The Koch Brothers and Health Care

Let’s talk about the Koch Brothers and their zealotry against any kind of health care anywhere.  In Tennessee the Governor of that state wanted a form of Medicare or Medic-Aid for the people.  But the Koch Brothers bussed people in (?) to protest this saying the whole plan was just Obama Care in disguise.  And so the bill failed.  Thom had this guy on his show after ten saying that all of the statistics we’ve seen on health care are wrong and that America’s system really isn’t the most wasteful, inefficient system of any first world nation.  But the guy doesn’t answer a question Hartmann poses directly but rather continues to read from something and babble on.  He did say that as a group that uninsured people are generally NOT the ones who get sick.  I have a philosophical problem with that myself as to why a healthy person should pay for some old person who spends half their time in hospitals getting useless diagnostic tests “To insure that the doctors don’t get sued” we are told.   Of course in California and in Texas we have all but wiped out mal practice suits due to how our laws are constructed and the caps are so low that no lawyer will take your case.  Thom’s strongest points were with examples of people “voting with their feet”.  Nobody in England, even conservatives, want to get rid of the United Kingdom’s health care system.  And in Canada I’ve heard mixed reviews but apparently even there- - there is no tied of people crossing the border into Michigan or Vermont to get US health care.  However Thom lived in Vermont and there is a whole fleet of busses (organized by Bernie Sanders?) to take US citizens to get prescription drugs from Canada.  Larry Elder, who calls himself a free market libertarian, apparently isn’t so free market, because he is against US citizens getting better prices in Canada.  Even Judy, my sister in law, admits that drug companies are gauging Americans, for often useless drugs.  She and I can agree Americans are way over-medicated.

Governor Scott Walker not only wants to slash state funding for places like the University of Wisconsin, but wants to delete from the campus' mission statement the words "to engage in a search for the Truth" and also "to improve the human condition".  Some of these people border on the mentally ill the way they go after higher education.  They may even be college educated themselves but speak of "higher education snobbery" and the like.  You see this bifercation on other issues such as vaccinations, and gay life styles, where if it's your own loved ones who are gay, well somehow they don't count in your overall sweeping condemnations of gayness from the campaign podium.   It was pointed out now that most Republican presidential hopefuls aren't even the "baby boomer" generation any more but are from Generation X, and as young as President Obama is, the majority of the Republicans running are YOUNGER than the president, and this includes Scott Walker and Maco Rubio.  I only say this from the perspective as an "older person" that maybe this highlights a basic emotional immaturity in these individuals.  But just as with the Calvary Chapel Jesus Movement- - what I see as "immiturity" today gets ratified and codified into hard dogma that is clung to and never departed from.  It goes without saying that Scott Walker is among the most dangerous men ever to run for President.

It’s Thom Hartman’s view that ISIS and Boco-herone, are not Islamic organizations.  Let's look at things from Hartman's perspective.  He sees ISIS and other Islamic terrorist organizations as completely non Islamic and are only "claiming" to be Islamic as a way of making themselves feel important, as a form of self agrandizement.  And therefore when FOX news features that 23 minute video, nobody is happier about it than ISIS themselves.  I guess we could talk about that half hour "video" without commercial break, that was a sheer advertisement for the movie "American Sniper".  It takes a lot of dedication by somebody to allow a continuous thirty minute "trailer" for one movie - - as the best hype the producers could ever get for Beat Movie come Award time.  So it's not as if the United States is entirely divorced from the idea of glorifying war.  Only we do it with feel good sentamentality about sacrifice and dedication and "the life long desire to be a protectors of the weak and defenseless.   But returning to my main point- - I am not sure why it even matters where certain terrorist groups- - Christian or Islamic - - are what they claim to be.  The important point is- - nobody wants them around- in any form - no matter what they call themselves.  The idea that FOX news and other would split hairs on this matter in an endless marathon- - seems almost comical to me.  I would certainly say that certain “Christian” organizations are in fact not Christian at all.  The German Nazi party promoted Aryan mythology rather than the Bible.  And Jim Jones, whom I attack in my book, is not a Christian and actually disowned the Bible at one point saying he was supreme over scripture.  Clearly even the name of the Church – the “People’s” temple, betrays a Bolshivic Communist leaning- - and they will not even saying that God is Lord of the Church.  Certainly Paul Ryan’s idol, Ayan Rand is not Christian, though it might be hard for tea party people, who adore her, to remember that.  Also in my book, I go after all the psychics on the Sam Yorty TV program of decades gone by.  They aren’t Christian either.  However not ALL “terrorist organizations” are non Christian.  Certainly the KKK qualifies as Christian, as ill as that makes some of you to hear that.  They quote the Bible, speak of a Christian nation, and of course they wear a lot of crosses and burn a lot of crosses.  In terms of Islamic nations- - - many of the things Thom Hartman said about the tea party that they are “mentally ill cultists” could apply to these Islamic outfits like ISIS or Boco-herone.  Hartman points out that whatever you choose to use for “scripture” is kind of a roreshock ink blot test, and you see whatever you want to see in it, depending on how your mind is wired.  To my way of thinking, laboring over the distinction over this is pointless.  We know they are terrorist groups and they are moral evils that need to be eradicated from the face of the earth.  And we should leave it at that.   There was also talk about “The Antichrist”, which ex patriot fundamentalists like me think about.  Parenthetically there was one called who said that six of the books of St Paul were obviously not written by the Apostle.  He goes to far as to say that “one of the books in his name- - was written to refute other books in his name”.  Many have pointed to many passages in Ephisians and Collosians.  The differences in these two books are different shadings in theology.  And one could argue that a scriptural cannon cannot accept both but should logically accept one or the other.

President Obama has said that he's a ways from making any decision about whether to send US aid to the Ukrainian conflict.  It was pointed out that if Putin were a rational man he'd see that sanctions against this country by the West have had their stated goal of putting Pressure on Putin to make peace, and there is some peace conference involving Russia and Ukraine coming up.  However Putin sees the matter all together differently.  He's playing the Nationalist and patriot card with his own people, and by this means in the past he has been able to bolster his domestic poll numbers.  But there will come a time when the Russian people will see that Putin is only screwing them over and only cares about himself.  And I believe Putin is so power mad that he will risk World War III to drive his point home that "the west isn't going to get the best of us so easily".   We in the west want peace as a goal.  But Putin frankly doesn't care one bit about peace breaking out.  He'd just as soon have continuing war if he can somehow whip up anti Western frenzy among the citizens of his own country to "follow him into the gates of Hell" or whatever, like lemmings running headlong into the sea.

This is the first "resume posting" in this blog in a while.  It's only too bad I don't organize my blogs by topic to make it easier on you people.  I hope it isn't true that my blog poosts are in a long term trend of steady decline.  They should be at least as good now as they were several months ago, when you were last reading them here.  Let's hope.  I've had a cold the past week which seems to be lingering on and on.  Of course any time it gets tword the end of the month or even past the half way point- - I have to start thinking about money.

The National Geographic talks about “dark matter” and its role in the Universe.  It’s invisible but it bends light, and arguably gravity.  However I would add that there is no provision in Einstein’s writing for the “bending of Time”.  This is only the domain of the science fiction writers.   You would of course have to describe what the bending of Time would be in order to know whether it was or wasn’t present.  Dark Matter appears to have been created first after “The Big Bang”.    Another word for it is “non baryon” matter, though I don’t recall the word “baryon” being used once in the article.   There was the vaguest implication that somehow dark matter was evolving into dark energy, and at the end of time there would be so much “dark energy” exerting its kenitic force, that that’s when the Universe as we know it would fall apart.  I think it’s an intriguing point worth pursuing that our Universe (as pointed out by a previous National Geographic magazine) that our Universe aka the big bang- - may have begun as a Black Hole.   And as I have pointed out, to speak of the Universe “expanding” you have to know “whose space” the reference is being made from.   But right now I’m having a coughing fit.