Monday Oct 24, 2005

So how about these drug prices?

Why is it that Americans pay 40-60 percent more for their medicine than to other countries like Canada? Why is it that "U.S. citizens spent $5,267 per capita for health care in 2002—53 percent more than any other country"(Matthew Holt)? Is it perhaps because Americans are, in fact, getting better treatment than those in other countries?
I'm sure that many of you have already been exposed to this issue whether it be through news articles, television, in class discussion, etc. And many of you probably recognize the truth to be that American's pay more for the same thing. *We* pay more for the same thing.
But...how can this be, one might ask. Aren't the resources expended in research, development, and production of the product universal? If this is the case then why is it that Americans are getting screwed?
The answer, of course, is obvious. The government, instead of working for the well-being of all of its people, has blatantly chosen to digress from this mission and embrace, instead, a mission to work for the well-being of wealthy, powerful individuals(namely, businessmen, namely, business men who run pharmaceutical companies).
The government has chosen to, instead of reducing drug prices or providing health care so that those at the bottom of the economic ladder can live properly, to see to it that pharmaceutical companies not be denied their right to charge grotesque prices for live-saving medicines...this all done in the name of democracy, of course.
But what answer does the government have for those individuals who neither have health care nor moneyto purchase their life-saving medicines? yeah...you guys, sorry but, you're screwed.
Something needs to be done, something has needed to be done for years. Around election time last year i saw a broken down car in some parking lot somewhere. It belonged to an obviously lower class man and on the back was a Bush-Cheney bumper sticker. It's one of the most depressing things i've witnessed. Something, indeed, needs to be done.

Posted by Ananya at 01:51 PM | Comments (657) |

Thursday Sep 22, 2005

Hot Catholic Love...

Some needs to explain this to me:

Homosexuals, even those who are celibate, will be barred from becoming Roman Catholic priests, a church official said Wednesday, under stricter rules soon to be released on one of the most sensitive issues facing the church.

The official, said the question was not "if it will be published, but when," referring to the new ruling about homosexuality in Catholic seminaries, a topic that has stirred much recent rumor and worry in the church. The official, who has authoritative knowledge of the new rules, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the church's policy of not commenting on unpublished reports.

He said that while Pope Benedict XVI had not yet signed the document, it would probably be released in the next six weeks.

First of all, I think it's funny that reporting has gotten to the point where even stories about the Catholic church has anonymous sources. More to the issue at hand, why the hell would this church go out of its way and ban homosexuals from being priests? It seems to me that the only way gays sin differently than heterosexuals is when they sin "gayly". But if they are bound by oaths of celibacy they wouldn't be kissing dudes and would be effectively in the same boat as the hetero's (in that sexual acts are forbidden of both, the gender of the partner seems really superfluous). Right?

Also, this ban on teh gay isn't retroactive. So, if gay-you are ordained sometime in the next six weeks it's all good, but after this piece of paper gets the signature, suddenly there's a ban on a group of people that if they cared about papal rules isn't necessary in the first place.

PRIESTS WHO FUCK ARE BREAKING THE RULES! So, the ones who care about the rules won't have sexual relations. The ones that don't will. All this new rule does is say that gay people are weaker and cannot possibly control themselves, not even when their god requires it of them. And though this position sounds ignorant and crazy to you and me, it seems to be exactly what they are thinking and saying:

But the church official who discussed the expected new rules said the document called for barring even celibate men who considered themselves homosexual because of what he contended were the specific temptations of seminaries.

"The difference is in the special atmosphere of the seminary," he said. "In the seminary, you are surrounded by males, not females."

Adding, "The gay has a voracious sexual appetite rooted in evil that cannot possibly be curbed by God (read: the self-loathing that accompanies being a cog in the machine of a gay-hating faith.)"

OK, I made that last bit up, but check this real quote out:

Mike Sullivan, of Catholics United for the Faith, a conservative advocacy group, said his group would favor a ban because putting a homosexual in an all-male seminary environment subjects that person to too much temptation, and increases his likelihood for failure.

"It's not appropriate to put an alcoholic in a bar either," he said.

Because gays don't funtion like not-gay-you and not-gay-me, all they think about is anus.

This ruling is motivated by the urge to purify the churches ranks. But all this is going to do is make prospective candidates for priesthood become less honest in the interest of self-preservation. And dishonesty and secrecy within the church is the real problem (and the true seeds of the past decades of scandals).

"People would do what they used to do, which is not be honest," said a gay American priest and professor at a Catholic college who did not want to be identified because he fears he could lose his church position if his sexual orientation was known.

"The irony is, if you look at the exact ages and seminary graduating classes of those priests who were convicted of sexual abuse in the past few years, they were not on the whole people who entered seminaries in the 1980's, when there began to be more openness about homosexuality," he said. "These were people from the old closeted days.

"So what the church is doing is repeating, in a weird way, the conditions they had before that gave rise to the abuse crisis."

This is probably for the best, seeing as this might awaken the remaining gays in Xtian churches across the land to the fucking obvious fact that despite disingenuous claims to the contrary, the xtian establishment (if not xtianity itself) hates homosexuals. And this new papal bull(shit) will serve as the beginning of a mass exodus of people from the church (gays and people that still believe that God speaks through a person with such ridiculous results).

Hmm. And people wonder why I thank my parents nearly everyday for not raising me hypochristian.

Posted by Arun at 10:25 AM | Comments (147) |

Monday Sep 19, 2005

AFL-CIO endores Casey: 14 months before the election

The AFL-CIO has just announced that they will be endorsing Bob Casey in the 2006 Senate race. The Patriot-News article includes the interesting tidbit that it took the AFL-CIO until 2 months before the 2004 election to endorse Specter, but in this race they are more than a year ahead. This allows the AFL-CIO to legally get involved in the race earlier, which could prove to be a useful boost to Casey.

Of course, this means that the Union is endorsing a candidate for a race that he hasn't even won the primary for. Most analysts and political operatives don't think Chuck Pennacchio has a chance against Casey, but this smacks of the field-clearing Rendell was guilty of to remove most of Casey's primary challengers. Although I agree Santorum is particulary bad for the state and needs to be removed, I wonder if we are taking this a bit too far? When does politics overrun the party electoral process?

Posted by at 10:43 AM | Comments (167) |

Sunday Sep 18, 2005

How to deal with "the pay raise"

If you live in PA and haven't been living under a rock, you know that in a rather underhanded, late night manner our state legislature gave itself a pay raise. With the state so often having money issues, this has set off an uproar across the commonwealth. Surprisingly, the media doesn't seem to want to let the issue go. Brian O'Neill of the Pittsburgh Post Gazette writes about an interesting proposal on how to deal with the current state legislature.

Apparently O'Niell was at a presentation by Tim Potts, a former director of communications for state House Democrats, and currently a leader in the group Democracy Rising PA at Point Park University. O'Niell talks about the presentation:

His group is called Democracy Rising and its Web site is democracyrisingpa.com. It's a coalition of lefties and righties and in-betweenies, with organizations ranging from the conservative Commonwealth Foundation to the liberal Common Cause.

"We check all the things that divide us at the door," Potts said. "The only thing we talk about is what's good for democracy."

The Web site offers solid information on why the post-midnight, no-debate pay grab by America's Largest Full-Time Legislature was an affront and a challenge to all Pennsylvanians.

While certaintly an interseting idea, I at least am always unsure of how effective groups like this will be. Even more interesting is their proposed solution to the almost hereditary rule that is going on in the legislature:

He suggested that to become relevant to the powers in Harrisburg, people should change their party registration. If Democrats and Republicans begin losing loyal party members, "that's the teachable moment.

"We're saying, 'You don't get to take my vote for granted anymore. You're going to have to earn my vote and the way you earn it is by showing some integrity."'

O'Niell then goes on to explain how to change your party registration. Now, I'm all for shaking up the PA state legislature - we need it, especially in light of this pay raise, and many other pertinant issues (minimum wage, for instance). That being said, I don't know if removing our ability to vote in the primaries is the proper way to go about doing things. Rather, finding capable, likable candidates who support views that progressives agree with is much more important. Getting them to run in every district, and forcing what has become old party cronyism to defend itself is more important.

Dean's 50 state strategy can apply on a local level just as well as it can on a national level.

Posted by at 11:19 PM | Comments (135) |

Saturday Sep 17, 2005

A few snark-filled asides...

Bush is requesting more funding for the relief/rebuilding effort:

President Bush will call tonight for an unprecedented federal commitment to rebuild New Orleans and other areas obliterated by Hurricane Katrina, putting the United States on pace to spend more in the next year on the storm's aftermath than it has over three years on the Iraq war, according to White House and congressional officials.

With the federal tab for Katrina already nearly quadruple the cost of the country's previous most expensive natural disaster cleanup, Bush plans to offer federal assistance to help flood victims find jobs, get housing and health care, and attend school, according to White House aides.

[...]

The president will call on Washington to resist spending money unwisely, but some in his own party are already starting to recoil at a price tag expected to exceed $200 billion -- about the cost of the Iraq war and reconstruction efforts. As emergency expenditures soar -- with new commitments as high as $2 billion a day -- some budget analysts and conservative groups are warning that the Katrina spending has combined with earlier fiscal decisions in ways that will wreak havoc on the government's finances for years to come.

Resist spending money unwisely? Oh you mean like on needless tax cuts? Like on gaudy re-inaugurations? Like on companies that almost pathologically overcharge? Like on missle defense systems that don't work? Like on privatizing Social Security which won't help anyone but the brokers? Like on a million other things I don't have the finger stamina to enumerate?

He has a knack for transforming me from a functioning student into an apoplectic, angry mess.

As far as the money needed to rebuild the places effected by Katrina, never have those tax cuts (you know, the ones before and after we went to war) looked more idiotic and short-sighted. And I hope Bush blushes a bit when he's in front of that podium tonight asking for 200 billion, becuase if we repealed all of his tax cuts the federal government would have that 200 billion without skull-fucking the deficit any more.

But you know, thats just like my opinion, man.

Posted by Arun at 10:39 AM | Comments (273) |

Thursday Sep 15, 2005

Check this out

Regardless of your feelings towards the band Rise Against (I love them), they have a pretty significant peice of information on their homepage. At the top right is a ticker, constantly measuring the cost of war in Iraq. Check it out.

Posted by Ryan at 05:41 PM | Comments (300) |

Thursday Sep 15, 2005

DFA: Grassroots star competition includes six PA Dems

This is a cross post from my blog PA Progressive. I'll be cross-posting relevant issues to this blog, and writing about local Oakland things as well.

DFA has just started a Grassroots All-Star competition to try and pick out one of the most deserving house candidates (either in a republican held or open seat), to recieve a DFA endorsement and fundraising e-mail. The process will begin with 50 candidates, with online voting knocking that number down to 10, and finally down to the one winner.

PA and California each have six candidates on the list, the highest of all the states. PA's candidates are:

Chris Carney (PA-10)
Lois Herr (PA-16)
Lois Murphy (PA-06)
Patrick Murphy (PA-08)
Steven Porter (PA-03)
Paul Scoles (PA-07)

As of the writing of this entry, 3 of the candidates are in the top 15. Lois Murphy is 3rd, Patrick Murphy 4th, and Paul Scoles isjust outside at 12th.

Pretty good showing by PA, and certaintly these are candidates you should be looking towards for internships, positions, and volunteer chances, if you live nearby.

Posted by at 04:55 PM | Comments (660) |

Tuesday Sep 13, 2005

Um. What? No way...

George Bush has taken responsibility for something in his life ever:

WASHINGTON -President Bush said Tuesday that "I take responsibility" for failures in dealing with Hurricane Katrina and said the disaster raised broader questions about the government's ability to respond to natural disasters as well as terror attacks.

"Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government," Bush said at joint White House news conference with the president of
Iraq.

"To the extent the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility," Bush said.

Wow. I can't help but remain cynical in my belief that this is a new tactic to nip the growing inertia of reform in the bud by denying it its fuel: righteous anger at a classless, blame-anyone-but-us administration. But as Ross (ThisSpaceForRent) said today:

I am at the very least willing to admit that it's heartening to see something resembling assumption of responsibility coming from this adminstration, even if I remain convinced that nothing will change. No matter how appropriate (or inappropriate... 'what went right' anyone?) this is, it does not change the fact that Bush constantly fucks up and constantly fucks up even worse on the rebound. No matter how he handles it from this point onward, he should not have been in charge in the first place, and he should not find himself or his party rewarded for it next year.

And that about nails how I feel about the whole affair. If something real happens as a result of this, if for example he is so shamed by his failure that he resigns, I'll have a completely different opinion of the man.

Oh, wishful thinking...

Posted by Arun at 04:36 PM | Comments (72) |

Tuesday Sep 13, 2005

Maybe we should outsource FEMA to India too...

On July 27th, 2005 many parts of Maharashtra, India flooded thanks to more than 37 inches of rain (8th heaviest rainfall in history, Noah). Despite the risk of telegraphing my pass, so to speak, the metropolis of Mumbai (formerly Bombay) was almost completely flooded.

Despite technological disadvantages in public communication, no Doppler radar to give warning, an antiquated drainage system for which funds never existed to fix/replace, and other various examples of disparity in resources that accompanies being poorer than America, 48 hours later Mumbai was up and running.

continue reading...

Posted by Arun at 07:46 AM | Comments (825) |

Friday Sep 2, 2005

Wow. You know shit's tough when even Russert is on top of things...

Well is seems Tim Russert has finally removed Li'l George from his mouth (from Atrios):

President George W. Bush said the other day that no one expected the levees to break.

Well, with all respect, study after study, including FEMA's own tabletop exercises last year, all included the breaking or the giving of the levees. Everyone who had studied the issue knew that with a Category 3, 4 or 5 storm, that was a very strong likelihood.

So, again, it's very difficult in the midst of a crisis for people to be critical, but I have not talked to anybody, underscore anybody, in official Washington who believes the government at any level has done a good job.

Yep. It's very tough to be critical in the midst of a crisis, he's right. However. There never seems to be the "right time" to expect accountability from those who are responsible for the lack of preparedness. The Army Corp of Engineers had to slow any flood protection project around the country because of the war in Iraq and the TAX CUTS! Of course, thousands of National Guard can only watch from across the world their homes and their families wade in water.

It's a shit time. And blaming someone sounds so crass, even when blame's due. But there is time to expect some fucking contrition from these assholes. Not guitar playin' vacations and tennis-n-broadway NYC shopping sprees.

continue reading...

Posted by Arun at 01:38 PM | Comments (152) |