscle relaxants every time I had an episode… I have friends that use it for similar purposes, and say that it works very well.

It was neat!  I explored the various dispensaries, and purchased cool paraphernalia.  Exciting times.

During this time, I have a chest cold and  I am taking all kinds of OTC cough/cold medications along with prescription cough medicine with Codeine.  Oh, and my schedule is all out of whack and I have forgotten to take my prescription prozac for a few of the days this week.  All in all, I am the last person in the world who should be taking drugs of any kind at this point.

Soooo…  Saturday I wake up and, as I am prone to do, I don’t bother to eat anything.  The wife has left to run some errands, and I figure (being the brilliant person that I am) “this would be a GREAT time for me to experiment!  I set up the vaporizer that I purchased a couple of days prior, with great anticipation…

Some background:  I had been trying for a couple of days to get some kind of reaction.  I had tried the THC laced candy, and the Glycerin drops that you take sublingually:  All to absolutely no effect.  My mindset at this point is “screw this jazz, I am going to get a reaction out of this…”  After all, you can’t overdose on pot, so what’s the risk?  If things get too bad, I’ll just go take a nap and sleep it off.

Wow… Just. Wow.  If you ever find yourself saying “how bad could it be”, that’s generally a pretty big red flag.  Just sayin’.

So I fire up the vaporizer.  What shall be my herb of choice?  Hrmmm… Here’s one that sounds like it will be effective:  It’s called “Vader”.  (Again, a sane person may have recognized this as a red flag…)  Everything is hooked up and off we go.  Took a hit.  Nothing much.  Very very very clean.  It should be noted that I HATE smoking anything, and this was much better.  Took another hit… and another.  I was going to get an effect out of this dammit.  I can’t tell you how many hits I took, but quite shortly I started feeling it.

Putting the vaporizer away was challenging (I had to put it away, because Jenn will be mad if she finds out, right?!?), and I could feel that things were only going to get worse, and quickly.  Couldn’t actually figure out how to get the stuff back into the box.  Kind of gave up at some point, and went up to the bedroom to relax.  Not much relaxing happened there.

Ok… starting to freak out.  Better call in support.  Now, I am aware that the drunk/stoned-phone call is not socially acceptable, but at this point, it’s gonna happen.  I have been unwise and I must pay.  Humiliation is just part of the territory.  I’m not thrilled with the idea, but I’m used to it.

So I’m on the phone with Aaron.  We talk for something like… 2 minutes?.. or maybe an hour.  I have no idea, because time dilation is now in full effect.  Aaron tells me not to call Jenn.  He tells me not to call 911.  Panic levels have now skyrocketed into the stratosphere, and I hang up on Aaron and call both Jenn and 911.

Sooo… calling Jenn was actually pretty easy.  Something in the tone of my voice tells her that it’s less important to ask questions and more important to get here as soon as possible.

911 was more interesting.  Something in the back of my head is still sane enough to realize that I would like to keep collateral damage to my house and myself to a minimum.  So I’m talking to the operator and trying at one and the same time to convince her that there’s nothing to worry about because I’m just freaking out on Marijuana, but also that if they don’t get here in the next minute, the world may in fact end.

Now I need to get out of the house.  Not too far out of the house.  There is a road out there, with cars that could theoretically run me over.  I just need to get out onto the front porch, preferably with some clothes on, so that doors do not need to be kicked in when the medical personnel get here and want to talk to me.  I also need to keep the dogs inside the house.  This is not easy, but I manage it, somehow.

Jenn calls me.  “Don’t let them take you to the hospital, I am just around the corner”.   I’m imagining the conversation with the theoretical medical personnel where I tell them that I’m thankful for their showing up, but my wife will be home soon, so if they could just hold on…

About 15 years later, (time dilation is pretty weird), a fire-truck pulls in front of my house.  Introductions are made.  Questions are asked.  I am probably a GIGANTIC ass.  Someone asking me for pertinent information at this point is on par with interrogating a rock, or the sky.  I inform my very helpful saviors of this.  They are not impressed by my wit.  I also inform them that they cannot take me, but have to wait for my wife to get here.  They are not thrilled with this idea, and they let me know that I will need to sign a waver stating that I am declining their assistance.  I explain to them that in my current state, my signature is probably not worth the ink it’s written with.  Having somehow lost a battle of brains with a complete imbecile, my helpers resign themselves to waiting there for my wife to show up.

Ok!  After something like a million more years, Jenn gets home.  So now the fun part starts.  All the nice uniformed men depart, I go put on some sweats and slippers, and off we go to the emergency room!

I’m going to skip ahead a bit, actually.  Suffice it to say, that was Saturday.  It is now Tuesday evening.  I am only now getting to a point where my world is stabilizing. Sunday and Monday, I suffered through a series of panic attacks that left me an emotional wreck.  (I have had attacks before, but this time made anything I’d experienced before seem trivial…)  Fun fact that I heard from one of the Doctors that I saw: A survey was carried out on heart attack patients which also suffered from panic disorders.  A majority of those surveyed stated that they would rather have a heart attack than a panic attack.  I will tell you now that this is absolutely true.

All fun aside, I have put myself and my family through a terrifying ordeal.  I would not wish such a thing on another human being.  I’m just glad that I have decent health insurance, but at the same time, I certainly got to see how many problems exist in the system we have now.  Not horrible, but certainly room for improvement.

Go, explore your world.  Just remember that being free to do something doesn’t mean that you are free of the consequences of your choices.

Pet Shop Boys ARE awesome… however I’m not sure they deserve to be awesome for quite as long as they have been on this blog.  To this end, I must have a new post.

This weekend I tried an entirely legal (at least in CA) psychoactive drug called Salvia.  It was really interesting.  If anyone ever wants to try it, you can get it at your local tobacco shop.  If you DID want to try it, please do some online research so that you know what to expect, and DEFINITELY try it in a safe place, with some people you trust. (Really, this is not something you want to do around people who like to screw with you…)

The whole thing lasts for MAYBE 20 minutes, and I can’t imagine anyone getting addicted to it.  It’s not an uncomfortable experience, although I can imagine that it COULD be if you were in a bad mental frame to begin with.  That being said, it’s not really a relaxing experience either.  You really do go on a pretty intense trip for a few minutes.  It is NOT a party drug.  You are not going to get buzzed on this and attempt to interact with ANYTHING.

All in all it was fascinating.  I would totally recommend it although I hate the fact that I had to smoke it.  Blech.

Ok, so in other news.  Went out to Hollywood on Saturday with my lovely wife Jennifer and my great friend Aaron.  Crazy crazy crazy good times.  Most fun I’ve had in… geez… probably years.  Can’t stop thinking about it.  Aaron’s Dr. Horrible Costume was awesome, and my wife was absolutely stunning.

Only one drawback to speak of.  We didn’t get to bed until 4AM on either Friday OR Saturday, and I just can’t hang anymore.  My body was SO very displeased with me on Sunday.  Don’t care.  Would do it again tomorrow… Maybe just leave the club a bit earlier!

All in all:  Epic weekend.  Thanks Jenn!  Thanks Aaron!

Check out their new video!  I dig it!

I usually like to steer clear of mocking anyone’s spiritual beliefs, if for no other reason than that it serves no real purpose other than annoying those who would be listening to me.  This week though, I’ve just got to address my good Catholic friends.  To those folks, I have to say (calmly, and with no malice), “what the fuck?”

Most religions that I’ve looked at have some skeletons in the closet… some thing(s) that maybe happened 25, 100, maybe 500+ years ago that the modern practitioner has to do some mental gymnastics to work around.  With the religion I was raised in, there is racism, mysticism, and polygamy.  With others there is much the same.  Actually, there is stuff that goes on in many if not most religions today that most people not of that particular faith would probably characterize as “bat-shit crazy”.  It’s pretty amazing the way the brain can work around cognitive dissonance…  I guess when you finally go all-in with the whole “great sky wizard” thing, resolving a few dozen or so blatant doctrinal contradictions or logical fallacies is not that big of an obstacle.

That being said, there are times when I wake up and I read something, and I just think, “That’s it!  That religion is done.  There is no way that anyone is going to THAT church anymore after this…”  It happens whenever it comes out in the news that some pastor had 20 mansions and a mistress, etc…  Even in those situations, I know deep in my heart that there is a immense population of kind souls who can forgive even the most egregious betrayal of trust and will dutifully continue to donate their pension money to help the poor sinner through the hell of drug rehab… which will undoubtedly be administered in one of the 20 mansions…

Now then, back to my “WTF Catholics”-point:
According to a recent Time magazine article, “Archibishop Jose Cardoso Sobrinho of the coastal city of Recife announced that the Vatican was excommunicating the family of a <9 year old> local girl who had been raped and impregnated with twins by her stepfather, because they had chosen to have the girl undergo an abortion. The Church excommunicated the doctors who performed the procedure as well… ” Apparently the rapist himself was NOT excommunicated. Child abuse just doesn’t rank up there in the churches sin scale.

So once again… to my good Catholic friends… I say again: “WTF?”.  How many times does this church have to literally and figuratively screw your children before you find another place to hang your hat on the Sabbath?

A quick way to quit blogging is to promise that the next time you write I will address a particular subject…  Thereafter, although I may wish to blog, I will am unable to do so without feeling that I must talk about said topic, even if my zeal for it has faded somewhat.  From now on, I think I will try to keep my posts “in the moment”…

(Afterthought: I realized immediately after publishing this that I am essentially promising that in future posts I won’t promise anything about future posts… hooray irony!)

It is your right to hate. You can spew forth the most vile vitriolic refuse that you want, and I will defend your right to make an ass out of yourself.

It is not your right to impose your hatred on others arbitrarily.

Usually, I’m quite proud to call California my home. While I don’t necessarily embrace far left hippie culture, I do lean more left than right. Although CA has its share of problems, we are often at the front of the push for progress, and that makes me happy. That being said, I was embarrassed that on a day that marked a huge step forward for civil rights, my state took a big step backward. I was further embarrassed by the fact that the church I was raised in had a substantial role in pushing the legislation.

I think my next few posts will be devoted to discussing exactly why the arguments for prop-8 are fundamentally flawed…

I have a problem…

I can’t actually do anything.  Oh, it’s not that I’m unskilled.  It’s just that I get an idea in my head… and then I get to thinking…

Hey, but it would be even better if I did it this way…

OH!  And I could do that too!!!

… all of which is true.  Unfortunately, when I think about all of the things that need to be done to bring my perfect vision to fruition, it just becomes overwhelming and I end up doing nothing.

This blog post, for example.  It has been running around in my thoughts all week.  “What would the perfect kickoff post for my blog be like?…” And you see how long it’s taken.  It is only for fear of my friend Aaron’s head actually exploding (he told me that it would if I didn’t post something soon) that I finally sat down to just get something out there.

So there it is.  I think my approach to this, at least in the beginning, will be just an imperfect mess of thoughts.  But wait… what if I…

Behold!  My descent into narcissistic bliss has begun.  I has blog!