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47015. robertjayb - 3/31/2017 8:01:09 PM

I'm no fan of Charles Krauthammer but his current column concerning prospects for single-payer health care is encouraging.

He writes that a broad national consensus is developing that health care is a right and that we might be heading inexorably to a government run single-payer system.

Wow!

47016. judithathome - 4/3/2017 10:33:02 PM

Is this the column you were referring to? Link

47017. robertjayb - 4/4/2017 4:43:06 AM

Thanks, Judith.

This is a column about Krauthammer's column and it has the main points of the original, including my too-often repeated assertion that Obama's effort is at least an important baby step toward a sensible system. We seem fated to bear out Churchill's observation on Americans doing the right thing after first trying everything else.

47018. judithathome - 4/4/2017 7:45:50 PM

fated to bear out Churchill's observation on Americans doing the right thing after first trying everything else.

Well, he certainly was prophetic about THIS President...can you imagine if Trump had to meet and match wits with Churchill...???

I don't think it's a stretch to know which would be the umarmed opponent.



47019. judithathome - 4/5/2017 8:11:31 PM

Duh....UNarmed ;-(

47020. Trillium - 4/5/2017 11:41:14 PM

If healthcare is a right, it is also a responsibility. Makes me think again about the LPN program in high school that Arky described. It is impossible to have too many LPNs or EMTs in a community, whether rural or urban.

One of the problems of healthcare is that it is a messy, infectious business. Nurses in training are warned that they will be asked to look after people with AIDS, hepatitis, and more. This is not a problem when you are armed with appropriate protective gear AND the patient is sane.

But what about situations where nurses and front-line medical staff are getting attacked (which has happened with increasing frequency in the last decade).

47021. Trillium - 4/5/2017 11:41:24 PM

It can only help to make healthcare training more accessible, and to ask people to learn more. Teen girls, for one small example, are likely to play with bulimia without understanding that this can cause fatal imbalances. More basic medical training for all ages -- for teens, for community religious and social groups -- and more participation in the healthcare system will bring up awareness of what we ask of medical care.

47022. Trillium - 4/5/2017 11:48:52 PM

I haven't taken LPN training, but I've been reading one of the standard textbooks that I found at the used bookstore for a dollar. The actual training runs about $7000 including books.

Many of the people who do the training are low income and not yet college educated; many of them already have families and financial responsibilities (rent, insurance, car payments and repairs, children), and qualify for financial aid.

A recent graduate (African immigrant) told me that about half the class dropped out before they were through. They could not assimilate the material quickly enough, possibly because of reading problems? (He did fine, but I'm sure he worked his tail off)

The more training that can be done through computer training modules available at public libraries or through the internet, at their own pace, the more people would pass the training and be able to help care for others in the community. There are leaders who think that we can simply import cheap labor to do the "dirty work" of healthcare -- and it a lot of work in healthcare is very physically demanding, intimate work, cleaning up vomit, feces, food, blood, changing clothing, showering people who have limited mobility or dementia. I don't agree with open borders or cheapened labor; people who actually get the job done need to be paid just as much as people who sit in offices scrutinizing rules, forms, and making demands of the front line staff. Yet people who sit behind desks are likely to get more respect and higher pay for simply inspecting instead of doing. This doesn't get the job done. All types of work are needed, from paper pushers to diaper changers to room cleaners to surgeons -- but all need respect and decent pay, and this will break the bank if corruption runs rampant in addition to normal costs.

47023. Trillium - 4/5/2017 11:53:49 PM

I'd like for a local church group that is highly active politically, to tackle a standard medical ethics textbook as a reading and discussion project. Kidney dialysis costs a fortune. Transplants often fail. What are the choices of OB/GYNs working with other doctors when a pregnancy may cause heart or kidney failure.

And what about schools that allow kids to batter each other in ways that cause permanent brain damage. I'm aware of at least two people who have needed 24/7 care for decades because of damage inflicted by other kids early in their lives. That costs a fortune. Same with soldiers sent off to dubious wars.

Communities shouldn't look away; somebody has to do the daily care of people who have been brain injured, and somebody has to be paid for doing this.

47024. judithathome - 4/6/2017 5:35:02 AM

You make good points, Trill...but don't expect anything to happen in this regard for at least the next 4 years.

47025. judithathome - 4/6/2017 7:59:13 PM

This is a great montage...Sean Spicer As Kindergarten Teacher

47026. robertjayb - 4/7/2017 2:49:57 AM

Now what?

"The U.S. launched a cruise missile attack against Syria after Bashar al-Assad's regime used poison gas to kill scores of civilians. The early morning attack targeted hangars, planes and fuel tanks at one Syrian military airfield. Bloomberg's Haidi Lun reports on "Bloomberg Markets." (Source: Bloomberg)"

47027. winstonsmith - 4/7/2017 5:10:17 AM

Who knows what's next. I just don't trust Trump's motivations or his ability to understand the situation in Syria, or the world in general.

47028. judithathome - 4/7/2017 11:41:45 PM

I think he did it to impress the Chinese President...who was there having dinner at Versailles...er, Mar A Lago..

Earlier, Trump had "mourned" the loss of all the little children, the ones he would have been refused entry into the US...so he had an excuse...but I think he did it strictly to impress China that he is a "tough guy".

47029. judithathome - 4/7/2017 11:44:18 PM

"ones he would have been refused"

47030. judithathome - 4/12/2017 6:56:32 PM

Hellllo? Where IS everyone?

Lotta stuff going on...anyone????

47031. Trillium - 4/15/2017 3:35:52 AM

Spending as much time in the garden as possible, the weather is too good to be indoors... and just hoping that the Korean peninsula stuff will turn out okay. It's above my pay grade and frankly, scary

47032. judithathome - 4/18/2017 7:26:33 PM

Okay, I will freely admit I suffer from "confirmation bias" when I say this but Trump is without doubt the least informed, least qualified, and most reckless person to EVER sit in the WH...and that is saying a lot considering we had GW Bush there for a time. (He now seems a genius in comparison!)

But what worries me is that we seem to have an electorate equal to him....totally uniformed, believing anything they read and/or hear, willing to support someone so woefully unqualified and
malleable that he will flow whichever way the wind blows so long as he is praised and worshipped.

The Presidency in my country now looks like that of a third world nation taken over by a ignoramus....with a willing cult of "believers" whom he has manipulated with lies and subterfuge.

Today I posted a link to a story about loved ones who lied to a dying man and told him Trump had been impeached...I hope their loving send-off for that guy becomes reality before the
country succumbs to this fool.

47033. judithathome - 4/18/2017 7:33:06 PM

Here's the post I made in my forum about the dying man:

Oregon Man Dies Peacefully After Good Deed

An Oregon man died "peacefully" after a friend falsely told him that President Trump had been impeached.

Michael Garland Elliott died on April 6, according to his obituary in The Oregonian, and the final words he heard were that the president had been impeached.

Elliott’s “ex-wife and best friend,” Teresa Elliott, shared the false news to bring him comfort in his final moments, according to the obituary.

47034. Ms. No - 4/19/2017 3:24:36 AM

It seems like something The Onion would make up on a joke, but sadly, this sort of thing reflects the very real mental and emotional anguish so many people are suffering from in the wake of the election.

I have to remind myself that there were people who felt that way when Obama was elected.....but then I think I don't really give a shit what depresses a racist.

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