health is not for profit

Passion Fruit Vine

"Bureaucracy" is a dirty word in today's health care discussion. "Government" another dirty word is perceived as a dysfunctional entity by many in the US.

But is it?

In the past i published a piece that outlined all the services government did well. Building and maintaining the interstate highway system for instance, Clean Water and Clean Air Dept. including sewage treatment plants. Our air and water is significantly cleaner than it was in the 60's and could be much better. Workplace safety cutting accidents and death by 40% since inception. The National Weather Service which alerts all of us including planes and ships to inclement weather. Food and Drug Safety and Science research. Did you know government pays for 80% of the basic science research in this country?

This list could go on much further. Other clearly effective programs and policies would include our National Parks, the Voting Rights Act, Social Security and Medicare, Rural Electrification, AmeriCorps and the Peace Corps, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Cooperative Extension Service, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the National Crime Information Center, and of course all the Military. Again, these are just the accomplishments of government on the federal level – they don't count the thousands of other successful public sector endeavors on the state and local level.

Terminology is constantly used to refocus you away from things that could benefit you.

Government is bad remember that.

When you hear the word government....think "bad".

Programming your thinking is complete when you always think government is "bad" and doesn't function. When the programming is successful you are permanently entrenched in "bad" even though all over the country government is functioning more successfully than not.

Insurance companies are claiming that working with them to modify the health care land scape will save trillions over ten years but is this accurate? They say they will slow the rise of health care costs by one and half percent per year over the next ten years. They then go on to estimate a savings total of 2 trillion over ten years.

Please note that they say nothing of cutting costs. They are counting on their clever wording to disguise that what they are really offering is to merely decrease the rate of increase. They will still be making profits off your illness.

At that rate, in ten years we will be spending $2.5 trillion dollars on health care rather than the already outrageous $1.5 trillion we spend now. Assume their estimate of a 6.2% rise in costs each year and do the math. It is an offer without substance. The sick remain a vehicle for profit.

The players in this industry have for too long exploited us. Now is the time to return health care to the caring and end the industrialization by insurance companies.



The anti-trust laws need to be changed so doctors and hospitals are unshackled.

The argument goes that insurance companies take risks by insuring you. They pool the money just as a National Health Insurance Program would pool money. There is no difference except the profit motive is removed if we opt in to a public program. You are told your taxes will increase and yes that will happen. But the increase in taxes will be less than the premium you pay for insurance and those pre-existing conditions will now be covered.

Here is one proposal for a national health plan, i'm not necessarily endorsing it but at least it is there for the public to review. It covers everything and more than my insurance plan...how about yours?
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s111-703

Do Republicans have detailed plans to improve our health care access and coverage and could you send it to me to review?

Health Care is not a Human Right

The experience i had last month dealing with the medical community has reaffirmed my strong belief that all human beings, whether rich or poor, should never be denied medical attention because they lack health insurance. Claiming that emergency rooms will take anyone is not true.

Researching Universal Health Care has been enlightening and rather than write about what i've found i've decided to just out and out copy it verbatim. i didn't write any of what follows and most of it doesn't address how Universal Health Care would actually work here...that will come in another post. Unfortunately, i failed to compile the authors names as i was collecting quotes originally thinking i would write my own. So the blue writing is mine and the black belongs to others but i've lost track of who they are.

Health Care is not a Human Right? Some believe this. i don't.

Have you asked yourself if our Health Care System reflects our American values? Are we a nation that doesn't believe in cooperation, that we only believe in the rights of the individual not of the community?

Is it the right of the Insurance Industry to deny us Health Care, is that a Human Right?

The fact is that health insurance corporations don't provide health care at all and yet they make enormous profits from a system that exists to provide health care.

Health Insurance Corporations profits increase when people don't get health care. That is the bottom line. The more care they deny, the more procedures they refuse to pay for the more they profit at your expense.

They provide no health care and they profit most when Americans pay for health insurance but can't get access to health care.

The health insurance industry can never engage in constructive negotiations on this issue because all they're doing is negotiating how much profit they're going to continue to bleed out of our health care system.

We look like our values put an emphasis on unbridled greed when it comes to health care.

Keep that in mind as you continue to read.

The fact is that thousands of people in America are dying every year because they can't get health care and this means nothing. The fact that over 1 million Americans go into bankruptcy every year due to medical debt — even though most of them had insurance when they got sick — means nothing.

1. Corporate health-insurance companies don't provide health care.

2. Corporate health-insurance companies draw an enormous amount of money out of the health care system as profits while increasing the paperwork costs of managing health-care.

3. Corporate health-insurance companies make the most profits when people pay for insurance but can't get access to health care.

4. Corporate junk health-insurance has caused a lot of health-insurance holders a lot of headache, heartache, and agony by denying them the access to health care they thought they were paying for when they signed up for the insurance.

The facts are clear.

1. The US system is a failure. European national health systems work. They provide 100% coverage. They cost 10% of GDP vs. US 16% of GDP and they get better health care results, we are not number 1 in health care results. Profits are.

2. The US system is killing the US economy, costing it $800B a year, 6% of GDP. GM, Ford and Chrysler and many other US businesses are in trouble because the cost of US health care makes them non-competitive.

3. Viable plans such as those proposed by Physicians for National Health Plan and "Medicare for All" provide the detailed policy framework for moving US to a competitive effective health care system where we all pay in and where we all get access.

We live in a country where average working people are one health-care crisis away from disaster.

Health crisis is the 2nd leading cause of bankrupcy in the US.

We live in a country where people with chronic illnesses are thrown away because employers cannot afford to keep covering them.

We live in a country where small-business people are shackled by the health-insurance costs of their employees.

I could go on and on. But I'll sum it up with this:

Aren't you tired of living in a country with an irrational health-care system that is based on a parasitic industry glutting itself on the illness and misfortune of others.

Should money that is spent for health care go into profits, stocks, venture capital firms etc or back into health care?

Our system is one of fear and money not health care.

We experience unnecessary medical care because of a fear of liability which drives up costs. Every extra unnecessary procedure makes money. The push for profits by hospitals and insurance companies imposes the profit motive on their employees(Doctors and Nurses)instead of good health care.

In 2005 the top pharma companies together had $222 Billion in sales out of that $32 Billion was spent on Research and Development and $71 Billion in Marketing and Administration. The argument that the high price of drugs is related to research and development is a false one. The high price of drugs is related to Marketing, Administration and obsene profits($39 Billion) or 16% when Fortune 500 companies are averaging 5%.

Some claim that Universal Health Care will ration care. Isn't it obvious that we already have rationing by insurance companies?

Some claim its socialized medicine. So what, our Veterans get socialized health care and for the most part they like it. Our seniors get socialized health care and for the most part they like it too. No system is perfect but taking the greed out of health care might finally make the US number 1 in the world.

If congress people get gold-plated coverage, and the waitress who lives next door has to put a begging can at the convenience store (because she has breast cancer but no insurance and minimum wages)... well, can you understand why I've had it with the bloated defense budget and the bailed out banks and the profit-seeking middleman called "health care companies.""

"Those begging cans common all over the country, strike me as more obscene than anything you could get at an adult bookstore."

Maybe it is time you should ask what the insurance companies are doing at the table during this discussion concerning revamping Health Care Access?
Check out this link:
http://www.ourailinghealthcare.com/

century plant inspiration

The century plant continues to inspire me. Here we are nine months since it sprouted out with the big "C". It has reached for the sky, been knocked down, didn't give up, sent out new shoots, blossomed with beautiful flowers that then turned into tiny plants. It folded up into itself protecting its new growth. It got quiet and reserved gaining strength waiting for the next step.

i look at it every day and today i'm inventing a new world...goofed on that word...meant to write i'm inventing a new word....but both would be nice. The new word for today is for spirituality, connectedness, and the divine..... without the dogma of religion.

Hmmmm!

Thinking about the composition of the three words above, spirituality, connectedness and divine, i decided to take a bit from each to create the new word.

Spirconvine (spir'kon-vin). n.v.t. 1. this word represents spirituality, connectedness, the divine and much more.

Spir......... is that little sprite that jumps around in your brain refocusing your energies towards the spiritual when the mundane and difficult have all but destroyed your day. We all have spir but we call it different things. Spiritual essence sometimes fits the bill and while others may prefer to call it soul, i like to think of it as a little sprite that refocuses me. Spir activates the emotional, feeling, compassionate part of your humanness. It helps you grow away from fear and can guide you to greater things.


The con in the middle of this new word could be regarded as negative even though it represents the terms with or together with. Con, in this sense, is involved when the secrets are revealed.....you know.....con artists who try to misdirect you...the con has already happened but now you are faced with the con which you use to correct and reconnect. This definition of con is the end point that brings you back together it is your source of strength and inspiration. The stuff in the middle you need. The concon to make you think when you go off track that the path back is really not so difficult. Right?


vine represents the ascent to the divine. Vines climb and intertwine but use other supports for growth. Some vines climb alone while others grow over other plants to reach their pinnacle. Mankind exhibits the same growth pattern vines do. Vines can colonize and adapt quickly while continuing to grow. Simple structures, such as vines, can get you to the divine without dogma to impede your progress. Vines don't invest a lot of energy trying to reach the sun so it shouldn't take much energy for man to reach the divine but historically it has. Instead of making this task difficult the vine makes it easy.

The spir con and vine go together. Use your inner sprite, your ability to recognize the cons so you can connect and cultivate that vine.

Remember, spirconvine is a simple tactic that works without a lot of fuss.

Dignity and Justice for all of Us

Judith Blau in an article called "Human Rights is a Local Issue" says:

"I'm increasingly convinced that the reason why human equality, human dignity, and social pluralism are illusive in American society is that we do not have what Miguel de Unamuno called "el público" and Alexis de Tocqueville called "the public spirit." Instead, American communities, towns and cities are segregated by race, class, and citizenship status, with withered downtowns, and with no spaces for people to discuss, argue, and talk across those divides of race, class and citizenship. It is sometimes said that Americans live, worship and work in their individuals silos, with a silo for each neighborhood, each church, and each workplace. There can be no deep shared conception under these circumstances of collective solidarity or the common good, and of authentic pluralism. True, within each community, parishioners in dozens of churches may celebrate one another's equality every Sunday, and during the week, co-workers in hundreds of work settings may affirm one another's dignity, but these celebrations and affirmations of shared humanity are within tiny homogenous clusters of people, and do nothing to advance the collective solidarity, the common good, and social pluralism. In these silos people simply affirm the equality and dignity of people who are just like themselves. It is far from the cacaphonous el público that Unamuno described and the vibrant public spirit that Tocqueville found in American communities early in the 20th century."

i believe that all governments want to show that they are POLITICALLY CORRECT as they "SPEAK" human rights for "EXPORT" purposes but hardly enforce them at home. Pointing out abuses in other countries without looking in our own backyard first and foremost makes us look like a bunch of hypocrites.

We are a nation of laws and our laws prior to the torture memos recently released labeled torture a criminal act. If you believe in the rule of law, if you are guided by the rule of law then the entire argument that torture is needed to prevent a ticking time bomb is a false one when the law prohibits it.

There is no way to ever prove that waterboarding prevented thousands or millions of Americans from dying. The argument is specious. Also, those who were waterboarded were declared "guilty" before ever having had the opportunity to defend themselves in court. If you believe that ANYONE can be declared "guilty" without ever defending themselves then you also accept that this same scenario could happen to you if you were rightly or wrongly suspected.

What was done was criminal, it was against our laws and the international agreements that we as a nation signed, it was a crime.

Human Rights begins at home. Democracy should be the deliverer of human rights. Here at home we should look to how we follow the rule of law, our delivery of food, housing, health care, gainful employment and education. These are inalienable rights and if we aren't successful at delivering these in our own country how can we demand other countries focus on their abuses if we aren't focusing on our own first.

Can we ever call ourselves human rights violators?

Look down this list of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. If we as a nation want to export democracy and liberty we need to stop pointing out other countries abuses and clean up our own abuses first and foremost.

We can spread human rights.

We can lead by example.

Article 1.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.


Article 2.

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.


Article 3.

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.


Article 4.

No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.


Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.


Article 6.

Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.


Article 7.

All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.


Article 8.

Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.


Article 9.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.


Article 10.

Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.


Article 11.

(1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.
(2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.


Article 12.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.


Article 13.

(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.


Article 14.

(1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.
(2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.


Article 15.

(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.


Article 16.

(1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.
(2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses.
(3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.


Article 17.

(1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.


Article 18.

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.


Article 19.

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.


Article 20.

(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
(2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.


Article 21.

(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.
(2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.
(3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.


Article 22.

Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality.


Article 23.

(1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.
(2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.
(3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.
(4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.


Article 24.

Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.


Article 25.

(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.


Article 26.

(1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
(2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.
(3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.


Article 27.

(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.
(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.


Article 28.

Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.


Article 29.

(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.
(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.


Article 30.

Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.

fear and earth day

i've been conflicted concerning Earth Day and the fact that Wednesday is when i publish here. Must i write a piece concerning the environment because it is Earth Day or could i get away with writing about another issue?

Doing a little bit of both won out.

Earth Day is celebrated around the world and is one of the few events that people of all faiths, backgrounds and nationalities participate in. Everyone recognizes that human beings have to share the earth and make an effort not to despoil her. Unfortunately we have major trouble with both the sharing and the trashing. Of all the living creatures that inhabit this orbiting world we humans are the most destructive.

We dirty everything while continuing to believe that the natural cycles of our environment will clean up our mess.

Somewhere i read that you can manipulate a population to do your biding if you start your appeal by using something to fear first. In order to do this you must create scenarios to be feared then tell your audience what to do to combat that fear. We can all list issues that have been used in the past to create fear in the population.

Terrorists should probably top the list.
Fear of taxes(Democrats)
Communists are right up there(take everything you have)
Right wingers(war mongers)
Socialists(want you to give them your money)
Universal Health care advocates(want to stop good health care)
Anti-gun people(take your guns)
Pro-choice(give you too much choice)
Anti-abortion(take away your choice)
Global warming and cooling advocates
Religious extremists of any ilk

The list could go on and on but all of these groups illicit unreasonable fear in certain segments of the population.

Why?

Because you are being manipulated to fear them. You are being manipulated to fear first, i'll say that again, you are being manipulated to FEAR FIRST so you don't hear the whole message.

Today when you hear about global warmers and global deniers look first to what they want you to fear. Fear will be the over riding manipulator to grab your attention. One group tells you we are reaching the tipping point and the other group tells you fixing it will be too costly and they are both crying chicken little.

Who is right?

Which fear have you bought into?

Ask yourself this whenever you become fearful about something affecting your life. What fear is controlling your thinking? Eliminate it first then review the issues without fear.

If we remove the fear from both sides i'll bet there is someplace in the middle where we can all meet and agree.

Do we dirty our planet and our air?

Can you answer that question without fear?

Are there solutions we can come up with without using fear to stop us from thinking about the issues?

i hope so.

Happy Earth Day!

the book shop

There is a great used book shop, close to my moms apartment. Jam packed with books from all categories, dark with little nooks set aside for intimate browsing. The crotchety owner sits deep within the surrounding books. He is not old although probing has revealed that he has lived within blocks of the book store his entire life and knows all the goings on in the neighborhood.

A computer is in front of him, readily available to find anything your heart desires, but his nature lies in wait willing to snap at you at a moments notice. He is ever vigilant, making sure no one absconds with one of his precious books.

At first, his demeanor is off putting but once you have gained his respect his smile is deep with feeling. He opens up and then the fun begins. He is filled with interesting topics for conversation, recommendations for books and the latest treatise on politics. i've bought books there and will leave most of them behind, gobbled up, but ready for others to read. His bookshop is a great place just to hang and for someone like me a refuge even when he didn't have the book i was looking for.

In the past i wrote about the Peace Pilgrim, the woman who started walking across the United States after deciding she would be a wanderer until mankind learned the ways of peace. i found her book, not in my favorite bookstore but a few doors down in the thrift shop. i was reading it last night and have decided to post a few of her insights.

So many of us punish ourselves by making wrong choices. According to the Peace Pilgrim enlightenment is constantly being offered but many refuse to accept it. Therefore those that don't accept it are being taught by the problems that are set before them, since they refuse to make the right choices on their own. Problems arrive to push us towards harmony.

i know i irritate people at times with a directness that some find offensive. Those who are irritated don't want to be reminded of the darker sides of our natures. Believing in justice means i have an extremely difficult time letting the actions of the unjust go unnoticed.

Rousing people from their apathy and making them think may sometimes seem to come into conflict with a loving attitude towards others. Problems have a purpose, hiding from them does not make them go away. Preventing one person from hurting another is a loving thing to do no matter what the circumstance. No problem that is set before you can be solved by denying it exists. That just sets up a life filled with failure.

You can solve it and learn and grow in the process by confronting all problems head on.

So like the Peace Pilgrim says, think positive thoughts about everyone don't let anger rule.

drug reactions

The care of an elderly adult can be harrowing at times. Understanding the nature of their debilitation takes undercover agent trained to recognize out of the ordinary symptoms.

While your charge is riddled with anxiety you must be careful to pay attention to their worries. Expressing concern at every new crisis that is discussed by the many physicians you encounter as you move through the maze of hospital tests will put your loved one at ease.

Illness that eludes diagnosis can kill. When i arrived at my mother's apartment the shock of her appearance immobilized me. i had no idea how to help her. She kept telling me she was dying and she looked like she was dying.

At first, i tried to encourage her to get out, to take on life, but as the reality sunk in that she really couldn't i searched for other alternatives. i quizzed her relentlessly and finally focused on the drugs she was taking to treat her heart disease. i needed help but knew no one locally.

i am the grand inquisitor, i can drive friends nuts with my probing questions, even though i am a relatively private person. This trait alone saved my mother's life. i quizzed everyone i encountered. i gained information about avenues i had no idea even existed when the crisis was at its height. i refused to back down when clerks said no appointments to see doctors were available. i insisted it was an emergency and we needed to see someone.

Spironolactone, an aggressive heart medication, was at the root of her illness. All her symptoms matched the ones listed under adverse effects. She had previously questioned her doctor about the drug but he told her drug companies had to put all those things down just in case and not to worry.

She tried to ignore the symptoms and tough it out as her condition worsened but her voice on the phone couldn't hide her deterioration. Finally after many conversations i could wait no longer and had to go see for myself what could be done. We loaded up all her drugs, all her paper work and off we went. i had been in town three days and her condition had worsened in that time.

Thankfully it was a general practitioner that heard my plea for help. He heard my concerns about the drug combination she was on and called in a pharmacology student to go over everything. While at the computer the students eyebrows kept raising and i knew we were on to something. i asked him what he thought and he said he had to defer to the doctor. They both left the examining room to consult and the doctor returned saying my mom needed a blood test. We went to the lab for the test and went home. That was in the morning, by that afternoon while I was out taking a walk the doctor had called and said he had called 911. She had to get to the emergency room immediately and couldn't wait for me to come back from my walk. Needless to say, i came back to a shocking note on the door saying she was at the hospital. i had no idea where the hospital was.

The emergency room went to work immediately draining out her overloaded system. She was experiencing renal failure, astronomical insulin levels, over the top potassium levels and was near to having a heart attack. She almost died. They saved her and within two days the change was phenomonal.

My mother was back, she no longer looked like a ghost and no longer thought she was going to die. She started laughing and now a week later has a raging appetite, can walk without looking like she is going to topple over at any minute. A home health nurse visits every other day, a physical therapist has her on a mild exercise program and the doctors are stabalizing her medications.

She still has issues which i believe are drug related so we are working on those with the doctors. Seven years ago she had a stroke that affected her right side. It made any use of her right hand and right foot difficult but two days ago her hand straightened out and her foot is not falling over. S

She thinks she is the new Benjamin Button.

All of this is truly miraculous and it was all done on Medicare. i've always been in favor of universal health care and this has reinforced my leanings. So all you naysayers out there slamming health care for all...get a grip. Any one of us could go through this on private care with insurance companies questioning every move. Insurance companies are in business to make a profit. Making a profit off illness is wrong. It is wrong, wrong, wrong. On Medicare they act...they don't have to wait for any approval and from what we have just experienced it works. No insurance forms to fill out...just hand them your card.

She could sue but she won't. What she does want is to alert everyone to the realities of over prescription of drugs and the issues relating to their interactions. All medications need to be checked to make sure they are not making the person more sick. If you think it is your medication it probably is. She is also singing the praises of all the medical personel who work on Medicare patients.

food for thought

Getting a wound can take a second.

Healing a wound can be a long process. Incredibly, our bodies know how to react to the initial opening, the alert goes out, cells kick in, and healing begins.

There are four stages to healing a wound, stopping blood loss, reconstruction, migration, and maturation and remodeling. If the wound is not large no outside remedy is needed. The body can repair itself. If the wound is gaping sutures bind the edges to encourage faster healing.

Our country was wounded. Everyone rallied all around the world to help us repair the damage but we lost our way following 9/11. We received a direct hit to one of our countries nerve centers and split into two factions that believed in different healing potions. For eight long years we bled. We were unable to stanch the flow of blood and became weakened in the aftermath. We never got past the first phase of healing.

Today, we look around and see attempts at reconstruction. Like nature, things that heal and grow never give up. We are faced with massive infection so we've taken out the medical kit and are experimenting with a new treatment. The infection is everywhere, we might not succeed, but our instincts tell us to try anyway.

There is nothing more terrifying to those who have been in power to have to sit back and watch the new leaders experiment with a new treatment. No one knows if it will work, but everyone knows that if enough fight against it, the likely hood of it not working increases.

i'll say that again: If enough fight against a new cure the likely hood of it not working increases.

Questions abound, articles are written daily concerning the direction the country should consider. Some, just want to continue doing what we have been doing which isn't healing the wound.

How are we going to heal?

Will we be disabled by the new and innovative actions we take today? The following questions are making the rounds on the internet strings, looping back on themselves trying to find the path.

A primary one to consider is if the growth model we have been following for the past fifty years is simply unsustainable both economically and ecologically?

Has prioritizing private markets over public interests been our undoing?

After half a century of catering to defense contractors could we save money and stop bleeding by closing bases around the world, reevaluating the use of obsolete weapons systems, reconsidering nuclear disarmament around the world and speeding up the end of the invasion of Iraq?

Should government protect people's health or insurance companies profits?

Who got the stimulus money and what did they do with it?

Who is our worst enemy, terrorists or the sinking planet?

Is your food safe to eat?

The list goes on and on.

Today the other side is claiming this new administration is only about tax, spend and borrow. For those non-thinkers out there this is easy to remember. Tax, spend and borrow. It sticks in the mind easily and it is not just true about this new administration but it is true of all administrations. They all just tax, spend and borrow but what they tax, spend and borrow for differs.

Yesterday it was tax the middle class, spend on weapons, war and defense, and borrow against the future. Tomorrow it is tax the upper class, spend on health, jobs and the environment and borrow against the future.

Choose your weapon. i kind of like tomorrow's outlook.

We have a long way to go to heal this country. We need to work together to close the wound. It is time to support a new way of doing things for the old way has failed miserably and the wound is gaping. Lets try to close it up.

It's their future.

love your home

i'm kind of lucky, i guess, because i love and i mean really love where i live. i like the people, the weather, the ocean, for me it is the center of the universe. i've loved this island ever since i moved here many years ago and that love hasn't diminished one tiny bit.

i'm not one that expects perfection and this place has its problems, there is lots of crime, poverty, and dysfunction like anywhere, but it's not severe enough to make me wish i lived somewhere else. i love traveling, love adventures but by the end of the trip i'm dying to get home. i enjoy all my time away soaking up the new terrain but no other place has ever called to me the way this island does.

A while back i was perusing the internet strings( i'm addicted to the strings) i clicked into an article that detailed Americans satisfaction and/or dissatisfaction with their domicile.

Shock number one, more people are unhappy with where they live than are happy.

This took me so off guard that i have spent way more time contemplating this unhappiness than i should.

The questions running through my mind ran the gamut but one stood out.

Why does where you live not satisfy you?

That question dominated my thoughts more than any of the others i came up with. i understood why people were unhappy where they lived but what i couldn't understand was why they didn't change it.

Why be miserable living somewhere you didn't want to? And what was it about that place that was making you miserable?

This island certainly isn't for everyone. If you are used to things happening rapidly and with a certain amount of expertise and quality don't come here. Things get done but at a much slower pace which can drive speedy people up the wall. They forget, after the vacation is over, that those lackadaisical qualities were charming at one time.

i know for many, economics is the primary motivator for staying where they are even when it makes them miserable and hence my next question.

If it is only money that keeps you in place, but it is making you unhappy, is that money really that important? Would it be such a leap to take a gamble and move to a place that might fit your psyche more completely, even if you had to live on less?

Here is another question.

Are you really yourself in this place where you are so unhappy?

Can you find yourself there? And finally,

if you can't find yourself there, why do you stay?

In the midst of writing just now i went to check my e-mail.

A crabby friend sent out an e-mail this morning that ends with a line that is perfect for this piece. He said and i quote:

This mornings run was uninspired so I got in the water to cool off with a water run. Waist deep the first hawkbill turtle breached 20 feet from me. Chest deep a second one breached 30 feet the other side of me. Started water running and for the next 20 min. a dolphin swam from 10 ft of me to 100 yds from me and was still there when I left for work

LESSON: A sucky day in the VI beats a good day most anywhere else.


Then another friend adds in:

It really is a hard life we live down here... I'm really jealous of the dolphin...

And so, think long and hard about where you want to spend the bulk of your life, raising kids, feeling part of a community and making a difference. If you can't be yourself, don't stay.

Listen

There is a movie out on DVD called "August Rush" and it is a dripper. It is about a boy who had been put up for adoption at birth and had found himself listening to the music of the world around him. He heard everything and internalized it.

August believed that he could hear his parents and that if he could just figure out how to play the music he heard surrounding him in his life back to them they would find him. You may have to be a bit of the dreamer to enjoy this movie, someone who can suspend logic long enough just to be entertained, but it is worth it.

The movie did have an aura of the fairy tale, even at times way over the top with fantastical events that couldn't happen in real life. The screenwriter used a lot of creative license, but you know what, sometimes we just want the impossible to happen and it does in this movie in a good way. Plus the music is really really good.

My favorite parts were the scenes of August Rush just listening to everything, you could see him palpably connecting with his mother and father and they with him even though no one had ever met or spoken.

His life is a symphony of sound that impacts every one of the actions he takes. He commits to that sound because he understands that it is the path to being "Found". He fears not. He doesn't let the disease of fear stop him. His self confidence allows him to do things others think he can't do but he stamps out the hesitation before it stops him. He believes in being found, he knows that being found is his destiny even with all the other paths blocking his way to that eventual reunion.

Frequently he stops whatever he is doing just to listen and connect and that is where we are today.

Listening and connecting.

How many times have you half heartedly listened to another person speak? Barely containing yourself because your point of view was much more important than theirs, or your story was more detailed, funny and needing telling, needing telling so much that you interrupt the original speaker?

Huh?

Fess up!

We have all done it....interrupted someone so we could tell our story.

Communication and connection occur when each of us learns how to decode the others mode of transference. Talkers need listeners, they seek them out and listeners need talkers, sometimes listeners would rather listen than speak and talkers would rather talk than listen. In this respect we each need the other and the interaction is mutually beneficial, but not always.

Apparently there are three ways of listening, combative, passive and active. Which explains why there is a difference between "hearing the words" and "hearing the message". When we "hear the message" it is as if we have become that person. We have actively tried to understand what the message is and even if we don't agree with the message we understand it on the other persons terms, comprehending their feelings and their intent, for many times the surface words are not the entire message.

People use codes to deliver messages to other people. They use words and body language, they use music, literature, touch and emotion. Some use language while others use non verbal devices

A passive listener is one who listens to the story but stays passive and doesn't verify it.
A combative listener is one who waits for an opportunity or opening to take the floor.
While an active listener verifies what they have heard and shows a genuine interest in the topic and understanding it before they respond.

Are you looking for that opening to attack? Do you really listen or do you have to work at listening? Are you half there when someone else is talking or do you engage completely?

These are questions all of us should ask.

What kind of listener's are we? What are our codes? Do others have trouble understanding us or do we care?

If we all tried to listen the way August Rush did maybe our differences would recede and our commonalities would become more prominent. We could connect on a different level.

And so, remember, we can all connect even with those we don't really listen to.

Do you resent paying taxes?

Do you think your life would be improved if you paid less taxes?
Do you resent government?
Why?

For years i have been admonishing friends that hate paying taxes to view government less as an adversary and more as something you should and could be proud of. Imagine that club or church you belong to, you pay your dues to keep it running smoothly, you feel a certain amount of pride towards it, you want it maintained and well functioning. How would you feel if it wasn't? Why is it we don't have the same pride when we talk about what our government does for us as a nation? Why don't we tell the world we are proud to belong to and support with our taxes the greatest nation on earth? Why do we want our nation to deteriorate?

No one and i mean no one does their job with 100% accuracy and that includes government. Builders and contractors, college professors, architects, doctors, small business men, teachers, insurance agents, lawyers, judges, dentists etc. they all make mistakes, they all do bad jobs at some point but they are not held to the same standards as government.

Why?

By and large, the private sector does a good job providing services and so does government. Government for the most part provides clean water to drink while getting rid of the sewage we produce, they keep the peace and protect you(policemen and firemen) they send out Social Security checks on time, they provide dependable electricity and try to educate our children, they also ensure aircraft safety, they feed the hungry, they protect our food sources, they build roads and bridges and so on.

If one were to focus on the programs that actually work in government we would quickly realize that we all benefit from the taxes we pay. Its easy to point out things that don't work in government but why don't we hold the 80% of new business that start and fail every five years to the same standards? You know why we don't, its because we have been brainwashed to think government can't work.

Here are some programs that have actually worked and been well administered by government.
* Regulation of the Business Cycle. The federal government uses a variety of monetary and fiscal policies to limit the boom and bust cycles of the economy. For example, it adjusts interest rates to give a boost to the economy when it is slowing down. Thanks to these policies, the U.S. has not suffered an economic depression since the 1930s. We tend to overlook the fact that before government took on this responsibility, severe depressions were a routine and recurring problem in this country – occurring in 1819, 1837, 1857, 1873, 1893, 1907 and 1929. And we have all but forgotten the enormous amount of human suffering caused by these economic meltdowns – the massive joblessness, the destitution, the rampant hunger, the disease, the riots, the hopelessness and the despair. By any measure, eliminating these depressions and this misery has been one of the greatest – and largely unheralded – achievements of our federal government. * Public Health Programs. A variety of programs run by the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and state and local Public Health departments have greatly improved the health of most Americans. For example, the scourges of polio, cholera, and smallpox have been effectively eradicated from this country – a huge achievement. And vaccination programs have reduced by 95% our risks of contracting potentially debilitating diseases like hepatitis B, measles, mumps, tetanus, rubella, and diphtheria. Federal funds spent on buying and distributing these vaccines have saved countless lives and the billions of dollars it would cost to treat these illnesses. In addition, the dedicated scientists who work for the CDC are all that stand between Americans and a potentially catastrophic epidemic imported from abroad. The most likely and worrisome threat is from a new and deadly strain of bird flu. The last deadly flu epidemic to hit the United States, in 1918, killed over 675,000 people in matter of months. * The Interstate Highway System. Started by the Eisenhower administration in the 1950s, this system now forms the backbone of long-distance travel and commerce in the United States. It makes up less than 1% of our highways, but carries almost a quarter of all roadway traffic. It has also allowed millions of Americans to move out of big cities and live in more pleasant suburban and small town environments. In addition, the interstate system has the benefit of being considerably safer than the old two-lane highways it replaced – saving hundreds of thousands of lives. Even some conservatives have been forced to admit the success of this building program, with George Will calling it "the most successful public works program in the history of the world." It's hard to imagine the U.S. without this interstate highway system, and this system would not exist at all if it weren't for the government. * Social Security and Medicare. Without these two government programs, growing old would be hell for many Americans. Before Social Security and Medicare, millions of the elderly were doomed to spend their retirement years in poverty and illness. Social Security has cut the rate of poverty for the elderly by over half – from 29% in 1966 to 10% today. Not surprisingly, financial columnist Jane Bryant Quinn has described Social Security as "arguably the U.S. government's greatest success." Medicare has also been incredibly successful. It has doubled the number of the elderly covered by health insurance, so that 99% now enjoy that benefit. Without this form of "socialized" medicine, 15 million of our neediest citizens would be going without many vital medical services and many would have to choose between food and medicine. Older Americans are now living 20% longer, thanks in part to this effective program. These two programs have done more than anything else to relieve the pain and suffering of our elderly population. * GI Bill Without this program, the middle class as we know it would not exist. The GI Bill provided government funds for 16 million World War II and Korean veterans to attend college. It allowed my father to become the first one in his family to graduate college, to become an engineer, and to go on to build a middle-class life for our family. Historian David Kennedy has remarked that "GI Bill beneficiaries changed the face of higher education, dramatically raised the educational level and hence the productivity of the workforce, and in the process unimaginably altered their own lives. * Federal Housing Authority. The middle class housing building and buying boom in the United States was initially financed by cheap GI Bill housing loans and by Federal Housing Authority insurance of conventional home loans. In 1945, only 44% of Americans owned their own home. But thanks in large part to the FHA program that lowered interest rates and down payments, 63% of Americans owned a home by 1968. These homes have become a multi-generational source of wealth for tens of millions of Americans. The FHA still insures over $50 billion a year in mortgages, and remains especially important for low-income house buyers. * Consumer Protection. In reaction to increasing pubic pressure in the early 1970s, government began to pass legislation to protect consumers from shoddy and dangerous products. The Consumer Product Safety Commission remains the key agency enforcing these laws. The need it fills is still a vital one – products kill over 20,000 consumers a year and injure over 25 million more. It would be far worse if the CPSC did not recall hundreds of products every year. It is estimated that its activities produce $10 billion in savings on the health care bills, property damage, and other costs that would have been created by these defective products. * Anti-Discrimination Policies. Since the 1960s, policies like the Civil Rights Act and Title IX have chalked up impressive gains in decreasing discrimination against minorities and women. Racial segregation in hotels, restaurants and other public facilities has been eliminated. Housing discrimination and workplace discrimination, while not completely eradicated, have been substantially reduced. College enrollment for minorities has greatly increased, jumping 48% during the 1990s alone. In terms of gender, workplace discrimination and sexual harassment have decreased and record numbers of women are now attending colleges and graduate schools. There is still room for improvement – particularly in the area of equal wages – but it is clear that these policies have made substantial progress in eliminating racist and sexist practices that had existed for hundreds of years. * Clean Water and Clean Air Programs. America's water and air are significantly cleaner than they were in the 1960s, thanks to federal legislation. The levels of four of the six air pollutants covered by the Clean Air Act – nitrogen dioxide, smog, sulfur dioxide, and lead – have been reduced dramatically, by an average of 53%. The quality of the air has significantly increased in virtually every metropolitan area in the U.S. The Clean Water act has been similarly successful. When it was passed in 1972, only one-third of the nation's waterways were safe enough for fishing or swimming. Today that has doubled to two-thirds. And while only 85 million Americans were served by sewage treatment plants in 1972, that figure has now risen to 170 million. * Workplace Safety. Businesses love to complain about the rules of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and sometimes its policies have been a bit overboard – but it has clearly been very effective in greatly increasing the level of protection for American workers. In 1970, the year before the creation of OSHA, 22,000,000 people were injured on the job and 14,000 died from job-related injuries. Since then, OSHA has helped to cut occupational injury and illness rates by 40 percent. Even more important, between 1980 and 2002, workplace deaths fell from 7.5 per 100,000 workers to 4.0. Particularly impressive has been its success against brown lung disease among textile workers, which has been virtually eliminated. * The Military. Even Rush Limbaugh, who has never met a government program that he likes, admits that the U.S. military is a great success story. Although debates continue to rage over how the military should be used, there is complete agreement that our Army, Navy, and Air Force are the most effective military organizations in the world today. We have the best trained and the best equipped armed forces, and they have an unparalleled ability to effectively project military force – as was demonstrated in the two recent Gulf wars. In the case of the military, the government has clearly done an exemplary job of creating a well-working and effective organization. * The West. Although few Americans think about this, much of the Western United States as we know it today is the creation of various federal programs. It has been that way from the very beginning, starting with government-sponsored explorations of the West in the early and mid-19th century. In continued with the federal government providing the money and troops for the depressingly efficient program of "Indian removal." The government also sold public land to settlers for low prices and sometimes even gave it away. The railroads, which spurred so much growth in the West, would not have been built without massive subsidies from the federal government. And today, much of the farming in many Western areas is made possible by federal water projects, substantial parts of the ranching are subsidized by the artificially low grazing fees on federal property, and much of the mining is made more profitable by dirt cheap access to federal land. Cities like Los Angeles and Las Vegas would dry up and blow away without the federally funded dam and canal projects that provide water to those arid regions. So it is ironic that while anti-big government sentiment is very strong in parts of this region, the West literally would not and could not exist as it does today without the sustained help of the federal government. * National Weather Service. This government agency not only makes your life more convenient by forecasting your daily weather, it also helps to ensure the safety of planes in the air and ships at sea and it has saved countless lives with its hurricane and tornado warnings. It also just keeps getting better. It's predictions of hurricane paths has improved by fifty percent during the past 15 years; and its forecasts of weather 72 hours in advance is now as reliable as 36-hour forecasts 25 years ago. * Poverty Policies. This may seem counter-intuitive. Everybody knows that poverty policy is the classic example of government failure. How could it possibly be considered a success when the poverty rate is essentially the same as it was thirty years ago? The answer is that most of the policies aimed at the poor in the U.S. were never intended to get them out of poverty. They were only intended to alleviate the suffering of the poor – and studies have shown that they have been very successful in doing this.8 For example, food stamps have worked to greatly reduce hunger and malnutrition among the poor. The poor are much healthier and have more access to medical treatment thanks to Medicaid. And rent subsidies have allowed many of the poor to move out of places with leaking roofs, inadequate heat, and faulty plumbing. These three programs form the backbone of our anti-poverty efforts – their combined budgets are eight times larger than that for welfare – and in terms of achieving their stated goals, these programs have to be considered impressive government successes. * Student Financial Aid Programs. College is getting increasingly expensive and more and more students require financial help to attend. The federal grants, loans, and work study money provided by the Department of Education form the largest source of college financial assistance, providing billions of dollars in funding each year. These programs have worked to remove financial barriers for students and thus create more equal opportunity in higher education. They have been a major factor in producing the rapid increases in college enrollment seen in the last 50 years, and they have also contributed to the increasing class and racial diversity of the college population. * Food and Drug Safety Programs. The federal government enforces extensive rules to protect the public from tainted food and directly regulates both the meat and poultry industries. It also plays a key role in ensuring the safe use of pesticides on agricultural products, both from here and abroad. Federal authorities are also on the frontlines in combating new threats to our food system, such as mad-cow disease. In addition, the Food and Drug Administration ensures that the drugs we take are pure and effective – an enormously complicated enterprise. Every year the FDA identifies almost 3,000 products that are unfit for consumption and ensures their withdrawal from the marketplace. Americans are undoubtedly safer and healthier thanks to these government programs. * Funding Basic Science Research. Most research on basic scientific topics – in physics, biology, chemistry, etc. – does not have immediate commercial applications and so this work is highly dependent on government funding. Federal funds pay for 80% of the basic science research in this country, through laboratory facilities in universities and in government agencies such as the National Institutes for Health. For this reason, the government deserves a great deal of credit for the important scientific and technological breakthroughs produced by these efforts. In just one area – biomedical science – basic research has provided the foundation to develop new diagnostic technologies, such as nuclear magnetic resonance machines, and new treatments for cancer, diabetes, and many other diseases. It is revealing that nearly half of the most important medical treatments in the field of cardiovascular-pulmonary medicine have their origins in basic research attempting to unravel the mysteries of the lungs, heart, and muscles – work done by scientists not working in this specific disease area. Beyond such practical payoffs, government-funded basic research has also made important progress in answering many of the most profound questions that have baffled humanity for centuries: What is the nature of matter and energy – and the nature of reality itself? How did the universe begin? How will it end? Are we alone in the universe? What is the nature of life – and how did it begin? The achievements of basic science in the United States have been many and stunning – and these are achievements of government as well. Pretty impressive – and this list could go on much further. Other clearly effective programs and policies would include our National Parks, the Voting Rights Act, Rural Electrification, AmeriCorps and the Peace Corps, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Cooperative Extension Service, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the National Crime Information Center. And again, these are just the accomplishments of government on the federal level – they don't count the thousands of other successful public sector endeavors on the state and local level.
And so to get to the point of my piece. Government can be a force for good. The good works accomplished by government have eclipsed those done by church's and charities. A few examples are abolishing slavery and ending child labor, almost eliminating poverty among the elderly, saving millions of lives through public health programs, inoculating children etc. and it may yet again be government that minimizes the destruction wrecking havoc with our economy.

If you would like more articles about how government can work for all of us check out
www.governmentisgood.com spend a little time there, you might come away viewing government in a more positive light.

All of the text in blue is directly quoted from Douglas J. Amy, Professor of Politics at Mount Holyoke College who has more articles in support of government at:
www.governmentisgood.com

seeding the youth

"Creating New From Old"

i have a new signature attached to all my e-mails and i think i have settled into it as a fixture that will remain.

The lead up to the Iraq Invasion(notice i still refuse to call it a war) was the beginning of my political activity. i constantly changed the sig line on the bottom of my e-mails depending upon which new outrage of the day compelled me to express myself. i wanted people to see these notices on everything. i wanted them to think about things outside their insulated lives. i wanted them to get angry and many did during all these years. i only lost one family to political ideology which all in all was pretty good considering.

My e-mails made them too uncomfortable and unfortunately their ideology trumped our friendship. They thought i was writing the stuff myself, heard my voice and hated me for it even though most of the time i was only passing on what i had read. They put me in the spam box....lovely way to end a friendship....the spam box. It must have been too difficult to just delete the political ones and read the personal ones. They couldn't do that though because they might accidentally read something they didn't want to know about so into the spam box went i and all my hopes for change. i almost felt proud knowing they had to go to those depths not to know something.

i finally figured out i had been put in the spam box a few years ago when they stopped answering even the personal notes, i forgive them for they know not what they have done and i hope someday they come back.

i liked them a lot but keep uppermost a conversation i had with another friend who is also very conservative. i'm actually amazed at how many conservative friends i have. i love them all.

But anyway she said to me.

"Friend, i will never let politics come between friendship."

And so moving on with my hope for humanity and forgiveness here is my new signature and something else to think about.

If Peace is to prevail we all have to become foes of violence.

How about if we start with young children and train them how to become peacemakers instead of warriors?

Here are a few ideas which most of you teachers already know and i found on a website that talks to non-violence and forgiveness:

Give a gift of your heart. Smile and talk with the children you see everyday. Befriend a child "in need" - get to know them, believe in them, and encourage their dreams. Show them you care.
Give a gift of your time. Volunteer with the many wonderful non-profit organizations that work with children. Serve as a coach, a tutor or a Big Brother or Big Sister "mentor."
Give your voice. Advocate & speak for the children who don't have a voice and often lack caring adults in their life to love and protect them.

i copied the above off the TKM website. At TKM they advocate non-violence and forgiveness.

TKM was formed after the killing of Tariq Khamisa who was a 20 year old college student delivering pizza in San Diego. He was killed by a 14 year old boy who had been given the order to shoot by his 18 year old gang leader.

Tariq's father was devastated by his death and through his journey with grief realized that he had to make some sense out of this horrific killing. He turned away from hostility and instead found forgiveness. He reached out to the killers grandfather and through that initial contact the two forged a relationship that endures to this day.

They formed a group that does outreach in schools in San Diego and around the country. They teach children the alternatives to violence.

To learn more about this group, visit their website at http://www.tkf.org/index.htm

Love, Care & Advocate for the Beloved Children In Your Community. There are countless ways to make a difference in the life of a child and spread peace not violence.

Also if you have a minute (its literally a minute) watch this You Tube which was an entry in a contest conducted by AARP. Pretty powerful stuff.

buttons

Ideas, those unconnected snippets of language that swim through our brains faster than we can catch them and absorb.

Today i started out with the word button.

Button...an object attached to a garment that is used to close an opening created when the garment was made so the eventual wearer could drape it over his or her body and close the whole darn thing up. Before i could read the definition of button in the dictionary...the above is mine...i was distracted by the word.....Babbit metal—which according to my dictionary is an antifriction alloy of copper, tin and antimony, used in bearings.

Antimony...hmmmm thinks i...lets go read about that.

Quick to the Wikipedia site where i type in antimony. Lordy, lordy there is all sorts of information about antimony.

First off i have to tell you that antimony is a chemical element and this piece is really supposed to be about buttons.
When antimony is stable(i keep writing alimony) it is blue and white and when it is unstable it is yellow and black.
It can vaporize and it can expand.
It can make some things hard and it can act as a flame retardant.
Some of it can even be used for medicinal or cosmetic purposes.
Muhammad said it can clear the vision and make the hair sprout.
Pliny the Elder claimed there were male and female forms of antimony(which must be why i keep writing alimony)
and it can be toxic (poisonous) which leads to an interesting parting shot.
The final entry at Wikipedia states that antimony may be leaching into bottled water from the PET (plastic)bottles but the concentrations may not be high enough to harm humans.

Now to get here from starting with the word button just boggles my mind. Mostly because every time i wash a plastic cup, dish or utensil (which is usually every day) i wonder if it is leaching some chemical into our bodies.

i now have one name that i discovered quite by accident which is probably leaching into us. It probably is...its leaching alimony into my body ahhhhh!

Is this important?

Yes!

It is! We need to pay attention to that which we put in our bodies.

Another thing to note here is that i really tried to write a piece that had a word starting with a different letter than A. If you've noticed, there has been a preponderance of essays with words beginning with A. i never planned it that way it just kept happening. When i noticed it was getting a bit much i decided to find some other topic and i thought of buttons. This was supposed to be about buttons and their ability to bring two things together, but antimony just dominated.

So there you have it. Antimony, a chemical element, known to be poisonous that may be leaching into your body from your water bottle or your plastic plates and cups. i have to say that i love plastic and am hoping my antimony levels are low and that yours are too.

Oh! To still be residing in that naive zone of unknowing, i could go on eating and drinking off of plastic forever not ever thinking of antimony.

i imagine i will write that other button piece sometime in the future.

By the way that century plant is just incredible. It has sent out another shoot and its blooming again. It does not give up.
Don't you give up either. Keep fighting for peace.