Obama's Health Care Plan

The LA Times is headlining an article on Google News about Barack Obama's plan to expand medical coverage to the uninsured. The tagline- "The Democratic hopeful's proposal lacks specifics, but he says it would cut costs while expanding coverage to everyone." Wow, sounds foolproof!

The article doesn't have much on specifics, except that consultants for Obama have stated that the plan can save up to $200 billion a year through increased efficiency.

"The plan's most far-reaching aspect is a set of cost-containment changes that Obama said could save a typical insured family up to $2,500 a year by wringing
out much of the inefficiency and waste that make the U.S. healthcare system the world's costliest."

Does anyone know what this means? I'm guessing it means that my doctor will stop using $100 bills as prescription tickets, or something. The token industry expert interviewed also disagrees-

"The numbers don't seem to work very well," said health policy analyst John Sheils, senior vice president of the Lewin Group, a top healthcare consulting firm. "I think [the savings] are just dramatically overstated."

What's left? Gratuitous naysaying from a competing campaign!

"The Edwards campaign also criticized the plan, saying the lack of a requirement that individuals buy health insurance means it will not achieve universal coverage."

I think that I'd like my next job to be one of the reporters that writes articles covering proposed legislation. It seems pretty easy. Every article seems to follow this formula:

1) Senator/Representative/Electoral Hopeful X proposes a plan to fix Y costing Z
2) Industry Expert says plan is way too optimistic
3) Irrelevant ass clown weighs in

I can't wait for my Pulitzer!

Michael Moore Asks Bad Questions

Michael Moore has released in new documentary about the failing state of the US Health Care system at the Cannes Film Festival in Europe. While I haven't seen it, or even heard about it until I read this article in the Globe and Mail, I'm betting it's probably full of singular examples that don't extrapolate to larger trends and misleading statements like this:

"When I look at Canada, the only long line I look at is that you get to live three years longer than we do. ... Why does a baby born into Toronto have a better chance of living to his first birthday than a baby in Detroit?"

Really, we're going to compare Toronto to Detroit? Is that really apples to apples? The only data I can find on this is from the CDC website, where Detroit is ranked the third highest in terms of infant mortality out of the largest 60 US cities. The only cities that rank higher are Norfolk and Cincinatti, neither of which is probably as recognizable to foreign audiences like Michigan's failed labor union headquarters.

Regardless, I was pretty sure the benefits of the US health care system was not that they don't drop babies on the linoleum any less than the Canadians, but that you don't have to wait for three years next time you want carpal tunnel surgery. You know, that and the fact that capitalist health care allows for the costly research and development that leads to pioneering techniques and technology.

It's Science!

I don't have any idea what this article is about, but paragraphs like this make me think the author doesn't either:

Theorists say the Higgs or something like it has to show up simply because the Standard Model breaks down and goes kerflooey at energies exceeding one trillion electron volts. If you try to predict what happens when two particles collide, it gives nonsense, explained Dr. Ellis of Cern, a senior theorist with the long white hair and a bushy beard to prove it.

Monthly Recap

The internet no longer works in my apartment, so my posting is going to be very infrequent from here on out. I can only do it from the office in my apartment building, and only if no one else is using the computers. So, in order to cover the most ground in the least amount of time, I'll resort to bullets.

• My last day of work is June 29th, my last paycheck from work will arrive September 15th. Sweet. I'll probably be going home for a few days before the 4th of July and then driving back to Ohio on the 4th. I'll then be packing all my material possessions into the back of my Civic ,and then driving to the Cleveland airport on the 5th to pick up the Redhurt and take off to Colorado. 40 hours of driving in a week? I'm looking foward to it.
• I'm currently involved in what will assuredly be a giant trainwreck. I'd like to post about it, but I'll refrain for the immediate future. I'm going to wait and ride it out to the end, and then let you know what it's like to go down in flames. Scorching, firey, flamey flames. There are probably a lot of things I could do to prevent this, but then I'd have a lot less material for the book I'll never write.
• I officially graduated from college, apparently with some kind of honors. Now I'll find out how worthless my degree really is while looking for a job in Colorado. However, the worst case scenario is that it looks like I have a job in the Grand Junction oil fields if I want it. Things I know about this job: 1) long hours 2) really hard work 3) fantastic money. The plan is to find something better.
• I spent a weekend not too long ago with CharlesPeirce and Wife_of_CharlesPeirce. It was pretty fantastic, I took some pictures at Manassas of people we didn't know who weren't paying attention with the intention of posting them here and making Redhurt captions, but I can't upload them because of all the stupid security on this computer. I can't even right click.
• I've been drinking a lot, and frequently. I'm not sure how I feel about this.