The Beginning of the End?

Posted on 29/10/2021 by Grumpa Joe

For the fourth time this year I left the house without my wallet. On previous occasions I left my car keys home too. As luck would have it, my wife was with me and the extra key is in her purse. Since the Death Star is a push button start it was her key that the car read.

This time, I was on my way to the post office to buy stamps and to mail some letters. I grabbed my ass pocket as I left the car for the PO door and felt ass, no wallet. I turned around and red-facedly admitted my error.

Is this the way Alzheimer’s begins? with little things like forgetting car keys? I recall some of the early incidents with Peggy and they were similar in nature. She began to forget little things. Once I found her staring at the controls of the washing machine, she was afraid to touch the buttons for fear of breaking the machine. This came from a woman who washed clothes every day for over fifty years. When we stopped at a rest stop while traveling, she always asked me to wait for her right outside the ladies room door, or a few feet away. She was afraid she would lose her way back to the car. Little things. On the face of my forgetfulness, I laugh at myself, but internally I fear for my life. I can’t imagine what I will do if I ever learn I have Alzheimer’s disease. My mother went through that process as well, and at first we thought it was somewhat comical, but later came to realize that forgetting the little things can mean a lot. There isn’t much I can do about it if it does happen. I learned from Peggy’s experience that taking the miracle drugs recommended will only make me another kind of vegetable. In her case I chose to take her off the medicine and take my chances with the predicted outcomes. Her doctors kept preaching to me that if she has another seizure she may fall and injure her head and have a stroke. After living with her on the drugs for a month I decided for her best interest she will be happier without the stupid drug. By the time I made that decision she was not able to walk anymore and was living in a wheelchair. How does one fall out of a wheelchair? I learned it is possible but probably unlikely to happen. One day I found her leaning over the armrest of her chair, her head nearly touching the floor. I quickly got her a chair with devices that would restrain her from leaning out of the chair.

Miracle drugs are great when they work. They are not unlike computers that are great when they work, but when they fail all hell breaks loose. Currently, the world is speaking out against miracle drug makers because they rape us with charges for the drugs. All we see and understand is the money leaving our pockets and we don’t really care about the drug makers profit and loss statement. This, I believe is very communist thinking.

I sound like a broken record when I keep telling my story about polio, also a virus. It was over twenty years before a vaccine was available. and we all relaxed when it became available. We didn’t argue that we didn’t want our kids to get it because it was against their first amendment rights. I remember getting vaccinated for measles, mumps, scarlet fever, chicken pox and other terrible killing diseases. My parents were happy that we were vaccinated. Another thing, I don’t recall anyone asking if we wanted to be vaccinated, we were lined up at school and the health department nurse did the job. I thank them for taking the initiative to do what was best for me.

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Stirring Up Trouble

Posted on 08/03/2017 by Grumpa Joe

healthcare1.jpg

This morning I did something I haven’t done in over two years, I ate breakfast at the countertop bar, and watched the morning news. Aside from remembering times past when Peg and I made this a daily ritual, memories of my work days stirred to life. How many times did I tell an engineer not to be feel distraught after presenting me with his proudly drafted report, and gave me a chance to critique it? My comment to them, it is a darn-sight easier to criticize something that already exists than it is to be the first one to draft the thing. What caused this recollection? The big flap about the new American Health Care Plan. So many of the people reading the drafts are being so critical of it being too much like Obama Care, Obama Care Light, etc. For Pete’s sake, it is about health care. For awhile I used a program called Grammarian, and another called Grammarly. One of them had a feature in it to check for plagiarism. I turned it on to check my work. After all, I didn’t want to add  plagiarist to all the many ‘ists’ I have accumulated. I quickly came to the conclusion that I had to turn the dang thing off. Why? Because it cited nearly every phrase uttered by man since he invented speech as a plagiarism.   I couldn’t  use any of my favorite phrases because they were used by someone before in a masterwork. So, what are the chances that a new document about health care written on the heels of an old document on healthcare  can be phrased completely different? Nada. I challenge the best grammarian, author,  writer in the world to take on that challenge. I’ll give them a rotten apple as a reward if they succeed.

Of course the first draft of the new health care act will sound similar to the Affordable Care Act it is all about healthcare, doctors, procedures, drugs, etc.  What I am afraid of is that the critics who wrote the ACA will never be happy until they see something that is like this, “Everyone in the world will have their health care paid for by the U.S. government with no questions asked.” To them I say, go jump into a very cold  lake, and wake up. The working citizens of this country are not slaves to everyone else. Here is what I want to see in the new program:

  1. Health care is not a God-given right, it is a benefit. If God had anything to do with it we would never get sick. God does give us free will, and free will dictates the choices we make. Go to any doctor and tell him you have a pimple on your ass and he will ask you if you smoke. Why? Because he knows that smoking has been connected to so many different outcomes that we can not imagine.
  2. Everyone has a choice to buy health care insurance.
  3. The choice is available anywhere in the country.
  4. I get to select the plan I want. If I chose to buy one that covers a pre-existing condition(pre-existing conditions are much like plagiarism phrases as cited above) then I will pay for it. If I am seventy-five and chose a plan with out pregnancy coverage, I will pay for it. Buying cheap insurance is like visiting a casino to gamble. Except in a casino you gamble your money, in healthcare you gamble your life. Since gambling is such a popular activity in the USA this should be an easy concept to accept.
  5. If an employer wishes to cover pre-existing conditions, and kids living at home until they are twenty-five let them be free to do so, but the employer will be in control of how much they will pay toward the plan.
  6. Doctors will not be allowed to invade our privacy by asking me if I own a gun. A gun does not have a damned thing to do with my health care, or a doctor’s treatment decisions.
  7. It will be the choice of the employer to offer a healthcare plan to its employees. If you are applying for a job because you need health care, and the employer doesn’t offer it, go work somewhere else, or buy insurance for yourself.
  8. Kids who are no longer covered by their parent’s policy and are too smart to buy health care insurance, will be cared for at the retail rates of the provider, and offered a plan to pay the bill at the going rate of interest. Maybe they will get smart and buy a plan or to work to cover themselves.
  9. People who have disabilities like Down Syndrome, Cp, MS, etc who will need lifetime care will be covered by a separate plan.
  10. People who choose to continue addictions like smoking, drugs, alcohol will be charged more for care than the un-addicted. Remember it is all about Liberty and freedom of choce.
  11. Each State will manage their health care systems using Federal Guidelines. If you don’t like what your state is doing with healthcare, move to another state. If no state offers what you are looking for then pay for what you want, or move to a country that does.
  12. If the Federal Government chooses to pay for any of the care it will do so equally to all, regardless of their ability to pay.

What people in the USA don’t seem to grasp is that the countries in Europe who offer what appear to be superior plans are also countries where taxes are very high. Sweden and Denmark for example have a seventy-five percent tax on their happy citizens. Think about that folks, that means you keep a quarter out of every dollar you earn.

What ever happens in the course of the next few months we will be having a debate about healthcare. My guess is that whatever the first draft is that we are criticizing today will not even be close to what finally passes. What is different already is that the project is transparent. Unlike the Democrat twelve hundred page plan which appeared out of thin air (I’m sorry for who ever coined that phrase ‘pulled out of thin air’ for plagiarizing ) and the Congress had little to no time to read it much less argue about it. Remember “you have  to vote for the plan to find out what is in it.” (Sorry, plagiarizing again)

We live in interesting times. (Sorry again, I just can’t seem to get out of the habit of using other people’s words.)

Filed under: Conservative, family, Government, health care | Tagged: , , , | Leave a comment »

Transforming The Greatest Country In The World

Posted on 02/06/2016 by Grumpa Joe

In many of my blog pieces I have discussed a phenomenon I called Taxery. That is when you work and support someone else with the taxes you pay. Look at the stats below, and see if your state is in that category. Hell, I’m retired and I still support someone else with taxes. So now, after eight years, we are finally learning what Transformation really means. We never heard what it meant while Obama campaigned. Had he been honest enough to explain what he was up to, he would never have been elected. I don’t blame him though, because he was doing what he had to do to get elected. I blame the press for not asking what he meant by transformation and the American people for voting for him just because he was a smooth talking black man. It is almost over, but now I fear that the same people will vote for Hillary just because she is a woman.

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Statistics-in-Research-Introduction-image.png

Here’s are some good reasons for voting Republican.
Amazing stats

Make sure you read to the bottom… An eye opener! (Or should be!)

1.
California
New Mexico
Mississippi
Alabama
Illinois
Kentucky
Ohio
New York
Maine
South Carolina

These 11 States now have More People on Welfare than they do Employed!!!

2.
Last month, the Senate Budget Committee reports that in fiscal year 2012, between food stamps, housing support, child care,
Medicaid and other benefits, the average U.S. Household below the poverty line received $168.00 a day in government support.
What’s the problem with that much support?
Well, the median household income in America is just over $50,000, which averages out to $137.13 a day.

To put it another way, being on welfare now pays the equivalent of $30.00 an hour for 40 hour week, while the average job pays $24.00 an hour.

3.
A recent “Investor’s Business Daily” article provided statistics from a survey by the United Nations International Health Organization:

Percentage (%) of men and women who survived a cancer five years after diagnosis:
U.S. 65%
England 46%
Canada 42%
% of patients diagnosed with diabetes -received treatment within 6 months:
U.S. 93%
England 15%
Canada 43%
% of seniors needing hip replacement who received it within six months:
U.S. 90%
England 15%
Canada 43%
% referred to a medical specialist who see one within one month:
U.S. 77%
England 40%
Canada 43%
Number of MRI scanners (a prime diagnostic tool) per million people:
U.S. 71
England 14
Canada 18
% of seniors (65+), with low income, who are in “excellent health”:
U.S. 12%
England 2%
Canada 6%
And now…for the last statistic:
National Health Insurance?
U.S. NO
England YES
Canada YES

4.
Check the last set of statistics!!
The percentage of each past president’s cabinet… who had worked in the private business sector…prior to their appointment to the cabinet.
You know what the private business sector is: a real-life business…not a government job.

Here are the percentages.
38% T. Roosevelt
40% Taft
52% Wilson
49% Harding
48% Coolidge
42% Hoover
50% F. D. Roosevelt
50% Truman
57% Eisenhower
30% Kennedy
47% Johnson
53% Nixon
42% Ford
32% Carter
56% Reagan
51% GH Bush
39% Clinton
55% GW Bush
8% Obama

This helps explain the bias, if not the incompetence, of this current administration: ONLY 8% of them…have ever worked in private business!
That’s right!
Only eight percent—the least, by far, of the last 19 presidents!
And these people are trying to tell our corporations how to run their business?
How can the president of a major nation and society, the one with the most successful economic system in world history, stand and talk about business when he’s never worked for one?
Or about jobs when he has never really had one?
And, when it’s the same for 92% of his senior staff and closest advisers?

They’ve spent most of their time in academia, government, and/or non-profit jobs or as “community organizers.”

Pass this on, because we’ll NEVER see these facts…in the main stream media.

Lord, keep your arm around my shoulder and your hand over my mouth

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Postage Due

Posted on 18/02/2014 by Grumpa Joe

Last week my doorbell rang. It was the mailman. He had a postage-due package from my new healthcare provider. I asked him why this particular package required $3.17 to receive. He showed me the metered stamp. It was a third class document, and third class cannot be forwarded to my new address. Hymmph, my healthcare provider considers his detailed book of benefits as third class, I’m in trouble.

The postage due was a benefit I never expected because I met a very interesting man. His name is Henry. Henry asked if I had read his letter to the editor published in last weeks free newspaper. I had not, in fact, I did not receive the paper. Before Henry left to continue delivering mail to his customer’s I learned a lot about him, his political views, his religion, and his family.

Henry came to America from Guatemala. He speaks excellent english and seems very well-educated. He told me he had been a merchant sailor for twelve years, and sailed to many ports around the Atlantic Ocean. He visited many countries. “When I arrived in America the very first time, I knew this is where I wanted live,” he said. “I am part Jewish and went Israel and I would never live there, nor Spain, or anywhere in Europe. I just knew America was my home. I love this country.”

He went on to explain that we have some very bad people coming into the country now, and we need to fix the borders. “I came in and applied legally, I waited, and I became a citizen, but these new people walk across the border and expect everything.” He was not happy with the situation. Then, he said something very surprising. When the current president came into office, Henry and his wife decided to migrate away from America because they do not approve of  Obama’s socialist transformation. They visited New Zealand with the idea of moving there. “It is a beautiful country, not like Australia, but we didn’t do our homework before we traveled there. We learned that New Zealand has a socialist medical system like the one coming to America, and we abandoned our plan to move.”

“Where will you go,” I asked.

“In a few years I will retire and return to Guatemala.”

Talk about  going full circle, Henry moved from Guatemala to have a happier life, which he found in America, and will return to the life he didn’t like in Guatemala just to get away from America turning socialist.

A few days went by and I found a copy of the Sun City West Independent that he promised to leave me. He circled his letter to the editor. In his letter he addressed the problem of the Post Office losing money. He urged fellow citizens to mail more letters instead of using e-mail and Facebook to communicate. He explained the reason for the P.O. losing money as follows

“But one of the Postal Service’s biggest problem has nothing to do with the mail. Its finances sank in fiscal year 2007, shortly after Congress passed the 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. It required the postal Service to start pre-funding the health benefits of future retirees 50 years in advance at a rate of about $5.6 billion a year. No other agency or corporate entity is required to do this. Without this restriction, the USPS would be profitable.”

He is right, it doesn’t make sense to pass a law to make the USPS behave one way when every agency of government rides on the tax-payer without providing any service.

Henry’s complete letter is below.

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Filed under: Characters I knew, Conservative, family, Government | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

Pay For Health Care? I’d Sooner Die.

Posted on 24/09/2012 by Grumpa Joe

Insurance

Insurance (Photo credit: Christopher S. Penn)

The political argument about women’s health is backwards. Libs argue that Republicans will kill women by repealing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Yet, when real live doctors begin to read the bill to find how it will affect them the opposite is true. Most people who want the health care act are those who can’t afford insurance, or have a pre-existing condition to make them uninsurable.

I heard a commentator give an analogy last week which is quite accurate but defies human logic. Most of us have car insurance and house insurance. We pay for it. When it comes to health insurance, we want someone else to pay for it. Historically this has been an employer. How many times have you heard someone say they had a car accident, but did not report it to the insurance company because they didn’t want a premium increase? The same kind of logic reigns over homeowners insurance too. When it comes to health insurance we expect someone else to pay, and we use the heck out of it. Why? If we paid for health care insurance ourselves, maybe we wouldn’t be so sick.

Dr. Jill Vecchio speaks in the video about her analysis of the PPACA and the effect it will have on how she will have to treat patients. She makes valid arguments about the law. Watch it and discern for yourself if the Republicans are responsible for killing women, or will the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act kill more?

Filed under: Conservative, Election, family, health care, politics | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

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