Sunday Night

Today I ate the Bœuf Bourguignon, all day long. It tasted better and better (no surprise, as these dishes usually do the longer they sit in the fridge--up to a point, of course). All it needed was little more salt and pepper. I also transferred it into containers for me to take to work tomorrow (to which B. wholeheartedly agreed). I can save a lot of money on lunches that way. Normally I order food from the restaurants downtown that deliver, and am a fairly generous tipper to the delivery people.

The Fall season's first episode of Desperate Housewives was a treat. I'd missed watching that show. I taped tonight's episode while I was doing laundry and other chores. B. and I watched it when he got home from work. I "Cackled" [i.e., with a capital C] most of the way through it. (I wonder if Hillary did.)

Pundits Pounce on Hillary's Laugh

Can you believe it? The media "kool kids" have come up with a new schoolyard diversion: critiquing Hillary Clinton's laugh. (I happen to enjoy her laugh myself.)

I first caught wind of it the other day at Talking Points Memo. See here. Then today we have the following. This from Frank Rich, in a piece titled "Is Hillary Clinton the New Old Al Gore?" (uh-oh, here we go again):

Then there was that laugh. The Clinton campaign's method for heeding the perennial complaints that its candidate comes across as too calculating and controlled is to periodically toss in a smidgen of what it deems personality. But these touches of intimacy seem even more calculating: the "Let's chat" campaign rollout, the ostensibly freewheeling but tightly controlled Web "conversations," the supposed vox populi referendum to choose a campaign song (which yielded a plain-vanilla Celine Dion clunker). . . .

And the perennially puerile Maureen Dowd had this (in "The Nepotism Tango"):

That’s why Hillary is laughing a lot now, big belly laughs, in response to tough questions or comments, to soften her image as she confidently knocks her male opponents out of the way. From nag to wag.

These people really are pathetic.

"Gingrich plots revenge on Clintons"

"Firebrand Republican threatens last-minute White House run to end primary 'chaos' - and stop Hillary"

As a person of Christian upbringing myself, I deign not judge my fellow human beings, but despite all that Newt Gingrich is in my humble estimation a cad and a despicable human being (although he's right on about George Bush's failure as president). Let him run for president and see what happens. As compromised and hypocritical as the Religious Right is, they still wouldn't overtly support a candidate who cheated on his second wife while she lay in the hospital battling cancer and then divorced her (serving papers in the hospital, no less) to marry the mistress. He's a piece of shit. "Bring it on."

"Clinton to Propose Universal Health Care"

It's about time.

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 — Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday will lay out a plan to secure health insurance for all Americans while severely limiting the ability of insurers to deny coverage or charge higher premiums to people with chronic illnesses and other medical problems, her aides and advisers say.

. . .

Mrs. Clinton will not try to impose an overall limit on national health spending, the aides said. But she is prepared once again to do battle with insurance companies, which she has said “spend tens of billions of dollars a year figuring out how not to cover people” and “how to cherry-pick the healthiest persons, and leave everyone else out in the cold.”

. . .

[Clinton's aides] said . . . that Mrs. Clinton would amplify a comment in March when she declared, “We could require that every insurance company had to insure everybody, with no exclusion for pre-existing conditions.” . . .

The insurance companies are of course ready for this fight:

Karen M. Ignagni, president of America’s Health Insurance Plans, the chief lobby for insurers, said they endorsed the goal of universal coverage. But Ms. Ignagni said that insurers denied only 3 percent of claims, and that many of those were for experimental procedures that employers did not cover.

Mary Nell Lehnhard, senior vice president of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, said, “Some of Mrs. Clinton’s proposals, while trying to make insurance more affordable for older, sicker people, could unintentionally drive up costs for young, healthy people and ultimately for everyone.” . . .

Denying even 3% seems to me a lot (I'll read more on this), and why should employers be in a position to make life-or-death decisions about their employees, especially if an experimental procedure might work and prove beneficial to other sick people as well?

Also, does Blue Cross then expect older, sicker people to pay higher premiums (when, because they're old and sick, they're probably least likely to be able to afford to)? The whole purpose of insurance is to spread the risk among a large pool of people, with everyone paying a reasonably affordable premium. Eventually the young, healthy people are going to get old and sick, too (I know this from experience), and their expenses will need to be covered by the premiums everyone (including themselves) has been paying.

The bottom line here is, the insurance companies just want to cover young, healthy people in order to maximize their profits to pay for their myriad bureaucracies and expensive executives and have some money left over for their shareholders. To hell with sick people. I personally think it's immoral for companies to operate in this way, let alone be in control of a nation's health care delivery system. (May I add that my doctor agrees on this.)

I'm all for Hillary if she has the guts to set this situation right. I'm glad to hear she's getting into the fray, and she of all the candidates has the experience under her belt for this whale of a confrontation.

Article here.

Saturday Night Grab Bag

I caught this at Hullabaloo:

It's become clear in the last few years that right wingers are psychologically unfit to lead the nation. Vast numbers of them are "conservative" not due to philosophy but to cover up for serious personal issues with sexuality, masculinity, oedipal complexes and worse. In fact, it's so pervasive that one must now assume that conservative political leaders are driven by a complicated desire to compensate for psychological problems rather than the usual political mix of ambition, ego and drive to power. There are just too many examples of disturbed, neurotic, secretive GOP hypocrites out there. It's a feature not a bug.

The context was a discussion of whether or not Condi Rice is gay. As Digby says, who cares?

The tooth socket seems to be healing normally--knock on wood! Got a lot of rest today and also managed to cook lunch for B. (hamburger steaks, mashed potatoes and mixed vegetables--not very creative) and clean up the kitchen. I made an entire box of Hungry Jack potatoes (my favorite) with evaporated low-fat milk and spiked with onion powder, dried chives, sour cream, white pepper and maybe a little garlic powder. I used four cups of that to make two salmon loaves for me to eat. They came out great, as they usually do. I'm not supposed to eat anything that requires chewing.

Wesley Clark has come out and endorsed Hillary Clinton for President. Got an email to that effect today: "Today [9/15], I am proud to announce my endorsement of Senator Hillary Clinton as President of the United States."

It's Really Time to Get Lobbyists Out of the Election Game

Especially vis-a-vis the need for a national healthcare program. See here. Hillary Clinton has already been bought, and so will not be proffering a realistic solution to our healthcare dilemma.

Clinton on Health Care (So Far)

While rivals Barack Obama and John Edwards have proposed detailed health care overhaul plans, Clinton is taking an incremental approach. She started with a speech in June on reducing costs, followed by Thursday's address on quality, and will outline her plan for universal health care coverage next month.

''My order here is deliberate,'' said Clinton, a New York senator. ''In order to forge a consensus on universal health care, we need to assure people that they will get the quality they expect at a cost they can afford.''

. . .

Speaking later in Manchester, Clinton said her universal health care plan would not involve a single-payer government system. Instead, she said, she would consider expanding Medicare and allow people to join the federal employees insurance program.

''I think you don't want to take choices away from Americans. We're big on choice here. But you've got to have some framework so the choices work better,'' she said.

Source

Almost TGIF

I did go to the gym tonight on foot and went shopping afterwards. I'll deal with the truck this weekend maybe. There's a Publix in the same shopping center where the gym is. Bought some "GreenWise" chicken Italian sausages (never saw them before)--raised without antibiotics; no artificial ingredients; air-chilled; and with natural preservatives. I just hope that when one of these chickens gets sick, they do give it antibiotics if necessary, rather than let it suffer.

I read the ingredients on the package. I guess the natural preservative is salt. These are hot Italian sausages, so I figure the hot spice also acts as a natural preservative. There was also some sodium lactate in it, but my research indicates that this enhances the flavor.

I'll make a nice spaghetti sauce with these for the weekend and also use some regular ground sirloin (which I assume has antibiotics in it).

We watched "Queer As Folk" on Logo tonight. (I'd never seen all the installments.) Last week they bumped it for the presidential debates. We were very disappointed. I already know where the candidates stand on almost every issue, but I'm still a little worried about Hillary's stand on healthcare, now that she's getting big financial backing from the healthcare industries. As far as I know, John Edwards still has the best plan, but obviously he's not going to win the nomination.

No more vitriol from this podium. As angry and frustrated as I get sometimes, it's not worth it to sit here and lash out when frankly I should be going to bed. Plus, if I've had a cocktail or two (as I do on occasion), it comes across as a freakish, paranoid rant. Then I have to delete it the next day. I'm tired of doing that!

Paul Krugman

From today's article, "The Substance Thing", wherein he derides the Republican candidates for their lack thereof and further states:

Whatever the fate of the Edwards candidacy, Mr. Edwards will deserve a lot of the credit if and when we do get universal care in this country.

Mr. Edwards has also offered a detailed, sensible plan for tax reform, and some serious antipoverty initiatives.

Four months after the Edwards health care plan was announced, Barack Obama followed with a broadly similar but somewhat less comprehensive plan. Like Mr. Edwards, Mr. Obama has also announced a serious plan to fight poverty.

Hillary Clinton, however, has been evasive. She conveys the impression that there’s not much difference between her policy positions and those of the other candidates — but she’s offered few specifics. In particular, unlike Mr. Edwards or Mr. Obama, she hasn’t announced a specific universal care plan, or explicitly committed herself to paying for health reform by letting some of the Bush tax cuts expire.

For those who believe that the time for universal care has come, this lack of specifics is disturbing. In fact, what Mrs. Clinton said about health care in February’s Democratic debate suggested a notable lack of urgency: “Well, I want to have universal health care coverage by the end of my second term.”

On Saturday, at the YearlyKos Convention in Chicago, she sounded more forceful: “Universal health care will be my highest domestic priority as president.” But does this represent a real change in position? It’s hard to know, since she has said nothing about how she would cover the uninsured.

And even if you believe Mrs. Clinton’s contention that her positions could never be influenced by lobbyists’ money — a remark that drew boos and hisses from the Chicago crowd — there’s reason to worry about the big contributions she receives from the insurance and drug industries. Are they simply betting on the front-runner, or are they also backing the Democratic candidate least likely to hurt their profits? . . .