Bob Morris @ Oct 30th 2006 07:46 - Category: Unfiled ;
Green Lisa emails that some of the Confused Koslings who, even though they oppose the war, originally supported prowar incumbent Howard Berman solely because he is a Democrat rather than antiwar Green candidate Byron De Lear, are now coming around.
Wood @ Oct 30th 2006 04:22 - Category: Unfiled ;
(Hi, I’m Wood. I’m a friend of Bob’s. Bob asked me if I’d like to contribute to his fine blog. I’m British. That doesn’t make a bad person. Right?)
So. I came across this fascinating post from an alumnus of a seminary who has concluded that the Christianity espoused by the Religious Right in your fine country is not, in fact, Christianity, but is in actuality a bizarre folk religion.
Read it at God School: Christianity vs. American Christianity.
Go for it; look at it phenomenologically, look at it sociologically, and what do you see? Basically a syncretic folk religion, based primarily on American nationalism, an expression of the “pervasive religious dimension of American political life”… Its purposes are basically civil and political. Its morality is taken from a highly selective and individualistic reading of the Old Testament, and it mixes in bits of consumerism, Zionism, Republican political values, and corporatism for good measure. Add to this an almost romantic sentimentality concerning the person of Jesus, much like the contribution of Catholicism to Vodou religions, and suddenly it all makes sense.
More people need to read this. If only because it’ll wind them up. But from this outsider’s view, it seems really quite convincing.
Bob Morris @ Oct 30th 2006 00:23 - Category: Unfiled ;
Insurers want to send patients to India for surgery because it saves money. In one case a union blocked such a surgery that would have saved the insurerer $50,000 because they feared such procedures would soon become mandatory. Health care needs to about more than just cost reductions. Patients do not want spent 36 hours in transit each way by plane every time they they need surgery when there’s hospitals nearby that can do it.
Outsourcing healthcare offshore, no matter how good it might be, means the quality of health care here in the States will suffer. Hospitals rely on private insurance income to subsidize their costs. They will get squeezed and cutbacks will occur. Like they need more cutbacks. Here in L.A. it is no exaggeration to say the entire hospital system is in crisis.
It’s not just surgeries either. Evaluations, scans, radiology, and well as billing and IT are outsourced to India too. The doctors and staff in India appear highly qualified and well-trained now. But if Bangladesh, Uruguay, and Mongolia start undercutting prices in India and prices wars break out, then it’s a given the qualiity of healthcare will then suffer.
Capitalism is so near-sighted, always looking to maximize profits short-term, rarely looking at the long-range big picture. We need affordable health care here for all rather than a two-tiered system, one for the well-off, another for everyone else.
Bob Morris @ Oct 30th 2006 00:15 - Category: Unfiled ;
ANSWER has detailed info on the multiple protests happening this week after Mexican federal police attempted to seize Oaxaca.
From Narconews, who often is first with news in situations like this.
Mexican police march on Oaxaca
Indymedia journalist killed by paramilitary
More on the murdered journalist
[tags]oaxaca[/tags]
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