As a federal employee....the "open season" is upon me. This is where you can swap or change your insurance packages... particularly health care. I spent twenty minutes at work today....gazing over the numbers. It's fascinating to see how every single offering....almost thirty different policies....have gone up a minimum of five percent in one year. One of them....went up 55 percent (they did modify their package drastically and lessen the deductibles, so you wouldn't want to be too harsh on them).
My policy from the past nine months? They went up around twelve percent.
How much did I use this year? I visited the doctor once....paying my $10, and the policy covered $480 roughly (the doctor had tried to get them to pay $750). You have to remember....this was for a 30-minute session for mostly freezing off skin tags. It was something that a trained nurse could have done and a total waste for a real doctor to be wasting his time on....and charging that much money. So the $8000 that they took from me and my government organization....kinda went into a black hole (as far as I was concerned).
I don't want to sound negative, but frankly, there's something corrupted about this whole mess....if you ask me.
Sitting in the doctor's waiting room for that one visit....in those 1966 dining room chairs which he offered for his customers....I came to this moment of pondering. Somehow, this whole thing has become a commercialized mess. What we need....is a Wal-Mart in every town....offering some Chinese guy named Wan who has twelve pills and a cheap view of medicine. Yes, competition.
If every single one of these health insurance packages and medical units had to really compete....they'd all get to be fairly reasonable and cheap. We already play this game with computers made in Mexico, Maytag washers made in Mexico, and spend vacations in some one-star retreat in Costa Rica.
I realize this Wan character and his twelve pills might be a hard episode to accept, but frankly....it's probably the best solution around. The alternate plan? 2,700 pages of text written by a bunch of dimwits in Washington....that makes life a bit more complicated. Face it....Wan is the answer.
Friday, 5 November 2010
Three Interesting Things
There were three things of a fascinating nature in today's news.
First, Representative Nancy Pelosi (who did win on Tuesday night in her district)....now says she wants to run for the leadership of the House minority in the upcoming year. The logic here is interesting. There are so many of the middle-of-the-road Democrats who lost....that the bulk of the guys left are what you'd consider fairly far-to-the-left Democrats (not all, but certainly the bulk). Some folks are suggesting that she could easily win the leadership position with this type of make-up.
I sat and pondered over this. In the south, we often envision these situation with wooden bridges. If you had a guy come up and burn a bridge up.....you wouldn't expect that guy to show up the next day and want to help up the crew to rebuild the bridge. He'd usually be two counties away and not want to show his face. In this case, I would imagine the Republicans would readily agree to have Nancy as the leader of the House Democrats because 2012 isn't that far away and you can still get more anti-Democrat miles out of Nancy being in charge.
You can imagine Nancy on some political chat show every two weeks and continuing to be the voice of the Democrats. The moderate Democrat guys, especially from the south....would be hostile about this image and shake their heads. The guys from the news media will have to find questions that give Nancy a chance to show that she's a moderate although they will eventually admit that you can't squeeze more than an ounce of moderateness out of Nancy.
Second on my list of topics? The Slurpee summit. Through the entire campaign period....the President continued to use this speech subject of him being in a car that ran off the road....into a ditch....and the Republicans were merely standing by the road, with a Slurpee in their hands, and not helping to extract the car from the ditch. The kindly folks over at Slurpee....want to have a Slurpee summitt....where Republicans would meet up with Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and the President.
For Slurpee, this is a $20 million advertising episode, that comes free of charge. They are already thinking of a vast ad campaign that could double the number of Slurpees consumed in America over the next twelve months. Naturally, you can only buy a Slurpee at a 7-11 shop and that means profit for lots of small franchise owners.
This is a loaded episode for the President to do a Slurpee moment at the White House. You can imagine the Republican group arrives, and the first thing they ask about....is if they could pull the President's car out of the ditch. There will be this awkward moment where the President gives verbal clues that he's really angry over that offer. Then one of the Republicans will ask if he preferred a "tea" and whip out a Lipton ice tea. That would hint of a Tea Party Movement episode, and just make the President more angry.
My guess is that a summit will occur, but certainly not with Slurpee involvement.
My third topic? Two articles appeared after the election....to suggest that some Democratic contenders for 2016....have actually started to review options for 2012. The hint? They might run against the President in the primary season.
A year ago....no one would have suggested a major primary run against the President in 2012. Even now....it'd be a difficult path to make it but you have to consider this....it starts in Iowa. This is the one state hit hard by economy. The right moderate Democrat....running a mostly jobs-message, could pick up the state. That win would trigger the Obama team to reformat his entire advertising campaign. He'd either have to be boldly moderate (losing most of his hardcore voters) or keep the boldly liberal message (hoping Iowa was just one simple loss only).
2012 could end up being an amazing year.
First, Representative Nancy Pelosi (who did win on Tuesday night in her district)....now says she wants to run for the leadership of the House minority in the upcoming year. The logic here is interesting. There are so many of the middle-of-the-road Democrats who lost....that the bulk of the guys left are what you'd consider fairly far-to-the-left Democrats (not all, but certainly the bulk). Some folks are suggesting that she could easily win the leadership position with this type of make-up.
I sat and pondered over this. In the south, we often envision these situation with wooden bridges. If you had a guy come up and burn a bridge up.....you wouldn't expect that guy to show up the next day and want to help up the crew to rebuild the bridge. He'd usually be two counties away and not want to show his face. In this case, I would imagine the Republicans would readily agree to have Nancy as the leader of the House Democrats because 2012 isn't that far away and you can still get more anti-Democrat miles out of Nancy being in charge.
You can imagine Nancy on some political chat show every two weeks and continuing to be the voice of the Democrats. The moderate Democrat guys, especially from the south....would be hostile about this image and shake their heads. The guys from the news media will have to find questions that give Nancy a chance to show that she's a moderate although they will eventually admit that you can't squeeze more than an ounce of moderateness out of Nancy.
Second on my list of topics? The Slurpee summit. Through the entire campaign period....the President continued to use this speech subject of him being in a car that ran off the road....into a ditch....and the Republicans were merely standing by the road, with a Slurpee in their hands, and not helping to extract the car from the ditch. The kindly folks over at Slurpee....want to have a Slurpee summitt....where Republicans would meet up with Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and the President.
For Slurpee, this is a $20 million advertising episode, that comes free of charge. They are already thinking of a vast ad campaign that could double the number of Slurpees consumed in America over the next twelve months. Naturally, you can only buy a Slurpee at a 7-11 shop and that means profit for lots of small franchise owners.
This is a loaded episode for the President to do a Slurpee moment at the White House. You can imagine the Republican group arrives, and the first thing they ask about....is if they could pull the President's car out of the ditch. There will be this awkward moment where the President gives verbal clues that he's really angry over that offer. Then one of the Republicans will ask if he preferred a "tea" and whip out a Lipton ice tea. That would hint of a Tea Party Movement episode, and just make the President more angry.
My guess is that a summit will occur, but certainly not with Slurpee involvement.
My third topic? Two articles appeared after the election....to suggest that some Democratic contenders for 2016....have actually started to review options for 2012. The hint? They might run against the President in the primary season.
A year ago....no one would have suggested a major primary run against the President in 2012. Even now....it'd be a difficult path to make it but you have to consider this....it starts in Iowa. This is the one state hit hard by economy. The right moderate Democrat....running a mostly jobs-message, could pick up the state. That win would trigger the Obama team to reformat his entire advertising campaign. He'd either have to be boldly moderate (losing most of his hardcore voters) or keep the boldly liberal message (hoping Iowa was just one simple loss only).
2012 could end up being an amazing year.
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