Yet one more reason I hate federal fingers in health care...

I should have been at the local party campaign HQ earlier this evening, for its (sort of) grand opening, and to meet Tom Foley, who someone from state had managed to get to promise to show up.

However, I spent 30 minutes this afternoon having lots of little needles pricking my back, lying there itching, a *lot*, for 15 minutes, having the nurse come in and measure things, clean me up and slather some anti-itch stuff on me, and remind me that I'm due back at 3 on Thursday so they can retest some of the stuff that came up negative this time.   Thursday evening I can use my antihistamines, and then I'm off them again on Friday morning for the next set of testing the following Thursday.  I have to figure out how to get ahold of pieces of fresh lobster and scallop, about a teaspoon worth of each, to fresh cook (microwaving for 30 seconds I'm told will do) the night before and bring for testing.  I can see being able to buy a single scallop, but I don't know any local places which sell shelled lobster meat. I'll check with the office on Thursday for the retesting to see if they have any suggestions.  Lots of other patients seem to be able to do this, so hopefully they can tell me how.

I made the mistake of stopping at the local stand-alone ER which has lots of outpatient clinics to see if we could schedule my daughter's PT for her foot.  And discovered that they can't see her until next Wednesday unless I'm willing to take time off of work to come and fill out the registration paper work.  After that my mother can bring her to appointments, but for some reason the registration paperwork must be filled out on the day of the first appointment and in person.  I can't even fill it out and fax it.  I'm going to see tomorrow if the stand-alone PT outfit can see her sooner without my having to be there.  I would have done it this afternoon, but I was just not feeling up to it.

I've run into this before, but it makes no sense to me.  It's a scheduled appointment, they can see my ID why can't I give them her info in advance rather than having to take time from work, which I don't have?  My mother has been able to take the girls to all of their regular doctors and specialists with no problems, but for some reason if a clinic is attached to a hospital, it must be the parent and the parent alone the first time.  I've seen this at Children's in Hartford, and also at the hospital where I work.  I'd rather do the 15 minutes of registration after work the day before, so I don't have to get me or me and my kid there at 6:30 for a 7am test, but the rules won't allow it.  I'm not sure what the feds or the insurance companies think is likely to change in 24 hours, and I could do the registration at 7am for a 7pm test, but if the date changes, it's no good.

It probably is the same sort of thing as with HSAs and the high deductible insurance plans.  You can only have an HSA if you have a high deductible plan, and you can't have a high deductible plan if you are covered by any other insurance.  So I can't do it because we're covered by my husband's Tricare.  If I opted out of Tricare, I could have the HSA/HDI, and then my husband and children could be covered by both, but the primary on the HDI can't?!?!?  And what about all the stuff that regular insurance plans don't cover, like cataract lenses which correct astigmatism too, or dental work which costs far, far more than the maximum annual payout?  I've been told I should just do an FSA, but $2K of dental work is something I'd like to be able to put away for over more than 1 year.

Anyway, I left the clinic, came home, realized I was getting hysterical again, and decided to just call it an evening.  Now that the itching and rash have pretty much subsided, I'm feeling much better, but I guess I'm going to have to list that as an allergic reaction.  Or rather as a sensitivity reaction, since apparently you are only allergic to something if you develop a rash or respiratory problems.  Which is odd, since the Epi-Pen is specifically described as something for people with allergies, and anaphylaxis is usually a sudden severe drop in blood pressure, which has nothing to do with skin, lungs, or sinuses.

Anxiety and depression -- election worries or just new medication side effects?

The title says it all.

The last week I've been progressively more short tempered, panicky, weepy, and just unpleasant to be around for everyone including myself.

I'd like to put it down to being too wrapped up in following politics, but I suspect the reason is the more mundane one of getting new meds for my asthma.

I've been having these sinus problems for about two months now, and after two rounds of antibiotics with a course of prednisone in the middle, which put 10 pounds on me which looks like about 20, I ended up at the allergist's.  I've had allergies all my life, but this is the first time it's been bad enough to go see a specialist.  Apparently they are worse than I thought, because they did some breathing tests and I was slightly obstructed, which I hadn't even noticed (common with asthmatics, you just get used to not breathing that well, and the abnormal becomes your new normal), and I guess that combined with working in a place that is carpeted which flooded three months ago, shortly before all the symptoms, along with some shellfish allergies meant that I left the office with three more appointments for testing and a script for an epi-pen.

That alone is requiring some adjusting of my world view and may account for some of the emotional instability.  But I also found out that my rescue inhaler is being discontinued, and I love the breath activated device, since it requires no co-ordination, and it worked better during my pneumonia in 2001 than the nebulizer did.  And my preventative of choice, Advair, is also being discontinued, at least in the purple disc form.  So I've got a new inhaler type preventative, QVar which doesn't seem to be helping much at all.  Though that could be because I've had to stay off the antihistamines until after the skin testing.  I have the first round tomorrow afternoon, and I'm hoping that mold comes up big time so I can use the test results to get work to do something about the regular flooding of my library.  I'm also hoping that cats don't come up too big, since we're not getting rid of them, and the youngest is only about four, so we'll have him for a long time.

But I've yelled at my mother, my daughters, vented at work, and find myself in tears watching Castle as they leave Alexis off to her dorm room at college.

So I either need some new asthma meds, need my workplace to be remediated, need the election to happen and the right guy to win, or some antidepressants.  Or a combination of all four.

Work has also decided to do change to a new office supply vendor and give us an extremely limited set of approved options, none of which are the things I normally use.  I can't even get refills for my Day Runner, because I "have Outlook on the computer".  The fact that I don't have access to my outlook account unless I am in my office on my desktop computer doesn't matter, I'm just supposed to haul printouts around, which doesn't sound terribly professional to me.  Not that they'll let me get a 7-hole punch so my unprofessional printouts can at least travel in a nice case....

I need to win the lottery, damn it!  Or at least find a new job, not that there are very many here in Connecticut within an hour of where we live.

Let's be shallow.

A post over at Buttercup's got me thinking.

It started with this picture:

As I said, I'm being shallow here.  We're not looking at either of the men who are the whole reason for the event, we're looking at FLOTUS.  And in this picture, we're seeing one mean ugly woman.

Which is a pity.  Looked at objectively, ignoring one's personal opinion of her and her husband's political leanings, she's no model, but she's not physically unattractive.  Her attractiveness problem isn't what's on the outside, it's how her outside reveals her inside.  She obviously doesn't want to be there; it's not just the scowl on her face which would erode granite, it's her body language.

Here are a few photos found elsewhere on the web to prove my point.

I also like this one:

Michelle can look like someone you'd be happy to have a coffee and chat with.  If she looked like this all the time, her press would be a lot more positive, from both sides of the aisle.

The one thing I've noticed is that very, very few of her happy photos have her husband anywhere near.  I do not think they have a happy marriage.  Whether it's because she is a "beard" as I've read rumored in more than a few places, whether it's because he's a narcissist and can't/won't love her the way a husband should love his wife, I don't know, and it's not really my business.

I'm inclined though to put more blame for their problems on him than her, because when they are apart, she seems much more normal and better adjusted than he does.  I just hope someday, before it's too late, she figures out what she needs to do to be happy, and does it.

I also hope that some day she realizes what a great country this is and that while we are not perfect, we are the best there is, and we need everyone to work together to improve rather than dividing us to demand more from one than another.  I hope she comes to realize that life isn't a zero-sum game, and if we don't separate into little ghettos of race, ethnicity, or creed, we can all win.  No matter what happens next month, or in future years, by virtue of having been a first lady her words and actions will always carry weight with many, and I'd love to see her learn to use that for the improvement of all Americans' lives.

Debate!

Which I will not be watching.  I'll get to read about it tomorrow. And the day after tomorrow. And the day after that.  And the day after that day after.  I'll get to see plenty of clips.

But by not watching, I won't be screaming at Ø, I won't have to listen to his condescending tone of voice, and his likely strings of "uhhh"s since he won't have a teleprompter.

The debates aren't going to change my decision on voting against Ø, and watching it in real time will raise my blood pressure. So for my mental health I'm going to watch Castle reruns, and maybe check in at a few of my regular blog reads.  I suspect watching Castle will be much more relaxing.

Does Ø really want to lose the election?

His re-election team created an e-card for his Tumblr page.  And this is what they came up with.  

Of course it's now down the memory hole with apologies for not "properly vetting" posts.

But Ø's team actually has people on it who think this is appropriate, and not in the least offensive.

But it's offensive on so many levels.  First, do we really need to go around talking about our "lady parts"?  My first thought was what happens if this shows up on a page you are at with your seven year old, but then I realized the only people who would be reading pages posting this sort of dreck with their seven year olds are the sort who think it's appropriate and don't have trouble telling their children stuff that isn't age appropriate.

Second, for the party which supposedly is "for women", it's incredibly demeaning to imply that the only thing we think is important is to be able to have consequence-less sex.  We don't care if we don't have jobs, we don't care if the few children we do bother to give birth to have a decent home, two parents, a decent education, or a hope of a decent job themselves, we just care that we can rut like animals without worrying about being punished by children.

I thought campaign stuff was supposed to make you want to vote for people, not run away, or even worse laugh at them.

Things to be angry about, part the zillionth.

Can you imagine the public outcry and outrage if this were being done by a Republican White House?

Obama urges companies to break federal law for his reelection

I've been hearing about this for a while, but no place "mainstream".  What are the odd that we'll hear about now from any of the so-called mainstream news outlets?

I would strongly suspect that I have a better chance of winning the lottery tonight than hearing about this on MSNBC.  I would still probably have a better chance if I didn't have a lottery ticket.

I think I need to steal Rachel Lucus's "Why I drink" label for this blog.

Edited to add: I just saw an article on the ABC blog which Jake Tapper is involved with.  Of course Jake is one of two or at most three journalists who seem to be willing to ignore their personal political leanings for actually delivering News.

Tired.

Last night, knowing full well that I had to get up a little after 6am for work, I didn't even end up in bed until after midnight, and then it took forever to fall asleep.

This morning as I was driving the younger child to school we looked up and saw a beautiful full or nearly full moon.  Which probably explains the sleep issues, since no one else in the family slept well either.

I got into work, took my antihistimines, and after two hours my face is starting to hurt again.  I have a work order request in to maintenance to check for mold and mildew from the flooding.  I suspect it will by a cool day in hell before they do check, and unless they find the toxic black mold the building won't get remediated, since very few years they think about tearing it down (it's from the '60s and built as well as you'd expect, i.e. not very).  I couldn't even get them to replace the rusting out window frames or even replace the cracked glass when they remodeled the area six years ago.  And if it's needed, it will cost much, much more than that.  Of course if they had replaced the windows, I'd be able to open them, and air the place out properly....

And politics is getting tiring.  I keep reading it, and it's just a constant drum beat of how great the (D)s are doing, and how the (R)s are losing so badly.  Lots of crappy polls, like the latest from Public Policy Polling for Connecticut, where Ø is leading by 7, but if you fixed the internals he'd probably be losing. They did poll nearly twice as many (D)s as (R)s, which is correct for this state, but there should have been even more (I)s than (D)s.  Instead they only had about 20%(I), less than their (R) representation.  But you can't unskew the poll because they do their Romney/Obama internals by how the respondent listed themselves on the Very Liberal/Somewhat Liberal/Moderate/Somewhat Conservative/Very Conservative continuum, which can't really be mapped to where the (I)s live very well.  Though if they are mostly Moderate, that would suggest that if you unskewed it, Romney would be winning.

But I'm getting too tired of it all.  I'm going to work the polls, I'm going to vote the way I think best, and I'm going to hope that the perception the media is spinning is just that, spin.

Or we are really, really screwed.

Telling it the way it is

This man is a treasure.  

This first video is addressed specifically to black Christians.

And this is for all Christians and Jews.

This is a man who isn't willing to let his parishioners get away with simply voting for a candidate's skin color, or because they have always voted a certain way.  He wants people to actually look at what the parties and the candidates stand for, and then vote the way their conscience dictates based on their religious beliefs. Because sometimes the party you have always supported changes, and no longer represents you.  Sometimes people with different skin color from yours can have the exact same values.

I am proud to call this man and all others like him my fellow Americans.

Techology. It's wonderful. Except when it isn't.

A few months back I inherited my sister's old MacBook.  It's a MacBook 4,1, which she bought at least four years ago, maybe 5.  When she upgraded a year ago she gave it to my daughter, who then upgraded to brand new Windows laptop this summer.  As mom, I get the hand-me-downs, and since my other box is a netbook, this was nice.

And then yesterday Chrome updated to v22, and no longer supports OS X 10.5.  Which is what I'm running.  We also discovered yesterday that my daughter's new iPod, which my mother had won online and given to her since she didn't need it, won't talk to Leopard either.

So it's off the Apple support sites and stuff to see what to do.  Thankfully, I am by no means the only person running Leopard right now, so there were lots of questions, and even more important, lots of answers.

I have a copy of Snow Leopard on order for a whopping $19.99 + tax.  The problem a lot of folks had been having is that you can't get it in the online store, but thankfully one commenter said it was available by phone.

So here's hoping that within the week my box will be running better, and my daughter can get stuff onto her iPod.

Shouldn't the folks who have to use office equipment be asked what they actually need first?

The copier I had in my department for years and years was still working well, but the organization decided that we needed to own all our own copiers, and have 3-in-1s.  

Sounds great.

Problem is, I'm a library.  I have to copy odd sized journals and big heavy books.  A Dell scanner with an 8.5x11 piece of glass just isn't going to work.  Especially when the glass is at about shoulder level, because that's where the copier stand puts it.  In trying it out, so that I had some facts to back up my complaint to management I injured my wrist/thumb, ending up on light duty for nearly two months with lots of PT/OT and then a cortisone shot. (And trust, me getting shot in the joint between the wrist and the first bone leading to the thumb is not fun.)

In the meantime, it was found that actually quite a few departments who had been given these new fancy machines needed bigger scanning beds, so the rentals which hadn't been sent back were kept and shuffled to those who needed them.  

I went from a nice little IR 3530, which was the perfect hight to an IR C4080i; the glass is three or four inches higher, meaning that the only way I can scan bound items is to stand on my tip-toes.  It takes absolutely forever to warm up, because it does color, which is nice, but not at all necessary, and it takes up a lot more floor space.  I am also beginning to suspect that the weird way I have to stand to make copies is a major contributer to the return of the plantar fasciitis pain.  It's bad enough that people ask what's wrong as I limp through the halls.

Translation: I hate it.

I don't use it a lot, but I had to copy some stuff yesterday and it worked just fine.  Today, after scanning a 10 page article and hitting print, after printing two pages, it happily informed me that I needed to replace the toner cartridge.  Which of course I don't have, since I didn't get a spare with it.  And unlike most copiers, this gives you no wiggle room.  When it says you need to replace the toner, there is NO. MORE. TONER.  At all.  So I've just spent several minutes standing uncomfortably on my toes, and lost all of it.  To e-mail this I'm going to have to scan it a page at a time into my office scanner attached to the computer which takes a lot longer.  And I'm going to have to wait a week or so to get the new toner in.  Grrrr.  I ordered one of each color cartridge and two black, since one is going directly into the machine the instant I get it.  And of course I can't find out who else in the hospital has one of these models, if anyone, because no one can use the "everyone" e-mail list anymore.

Of course, if they had just talked to me before getting the Dell, they would have found out that I needed the larger glass, and we would have done it right the first time, instead of simply replacing the printer with a much more expensive one since we don't use it for copying.  Grrrrr.

Partisan stupidity.

I just saw this ad on CBS out of Hartford this evening. The whole damn thing is a lie, because it's based on the premise that Romney/Ryan are planning to do away with Medicare for current seniors, all to scare CT seniors to vote for Ø and the (D)s.

In announcing the release of the ad, the DCCC said, "The ad highlights that Roraback is running on the ticket with the Republican plan to end Medicare and force Connecticut seniors to pay $6,400 more every year to fund tax breaks for millionaires."

And then I find that the (R) candidate for CT-5, whom the ad targets by name, puts out a press release which starts out just fine, threatening to sue CT TV stations which air the ad, due to the provable falsehoods in it

“Without a doubt, the Advertisement contains false information deliberately intended to mislead Connecticut voters and defame Roraback’s reputation. Because the Advertisement conveys messages that are plainly disproven by fact, we respectfully demand that your station immediately stop airing the Advertisement and that no further airings of this misleading content be allowed on your station.”

and then:

The letter says that the ad, which says “Meet Washington’s tea party Republicans,” defames Roraback’s character and falsely claims that Roraback supports budget proposals from Republican vice-presidential nominee Paul Ryan.

I mean really, for the folks who vote (R), a primary reason is because we want people who will support plans to try save the country's financial situation. And here is a candidate claiming that he is being defamed by being connected with the plans of those at the top of his ticket. 

Kim Du Toit used to refer to the Democrats as the Evil Party and the Republicans as the Stupid Party. The (R)s are working hard to prove him right.

The Food Police

Today we get to read about the food police.  The USDA, at the behest of Congress acting on marching orders from Mrs. Ø, have changed the rules for school lunches.

Now, I'll be the first to admit that school lunches need help.  Lots of help.  The meat tends to be what a friend in college referred to as "Grade Z but edible".  The chicken patties are made from unidentifiable bits of the chicken (which apparently is often just a version of pink goo, including bits of bone!) with too much bread.  The vegetables aren't the best quality to begin with and they tend to be over cooked.  The pizzas are either cheese (with not enough cheese and too much grease) or pepperoni (same issues) and very "eh" crusts.  The grinders are on hoagy shaped rolls of WonderBread, again using processed lunch meats from smooshed up bits of beast, such that you really can't tell the pork from the turkey by eye-balling it, and not always by taste.

But now there are new rules.  And those rules seem to dictate foods that most kids don't want to eat (the stuff they will at home if they can get desert afterwards, but only then), and the folks tasked with creating the new menus seem to have even less of a clue.

From Townhall:

Nancy Carvalho, director of food services for New Bedford Public Schools, was quoted as saying that hummus and black bean salads have been tough sells in elementary cafeterias. That means even smaller children are going through the day fighting hunger pains, which can never be considered a good thing.

Who in their right mind feeds gradeschoolers humus and black bean salads?  My children liked that sort of thing occasionally, but I doubt they'd want it at lunch, and not the way the school makes it, nor in the tiny portions the school gives out.

The article continues:

One government official tried to put the blame on the students."One thing I think we need to keep in mind as kids say they're still hungry is that many children aren't used to eating fruits and vegetables at home, much less at school. So it's a change in what they are eating. If they are still hungry, it's that they are not eating all the food that's being offered," USDA Deputy Undersecretary Janey Thornton was quoted as saying.
Ms. Thornton just put her finger on the problem. The government is trying to impose a new diet that children are not accustomed to. It’s not reasonable to expect them to either eat what the government deems healthy or go hungry.
Many will opt to go hungry, and that’s the government’s fault.

And here is where the nanny state issues start really rearing their ugly heads.  The only reason that children won't eat these meals is because their parents don't know how to feed them right at home.  Ms. Thornton is clueless.  My children got large servings of vegetables at night.  They got good meat, and pasta or potatoes.  For breakfast they got healthier cereals, like Cheerios or cornflakes or oatmeal and fruit juice.

And they still aren't scrawny, and one, the one who was the most physically active of the two, is technically obese/morbidly obese.  Her weight issues started even while she was skating.

The standard American diet (referred to in some quarters quite appropriately as SAD) is the problem.  It's not the quality of the food, as in whole grain bread vs Wonder.  It's not the quantities.  It's the high levels of carbs we have been taught to think is healthy.  It's the low levels of fat, fat which is especially needed by growing children and active teenagers.  It's the low levels of fat which make the food tasteless so we have to add tons of sugar to make it palatable.  It's the low levels of fat which leave us hungry two hours after a 400 calorie breakfast, even though 400 calories of bacon and eggs will leave us sated for four hours, even if we're being moderately active.

The other problem is the science.  Every year we are told that eating foods containing nutrient X is really, really, bad for us, and it's a wonder our ancestors survived long enough to reproduce.  And then a year or two later, we find out that, fancy that, nutrient X is actually necessary for optimal functioning and we have to start adding it back in.  This year's must eat food also turns out to be next year's you-really-need-to-cut-back-on food.  Look at butter vs. margarine.  Unless you have a lactose issue, butter has no more calories, and not having tons of weird chemicals, it's much, much healthier.  I admit we still have some "I can't believe it's not butter" or some Olio in the fridge, but that's because it's so much easier to spread than butter. But we don't use much, and I do all my cooking with lots of butter.  I eat lots of meat, and I'm discovering that as I cut carbs, the fat is actually starting to taste really good.  And guess what?  My blood pressure is back where it was 20 years ago, even if my weight isn't, though the fact that I haven't been able to cut the sugars and carbs as much as I like is probably the main culprit.  We live almost next door to a Dairy Queen, and in the summer when you don't have central air, the will power, it is weak.

My elder daughter is opting out of the school lunch her new high school provides, (they get it shipped in from a nearby school which has a kitchen) and is eating at the college cafeteria (her school is on a community college campus, and starting next semester she will be taking some classes on the college side).  She says the food is much better and not surprisingly, it really doesn't cost much more.  But I'd rather pay $4 for her to get a piece of pizza and a small salad from the salad bar than $2.65 for the standard school lunch which she won't eat most of any way.  The younger one, the one with the weight issues, tried her new school's lunch, and while she says the caf isn't bad, she prefers to make a sandwich with good quality lunch meat (like real chicken breast) than buy it.  And I can afford to do that quite easily for the cost of the school lunch.

We've already seen cases where schools have examined brown bag lunches and found them deficient, in one instance taking away a child's chicken sandwich and giving her the school's chicken nuggets and soggy vegs.  The child ate one nugget, drank the milk, threw the rest out, and was hungry for the rest of the day.  The mother was understandably irate, especially since her child eats lots of vegetables at dinner, and is in no way malnourished.  You don't actually need to eat something from every food group at every meal.  And the school had the nerve to charge her for this meal which was of far worse quality than the one she had packed, and which her child wouldn't eat.  Children are picky eaters, and if all your child will eat is a PB&J sandwich, they are better off eating that than staring at a plate of soggy fries and nuggets.

So when does the tar and feathering begin?

Why veterans don't support Obama. And neither do a lot of other people.

From a post at The Other McCain:

Obama’s veterans-outreach efforts have been “failing because voters understand that his defense cuts threaten our position as a global power, unemployment for returning veterans is at an unacceptable level, and the VA system is breaking under a backlog of disability claims that has doubled on his watch,” Williams said

Ray Kelley, national legislative director for the Veterans of Foreign Wars, said he expects Obama will have some success this fall with the post-Sept. 11 generation of veterans because of the Iraq War and his programs for returning troops. But older veterans — the majority conservative white males — will probably stick with Romney, and that’s despite Obama’s work on many of their issues.

Sweet, sweet raaaaace card! But no: you could swap Mitt Romney with Herman Cain with scant effect on the numbers. Why? Because veterans are steeped in meritocracy. Which is why Cain, or other staunch Americans like Allen West, enjoy massive veteran support. Conversely, even the idle curiosity that might have garnered Obama a few military followers initially has long since worn away.

If you disagree with Obama, it's because you are a racist.  But veterans disagreed by a vast majority with Kerry back on '04.  The MSM came up with a different set of excuses, but the big takeaway from this is that you can never disagree with a (D) politician because of his policies.  There is always another nasty reason, like racism, or sexism, or genderism, or whatever to explain it.  They never, ever can accept that it's the policy that's the problem, not the person espousing said policy. You would think that when enough people don't like what you are selling that it would be a good time to see if there is a problem with your goods, but not for these folks.  Their schemes are always golden, and we are just too stupid or bigoted to see the truth.

And yet we are the delusional irrational ones.

Funny if it wasn't so close to the truth....

Thanks to a link from a comment at Buttercup's I found this:

Given some of Matt's other stuff, I'm guessing that he's picking up the mantle from Ray Stevens.

Though Ray still seems to be going pretty strong too.

"We don't care if you're offended, and we never will. Get used to it."

The wonderful Pat Condell telling it the way most of us feel, but saying it so much better than most of us can.

And then read the article from City Journal by Michael Totten, "The Terrorist's Veto".

I wonder how many in my family or at my workplace would read this and merely think, "How intolerant that man is!"?

The News (and procrastination)

So, doing a final news check before trying to research brain death and hypothermia one more time, I did my daily check of poltico's polling page.

They haven't had a new Connecticut poll for over three weeks.  The last ones had had Ø up by about 7, even in registered voter polls.  (He won this state in '08 by 22).

Low and behold they have a new poll from the Hartford Current and UConn which puts Ø up by 23.  It claims to be likely voters, but we can't find any links to the poll to see the methodology or the breakdown.  Surprise.  One of the commenters at the HC site actually brought this up.  I was quite heartened by the number of comments that were critical of the poll and Ø.

So I'll keep hunting for the internals, and I bet they're skewed enough to make the poll a meaningless partisan propaganda tool, useful in ginning up some (D) enthusiasm and as an attempt at making (R)s so despondent they stay home.

More not the news

We didn't get the shrubbery finished by a long shot yesterday, but we did get a fair bit of the dirt fill in.  My comment to the husband? "If anything can get to the piggies through that dirt, wire, and those rocks, I don't want to meet it without a shotgun."

The bushes are still in their pots, but hopefully we can get the rest of the dirt pile moved into the frame by this weekend to plant them.  I had also used some of the fence posts from the section of privacy fence we had taken down (because it was so badly installed, that parts of it were falling over), and propped up the remaining fence, one prop against the posts on either side of the shrubbery.  I'll get some hardward and bolt them in place later, and get a panel of trellis to affix to the front on so that it's somewhat more decorative from the street.  The post that's at the middle of the back wall of the shrubbery got a very large pointy rock driven in next to the post on the leaning side so that it's staying pretty much straight too.  Of  course to do that I had to move the neighbors' sun tent thingy, which they had staked down so close to the leaning fence that I couldn't push the posts upright.  No-one was home at the time.  I wonder if/when they'll notice.

So I'm back at work, with an AWOL brain, which is sad, because I've got to get one of my docs a bibliography on brain death and hypothermia, and I'm just not having any ability to put something coherent together for him....

Not the news

because the news is just depressing, and we talk about it on most of the other blogs I read.

I'm on a new antibiotic, which will hopefully take care of whatever is wrong with my sinuses.  Right now I'm on clarinex (systemic antihistime), nasonex (nasal spray antihistimine) and singulair, (another systemic antihistime, specifically for allergic rhinitis).  When my GP added the singulair he also put me on a 12 day tapering course of prednisone.  My face stopped hurting, which was good, because the cheek bones were so bad that it hurt to put my head on the pillow, and I'm a side sleeper.  All of my upper teeth hurt too, including all the ones that aren't there.  However, as soon as I finished the prednisone the pain came back.  So I went to the ENT, who has put me on Levoquin, and if that doesn't work, it's off for another CT (the last one was a year and a half ago).

The real problem is that I have a massively deviated septum and the lovely boney bits from the sides, the turbinates, have decided to grow to fit all the extra space on that side.  Things are blocked enough on a good day that I can't use a neti pot because there really isn't anyplace for the water to go, meaning that breathing through my nose is almost miraculous.  I was told years ago that this sort of thing only gets worse with age, and that at some point we'd probably have to treat it surgically; it was just a question of how long we could put it off.  So.... have we reached that point yet?  I guess I'll know in another two or three weeks if the antibiotic is having any lasting effect.

On the home front, my husband had a week off, ending today, so I took off yesterday and today so we could do some stuff around the house, in particular outside.  So of course we had major weather yesterday, and high winds, so all I got done on the outside was to buy the wood for the garden frame for the pit where the previous owner tried to put in a koi pond.  It's only about 6 inches deep, because this entire area is terminal morraine, and he gave up.  So we're putting in a raised bed, wood this year, and we'll surround that with rock or brick in a year or two.  We're going to put in some butterfly bushes, and some azaleas or some everygreenish stuff, and this will also allow us to bury the guinea pigs who have died over the last year and are currently taking up half my freezer.

Yes that sounds nasty, though the kids have loved confusing classmates be talking about the corpses in the freezer without specifying what type of corpse.  I figure they're wrapped in several layers of plastic, just like all the other stuff there, and of course they're frozen solid, so it's not like dead piggie cooties are infecting the triple bagged chicken.  On the other hand, I'd like to have all my freezer back, it's not that large to begin with.

Of course we have to take a break in the middle of the afternoon to pick the girls up from their various schools and take the one to her cello lesson.  So it will be interesting to see how much actually gets done today.....

Update:  Well, I got the frame put together, with only two small gashes, both mine, and both stupid.  I have checked that my tetanus is up to date.  We went to Home Depot and got three small azaleas and a butterfly bush.  The morgue has been emptied and the piggies laid to rest under a layer of rabbit wire held down with many large rocks and (so far) several inches of dirt.  We're taking a break, and will move more of the dirt pile later.

Explosions in Iran?

This is potentially quite interesting.  Not enough, but a good start.  I love how the Iranian is complaining about the "integrity" of the IAEA. Really, when did they last have any to complain about?

So the question is, is this going to be "it" for now, or is it just a start?  I'm reading that all flights out of Ben Gurion are booked, and lots of retired military and intelligence folks are looking to get their families out of Israel for the time being.

Mostly I hope that this, whatever this is, will be enough to at least apply some breaks until we can hopefully get a few people in DC who have more common sense than God gave marshmallows, given that the current lot seem to have been seriously missing when it was being handed out.

A small bit of me just wishes things would blow up properly, and let us get on with dealing with the problem.  Someplace I was reading comparisons between slavery and Islam; in the lead up to the Civil War, the feeling was that it could be contained, and if so, it would wither and die, a sentiment on both sides of the argument.  The author was suggesting that something similar might work for Islam, satisfying as "Grants March Through Cairo" would be on the visceral level. The problem with that argument is that containment didn't work on slavery, witness the Civil War, and I suspect that it would be even less likely to work with Islam. And yes, Grant's March Through Cairo sounds like an excellent idea.

Pleasant surprise

I woke up this morning, pleasantly surprised to see that we haven't started World War III.  Yet.

Yesterday evening while putzing about on the computer and watching "Runaway Jury", (an excellent movie, though with a definite anti-gun bias), I kept hearing helicopters.

We live near the submarine base in Groton, Connecticut, just to the side of the flight path to the local airport, which is less than a mile away.  You get used to hearing small jets flying very low overhead, to the point that during the day you don't normally even notice it.

These flights don't happen too often an night, in fact in general I think the airport closes at dusk.  Last night, betwen about 9pm and 10pm I heard helicopters, more than once.  Usually I've heard them when we're dealing with heightened security at the base or at EB or the Coast Guard Academy, such as a visiting dignitary, but that is usually during daylight hours.

I haven't heard any so far today, but it's only just past noon, so we've got plenty of time yet.

This morning has been fairly quiet, everyone has a headache/cold/allergies/miraine, but I had to go to Dunkin Donuts to return two of the bagels with cream cheese my husband had brought home.  We are always very specific that we do NOT want them toasted.  And about half the time, they are.  Husband doesn't pick them up often enough to remember that he needs to check them before he leaves the store.

It's plenty late enough that I need to get off the computer and start working on the guinea pig and rabbit cages, as well as cleaning the kitchen and bathroom.  I want to be able to wash the floor tonight, as well as sit at the table for dinner.

And in other news, the White House proves itself delusional again...

What else can you say about this?

Carney is giving Bagdad Bob a run for his money at being able to state the blatantly false with a straight face.

Lord, I wish we had some adults running the show.  My teenagers would do, being more intellectually mature than most of the folks in DC.

I should post something, but....

I'm tired.  I'm frustrated.  I'm at home and my MacBook is acting up, though it works fine on the wi-fi at work, and my mini just seems so small and tiny.  I'm also starting to get used to Mac macros, and a slightly larger keyboard, so sometimes my fingers do some odd things.

Mostly, everything I want to say has been said by plenty of others, and more eloquently.  I've added my 2 cents at Rachel's and Buttercup's and Misha's, and really, how many times do I need to state the obvious? We needed  have marines at all our stations, never relying on the locals, we needed to get our guys out, especially since I'm now reading that we had warnings about these attacks a week in advance, (not to mention the Libyan telling us that he was warning the Mr. Stevens about security issues that morning), we need to make a few heads roll, though I understand that the government in Libya is actually apologetic, seemingly sincerely, but nothing from Cairo, or any of the other places.

We've been messing up the middle east for decades now, and the problem would seem to be that we have forgotten the first rule of diplomacy:  you don't support regime change unless you are damn sure that the new regime will be a better friend to your country than the old one.  So Mubarak.  Nice guy?  Probably not really.  Political "friend"? Yes.  New regime. Nice guy(s)? No. Political "friend"? Definitely not.  So what have we gained? Nothing!  We have lost even more credibility with other regimes in the area, as it becomes more and more obvious that you can't trust the US farther than you can throw us.  Add in that we are obviously weak, which in Islamic terms is an open invitation for murder and mayhem, and I think we can call our current foreign policy and state department unmitigated disasters.

But God forbid we let that hick from Alaska anywhere near the levers of power, she's just plain stupid!

Grrrr.

I'm going to head off and see if I can get my Mac working better now that I've completely rebooted it.

Acts of war

The last time I checked, killing an ambassador was unequivocally an act of war.  The only possible response if a country wanted to be taken seriously was to flatten the offending nation.

Obama does not want us to be taken seriously.  We will probably continue to apologize for upsetting Moslem sensibilities by having a film which accurately portrays quotes from their supposedly "holy" book.

After 9-11 we should have ignored the fact that we are supposedly allied with the Saudis and flattened Medina, with the message proclaimed loud and proud that the next time a moslem hurt a single american hair we would do worse to Mecca.

Of course, if we had just not listened to Colin Powell and had gone straight through to Bagdad back in 1991, the Islamic world would view us as a "strong horse", and a country to be sucked up to rather than conquered.

I fear for the world my daughters are going to have to live in.

Remembering...

I imagine that 9/11 will be one of those days when pretty much everyone in this country can remember where they were and what they were doing.

For me, it was taking the first day of the MOAB (management of agressive behaviour) training which my hospital offers.

At our first break, we were out in one of the patient waiting areas and caught site of the TV turned to one of the news channels.

We watched the replay of the planes going into the towers over and over.  We watched the towers fall, over and over.  The instructor said that they had been trying to convince the airlines to hire them to teach their techniques, which included how to disarm someone coming at you with a knife, for several years, but of course this was back when everyone assumed that a hi-jacker just wanted to go someplace and land.  I believe that most of the airlines teach their employees this or similar programs now.

Today, this morning, looks just like it did that morning, beautiful skies, clear and cool.  I had a daughter in school that day, and we live in a navy town.  We're also only about two hours from NYC.  Almost everyone knew someone in NYC that day.  I know that one of our staff was waiting to here from their fiance who was working in the Towers.  I never did hear whether they were one of the survivors or the lost.

My husband's submarine was on a med run with a month and a half left; they were supposed to be home before Halloween.  Within a day we had been informed that they would be home on time (yeah, right) but all port calls had been cancelled. Within a few weeks, on another Tuesday, we got a call from squadron for a mandatory spouses meeting the next night.  The first thing we were told was that they no longer knew when the boat was coming home, but it wasn't likely to be the original date.  I pissed off more than a few wives at that point, since I was unable to restrain a "Surprise, surprise" in my best Gomer Pyle imitation, though the CO's wife was snickering.

Squadron was telling us as soon as they heard, because they knew a lot of families had plans for the weekend after homecoming.  Like the poor sailor whose wedding was scheduled for that Saturday.  The navy wanted us to have as much time as possible to change plans and schedules, but since they didn't know when they'd be back, it was up to us to decide what to do.

And then they threw the floor open for questions.  Woman after woman repeated almost the same thing: "We have a trip planned, and the plane tickets bought.  What should we do?"  And time after time poor Master Chief repeated, that they didn't know, each family would have to decide for themselves, whether to take the trip without the husband/brother/son, or reschedule, or what.  After the third or fourth version, I leaned over to the woman next to me and whispered "What part of "we don't know" do these women not understand?"  She laughed rather ruefully.

Over the next few weeks I got to listen to a lot of freakouts from wives and mothers that their husbands and sons were being called to duty, or sent out on patrol early.  I just kept reminding them that the men were safer underwater in the Persian Gulf than they were driving to and from the base in Peace Time.  I'm not sure if anyone of them actually believed me, but I do know that the only loss of a crew member suffered by any of my husband's commands in his 21+ years in the Navy was a few weeks after they got home from that deployment, when someone ran his car into a tree at midnight on the way home from bowling.  He left behind a wife and a three month old baby.

I got to spend my elder daughter's 6th birthday with one of her friend's parents in the next room watching CNN as we shot at Afghanistan.  CNN had to tell everyone the name of the boat (my husband's) although he wasn't allowed to tell me for over a year after they came home.  The Navy finally realized that the horse well and truly gone, so keeping that barn door locked was kind of pointless.  My husband always refers to that day as shooting fireworks for Katy's birthday.

And the world has never seemed quite as safe for us as Americans since then.  I suspect it never really was "safe" as such, but we never had to think about it, if only because it always happened someplace else before then.

I have realized that I missed one anniversary this year I try to never forget.  Beslan.  Islam has hit us here at home once, don't ever think they won't try, and try something like that if we ever let them.

Things to be thankful for

because thinking of everything else is just plain depressing.

The weather is finally seeing highs in the mid-70s.  I am not a good hot weather person, and we don't have a/c at home.  So for the last few months little has been accomplished, including house cleaning.  At least it isn't at the point where you just rent a dumpster and a shovel, and while I didn't do much yesterday, I could actually see progress.  Another week or two (or three)...

The girls both like their new high schools.  Younger daughter has gotten over the first day angst and tears, especially since a friend from middle school had moved to the new town, was attending the town high school the magnet is attached to, and has now transfered to the magnet school so they have several classes together.  Elder daughter thinks English might actually be a bearable class for the first time in years, and it looks like the teacher may actually teach some formal grammar.

I'm almost finished my course of prednisone.  I have put on at least 10 pound in the last 9 days, most of it water (I hope) though the fact that I have been constantly starving hasn't helped.  Only two more days of the lowest dose and it's done, so I should be able to start getting my food intake back to something normal.

My husband and I both have jobs.  Of course I'm not going to see much if any of a raise this year, although my town seems to be handing out 3% plus to all their employees.  And the husband's hours have been cut; he used to see lots of overtime, because Sears figured it was cheaper to do the overtime than the extra benefits.  Now they expect as much work from fewer employees on 35 or fewer hours a week.  I'll be surprised if our AGI for 2012 is as high as it was in 2011.  But our tax bill will be higher. 8(  So time to start thinking of other stuff, so that I don't get too depressed with it only being Monday.

Things I've learned this year about gardening and our house:

Next year I'm going to not even try carrots or lettuce.  Not unless I find enough money in the budget for a majorly groundhog-proof fence.  Nor will I try cucumbers or melons.  The vines have mildewed and the fruit died before it was ripe.  I had the same problem in the community garden the last few years, so I think I'll stick with tomatoes and lots of summer squash and zucchini.  The onions, radishes, beets, basil and chives did OK, so I'll probably do them again too.  Nasturtiums and marigolds, again, probably not until we can upgrade the fence seriously.  Groundhogs seem to love nasturtium leaves.  I'm going to try to bring the window boxes in this winter and set up a shelf in front of the kitchen window and see if I can grow lettuce inside.  Or at least some small herbs (basil gets huge).  If it works, I may just keep them indoors permanently, including the summer, since I don't think the groundhog will figure out how to get in the house.  Maybe.

I have to get mouse traps.  Our morbidly obese kitty caught two night before last, and kindly didn't eat them, just left one in front of the toilet and the other in the next room in front of the stove, where everyone ignored it as they stared hopefully up at the counter for my husband to give them breakfast. We did have some mice in the walls last winter, so I'd like to nip the problem in the bud if possible.

WW III

which hopefully won't be starting anytime soon.

But Canada has pulled it's few diplomats out, and is giving Iran five days to get all of theirs out of Canada.  It makes you wonder what the Canadians know.

Regnery has an interesting post on Breitbart.  There's an article over at HuffPo, written by someone doing a great ostrich imitation, since she seems to be claiming that Canada is the worst violator of middle eastern civil rights.  And of course the comments section looks vile, what with blaming everything on Israel.  There may be some sane comments, but I don't feel like wading through the sewage to find them.

And a few others at Breitbart:

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2012/09/07/BREAKING-Canada-Suspends-All-Diplomatic-Relations-With-Iran

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2012/09/07/8-Sep-12-World-View-Canada-severs-all-diplomatic-relations-with-Iran

And on a much more local note, here in SouthEastern Connecticut, we have a tornado watch, one of the first I've seen in well over a decade here.

It's very black out, as well as windy, and if the rain hasn't started when I get the meatloaf ready for the oven, I'll go stand outside with the wind in my hair, enjoying it.

When you've lost the Daily Show.... where in I vent, and really wish I had a stiff drink.

Ø seems to have lost the Daily Show.  I admit that while I don't go out of my way to watch it, I've usually enjoyed the bits I've seen, because even at it's most pro-Democrat, Stewart didn't seem to be mean the way folks like Bill Maher were.  There have also been more than a few times when he seemed to be trying to poke fun at the administration, but something, whether his network, or his own personal biases, was holding him back.  I also never got the feeling that he was hiding his personal feelings on the matter to try and come across as neutral.

But since the DNC convention started Stewart seems to be really going to town.  I wonder if he and his writers are getting out all the pent up frustration of the last four years now that they're finally allowed to mock Ø, in spite of his "historicalness".

My parents still seem to be totally in the tank, Ø inherited a much worse mess than we expected, you can't trust anyone who fact checks the White House, even if it's part of the MSM, etc., etc., etc.  I called  them earlier about something and heard Daddy have hissy fits in the background over the employment figures.  I may have misunderstood what my mother was saying, but it seemed that he was upset because the media wasn't buying the White House's rose picture of how getting people out of the job market so that the U-3 figure goes down is a good thing.

If, God willing, we get an R in the White House as well as an R congress, it will be interesting to see their cognitive dissonance, especially if the economy picks up faster than expected.  Mother's take is that she almost hopes Romney wins so we can see how bad things really are, and that he can't fix it any faster than Ø has.  Of course if R/R win in November, I expect the economy to start taking off immediately, the same way that it tanked as soon as Ø won in '08.  Of course Bush was responsible for that tanking, because he was still president, and a Democratic Party controlled Congress, and the knowledge that a far left/marxist sympathizing (at best) President was going to take over in two months couldn't have had anything to do with it.  Likewise if we see improvements after November but before swearing R/R in, it will all be due to Ø's fantastic policies, and we should have just given him that extra four years.

Sigh.

They will never admit that JFK was probably to the right of Romney; although they idolize JFK, they've been brainwashed to assume that the Dems have always been as they are now, and that that is always best for anyone who isn't a millionaire, and why would anyone who isn't a millionaire want to vote against their personal interests?  These are the same people who when I pointed out where things were going with the passing of ObamaCare, told me that there was no way companies would stop providing employee health insurance because they want to keep good workers.  (Of course they'll also agree that companies don't give a crap about their employees because they just want the profits.)  I've shown them the articles where benefits companies tell how 50% or more of their clients are planning or at least considering dropping benefits and dumping their employees on the exchanges.

I wonder if they'll pay all my other bills when work drops coverage, and the government unilaterally changes their contract with my Navy retiree husband and starts making us pay for our Tricare, to the tune of what we'd have to pa on the exchange, which for us is 9.5% of our total income, which will be over $7000, up from my current $2K and his free.  I don't know about anyone else but we don't have a spare $100 a week lying around and of course there will still be significant co-pays and stuff we need like new glasses for growing girls that isn't covered. As it is, if we don't get an extension on the Evil Bush Tax Cuts for the Rich Only (TM) and the SS deductions go back up that 2%, we'll be seeing at least $50 less a week after January, not to mention gas going up, oil going up, groceries going up, etc., etc., etc.  And if, God forbid, all this were to come to pass, they would never believe that their vote choices might have had anything to do with it.

Ouch.

I guess it's proof that I'm getting older even if I don't feel it.

Every few years I have to completely rearrange the back journal shelving at work (360 or so shelves) because of changes in subscriptions, running out of room for the stuff we still get, having too much space after stuff we've discontinued, etc., etc., etc.

I was shifting a handful of journals (six or eight shelf inches) as a bunch from a bottom shelf in one stack to the fourth of six shelves in the next column and twisted just wrong.  I know I have muscles and connective tissue from my waist down over my hip joint and into my thigh.  It's just that the waist area of the IT band stuff doesn't usually seize up.  So know I'm sitting at my desk, trying to stretch it out, which is hard because I have very loose joints and can't bend far enough to stretch already too long connective tissue, and trying not to breath too hard.

Hopefully it will ease off soon, so I can get some lunch without squeaking with every step.  Work will not be happy if I break myself again just doing my job.  I was on "light duty" for a wrist injury for two months, ending less than two months ago.

Growing old sucks, but it does beat the alternative.

There was a convention?

I know there was, because none of my usual Thursday night TV fare was on.  So instead I went to the pharmacy to pick up an antihistamine  refill.  I found it much more edifying and happy making.

The nice discovery for the evening was that sometime in the last few months, my drug of choice, Clarinex, has gone generic.  The insurance companies keep trying to practice medicine without a license and force me to use OTC claritin.  I use Clarinex because the -tin knocks me out.  I can't drive, I can't do any work if I make it to work alive, I can't even read or watch a mindless TV show, I'm so sleepy.  I actually had to get a script of Claritin last spring so that I could "prove" to the company that I had tried the stuff.  Buying it over the counter or using samples from the doctor's office didn't cut it, because they had no proof, not even believing the doctor.  So I filled a script, gave the entire thing to my daughter, since she also has a script for it, and it works for her, and then, with proof in hand, they were willing to cover it.  Idiots.

I'm waiting to see what our share of the hospital insurance premiums looks like for next year.  If it goes up as much as other Aetna products have been lately, I may drop it, stick with just Tricare, and put the premium money in a savings account.  I can go through all my Aetna record for this year, but I think without the Aetna, we wouldn't have spent $2K after whatever Tricare paid, and I need to save up $2K over the next year or so for some major dental work.

Dental insurance is another scam.  I'm getting at least what I put in back since it's a family plan, but the maximum payouts haven't changed in 30 years, while the costs of the work have gone up more than a bit.  Certainly once the girls are off the family plan, I'd be better off just putting the money away and paying all dental costs out of pocket, since I pretty much am anyway.

The DNC is getting into full swing

And I just can't bring myself to watch any of it.  From reading the blogs and news sites this morning it seems to be strictly Abortion! Abortion! Abortion!

Seriously, who cares?  If we're all broke, how are we supposed to pay for your damn free abortions?

And really, how is not paying for something for someone else automatically denying them the right to buy said product or service? If refusing to pay for someone else's contraceptives or abortion is denying them the right to medical care, their refusal to pay for my rent or mortgage is obviously denying me my right to shelter.  But I don't see anyone making that claim.  Which is silly, because shelter from the elements is obviously a much more important "right" than something to help you deal with your poor life choices.  (And yes, I know that not everyone who gets an abortion is doing it for convenience, just 95%+ of them; if it's an ectopic pregnancy, I'll drive you to the clinic myself.)

Add in the new add, where we are told that the only thing we all belong to is The Government.

I am NOT a slave or indentured servant.  I may belong to a country, a church, a family, a social club. My membership in these things is just that, MEMBERSHIP.  It is, even with family, voluntary.  It is a mutual contract, which can be broken at any time.  But I don't have membership in the "government".  The only way I can belong to said government is as a chattel.

I am NOT Julia.  I do not need the government to step in and do everything for me, without my even trying to get ahead on my own first.

I am NOT Julia.  I have a man in my life, whom I love, and who is helping me make a home and raise a family.  We are a package deal.  I can't have that package with the feds.  Or I suppose I could have something similar, but then it would be some creepy blend of Julia and the Lebensborn.

I am NOT Julia.  I AM free.  I WILL stay that way.

Dr. Who

Not much to say about it but that it was worth the wait.

And yes, I am slow.  I didn't get the bit about the soufflé until the doctor spelled it out.

Offense

Not the military kind.  

The kind which one gives.

The State Department obviously has employees who don't have enough to do, so they put out a department magazine.  It would seem to be bi-monthly, and the latest issue is found here:  http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/195572.pdf

Go to page 8, and read.  I'll wait.

It's short but jam packed with inaccuracies.  As well as giving as much offense as it claims to be trying to prevent us from giving.  "Vicious Native American intruders"?!?!?!?!  I thought they were supposedly here first, making those "holding down the fort" the intruders.  Not to mention, as at least one other blogger has, that forts did exist before the U.S. Army started building them on our western frontier.  I seem to recall a few in Gaul.

But the author of that piece is black, so he is categorically incapable of giving offense, because his skin color somehow filters it out or something.  It is only us poor deluded evil white folks who have to worry about that sort of stuff.

School fun and games

My elder daughter is attending a new magnet high school.  The state has decided that parents should be able to get reimbursement of a token amount from their local school districts for transporting their own children if the town does not offer transportation to that particular school.

However, the state only decided to allow for parent reimbursement this summer, and hasn't sent the districts the info.  It requires a "contract" between the district and the parent.  It requires that this all be completed and submitted to the state by September 17th, so that the town can get reimbursement and then give it to the parent.  It sounds like my district doesn't think they can get it done before then, since it's a new legal thing.  

Hopefully it's just that the person I was talking to meant we wouldn't be able to get it done in the next week, not that we wouldn't be able to get it done before the 17th.  

Sigh.

At least the BoE is beginning the termination process for our Superintendent, who, based on the letter he wanted to read at the meeting last night, has some serious psychological issues (not to mention what he did that has brought us to this point).

Back again. Maybe.

Maybe it's time to start taking out my frustrations on a seldom read, minimally known blog rather than driving my leftie family and acquaintances nuts by posting on Facebook and Twitter... 8)

HR 3200 Sec, 113, 114, 115, 116

Sec.113 INSURANCE RATING RULES

a) allows for limited variations in rates QHBPs charge enrollees
b)1) requires a study of large groups, self-insured employers vs. those with a bought plan, including solvency issues for the self-insured.
b)2) requires a report on this study to with recommendations to make sure that there are no incentives for smaller employers to self-insure, or which will "create adverse selection in risk polls of large group insureres of self insured employers". Is this adverse selection adverse to the insurers or the insured?


Sec. 114 Nondiscrimination in benefits.

a) To understand this properly you have to look us sec 702 ERISA 1974, Sec 2702 Public Health Services Act, and Sec 9802 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986. Which I haven't got to yet.
b) requires parity in mental health and substance abuse benefits, making the provisions of Sec 2705 of the PHSA applicable to all plans, both individual and group, as long as they are not superceded by or inconsistent with Subtitle C.


Sec. 115 ENSURING ADEQUACY OF PRIVIDER NETWORKS.

a) QHBPS areto have enough profiders in their networks that their enrollees can actually get the covered services. What happens if no QHBPs in a geographic area can get enough folks to accept their plans?
Transparency in the cost-share differential between in network and out-of-network is required. Every plan I've ever had had this in the enrollment book and printed on the insurance cards.


Sec. 116 ENSURING VALUE AND LOW PREMIUMS

a) seems to basically mean that if a QHBP takesi n more than a pre-set % of what it pays out it must rebate the excess to enrolees. The term medical loss ratio is used, which seems to mean the portion of premiums taken in that is used to cover enrollees claims.
b) the Commissioner is to use HHS methodology to set the MLR. It must be high enough to get insurers to participate. Though if the MLR is what they pay out, it would seem that they mean setting the percentage of premiums NOT spent on enrollee claims high enough.

"Fixing" health care

I was thinking about this topic this morning (surprise) and wondered: in all this rush to "fix" health care in the US, have any of those folks in Washington DC who are writing the bills actually studied the problem to find out not only what things aren't working for folks (costs are high, and not everyone has insurance which will cover all the unexpected stuff), but also what works?

We're told that 85% of Americans are pretty happy with how things are now. Have any policy makers actually talked to them to find out what they're happy with?

It's as if my current employer suddenly started getting surveys back saying 15% of our patients were unhappy, so the solution is obviously to raze the whole building to the ground, fire everyone, and start from scratch, with no real data as to what made the other 85% satisfied.

John Conyers is an ass.

John Conyers actually has the nerve to say there is no reason for our legislators to read the bills put before them. Since the health care bill would take two days and two lawyers to understand, they shouldn't bother.

Patronizing is one of the nicer terms I can think of. I mean, us poor stupid voters, how can we think that our representatives ought to know what they're doing when they vote on something?

Here is the news item, with a video clip :http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=51610&print=on

Edited on Friday, July 31st to add:
I've been told that what he was saying was that there was no point in reading the current version of the bill because it was that long and complex and was going to be changed in committee anyway.

However.... it will probably be easier to understand the changes if one understands what was there to be changed, and if they had come up with a bill out of committee on Wednesday, I'd be willing to bet that they'd still expect the House to vote on it by today, even if the members hadn't had the two days and two lawyers to help them out.

HR 3200, Sec. 100, 101, 102, 111, 112.

OK, I started reading this thing and taking notes on it yesterday.

Text in red is directly from the GPO pdf of the bill.

Dr. Who is much more interesting.

DIVISION A - AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE CHOICES

Sec. 100 PURPOSE; TALBLE OF CONTENTS OF DIVISION; GENERAL DEFINITIONS

a)1) The purpose of this division is to provide affordable, quality health care for all Americans and reduce the growth in health care spending.
Will the bill ever address how you can increase the number of people utilizing our health care system without increasing the amount you need to spend?
a)2) actually uses the word "broken" to describe aspects of the health care system.
a)3) discusses how the bill will reform health insurance.
a)4) Entitled HEALTH DELIVERY REFORM
First the snarky question - how do you deliver health? Second - similar question to a1, how do you increase quality of health care to more people while spending less per person?
b) the table of contents
c) general definitions used throughout the bill, with many references to ERISA 1974
c)25) Y1 ... and similar subsequently numbered terms, mean 2013 and subsequent years, respectively.
Do most folks who are pushing for this realize that it won't help anyone for at least 4 years?

Now we get to the actual TITLE I of the bill - PROTECTIONS AND STANDARDS FOR QUALIRIED HEALTH BENEFITS PLANS.

Subtitle A - General Standards

Sec. 101 REQUIREMENTS REFORMING HEALTH INSURANCE MARKETPLACE

That is an exact quote from the GPO copy of the bill. Does anyone out there know what it means? Otherwise the section is actually comprehensible, at least to someone with a postgraduate level of education.

Sec. 102 PROTECTING THE CHOICE TO KEEP CURRENT COVERAGE

a) defines grandfathered coverage. If I'm reading this right, only individual plans (not group, or employer plans) can be grandfathered. However, per b)1) there is a 5 year transition period for group plans.
a)1) beginning with day 1 of Y1, no new enrollees in existing plans, except for adding dependents.
a)2) NOTHING about a plan can change except for the premiums or other changes required by law.
a)3) defines the premium increase rules.

b)1) by the beginning of Y6, all employment based plans must meet requirements of Sec 101 for QHBPs, i.e., unless your plan already met the requirements on Day 1, Y1, YOU CAN NO LONGER KEEP YOUR
PLAN
b)2) beginning with Day1, Y1, the only individual plans for new enrollees must be QHBPs and must be Exchange participating.


Subtitle B - Standards Guaranteeing Access to Affordable Coverage

Sec. 111 PROHIBITING PRE-EXISTING CONDITION EXCLUSIONS
A short section, only one paragraph, which prohibits QHBPs from imposing pre-existing condition exclusions or limits.

Sec. 112 GUARANTEED ISSUE AND RENEWAL FOR INSURED PLANS

This is a little unclear on initial reading, partly because it references sections 2711 and 2712 of the Public Health Service Act, but it sounds like once someone is in a plan, as long as they pay their premiums they can never be dropped, for any reason. As a reasonable person, I would read this section to say that a) an insured can never be dropped unless they fail to pay their premiums, and b) as long as a single insured wishes to keep their plan, the insurer MUST keep insuring them.

Does this mean that once a plan is offered the insurance company can never stop offering it? i.e., if BigInsCo decides they no longer want to offer group plans, they must continue for as long as a single
client wishes to use that plan?

Why I don't favor a rush to "fix" health care

I spent several years on Tricare (it's still my secondary), and rather longer before that in Ireland in their NHS system. Which is why I worked hard to get a good job so I would have something NOT run by a gov't. The Navy tried quite hard to kill my eldest child, and I still have occasional problems stemming from the post-appendectomy abscess in Galway ("Oh, but 10% to 20% of all appendectomies get post-op abscesses!")

At least HR 3200 is currently not quite as bad as HR 676 - Medicare for all! No co-pays, ever! No for-profits of any kind anywhere in the health care system (we'll buy them out forcibly)! The gov't will decide in advance how much they will allow a geographical region to spend on care for the year! (Ask the UK how that's doing - no money for cleaning and other basic supplies.) A rather Orwellian/Soviet-sounding "National Board of Universal Quality and Access"! What could go wrong?

Yes, the current system needs some fixing. But handing it over to gov't bean counters to decide whether the only treatment that will cure me is "cost-effective" or if I’m far enough up the queue is not something I ever want to deal with again.

One place to start reform is letting the uninsured pay the same as is accepted from insurance. I've been charged $70 for an inhaler when Tricare's computers were down and there was no proof that I was still insured. Two days later when they were back up, the pharmacy accepted a total of $40 between insurance and co-pay for the same med. But federal law requires that they charge the uninsured full freight, even though they must accept the lower amount from the feds. Why should a lack of insurance mean you have to pay 50-100% more for all your medical care? I'd like to see a provider being allowed to recieve the same amount for the same service, no matter who pays. The feds are responsible for that, so they could fix it pretty fast, if they were willing to. However, if they did, they'd have to up what they pay, since providers tend to lose money on the federal patients, and have to make it up on privately insured, and uninsured.

We could also buy basic private insurance for all the legally-here uninsured for far less over the next 10 years than the projected costs of HR 3200.

I just worry that if we get system which divorces end users even more from the costs, inspite of gov't rhetoric, the only way to contain costs will be rationing, and then we'll end up with folks dying of curable diseases, simply because it costs too much to do detection testing, such as pap smears on women under 25, because we know that they never get cervical cancer, or because at 80 how much use will you really get out of that pace-maker?

The problems with our current delivery of quality health care and - perhaps even more so - sick care are complex, and to ram through a fix on a rapid time frame, designed by who-knows-who, and voted on by legislators who don't even read, much less understand, what they vote on, just so we can say we "fixed health care!" will create even more problems.

Utah has what looks to be a distinct possibility in improving access to health care, MA's system is going (gone?) broke, Hawai'i tried something for kids which they had to stop within 7 months, because they didn't account for human nature and it cost way more than expected. Let's see how all these experiments work before we rush into fixing a damaged, but still functional-for-the-majority system.

HR 3200

So I'm starting to read this 1000+ page monstrosity. Lets see if I can make any sense of it....

Response to a responses to post at Cranky Prof's place.

Here is the original post and comments.

Most hospitals and doctors in this country are more than happy to work with folks with no insurance. Especially the non-profit hospitals, such as the one I work at. We have foundations and other programs specifically to help people in your position. I know of no-one who has been denied lifesaving treatments solely because of lack of insurance or another way to pay. If you get your insurance through your employer, especially if it's a larger employer, the plan they offer HAS to take you, though some do deny payments on pre-existing conditions for up to 12 months. After that period, you ARE covered. And I know a lot of doctors who would rather do so-called charity work, than see medicaid or medicare patients, because at least with the charity case, their office doesn't have to spend hours trying to get the gov't to cough up the insurance payment, which is always less than the cost of the billing office's time, never mind the doctor's. And they legally DO have to bill the gov't, they can't just write it off.

I am a medical librarian, so I get to read a lot of the British medical literature - we subscribe to both Lancet and BMJ as well as some of the specialty journals. When patients have to wait over 6 months between cardiac imaging studies and the stenting those studies show is required, patients die. When studies show that of patients considered curable at the time they go on the list to recieve chemo or radiation treatment for cancer at least 10% have their disease advance to the uncurable stage before they can even begin treatment, it is obvious to most that that system is far more broken than the one in the US.

Remember, that if your insurance denies you, you have options which include legal, such as suing the bastards, changing your insurance, and if the bill is small enough, paying for it yourself. In a lot of nationalized systems, you aren't allowed to pay for procedures the gov't plan won't cover. For that matter, if the gov't plan won't cover it, the doctor probably can't even offer the procedure. If there is only one plan nationally, and it only covers certain drugs within a class, the other drugs cease to be available, as they are no longer financially viable for the manufacturer. I can't use albuterol sulfate for nebulizer treatments, since it makes me throw up for the first few doses, and then attacks my guts, which take years to recover (if ever). If the gov't plan becomes the only one, and they decide that they're only going to cover generic albuterol, and not Zopenex, I'm in deep s**t the next time I get bronchitis or pneumonia, because the xopenex will no longer be there at all, no matter how it's paid for.

I lived in Ireland for 8 years and because of my age I was on the national health system, and the waiting for anything other than my GP was months, and a lot of the stuff that had to be done at clinics was stuff my GPs here in the States have always been able to do in their offices. I've had to deal with only one drug in a given class being allowed, and that was one I had vile reactions to, so my options was to pay myself (very expensive) or do without. I was told I had a 6 to 12 month waits to have a "wart" removed at the clinic, when it wasn't even a wart, and if my GP hadn't been willing to inject a local and attack it with a scalpel, I'd have waited the 9 months or so for ineffective treatment, and then another God-knows-how-long for another appointment for them to try to figure out what it was (a dermatofibroma) and then who knows how much longer after that for an appointment to have it removed. In the US I made one appointment with a dermatologist, who looked at it (it had grown back due to not being completely excised in Ireland) and removed it that visit. And yes, my insurance covered it, but I bet it cost them a lot less than the three visits would have cost the Irish NHS.

Our system is hardly perfect, but instituting a gov't plan which due to it's subsidy by the gov't will put all the private insurers out of business it not the way to go. When patients are insulated from the actual costs of their treatments, a lot of unnecessary stuff is done (e.g. it is quite possible to diagnose appendicitis without a $2K CT scan, which also exposes the patient to LOTS of unnecessary radiation). And when there is only one plan and it's run by the gov't there will be no recourse when they tell you you're too old for a kidney transplant or a hip replacement, or not sick enough for the drugs which may not cure the problem but which will allow you to have a decent quality of life.