Social Darwinism in the 21st Century, the working class devours each other
In the weeks of the close of 2008, we have seen an amazing thing, that the fate of millions of working class families is being downplayed by the other members of the working class. I am talking about that dark night of disaster that could befall the members of the one of the greatest labor organizations to come out of the shadows of the Great Depression, the UAW.
We seen the financial giants of Wall Street stride smugly into the hearing rooms of the nation’s capital, and walk away with a bonanza of taxpayer bucks, with no questions and no strings attached in October. The Big Three or the US automakers announced that they are on thin ice financially and in need of some help, 25 billion dollars worth. When the big three CEO’s sat at the hearing tables in Washington, they were asked how they traveled to the meeting, and were roundly criticized for using their corporate jets. Then they were told to come up with a plan and come back and talk. Well, after traveling by hybrid vehicle back to DC, they submitted a plan for 34 billion dollars of assistance. This amount was reduced to 14 billion and is in jeopardy of being shot down by a block of GOP Senators from the Deep South. Why is there so much resistance to helping our US auto industry?
The UAW is the reason, for the white power paradigm has long hated this organization. When the UAW was created in the 1930’s, it represented all workers, white and black, fighting for better pay, benefits and working conditions for all. In the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s; it was the UAW who marched alongside the civil rights protesters. A presence at all of the demonstrations, from the march on Washington in 1963 to the Memphis Sanitation Workers strike in 1968, was Walter Reuther, the first President of the UAW, who became a icon and martyr of the movement. The UAW not only fought for its members, but for all who were marginalized in our society, all of the progressive policies from the New Deal to the present have the stamp of the UAW on them. Social Security, Unemployment insurance, Medicare, Medicaid to name a few, came from the social movements of progressive industrial labor organizations like the UAW.
Starting in the early Reagan years, the UAW came under attack, with the upsurge of imports eating away at the market share of the US automakers. This is when the concept of “team” came about, management and labor working together to increase efficiency and cut costs. Actually, if you examine this period of the 80’s and 90’s, it was management who came away from the table with the lion share of cost reductions, introduction of robotics, work rule changes and a declining worker population. The workers and the UAW were consoled with the fact, that they saved their jobs for the moment. The auto boom of the 90’s was not shared by the UAW by the big three, for the jobs kept declining, with plant closures, line consolidations and spinning off of the parts plants. This increased the profit share of the big three 1,000 fold, while the gain share by labor was nil, other than the profit sharing payments that some workers received at the time; which if considered alongside the rule changes, job reductions and plant closures were insignificant. The beginning of the new millennium was the start of another round of problems with market share for the big three.
This slide to the bottom by the US automakers was also dragging the UAW with it. The Big Three, who had a fascination with SUV’s and trucks, that when loaded up with accessories normally seen on luxury cars, yielded them fantastic profits. All made possible by the work rule changes, automation and job cuts agreed to by the UAW. The labor cost of a new vehicle had slid to only 10%, including wages, healthcare and pension; while the profit share had sky rocketed.
As energy prices started to spike, the US automakers made even bigger SUVs’ and trucks that were harder and harder on gas. They resisted calls from their dealers and the public to make more fuel efficient vehicles for one reason; the profit margin on them was lower. All the while, the big three whipsawed the members of the UAW, having them compete amongst themselves for product lines; who ever made the most concessions received the work. In 2007, the contract talks yielded the greatest step backward in the history of the UAW, with the members agreeing to a 50% wage reduction for new workers, increasing the timeframe for temporary workers to one year and eliminating or reducing healthcare, and pension benefits. The industry went through a series of buyouts of workers who are grandfathered under the older agreements. As a result the numbers of workers receiving the higher wages were cut. Now comes the final chapter in 2008 and the decimation of millions of worker families by their fellow workers.
Instead of being critical of the failure of the US automakers to react to the energy prices, calls for green cars and re-engineering the idea of the auto in our society, we have seen the tried and true method of bash the workers used by their enemies and surprisingly by their fellow working class members. I am constantly amazed that folks who have and still are being marginalized into poverty by wages that have lost purchasing power take delight in the plight of the autoworkers. They used the tired clichés and rhetoric, of the US Chamber of Commerce and the right to pour salt into the wounds of the autoworkers caused by the assault on them by the GOP.
Why cannot workers, all workers understand that the battles that other workers are fighting are really their battles too? For a loss of wages, benefits and other things that were hard fought for by our predecessors’ on the picket line, in the streets and in the courts; will come home to all of us eventually.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
What can Big Three do in order to survive?
PATRICK SAUNDERS
As Yogi Berra said so aptly, “its déjà vu all over again.” The column by Mark Mix, spokesperson for the National Right to Work Committee echoed its same old tired refrain, blame the workers and the unions, and arguing against helping the U.S. auto industry — Ford, GM and Chrysler in their time of trouble.
Mr. Mix’s argument that lays all of the woes on the doorstep of the UAW simply does not hold water in the present time. The UAW leadership has worked hand and glove with the Big Three since the early 80s to make their operations more efficient, allowing drastic changes in work rules, the introduction of automation and robotics that lowered the labor cost per unit to its lowest point. While this allowed the Big Three to greatly increase their profits on larger cars and SUV’s loaded with accessories once thought to be luxuries. The UAW and its declining worker-membership base were not allowed to have input into the type of products being made.
If you look at the UAW plants in this region, the impact of the concessions by labor was shown in the drop in work force. The now closed Ford plant in Lorain once employed more than 5,000 workers. After the concessions of the 80s, the workforce there shrank by one half in the early 90s and by another 50 percent before it closed its doors several years ago. The former New Departure in Perkins Township that had thousands of workers now has about 800. The former Ford/Visteon/ACH plant in Margaretta Township has shrunk by half or more from about 2500. The UAW members have been forced into a defensive posture, ratifying contracts in 2007 that cut wages by 50 percent to an average worker wage of $29,000 a year and reduced benefits (pension and healthcare) won by years of negotiating to a mere shadow of their former selves. What this means is that auto workers with families cannot afford to buy the cars they make every day. So to picture them as an omnipotent power in the 21st century as Mr. Mix did in his column is far from the truth.
Mr. Mix talks about the foreign plants in our country, Toyota, Nissan, Hyundai and Mercedes being among them and their profitability. He points out that they are in “Right to Work” states, but does not discuss that those states took on major debt in infrastructure costs, economic aid and training of employees to lure those plants. In Alabama, the Mercedes plant located there costs the state annually more than the taxes it produces. The average wage in all of those plants is about $15 per hour and they are heavily automated to reduce the number of workers needed. Their workforce is also much younger than the Big Three’s and has not incurred the healthcare and pension costs of the big three. The ripple from these plants in the local economic pond has not helped those states to shake off the desperate poverty that traps more than half of their citizens.
One element that Mr. Mix does not discuss is healthcare costs, something that the Big Three cannot control, health care costs run about $1600 per unit in the US, opposed to about $250 per unit in Canada, the land of the hated socialized medicine, but where most of the new auto plants have been built. Healthcare, a central issue of the recent campaign is one of the causes of our inability to compete on a global scale, for all of the other developed nations have a single payer healthcare system in place. This allows manufacturers to concentrate on producing products, and not on negotiating increasing costs with HMOs, PPOs and Insurance corporations for health care services that rank 37th in the world in quality and first in cost. But that would cast aspersions on those who really fund the National Right to Work Committee and pay Mr. Mix’s salary.
The question we should be asking ourselves, what will happen if the Big Three are allowed to crumble? In our area, there are at least a dozen plants that will probably close or reduce operations drastically. Across the Great Lakes Region are hundreds of thousands of families who are directly tied to the future of the big three, either through employment or their retirement pension. What will happen to these folks? Retirees will find their income reduced by at least 33 percent when the Federal Pension Benefit Guarantee Fund absorbs them into its system, which is also running in the red from the increase of failures of private corporate pension funds in the last 10 years. Health care for the employees will end immediately and retirees will find their healthcare either drastically reduced or cease to exist as the payments cease from the auto companies into the UAW VEBA (the UAW took over the administration of the retiree healthcare from the Big Three) created last year from the new contracts. These folks are going to be forced to ask the government for help to live and their request has to be answered, for they are our neighbors, friends, and family. So instead of killing the messenger of bad news, which Mr. Mix advocates, what about discussing the shape that the U.S. auto industry should take in the future to compete in the global market? What about breaking the hold that the fossil fuel cartel (BP, Exxon, OPEC etc.) has over our economy? Involving the manufacturing expertise and trained workforce of the Big Three in creating a green solution for our transportation quandary in this country would be a better choice than letting them be bought up piece meal on the cheap by foreign corporations in a bankruptcy fire sale.
After all, we don’t want Toyotas to be the only make of car racing on the NASCAR circuit, do we?
PATRICK SAUNDERS
As Yogi Berra said so aptly, “its déjà vu all over again.” The column by Mark Mix, spokesperson for the National Right to Work Committee echoed its same old tired refrain, blame the workers and the unions, and arguing against helping the U.S. auto industry — Ford, GM and Chrysler in their time of trouble.
Mr. Mix’s argument that lays all of the woes on the doorstep of the UAW simply does not hold water in the present time. The UAW leadership has worked hand and glove with the Big Three since the early 80s to make their operations more efficient, allowing drastic changes in work rules, the introduction of automation and robotics that lowered the labor cost per unit to its lowest point. While this allowed the Big Three to greatly increase their profits on larger cars and SUV’s loaded with accessories once thought to be luxuries. The UAW and its declining worker-membership base were not allowed to have input into the type of products being made.
If you look at the UAW plants in this region, the impact of the concessions by labor was shown in the drop in work force. The now closed Ford plant in Lorain once employed more than 5,000 workers. After the concessions of the 80s, the workforce there shrank by one half in the early 90s and by another 50 percent before it closed its doors several years ago. The former New Departure in Perkins Township that had thousands of workers now has about 800. The former Ford/Visteon/ACH plant in Margaretta Township has shrunk by half or more from about 2500. The UAW members have been forced into a defensive posture, ratifying contracts in 2007 that cut wages by 50 percent to an average worker wage of $29,000 a year and reduced benefits (pension and healthcare) won by years of negotiating to a mere shadow of their former selves. What this means is that auto workers with families cannot afford to buy the cars they make every day. So to picture them as an omnipotent power in the 21st century as Mr. Mix did in his column is far from the truth.
Mr. Mix talks about the foreign plants in our country, Toyota, Nissan, Hyundai and Mercedes being among them and their profitability. He points out that they are in “Right to Work” states, but does not discuss that those states took on major debt in infrastructure costs, economic aid and training of employees to lure those plants. In Alabama, the Mercedes plant located there costs the state annually more than the taxes it produces. The average wage in all of those plants is about $15 per hour and they are heavily automated to reduce the number of workers needed. Their workforce is also much younger than the Big Three’s and has not incurred the healthcare and pension costs of the big three. The ripple from these plants in the local economic pond has not helped those states to shake off the desperate poverty that traps more than half of their citizens.
One element that Mr. Mix does not discuss is healthcare costs, something that the Big Three cannot control, health care costs run about $1600 per unit in the US, opposed to about $250 per unit in Canada, the land of the hated socialized medicine, but where most of the new auto plants have been built. Healthcare, a central issue of the recent campaign is one of the causes of our inability to compete on a global scale, for all of the other developed nations have a single payer healthcare system in place. This allows manufacturers to concentrate on producing products, and not on negotiating increasing costs with HMOs, PPOs and Insurance corporations for health care services that rank 37th in the world in quality and first in cost. But that would cast aspersions on those who really fund the National Right to Work Committee and pay Mr. Mix’s salary.
The question we should be asking ourselves, what will happen if the Big Three are allowed to crumble? In our area, there are at least a dozen plants that will probably close or reduce operations drastically. Across the Great Lakes Region are hundreds of thousands of families who are directly tied to the future of the big three, either through employment or their retirement pension. What will happen to these folks? Retirees will find their income reduced by at least 33 percent when the Federal Pension Benefit Guarantee Fund absorbs them into its system, which is also running in the red from the increase of failures of private corporate pension funds in the last 10 years. Health care for the employees will end immediately and retirees will find their healthcare either drastically reduced or cease to exist as the payments cease from the auto companies into the UAW VEBA (the UAW took over the administration of the retiree healthcare from the Big Three) created last year from the new contracts. These folks are going to be forced to ask the government for help to live and their request has to be answered, for they are our neighbors, friends, and family. So instead of killing the messenger of bad news, which Mr. Mix advocates, what about discussing the shape that the U.S. auto industry should take in the future to compete in the global market? What about breaking the hold that the fossil fuel cartel (BP, Exxon, OPEC etc.) has over our economy? Involving the manufacturing expertise and trained workforce of the Big Three in creating a green solution for our transportation quandary in this country would be a better choice than letting them be bought up piece meal on the cheap by foreign corporations in a bankruptcy fire sale.
After all, we don’t want Toyotas to be the only make of car racing on the NASCAR circuit, do we?
Thursday, July 24, 2008
“The Road to Megiddo”
In the time of the Tuthmosis III, one of the greatest Pharaohs of Egypt fought a great battle in 1479 B.C., in a town called Megiddo in Palestine. The outcome of that battle set the tone for the region for hundreds of years, in that Egypt reigned supreme, until she fell apart from the inside as most great powers do. That battle was of such significance at the time, that it became the fabric of a legend known as “Armageddon,” the battle to end all battles and to end the world, as we know it.
The recent happenings in Southwest Asia, referred to by many as the Middle East, with Israelis’ attacking the “Hezbollah” in Lebanon, after some of their soldiers were kidnapped by them, could open the entire region to more strife and suffering if that is possible. But the burning question is, what will we do, the most powerful nation in the world about this latest threat to the peace of the world? As the talking heads talk ceaselessly about yet another challenge to the administration of George Bush, I wonder what is really going on in his mind, as he confronts what amounts to a multi-faceted problem in dealing with a region, whose significance in terms of importance is best articulated in the prices posted at the local gas station?
Up to now, we have been dealing with problems that are at most two dimensional, Iraq, Afghanistan and the Al Qaeda. Now we have fires breaking out all over, the Iranians are in the mix for hegemony in Southwest Asia (as they did in the days of Alexander the Great), a group of Islamic Taliban style fundamentalists are on the verge of taking over in Somalia, trains are blowing up in India, the North Koreans have fired missiles of different shapes and abilities in a challenge to that region and us, the IDF (the Israeli Army) has rolled back into the Gaza Strip in retaliation to the Palestinian Militia capturing an Israeli soldier, and now Lebanon is erupting again after a relative lengthy period of quiet (even with the strife about the assassination of the former Prime Minister, it was still quiet compared with the years of war prior). The one player that has the ability to control or bring some sanity to the process is our country in all of these issues.
But when you have a President who seems to be under the sway of evangelicals who believe in the end times, and the last battle, the battle of Armageddon, will he act in such a way to stem the movement towards chaos or will he let it flow as if to fulfill the prophecies of the Christian evangelical movement?
The Islamic “evangelicals” also believe in the re-creation of the Caliphate in that region, in which an Islamic government headed by a single person will rule as in the days after the rise of Mohammadism. The Christian Evangelicals believe that this will be the beginning of the return of the Son of God to Earth and his establishment of his kingdom. In Israel, there are also the Jewish “evangelicals” who believe in the re-establishment of the Jewish Kingdom of old; and it will rule as in olden times. These folks are also part of the settler movement on the West Bank. It is their fondest wish to foment the chaos needed to set in action, the return of the Kingdom of David.
In some ways, there is similarity in these dueling beliefs; all entail the establishment of monarchial governments. The Islamists see a caliphate headed by a man, picked by the imams and mullahs to carry out the word of Allah. While the Christians see a return of Christ to Earth to rule and I am sure that they see themselves (Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, etc.) as the chosen to assist in this rule. The Jewish “evangelicals” see a Jew ordained by God on the throne of David, ruling and in the just manner of David, with the aid of Yahweh, or God, the Jewish God, which incidentally is the basis for both Christianity and Islam. All of these ideas are utopian in nature that each of these kingdoms will be perfect and harmonious in their rule over the Earth.
I guess that there could be some hope, if it was not for the human factor attached to all of them, for all of these ideas, although divinely inspired; the framework for them has come from man. For it is man, who set these ideas to paper and created the texts that outline these coming events; and after you look at the history of man kind on this planet, it gets rather disheartening, for as long as man and human kind are part of the equation, it seems like we will be subject to its (humanity) failings, as demonstrated in the past. For the bottom lines in all of these harmonious kingdoms, are the forced imposition of a belief system on everyone and the eradication of those who will not accept that belief system. Which does not sound any different than spreading freedom and liberty by us, which is not going over to good in Afghanistan and Iraq at the present or when the Taliban tried to force their beliefs on the Afghanis?
History has shown us that our time on earth is transitory, and at some time in the future, the residents or perhaps visitors to this planet we call earth, will be searching the archaeological ruins of our time, like we searched the ruins left by that Great Pharaoh, Tuthmosis III. Will they, our children's children's children's children's children, ad infinitum, be as dismayed at what they find to be cause of end of our epoch, that dismayed the majority of us who lived during that time? Which are our human failings of prejudice and hate in dealing with each other’s beliefs, cultures and differences; and to make a world based on harmony and peace? Will these human failings truly be the cause of our “Megiddo,” that great battle of legend, or can we learn from the past and not be condemned by it?
Winning Wars in the 21st century
When I was in elementary school and in high school, I was always fascinated by American History, our history. I bought the whole “Great Story” style of the text books, a style that even pervaded other historical books and works of fiction in those days. Being a baby boom child, the product of a returning war veteran and a home front warrior, my dad was in the service in the Atlantic and Pacific theaters from December 15, 1941 till January, 1946; my mother, a 15 year old young woman, worked at Wright Patterson Air Base during the war, dissembling the airplane engines that had been salvaged from the wreckage of war. It was natural that war would fascinate me, after all I lived in the greatest country in history, and who had never lost a war.
As children, we would discuss the potential for us to experience war as our parents had, and actually hoped that it would happen. Before, I go further, remember we were a generation who saw the old news reels of the crowds throwing roses at our troops as they liberated one town after another in Europe, and watched the documentary “Victory at Sea,” which set to music the great crusade against darkness our fathers had taken part in WWII. Korea was another story, and really an unfinished one, as we are finding out over 50 years after the cease fire and armistice was agreed to in 1953.
So we immersed ourselves in the glorious stories of the last real fight against darkness, which was not tinged with politics and grey areas. I think that is why the class of ‘46, our fathers and uncles, who fought in that war, had a hard time reacting to the political wars that started with Korea and are still with us. For them a war was to be fought until “victory” was achieved. That was the way in their war, after all. The idea of waging war without victory was unthinkable, and therefore they did not accept the idea, that troops would be sent into harm’s way without a clear idea of the goals, other than to contain the other side or to demonstrate willingness to shed blood for no clear purpose.
So as we went to war, and dreamed of being pelted with roses from a grateful people for being liberated from evil, we were awakened from our dreams being pelted with anything but roses, and told that they did not want us there. Some of the people who doing the talking were our own, and the romantic idea of the just war was crushed in our minds. Now some 40 years later, we are in a war without end again, which I truthfully did not think would happen again. For if you look at the conflicts after Vietnam, they all have one thing in common, shortness of duration and clear goals. Also the opponents were clearly those who we could overwhelm easily and bring the conflict to an end quickly, Grenada, Panama and even the first Gulf War falls into that category.
When the neo-cons, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Cheney, lobbied for a war with Iraq, they assured the people, that it would be of short duration and that we would welcomed as liberators. Well, they were right on the shortness of the “war,” the actual invasion of Iraq and terribly wrong about the reception. There were some incidents of people welcoming our troops, but that ended five minutes after the regime was deposed. Now we are the occupier, represented by that armed patrol cruising through neighborhoods in Baghdad, with scared kids doing sweeps and armed to the teeth, when they should be at home planning for college or working a job.
We are told that right is on our side that we are on the side of freedom and liberation, spreading democracy throughout the world. But in the 21st century, what is right? I am sure that the insurgents feel that right is on their side, for they are attacking a foreign military presence in their land, the same as we would do if the situation was reversed. Just like those who are in Hamas on the West Bank and in Gaza, feel that their struggle against Israel is just, as they see their family members die in missile and artillery attacks by the IDF. Just as the Israelis feel that they are right, in their attacks against Lebanon and the Palestinians, seeing their family members die from suicide attacks and now from rocket attacks. Just as the Hezbollah feel that their fight is just, to punish the Israelis for attacking them. The only problem is that not everyone can be right, all of the time and in every issue.
A talking head on a Sunday TV news show, in trying to justify the continuing attacks on Beirut and the rest of Lebanon, said that the eight people killed in Israel, was the same proportionally as if 500 people were killed in the US. The dissonance in that rationalization of Israel’s response in Lebanon struck me. The death of a human being, is the same no matter where it happens, it is a tragedy. That is the point that we should be making, not that some are worth more and others are worth less somehow, that is how we got in trouble as a human race in the 20th century.
In the 21st century, maybe we as the human race should accept that war is in fact unwinnable, for the abstract reasons we fight them in this century. That it is time to use other means to reach that middle ground, before we waste the lives of our youth and treasure that could be put to better purposes. Just six years ago, we turned the page on the 20th century that was both a time of unparalleled achievement by human kind and a time of unparalleled slaughter by human kind.In the 21st century, winning wars is not fighting them, but dealing with the problems that cause them proactively and unselfishly. Call me a dreamer, but “Imagine.”
Winning Wars in the 21st century
When I was in elementary school and in high school, I was always fascinated by American History, our history. I bought the whole “Great Story” style of the text books, a style that even pervaded other historical books and works of fiction in those days. Being a baby boom child, the product of a returning war veteran and a home front warrior, my dad was in the service in the Atlantic and Pacific theaters from December 15, 1941 till January, 1946; my mother, a 15 year old young woman, worked at Wright Patterson Air Base during the war, dissembling the airplane engines that had been salvaged from the wreckage of war. It was natural that war would fascinate me, after all I lived in the greatest country in history, and who had never lost a war.
As children, we would discuss the potential for us to experience war as our parents had, and actually hoped that it would happen. Before, I go further, remember we were a generation who saw the old news reels of the crowds throwing roses at our troops as they liberated one town after another in Europe, and watched the documentary “Victory at Sea,” which set to music the great crusade against darkness our fathers had taken part in WWII. Korea was another story, and really an unfinished one, as we are finding out over 50 years after the cease fire and armistice was agreed to in 1953.
So we immersed ourselves in the glorious stories of the last real fight against darkness, which was not tinged with politics and grey areas. I think that is why the class of ‘46, our fathers and uncles, who fought in that war, had a hard time reacting to the political wars that started with Korea and are still with us. For them a war was to be fought until “victory” was achieved. That was the way in their war, after all. The idea of waging war without victory was unthinkable, and therefore they did not accept the idea, that troops would be sent into harm’s way without a clear idea of the goals, other than to contain the other side or to demonstrate willingness to shed blood for no clear purpose.
So as we went to war, and dreamed of being pelted with roses from a grateful people for being liberated from evil, we were awakened from our dreams being pelted with anything but roses, and told that they did not want us there. Some of the people who doing the talking were our own, and the romantic idea of the just war was crushed in our minds. Now some 40 years later, we are in a war without end again, which I truthfully did not think would happen again. For if you look at the conflicts after Vietnam, they all have one thing in common, shortness of duration and clear goals. Also the opponents were clearly those who we could overwhelm easily and bring the conflict to an end quickly, Grenada, Panama and even the first Gulf War falls into that category.
When the neo-cons, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Cheney, lobbied for a war with Iraq, they assured the people, that it would be of short duration and that we would welcomed as liberators. Well, they were right on the shortness of the “war,” the actual invasion of Iraq and terribly wrong about the reception. There were some incidents of people welcoming our troops, but that ended five minutes after the regime was deposed. Now we are the occupier, represented by that armed patrol cruising through neighborhoods in Baghdad, with scared kids doing sweeps and armed to the teeth, when they should be at home planning for college or working a job.
We are told that right is on our side that we are on the side of freedom and liberation, spreading democracy throughout the world. But in the 21st century, what is right? I am sure that the insurgents feel that right is on their side, for they are attacking a foreign military presence in their land, the same as we would do if the situation was reversed. Just like those who are in Hamas on the West Bank and in Gaza, feel that their struggle against Israel is just, as they see their family members die in missile and artillery attacks by the IDF. Just as the Israelis feel that they are right, in their attacks against Lebanon and the Palestinians, seeing their family members die from suicide attacks and now from rocket attacks. Just as the Hezbollah feel that their fight is just, to punish the Israelis for attacking them. The only problem is that not everyone can be right, all of the time and in every issue.
A talking head on a Sunday TV news show, in trying to justify the continuing attacks on Beirut and the rest of Lebanon, said that the eight people killed in Israel, was the same proportionally as if 500 people were killed in the US. The dissonance in that rationalization of Israel’s response in Lebanon struck me. The death of a human being, is the same no matter where it happens, it is a tragedy. That is the point that we should be making, not that some are worth more and others are worth less somehow, that is how we got in trouble as a human race in the 20th century.
In the 21st century, maybe we as the human race should accept that war is in fact unwinnable, for the abstract reasons we fight them in this century. That it is time to use other means to reach that middle ground, before we waste the lives of our youth and treasure that could be put to better purposes. Just six years ago, we turned the page on the 20th century that was both a time of unparalleled achievement by human kind and a time of unparalleled slaughter by human kind. In the 21st century, winning wars is not fighting them, but dealing with the problems that cause them proactively and unselfishly. Call me a dreamer, but “Imagine.”
Choices and Risk Taking
It is a clear day, traffic is heavy and a motorist who is heading north bound in the right-hand lane of a four lane highway, and impulsively decides to turn across the left hand north bound, the middle turn lane and the two south bound lanes to enter a gas station. The turn is best described as a “swerve” by those who were cutoff by this motorist. The motorist almost makes this “turn,” the only obstacle was a south bound motorcyclist who was taken unawares by this motorist and unable to stop in time. The motorist hits the motorcyclist and his bike, running over top of both of them. The motorcyclist was seriously injured and tragically, died from those injuries. The motorist is fine, and won’t be worrying about getting gas for a while, hopefully while sitting behind bars for a number of years.
What I described really happened, and if you would relate this to another person, the first comment elicited from them will be, “was he wearing a helmet?” It is almost as if the accident was caused by the motorcyclist because he was or was not wearing a helmet. An analogy of this kind of thinking would be if someone was shot by a gun wielding nut, and the blame would be placed on the victim because they were not wearing a Kevlar vest. You say that I am going too far in that analogy? Why, for it could be part of the argument put forward by the insurance company in a civil action, to discredit the victim. In the accident described above, the motorcycle rider was the victim, but partial blame is going to be assigned to him for not wearing a helmet in the minds of the public at large. The blame assigned to the motorist is almost lessened because of the mindset created by the insurance companies and the media about motorcyclists.
So far this year, there have been many serious automobile accidents, and there have been only a small number of motorcycle accidents. But the attention in the media on a motorcycle accident will center on the wearing of helmet invariably, even though of all these accidents, only one or two can be attributed to rider error. In almost all of the other accidents, the riders were hit by a motorist who was not paying attention or breaking the law. Somehow the illegal act of the motorist takes second place in the blame game to the idea that the rider’s not wearing a helmet that “could have, should have or maybe” made a difference. Does this assigning of blame have implications on other issues in our society?
For when you see a rider wearing a helmet on a motorcycle, and the first word image that is presented in your mind is “responsible.” You see another rider who is not wearing a helmet, the word image that comes to mind, is “risk taker.” The issue is not the helmet, but the image that has been successfully planted in people’s minds about this issue. In Ohio, motorcycle riders have a choice, to wear or not to wear a helmet. This choice was not given to the riders, but came about only after an intensive lobbying and grassroots action by riders across the state against an earlier imposed statute that required the wearing of a helmet by riders. It is a choice that riders are allowed to make, and when you consider the multitude of statutes, one of the few still around. But because of the images planted in public mindset, motorcyclists are seen as risk takers, and not wearing a helmet is the supreme act of risk taking. Risk taking is a part of life and part of American Culture, for our history is full of risk takers who placed their lives at risk to accomplish or to do something out of the norm. The difference is who taking the risk, after all we are governed by risk decision makers, the difference is that they place others in the risk taking roles, i.e., soldiers in combat, and don’t personally take the risks themselves, unlike a motorcyclist.
Choice is also a word that is used in the American Culture, for it is also symbolic of the idea that is the foundation of our freedoms here, that we as individuals have the right to make choices, and as long as those choices do not interfere with the rights of others. Wearing a helmet is one of those choices, and whether it is worn or not, this choice does not impede the on the rights of others. We live in a society that has become so regimented in the rules and or laws that have to be complied with, that our individualism is in danger of being snuffed out. Maybe that is why when a people look at a motorcycle rider out on the highway or on the local streets; they see an individual act of being different, not conforming to society’s strictures, of exercising personal freedom, which is characteristically the basic element of our American Culture.
Maybe that is what scares the establishment the most?
Fanatics with Nukes
Since that fateful day in August of 1945, when the land of the free and the home of the brave let the nuclear genie out of the bottle over a Japanese city in southern Honshu. The world has lived with bated breath, in fear of another appearance of that genie, that would set off Armageddon, the last battle of humankind.
We lived in the shadow of the bomb for over 50 years, during what was called "The Cold War," a war that ran hot, but usually in surrogate countries, like Angola, Vietnam, Laos, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, with surrogate people of color doing the dying for the most part. This kind of shadow war between the East and West, kept those missiles tipped with the power to end the world as we know it, in their launchers. Finally, with demise of the Soviet Union, the Cold War cooled off forever we thought, and a new day seemed to have dawned for all of humankind.
One in which the idea of being vaporized in a nuclear strike or dying a slower death in the aftermath of such an exchange was gone. The future instead of depending on the two global 800 pound gorillas, the USSR and the USA, maintaining a peaceful coexistence towards each other, depended on your efforts at making the lives of your family and community a better place to live. We lived without the idea of an external enemy that wanted to destroy our way of life. Even those small conflicts that rose up in the Balkans and other places did not dint our optimistic outlook on the future. When the idea of terrorist attacks started to rise as a specter on our horizon, they were still not in the range of living with the thought of a nuclear exchange in the back of your mind.
Then 9/11 came and went, and with it, the so-called idea of US invulnerability to attack, went with it. After 9/11, the majority of Americans backed the idea of retaliation against those who planned and launched the horrific attacks on the twin towers, the Pentagon and flight 93. We gladly gave away our freedoms as laid out in that document that made the constitution a living thing, the bill of rights, anything to help make us safe. With 9/11, came the thoughts of being attacked with biological, chemical and nuclear weapons. The nuclear attacks discussed were the so-called dirty bomb that would mainly spread nuclear radiation in a large urban center and cause masses of people to become sick and possibly die from radiation poison. Even the idea of these kinds of attacks, did not raise up those old fears. The one thing that we knew as Americans, that these were weapons that others would employ, not us, for we had principles and values that put the idea of humanity before any thought of pre-emptive attack.
Then March 2003, came and our attack on Iraq and the Hussein regime, a 'quick war,' the resulting long and bloody occupation with our troops fighting insurgents on all sides, and no successful conclusion in sight. During this time, we are still fighting in Afghanistan, looking for the architects of 9/11, and that seems to be another black hole in which our treasure and youth disappear in and are never seen again.
Now, we are in discussions with Iran, over their nuclear technology program, a program that was started some 35 years ago, under the former Shah of Iran, with our help. Our leaders and those of other western nations are fearful that the Iranians will make nuclear weapons with the enriched fuel that their technology program produces. And they are right, for the world with only one super power, a super power that has shown itself ready to commit its might, treasure and youth in a 'pre-emptive' attack on sovereign nations to achieve its foreign policy goals, is a dangerous place for the smaller nations who cannot defend themselves against such a pre-emptive attack. That is why the Iranians want the bomb; for they know it is the last defense against an attack on their nation by a larger super power. For verification of this thought, look at North Korea, the other 'axis of evil,' which sits with the bomb and a four million person army untouched.
Our President, in considering options to deal with Iran, is considering an attack on her nuclear technology sites. This would be what many would consider an unprovoked attacked on a sovereign nation. The worst thing is not the idea of the attack, but it is the idea of an attack that utilizes nuclear weapons to 'make sure' that we wiped out Iran's nuclear capability. The administration and others have talked for months about the dangers of having a so-called rogue nation like Iran with nuclear capability. That we could under the scenarios advanced by them, have our forces attacked in Iraq and other places in the Middle East by Iranian nuclear weaponry. Of course, the main concern is that Israel would be in the cross hairs of an Iranian nuclear onslaught too. So the idea of wild eyed Islamic fundamentalist Iranian fanatics waving nuclear tipped weapons of mass destruction is very scary to many people.
So it should be easy to imagine what the average Iranian person on the street feels, when he or she hears of the President of the United States thoughts on launching what they consider to an unprovoked attack on their country with nuclear weapons. It is easy to see those same thoughts in the Iranians' mind of American fanatics waving nuclear weapons, but these would be wild eyed Christian fundamentalist fanatics like Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, waving these nuclear weapons of mass destruction, urging our President on, and hoping for the "end times" to come from such an attack.
Any scenario is possible when you have fanatics of any kind in charge of the nuclear genie, and the urge to uncork the bottle beckoning you to save the world from what?
We lived in the shadow of the bomb for over 50 years, during what was called "The Cold War," a war that ran hot, but usually in surrogate countries, like Angola, Vietnam, Laos, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, with surrogate people of color doing the dying for the most part. This kind of shadow war between the East and West, kept those missiles tipped with the power to end the world as we know it, in their launchers. Finally, with demise of the Soviet Union, the Cold War cooled off forever we thought, and a new day seemed to have dawned for all of humankind.
One in which the idea of being vaporized in a nuclear strike or dying a slower death in the aftermath of such an exchange was gone. The future instead of depending on the two global 800 pound gorillas, the USSR and the USA, maintaining a peaceful coexistence towards each other, depended on your efforts at making the lives of your family and community a better place to live. We lived without the idea of an external enemy that wanted to destroy our way of life. Even those small conflicts that rose up in the Balkans and other places did not dint our optimistic outlook on the future. When the idea of terrorist attacks started to rise as a specter on our horizon, they were still not in the range of living with the thought of a nuclear exchange in the back of your mind.
Then 9/11 came and went, and with it, the so-called idea of US invulnerability to attack, went with it. After 9/11, the majority of Americans backed the idea of retaliation against those who planned and launched the horrific attacks on the twin towers, the Pentagon and flight 93. We gladly gave away our freedoms as laid out in that document that made the constitution a living thing, the bill of rights, anything to help make us safe. With 9/11, came the thoughts of being attacked with biological, chemical and nuclear weapons. The nuclear attacks discussed were the so-called dirty bomb that would mainly spread nuclear radiation in a large urban center and cause masses of people to become sick and possibly die from radiation poison. Even the idea of these kinds of attacks, did not raise up those old fears. The one thing that we knew as Americans, that these were weapons that others would employ, not us, for we had principles and values that put the idea of humanity before any thought of pre-emptive attack.
Then March 2003, came and our attack on Iraq and the Hussein regime, a 'quick war,' the resulting long and bloody occupation with our troops fighting insurgents on all sides, and no successful conclusion in sight. During this time, we are still fighting in Afghanistan, looking for the architects of 9/11, and that seems to be another black hole in which our treasure and youth disappear in and are never seen again.
Now, we are in discussions with Iran, over their nuclear technology program, a program that was started some 35 years ago, under the former Shah of Iran, with our help. Our leaders and those of other western nations are fearful that the Iranians will make nuclear weapons with the enriched fuel that their technology program produces. And they are right, for the world with only one super power, a super power that has shown itself ready to commit its might, treasure and youth in a 'pre-emptive' attack on sovereign nations to achieve its foreign policy goals, is a dangerous place for the smaller nations who cannot defend themselves against such a pre-emptive attack. That is why the Iranians want the bomb; for they know it is the last defense against an attack on their nation by a larger super power. For verification of this thought, look at North Korea, the other 'axis of evil,' which sits with the bomb and a four million person army untouched.
Our President, in considering options to deal with Iran, is considering an attack on her nuclear technology sites. This would be what many would consider an unprovoked attacked on a sovereign nation. The worst thing is not the idea of the attack, but it is the idea of an attack that utilizes nuclear weapons to 'make sure' that we wiped out Iran's nuclear capability. The administration and others have talked for months about the dangers of having a so-called rogue nation like Iran with nuclear capability. That we could under the scenarios advanced by them, have our forces attacked in Iraq and other places in the Middle East by Iranian nuclear weaponry. Of course, the main concern is that Israel would be in the cross hairs of an Iranian nuclear onslaught too. So the idea of wild eyed Islamic fundamentalist Iranian fanatics waving nuclear tipped weapons of mass destruction is very scary to many people.
So it should be easy to imagine what the average Iranian person on the street feels, when he or she hears of the President of the United States thoughts on launching what they consider to an unprovoked attack on their country with nuclear weapons. It is easy to see those same thoughts in the Iranians' mind of American fanatics waving nuclear weapons, but these would be wild eyed Christian fundamentalist fanatics like Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, waving these nuclear weapons of mass destruction, urging our President on, and hoping for the "end times" to come from such an attack.
Any scenario is possible when you have fanatics of any kind in charge of the nuclear genie, and the urge to uncork the bottle beckoning you to save the world from what?
Healthcare, the Issue that divides Us
The Other side of the Debate
"A country that fails to take care of those who have the least, is destined to end up on the ash heap of history, for if it neglects such moral questions at home, it follows that it will act without morality abroad in its foreign policy."
When you think about it, it never fails amaze, that in this country, in the 21st century, we still have millions and millions of people without healthcare. The so-called richest nation in the world, which is spending hundreds of billions in the remotest regions of the world, for national security, cannot find the funds to provide an affordable, equitable and accessible healthcare system for its citizens' security.
Choosing Death over Life
It seems that when we need to come up with billions for some new war making technology, the money is found, and in that action, lies the irony that for this country the ability to cause death and destruction, is more important than the ability to protect life and save lives from destruction. We have a government that is dominated by those who preach about the sanctity of life, reducing their interpretation of it, to a puddle of fluid, that cannot be used to save other lives and cure the sick.
Show Me the $$$
But these same folks, when confronted with the idea of single payer healthcare, will scream and shout, about it being socialist healthcare and limiting the people's right to choose. What they are not saying is that big insurance, the AMA and the Drug companies are paying out millions in what could be and should be called bribes to members of congress and senate to insure that this issue will never see the light of day inside the beltway.
All Politics is Local
That is why we have to start this process, state by state, and in Ohio, people have started the process. The initiative is being pushed by a group called SPAN Ohio, which stands for Single Payer Action Network Ohio. Locally, there are meetings set for the 10th of January in Norwalk at 10 a.m., at the VFW Hall on Milan Avenue, and at BGSU Firelands, Huron, in Foundation Hall, Room 204 at 1 p.m., the object is to establish local chapters in Huron and Erie Counties to spearhead the process in this area.
By starting this on the local and state level it will force the political class inside the beltway of Washington to accept it or lose power by being voted out of office. All things that have helped the folks at the bottom of the food chain got started this way. Social Security was the brain child of Sinclair Lewis and a man called Townsend, it took a catastrophe in the form of the Depression to cause the political class in this nation to buy into it. But they did it, for they recognized that their survival was dependent on it.
We have reached a crossroads in the way healthcare is provided in this country, the skyrocketing costs of it are causing the destruction of our manufacturing base in this country. Our companies cannot compete with the other companies from nations that have a form of national health insurance. The irony of outsourcing jobs from this country to other countries, that it levels the playing field for those companies that do it. Because their workers are not only making lower wages, but are covered by national healthcare and that takes healthcare out of the the cost per product, as it is in this country.
What about the poor, the sick and young?
Beyond the cost that it imposes on our ability to compete in the global market place, there are 44 million citizens without access to healthcare and another 40 million with poor healthcare coverage, including millions of children who have been cutoff CHIP and other programs for budgetary reasons.
Healthcare is a Moral Issue
A country that fails to take care of those who have the least, is destined to end up on the ash heap of history, for if it neglects such moral questions at home, it follows that it will act without morality abroad in its foreign policy.
Isn't it time to bring our nation back to a sense of moralness and of compassion that was our foundation belief from the beginning?
"A country that fails to take care of those who have the least, is destined to end up on the ash heap of history, for if it neglects such moral questions at home, it follows that it will act without morality abroad in its foreign policy."
When you think about it, it never fails amaze, that in this country, in the 21st century, we still have millions and millions of people without healthcare. The so-called richest nation in the world, which is spending hundreds of billions in the remotest regions of the world, for national security, cannot find the funds to provide an affordable, equitable and accessible healthcare system for its citizens' security.
Choosing Death over Life
It seems that when we need to come up with billions for some new war making technology, the money is found, and in that action, lies the irony that for this country the ability to cause death and destruction, is more important than the ability to protect life and save lives from destruction. We have a government that is dominated by those who preach about the sanctity of life, reducing their interpretation of it, to a puddle of fluid, that cannot be used to save other lives and cure the sick.
Show Me the $$$
But these same folks, when confronted with the idea of single payer healthcare, will scream and shout, about it being socialist healthcare and limiting the people's right to choose. What they are not saying is that big insurance, the AMA and the Drug companies are paying out millions in what could be and should be called bribes to members of congress and senate to insure that this issue will never see the light of day inside the beltway.
All Politics is Local
That is why we have to start this process, state by state, and in Ohio, people have started the process. The initiative is being pushed by a group called SPAN Ohio, which stands for Single Payer Action Network Ohio. Locally, there are meetings set for the 10th of January in Norwalk at 10 a.m., at the VFW Hall on Milan Avenue, and at BGSU Firelands, Huron, in Foundation Hall, Room 204 at 1 p.m., the object is to establish local chapters in Huron and Erie Counties to spearhead the process in this area.
By starting this on the local and state level it will force the political class inside the beltway of Washington to accept it or lose power by being voted out of office. All things that have helped the folks at the bottom of the food chain got started this way. Social Security was the brain child of Sinclair Lewis and a man called Townsend, it took a catastrophe in the form of the Depression to cause the political class in this nation to buy into it. But they did it, for they recognized that their survival was dependent on it.
We have reached a crossroads in the way healthcare is provided in this country, the skyrocketing costs of it are causing the destruction of our manufacturing base in this country. Our companies cannot compete with the other companies from nations that have a form of national health insurance. The irony of outsourcing jobs from this country to other countries, that it levels the playing field for those companies that do it. Because their workers are not only making lower wages, but are covered by national healthcare and that takes healthcare out of the the cost per product, as it is in this country.
What about the poor, the sick and young?
Beyond the cost that it imposes on our ability to compete in the global market place, there are 44 million citizens without access to healthcare and another 40 million with poor healthcare coverage, including millions of children who have been cutoff CHIP and other programs for budgetary reasons.
Healthcare is a Moral Issue
A country that fails to take care of those who have the least, is destined to end up on the ash heap of history, for if it neglects such moral questions at home, it follows that it will act without morality abroad in its foreign policy.
Isn't it time to bring our nation back to a sense of moralness and of compassion that was our foundation belief from the beginning?
Healthcare, the Issue that divides Us
The Other side of the Debate
"A country that fails to take care of those who have the least, is destined to end up on the ash heap of history, for if it neglects such moral questions at home, it follows that it will act without morality abroad in its foreign policy."
When you think about it, it never fails amaze, that in this country, in the 21st century, we still have millions and millions of people without healthcare. The so-called richest nation in the world, which is spending hundreds of billions in the remotest regions of the world, for national security, cannot find the funds to provide an affordable, equitable and accessible healthcare system for its citizens' security.
Choosing Death over Life
It seems that when we need to come up with billions for some new war making technology, the money is found, and in that action, lies the irony that for this country the ability to cause death and destruction, is more important than the ability to protect life and save lives from destruction. We have a government that is dominated by those who preach about the sanctity of life, reducing their interpretation of it, to a puddle of fluid, that cannot be used to save other lives and cure the sick.
Show Me the $$$
But these same folks, when confronted with the idea of single payer healthcare, will scream and shout, about it being socialist healthcare and limiting the people's right to choose. What they are not saying is that big insurance, the AMA and the Drug companies are paying out millions in what could be and should be called bribes to members of congress and senate to insure that this issue will never see the light of day inside the beltway.
All Politics is Local
That is why we have to start this process, state by state, and in Ohio, people have started the process. The initiative is being pushed by a group called SPAN Ohio, which stands for Single Payer Action Network Ohio. Locally, there are meetings set for the 10th of January in Norwalk at 10 a.m., at the VFW Hall on Milan Avenue, and at BGSU Firelands, Huron, in Foundation Hall, Room 204 at 1 p.m., the object is to establish local chapters in Huron and Erie Counties to spearhead the process in this area.
By starting this on the local and state level it will force the political class inside the beltway of Washington to accept it or lose power by being voted out of office. All things that have helped the folks at the bottom of the food chain got started this way. Social Security was the brain child of Sinclair Lewis and a man called Townsend, it took a catastrophe in the form of the Depression to cause the political class in this nation to buy into it. But they did it, for they recognized that their survival was dependent on it.
We have reached a crossroads in the way healthcare is provided in this country, the skyrocketing costs of it are causing the destruction of our manufacturing base in this country. Our companies cannot compete with the other companies from nations that have a form of national health insurance. The irony of outsourcing jobs from this country to other countries, that it levels the playing field for those companies that do it. Because their workers are not only making lower wages, but are covered by national healthcare and that takes healthcare out of the the cost per product, as it is in this country.
What about the poor, the sick and young?
Beyond the cost that it imposes on our ability to compete in the global market place, there are 44 million citizens without access to healthcare and another 40 million with poor healthcare coverage, including millions of children who have been cutoff CHIP and other programs for budgetary reasons.
Healthcare is a Moral Issue
A country that fails to take care of those who have the least, is destined to end up on the ash heap of history, for if it neglects such moral questions at home, it follows that it will act without morality abroad in its foreign policy.
Isn't it time to bring our nation back to a sense of moralness and of compassion that was our foundation belief from the beginning?
"A country that fails to take care of those who have the least, is destined to end up on the ash heap of history, for if it neglects such moral questions at home, it follows that it will act without morality abroad in its foreign policy."
When you think about it, it never fails amaze, that in this country, in the 21st century, we still have millions and millions of people without healthcare. The so-called richest nation in the world, which is spending hundreds of billions in the remotest regions of the world, for national security, cannot find the funds to provide an affordable, equitable and accessible healthcare system for its citizens' security.
Choosing Death over Life
It seems that when we need to come up with billions for some new war making technology, the money is found, and in that action, lies the irony that for this country the ability to cause death and destruction, is more important than the ability to protect life and save lives from destruction. We have a government that is dominated by those who preach about the sanctity of life, reducing their interpretation of it, to a puddle of fluid, that cannot be used to save other lives and cure the sick.
Show Me the $$$
But these same folks, when confronted with the idea of single payer healthcare, will scream and shout, about it being socialist healthcare and limiting the people's right to choose. What they are not saying is that big insurance, the AMA and the Drug companies are paying out millions in what could be and should be called bribes to members of congress and senate to insure that this issue will never see the light of day inside the beltway.
All Politics is Local
That is why we have to start this process, state by state, and in Ohio, people have started the process. The initiative is being pushed by a group called SPAN Ohio, which stands for Single Payer Action Network Ohio. Locally, there are meetings set for the 10th of January in Norwalk at 10 a.m., at the VFW Hall on Milan Avenue, and at BGSU Firelands, Huron, in Foundation Hall, Room 204 at 1 p.m., the object is to establish local chapters in Huron and Erie Counties to spearhead the process in this area.
By starting this on the local and state level it will force the political class inside the beltway of Washington to accept it or lose power by being voted out of office. All things that have helped the folks at the bottom of the food chain got started this way. Social Security was the brain child of Sinclair Lewis and a man called Townsend, it took a catastrophe in the form of the Depression to cause the political class in this nation to buy into it. But they did it, for they recognized that their survival was dependent on it.
We have reached a crossroads in the way healthcare is provided in this country, the skyrocketing costs of it are causing the destruction of our manufacturing base in this country. Our companies cannot compete with the other companies from nations that have a form of national health insurance. The irony of outsourcing jobs from this country to other countries, that it levels the playing field for those companies that do it. Because their workers are not only making lower wages, but are covered by national healthcare and that takes healthcare out of the the cost per product, as it is in this country.
What about the poor, the sick and young?
Beyond the cost that it imposes on our ability to compete in the global market place, there are 44 million citizens without access to healthcare and another 40 million with poor healthcare coverage, including millions of children who have been cutoff CHIP and other programs for budgetary reasons.
Healthcare is a Moral Issue
A country that fails to take care of those who have the least, is destined to end up on the ash heap of history, for if it neglects such moral questions at home, it follows that it will act without morality abroad in its foreign policy.
Isn't it time to bring our nation back to a sense of moralness and of compassion that was our foundation belief from the beginning?
Catch-22, where do the sick go when they are still sick?
Where is Yossarian, when you need him?
For those of us who are old enough to remember JFK, Joseph Heller's novel, "Catch-22," is a classic work of dark humor about war, human nature and how the military seemed to conspire to keep the unwilling anti-hero, Ben Yossarian, in the nose of a B-25 as a navigator-gunner by continually increasing the number of missions he had to fly or "Catch-22."
You are probably wondering what does that have to do with, "Catch-22, where do the sick go when they are sick?" What I am talking about is the gaping hole or the "Catch-22" in our healthcare system for our seniors. Which is after they have exhausted their hospital stay under Medicare for a particular illness, they cannot be admitted in the hospital again, unless it is for another illness, not the first one. Understand?
You are again wondering, what in the world is he talking about, cannot be hospitalized again unless it is for another illness? Yes, that is the "Catch-22," and it is impacting a dear friend and neighbor, who suffered a serious and debilitating stroke in the fall and was in the hospital for the maximum stay allowed for that illness. Even though she is still suffering from the after affects of the stroke, she could be denied admission to the hospital if her condition would worsen from the stroke. Understand?
So, while she continues to suffer from her stroke, like Yossarian being kept in the nose of that B-25 dodging flak and fighters while the number of missions keep increasing, and for her, the Medicare "Catch-22" is in play and she cannot go in the hospital unless she has a new illness.
I wonder if a cold is covered by Catch-22?
For those of us who are old enough to remember JFK, Joseph Heller's novel, "Catch-22," is a classic work of dark humor about war, human nature and how the military seemed to conspire to keep the unwilling anti-hero, Ben Yossarian, in the nose of a B-25 as a navigator-gunner by continually increasing the number of missions he had to fly or "Catch-22."
You are probably wondering what does that have to do with, "Catch-22, where do the sick go when they are sick?" What I am talking about is the gaping hole or the "Catch-22" in our healthcare system for our seniors. Which is after they have exhausted their hospital stay under Medicare for a particular illness, they cannot be admitted in the hospital again, unless it is for another illness, not the first one. Understand?
You are again wondering, what in the world is he talking about, cannot be hospitalized again unless it is for another illness? Yes, that is the "Catch-22," and it is impacting a dear friend and neighbor, who suffered a serious and debilitating stroke in the fall and was in the hospital for the maximum stay allowed for that illness. Even though she is still suffering from the after affects of the stroke, she could be denied admission to the hospital if her condition would worsen from the stroke. Understand?
So, while she continues to suffer from her stroke, like Yossarian being kept in the nose of that B-25 dodging flak and fighters while the number of missions keep increasing, and for her, the Medicare "Catch-22" is in play and she cannot go in the hospital unless she has a new illness.
I wonder if a cold is covered by Catch-22?
Catch-22, where do the sick go when they are still sick?
Where is Yossarian, when you need him?
For those of us who are old enough to remember JFK, Joseph Heller's novel, "Catch-22," is a classic work of dark humor about war, human nature and how the military seemed to conspire to keep the unwilling anti-hero, Ben Yossarian, in the nose of a B-25 as a navigator-gunner by continually increasing the number of missions he had to fly or "Catch-22."
You are probably wondering what does that have to do with, "Catch-22, where do the sick go when they are sick?" What I am talking about is the gaping hole or the "Catch-22" in our healthcare system for our seniors. Which is after they have exhausted their hospital stay under Medicare for a particular illness, they cannot be admitted in the hospital again, unless it is for another illness, not the first one. Understand?
You are again wondering, what in the world is he talking about, cannot be hospitalized again unless it is for another illness? Yes, that is the "Catch-22," and it is impacting a dear friend and neighbor, who suffered a serious and debilitating stroke in the fall and was in the hospital for the maximum stay allowed for that illness. Even though she is still suffering from the after affects of the stroke, she could be denied admission to the hospital if her condition would worsen from the stroke. Understand?
So, while she continues to suffer from her stroke, like Yossarian being kept in the nose of that B-25 dodging flak and fighters while the number of missions keep increasing, and for her, the Medicare "Catch-22" is in play and she cannot go in the hospital unless she has a new illness.
I wonder if a cold is covered by Catch-22.
For those of us who are old enough to remember JFK, Joseph Heller's novel, "Catch-22," is a classic work of dark humor about war, human nature and how the military seemed to conspire to keep the unwilling anti-hero, Ben Yossarian, in the nose of a B-25 as a navigator-gunner by continually increasing the number of missions he had to fly or "Catch-22."
You are probably wondering what does that have to do with, "Catch-22, where do the sick go when they are sick?" What I am talking about is the gaping hole or the "Catch-22" in our healthcare system for our seniors. Which is after they have exhausted their hospital stay under Medicare for a particular illness, they cannot be admitted in the hospital again, unless it is for another illness, not the first one. Understand?
You are again wondering, what in the world is he talking about, cannot be hospitalized again unless it is for another illness? Yes, that is the "Catch-22," and it is impacting a dear friend and neighbor, who suffered a serious and debilitating stroke in the fall and was in the hospital for the maximum stay allowed for that illness. Even though she is still suffering from the after affects of the stroke, she could be denied admission to the hospital if her condition would worsen from the stroke. Understand?
So, while she continues to suffer from her stroke, like Yossarian being kept in the nose of that B-25 dodging flak and fighters while the number of missions keep increasing, and for her, the Medicare "Catch-22" is in play and she cannot go in the hospital unless she has a new illness.
I wonder if a cold is covered by Catch-22.
Economic Pain, who feels it and who gains from it? (written in 2005)
“Time is the great eraser and this will not even show faintly on the chalkboard of our memories. But for the IPC workers and their families, time will not erase the pain of this sacrifice, for it will be with them every day, sitting on the other side of their kitchen tables, like an unwanted supper guest.”
There is an old saying from the fitness book of clichés and overused metaphors, “No pain, No gain.” In these days of economic contraction in our area, the question could be who feels the pain and who gains from it? A prime example is, Industrial Powder Coating or IPC, a local company who has been in the community for over 20 years, started by a Norwalk family and now owned by outsiders, who was in the news lately. The story was about the concessions or givebacks that the workers at this plant accepted “to keep the doors open.” The workers represented by UNITE, had little choice if the truth is known in this discussion, which probably amounted to “take it” or “we’ll close the doors.” Having been on that side of the issue, “the take it “side, for many years, when a company comes asking for the type of givebacks that were agreed to in this continuing saga of 21st century America, it is a last chance scenario.
Profit before People
Of course, the company probably said to the workers, that when things turn around, you will get these items back, but the truth is that once it is lost, there is always another crisis or reason the company will have for not reinstating the concessions. I mean the bottom line for the corporation is to make money, and that is the reason for its existence, period. It does not matter if they are powder coating parts or making widgets, the profit is the motive for their being; and the workers and the community, are just parts of the process to make that profit.
Low paying J-o-b-s = T-a-x-e-s
There were the usual comments in the paper by company officials, elected officials and the local economic folks. The Mayor was effusive in her praise for the UNITE Local for the agreement that saved the company and the jobs. How can you be effusive, when a little investigation would have shown that these folks at IPC were barely making a living wage before the wage cuts, freezes and more out of pocket for healthcare? The real reason for the joy was the saving of tax dollars for the city budget; for that is the government’s bottom-line, tax revenues. Let’s be real, for local government, County, City and School districts, the workers wages are just a source of tax dollars. In the discussions that follow on tax abatements for companies and corporations, the selling point is that the municipalities will be able to generate tax revenues from the “new jobs” that are created, regardless of what the wages are for those jobs. The point that is never discussed is that the companies do not pay any taxes on their income, just the workers. So should we be surprised that it didn’t seem to make a difference to these officials making the comments, of the pain that the workers were going to feel by giving the company these givebacks in wage cuts, wage freezes, and accepting an increase in healthcare costs?
The Gain like the Pain is One Sided
I didn’t hear anyone say, how are these people going to live on less money or no raises in the future, while paying increased costs for their healthcare? How are their families going to cope with the increased cost of everything else, gas, food, rent, clothing and education for their kids, which continues to go up while the value of their real wages keep sinking and sinking? I did not hear any one wonder how the workers families are going to cope with a quality of life that is in decline? I did not hear anyone raise a question of the moralness of pain that is only felt by one side; while the gain from that pain is only felt by one side, those who are not feeling the pain?
Time moves on for us, but not for those in Pain
But like all stories, this one will fade very fast, and those who were effusive in their praise for this agreement, will forget those workers who gave all. And as we drive past the IPC building in the industrial park, we will not even slow down to think of those people who gave up their hold on a quality of life to save the company and those tax dollars. Time is the great eraser and this will not even show faintly on the chalkboard of our memories. But for the IPC workers and their families, time will not erase the pain of this sacrifice, for it will be with them every day, sitting on the other side of their kitchen tables, like an unwanted supper guest.
Economic Pain, who feels it and who gains from it? (written in 2005)
“Time is the great eraser and this will not even show faintly on the chalkboard of our memories. But for the IPC workers and their families, time will not erase the pain of this sacrifice, for it will be with them every day, sitting on the other side of their kitchen tables, like an unwanted supper guest.”
There is an old saying from the fitness book of clichés and overused metaphors, “No pain, No gain.” In these days of economic contraction in our area, the question could be who feels the pain and who gains from it? A prime example is, Industrial Powder Coating or IPC, a local company who has been in the community for over 20 years, started by a Norwalk family and now owned by outsiders, who was in the news lately. The story was about the concessions or givebacks that the workers at this plant accepted “to keep the doors open.” The workers represented by UNITE, had little choice if the truth is known in this discussion, which probably amounted to “take it” or “we’ll close the doors.” Having been on that side of the issue, “the take it “side, for many years, when a company comes asking for the type of givebacks that were agreed to in this continuing saga of 21st century America, it is a last chance scenario.
Profit before People
Of course, the company probably said to the workers, that when things turn around, you will get these items back, but the truth is that once it is lost, there is always another crisis or reason the company will have for not reinstating the concessions. I mean the bottom line for the corporation is to make money, and that is the reason for its existence, period. It does not matter if they are powder coating parts or making widgets, the profit is the motive for their being; and the workers and the community, are just parts of the process to make that profit.
Low paying J-o-b-s = T-a-x-e-s
There were the usual comments in the paper by company officials, elected officials and the local economic folks. The Mayor was effusive in her praise for the UNITE Local for the agreement that saved the company and the jobs. How can you be effusive, when a little investigation would have shown that these folks at IPC were barely making a living wage before the wage cuts, freezes and more out of pocket for healthcare? The real reason for the joy was the saving of tax dollars for the city budget; for that is the government’s bottom-line, tax revenues. Let’s be real, for local government, County, City and School districts, the workers wages are just a source of tax dollars. In the discussions that follow on tax abatements for companies and corporations, the selling point is that the municipalities will be able to generate tax revenues from the “new jobs” that are created, regardless of what the wages are for those jobs. The point that is never discussed is that the companies do not pay any taxes on their income, just the workers. So should we be surprised that it didn’t seem to make a difference to these officials making the comments, of the pain that the workers were going to feel by giving the company these givebacks in wage cuts, wage freezes, and accepting an increase in healthcare costs?
The Gain like the Pain is One Sided
I didn’t hear anyone say, how are these people going to live on less money or no raises in the future, while paying increased costs for their healthcare? How are their families going to cope with the increased cost of everything else, gas, food, rent, clothing and education for their kids, which continues to go up while the value of their real wages keep sinking and sinking? I did not hear any one wonder how the workers families are going to cope with a quality of life that is in decline? I did not hear anyone raise a question of the moralness of pain that is only felt by one side; while the gain from that pain is only felt by one side, those who are not feeling the pain?
Time moves on for us, but not for those in Pain
But like all stories, this one will fade very fast, and those who were effusive in their praise for this agreement, will forget those workers who gave all. And as we drive past the IPC building in the industrial park, we will not even slow down to think of those people who gave up their hold on a quality of life to save the company and those tax dollars. Time is the great eraser and this will not even show faintly on the chalkboard of our memories. But for the IPC workers and their families, time will not erase the pain of this sacrifice, for it will be with them every day, sitting on the other side of their kitchen tables, like an unwanted supper guest.
more like a caricature of a person, instead of being a real person
The other day, I was talking to a local couple who are good friends of mine. We got on the topic of those who represent us in the national and state capital, how that after being there for a while, they take on the characteristics of being more like a caricature of a person, instead of being a real person. One of them saying, “That they (the politicians) should come down here and stand in line at a local fast food restaurant for it is there that they will meet and see the real electorate, the folks who are being affected by everything they say and do.”
500 Families
Today someplace, many places around the world,
500 families found out that they have lost their jobs,
500 families buried a loved one killed in a war,
500 families were evicted from their home,
500 families are making the choice of food or medicine for a loved one,
500 families lost their health care,
500 families lost a child to crime violence,
500 families spent their first night on the street,
and 500 families were turned away from a government agency
500 families found out that they have lost their jobs,
500 families buried a loved one killed in a war,
500 families were evicted from their home,
500 families are making the choice of food or medicine for a loved one,
500 families lost their health care,
500 families lost a child to crime violence,
500 families spent their first night on the street,
and 500 families were turned away from a government agency
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