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A Health Care Proposal

Here's a little thing I found in a health care reform proposal called the "Patients Choice Act of 2009":

Affordable premiums. Under the status quo, plans offering coverage to individuals often charge exorbitant premiums. The Patients’ Choice Act solves this very real problem through a model that works in several European countries: independent risk-adjustment among insurance companies. A non-profit, independent board would penalize insurance companies that cherry pick healthy patients while rewarding companies that seek patients with pre-existing conditions. This solution would ensure health insurers compete based on superior products and the lowest price.

Sounds good, right.

Let me highlight a couple of things:

Affordable premiums. Under the status quo, plans offering coverage to individuals often charge exorbitant premiums. The Patients’ Choice Act solves this very real problem through a model that works in several European countries: independent risk-adjustment among insurance companies. A non-profit, independent board would penalize insurance companies that cherry pick healthy patients while rewarding companies that seek patients with pre-existing conditions. This solution would ensure health insurers compete based on superior products and the lowest price.

That should make it pretty obvious how this one would be attacked by health care reform opponents. Assholes. This is another reason we can't have nice things.

Oh, one more thing: this is a Republican proposal. Yes, that's right; it's a plan based on a European system, with government making health care decisions, and it was written by Republicans who presumably now know to hate all of those things.

Run it back, bitches.

Dazzling?

Towards the end of an otherwise interesting article about the evolution of song to performance in the Financial Times (via):

Black styles continued to dominate the dance floor in white neighbourhoods but they were [rarely?] heard on records. And rock simply ignored the evolving rhythmic trends. It is startling to contrast the blend of black and white at Freed’s 1950s rock ’n’ roll festivals with the dazzling whiteness of both audience and performers at Woodstock.

OK, I get the point, but let's be fair:

First day, first performer @ Woodstock : Richie Havens
Second: Swami Satchidananda
Fifth: Sweetwater
Ninth: Ravi Shankar
Second day, third Band: Santana
Eighth: Sly & The Family Stone
And the final act of the show: Jimi Hendrix. No need to link to anything about him.

Yeah, the article was talking about the differences between "black" (=dance) music and "white" music, and maybe Woodstock wasn't about dance music (though I don't know how you could say Sly wasn't...). But, there were plenty of non-white acts at Woodstock. It was more white than anything else, but it was hardly "dazzling" in its whiteness - at least from my vantage point.

I nitpick because I have nothing else to do.

Damned Busybodies

John Cole says:

Yet another reason I have no interest in organized religion- this long and tedious discussion at the American Spectator examining whether or not Ted Kennedy was a good Catholic. Religion isn’t so much about God and spirituality and your fellow man for these wankers, it is just another competition and another way to exert control over people.

In the words of the prophet, Britt Daniels:

Jonathon then says it's a sin
But he don't think twice cause to him
Religion don't mean a thing
It's just another way to be right wing

Amen.

Which Is To Say

Via The Dish:

As Roger Nicoll, a neuroscientist at UCSF, puts it: “The brain makes its own marijuana.” Smoking a joint just helps you make more of it.) While these cannabinoid receptors have been targeted for the treatment of a wide variety of ailments and disorders, from obesity to chronic pain, I think they might hold the most promise for the treatment of anxiety. There's now good evidence that mice lacking a normal cannabinoid receptor have difficulty forgetting or unlearning fearful memories.

Which is a roundabout way of saying what everybody knows: pot makes you forgetful. But now it's a feature, not a bug. Awesome!