Public and Private Yuletide Health

I’ve taken a break from blogging over the last several months, in large part because of a deluge of things that have happened in my life.   What has arisen me from my hibernation from my keyboard, besides a general need to write, is a bit of news regarding a subject near and dear to me: health care.   I’ve received wind, as I’m sure you have, about a full-bore effort to derail Medicare-For-All in this country, being waged by some of the biggest players in the industry such as Blue Cross Blue Shield, as well as a bipartisan rogue’s gallery of hacks such as high-level advisors with both the Obama and Clinton campaigns.    The overall popularity of Medicare-For-All has reached 70% in recent polling, so why the fight over it when so many support it - Democrats, Republicans, and otherwise?

That 70% figure, which was culled from a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll, is exactly what has the industry spooked.   It is viewed widely within various corridors of the industry, especially the payors, as a direct and existential threat to their existence.    Some of the typical arguments given by those that oppose Medicare For All include:

—> According to the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, healthcare spending accounts for 17.9% of our Gross Domestic Product.   Switching now to a nationally-administrated Single Payor plan from our current mishmash of private providers might prove to be too much of a jolt for our economy to handle (nobody can predict this, but you can bet it will be brought up);

—> Single Payor Healthcare is considered a socialist solution, and socialism has been a favorite bogeyman of the business classes in this country for well over a century.   It lost some of it’s negative connotation in recent years, thanks in large parts to the Bernie Sanders 2016 presidential campaign.   It is also increasingly popular among younger generations, which provides further consternation among the boomers who still dominate our business and government communities. (In other words, red-baiting);

—> Single Payor Healthcare would require a necessary expansion of the government bureaucracy, something that Republicans and conservative Democrats are reflexively opposed to (They’ll just have to get over it);

—> What of those that work for the private payers, like Blue Cross?   If we go to a single payor system, where do those work? (There may be a point here - this will need to be worked out.)

The Atlantic attributed several reasons for Obama dropping the Public Option during the negotiations for Obamacare’s passage.   He campaigned for it during his 2008 run and touted Single Payor during many of his stump speeches, so why did he drop it?   While I can’t completely fault him for it - there were still many DINOs who needed to be appeased such as Joe Lieberman and Blanche Lincoln - he still showed a gross lack of leadership.  I think he knew that if a Public Option was offered, people would flock to it in such a way that private payor subscriber numbers would plummet to the point where many of the names you know and hate - Blue Cross, Blue Shield, United Healthcare, etc. - would have to either fold or radically reinvent their business models. 

If you’re so inclined, here’s the link for their brand-spanking-new organization.   In looking through this site, I can see just how slickly worded and phrased the contents were - almost like they were written by people affiliated with political campaigns.   Wait a minute - they most likely were, because apparently, advisers and operatives from the Clinton and Obama campaigns are joining forces in this exercise of propagandistic bullshit.  

And look for various talking heads and meat puppets to scream this organization’s mantra to the airwaves and bandwidth.   Expect several cameo appearances from Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Screamin’ Howie Dean (among many others) to discuss ad nauseum about the inadequacies of Medicare For All, and to pump the concept of how great, wonderful, and innovative our healthcare system truly is.  

Also, here is Jimmy Dore’s takedown of same organization and those that run it.   Consider yourself warned regarding the language he uses, but he lays it out (and lays them out flat) here.  

All of this boils down to one question I have for the politicians and their operatives involved in this: just who do you represent?   Seventy Percent of the population wants it, they already pay taxes for Medicare - so who could you possibly be representing except for your EMM-EFFING Big Pocketed Rich Donors?    And you want MY SUPPORT?  You think I should listen to YOU, knowing your history of dishonesty and double dealings?  

Here’s my response to those listed on the “about” page of this organization:

F$%K YOU!

Long Time No Post...and why

Hello all - I know it's been several months since I last contributed to The Bollzilla Chronicles, and feel that this would be a good time to give you all some insight as to why that's the case, and what my plans are for the future of this blog - my first one and one that has been online since 2010.

Facebook has to take a bit of the blame.   By this, I mean that I created my online profile in 2015, and found that while I can, and have, used it to promote this and my other blogs (beyondhighway99.com and bollzillaswordsonmusic.com), I found the immediacy of commenting on Facebook posts quite, uh, seductive.  I spent much more time commenting on existing news posts than creating them on my own.

Another reason/excuse/whatever you wish to call it is, I no longer have the bandwidth to maintain three blogs (none of which are monetized), and hold down a full time job, maintain a relationship, and stay true to my other responsibilities.   The bites were simply too big to chew, and I haven't realized it until recently.    So, something has to give. 

Probably the biggest reason: I've changed.   The person who wrote the blog posts years ago is not the same person whose words you are reading right now.  Don't worry - I'm still as idealistic, lefty, and intolerant of BS and nonsense as ever.   But I've come to a few realizations, a big one being that while the current holder of the Office of the President is every bit the liar, racist, misogynist, and all of the other symptoms attributed to him, he is just that - an EMBODIMENT of those symptoms, which are deeply interwoven in our nation's fabric.   He is a symptom, not the cause.   Getting rid of Trump doesn't get rid of the symptoms that put him in the White House.

And those of use who have spewed vitriol towards him and his followers for embodying those symptoms GIVE HIM AND HIS SUPPORTERS EXACTLY WHAT THEY WANT.   Basically, they love him BECAUSE WE HATE HIM.   This is the product of a nation having been brainwashed by the likes of Limbaugh, Hannity, Savage, and the rest of the right-wing BS artists for going on two generations.

Thus, I'm no longer going after the man or his Administration.   I'm redirecting my energies toward the symptoms that put him in power - racism, misogyny, and the others. 

With the above in mind, I've made a few decisions about my online future:

--> The Words on Music blog will be retired, effective in the summer of 2019.   I intend to archive the posts to either of the surviving Google-hosted blogs;
--> Continued updates to bollzilla.com will occur on an ad-hoc basis, with plan to fold this blog into...
-->Beyondhighway99.com.   This has been my travel blog for a few years, and will be repurposed into a personal catch-all commentary blog, much as bollzilla.com has been.   By 2020, expect the Bollzilla name to ride off into the sunset, leaving BeyondHighway99 behind as my outlet. 

One more thing.  Stay tuned for a new travel blog coming your way in early 2019.   It's in the development stages, so I can't reveal too much as of yet - of course, look for an announcement when it's ready.

Meet the New War, Same As The Old War...

Syria.

It’s a far-off land, not only geographically but also in the minds of most Americans.

Wrapping my brain around the exact reasons why were there and why we’re trying to overthrow Assad has been quite the challenge, largely because I don’t know who or what to believe.   Believe T-Rump?  Really - given his track record of lying (thousands of recorded, provable lies since he took office, and yes, there are people and entities checking this stuff).   Believe our Congress Critters?  Given how bought and paid for most of them are....right.   Believe the American Mainstream Media? Hahahahahah...our media has been one of the most useful tools in manufacturing consent around any kind of government action, and those for-profit concerns are either owned  or have board members from (or both) the Military Industrial Complex.   Between this and the “war” on “fake news” - it seems like everything has to be taken with greater quantities of seasoning so it will go down more palatably.

Did Assad truly gas his own people or was it all al setup?  Are we truly going there for lily-white-pure humanitarians reasons, or what else is driving the decision making?  Who really gains from all of this and who loses?  We can guess, surmise, or deduce anything from what we know - but there’s still a whole lot of wiggle room.

But what do we know?   First, there are two key oil pipelines which run through Syria.   Second, Syria is a geographic neighbor to Israel, and has openly criticized the Israeli Government’s policies toward the Palestinian people and settlements.      Third, Syria is one of very view countries who has a central bank not controlled by the infamous Rothschild family.   Fourth, Syria has its own large petroleum reserves.   Fifth, Syria has banned GMO agriculture.    These facts do not sit well with those behind the scenes - the big bankers and corporations.  Also, the Democratic Party’s official bogeyman - Vladimir Putin - support Syria.   In short - Syria possesses strategic resources, can control the flow of said resources, and thinks and does things for itself.    To me, the response to all of this adds up to the “Disaster Capitalism” described by Naomi Klein in her seminal work The Shock Doctrine, as well as John Perkins’ writings, such as Confessions Of An Economic Hitman.  It also smacks of a proxy war - with Russia being played by Syria, and the US being played by Israel, France, Britain, and...the US.   Shades of Vietnam.  

Doubt abounds.   And where doubt abounds, decisions will always carry the taint of ulterior motives and untruth.   To put simply:  The T-Rump Administration has not made the case to send bombs, troops, and war materiel, to Syria for humanitarian reasons.   The Congress Critters squalling about escalations (such as Lindsey Graham), as well as dilettantes like former governor (and current Health Care industry shill) Howard Dean, have not made the case.   The Media has certainly not made the case for military action - and of all people, Tucker Carlson (yes, the bow tie boy) pointed this out in a recent commentary.    We live in a different era now, one where the citizens are far more aware of terms like “Disaster Capitalism”, and the use of human suffering to push economic and political agendas, because people like Naomi Klein and John Perkins helped make them more aware.

I will hereby go on record as saying:  I do not support the actions being taken by the Trump Administration in regards to Syria.   These actions can literally escalate to Worldl War Three, or a nuclear holocaust (or both).   Those that will pay the heaviest price for enforcement of these policies will be those young people, serving now or to serve later, in our Armed Forces - almost none of them coming from any kind of privilege or wealth.  In other words, the poor and working classes are fighting and dying in wars that rich people send them to - once again.   The only winners will be the same cabal as in Vietnam, or Desert Storm, or any of our other military adventures:  the military-industrial complex Eisenhower warned us about.    Lots of profits will be made and dividend checks sent to the owners of these involved companies (who play both sides of this conflict, a game that goes back centuries).

I’m sure there will be much more to this story as it unfolds in the coming weeks and months.   But we have to speak up - NOW.   And we have to recreate the anti-war movement.   NOW.  

Targets

In the two months since the Florida school shooting, and the remarkable show of leadership being shown by the surviving students of that shooting, the way that many in the media have treated these students has been, to say the least, mesmerizing.  “Who are these kids? Why do they have the audacity to take on the National Rifle Association, who has so many politicians in its back pocket that they may as well be a fifth branch of government?  Who do THEY think they are? Aren’t they out of their lane?  How dare they?” - these are among the questions raised. 

The NRA and their pawns have run into an unusual level of resistance to their usual methods of pushing back against criticism, which involve personal attacks against their critics, threats (including death) against the same, and other sordid methods.   These are not your “usual” band of grieving parents - they are the kids themselves, and these tactics against kids is frowned upon (to say the least) in this society.   Not that they don’t try - there are memes going around about David Hogg being “fake”, that he wasn’t really there during the shooting and lied about it, that Emma Gonzalez is a professional actress, that they are all “crisis actors”, etc. etc. etc.   I would expect this kind of tar-and-feather job to come from the NRA’s minions, but I’m finding it surprising that it’s also coming from the further elements of the left.  I’ll get to the left’s over-the-shark moment shortly.

While I have seen a few pictures of people holding signs saying “Yes, We Are Here To Take Your Guns”, and other memes of the sort, I don’t think that taking all guns is the goal here - as much as the NRA would want us to believe otherwise.  What is being demanded here is much of the same thing that has been demanded for decades: outlawing military-style assault weapons, universal background checks, age limits - in other words, REGULATION.   AR-15s, Tech 9s, AK-47s, and other assault weapons have no business on the streets, and neither do they have any business in the hands of civilians or most cops (save for SWAT teams).   In some countries where you do see them (e.g. Switzerland - an example the NRA likes to trot out), it is only because those weapons are highly regulated and because the citizens of such countries also serve as the “well-regulated militia”, to quote the first part of the Second Amendment.   

What about the left buying into the media’s pillorying of the student leaders?  In segments of the far left, there is a common belief (which holds some merit) that the government no longer represents the citizens, that the government is currently in the final stages of metamorphosis into a corporate fascist regime, that the only check we’ll have against the government is to be armed, with few limits to access to whatever weapon you choose.   And voting? Votes don’t count when the machines and the means of voting are owned by private interests with vested interests in certain outcomes.  So, these factions within the left largely bought the NRA’s primary calling card insofar as weapons access.  

Let’s cut right to the chase: everything we’re hearing about the individual students and whether or not they are genuine (I believe they are), everything that we’re hearing about them being “pawns” of their parents or elements such as the Democratic Party, the monetary support behind the March For Our Lives, etc. etc. etc., are mere DISTRACTIONS from the main point: that military-style assault weapons HAVE NO PLACE ON OUR STREETS, OR IN THE HANDS OF THOSE NOT TRAINED TO USE THEM.  I include civilians and beat cops (non-SWAT) in this prohibition.  I have no problem with hunters using firearms designed for that purpose, and if you need a firearm for personal protection in your home and can demonstrate that you know how to and when to use it (and when NOT to use it), then I’m OK with that.   Licensing should also not be a problem for those who say they are truly sincere about gun safety - we license people to drive after they demonstrate proficiency behind the wheel, and as we all know, a car or truck can be as deadly as a firearm in terms of the lives they take on our roads.   Military-style assault weapons only belong in the hands of two entities: the MILITARY, and the specially-trained members of our SWAT and other police tactical teams.  

As for those who talk about how civilian firearms serve as a check against government tyranny: any kind of arsenal you think you can build up will be CRUSHED LIKE A BUG when put up against the equipment and training of our armed forces.   A lot of the right-wing militia groups we’ve heard about in the Pacific Northwest and Upper Midwest subscribe to the idea of civilian armaments being a check on government power - a notion that in a dark way, makes me laugh.  I would never condone violence against anybody or anything unless I, my family, or the country was directly attacked. However, if one these groups decided to try it, it wouldn’t take a phalanx of soldiers to take them out.   A small special forces unit could handle it - stealthily, quickly, and probably without much (if any) resistance.

So I’m not asking for any kind of outright firearms ban, and I don’t think the majority of the country is, either.  We’re asking for SANE, COMMON-SENSE FIREARM REGULATION - regulation which is, by the way, NOT PROHIBITED BY THE SECOND AMENDMENT, which can be proven by the Brady Bill surviving most of it’s constitutional challenges brought by the NRA.  

We should have solved this issue decades ago - before the Columbine Massacre, before Sandy Hook, before the Pulse nightclub, and certainly, before Stoneman Douglas.   I absolutely APPLAUD the students leading this push, and it’s only right they do since it is they who are targeted - they have more skin in this game than anybody else.   Let them speak out.  Let them get out front.  

And let us have their backs.

Quibbles and Bits, The Kids Shall Lead Them Edition...

Thoughts about the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting on February 14th... 

>> As I saw the story on my Facebook feed, I recalled the Columbine Massacre of nineteen years ago (April 20th, 1999).   I remembered the TV images, as well as the 911 calls and footage from Michael Moore's Bowling For Columbine, and wondering then why the hell it is that kids have to now worry about if one day, they go to school in the morning and end their school day in a box.   I remember the father of one of the victims, speaking to a crowd of mourners and supporters at a rally, detailing how his son faced his death (a gunshot to the face), and how a Tech-9 semi-automatic is not used to kill deer.   I felt for him – in that state, it took a lot of courage for him to publicly speak on this issue, especially in light of how the NRA and their members, for decades, have intimated most critics into silence.   I wonder what he's thinking now, nineteen years later, knowing that his son would have been 37 had he survived.    

>> Emma Gonzales's speech needs no adornment or explanation from yours truly.   Here's the transcript – I encourage you to read it.  

>> This episode, like all of the school shootings since before and after Columbine (Virginia Tech, Santee, Red Lake, Sandy Hook, etc.), is yet another lesson, as yet unlearned, about the sheer power of political influence and money when wielded by an entity with absolutely no interest in the public interest.  The National Rifle Association virtually owns the Republican Party, with several key lawmakers (including Senators Jodi Ernst and Mitch McConnell) taking millions of dollars from the NRA during their senatorial careers.   This is why they offer only "thoughts and prayers" during these times – because their silence has been bought at a premium.     

>> Don't underestimate the kids taking the leadership on this issue – now that the adults have proved themselves incapable.   We may actually see some real change happen within the next election cycle,  such as effective gun regulations and registration (at a minimum), and the outright banning of weapons of war such as the Tech-9 and the AR-15.     

>> About the weapons used in these massacres: with few exceptions, they all have been carried out with military-grade automatic or semi-automatic weapons.   As stated earlier, these weapons are not used for hunting – that's not their primary purpose.   Anybody who calls himself or herself a hunter, who says that he or she needs one of these military-grade weapons to hunt, is probably a bad shot and perhaps should not be operating a firearm of any kind.   Their only purpose is to KILL PEOPLE, and should only be in the hands of highly trained individuals such as those in the military.   So yes, I say ban them from the untrained and the civilian sectors.   We can have a grace period which allows owners to turn in these weapons, with compensation, and afterwards enforce a ban with stiff fines and imprisonment as a deterrence.    

>> To any of you who may be reading this from outside the United States and are as bewildered as many of us Americans are about the alarming frequency of these shootings, I think the discussion needs to be had about just what the gun represents in this country.   I've heard many stories and many takes about the meaning and role of firearms in this country's recent and distant history, but they all point, eventually, to the same root as far as I'm concerned.   Said in its simplest terms: the gun represents power.   Specifically, the gun represents the ultimate power one human being can have over another living thing (including human) – the ability to end that living thing's life, and to do so instantly and easily.  Throughout our history, this power has manifested itself in the conquest of the continent and genocide of our Native population, the subjugation and enslavement of the Africans brought here on ships in human trafficking, the continued domination of those same people through the Jim Crow era and beyond, and on, and on, and on.    This power is seen by many, especially by a core of NRA members, as being sacrosanct and an absolute right of the people, and they point to the second part of the Second Amendment as their proof.   This convenient-for-them reading of the Second Amendment does not consider that this right is contingent on "a well-regulated militia", and also does not consider that in the 1700's, muskets were the weapons used by armies and kept by privateers.   How could the Founding Fathers have envisioned the kinds of firepower and technology in use today?   

>>To those who may argue that an armed populace is a defense against a "tyrannical government", I say this:  your great and wonderful firearms are POPGUNS when compared to what the American military uses (and trains their people to use).   Try again.    

I'm sure that there will be more to say on this subject as time passes and developments...develop.    I wish not.   

Quibbles and Bits, Catching Up Without Catching Hell Edition

More nuggets for your mental mastication.... 

>>T-Rumps's Parade:  I'm trying to discern just what T-Rump's "logic" is behind his request.   He sees France,  North Korea, and other countries parading their weapons packages, equipment, and other phallic-looking devices down the main drags of their respective capital cities, so why not here?  Other than stroking his ego to his satisfaction, the other net effects are all negative:  unnecessary expense, torn-up roads and other infrastructure, personnel diverted to provide security and operations for the industrial-sized stroking of T-Rump's ego, etc.   We don't need to parade anything about our military at this point – we already have enough nukes to reduce the Earth's crust to radioactive toast  many times over, and boy, does the rest of the world know THIS.    

>>Izvini Pajalusta: I'm not sure that anybody could have predicted two years ago, that we would see a return of McCarthyism – but this time, with the Democratic Party being the perpetrators of said political illness.   I still find the case against Russia incomplete at best, and suspect at worst.   Recall that in the book Shattered (pertaining to the 2016 presidential campaign), that less than 24 hours after Clinton's ignominious defeat, that plans were already afoot to roll out the anti-Russia narrative.   That, combined with all of the hearsay being repeated by Big Media about how this agency said this, and this person with a big-sounding title said that, leads me to the conclusion that nobody is right on this.   I don't know, honestly, who to believe.  

>>Internet Censorship: I have been a denizen of Facebook for the last couple of years, using it as my primary outlet for my political activism and commentary.   My newsfeed used be chock-a-block of postings from alternative news sites and lefty opinion groups, but now I'm seeing the number of posts drop considerably over the last several months.  I've also heard about sites like my personal favorites Truthdig and Truthout lose a considerable number of Google page hits (and thus, revenue) because of Google's change in search algorithm.  In seeing the countless other examples of "adjustments" in search algorithms, Ajit Pai's recent demolition of Obama's Net Neutrality regulations, and other factors, it's easy to draw a conclusion – however conspiracy-based it may be – that there is a concerted effort by the elites to re-gain control of the messaging that goes through the internet.   There would certainly be a vested interest in doing so:  Trump's election has been attributed, in part, to the political establishment losing control over the messaging.  Let's face it – Trump treated the entire campaign, at least initially, as a publicity campaign designed to further his brand and fill his coffers.   I doubt that he or any of his inner circle expected to get anywhere near the White House, let alone win it outright.   If the "machine" worked properly, Hillary Clinton would be our president – she had the entire media machine behind her, she had Hollywood, she even had noted Republicans behind her.   But she was up against a master of media manipulation: Trump plays the media and the press like a Stradivarius.    

More later, including the recent Florida school shooting.