The Insanity Of American Health Care Costs...

One pretty concise (and altogether maddening) explanation as to the wholesale insanity of the cost of American health care:

America- The Greatest Health Care System In The World... Bar None!

Except the 36 countries in the world ahead of it!
(Hilarious- esp about 4 min in...)

The Daily Show
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How Ignorant Are Americans? Oh, About...

Yeah, but them's hicks- surely my sophisticated, hometown New Yorkers know what side is up...
(thank you FOX News- bring on the Death Squads!)

Obama: Exposed And Corrupted

Watching something like this makes me want to lash out and become as lawless, ruthless and criminally irresponsible as possible. In other words it inspires me to become every bit as criminally flagrant and opportunistic as the big banks, and every bit as negligent and thoroughly corrupt and hypocritical as the DOJ under the auspices of President Obama.

This administration, which swore to greater transparency, this administration that was voted into power under the guise of  justice, has effectively made the very word not only a joke (the prior administration saw to that) but a concept that can no longer be aspired to, or realized- certainly not for the remainder of his term. He has run that concept into the very ground, well beyond the reach and redemption of his most eloquent of speeches. He has taken America's greatest opportunity to lead, and perverted it into a sad, self serving mockery. And for that he cannot be excused.

Watch The Untouchables on PBS. See more from FRONTLINE.

Kill- Yes! Save? Not So Much...

Despite the plethora of suicides that take place directly from one of the world's most famous and beautiful landmarks, a proposed and approved suicide prevention barrier has yet to be built. This country, the most efficient and innovative in the history of mankind when it comes to killing people the world over has to be shamed into saving its own citizens on any front (incl healthcare). And still...

As much as we should applaud this man, it is a stark reminder of how an America which could once pride itself in confronting (and sometimes even resolving) issues and challenges, is now mostly expert in avoiding denying them!

You Feel OK?

 Then ya may not wanna read this...

Years ago, one of my favorite public-health professors, Harvard surgeon Dr. Lucian Leape, opened the keynote speech at a national surgeons’ conference by asking the thousands of doctors there to “raise your hand if you know of a physician you work with who should not be practicing because he or she is too dangerous.” Every hand went up...

The number of U.S. patients killed annually by medical errors is equivalent to 4 jumbo jets crashing each week. (Chris Ryan / OJO Images-Getty Images)

Under Our Skin

Under Our Skin is perhaps the most disturbing documentary I've ever seen- and for several reasons. First, it is a very somber study of a very serious disease that first made headlines in the late seventies and has managed to fall off radar while leaving an ever growing circle of despair and devastation. Lyme Disease is caused by a parasitic spirochete from the bite of an infected tick, that can conveniently burrow into any part of your body (just like its syphilitic cousin) and cause grave havoc wherever and however it chooses to manifest. This is one seriously scary bugger- and they're practically... everywhere!!!

Not only do the ever growing numbers of those stricken have to battle the infection itself (and its myriad of severely debilitating manifestations), for which the only treatment is massive and prolonged antibiotics- they also have the fight of their lives (literally) with the vast majority of the... US medical establishment. Meanwhile, the small minority of doctors who are, in fact, willing to treat patients (I'm very much tempted to say 'victims') properly are having their licenses revoked by the ruling doctors who are in bed with health insurance companies (1-3 months coverage and 'bye, bye') and private, for profit interests working on vaccines and completely unwilling to share information to hasten the control of this epidemic. Meanwhile, patients are dismissively ordered to see shrinks (by those who either should or do know better) while more and more of them are slowly and agonizingly suffering- and dying...

Give 'em 1% of a Heimlich

UPDATE: Mea Culpa!!! Seems it was a... HOAX! Please take expressed sentiments and apply to Tea Party member described below... and all the other bankers who received government bailouts only to complain that it's the government that always fucks up and it's private enterprise that always does things best.......

I hope this filthy rich son of a bitch needs a Heimlich in a restaurant one day- and as he gags and chokes on what may very well be his last few dying breaths, I hope the waitress who serves him saw The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.

Reminds me of The Tea Party Filth who threw dollar bills at a guy with Parkinson's. And you know full well that both these sons of bitches are proud, patriotic, card carrying Republican... "Christians."

Sorry, Eric- you know what I'm talking about...

Capitalism At Its Best!

The Cure For Cancer!

I started the week with Lee Camp, and I sure as hell can't think of a better way to end it!

Photo Of The Year

Ben Goff / The Gazette

Take a good, long look at it. This photograph was taken in the "richest" country in the world, the country of your dreams, my dreams, where a man's willingness to work has long been prized, respected, and rewarded above all else. So why is this man in jail?

Why didn't James Richard Verone just pull himself up by the bootstraps? Why didn't he just stop feeling sorry for himself and his thoroughly debilitating list of physical conditions? Why did he actually expect to receive medical care after fifty nine years of being a productive citizen in the land of his birth? Surely, real men like a Limbaugh, Beck or Cheney would be able to work right through the pain, without complaint, without these pitiful theatrics for public attention!

This is what we have allowed ourselves to become- a country that kicks its own to the very gutter the second they can no longer produce to maximum peak efficiency- and profit. For anyone counting every lost penny (or dream), living one check to the next- this could very well be you, it could damn well most definitely be me. We live in a country where greed is a virtue, and being poor is a disease unto itself, if you're part of the ever growing "working poor," you're obviously not working hard enough. If you're as sick as this man and can't work, you're lazy- if you can't find work, you're criminal.

Somehow the American Dream got distorted, twisted beyond all manner of reason. Instead of striving to get their fair share, there were those that started demanding it all and goddamn anything and anyone who got in their goddamn way. Middle class jobs were outsourced out of existence, war became our number one industry, mercenaries became honorable, education the luxury of those who could afford it. All this while the rich were allowed encouraged to scheme, divert and reconfigure other peoples' money into personal pinnacles of wealth so obscene that the very government (who they refused to pay tax to) forgave and then aided them anew when they failed in their grandest of larcenies. And who do you think they blamed?

So look long and hard at that photo good people of these semi United States. And think of it some more when your "leaders" ask you to rally round the flag, fight another war, and give up something else for the filthiest of those you already helped make rich. It's the same look the emperor wore that day the empire cascaded all around him- the same look its citizenry denied in their own faces for many a year prior.

On A Mission...

It's back to the doc's today to give them holy hell- I was there last Monday when they told me "it was probably a virus." Wow! That's your professional diagnosis, huh? All that med school for something I already surmised before I even dragged my wounded ass down there. That's what I pay Kaiser Health (don't ya just love that name) $3,000 for every damn year (for me and the missus), and I don't even rate a freakin' aspirin for the effort! Well, this time they're gonna hear my bloody mouth- if ya can't bloody well cure me, at least tell me what the fuck is wrong! You can at least do that- can't ya?!?

Everyone else that has a decent health care system- thank your bloody stars!