Daily Kos: State of the Nation: President Obama addresses the Gates arrest.

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24 July Midday quips

I am not one of those who believes that health insurance (government or otherwise) should pay for wooish, unproven stuff (with perhaps the exception of part of the cost of experimental treatments done by serious scientists and doctors on someone who is terminally ill).

Yes, some Democrats are part of the problem:

Tom Harkin is up to his usual tricks: he wants to expand the role of ‘alternative therapies’ by allowing them to be covered by insurance. The quacks are cheering him on, too — every naturopath, homeopath, acupuncturist, crystal healer, shaman, meditator, and iridologist wants their slice of that great big health insurance pie. It’s a disgrace. Strangely, the insurance companies aren’t complaining. This comment explains that, though.

Harvey Kaltsas, president emeritus of the American Association of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine, said the country could save billions of dollars by shifting care for a number of conditions away from pharmaceutical treatment and toward acupuncture. Kaltsas said the number of licensed practitioners has grown to 20,000 from just 300 in 1971, indicating that many people are sold on the practice’s effectiveness.

Here is the Boston Globe article.

Senator Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat who is a longtime supporter of nontraditional medicine, is at the forefront of the effort to win insurance coverage for such providers as part of national healthcare legislation.

“It’s time to end the discrimination against alternative healthcare practices,’’ Harkin said at a congressional hearing.

Harkin is the cosponsor of an amendment that says healthcare plans will not be allowed to “discriminate’’ against any healthcare provider who has a license issued by a state, an amendment Senate aides said was designed to provide coverage for alternative medicine. Backers of the amendment say it could save tens of billions of dollars in the long run by providing less expensive and better alternatives to drugs and surgery in a variety of cases. The amendment was adopted by a Senate committee writing health legislation, but details are still being negotiated.

[...]

Forty-four states license acupuncturists. Fifteen states, not including Massachusetts, license naturopathic physicians, who use natural remedies in their treatment.

Many practioners of alternative medicine say mainstream caregivers don’t want the competition.

But the American Medical Association says there is little evidence to confirm the safety or efficacy of most alternative practices. “Much of the information currently known about these therapies makes it clear that many have not been shown to be efficacious,’’ the association said in a policy statement. The association denies that it is trying to stifle competition and says it is only trying to ensure that medicine is based on science.

Dr. Harriet Hall, a retired Air Force flight surgeon who examines medical claims for Skeptic magazine, said she worries that ill-informed members of Congress will elevate practitioners of alternative medicine to the same level as medical doctors.

“If it were shown to be truly effective, it would be part of regular medicine,’’ she said.

With friends like these….this is just so discouraging.

Bill Maher: profit motive (sort of goes along with Mano Singham’s post)

How about this for a New Rule: Not everything in America has to make a profit. It used to be that there were some services and institutions so vital to our nation that they were exempt from market pressures. Some things we just didn’t do for money. The United States always defined capitalism, but it didn’t used to define us. But now it’s becoming all that we are.

Did you know, for example, that there was a time when being called a “war profiteer” was a bad thing? But now our war zones are dominated by private contractors and mercenaries who work for corporations. There are more private contractors in Iraq than American troops, and we pay them generous salaries to do jobs the troops used to do for themselves ­– like laundry. War is not supposed to turn a profit, but our wars have become boondoggles for weapons manufacturers and connected civilian contractors.

Prisons used to be a non-profit business, too. And for good reason –­ who the hell wants to own a prison? By definition you’re going to have trouble with the tenants. But now prisons are big business. A company called the Corrections Corporation of America is on the New York Stock Exchange, which is convenient since that’s where all the real crime is happening anyway. The CCA and similar corporations actually lobby Congress for stiffer sentencing laws so they can lock more people up and make more money. That’s why America has the world;s largest prison population ­– because actually rehabilitating people would have a negative impact on the bottom line. [...]

And finally, there’s health care. It wasn’t that long ago that when a kid broke his leg playing stickball, his parents took him to the local Catholic hospital, the nun put a thermometer in his mouth, the doctor slapped some plaster on his ankle and you were done. The bill was $1.50, plus you got to keep the thermometer.

But like everything else that’s good and noble in life, some Wall Street wizard decided that hospitals could be big business, so now they’re run by some bean counters in a corporate plaza in Charlotte. In the U.S. today, three giant for-profit conglomerates own close to 600 hospitals and other health care facilities. They’re not hospitals anymore; they’re Jiffy Lubes with bedpans. America’s largest hospital chain, HCA, was founded by the family of Bill Frist, who perfectly represents the Republican attitude toward health care: it’s not a right, it’s a racket. The more people who get sick and need medicine, the higher their profit margins. Which is why they’re always pushing the Jell-O.

Because medicine is now for-profit we have things like “recision,” where insurance companies hire people to figure out ways to deny you coverage when you get sick, even though you’ve been paying into your plan for years.

When did the profit motive become the only reason to do anything? When did that become the new patriotism? Ask not what you could do for your country, ask what’s in it for Blue Cross/Blue Shield.

If conservatives get to call universal health care “socialized medicine,” I get to call private health care “soulless vampires making money off human pain.” The problem with President Obama’s health care plan isn’t socialism, it’s capitalism.

Don’t get me wrong: doctors, scientists, nurses, etc. deserve good pay. What I am saying is that I would approve of my taxes going toward poor people being able to see the doctor for a check up and for illnesses not bankrupting people.

We spend money of the military and for law enforcement to “keep us safe”, right? Well, isn’t health care part of “keeping us safe”?

24 July 09 (am)

Workout notes 4 mile walk in 51 minutes (12:45 pace); timed 1.23 mile lower loop of Bradley Park section in 13:16; the good news is that this pace didn’t put me out of breath in the least. The bad news: still too friggin slow; but the technique felt good.

But in now way did my aerobic stress match the stress I had when I attempted to run a “fast” mile.

Other stuff:

You might have to blow this up a bit to read the altered dialogue; it is in modern geek-speak and is funny. The art work is taken from the old “Charles Atlas” home body-building course advertisements that appeared in comic books when I was growing up.

Here is the original ad:

Health Care Mano Singham lays out the case of why corporate profits ought to not be the driving force in health care.

Pat Condell: a great rant!

Yes, I am a liberal and remain one.

A Case Study of Why a Democratic Supermajority Means Nothing

I remember this post from a while ago:

Relax. I think what has happened is that the R’s have gotten so bat-*hit crazy that the only ones that they will accept are those completely divorced from reality.

Look at who the Ds have: Pryor, Blanche, Landrieux (sp), Byrd, etc. These people are conservative by, say, Illinois or New York standards and would be Rs in those states. Even with 60 “D”, it is hardly a liberal juggernaut.

I’ll say it again: the current Democratic Party is a collection of centrists and conservatives (aka: “bluedogs”) and the Republicans are mostly the bat-shit insane wingnuts.

Anyway, the fact is that the Senate won’t take up health care reform this August.

I am saddened but not surprised. I give President Obama credit for trying. But the fact is that we have a sad, sad collection on our side; we’ve never had the unity that the Republicans had.

Still, when it comes to health care, at least one respected voice says that it is too early to despair.

Civil Discourse? Yet another reason it is all but impossible.

Just Read.

So, this is the work of uneducated trash right?

Well no; it was educated trash that did this:

Now, Tea Party activists trafficking in racist imagery are pretty much dog bites man. But McKalip isn’t just some random winger. He’s a Florida neurosurgeon, who serves as a member of the American Medical Association’s House of Delegates.

He’s also an energetic conservative opponent of health-care reform. McKalip founded the anti-reform group Doctors For Patient Freedom, as well as what seems to be a now defunct group called Cut Taxes Now. Last month he joined GOP congressmen Tom Price and Phil Gingrey, among others, for a virtual town hall to warn about the coming “government takeover of medicine.” And in a recent anti-reform op-ed published in the St. Petersburg Times, McKalip wrote that “Congress wants to create larger, government-funded programs for health care and more bureaucracy that ration care and impose cookbook medicine.”