It surprises me, that in all the furor raised over Al Gore's announced support for socialized medicine, no-one has pointed out the constituency most likely to be pleased by Gore's statement.
I am speaking, of course, of the U.S. health insurance industry.
I believe that Al has taken stock of his chances wnd knows that he is racing towards the event horizon of political oblivion, which will come in the general election of 2004. Knowing that his speaking fees will never approach Clinton's, Al has decided to sell out in every way possible.
He has sold out to the insurance industry. When Al Gore goes down, his defeat will discredit the single-payer health care plan he championed.
Who else will buy a piece of Gore's loss? The pro-choice lobby? Pharmaceutical manufacturers (go ahead Al, promote generics!)
Oh, I know politics is never really this simple. But I can dream, can't I?
Please compare the two photographs below and answer the following questions:
Which is Canadian comic Mike Myers and which is disgraced former Canadian communications director of the Prime Minister's Office Francoise Ducros?
Is this the same person?
Is this some sort of promotional stunt for the new Austin Powers movie?
I haven't seen much play given to this story about French President Jacques Chirac's choice of reading material during the NATO summit (from NRO's Corner weblog). Is it because the liberal media sympathizes with the French?
Let's have a thought experiment. Imagine if George W. Bush was reading an art magazine during the NATO summit. Would there be a story on the front page of the New York Times and the Guardian?
No.
Because such a photograph would prove that Bush could read, and the liberal media can't have that.
(Shout out to Reuters photographer Petr Josek.)
So I watched my first game of Canadian Football today. Colby will probably have a more impassioned commentary, but to be brief: Edmonton lost. They went scoreless the entire first half, and then racked up a touchdown and a field goal in the second half to bring the score to 18-10. With less than a minute on the clock they scored a touchdown on last down, but they blew the two-point conversion, bringing the score to 18-16. At last ditch, they tried an onside kick, which was returned by the Alouettes for another touchdown. Final score, 25-16. Exciting game.
Canadian rules are weird, even to as football-illiterate of an American as I am. The field is wider; the field is longer (110 yards) and the end zones are longer too (35 yards each). I don't know why they don't go metric -- it would be less weird to hear that the ball was on the 50-meter line than on Edmonton's 52-yard line. There are only three downs before a turnover, which makes the play very predictable. 1st down -- run or pass. 2nd down -- always pass. 3rd down -- punt or sneak. Lather, rinse, repeat.
The strangest thing is the single. Kick the ball into or through the opponent's end zone and score one point. The comment from the other American at the Grey Cup party was, "Isn't that immoral?"
I "talked about stuff" with Jason tonight. That's the last part of his bedtime ritual, before his Animals Animals tape gets started. With me, sometimes he wants to talk about chemistry, but lately he's been satisfied to play with the calculator on my cell phone. He counts up to 100.
Today he was counting, "65 ... 66 ... 67 ... there's a really good number coming up ... 68 ... 69. 69! That's my favorite number."
So young, and yet so innocent.
Same symptoms, different disease.
In other cheerful news: early this morning a clot formed in Karen's arm, obstructing the vein where the PICC line is inserted. So she is in a lot of pain, there's swelling in that arm, and the PICC line has been removed. Which means she's back to having "the needle people" come and try to find her veins.
Since both my wife and I were sick much of the afternoon, childcare services were provided by the doting grandparents and the other sister while we lay in bed. Not moving seemed to help. At one point I laughed at something my wife said, and then it hurt because the diaphragm muscle moves when I laugh. I tried to say, "It hurts to laugh." That made me laugh more. Luckily, the series died down after a while.
Oh, also, I bottled that batch of Rickard's Red Style (I) from four weeks ago and it's quite possible that the whole batch was contaminated with mold. I bottled it anyway but I'm planning to check it soon.
I've also noticed that I'm becoming increasingly whiny.
One thing I've learned about myself in the past weeks is that I have vast, untapped reserves of puerility saved up against the day that we have children. I'm going to be one of those dads with an endless supply of embarassing comments, butt and fart jokes, and risque song parodies.
An example: Karen's four-year-old son (we'll call him Jason) attends Yamaha music class, which at that age is focused on playing simple tunes on the piano, and singing simple to moderately complex songs. One such song is "Hopping Bunnies," with first verse Bunnies hopping, hopping all around... and second verse Bunnies thumping, thumping all around....
Therefore, for your enjoyment, I present Exhibit A:
Bunnies humping, humping all around
Little bunnies humping, humping on the ground
One is so fast, one is slow
With ____ wiggling as they go
Hump hump! Hump hump! Hump hump!
At least once so far I have accidentally sung 'humping' in place of 'thumping' in verse 2.
Please, someone: save me from myself.
Prostrate this morning with stomach flu. Up around noon, moving slowly, I was able to hold down food, so I did some work and read the paper.
We started a trial subscription to the Globe and Mail a few weeks ago (right before Karen got sick), and we've been trying to cancel it ever since.
It's not just that it's a bad paper (though it is). It's not just that it's a bad paper with no coverage of Alberta (though it is). It's headlines like these:
Fed says rate cut should work
Desire for power lures CEOs to troubled firms
Canada won't be cowed by threats, Manley says
Really, what do you expect [deputy Prime Minster of Canada John] Manley to say? "Canada will be cowed by threats, Manley says." "Canada backs out of Iraq war due to Al-Qaida threats, Manley says" "Canada waiting for Osama bin Laden to shout 'Ollie ollie oxen free' before coming out of hiding".
Sheesh.
UPDATE:
Got a new flat screen monitor about three weeks ago. I finally set it up yesterday. I think it was yesterday. Bleah.
Right now my sister-in-law (let's give her a pseudonym: Karen) is coming home from the hospital for up to four hours at a time. That makes life a lot better for everyone involved, but it means that the logistical issues are ever-changing.
My life has turned into a cat-rat-dog puzzle.
We're actually working now, though, which is wonderful. Right now, I mean. We actually booked half-time for October, even though we started with a couple mediocre weeks.
I'm rambling, but it helps to get this off my chest. Thanks for listening.
Right, my new flat screen. The main benefit is that it's about three feet away from my eyeballs instead of ten inches. It's nice to have the extra desk space, but for my farsighted eyes (20:40), the increased distance is the big win.
The old CRT will be donated to our pet charity.
Started a six of this beer with high hopes. The high hopes were quickly dashed and I'm left with a five-pack of blah ale. No accented hop flavor, no heavier than a normal pale ale -- Big Rock WTF is more like it. Nor am I alone in my opinion..
Big Rock is a local micro, too. I wish this beer were better.
So far the only Canadian micro I've really liked is Hophead IPA. Buy it at the liquor store on 82nd Ave around 107th St.
The other day I caught my mind in the act of rewriting history. I was driving and I had a sudden memory -- that is, the memory of a situation suddenly came to my mind. The memory was exquisitely detailed, of me riding in a car and being yelled at by one of my parents.
Later on, recounting this to my wife, I realized that I had falsified the memory. I had swapped the roles. The actual memory was of riding in a car and yelling at one of my parents. Unfortunately, that memory is much less useful for blaming some or all of my current behavior on parent-inflicted childhood trauma.
I'm happy that I caught myself in the act of lying to myself, but of course it's never pleasant to have such a personal reminder of Man's fallen nature.
But this brings to mind something I heard this weekend in St. Louis. We were at the wedding of a couple of college friends, and therefore the old gang (such as it was) was all together again. On the whole we are skinnier, drink less, and go to sleep earlier than we did in college. In a word, older. But just as liberal. You see, my wife and I are the token conservatives among our college friends.
Which brings me to the unbelievable comment one of our friends made.
This friend is a native (liberal) Californian who now lives in Missouri. Missouri, you will recall, was where John Ashcroft used to be a senator before he was defeated in 2000 by Mel Carnahan (deceased, D-MO). In Carnahan's place, Democratic Missouri governor (Bob Holden, D) appointed Mel's widow Jean Carnahan to the Senate, leaving the Senate split 50-50 until Jim Jeffords took his fateful leap.
The comment was, "If I'd known then what I know now, I would have voted for Ashcroft. He's the devil incarnate, but I'd rather have him as a Senator than as Attorney General."
My immediate reaction was, Yeah, right. You would have voted for Ashcroft, thus giving the Republicans a Jeffords-proof majority in the Senate. In 2000, there weren't any other conservative AG candidates in the entire country. If not for Ashcroft's Senate defeat, Bush would have been forced to ask Janet Reno to stay on another four years.
I believe I said, "Hmmm."
Self-deception is never pretty.
I've only known three people in my life who have migraines.
A migraine is not simply a very severe headache, as many people assume. It's a very severe headache accompanied by auditory or visual hallucinations: "floaters".
A friend of mine used to get migraines. He described "dancing triangle shapes" that appeared at his visual horizon and slowly approached him. When they reached close enough to fill his whole visual field, he would have to lie down in a dark room for four to eight hours while the headache progressed. His migraines got more severe as he and his wife of twenty years had a difficult divorce. He died shortly afterward of an aneurysm.
My sister-in-law has migraines, which were the initial presentation of her very serious blood disease.
One summer I had a job at a national lab doing computations. My boss got migraines. As far as I know, she's still fine.
Anyway, here's an utterly batshit theory about migraines. Perhaps it will help somebody.
Jonah Goldberg's online article about Canada provides useful facts for debating Canadians. In particular:
Canada was once willing to back up its moral ambitions with force of arms; today it's ranked 37th on the list of peacekeepers.
This would be a useful factoid to shoot back at the regular Canadian claim of significant contributions to international peacekeeping. Would be, if only there were a reference somewhere. 37th in what, anyway? In popularity? In troop commitments? In payments made?
And Jonah's showing some chutzpah in criticizing the army which has the best snipers in the world.
I'll have to get my hands on NRODT to see what else he says.
Berkeley coffee going to be just like it used to be
Voters reject measure ordering only organic, fair-trade or shade-grown brands to be sold.
My sister-in-law is still hospitalized, but she's in much better shape than she was. We've been helping out with the kids for the last three weeks, but as she's needed less attention from her husband, he's been able to spend more time at home. At this point we sleep in our own house at nights, which is a blessed relief.
What she has is a rare blood disease where the immune system destroys the body's own red blood cells, causing severe anemia. It's pretty nasty, but it can be managed with steroids to suppress her immune system.
Life has gotten predictable enough that I can plan on finding ten or so minutes a day for blogging. So I guess I'm back, at least for now.