Massachusetts Enacts Universal Health Care
We're not going to spend a lot of time comparing operations around here. But the health care crisis in America is going to be a persistent topic on this blog. First, because in our sixites we enter an especially vulnerable part of our lives. And second, because all the ideals and the now forgotten knowledge of the 1960s tells us that universal health care makes sense, is possible and is right. It's civilized health care.
I'd planned to begin with a rationale for why we need universal health care, particularly a single-payer system. But there's startling news from Massachusetts: both houses of the legislature have passed an innovative plan for universal health care coverage, and the governor is going to sign it. It isn't a single payer plan. It is untested but looks like it might work, and it certainly is the best any state has passed so far. According to Reuters, here are its major features:
The state's poorest — single adults making $9,500 or less a year — will have access to health coverage with no premiums or deductibles.
Those living at up to 300 percent of the federal poverty level, or about $48,000 for a family of three, will be able to get health coverage on a sliding scale, also with no deductibles.
The vast majority of Massachusetts residents who are already insured could see a modest easing of their premiums.
Individuals deemed able but unwilling to purchase health care could face fines of more than $1,000 a year by the state if they don't get insurance.
The plan requires no new taxes.
The devil may be in the details, but the law has bipartisan support: business and a "health care for all" advocacy groups favor it, both houses passed it by lopsided margins, and the Republican governor supports it. "It's only fitting that Massachusetts would set forward and produce the most comprehensive, all-encompassing health care reform bill in the country," said House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi, a Democrat. "Do we know whether this is perfect or not? No, because it's never been done before."
We'll be watching. But if it encourages other states to pass their plans (California has a universal plan inching its way through the legislature every year), then the logjam of opposition and indifference may be broken. That alone makes it progress.
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Enduring 60's Hero: Roberto Clemente
An article by Dave Maraniss in the Washington Post Sunday, taken from his book on Roberto Clemente that will be published later this month, is called The Last Hero. It was about Clemente as an enduring hero throughout Latin America. It's a very moving piece, not only for what it says Clemente continues to represent, some 34 years after his death, but what he had to endure as a Latino in major league baseball in the 1950s until 1972, when his small plane was lost as he tried to deliver relief supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua.
But even though I am not Latino, Roberto Clemente was a hero to me. He played his entire major league career for the Pittsburgh Pirates, and I grew up about 35 miles from the city. I saw him play at Forbes Field several times, watched the televised games and listened to many, many games on the radio, in the late 50s and early 60s.
MORE at Boomer Hall of Fame
An article by Dave Maraniss in the Washington Post Sunday, taken from his book on Roberto Clemente that will be published later this month, is called The Last Hero. It was about Clemente as an enduring hero throughout Latin America. It's a very moving piece, not only for what it says Clemente continues to represent, some 34 years after his death, but what he had to endure as a Latino in major league baseball in the 1950s until 1972, when his small plane was lost as he tried to deliver relief supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua.
But even though I am not Latino, Roberto Clemente was a hero to me. He played his entire major league career for the Pittsburgh Pirates, and I grew up about 35 miles from the city. I saw him play at Forbes Field several times, watched the televised games and listened to many, many games on the radio, in the late 50s and early 60s.
MORE at Boomer Hall of Fame
Monday, April 03, 2006
Sounds Familiar
Echoes of a 60s President
"Last month, in a memorandum ... the Justice Department claimed the inherent right to bug or wiretap-without court orders-any time it felt that the "national security" was in jeopardy."
Sound familiar? There have been Bush administration memos claiming this inherent right, but this quote happens to be from a 1969 TIME magazine story on the administration of Richard Nixon. (It's quoted by the Unclaimed Territory blog, with a link to a reprint of the article.)
The justification was explained: As authority for this broad power, the Government cited the President's oath to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution" from domestic subversion as well as foreign enemies. Contending that every President since Franklin Roosevelt had permitted such wiretaps, the Government went on to imply that they were even more important now because of the growing violence and rioting in the nation's cities and on its campuses.
The memo justified spying in connection with the trial of the Chicago 8, accused of conspiring to disrupt the Democratic National Convention in 1968. Among the defendants were Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Tom Hayden and Bobby Seales. It is now a trial that lives in infamy.
"Last month, in a memorandum ... the Justice Department claimed the inherent right to bug or wiretap-without court orders-any time it felt that the "national security" was in jeopardy."
Sound familiar? There have been Bush administration memos claiming this inherent right, but this quote happens to be from a 1969 TIME magazine story on the administration of Richard Nixon. (It's quoted by the Unclaimed Territory blog, with a link to a reprint of the article.)
The justification was explained: As authority for this broad power, the Government cited the President's oath to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution" from domestic subversion as well as foreign enemies. Contending that every President since Franklin Roosevelt had permitted such wiretaps, the Government went on to imply that they were even more important now because of the growing violence and rioting in the nation's cities and on its campuses.
The memo justified spying in connection with the trial of the Chicago 8, accused of conspiring to disrupt the Democratic National Convention in 1968. Among the defendants were Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Tom Hayden and Bobby Seales. It is now a trial that lives in infamy.
Sunday, April 02, 2006
Civilized Health Care
The Bonds of Generations
She would be just another nameless victim, a true elder who inspired everyone who met her, but reduced to homelessness through no fault of her own. She has a name, of course--it's Rosie Kreidler, age 62. And she had a past. An Olympic athlete. A nurse, who had applied to join Doctors Without Borders and go to the Congo. Until an automobile accident started her on a journey that many Americans have taken, particularly older Americans. And many more will take in the coming decade, as baby boomers age into vulnerability.
No one outside of the people she met might ever have known her story. Except that somehow, someone found out that her nephew is Barry Bonds, one of the most famous men in America. Not even he knew of her plight.
But her story is the story of many others, and will be the story of countless others, until this country fixes its disreputable health care system, and puts human health and human dignity above the greed of a powerful few.
She was known as Rosie Bonds when an automobile accident left her badly injured. She might have eventually become well enough to resume her career, but her insurance company denied her the treatments she needed.
Having been released from a hospital into physical therapy, she battled with insurers to cover her treatment. About $50,000 in coverage ran out fast, as did her savings; her 18 months of physical therapy ended when the money did, not because she had recovered. Her Social Security Disability Insurance application was rejected; she challenged the rejection in court and lost.
Eager to go back to work because she loved nursing and was desperate to pay her mounting bills, she returned to the Bay Area in 2005. But constant pain made bending or lifting impossible, and numbness in her hands prevented her from drawing blood or inserting an IV.
Her career as she had known it was finished. Destitute and unable to work, too proud to turn to her family or friends for help, she soon was sleeping in her car.
Read this story, of a woman of rare courage and accomplishment, who nevertheless was reduced to poverty and indignity, and consigned to needless pain, because this country will not take care of its people.
Barry Bonds was born in 1964, the last year of the postwar baby boom as designated by demographers. Rosie Bonds was born just 20 years before, in 1944. Let's hope he sees this not only as a family tragedy but as a cause for his own generation. America needs to join the civilized world, with a health care system that works.
She would be just another nameless victim, a true elder who inspired everyone who met her, but reduced to homelessness through no fault of her own. She has a name, of course--it's Rosie Kreidler, age 62. And she had a past. An Olympic athlete. A nurse, who had applied to join Doctors Without Borders and go to the Congo. Until an automobile accident started her on a journey that many Americans have taken, particularly older Americans. And many more will take in the coming decade, as baby boomers age into vulnerability.
No one outside of the people she met might ever have known her story. Except that somehow, someone found out that her nephew is Barry Bonds, one of the most famous men in America. Not even he knew of her plight.
But her story is the story of many others, and will be the story of countless others, until this country fixes its disreputable health care system, and puts human health and human dignity above the greed of a powerful few.
She was known as Rosie Bonds when an automobile accident left her badly injured. She might have eventually become well enough to resume her career, but her insurance company denied her the treatments she needed.
Having been released from a hospital into physical therapy, she battled with insurers to cover her treatment. About $50,000 in coverage ran out fast, as did her savings; her 18 months of physical therapy ended when the money did, not because she had recovered. Her Social Security Disability Insurance application was rejected; she challenged the rejection in court and lost.
Eager to go back to work because she loved nursing and was desperate to pay her mounting bills, she returned to the Bay Area in 2005. But constant pain made bending or lifting impossible, and numbness in her hands prevented her from drawing blood or inserting an IV.
Her career as she had known it was finished. Destitute and unable to work, too proud to turn to her family or friends for help, she soon was sleeping in her car.
Read this story, of a woman of rare courage and accomplishment, who nevertheless was reduced to poverty and indignity, and consigned to needless pain, because this country will not take care of its people.
Barry Bonds was born in 1964, the last year of the postwar baby boom as designated by demographers. Rosie Bonds was born just 20 years before, in 1944. Let's hope he sees this not only as a family tragedy but as a cause for his own generation. America needs to join the civilized world, with a health care system that works.
Saturday, April 01, 2006
This Day in Boomer History
April Lennon Day
Not too surprisingly, April 1 and John Lennon met in the news on several occasions.
On April 1, 1970, John and Yoko announced they were both having sex change operations. No indication of how many reporters took them seriously before the April Fools Day joke was discovered.
In a different kind of foolishness, more classical in terms of the court jester tradition, John and Yoko announced on April 1, 1973, the formation of a new nation, which they called Nutopia. Nutopia had no laws and no borders. It's national anthem was silence.
There were two April 1s of a different nature involving John Lennon and his father, Freddie Lennon, who had abandoned his family when John was a baby. John and Freddie met again for the first time on April 1, 1964. They didn't see each other much after that. And on April 1, 1976, Freddie Lennon died.
Not too surprisingly, April 1 and John Lennon met in the news on several occasions.
On April 1, 1970, John and Yoko announced they were both having sex change operations. No indication of how many reporters took them seriously before the April Fools Day joke was discovered.
In a different kind of foolishness, more classical in terms of the court jester tradition, John and Yoko announced on April 1, 1973, the formation of a new nation, which they called Nutopia. Nutopia had no laws and no borders. It's national anthem was silence.
There were two April 1s of a different nature involving John Lennon and his father, Freddie Lennon, who had abandoned his family when John was a baby. John and Freddie met again for the first time on April 1, 1964. They didn't see each other much after that. And on April 1, 1976, Freddie Lennon died.
Friday, March 31, 2006
1960s Now
New Protests in L.A.: "This is How They Did It in the 60s"
Antiwar demonstrations have become all too familiar since the 1960s, thanks to so many awful wars to demonstrate against. But the recent protests by Latinos against certain proposed legislation on immigration in the 2006 Congress have other direct roots to the 1960s: to the Civil Rights era, and to the Cesar Chavez marches and boycotts. In California, March 31 is a state holiday in honor of Chavez.
According to this article in the L.A. Times, high school students are looking to the 60s for some of their models for non-violent protest, in particular to Los Angeles school demonstrations in 1968 as depicted in the recently shown HBO film, "Walkout."
"It hearkens back to 1968," said Andres Jimenez, director of the California Policy Research Center at the University of California. "There was a sense of frustration that they saw with their parents in terms of the tenor of the immigration debate. This group is being singled out as a 'problem group.' And they wanted to seek an avenue to respond to that, to show that on the contrary, this group is very much a part of the broader society."
To be sure, students revealed both their youth and their naivete at times. When thousands of Los Angeles students descended on City Hall on Monday, for example, one student said she remembered something about civil rights protesters in the 1960s sitting down during demonstrations. It was a reference to the "sit-in," but it wasn't entirely clear whether the students recognized the pedigree of their decision to plop down on the steps.
"That was the idea of a girl from Belmont" High School, said Tabares. "In the '60s, the way they did it was sitting down. So we told everybody to sit down."
The story goes on to say that some students were also quite savvy about protesting, and had good instincts for how to be effective. They also use new tools, like the Internet, in particular Myspace.com, which became an information clearinghouse that every teenager knew but few adults did. The result in one school:
It didn't take long before most of Garden Grove High's roughly 2,200 students knew what was coming, without the knowledge or involvement of teachers or parents.
Soon, the bulletin crossed over an invisible but critical line between teens who were friends but attended different schools. Students began posting their telephone numbers, and soon dozens more pledges to participate were obtained through phone calls and instant text messages.
Still, when the tardy bell rang Monday morning, Muniz had no idea what to expect. Teenagers can talk a big game. But would they follow through?
She waited in front of the school. Soon, the doors opened, and scores of students — most of them Latino, but a handful of whites, African Americans and Asian Americans too — joined her. They marched through Garden Grove and Anaheim, picking up students at several other schools as planned through MySpace bulletins. By 1 p.m., they had covered 10 miles. An estimated 1,500 students had walked out. Muniz was a truant — and, to her friends, a hero.
Antiwar demonstrations have become all too familiar since the 1960s, thanks to so many awful wars to demonstrate against. But the recent protests by Latinos against certain proposed legislation on immigration in the 2006 Congress have other direct roots to the 1960s: to the Civil Rights era, and to the Cesar Chavez marches and boycotts. In California, March 31 is a state holiday in honor of Chavez.
According to this article in the L.A. Times, high school students are looking to the 60s for some of their models for non-violent protest, in particular to Los Angeles school demonstrations in 1968 as depicted in the recently shown HBO film, "Walkout."
"It hearkens back to 1968," said Andres Jimenez, director of the California Policy Research Center at the University of California. "There was a sense of frustration that they saw with their parents in terms of the tenor of the immigration debate. This group is being singled out as a 'problem group.' And they wanted to seek an avenue to respond to that, to show that on the contrary, this group is very much a part of the broader society."
To be sure, students revealed both their youth and their naivete at times. When thousands of Los Angeles students descended on City Hall on Monday, for example, one student said she remembered something about civil rights protesters in the 1960s sitting down during demonstrations. It was a reference to the "sit-in," but it wasn't entirely clear whether the students recognized the pedigree of their decision to plop down on the steps.
"That was the idea of a girl from Belmont" High School, said Tabares. "In the '60s, the way they did it was sitting down. So we told everybody to sit down."
The story goes on to say that some students were also quite savvy about protesting, and had good instincts for how to be effective. They also use new tools, like the Internet, in particular Myspace.com, which became an information clearinghouse that every teenager knew but few adults did. The result in one school:
It didn't take long before most of Garden Grove High's roughly 2,200 students knew what was coming, without the knowledge or involvement of teachers or parents.
Soon, the bulletin crossed over an invisible but critical line between teens who were friends but attended different schools. Students began posting their telephone numbers, and soon dozens more pledges to participate were obtained through phone calls and instant text messages.
Still, when the tardy bell rang Monday morning, Muniz had no idea what to expect. Teenagers can talk a big game. But would they follow through?
She waited in front of the school. Soon, the doors opened, and scores of students — most of them Latino, but a handful of whites, African Americans and Asian Americans too — joined her. They marched through Garden Grove and Anaheim, picking up students at several other schools as planned through MySpace bulletins. By 1 p.m., they had covered 10 miles. An estimated 1,500 students had walked out. Muniz was a truant — and, to her friends, a hero.
Thursday, January 26, 2006
Intro to the Alpha version (work in progress)
As the battleship Missouri was sailing into Tokyo Bay to accept the Japanese surrender that ended World War II, my parents were walking up the aisle for their marriage ceremony at the Most Blessed Sacrament Cathedral. I was born the following June, as one of the first of the postwar baby boomers.
The baby boom generation, which demographers mark as beginning in 1946 and ending with babies born in 1964, was a major influence on institutions, culture, politics, business---just about everything. That influence was conspicuous from our infancy through childhood, early adulthood and maturity.
This year the first of us will turn 60. If life is a three-act play--with Act I as youth, and Act II as middle age, then early baby boomers are entering the last Act.
These days we often find ourselves vilified, both for our past and for the imagined costs to society of our projected dependence. Economically and culturally, we are increasingly isolated. Though we are in some ways still a huge market, and collectively we hold a lot of private wealth, we are no longer the obsessive target of advertisers, and therefore of the media supported by advertising.
That’s largely because advertisers don’t believe that can sway us anymore. Either because of our fixed habits or hard-earned skepticism or both, we can’t be so easily convinced to buy something or switch brands, after seeing a commercial that dramatizes how we will be instantly more attractive and successful if we do. We are kind of past a lot of that.
But that also means that news media are less likely to cover our concerns or activities. We may be the subject of cover stories this year, but there are few publications devoted to our interests.
This site—together with its companion site, The Boomer Hall of Fame --- is one small attempt to remedy that.
This site is about baby boomers and their interests and concerns, primarily for baby boomers, and by at least one baby boomer (though I hope many more will participate through comments.)
The baby boom generation, which demographers mark as beginning in 1946 and ending with babies born in 1964, was a major influence on institutions, culture, politics, business---just about everything. That influence was conspicuous from our infancy through childhood, early adulthood and maturity.
This year the first of us will turn 60. If life is a three-act play--with Act I as youth, and Act II as middle age, then early baby boomers are entering the last Act.
These days we often find ourselves vilified, both for our past and for the imagined costs to society of our projected dependence. Economically and culturally, we are increasingly isolated. Though we are in some ways still a huge market, and collectively we hold a lot of private wealth, we are no longer the obsessive target of advertisers, and therefore of the media supported by advertising.
That’s largely because advertisers don’t believe that can sway us anymore. Either because of our fixed habits or hard-earned skepticism or both, we can’t be so easily convinced to buy something or switch brands, after seeing a commercial that dramatizes how we will be instantly more attractive and successful if we do. We are kind of past a lot of that.
But that also means that news media are less likely to cover our concerns or activities. We may be the subject of cover stories this year, but there are few publications devoted to our interests.
This site—together with its companion site, The Boomer Hall of Fame --- is one small attempt to remedy that.
This site is about baby boomers and their interests and concerns, primarily for baby boomers, and by at least one baby boomer (though I hope many more will participate through comments.)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)