RIP Les Paul
I need to say something about the passing of Les Paul, who died this week at the age of 94. Les was an old-school good guy. He loved music, he loved tinkering with the equipment, he personally, individually, out of his own compulsive creativity brought music into the age of electronics. He was an excellent guitarist and innovative inventor whose contributions to music, and especially recording, changed the ambience of our world profoundly.
I'll quote from MSNBC -- you should follow the link and read more if you are not familiar with this musical giant.
You want to know what's good about America, look at Les Paul, a regular guy from Waukesha, Wisconsin who did things his own way and changed the world without trying.
I'll quote from MSNBC -- you should follow the link and read more if you are not familiar with this musical giant.
NEW YORK - Les Paul, who invented the solid-body electric guitar later wielded by a legion of rock ’n’ roll greats, died Thursday of complications from pneumonia. He was 94.
According to Gibson Guitar, Paul died at White Plains Hospital. His family and friends were by his side.
As an inventor, Paul also helped bring about the rise of rock ’n’ roll with multitrack recording, which enables artists to record different instruments at different times, sing harmony with themselves, and then carefully balance the tracks in the finished recording.
The use of electric guitar gained popularity in the mid-to-late 1940s, and then exploded with the advent of rock in the mid-’50s.
“Suddenly, it was recognized that power was a very important part of music,” Paul once said. “To have the dynamics, to have the way of expressing yourself beyond the normal limits of an unamplified instrument, was incredible. Today a guy wouldn’t think of singing a song on a stage without a microphone and a sound system.”
“Without Les Paul, we would not have rock and roll as we know it,” said Terry Stewart, president of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. “His inventions created the infrastructure for the music and his playing style will ripple through generations. He was truly an architect of rock and roll.”
A tinkerer and musician since childhood, he experimented with guitar amplification for years before coming up in 1941 with what he called “The Log,” a four-by-four piece of wood strung with steel strings.
“I went into a nightclub and played it. Of course, everybody had me labeled as a nut.” He later put the wooden wings onto the body to give it a traditional guitar shape.
...
In the late 1960s, Paul retired from music to concentrate on his inventions. His interest in country music was rekindled in the mid-’70s and he teamed up with Chet Atkins for two albums. The duo were awarded a Grammy for best country instrumental performance of 1976 for their “Chester and Lester” album.
With Mary Ford, his wife from 1949 to 1962, he earned 36 gold records for hits including “Vaya Con Dios” and “How High the Moon,” which both hit No. 1. Many of their songs used overdubbing techniques that Paul had helped develop.
“I could take my Mary and make her three, six, nine, 12, as many voices as I wished,” he recalled. “This is quite an asset.” The overdubbing technique was highly influential on later recording artists such as the Carpenters.
Released in 2005, “Les Paul & Friends: American Made, World Played” was his first album of new material since those 1970s recordings. Among those playing with him: Peter Frampton, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton and Richie Sambora.
“They’re not only my friends, but they’re great players,” Paul told The Associated Press. “I never stop being amazed by all the different ways of playing the guitar and making it deliver a message.” Guitar legend Les Paul has died at 94
You want to know what's good about America, look at Les Paul, a regular guy from Waukesha, Wisconsin who did things his own way and changed the world without trying.
posted by JimK at 9:25 AM
46 Comments:
Where is the outcry from the gays about the Obamacare?
Not only will it throw out grandma but it will throw out HIV/AIDS patients. It will fund abortions resulting in fewer adoptions for the gays.
Les Paul was a giant. His talents and grace will be sorely missed. The jam sessions they'll be having in heaven these days will be awesome!
Anon. I'm sure the private health insurance industry that is backing the teabagger town hell lie-telling madness appreciates your support by spreading more lies on their behalf.
Elderly Americans are turning out in droves to fight ObamaCare, and President Obama is arguing back that they have nothing to worry about.
Allow us to referee.
While claims about euthanasia and "death panels" are over the top, senior fears have exposed a fundamental truth about what Mr. Obama is proposing: Namely, once health care is nationalized, or mostly nationalized, rationing care is inevitable, and those who have lived the longest will find their care the most restricted.
Far from being a scare tactic, this is a logical conclusion based on experience and common-sense.
Once health care is a "free good" that government pays for, demand will soar and government costs will soar too.
When the public finally reaches its taxing limit, something will have to give on the care and spending side.
In a word, care will be rationed by politics.
Mr. Obama's reply is that private insurance companies already ration, by deciding which treatments are covered and which aren't.
However, there's an ocean of difference between coverage decisions made under millions of voluntary private contracts and rationing via government.
An Atlantic Ocean, in fact.
Virtually every European government with "universal" health care restricts access in one way or another to control costs, and it isn't pretty.
The British system is most restrictive, using a black-box actuarial formula known as "quality-adjusted life years," or QALYs, that determines who can receive what care.
If a treatment isn't deemed to be cost-effective for specific populations, particularly the elderly, the National Health Service simply doesn't pay for it.
Even France—which has a mix of public and private medicine—has fixed reimbursement rates since the 1970s and strictly controls the use of specialists and the introduction of new medical technologies such as CT scans and MRIs.
Yes, the U.S. "rations" by ability to pay (though in the end no one is denied actual care).
This is true of every good or service in a free economy and a world of finite resources but infinite wants.
Yet no one would say we "ration" houses or gasoline because those goods are allocated by prices.
The problem is that governments ration through brute force—either explicitly restricting the use of medicine or lowering payments below market rates.
Both methods lead to waiting lines, lower quality, or less innovation—and usually all three.
A lot of talk has centered on what Sarah Palin inelegantly called "death panels."
Of course rationing to save the federal fisc will be subtler than a bureaucratic decision to "pull the plug on grandma," as Mr. Obama put it.
But Mrs. Palin has also exposed a basic truth.
A substantial portion of Medicare spending is incurred in the last six months of life.
From the point of view of politicians with a limited budget, is it worth spending a lot on, say, a patient with late-stage cancer where the odds of remission are long?
Or should they spend to improve quality, not length, of life?
Or pay for a hip or knee replacement for seniors, when palliative care might cost less?
And who decides?
In Britain, the NHS decides, and under its QALYs metric it generally won't pay more than $22,000 for treatments to extend a life six months.
"Money for the NHS isn't limitless," as one NHS official recently put it in response to American criticism, "so we need to make sure the money we have goes on things which offer more than the care we'll have to forgo to pay for them."
Before he got defensive, Mr. Obama was open about this political calculation.
He often invokes the experience of his own grandmother, musing whether it was wise for her to receive a hip replacement after a terminal cancer diagnosis.
In an April interview with the New York Times, he wondered whether this represented a "sustainable model" for society.
He seems to believe these medical issues are all justifiably political questions that government or some panel of philosopher kings can and should decide.
No wonder so many seniors rebel at such judgments that they know they could do little to influence, much less change.
Mr. Obama has also said many times that the growth of Medicare spending must be restrained, and his budget director Peter Orszag has made it nearly his life's cause.
We agree, but then why does Mr. Obama want to add to our fiscal burdens a new Medicare-like program for everyone under 65 too?
Medicare already rations care, refusing, for example, to pay for virtual colonsocopies and has payment policies or directives to curtail the use of certain cancer drugs, diagnostic tools, asthma medications and many others.
Seniors routinely buy supplemental insurance (Medigap) to patch Medicare's holes—and Medicare is still growing by 11% this year.
The political and fiscal pressure to further ration Medicare would increase exponentially if government is paying for most everyone's care.
The better way to slow the growth of Medicare is to give seniors more control over their own health care and the incentives to spend wisely, by offering competitive insurance plans.
But this would mean less control for government, not more.
It's striking that even the AARP—which is run by liberals who favor national health care—has been backing away from support for Mr. Obama's version.
The AARP leadership's Democratic sympathies will probably prevail in the end, perhaps after some price-control sweeteners are added for prescription drugs.
But AARP is out of touch with its own members, who have figured out that their own health and lives are at stake in this debate over ObamaCare.
They know that when medical discretion clashes with limited government budgets, medicine loses.
Even if you don't like the massive health-care package being considered in Congress, you have to admit that health insurance and health care in this country are not working well.
There are two basic problems:
First, if you get sick and then lose your job or get divorced, you lose your health insurance. With a pre-existing condition, new insurance will be ruinously expensive, if you can get it at all. This, the central defect of American health insurance, explains why most Americans are happy with their current coverage yet also support reform.
Second, health care costs too much. Yes, we get better treatment, but the cost-cutting revolution that has swept through manufacturing, retail, telecommunications and airlines has not touched health care.
The problems are real, but the proposed remedy—even more government intervention—is counterproductive.
A market-based, deregulation-focused reform is possible, and it will work.
Health care and insurance are service-oriented, retail businesses.
There is only one way to reduce costs in such a business: intense competition for every customer.
The idea that the federal government can reduce costs by negotiating harder or telling businesses what to do is a triumph of hope over centuries of experience.
Take the claim that centralized record-keeping can cut costs.
In his July 22 press conference, President Barack Obama noted that a new doctor today might run a test again rather than ask for records of a previous result.
That seems silly.
But maybe it isn't.
Maybe the test is cheap, the condition changes, the test can fail, and the cost of setting up an integrated record system between these two doctors isn't worth two tests a year.
The cost-cutting revolutions in other industries didn't settle questions like these with acts of Congress, expert commissions, armies of regulators, or via a "public option"—while leaving in place a system in which consumers have little choice, aren't spending their own money, and suppliers are protected from lower-cost competitors.
That approach has never spurred efficiency, and for good reasons.
Cost-cutting is painful.
Even in Mr. Obama's trivial example, lab technicians and secretaries will lose their jobs to computer programs, and they will complain.
Patients might have to get tests at inconvenient times and locations.
They will do this when their money is at stake—what people will put up with from airlines for a few dollars is truly amazing—but they will never accept it from the government.
But what about pre-existing conditions?
A truly effective insurance policy would combine coverage for this year's expenses with the right to buy insurance in the future at a set price.
Today, employer-based group coverage provides the former but, crucially, not the latter.
A "guaranteed renewable" individual insurance contract is the simplest way to deliver both.
Once you sign up, you can keep insurance for life, and your premiums do not rise if you get sicker.
Term life insurance, for example, is fully guaranteed renewable.
Individual health insurance is mostly so.
And insurers are getting more creative.
UnitedHealth now lets you buy the right to future insurance—insurance against developing a pre-existing condition.
These market solutions can be refined.
Insurance policies could separate current insurance and the right to buy future insurance.
Then, if you are temporarily covered by an employer, you could keep the pre-existing-condition protection.
Some insurers avoid their guaranteed-renewable obligations by assigning people to pools and raising rates as healthy people leave the pools.
Health insurers, like life insurers, could write contracts that treat all of their customers equally.
The right to future insurance could be transferrable to another company, for example, if you move.
You could have the right that your company will pay a lump sum, so that a new insurer will take you, with no change in your premiums.
Better, this sum could be occasionally placed in a custodial account.
If you got sick but had something like a health-savings account to pay high premiums, you could always get new insurance.
Insurers would then compete for sick people too.
Innovations like these would catch on quickly in a vibrant, deregulated individual insurance market.
How do we know insurers will honor such contracts?
What about the stories of insurers who drop customers when they get sick?
A competitive market is the best consumer protection.
A car insurer that doesn't pay claims quickly loses customers and goes out of business. And courts do still enforce contracts.
How do we get to a competitive market?
The tax deduction for employer-provided group insurance, which has nearly destroyed the individual insurance market, is a central culprit.
If we don't have the will to remove it, the deduction could be structured to enhance competition and the right to future insurance. We could restrict the tax deduction to individual, portable, long-term insurance and to the high-deductible plans that people choose with their own money.
More importantly, health care and insurance are overly protected and regulated businesses.
We need to allow the same innovation, entry, and competition that has slashed costs elsewhere in our economy.
For example, we need to remove regulations such as the ban on cross-state insurance. Think about it. When you're not inebriated. What else aren't we allowed to purchase in another state?
The bills being considered in Congress address the pre-existing condition problem by forcing insurers to take everybody at the same price.
It won't work.
Insurers will still avoid sick people and treat them poorly once they come.
Regulators will then detail exactly how every disease must be treated.
Healthy people will pay too much, so we will need a stern mandate to keep them insured.
And this step further reduces competition.
Private, competitive insurance markets are a superior way to solve the pre-existing-conditions problem, and the only hope to lower costs.
good news for TTF if they're looking to recruit new officers:
Squeaky Fromme has been released from prison and is looking for a lunatic fringe group to hook up with.
During live television coverage of the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago, novelist Gore Vidal famously called William F. Buckley a "crypto-Nazi." To which Buckley famously replied (in addition to other choice words), "Stop calling me a crypto-Nazi, or I'll sock you in the goddamn face and you'll stay plastered."
Buckley later apologized. He also explained: "Can such men understand the causes of anger in others? Understand the special reverence we need to feel for that which is hateful? I do not believe that anyone thought me a Nazi because Vidal called me one, but I do believe that everyone who heard him call me one without a sense of shock, without experiencing anger, thinks more tolerantly about Nazism than once he did, than even now he should."
In recent weeks, left and right have employed the Vidal tactic. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi accused town-hall protesters of "carrying swastikas," leaving the impression they were proud Nazis -- when, in fact, a few protesters carried signs accusing Barack Obama of having Nazi aims (bad enough). Rep. Brian Baird (D-Wash.) declared the protesters guilty of "Brownshirt tactics." Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) compared America under Obama to Germany in the 1930s. Rush Limbaugh talked of "similarities between the Democrat Party of today and the Nazi Party in Germany."
The accusation is a staple of American T-shirt and bumper-sticker political culture, found too often at liberal antiwar protests and conservative tea parties. Anyone with a black felt pen and the ability to draw a Hitler moustache on a poster can make this witty, trenchant political statement. Michael Moore compared the USA Patriot Act to "Mein Kampf." Al Gore warned of "digital Brownshirts."
This rhetorical strategy is intended to convey intensity of conviction, as in, "I am very, very, very serious, you Nazi jerk." Actually, it is a lazy shortcut to secure an emotional response. Worse than that, it is an argument that puts an end to all argument. What discourse is possible with the spawn of Hitler? And when someone is unjustly accused of Nazi tactics or sympathies, what response can we expect other than Buckley's outrage? Let the head knocking begin.
Worst of all, the Vidal tactic does undermine the "special reverence we need to feel for that which is hateful." Nazism is not a useful symbol for everything that makes us angry, from Iraq to abortion. It is a historical movement, unique in the ambitions of its cruelty. Those who doubt this uniqueness should read Saul Friedlander's "Nazi Germany and the Jews, Vol. 2: The Years of Extermination," which records the Nazi terror with the same meticulousness that the Germans displayed in producing it. Nazism was the "beard game," in which the beards and sidelocks of Jews were pulled off or set afire before audiences of cheering soldiers. It was the practice of making elderly Jews dance around a fire of burning Torah scrolls. It was whole orphanages deported to death camps, and pits full of corpses, and ancient communities erased from human memory, and death factories issuing a thick smoke of souls, and a mother trading her gold ring for a glass of water to give her dying child.
Many who study these events think silence the only appropriate response. "There is nothing," says scholar Lawrence Langer, "to be learned from a baby torn in two or a woman buried live."
But it is our nature to attempt to wrestle meaning from catastrophe. So we draw lessons about the poison of racism, the dangers of blind obedience to authority, the corruption of grand schemes of social purity, the shallowness of civilization in "civilized" nations, and the hatred hiding within ordinary men and women.
These lessons are relevant to politics. But they are trivialized when applied to Obama's health insurance reform plan or the conduct of disorderly town-hall protesters. The burning of the Reichstag and Kristallnacht are not arguments against a single-payer health plan or against the Patriot Act.
For the survivors of Nazism, memory is a kind of sacred duty. The Vidal tactic desacralizes those memories -- shrinking them to the size of our political agendas and robbing them of their power to shock and teach. The history of those times should be
approached with fear and trembling, not mocked with metaphor.
On Monday, pro-abortion U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., acknowledged that the federal health-care overhaul would include abortion.
"Abortion will be covered as a benefit by one or more of the health-care plans available to Americans, and I think it should be," she said at a town hall meeting.
But on Tuesday, Lofgren's fellow Democrats touted the opposite position.
"There's nothing in the bill that talks about Planned Parenthood," claimed Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. "There is not one dime for any abortions. There is nothing in the bill that mandates any kind of abortion coverage."
At his own town hall meeting Tuesday, Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., agreed with McCaskill.
"If you want to have a health-care plan, which does not have payment for abortions, you can have that one where you'll not be charged for somebody who has an abortion," he said. "Now, if you want a different health-care plan, an option where you can have payment for abortion and you pay for it, because there'd be a little bigger premium, you have the choice of being in one plan or the other."
In truth, the debate was settled more than two years ago, when then-Sen. Barack Obama shared his agenda with Planned Parenthood supporters.
"In my mind, reproductive care is essential care," he said. "It is basic care. And so it is at the center and at the heart of the plan that I propose. Essentially … we're gonna set up a public plan … that will provide all essential services, including reproductive services.
"We also will subsidize those who prefer to stay in the private insurance market — except the insurers are going to have to abide by the same rules in terms of providing comprehensive care, including reproductive care. I still believe that it is important for Planned Parenthood to be part of that system."
"Reproductive care" is a political euphemism for abortion.
It's pretty clear what President Obama and the Democratic Congress are working toward. They have shot down every single attempt in both the House and the Senate to keep abortion funding out of the health-care proposal. The reality is, if this proposal passes, there will be unlimited funding of abortions.
Andrea- not anon
I laughed out loud while eating lunch and reading page 29 of this week's City Paper- the quote from Weepy Ruth is priceless!!
Wall Street Journal 1
Wall Street Journal 2
Dumbya's speechwriter, Michael Gerson
CitizenLink
I see you are a serial unattributed commenter today. What's the matter Anon, has the cat got your tongue?
any of it you disagree with, Anon-B?
btw, I saw an Aunt Bea's BBQ and Dairy Shack down in Mt Airy, NC earlier in the week
don't worry, I didn't tell them you're up here anonymously associating their trademark with the gay agenda
I laughed out loud while eating lunch and reading page 29 of this week's City Paper- the quote from Weepy Ruth is priceless!!
Thanks for the tip, Andrea. It is pretty funny, especially since our very own shower nuts carried around protest signs and displayed them at their public meetings -- signs that said NO UNISEX BATHROOMS.
The City Paper reports:
...Last year, the Maryland Citizens for Responsible Government launched its own awareness campaign over transgender bathroom use: the “Not My Shower” initiative. Ruth Jacobs, the group’s president, says the campaign is meant to publicize the flip-side of transgender rights—privacy infringement for “normal people.” “If somebody with an opposite body part is allowed in to a ladies’ restroom—a guy who has a penis, who could put his penis inside my vagina—what am I to do?” says Jacobs. “We need to be able to retain the right to speak up about men in our bathrooms without being labeled bigots.” Jacobs does, however, approve of the gender-neutral single-stall. “That sounds like a reasonable compromise that doesn’t cause any problems for anybody, and that’s a fine thing to do,” she says...
any of it you disagree with, Anon-B?
I'd say Gerson got it half right. I remember our local haters, the shower nuts, particularly one who was a member of the Montgomery County Republican Central Committee, who jumped up at a County Council meeting where participants were discussing non-discrimination laws, yelling ‘‘Heil Hitler!”
I don't recall the press reporting that about any local Democrats or TTF supporters, do you, Anon?
In DC, single-stall bathrooms are required to be labelled as gender-neutral, though they are not always. In Virginia, ridiculously, most places will have two single-person rooms adjacent, each labelled for use by only half the people around. What are the regulations for Montgomery?
At my work, in general, we all use the two rooms as needed and as available, though I have noted (I've watched) that given the choice everyone tends to use the one designated for their half of the faculty.
Maybe Ruth could pass a law for MoCo.
Her quote is awfully graphic.
well, of course, the press wouldn't say that about Democrats or TTF
I thought you knew- the press is biased
however, that doesn't change the fact that what Gerson is referring to is a common tactic of TTF
everyone they don't like or disagree with is accused of Nazism
and "Nazi" is not the only term you sap of its power by misuse: "hate", "tolerance", 'family", "bigotry","marriage" et al
how about the other comments
they attack many positions you have ignorantly put forth here
should we assume they've won the argument and you now see the errors of your comments?
"At my work, in general, we all use the two rooms as needed and as available, though I have noted (I've watched) that given the choice everyone tends to use the one designated for their half of the faculty."
Stop stalking people using the bathroom, Robert.
Someone might think you're a pervert.
And here I thought this post was about Les Paul. I'm all for freedom of speech but I'm also for respect. When someone threadjacks a blog, they are showing that they neither respect the blog nor the people who create it.
It's a shameful act.
I agree with you Alvin. I have repeatedly complained about the rudeness and egoism of "Anonymous" in his attempts to hijack this site. He constantly steers his screeds away from the Blog Master's topic of discussion with impunity.
The length of his pontifications not related to this topic: "RIP Les Paul" is ludicrous because they have absolutely NOTHING to do with the topic. I wish Jim would create and monitor a rule that any diary entry will be removed if it is not pertinent to the topic being discussed.
I don't have his tolerance for the rude and inconsiderate theft of the Vigilance site that Jim has. I agree with your comment: "When someone threadjacks a blog, they are showing that they neither respect the blog nor the people who create it."
Diogenes
guys, the topic being discussed has been a regular topic and introduced by Jim himself many times
the comments are put on the most recent post for the convenience of the continuing conversation, so that people don't have to go scrolling through past posts
the Les Paul post stands as the tribute Jim intended and the comments don't detract from it
Alvin, do yourself a favor: find a great gal, in abundance in your hospitable Southern city, and ask her to go shag dancing with you at Jillian's this weekend
could be the start of a new lifestyle and you could stop worrying about how "on-topic" blog posts written in a city eight hours away are
Dio, you're hopeless
Honey, it's never funny to call someone a pervert.
I didn't, sweetie pie
I noted that a lot of people would think someone who sits around watching people go to the bathroom is one
that's just a fact I didn't know if you were aware of
just giving you a tip
Anon-B requested information on the comparative effectiveness board created by the February stimulus package:
"WASHINGTON, Feb. 19 -- The $787 billion stimulus package signed by President Obama on Tuesday dedicates $1.1 billion for head-to-head research to determine which drugs, devices, and procedures are most effective and carry the lowest risk.
The money will be split between the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
The legislation also creates a board, called the Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Clinical Effectiveness Research, to oversee and direct the studies, which will likely include literature reviews as well as independent trials.
The concept of federal input into effectiveness determinations is, however, controversial.
Comparative research could save money, proponents say, providing physicians with information on cost-effectiveness as well as clinical effectiveness.
Former Congressional Budget Office (CBO) Director Peter R. Orzag, Ph.D., told a congressional committee last year that a comparative effectiveness program could be a major long-term cost-saver, although he acknowledged that such savings wouldn't have an impact on the federal budget for a decade.
Doug Elmendorf, CBO's new director, recently said that a comparative effectiveness institute might yield results, but only if it's tied to incentives to control costs and improve efficiency.
". . . the effect of information alone on spending will generally be limited," he told the Senate Budget Committee.
And that's where the controversy comes in -- critics fear the comparative effectiveness information will drive medical decision-making through reimbursement policies.
A report accompanying the version of the bill that passed in the House in late January stated that money would be saved because "less effective and, in some cases, more expensive" interventions "will no longer be prescribed."
Read that "no longer be reimbursed," critics charged, noting that the underlying plan is to give the government control over all nearly all aspects of healthcare.
Some worry that the bill would lead to "rationing of care," or denying patients interventions because the comparative effectiveness research deemed something else a better deal.
Women's groups and minority groups, for instance, have expressed concern that a catch-all conclusion on interventions could overlook the unique ways in which disease manifests in those populations.
The legislation's language does not go so far as to set the framework for a system in which the government could deny payment based on the research, said David Merrit, project director at the Center for Health Transformation, although it may come to that in the future.
"Fears are justified that this kind of research could indeed be a slippery slope to ultimately rationing care," said Merritt."
Now's the time to be creeped out, folks.
to quote Thomas Jefferson:
"a government big enough to give us everything we need is a government big enough to take everything we have"
Thank you for the advice, honey. Are you a specialist on stalking?
As we all know, internet discussions in which Nazis and Hitler are invoked have gone on for too long, and are no longer discussions but simply flame-wars (rf. "Godwin's Law"). What can we say about real-world political debates that involve Nazis, Hitler, and killing granny? For that matter, what can we say about discussions that involve charges of racism and perversion?
Alas for civility.
"Anonymous"
Thanks so much for your clarification and justification of continued trolling at this site. I didn't realize that you speak for and represent Jim. I guess my hunch that you were attempting to pirate this site has been confirmed.
You are really as tiresome as those ignorant folks who scream, rant, rave, and chant obscene nothings at the so-called "Town Hall" meetings. Constant shouting and mouthing of lies eventually uncovers your true motives.
I think those who have read your e-n-d-l-e-s-s posts here have become very aware of your motives in "instructing" us.
You really have nothing new to offer us...the constantly revolving record has become worn out. Be a gentleman and move elsewhere.
Diogenes
GOP hypocrites on parade:
Time reports:
You would think that if Republicans wanted to totally mischaracterize a health care provision and demagogue it like nobody's business, they would at least pick something that the vast majority of them hadn't already voted for just a few years earlier. Because that's not just shameless, it's stupid.
Yes, that's right. Remember the 2003 Medicare prescription drug bill, the one that passed with the votes of 204 GOP House members and 42 GOP Senators? Anyone want to guess what it provided funding for? Did you say counseling for end-of-life issues and care? Ding ding ding!!
Let's go to the bill text, shall we? "The covered services are: evaluating the beneficiary's need for pain and symptom management, including the individual's need for hospice care; counseling the beneficiary with respect to end-of-life issues and care options, and advising the beneficiary regarding advanced care planning."
On July 24, 2009, Newt Gingrich said:
We should eliminate any financial incentive to do any test, treatment or therapy that does not directly benefit the patient or add value to the care process. Payments to doctors and hospitals must change from a transaction-based to an outcome-based model. And we need to migrate the system to proven best practices.
On July 2, 2009, Newt Gingrich said:
More than 20 percent of all Medicare spending occurs in the last two months of life. Gundersen Lutheran Health System in La Crosse, Wisconsin has developed a successful end-of-life, best practice that combines: 1) community-wide advance care planning, where 90 percent of patients have advance directives; 2) hospice and palliative care; and 3) coordination of services through an electronic medical record. The Gundersen approach empowers patients and families to control and direct their care. The Dartmouth Health Atlas has documented that Gundersen delivers care at a 30 percent lower rate than the national average ($18,359 versus $25,860). If Gundersen's approach was used to care for the approximately 4.5 million Medicare beneficiaries who die every year, Medicare could save more than $33 billion a year.
Another GOP hypocrite on parade:
In April 2008, halfterm Governor Sarah Palin hosted:
Healthcare Decisions Day
WHEREAS, Healthcare Decisions Day is designed to raise public awareness of the need to plan ahead for healthcare decisions, related to end of life care and medical decision-making whenever patients are unable to speak for themselves and to encourage the specific use of advance directives to communicate these important healthcare decisions.
WHEREAS, in Alaska, Alaska Statute 13.52 provides the specifics of the advance directives law and offers a model form for patient use.
WHEREAS, it is estimated that only about 20 percent of people in Alaska have executed an advance directive. Moreover, it is estimated that less than 50 percent of severely or terminally ill patients have an advance directive.
WHEREAS, it is likely that a significant reason for these low percentages is that there is both a lack of knowledge and considerable confusion in the public about Advance Directives.
WHEREAS, one of the principal goals of Healthcare Decisions Day is to encourage hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, continuing care retirement communities, and hospices to participate in a statewide effort to provide clear and consistent information to the public about advance directives, as well as to encourage medical professionals and lawyers to volunteer their time and efforts to improve public knowledge and increase the number of Alaska’s citizens with advance directives.
WHEREAS, the Foundation for End of Life Care in Juneau, Alaska, and other organizations throughout the United States have endorsed this event and are committed to educating the public about the importance of discussing healthcare choices and executing advance directives.
WHEREAS, as a result of April 16, 2008, being recognized as Healthcare Decisions Day in Alaska, more citizens will have conversations about their healthcare decisions; more citizens will execute advance directives to make their wishes known; and fewer families and healthcare providers will have to struggle with making difficult healthcare decisions in the absence of guidance from the patient.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, Sarah Palin, Governor of the state of Alaska, do hereby proclaim April 16, 2008, as:
Healthcare Decisions Day in Alaska, and I call this observance to the attention of all our citizens.
Advance Medical Directives. They were all for it before they turned against it in order to keep campaign contributions from health related industries flowing. Hypocrites!
Bad anonymous made 9 of the first 10 comments, all off topic. Clearly he's mentally ill when he does this and at the same time claims he "only speaks when spoken to". Live up to your promises for a change mentally ill anonymous.
guys, your dismissal of all the discussion at town hall meetings as lies will backfire on you because everyone has heard parts they agree with
it's free speech: they are some good comments, some bad
problem is, Democrats got more free speech then they bargained for and their attempt at propaganda badly backfired, solidifying the opposition
the post has a very humorous profile of Ben Cardin this morning saying the reaction of his constituents at the recent town hall meeting, where he was confronted with the anger of the voter toward his support for Obamacare, has made him determined to pass the bill
then he says the meetings have changed him and he will now oppose any bill that adds to the deficit
Earth to Ben:
all the bills increase the deficit
of course this little contradiction is only a problem if Ben plans to keep his word, which since he's a filthy, stinking, lying two-faced congressional Democrat, is not likely
There are two basic points about health-care reform that President Obama wants to convey.
The first is that, as he put it in an ABC special in June, "the status quo is untenable." Our health-care system is rife with "skewed incentives." It gives us "a whole bunch of care" that "may not be making us healthier." It generates too many specialists and not enough primary-care physicians. It is "bankrupting families," "bankrupting businesses" and "bankrupting our government at the state and federal level. So we know things are going to have to change."
Obama's second major point is that--to quote from the same broadcast--"if you are happy with your plan and you are happy with your doctor, then we don't want you to have to change ... So what we're saying is, If you are happy with your plan and your doctor, you stick with it."
So the system is an unsustainable disaster, but you can keep your piece of it if you want. And the Democrats wonder why selling health-care reform to the public has been so hard?
Again and again, their effort has brought us into a land of paradoxes.
Public skepticism is warranted when the President promises to cut costs while simultaneously providing coverage to nearly 50 million uninsured people.
It is even more warranted when his congressional allies seek to raise taxes to pay for all the new spending that this cost-cutting entails.
We aren't talking about short-term spending either; this isn't a trillion-dollar investment in a new system that will ultimately save money.
The Congressional Budget Office says the leading health-care-reform proposals will increase health-care spending and make the budget harder to balance in the long run.
Yet saving money is the President's principal stated rationale for reform.
Health-care reformers send out mixed messages on the uninsured as well.
The moral imperative of improving their health care is what drives the passion of most liberal activists for reform.
But when you read the liberal policy analysts, it quickly becomes clear that getting young and healthy people to pay more in premiums than they will spend on medical expenses is the point of forcing them to buy insurance.
Which is it?
In aggregate, are we trying to rescue the uninsured or bilk them?
Is reform something we are doing for them or to them?
The reformers' speed belies their words as well.
If health-care reform is so critically important, as they keep insisting, why not take the time to get it right?
Hard as it is to believe, at one point Obama was urging the House and Senate to pass legislation by three weeks after they began debating it.
One final contradiction may lie beneath all the others.
Democrats, particularly those involved in health policy, were scarred by President Clinton's failure to achieve reform in 1994.
They are determined to avoid a similar debacle. So on every procedural question, they have done the reverse of what he did.
Everything is different this time--everything, that is, except the plan.
The Democrats are seeking mostly the same policies they sought 15 years ago: mandates, regulations on insurance companies, new government-managed markets.
The major difference is that this time they also want a "public option," an insurance program open to everyone and run by the government.
Obamacare is Clintoncare with a little more liberalism.
The Democrats have apparently concluded that it was tactical blunders that sank Clinton. It wasn't. It was his plan. Like today's plans, it had too many conflicting goals.
Stanley Greenberg, who was polling for Clinton back then, recently reminded Democrats that the insured public in the early '90s just could not be persuaded that the President was going to cut its costs by expanding coverage for others.
No amount of clever strategizing is going to make the sales job easier this time.
Instead, the President is in a series of double binds.
The more he emphasizes how much has to change, for example, the more people are going to doubt his pledge that they can keep their doctor.
This time there is no barrage of Harry and Louise ads to blame.
It is health-care reform's own contradictions that are causing it to sink.
I had a dream last night
What a lovely dream it was
I dreamed we all were alright
Happy in this land of ours
Why did everybody laugh
when I told them my dream
I guess they all were so far
from that kind of scene
Feeling mean
I heard a song last night
What a lovely song it was
I thought I'd hum it all night
Unforgettable because
All of the players were playing together
And all of the heavies were light as a feather
All I remember is a feeling tomorrow
And as I recall the rest will just follow
I had a dream last night
What a lovely dream it was
I dreamed we all were alright
Happy in this land of ours
Happy in this land of ours
Ooops Anon! You skipped a line or two in Ramesh Ponnuru's Time Magazine piece, like this one:
Congress may yet pass the health legislation Obama wants. If it does, that success will reflect the Democrats' numbers in Congress and their determination
We all remember the GOP never once came up with a healthcare program to insure the millions of uninsured Americans from 1994-2006 while they had complete Congressional control. Now they will sing JUST SAY NO as they watch the Democrats lead every citizen of this nation to a better life of peace, prosperity, and health insurance for those in need.
"Alvin, do yourself a favor: find a great gal, in abundance in your hospitable Southern city, and ask her to go shag dancing with you at Jillian's this weekend."
Anonymous, I would suggest that you follow your own advice. After all, its obvious that all you do is sit behind your computer and launch silly comments against people.
"Congress may yet pass the health legislation Obama wants. If it does, that success will reflect the Democrats' numbers in Congress and their determination"
You notice the "may" and "if".
That makes the statements not very valuable or, even, factual.
"We all remember the GOP never once came up with a healthcare program to insure the millions of uninsured Americans from 1994-2006 while they had complete Congressional control."
There are already laws that emergency rooms can't turn back people who are ill. Health insurance is not an entitlement and Americans don't want to bankrupt the country with a new one.
About half the people who don't have insurance can already qualify for government assistance. Most of the rest have voluntarily chosen not to have insurance.
"Now they will sing JUST SAY NO as they watch the Democrats lead every citizen of this nation to a better life of peace, prosperity, and health insurance for those in need."
Most Americans don't believe that.
They know that extending health insurance to 50 million for free will mean they will pay more and receive less.
When Democrats go after trial lawyer abuse and remove the inequity of tax exclusion for employer paid insurance, the market will correct most of the problems.
As for prosperity, France and Germany have already pulled ot of recession because they are moving to a market based economy while we're dawdling behind.
Obama's a failure.
Yeah, come on all of you, big strong men,
Uncle Sam needs your help again.
He's got himself in a terrible jam
Way down yonder in Vietnam
So put down your books and pick up a gun,
We're gonna have a whole lotta fun.
And it's one, two, three,
What are we fighting for ?
Don't ask me, I don't give a damn,
Next stop is Vietnam;
And it's five, six, seven,
Open up the pearly gates,
Well there ain't no time to wonder why,
Whoopee! we're all gonna die.
Anon, some of us are old enough to remember these songs (I thought Country Joe's first album was better, but ...) but they are not promoting the discussion here in any perceptible way. I'm going to start deleting irrelevant song lyrics.
JimK
it's a commemoration
looks like Obama has decided the Repubs were right after all:
"WASHINGTON (Aug. 16) - Apparently ready to abandon the idea, President Barack Obama's health secretary said Sunday a government alternative to private health insurance is "not the essential element" of the administration's health care overhaul.
The White House indicated it could jettison the contentious public option and settle on insurance cooperatives as an acceptable alternative, a move embraced by some Republicans lawmakers who have strongly opposed the administration's approach so far."
I guess those town hall meetings were useful.
You notice the "may" and "if".
That makes the statements not very valuable or, even, factual.
Oh, so it makes these statements you didn't omit "not very valualbe or, even, factual" either.
that "*may* not be making us healthier."
One final contradiction *may* lie beneath all the others.
of course this little contradiction is only a problem *if*
unsustainable disaster, but you can keep your piece of it *if* you want
As for prosperity, France and Germany have already pulled ot of recession because they are moving to a market based economy while we're dawdling behind.
Well of course they did. Both France and Germany have already reformed their healthcare industries, controlling costs and improving care as follows:
France:
Although the French system faces many challenges, the World Health Organization rated it the best in the world in 2001 because of its universal coverage, responsive healthcare providers, patient and provider freedoms, and the health and longevity of the country's population. The United States ranked 37.
The French system is also not inexpensive. At $3,500 per capita it is one of the most costly in Europe, yet that is still far less than the $6,100 per person in the United States.
Germany:
In 2007, there were some 200,000 persons living in Germany without health insurance coverage [compared to 50 million living in the US without it]. With the health insurance reform of 2007, the German government has now implemented a new insurance law which makes insurance mandatory for everybody living in Germany.
People live longer in France and Germany than in the US, yet the US spends so much more than either France or Germany.
we weren't comparing the health systems of France and Germany, we were discussing the economics
we don't believe in rationing health care here
the leaders of both those countries, however, embrace the economic system which has made America so prosperous for the last quarter century and which we have now abandoned
thus, there is already evidence that this approach will harm America's economy
not to worry: it's looking more every day like we will have a Republican resurgence in the 2010 congressional election
look at the Virginia governor's race and you have to laugh
Deeds decided a couple of weeks ago to attack McDonnell's pro-life positions
the result: this morning, the Post reports that McDonnell has a solid lead over Deeds among likely voters
New Jersey, the other governor race thus year, is also a lock for Republicans
this fall, expect lots of stories about Democrats' falling approval ratings, putting more pressure on moderate Democrats to abandon the socialist agenda
Obama expects Americans to pay more for less and we aren't inclined to sit still for it
we weren't comparing the health systems of France and Germany, we were discussing the economics
That's right, you didn't make that comparison, I did. The cost of heathcare most definitely is related to economics. We can't keep paying nearly twice as much for health care per person as other developed nations like France and expect to be prosperous.
And not only that, but it is shameful that America, the richest, strongest nation on Earth permits nearly 50 million of her own citizens to live and die with no healthcare coverage at all.
"That's right, you didn't make that comparison, I did. The cost of heathcare most definitely is related to economics. We can't keep paying nearly twice as much for health care per person as other developed nations like France and expect to be prosperous."
Of course we can.
We spent more on it because we value access and self choice more than other nations and believe it is worth it.
Japan spends 8% of its GDP on healthcare, same as Zimbabwe. Monaco spends 5%, same as Afghanistan.
It's obvious that the level of healthcare spending and economic propects aren't closely related.
No one complains that the 20% of our GDP that we spend on manufacturing is dragging us down. Instead, we try to increase it with a cash for clunkers program.
What we spend our money on is a matter of choice.
We also spend a lot less on clothing and food in America because Sam Walton has used our market-based economy to lower those costs, relatively, in most parts of the country.
Capitalism works, which is the real problem with our health care system. Having employers control our expenditures has warped the market.
That, and the cost of tests ordered simply to avoid litigation, are the problems we need to address.
Obama, after having attended a few town hall meetings is starting to get it. You will too.
People from around the world flock here for medical care.
Two reasons:
-quality
-they don't have to wait so long to see a doctor
Government-run national health care is dead.
After this, no one will try again.
People from around the world flock here for medical care.
That would be rich foreign people or foreign people with really expensive health insurance that will cover going to a foreign country for treatment or charitable cases. But while these foreigners come and benefit from the best the American medical system has to offer, there are also nearly 50 million Americans right here at home who are not covered and therefore do not benefit. These tens of millions of uninsured Americans are the shameful part of the American medical system, the part healthcare reform is supposed to fix.
Here's an informative piece by Joan Walsh of Salon that talks about the reality of
Right-wing cynics and America's third-world healthcare
As President Obama heads to Bozeman, Montana today for a second "Town Hall" on healthcare, I find myself wishing he'd hosted one of his events at the teeming, third-world-style health clinic set up at the Inglewood Forum in Los Angeles. It's a wonderful example of American volunteerism and compassion; it also represents a complete breakdown in our values of fairness and equal rights.
The clinic is run by the non-profit Remote Area Medical group, founded two decades ago to bring medical advances to the third world. Now they're doing 65 percent of their outdoor clinics in the U.S, according to CBS News. They've been serving 1,500 uninsured people a day for the last three days, many if not most of them employed people who lack insurance.
It's stunning how much more media coverage the rowdy, abusive "Town Hells" are getting than the tragedy of the Inglewood Forum. ...
Read more about it and see a picture of the clinic's waiting room here.
brilliant-anon noted:
"People from around the world flock here for medical care."
anon-B said:
"That would be rich foreign people or foreign people with really expensive health insurance that will cover going to a foreign country for treatment or charitable cases."
In other words, anyone who can. We pay a lot because of our high quality.
"But while these foreigners come and benefit from the best the American medical system has to offer, there are also nearly 50 million Americans right here at home who are not covered and therefore do not benefit. These tens of millions of uninsured Americans are the shameful part of the American medical system, the part healthcare reform is supposed to fix."
As has been noted, about half of these people already qualify for government assistance and don't know it.
Spend some money educating them to go along with the crackdown on wasting money to get John Edwards $400 haircuts and ending the exemption for employer-paid health insurance.
Most of the rest of this "50 million" are young people who have opted not to spend their money on insurance, thinking they won't need it.
Most of them are right.
"the teeming, third-world-style health clinic set up at the Inglewood Forum in Los Angeles. It's a wonderful example of American volunteerism and compassion; it also represents a complete breakdown in our values of fairness and equal rights.
The clinic is run by the non-profit Remote Area Medical group, founded two decades ago to bring medical advances to the third world. Now they're doing 65 percent of their outdoor clinics in the U.S, according to CBS News. They've been serving 1,500 uninsured people a day for the last three days, many if not most of them employed people who lack insurance."
Sounds like a good charity.
As such, we already subsidize it by making donations to it tax deductible.
Any idea how many of the 1,500 are citizens?
Most of the rest of this "50 million" are young people who have opted not to spend their money on insurance, thinking they won't need it.
Nice spin. Try some facts for a change.
The CDC reports:
Health insurance coverage improves access and quality of medical care and can contribute to the overall health of Americans. According to 2005 data from the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey and the National Hospital Ambulatory Care Survey (SOURCE: National Health Interview Survey, 2006)
• The visit rate for patients with no insurance was about twice that of those with private insurance in emergency departments.
• Conversely, patient visits to physician offices were higher for individuals with private health insurance compared to those with no insurance.
Other recent data on health insurance from the National Health Interview Survey show slight increases in uninsured adults:
• In 2006, 14.8 percent of Americans, or 43.6 million, were currently without health insurance.
• Among working-age Adults (those ages 18-64), 19.8% did not have health insurance in 2006, an increase in the percent uninsured from 18.9% the year before.
• Approximately 9.3% of children under the age of 18 did not have health insurance in 2006, a non significant increase in the uninsured from 8.9% in 2005.
Data from 2006 also show differences in percentage uninsured by race and ethnicity:
• Almost a third (32.1 percent) of Hispanic people were uninsured when interviewed in 2006.
• While 10.4 percent of non-Hispanic white persons and 15.9 percent of non-Hispanic black persons were uninsured when interviewed.
A person was defined as uninsured if he or she did not have any private health insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), state-sponsored or other government-sponsored health plan, or military plan. A person was also defined as uninsured if he or she had only Indian Health Service coverage or had only a private plan that paid for one type of service such as accidents or dental care.
Adults aged 18-64 who have any kind of health care coverage (by state)
The link immediately above is for 2006 data. Here's the same data for 2008: Adults aged 18-64 who have any kind of health care coverage (by state)
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