Month: March 2018

For all of you liberal Democrats (there must be at least one) who read this blog, I am going to review a basic term that I have gone over before . . . “Racism!”
In more simple language racism involves making a decision about someone based on the color of his/her skin or nationality, and not on the basis of his/her ability. If I were to state, “I am not hiring him, because he is Polish,” that would be a racist statement, because my decision was based on his ethnic background, and not on his ability to do the work. Likewise if I said, “I oppose the nomination of Mr.X because he is black or yellow or brown,” that too would obviously be racist, because I was opposing him because he is black or yellow or brown.
What if someone said that he could not vote for Mr. X for a vacancy on the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina because he is . . . A White Man . . . a white man replacing two black Obama nominees. Well, sport’s fans, that is what Senator Chuck Schumer (D, NY) said last week on the Senate floor about nominee Marvin Quattlebaum, and that is a racist statement. Now his statement, in and of itself, is not that surprising as Chuck Schumer is a political hack and a boor. What is surprising to me, however, is that I did not hear any of the other 48 Democratic senators call him out on it. The way that I look at that is that either all of the other Democratic senators are either afraid of Mr. Schumer and thus are afraid to speak their own mind, or they agree with his racist statement.
To be perfectly honest I am not sure which is worse!

Last week after President Trump announced his intention to institute significant tariffs on aluminum and steel, I received an article from The Economist in an email from a friend. He said that he sent me the article because “you occasionally send around some items on Trump.” Actually I send around a lot of items on Trump, but I only send a few of them to him.
Anyway author of the article from The Economist was against the proposed tariffs. I noted that he was either educated outside the USA or lives outside the USA, because no one in the USA uses the word “tyres” when talking about those round things on a car. My guess is that he probably was from Great Britian, and so I would expect him to be against U.S. tariffs. Should I take his opinion as gospel. Err, . . . “No.”
As I see it, this is another fulfilled Trump campaign promise. He has been saying for at least five years (long before he was a candidate) that other countries were taking advantage of The United States on trade. He promised to change that, and he feels that tariffs are a step in the right direction.
Be that as it may, there are a multitude of opinions concerning why these proposed tariffs are either good or bad. I am a bit skeptical because uber liberal radio talk show host, Leslie Marshall, and Senator Sharrod Brown (D, Oh) are both in favor of these new tariffs. On the other hand some Republican Senators have come out against these tariffs. They include Orrin Hatch (R,Ut) who is a lawyer by trade and who has been in Congress for umpteen years. Does he have experience in business or international trade? Err, . . . “No.” Ben Sasse (R,Ne) has also come out against them. He was a college professor and subsequently a university president. Does he have experience in business or international trade? Err, . . . “No.” Another critical Senator is Pat Toomey (R, Pa), who actually did work as a currency trader, which, I guess, gives him some basic international experience, but no real business experience. Does this make him an expert on tariffs? Err, . . . “Maybe, at best.”
On the other hand Mr. Trump has had multitudinous years of international business experience. Has he had results on the economic front since he has been president? Are there some significant economic parameters that we can measure since Trump’s election to gauge economic success? As a matter of, there are quite a few:
In January U.S. household incomes rose 0.9%.
In February new jobless claims fell to a 50 year low (the lowest reading since 12/6/69). The ISM Manufacturing Index in February was 60.8 . . . in other words, terrific!
The adjusted GDP growth over the last nine months was 3% . . . Wow!
Who should I believe and trust on economic issues? On tariffs?
Err, . . . “I’ll take The Donald!”

What’s the best insurance policy? No, this is not a trick question. The best insurance policy is one that you never use! If you have health insurance and never have to use it, obviously that’s a good thing as it implies that you are never sick or injured. The most dramatic example of this tenet is life insurance . . . again if someone doesn’t need to be a beneficiary of your life insurance policy, it means that you are around to live another day.
In the aftermath of the recent Florida school shooting, could this line of reasoning be of any use? Could this insurance metaphor be helpful? At this point both the left and the right cannot find a compromise solution that is acceptable to both sides. Those on the right argue that taking away guns is not the solution, while those on the left always address this issue by emotionally stating that the answer is to take away guns. While I believe that limiting some guns may be helpful in certain circumstances, it is not the panacea that the anti-NRA lobby is trying to sell us. Eventually some sort of limited gun ban will be passed and suits will follow. The courts will get involved and eventually the Supreme Court will be called upon to make decisions on specifics. This may take years, and in the meantime, “What?”
Perhaps we can apply the concept of insurance (the best insurance policy, etc.) to this vexing topic. If we could take out some sort of insurance to prevent future school shootings, would that be a good thing? To me, the answer is obviously, “yes.”
The insurance policy that I have in mind addresses the following questions:
“Is anyone at the school armed?”
“Would arming anyone at schools be helpful?” (Interestingly if there is any sort of a
threat at a particular school, multiple armed law enforcement personnel are there
standing guard.)
“Would the potential shooters think twice before marching Continue reading “Cheap Insurance?”

Unfortunately yesterday my wife and I spent four hours in the Emergency Room. Fortunately, we were able to go to the Emergency Room and receive good timely medical care. Fortunately the USA is a rockstar in the medical care arena compared to those countries that unfortunately have a single payer system, as is illustrated by the following true story.

Fortunately, while on a recent December trip, my wife and I met a wonderful couple, Ken and Pat, from Liverpool, England. Unfortunately, in mid-December Pat began having trouble with her knee. Fortunately, she was able to get an appointment with her doctor on the 27th after she returned home . . . unfortunately it was not until January 27th.
We recently received an email from Pat on 2/4/2018. It read verbatim as follows:
“Still having trouble with knee, doc says X-ray shows mild arthritis, and not much else, can’t have scan till I’ve had physio which I have to wait 4 weeks to ring and then wait for appointment, then if still bad will refer me to specialist who can scan me! But talking to people I think the world has arthritis and I’ll just have to manage pain. Its less painful today so more positive. Trying to walk longer each day, the weather here is cold but dry.”

As I am sure you are all aware, England’s National Health Service (NHS) is a single payer system with the payer being the British government. It is free at point of use, and is paid for by general taxation. For all intents and purposes, it is designed to be inefficient, and by our standards, very inefficient. The NHS came into being in 1948, and so Pat who is in her late 60s has used NHS all of her life. Reread her email, and note that she is not complaining that she has had this knee problem for over six weeks, and there is no diagnosis in sight. She is not complaining that she will not see a specialist until probably April. To me, the problem is not arthritis, but probably a medial or a lateral collateral ligament issue, and the probability of getting it repaired within six months of its onset, is close to zero, as the median wait time for elective surgery in England is close to six weeks. She is not complaining because the NHS is the only healthcare system that she knows, whereas in the USA these long delays would not pass muster.
Unfortunately, here in California all of the potential Democratic candidates in next year’s election for governor are all espousing “single payer healthcare.”
A few questions for these candidates: “How will this be paid for?”
“Would the medical care be similar to that in England?”
“To which states will the California patients with torn medial or lateral collateral ligaments go for expedited care?”