August, 2009 archive
Lies and the Lying Liars 0
Zachary Roth over at TPM runs down the sources of the latest lie, that the proposed health care bill will allow the Federal Government electronic access to private bank accounts (since I’m scheduling this to publish tomorrow, there may be a new latest lie by the time anyone reads this):
What’s the truth? The section of the legislation on which this claim is based states that the bill will “enable electronic funds transfers, in order to allow automated reconciliation with the related health care payment and remittance advice.”
As Politifact points out, the bill’s legislative summary makes clear that the intent of this section is to “adopt standards for typical transactions” between insurance companies and health-care providers, and continues: “The legislation generically describes typical electronic banking transactions and does not outline any special access privileges.”
Read the Politicfact analysis of the email here.
Rationing Health Care 0
It’s what insurance companies do. Richard Blair explains the dangers of allowing persons with a fiducuiary interest in (that means who will make money from) denying care to be making decisions about care:
(snip)
To Cigna, the cost of Nataline’s transplant was like buying a Nintendo Wii. When you buy a Wii, it’s not so much the initial investment in the game machine, but the ongoing followup costs in purchasing games and other hardware add-ons. The risk managers at Cigna who made the decisions in Nataline’s case weren’t so much looking at the cost of the initial transplantation procedure, but the annual cost of followup care and medication.
Nataline was 17 years old. The average lifespan of a woman in America is 79.1 years.
(snip)
The (possible projected–ed.) cost of her followup care for the next (projected) 62 years: $1,302,000.
Light Bloggery 0
I’m taking the day off.
Gog Rations 2
The Booman wrote about Gog and Magog last week.
Now comes Andrew Brown in the Guardian. After quoting the relevant passage, a relativerly minor one in Ezekiel, Brown explicates it:
Ezekiel was prophesying to his countrymen, not ours, 2500 or so years ago.
Anyone who calls himself a Christian, as I do, must accept that Jesus fulfilled the law and the prophesies and that, from that point on, it has been a whole new ballgame.
Playing semantic games with the scriptures–any scriptures, not just Christian scriptures–for contemporary terrestial political gain is the worst kind of pandering.
Afterthought: There is no halfway point for BIblical literalism. If one chooses to be a literalist, one must, at the next wedding one attends, demand to see the proofs of virginity following the consummation of the marriage.
Good luck on that.
Brendan Writes a Column 0
Medicinal marijuana, the DIY way; a dealer talks about a delivery (“Barry,” of course, is a nom de noone):
But Did He Issue the Ticket? 0
Speeding to the hospital:
Trooper Peter Burghart was patrolling the area Saturday when he saw an SUV speeding down the highway. The vehicle initially failed to stop but eventually pulled over near the airport exit.
Greater Wingnuttery XXXVII 0
The truly sad part is that some are so bigotted or stupid or afraid or some combination thereof as to believe the lies. DougJ reports from the field and explains why this should not surprise us.
Twits on Twitter 2
Melissa Dribben twits no more. Read the whole thing:
But if e-mail is the exasperating, all-knowing secretary you would love to fire but can’t live without, Twitter is the lightning-fast tattooed bike messenger who never brings a package worth opening.
Come into My Parlor . . . 3
. . . said the spider to the fly.
Nature Red in Tooth and Claw 3
Puddytat 1, Tweety 0.
Frankly, I could do without the little presents.
>/center>i
You Won’t See This on “Cops” 0
If I had been beaten and robbed, I might not be holding my teacup with my pinkie out either.
When did cops become Miss Manners?
Camden Detective Maurice Gibson, who alleges that Kimberly Halpin made racial slurs in describing her assailants, decided that she should be handcuffed, arrested, and jailed.
Their he-said, she-said trial landed before U.S. District Judge Renee Bumb this week. And a jury of five women and three men unanimously decided yesterday that the detective fabricated information to justify the June 19, 2004, arrest.
(snip)
Gibson, who is African American and has been a police officer for 16 years, said he tried to take Halpin’s report, but she cried too much, was irate, cursed, and then twice used the “N-word” in describing the two assailants who took her backpack, purse, car keys, money, and cell phone.
So she got slapped with a disorderly conduct charge for crying, being angry, and forgetting her manners.
I’ve known and worked with a lot if cops. Almost all of them were decent persons who, underneath the locker room joking, took their responsibilities seriously.
Some were not.
And some were psychologically brutalized by the job. Those had the emptiest eyes I have ever seen.
None of them had such thin skins as today’s cops seem to have.
Watch the Racism 0
It’s a constant undercurrent in this scene.
No, I’m not accusing the Marx Brothers of racism, and, as they were Jewish, they probably had plenty of other isms to deal with. Though they were children of their time, just as I am a child of my time.
But watch closely. You can see it, a nasty undercurrent, not noticeable when the film was made because it was part of the fabric of society, but all too noticeable now.
It is there, even as Harpo takes the harp to heavenly places, because this film is a child of its time.
And consider as you watch it: This is what the odious Southern Strategy of the Republican Party is all about.
And this is what the whole “birther” thing springs from.
Keeping the darkies in their place. And keeping the white folks scared of the darkies.
Aside: My South Carolina grandmother commonly used the term “darkie.” In her upbringing, it was bad form to remind black folks that they were black.
Twits on Twitter 0
Report from the field on Twitless Thursday:
People were on Facebook saying stuff like “TWITTER IS DOWN! I CAN’T LOOK AT MY COMPUTER! IT BURNS!”
The response was even more pathetic on MySpace: “TWITTER IS DOWN. IS ANYBODY THERE? ANYBODY???”
I read those things (and yes, they were in all caps) and realized the horrible truth. While Twitter is merely a social-networking tool for me, it’s an addiction for others. That’s scary. Because boiling all our social interactions down to 140 characters means we’re no longer talking with each other. We’re talking at each other.
I talked my thoughts at people at Geekazine.
Time Warp, Shrinquirer Style 0
I have cancelled my home delivery subscription to the Inquirer, mainly because I’m gone so much anymore it’s not worth it. And the last time I did a delivery stop, they forgot to start it again (more FAIL).
So this morning I went to the local Wawa to pick up a paper to enjoy over my coffee. If nothing else, I still want the comics and the advice column. Life is not life without comics, despite the best efforts of the Republican Party to render them redundant.
I didn’t look at the paper. I just grabbed it, along with several other things.
And when I got home, I noticed it was kind of fat.
I looked.
It was dated Sunday, August 9, 2009. It had all the Sunday sections and everything. The articles aren’t even up on the website yet.
The Inky is not known for releasing the Sunday paper early.
So where in the time warp did today go?