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List of Articles
- Tea Party Hypocrisy
- The Flowers is Us
- Obama Hasn't Done Anything
- Deregulation; Bah Humbug!
- The Economy; Gettin' Real
- BP; Beyond Pissed
- It's Economics Stupid
- Ain't it Ironic?
- John Stewart; In Dodd we Trust
- Medical Bills; You Too?
- Teens and Retirees
- Health Care Rationality
- Hershey Bars, Toilet Paper &
- Brief History of Party Politics
Okay, here's where it gets ugly, politics, economics and religion.
The vast number of Americans have views that are tolerant of others and are inside of the extremes. Let's work to keep such true on this page.
Say what you want but keep it sane, in
POLITICS, ECONOMICS and RELIGION: This is where it gets difficult and where moderation is required. If your views are to the extreme in either direction please go elsewhere. If, otherwise, your opinions lay somewhere in the realm of moderation have a seat. Here's a little test, If you cannot say the words Obama and/or Bush without wanting to spit, you're too radical for here.
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Recently I was driving around the area checking out yard sales and came across someone who I've known for well over twenty years having a sale. So, I stopped, said hello, engaged in some idle chatter, didn't find anything to purchase and began to drive away.
Along his fence, though, I noticed a number of yard signs proclaiming his support for the troops, asking for God to bless us, and telling all who passed that he was a proud member of the Tea Party. The Tea Party sign firmly stated that he and his fellow baggers stood for limited government, fiscal restraint and free markets. As I drove away from this fellow's home I got to reviewing what I have come to know about both he and his wife over the years.
First of all, when I initially met him he was only working part time and complaining then about medical problems. His spouse was working as a clerk in a local shop and probably not earning much more than minimum wage.
Later on the spouse latched onto a government job and hung in there long enough to become vested in the State Employee's Retirement System. Before this took place, however, the husband had been successful in winning a full disability claim against Social Security. He is now “totally” disabled and receiving a monthly check from good old Uncle Sam along with some pretty expensive Medicare coverage.
Last time I saw the two of them they were in his and her electric scooters, possibly purchased from the Scooter Store at government expense, traveling the aisles of a Wal-Mart store. Seems that she too pulled all the strings and leaped all the hurdles needed to, “Get a check.”
To be fair, I have no idea concerning the actual medical conditions of these two people and they may certainly be major and genuine. But, it strikes me as being more than a little hypocritical to be living off the largesse of the US and Ohio governments while loudly decrying the size of those governments and demanding fiscal responsibility.
I also noticed the number of toys gracing their driveway and lawn. Amongst them I noticed an above ground swimming pool and a large and fairly new camping trailer. Possibly that's the free market they're supporting. The ability to somehow have your monthly government Social Security checks pay for your adult playthings.
I don't really know how one explains this blatant disparity in thinking versus reality. How can someone rail against the government and not realize that they are, at the same time, almost totally dependent on the government for their monthly income, medical care and possibly food stamps and more?
It's the same thing we heard time and again during the health care debate, “Keep government out of medical care but don't touch my Medicare.” The only explanation that comes to mind at the moment has to do with the cloistered lives many of these people seem to live.
They watch the same cable TV channels, they take their cues from the same talk radio personalities, they gather with like minded people in restaurants and coffee shops where they pat each other on the back while agreeing that they have a lock on truth, they are mostly Christian and attend similar churches where they hear conservative ministers preach to the choir, and their views, positions, and values rarely see the light of confrontation, contradiction or challenge.
In all the years I taught American Government one of my main objectives was to challenge the collective and common wisdom of my students. It didn't make any difference which side of an issue I took as long as there was a debate. It is through the process of debate that one's ideas get proven and hopefully modified if they can't stand up to the assault of others.
Years ago I had one of my principle's sons in class and we engaged in some pretty heated debates. Sometime afterward I was telling his father, my boss, about our classroom debates and he was just fine with it. It made him feel good that his son had strongly held values and was able to support them when confronted with other opposing points of view.
The Tea Party isn't wrong on several of their criticisms about government in America. Government is large, government is expensive, government is often wasteful, government is often slow in reacting to our needs, some politicians are blatantly corrupt while most others operate under something I'll call, legal corruption. They willingly and legally accept large amounts of money from supporters and too often allow those contributions to sway their decisions in ways that don't best represent, “We the People.”
Where the Tea Party, goes wrong is to not take a few steps back and view their reality from outside the cloister they exist in. Like the people I described earlier the Tea Party fails to see that they, just like us all, depend on government and our lives would be drastically lessened if government was to fail. They need to consider that weak government and fiscal restraint is their cake but they can't have their cake and their Medicare too.
To me the Tea Party appears to be fueled by anger. They need to channel some of that anger into understanding the reality of their lives and the part many of them play in fostering the very things they claim to be angry about.
Larry Chapman, July 7, 2010: Submit Comments
We Have Met the Flowers and They is Us!
For some reason this
year I have been especially aware of all the wild flowers and weeds
which adorn our area's roadways in the spring and early summer.
There are many varieties, they are all in their own way, beautiful,
they are perennial and extremely tenacious.
Tiger lilies, ditch daises, trumpet vine, corn flowers, brown-eyed Susans, wild phlox, Queen Ann's lace all add to the color of the season and remind us that life returns following the harshness of winter.
All these plants are found in the most severe of environments, the ditches and berms of our roads and highways. They are subject to poor soil, sparse nutrients, exposure to chemical sprays, road salt, and much more, but each year they come bouncing back and to regain their hold on what little space we humans have allowed them.
I've never heard of a fancy flower show given over to wild flowers and weeds. There are few, if any, books on the subject of propagating ditch daisies. To the contrary, however, roses are beloved, adored, admired, cited in untold poems and other pieces of literature, referred to in popular music, have a famous football game bearing their name, and the focus of a multimillion (maybe billion) dollar annual business.
Musing over this I've concluded that there is an analogy about human life to be found here. To me these wild flowers and weeds represent the staying power, ethic, and toughness of the average American working person.
They get up each morning, brush their teeth, grab a bite, kiss the wife , hug the kids, and try to hang on to what life has allotted them until the next morning when they do it all again. Through all life's ups and downs most of them never fail to find a way to keep on keepin' on.
On the other hand, the rose, to me represents the prima donna of the flower world. The high maintenance, most catered, most emulated, most nurtured, pruned, fertilized, spayed, watered, debugged of all the floral community. The rose is at the top of the floral chain and from its height it reigns supreme and looks down upon all those small, lesser floral imitators. /p>
The problem is, after generations of all this attention, care and adulation, the rose remains a thing of beauty while having lost it's wonderful fragrance. It has reached the point that, in human terms, it believes it's stuff doesn't smell and in fact, it doesn't.
I see in this parable of the human condition that most of us are hard working individuals trying to make a place and keep hold of what little we may have. All the time, though, a few are able to gain so much more and in their quest they begin to take advantage of all who lag behind.
To me the perfect examples are those Wall Street bankers whose greed drove the nation into bankruptcy. After destroying the savings and retirement accounts of millions of Americans they patted themselves on the back and began passing out billions in bonus checks to themselves and those who had lent a hand.
The worse thing, though, is that so many Americans seem to be okay with it. We gripe about bailing out the banks but when the President or Congress attempts to reign in and regulate the abusers these same people begin issuing complaints of too much government power, we're becoming too socialists, or other familiar platitudes.
Maybe everyday Americans don't want to de-thorn the mighty rose because someday they too dream of being odor free and having a bowl game named after them.
Larry Chapman, July 2, 2010: Submit Comments
"Obama Hasn't Done Anything"
There is, and never has been, a shortage of
those who spew forth political slogans, jargon, jingoism, and
distributed talking points. Typically, those who engage in such are
unable to discuss the complexities of the subject at issue beyond
the aforementioned. Such happened over
the weekend when an acquaintance loudly proclaimed that, regarding
the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, “Obama hasn't done anything.”
This person didn't say it just once and let it ride, they restated
it several times and accompanied each with a supporting statement
that provided no real evidence that their claim was valid. Their
supporting evidence was nothing more than a copied statement of some
other clown saying the same thing. While the facts
regarding the immensity of the gulf spill and the response of both
BP and the US Government may be in short supply, claims that the
Obama Administration was slow to react or has “done nothing” simply
can't be supported. Don't forget that
beyond the news regarding the loss of life, other details about the
enormity of the spill either wasn't known or was downplayed by BP.
After all, it was BP and not the government who owned and operated
the well and it was they who were the holder of whatever truth was
known. Those Coast Guard officials were just reporting the situation
as related to them by BP. This has, from day
one, been an unfolding tragic saga and even today further truths
will probably be revealed. Who knows when the whole story will or
can be told. It certainly isn't over and the truth certainly hasn't
been determined. A couple of simple truths do exists, however. First, both BP and
their partner in crime, the Mineral Management Service, are greatly
at fault. You can place all this on whose shoulder you wish but it's
obvious that both were complicit in the root causes of this
disaster. Secondly, the
philosophy of government deregulation has been proven to be a
disaster of its own. We merely need to look at what has happened in
America's housing industry, its financial institutions, and the wild
ride the stock market has taken us on. Couple that with the millions
of barrels of “deregulated” oil fouling one of the nation's most
beautiful and important shorelines and it becomes obvious that we
need a return to making corporations responsible for taking the
correct, rather than most profitable, actions. Lastly, we the
American energy consumer bare a big chunk of responsibility. It is
our “addiction to oil” that is the driving motivation behind
dangerously drilling in deep and dangerous waters. It is our
lifestyle choice to insist on the private automobile rather than
mass transportation that fuels the cry, “drill baby drill!” There
are lots of places to point our finger but one of them is at the
nose we see every time we look into the mirror. Now, back to Obama
doing nothing. Everything I have mentioned is subject to debate and
difference of opinion. We can question whether the president should
have played golf over the Memorial Day weekend. We can question how
much the government relied on information from BP. You can disagree
with Obama demanding BP create a $20 billion relief fund. There are
tons of things you can discuss, debate, and disagree with. But, only an idiot
can say Obama is “doing nothing.” There are over twenty-five
thousand federal employees working on the problem, thousands more
Coast Guard members, thousands of state and private experts, and
tens of thousands of oil industry workers both on land and at sea
working to stop the leak and gather the spreading oil. Additionally,
close to six thousand surface vessels are working the gulf in a
capping or recovery role and the president has authorized the use of
seventeen thousand National Guard troops if the states chose to use
them. The president and his staff have also insisted, and
successfully so far, that BP be held responsible for paying the
entire cost of the recovery. When the World Trade
Centers were destroyed in 2001 the vast majority of Americans,
regardless of party, ethnic background, religion, sexual preference,
etc., rushed to the side of George Bush and gave him their support
in this moment of tragedy. As 9/11 unfolded we began to debate how
to deal with those responsible but most stood with the president. It
was not until the invasion of Iraq that this support began to
rapidly weaken. It would certainly
be refreshing to see the nation rally around President Obama as they
did on 9/11. Unlike then, however, today there appears to be an
unlimited supply of those whose motivations are driven by factors
far removed from truth and reason. On the surface, the over riding
slick seems to be a dislike of the man, that too often borders on
hatred, regardless of his accomplishments and efforts. Too many
Americans are driven by selfish desire fueled by ideological
blindness. Larry
Chapman, June 23, 2010: Submit
Comments
Deregulation as we know it today began in the early 1980s with the election
of Ronald Reagan. The philosophy though, is rooted in the fundamentals that
divide the political left and right regarding how much control should
government, especially the federal government, have over business. Particularly since the Great
Depression the Democrats have argued that big business cannot be trusted to
make profit driven decisions that may adversely affect the people at large.
Government has a fundamental role in seeing that profit doesn't get in the
way of prudence. Government is the only institution in our society that has
the power to be the umpire. Contrary to this, the
Republicans have argued that the free-market should make the decisions and
the rules of market will dictate that big business make the correct
decisions because to do otherwise would be counter to their interest. There
is this huge, but oft proven incorrect, presumption that profit will somehow
never get in the way of ethics and morality. Republicans are basically
distrusting of government's ability and for thirty-years now have strongly
touted that government is a failure and is the root of most of our problems.
Most are familiar with Reagan's famous statement, “Government is not a
solution to our problem, government is the problem.” Well, here we are,
thirty-years later and during that time we have witnessed a great deal of
deregulation. There is hardly an industry or economic institution in
American that is not freer of government regulation than it was in 1980. The
question is now, what has it gotten us? To begin, it has gotten us
even larger, wealthier and more powerful corporations that threaten to
destroy the basic democratic principles we have enjoyed for over two-hundred
years. Over a hundred-years ago it was decided that huge companies and
monopolies were not in the people's interest. And, beginning with Theodore
Roosevelt, the legislatures and courts began to regulate and control
corporate growth and influence. Competition is supposed to
be a fundamental benefit of free-market economics. Free-markets are supposed
to increase competition with the consumer being the beneficiary of better
products at lower costs. To the contrary, unregulated markets have gotten us
a concentration of manufacture along with huge centralization in the retail
segment of the economy. The big box stores have driven mom and pop to their
graves and while they fight each other for our dollar, their numbers
continue to get smaller. For example, Best Buy no longer has to compete
against Circuit City or CompUSA and Wal-Mart continues to do a number on
K-Mart. With the collapse of the
stock market and banking system in the 1930s, government stepped in and
created agencies, laws and regulations whose purpose was to either prevent
or lessen the affects of future economic downturns. Beginning with Reagan and
continuing well into the G.W. Bush era these protections were either deemed
null and void, no longer necessary, or simply ignored. Much of the financial
collapse of the past few years is directly attributable to taking the reins
of government control from the mouths of the horses of finance. Early in the Reagan years
the airline industry was deregulated and the air-traffic controller's union
destroyed. The result, planes began falling from the skies. While planes are
safer today and crashes less frequent, when they do occur it is too often
because of the failure of the airline to put safety before profit. I'm sure there are examples
of good things coming from deregulation. Following the break up of Bell
Telephone there occurred a revolutions in communication technology along
with new options that the Bell monopoly didn't provide. However, if one looks at the
major disasters we Americans have had to face in the past several years, it
is not difficult to see the unclenched hand of deregulation at work. The
stock market, housing bubble, and bank bailout debacles are the direct
consequence of government turning a blind eye toward the financial industry
and permitting it to become as greedy as it wished. The collapse of Enron is but
another example of a huge corporation running under its own rules and in the
end crash landing and wiping out the futures of a lot of innocent victims.
In the workplace the rising
number of job related injuries is directly related to the decline of the
budget and power of OSHA. The steadily diminishing wage average in America
is in proportion to the continued failure of recent governments to enforce
worker rights laws and give the National Labor Relations Board some true
grit. Regarding the workplace,
Americans have witnessed a tremendous erosion of the number of jobs in the
past thirty-years as corporations have shipped millions of jobs overseas.
The treasury of the United States also loses approximately sixty-billion
dollars each year in lost taxes because American companies are legally
permitted to transfer their profits to offshore nations. Both realities are
the consequence of deregulation and governmental policies that favor the
maximization of corporate profits. The fundamental mantra
taught in American MBA programs is that the number one responsibility of
corporate America is to its shareholders. Simply put that means that
profit/dividends come before anything else. Unfortunately, that too often
includes the safety and well being of the tax paying public. The failure of the EPA and
other government regulatory agencies has helped permit such things as lethal
refinery fires in Texas, leaking pipelines in Alaska, coal mine explosions
in West Virginia, a major coal ash disaster in Tennessee and now the
horrible nightmare that is unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico. I don't have enough time or
energy to compile a list of disasters and other calamities that have
befallen us in the past thirty-years. But, if I did my gut reaction is to
believe that the majority of the really bad things that have happened would
have as their root cause, deregulation. This isn't just “shit happening.”
Most of these failures are man made because man has somehow decided that
profit is a better indicator of reasonableness than reason is. We need to hang up all this
rhetorical nonsense about government regulation equaling socialism and come
to realize that ours is, and always has bee, a mixed economy. One that
includes both the tenets of capitalism while at the same time giving
government the role of oversight. Ironically, another of Reagan's famous
statements aptly fits here, “Trust, but verify.” I'm taking this to mean
that we should permit free-market capitalism to have its way while at the
same time insist that government keep a keen watch over its shoulder. Larry Chapman,
May 18, 2010: Submit Comments
Just a few thoughts about the economy
in response to comments I read this morning on Facebook. First of all, President Obama, nor anyone else,
has ever said that the second most serious economic slump in
American History was going to be easy or quick to recover from. Every
time Obama has spoken about the issue he has tempered his remarks
with a realistic caution that we aren't out of the woods yet.
Additionally, every economist worth his/her
salt has stated that jobs are always the last thing to return
following a recession. Given that, what are so many Americans so
angry that jobs haven't miraculously reappeared overnight? There doesn't seem to be any shortage of those
who chose to ignore signs the stimulus bill is having a positive
effect and recovery is occurring at a slow pace. While the naysayers
on Facebook and cable commentary for entertainment value programs continue to rant about the evils of big
government and financial bailout, recovery slowly marches on. A friend who is familiar with Northern Ohio
told me that GM Lordstown has added a new shift, there is a strong
rumor that Johnson Controls is coming back to Greenfield and I spoke
to a fellow coming out of Lowes' yesterday who was wearing a uniform
from American Showa in Blanchester. He told me that their orders are
up, they have added a new shift on a pump line, and are hiring
new workers. The nightly news tells me that the Dow-Jones is
steadily getting higher, the number of new hires is increasing,
temporary job agencies are getting orders, those seeking
unemployment for the first time is decreasing, sales of existing
housing is up along with new house starts. Ford is rapidly becoming the leader in the
automobile industry, GM has paid back, early and with interest, a
substantial part of its debt to America, and those crooked bastards
in the banking business have even paid back some of the TARP money
that kept them afloat through the worst of it all. Exports of American grain are increasing,
orders for manufactured goods are up, major box stores are reporting
increasing profits, the economic rate of expansion is way up
compared to what it was 2 years ago, semi rigs that have set idle
for months are back on the highways, American's have paid down their
personal debt as well as returned to trying to save a little. All these things and many more are plus signs
that we are on the way back but Americans don't seem to be able to
accept anything other than instant gratification. What we need to do
is get real and pay some attention to what is slowly happening while
ignoring all the
bullshit that is thrown at us for political and ideological purposes
on cable TV, and accept that it may never again be as good as it
once was. And, that isn't all bad. Maybe we need to all
adjust our lifestyles in ways that don't make us a vulnerable as we
became in the past three decades. American's were spending nearly
30% more than they made and saving next to nothing. For years we
lived on the ragged edge of financial failure while being just a couple of pay checks away from ruin. Possibly we would all be better off if we
decided our children don't really need dance lessons, IPods,
straight teeth and their own cell phones with unlimited texting
plans. Maybe we could get along without $40,000 bass boats and
$50,000 pick up trucks to haul them around with. It's just possible
that we could live happy, productive and meaningful lives in 2,000 square
foot homes instead of 6,000 square foot McMansions we'll never live
long enough to pay off. Instead of bitching about the realities we have
chosen to ignore, we might possibly take a little time to consider
or reflect on how we can prevent the same from taking place again.
For all you who long for the "good old days" don't forget that those
days were not the "live off a dozen credit cards days" that we have
found ourselves today. In the "good old days" people lived within
their means and socked some away for the rainy day they knew would
surely arrive. In my own case, I've honed down my absolute
needs to just three things; my family, satellite TV with a DVR, and Mary Jane
Parker's raisin pie once every couple of months. Larry Chapman, May 14, 2010:
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Back in the 70s I usually purchased
my gasoline, etc. from Winston Price's Sohio Station. As you may know, Sohio
was once John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company but was spun off when
the giant monopolies were broken up in the early 20th century.
We made most of our purchases using our
Sohio credit card and when Sohio was bought out by British Petroleum (BP)
our card was automatically converted to BP and we continued doing business
with them.
All
was well with the world until we had an infestation of fleas and my wife saw
an advertisement that came in our BP bill for a flea trap. For $49 it
promised to rid our home of these tiny little circus animals.
So,
the purchase was made, the fleas trapped, and when the next credit card bill
arrived from BP, the check was written and mailed.
Some
time later, however, we received notice from BP that we hadn't paid for the
trap. We promptly mailed them a copy of the canceled check and assumed that
would be the end of it.
Not
to be, these were the early days of doing business using computers and it
seemed that once information had been fed into these giant machines it was
impossible to change it. Either BP didn't know how to update the information
on their IBM mainframe monster or nobody was willing to take the time.
Whichever, we continued to get letters from BP for months warning us about
this debt and each time we would call their phone number and inform whoever
answered that the bill had been paid and a copy of the canceled check had
been submitted.
BP
finally sold our account to a collection agency and literally for years we
continued to get threatening letters and phone calls regarding this $49 debt
owed. Long before this, however, we had shredded our credit cards and mailed
the pieces to BP along with a blunt note containing instructions on what to
do with the sharp edged little card shards.
For
over thirty years now I have pretty much refused to walk into a BP station
and would only do so for two reasons. First, I would have to be out of
gasoline and they would have to be the only station within walking distance
that was open. Secondly, I would have to urinate so bad it was my only
option...and even then, I would not lift the seat lid and would aim for the
floor.
The
whole point of telling you this is to be able to say that in my eyes BP has
done nothing to vindicate itself. To the contrary, over the years they have
been responsible for a number of major oil spills, busted pipelines,
refinery explosions, and drilling accidents.
BP is
the world's fourth largest corporation but on two different occasions has
been voted by Mother Jones Magazine to be among the world's top ten worst
companies in regards to environmental and human rights records.
In
1991 the EPA cited BP as the most polluting company in America based on its
release of toxic elements into the American environment. Thus, in the last
twenty years, BP has paid tens of millions of dollars in fines. Many of
these fines have been for “willful” violations of both state and federal
laws. There is much evidence to justify the statement that BP's business
policy includes the concept that it is cheaper to pay the fine then to obey
the law.
So,
this brings us to April 20, 2010 when a BP owned drilling rig blows up in
the Gulf of Mexico and three weeks later we are witness to what is certainly
to become the greatest environmental disaster in America's history, if not
the world's.
Today, I pick up the paper and a leading
headline reads, “Oil
spill testimony to Congress: Not our fault.” There are essentially three
companies involved in this calamity, BP (who owns the well), Transocean (who
was hired to drill the well), and Halliburton (who encased the wellhead in
concrete to secure it) and all are doing their best to deny fault.
To make things worse, in other offshore
drilling areas of the world, such as the North Sea, oil companies are
required to include “acoustic shutoff valves” that provide yet another layer
of safety. These devices cost $500,000 but the Bush Administration decided
to no longer require them on American wells. In the rush to deregulate the
Bushites decided that BP would be its own best sheriff.
Well, voila fish 'n chips, here we are facing economic and environmental disaster for the savings of half a million dollars in costs. All at the same moment that BP just reported record first quarter profits running into the billions.
I wonder if I would be this pissed if we hadn't bought that damned flea trap thirty years ago?
Footnote: The executives mentioned above reminded me of a cartoon titled "Who" by the great political cartoonist Thomas Nast. I've add a copy of the drawing to this article.
Larry Chapman, May 11, 2010: Submit Comment
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Immigration Reality; It's Economics Stupid!
There is nothing simple about immigration in America. We are certainly a "Nation of Immigrants" and we can all trace our ancestries back to someplace else. Even Native Americans immigrated here from Asia.
Historians, economists, and sociologist agree that our immigrant history has helped make us the strong nation we have become and most will agree that to stop immigration would be at our present and future detriment.
Ours is a "free market" economy and it is driven by the basic economic laws of supply and demand. If there is a need for cheap labor the supply will appear. If there is a hunger for drugs, drugs will appear.
Of course, both of these things exists, American businesses are addicted to cheap labor and Americans have a huge taste for drugs. The supply is being provided from south of our border and we have lost control of it.
Which brings me to the current law in Arizona. Those who support the law state that they were somehow forced into taking action because of the federal government's failure to pass a comprehensive immigration policy. And, they are correct...the feds have not picked up the ball on what is Constitutionally their responsibility.
However, what Arizona has done doesn't address the root causes of their problem and worse, it weakens the Constitutional rights of all those Latinos who are here legally and those who are legitimate citizens of the United States. I am a strong supporter of the Bill of Rights and agree with whatever Supreme Court Justice said it was better that a hundred guilty go free than one innocent go to prison.
It is claimed that the Arizona border region is fraught with crime and implied that most of the 400,000 plus illegals in the state are criminals. Certainly there is drug related violence along the Arizona border but that doesn't involve most illegals. Most illegals are hard working honest people who are lured here by the promise of jobs and the need to feed their children.
If you want to do something about the criminal element you don't need to pass any legislation that attacks the rights of the people. All you need to do is provide the funding to enforce the laws that already exist.
If you want to slow down the rate of illegal migration into America require growers to pay wages and benefits substantial enough to attract regular old American citizens and then be willing to pay more for your next chef salad.
There are many examples in our nation's history that prove legislation isn't always the answer to problems associated with free market economic law. Changing the Constitution in the early 20th Century didn't stop people from drinking, creating a list of controlled substances hasn't done away with addiction, legislating against the use of marijuana hasn't reduced the number of pot heads in America, etc.
The problems associated with illegal immigration may only be solved when our society decides that our wage-benefits schedule should be high enough that Americans are willing to go into the fields and bend over at the waist. Financial incentive is also a part of Economics 101.
Larry Chapman, May 3, 2010: Submit Comments
There is a series running on cable TV about the
history of st1:country-region
w:st="on">
While serving with
He played further roles as a leader of troops and
was one of those responsible for the successful siege at
This guy played no small part in the birth of this
nation and following the war he was awarded a land grant and a small
pension. His name has become a part of
The baron came to
So, here sits
How ironic and indefensible is that?
Larry Chapman, April 28, 2010: Submit Comments
John Stewart; In Dodd we Trust
There's been no shortage of explanations and blame pointing regarding our recent and current economic troubles. Few, if any, have been easy to understand. However, the best explanation I've observed thus far came from none other than John Stewart of The Daily Show.
What the pundits and economists haven't been able to explain in a manner that the general public can understand, the comedian has. In my opinion, after having watched this video clip, you can't understand how the people of America have been shafted by the Wall Street "fat cats" you have been spending too much time in Foxatopia. The URL is:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-march-16-2010/in-dodd-we-trust
The Daily Show, March 16, 2010: Submit Comments
Medical Bills; I'll Bet You Have Experienced This!
For most of the past decade I’ve been sleeping
with a CPAP machine to ward off the affects of sleep apnea. The machine
was purchased from a supplier in Washington CH because of its proximity
to where I reside. For several years obtaining replacement supplies was
as simple as calling or dropping by their facility in WCH and getting
what I needed. It was a good deal, quick service coupled with friendly
faces that recognized yours and remembered what system you were using
and what supplies you required.
Later, that company was purchased by a larger
company and a decision was made to stock all sleep apnea equipment at a
central warehouse on the KY-TN border. Suddenly, I was being forced to
communicate via telephone with people I didn’t know and who didn’t know
me. It took several mistakes until I finally began receiving the correct
replacement materials. CPAP equipment isn’t one size fits all and if you
don’t have exactly what you need there isn’t much room for compromise.
At first “sleep central” would call me every
couple of months and ask what I was in need of. Then they unilaterally
decided to periodically send me whatever my insurance company would
cover, regardless of whether I needed it or not. So, about every three
months I get a care package containing mostly things that don’t need
being replaced. I have a drawer in my bedroom brimming over with
unneeded nasal pillows, Velcro strips, filters, tubes, humidifier
cartridges, etc.
I’ve tried calling the company but only get
synthesized voices telling me that all agents are busy and that my
business is very important to them. Then, after listening to their
message for several minutes I’m told I’m being transferred to an agent
which turns out to be yet another non-human voice telling me to leave a
message along with my phone number and someone will be in touch. I’m
still waiting for that return call.
Today, I get a bill for the last batch and my
insurance company has refused to pay a large portion of it because the
supplier is “out of network.” It is the same supplier but they are
apparently now billing under the name of the parent company and that
name is not on the “we like you” list.
As I’m writing this I have been awake five hours
and on the phone a significant portion of that time with various talking
computers of the apnea supplier and my health insurance company and
still haven’t spoken to that exact person who can resubmit the bill
under the correct company name and get the insurance company to pay what
is their responsibility.
Like many of you, I don’t like this part of the
world I now find myself living in. I want a place on
I also want to be able to charge to my insurance
company only those items that I truly do require. I don’t want a bag of
twelve nasal pillows when two would do just fine. And I don’t want my
insurance company, my wife’s employer or my wife’s share of the premium
paying for things that aren’t absolutely needed.
One of the questions I had for our insurer was,
“Can I purchase these supplies from a local pharmacy?” I figured I could
get one of our local pharmacies to keep in stock a few of the items I
typically need and it would be a win-win for everyone. Well, unlike the
Wright brothers my little home-made airplane didn’t get off the ground.
Both locally owned pharmacies are not in the network for providing such
supplies. Thus, if I purchased outside the network, a different
deductible would apply and my cost would be significantly higher.
Instead I was told that they (the insurance company) prefer that I do
business with a certain nation-wide company they have a contract with.
Immediately the bias kicked in and I perceived
this statement as meaning, “We do business with this big corporation,
which we possibly own shares in, because they cut us a discount which
reduces our cost and increases our bottom-line. No, we don’t pass along
these savings to those who pay the premiums; we’re only interested in
maximizing our profits.”
This is the replacement nasal pillow my
CPAP requires and they rarely wear out. They do require frequent
cleaning and I usually pack a spare set incase something goes
wrong while I'm away from home.
Do these things look like they should
cost $39.00? And, should my insurance company be paying for a
couple dozen pair each year?
I don't think so but it doesn't seem to bother the company.
There are several things here that anger me.
First is the question, in how many ways is all of this contributing
to the ever spiraling cost of health care in
Is it just me?
PS: As a postscript consider this. I did a
little research regarding the price my insurance company was being
billed and what these identical items could be purchased for online.
Check this chart out and then try to convince me that insurance
companies are being run efficiently and aren’t contributing to the
rapid increase in the cost of medical care in
|
Item |
Billed Cost |
Online Cost |
|
Paper air filter |
6 pk. $40.33 |
6 pk. 13.95 |
|
Nasal pillows |
1 pair $39.00 |
1 pair $19.95 |
|
6’ air hose |
$49.22 |
$9.95 |
Teenagers and Retires; What's in Their Futures?
Years ago I was reading a book on social history and discovered that the concept of teenage hood didn’t exist until sometime following World War One. Most people till then just acknowledged two kinds of people; children and adults.
The definition of adult was simply being big enough and strong enough to take on the chores and responsibility of those older than you. Boys became men when they could earn a living in the nation’s fields and factories. Girls became women when they reached puberty and were able to conceive.
That there should be a third phase of life didn’t come into existence until it was decided child labor laws were too lax and compulsory education was more important to the nation than leaving sixth grade for the assembly line. So, laws were passed, attitudes altered, schools built, and children entered into a new realm of existence, the teenage years.
Society created a new class of which little was expected other than going to school, worrying about acne, conforming to the demands of their peers, being overwrought with angst, and hopefully being someday able to achieve more in life then their parents had.
At the other end of the yard stick I recently read that the concept of retirement didn’t exist until the industrial revolution took hold in America. When most people were engaged in farming, small business or some skilled trade there was little need to consider not working. Even the oldest could be relied on to contribute something to the family’s well being. An old shoemaker may not be able to drive a nail but his head was full of enough knowledge to train an apprentice to keep him in business and able to support himself.
However, when people left the farm and went to the factory the new laws of mass production came into play. Mass producing goods required that quotas be both established and met. Older workers often found it difficult to maintain the pace of the assembly line and became an impediment to production. Thus, something had to be done with them.
That something, if the worker were lucky, was to “pension” them out. To retire them from working to live the remainder of their lives on a small “old age pension” check. It was kind of a win-win for the employer, they got rid of slower employees and because the typical retiree didn’t live too long after retirement, it didn’t cost that much. It also gave them the appearance of being socially responsible.
Large numbers of older workers were just simply “let go” with little to no regard given to how they would make ends meet. It wasn’t until the advent of Social Security in the 1930s that working class Americans attained any degree of financial security when it was their time to be let go.
Over the past century our economy has been strong enough to permit the expansion of both the teenage and retiree classes. Mandatory education has been expanded to include the twelfth grade and ample opportunity exists for the teen years to flow into the twenties as more young people opt for a college education.
The concept of retirement has become universal in America and over the decades the age of retirement has generally come down. In the last thirty years increased numbers of Americans have retired early, cashed in their real estate, bought into retirement communities and, living off their 401k accounts, are enjoying very active lifestyles into very advances ages.
Today the question is can this be sustained? With the explosion of the housing bubble, the implosion of the economy, the outsourcing of jobs, the high degree of personal debt, the serious questions regarding the sustainability of Social Security and Medicare, where will today’s working age adults find themselves as the society and economy continues to evolve?
Larry Chapman, February 12, 2010, Submit a Comment
One More Plea for Health Care Rationality
For nearly a year now the debate over health care reform in
America has raged. I can't recall another issue in my life that has
resulted in so much emotional response coupled with so much vitriol.
The president has been called everything from a Nazi to the reaper
of death for America's elderly.
It seems that no degree of studied information seems to make any difference to those who have bought into the "don't touch my Medicare" arguments of the right.
However, I'm going to give it one more attempt. I just came
across this chart from the latest edition of National Geographic
Magazine dealing with the life expectancy of nations who have
universal government
health care systems vs. two of those who don't.
Please study the statistics and note that the US annually spends over $7,000 per capita and the life expectancy is 78. On the other hand, Mexico, who also does not have a universal public health care system, only spends a little over $800. Yet, the life expectancy in Mexico is only about three years less than America's.
You may also note that New Zealand, with its universal health care system only spends $2,500 per capita but ranks at the top in life expectancy, almost 83.
So, I'm left asking the same questions I've been asking during this "great debate." How is the American fee based system defensible? How can any American citizen who relies on insurance for health care argue that our system is the best? And, please bare in mind, we are not talking about the quality of care or degree of medical technology. We are talking about the cost of care and who can and cannot afford to obtain it.
We may have the best doctors, pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, etc. in the world but if you have large numbers of your citizens unable to obtain it, your life expectancy numbers head South!
Larry Chapman,
February 8, 2010, Submit a CommentHershey Bars, Toilet Paper and Inflation
Years ago a teaching colleague, Travis Turvey, brought a box of frozen Hershey chocolate bars to school to use as a teaching tool in his consumer education class. What he wanted to demonstrate was how the purchasing power of our money changes with time and
circumstance. Turvey, for whatever reason, had purchased this box of candy a decade earlier and kept it in his freezer. Compared to the size of a contemporary Hershey bar these were huge. Not only were the newer bars much smaller, they also cost more.
It was a great presentation and one I could personally relate to. When I was a kid a Hershey bar cost a nickel and was large enough that eating two at the same time was certain to give you a stomach ache.
Of course, as we all know, Hershey bars cost more than a nickel today. In a typical convenience store you’d be lucky to find one for much less than a dollar and it would only contain enough chocolate delight to merely tickle your desire for another one.
As we have aged we all have experienced the ever increasing cost of what we consume and the ever decreasing quantity of what we receive in exchange for our dollar. If you’ve ever looked at the grocery ads in a thirty-year old newspaper these facts have slapped you in the face and caused one of those, “man, those were the days” moments.
Certainly manufacturers and food processors are aware of these realities and are just as aware that we too know and that we don’t like seeing it take place. So, they go to great lengths to hide or soften the blow, hoping we won’t notice.
Have you looked at a one-pound can of coffee in recent years? Well, “a pound is a pound the world around” no longer holds true. Today a pound of coffee is fourteen ounces. I recently noticed that a one-pound cup of margarine now contains fifteen ounces and if these trends continue it may one day be necessary to change the name of the Hostess Twinkie to the Hostess Shrinkie.
What brought this whole subject to mind was the recent realization that our toilet paper rolls no longer fit the spindle of our bathroom dispenser…they are too narrow. We haven’t changed brands and the price hasn’t come down. But, the damned roll has gotten skinny.
Those good folks at Quilted Northern Tissue have very subtly gotten into my wallet again. I say again because I’m sure that when they, several years ago, started labeling their product as a “double roll” we really received twice the cleansing power. Somewhere in the “newspeak” we got shafted.
If you’re not familiar with the term newspeak it is very apropos for this article. In George Orwell’s novel 1984 the government (Big Brother) spoke to the people in a jargon that was meant to convince them that big was small and black was white.
The most fitting example, to me, is the government’s statement regarding changes in the upcoming ration of chocolate. Working in Big Brother’s propaganda ministry it was the main character’s job to explain that the coming chocolate ration was going to be increased from 30% to 25%. Me thinks Big Brother just bit us on the behind!
And now, for those of you who aren’t squeamish, here’s a little TP factorial information I came across on the Internet: A random survey of 100 plus people yielded the following…The average tear is 5.90 sheets of TP. 44% wipe from front to back from behind their backs. 60% look at the paper after they wipe. 42% folds, 33% crumple, 8% do both fold and crumple, 6% wrap it around their hands. 50% say that they have wiped with leaves. 8% have wiped with their hands. 2% have wiped with money!
Larry Chapman
, December 21, 2009, Submit a Comment
A Brief, Yet Still Confusing, History of America's Political Parties
Originally published in January, 2006 in the Times-Gazette newspaper
Ro
thousand
words in length, I will read the first one hundred
words. If, during that, he doesn’t step over the
edge, I will finish the column whether I agree or
not.
Now, don’t get me wrong, most
of the time I enjoy his columns and even sometimes
agree with him. He, like the old Hog Farmer, ain’t
always wrong!
I recently received an email
from a reader thanking me for my column on
conservative-liberal points of view (December, 2004)
and stating that it should be required reading in
our schools. While I thank that person for the
compliment I have to say that it
is required
reading. Those same ideas are found inside every
mostly unopened American Government textbook that
ever languished in a mold-infested high school
senior’s locker. Apparently, too many students opt
for an “F” on that test.
This brings me back to one of
First of all, political
parties weren’t supposed to happen. They are not
mentioned in either the Articles of Confederation or
the US Constitution. George Washington so disliked
and feared the inception of political parties in
Ironically, it was the debate
over ratification of the Constitution that
instigated the birth of parties. The question was,
“What kind of a nation will
What has happened in the
two-hundred plus years since is that party names
have changed, some basic ideas have flip-flopped,
and the whole thing has gotten a little more than
confusing.
Today’s Democrats trace their
founding back to
The Federalist Party, led by Alexander Hamilton, believed in a strong centralized national government and political power vested in the hands of a ruling class (aristocracy). What we know as today’s Republican Party didn’t exist yet.
Jumping forward to the 1820s,
several things had begun to change. First, the
Federalist, as a party, disappeared and secondly,
political thought evolved and realigned. Under
Today’s Republican Party
evolved from a melding of the old Whig and Free-Soiler
parties and believing that the government should
permit free settlement of western lands and that
slavery should be abolished. By
Now, if you’re not totally
confused yet, take no comfort, everything is about
to flip. By the late 1800s the Republicans had
become the darlings of the well-heeled, but they
also worked to win Constitutional rights for former
slaves and voting rights for women. If they had kept
it up they might have even gone so far as to fight
for gay rights and got an Equal Rights Amendment
passed way back when!
The Dems, in the meanwhile,
were busy fightin’ for the rights of the common man,
speakin’ out for state’s rights, and getting federal
troops out of the South so white folks could do as
they pleased!
If the Ryan Rule didn’t kick in
several thousand words ago you may have noticed that
the two parties don’t, in several ways, fit the
typical descriptions we are familiar with today. The
Dems sound more like Pubs and the Pubs more like
Dems. That’s because both parties have done some
more flip-flopping since the late 1800s.
Throughout the first seventy
years of the twentieth century the Democrats continued
to become more pro labor, pro farmer, pro working
class and anti big business. It also flopped,
beginning with F.D.R., and became the party of big
government and strong centralized power. Since the
1930s it has become the party of social change and
inclusion, as it reached out to blacks, immigrants,
and the poor.
The Republicans have
remained the party of big business but they have
abandoned the cause of social change in favor of
preserving the status quo. Additionally, they lost
the black vote after enlisting the Dixiecrats and
embracing the white southern voter. They again
flopped by adopting the old Democratic position of
state’s rights and weaker central government.
To many, the parties today are
once again experiencing change. The Republicans are
working hard to be more inclusive as they attempt
reaching out to minority voters. Given the massive
deficits of the Reagan and current Bush
administrations they may also be evolving into the
party of fiscal irresponsibility, a moniker the
Democrats were long been branded with.
By now I’m getting as tired of writing this column as you must be of reading it. So, permit me to abruptly finish by saying that I hope you have concluded that the important issues have remained pretty constant throughout our history and in vying for our votes the positions of the two major political parties is always shifting. What is considered liberal today may be seen as conservative tomorrow. Given that, my greatest fear is that I’ll live long enough that someday a reader will tell me that I’m the nearest thing to a fascist they’ve ever known.
FOLLOWUP: After rereading this column I had a couple thoughts.
First, the Republican Party is imploding and appears to be suffering from a moderate and inclusive leadership vacuum. As to air filling a vacuum, the far right is grabbing control of what remains and taking the party further away from social reform and inclusiveness. The very loud and vocal mouthpieces of what remains of the GOP (recent polls indicate only 20% of registered voters claim membership in the party) have entrenched themselves behind the mantra of, "you're either with us or against us." How the continued evolution of political parties in America will unfold is very much cloudy at best.
Secondly, I may have lived too long. Given the political rhetoric and insanity of the summer of 2009, according to Glen Beck and others, I as a Democrat, can now consider myself a fascist. Somehow it is now possible to be, at the same time and in the same brain, a liberal, a communist, a socialist, a fascist and a Nazi.
All this has happened in the three short years since I originally wrote this column. The question now is, how long must I wait before I can be all the above plus also be labeled a conservative Republican?
Larry Chapman, October 27, 2009, Submit a Comment