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Saturday, November 29, 2008
Health-care reform fiscal necessity
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
“Talk to the chief executives of America’s preeminent health-care institutions, and you might be surprised by what you hear: When it comes to medical care, the United States isn’t getting its money’s worth. Not even close.
“We’re not getting what we pay for,” says Denis Cortese, president and chief executive of the Mayo Clinic. “It’s just that simple.”
“Our health-care system is fraught with waste,” says Gary Kaplan, chairman of Seattle’s cutting-edge Virginia Mason Medical Center. As much as half of the $2.3 trillion spent today does nothing to improve health, he says.
Not only is American health care inefficient and wasteful, says Kaiser Permanente chief executive George Halvorson, much of it is dangerous….
The United States today devotes 16 percent of its gross domestic product to medical care, more per capita than any other nation in the world. Yet numerous measures indicate the country lags in overall health: It ranks 29th in infant mortality, 48th in life expectancy and 19th out of 19 industrialized nations in preventable deaths.”
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The perverted logic of terror
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Once-improving relations between India and Pakistan have been seriously strained with the attacks in Mumbai, which is no doubt the very goal the terrorists sought to achieve.
In the Middle East, Palestinian terrorists and Israeli extremists use violence to keep moderates on both sides from reaching agreement. Every time peace seems it might be within reach, a spate of terror attacks is launched to subvert it.
On September 11, Osama bin Ladin was hoping to provoke precisely the kind of American overreaction that resulted in our invasion of Iraq, an attack that served to bolster his claim that the U.S. was anti-Islamic and imperialistic.
We claim over and over that we will not let the terrorists get their way. And over and over again we react precisely the way they had hoped and give them just what they wanted.
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Fresh thread (you supply the needles)
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
… ‘cause I’m busy making homemade waffles and coffee and sausage for 20.
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