Recent comments
ADHD: Hunter in a Farmer's World
Thom Hartmann has written a dozen books covering ADD / ADHD - Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder.
Join Thom for his new twice-weekly email newsletters on ADHD, whether it affects you or a member of your family.
Thom's Blog Is On the Move
By webmaster
Hello All
Thom's blog in this space and moving to a new home.
Please follow us across to hartmannreport.com - this will be the only place going forward to read Thom's blog posts and articles.
Small World Palindromedary. Guadalajara is where we land when we visit San Gabriel which is about an hour or so from Sayula and several hours from Guadalajara. It's a wonderful Pueblocito. We actually already own a house there, and if it wasn't for our property here that is under water we would probably move there to retire. I'm also keeping my eye out for something in Manzanilla. That's my ideal retirement goal. Something near the beach where we could sail a boat and fish. Heaven!
DAnneMarc: Yes, I have also been down to Mexico...Guadalajara...many times for work for weeks at a time. I am very much aware of how easy it is to get prescription meds in those pharmacies. They try to scare us, here in America, with propaganda about how those drugs could very easily be tainted or not even the real thing. But, the Mexicans do just fine with them...and besides, most of the drugs that they pedal here in America comes from abroad anyway. Some of those drugs that they pedal to us here in America under brand names could very well be just a tainted or fake as any others. I think I remember reading something on that...which was quite shocking at the time I read it. DEA, USDA...you name it government organizations that are supposed to watch out for our safety can no longer be trusted either. They are just as bought off as anyone else.
By the way, there is a big lake just south of Guadalajara that has a number of communities that are heavily populated by lots of non-Mexicans...many Americans and other people from other countries. They usually have gated communities and they look just like any other nice gated communities in the US. I looked at the properties for sale and, about 4 or 5 years ago, they were all very inexpensive compared to the US. The area right around Guadalajara often gets very smoggy...choke...choke...but I've never seen or smelled that problem further south near that lake. Lake Chapala I believe the name was. There were gated communities, at that time just north of the lake.
BTW Ken, I told my cat Xena about your comment. She said, "Thank you, it was a pleasure to perform for you."
Palindromedary I think you've touched on an interesting point.
The current system does do us a disservice requiring Doctors Prescriptions for everything. On one of my vacations in Mexico I started to come down with a cold. I wasn't very happy about my condition ruining my vacation. My wife suggested we go get some penicillin pills and I'd be fine in a day or two. I asked who I could get them from. She said the corner store a half block down the street. I was in disbelief. When we got to the store the 11 year old girl behind the counter asked us what we wanted. We told her penicillin for a cold. She pulled out a string of packaged pills from a box, told us to take one every day for three days, tore off three pills on a packaged strip, handed it to us and said that will be 30 pesos--about $3.00. I almost fainted. An eleven year old child handing out antibiotics over the counter without a license and not demanding a prescription and an insurance card?
After I took the first pill, about 6 hours later, I started to feel better. Halfway though the next day after taking the second pill in the morning I felt well again. All the symptoms were gone! I don't think I needed the third pill but I followed the directions of the little girl because she seemed to know what she was talking about. You're absolutely right Palindromedary, our Pharmaceutical dispensing system is a rip off, an obstacle to our general health, and in insult to our intelligence. Like I said before, like it or not, Mexico is far more progressive in Heath Care than the US.
And how many people actually get flu shots every year? And how many people will avoid getting flu shots not just from the scarey prospects that they might kill you but also from the fact that you have no health insurance? If you have health insurance you go to the doctor, if you don't, you don't go to the doctor and will likely not get flu shots. An epidemic waiting to happen! And after what just happened in that case of contaminated injections for back pain* not many people are going to have much trust in those flu shots.
*13,000 people with 8 dying after getting injections of contaminated steroids for back pain. The injections came from the Massachusetts-based pharmacy, New England Compounding Center (NECC).
All they have to do is to make many of the commonly needed drugs, that currently now require a prescription, over-the-counter without needing a prescription. They have quite a racket going on for them now..requiring you be forever stuck with having to go to the doctor (which clogs up the system creating a more costly system) ...just to get a prescription.
Many people have chronic diseases, like asthma and high blood pressure, and they have been taking these prescription medications for years and years and they know that they will have to take them until they die.
So why the heck do you have to constantly go back to the doctor...just to get a prescription refilled? Yes, they can refill them over the phone...but why is that even necessary? And, sure they get you into the lab for tests...mostly to protect their asses. It's just a racket that is meant to keep the prices high and to squeeze out every last cent out of us.
One medication that I was quite surprised that they finally made over-the-counter was Omeprazole which keeps the stomach from over-producing acids..for people who are bothered with indigestion. Why can't they do that for Asthma medications...especially the inhalers? Why can't they do that for high blood pressure?
Many people have high blood pressure which could eventually kill them if they can't get medicines to reduce their blood pressure. And right now...you can't get these medicines without a prescription...and unless you have insurance...it is questionable whether the doctors you pay cash to will actually write a prescription for reducing blood pressure.
I know someone who, doesn't have insurance, and spent close to $1000.00 on doctors trying to get a prescription for high blood pressure. She goes in because she is sick and her blood pressure test showed high(something like 190/130)but the doctor would only send her to the lab for expensive tests and scan for the original illness she went in for; but, they wouldn't write a prescription for high blood pressure. They wanted her to go back the next week to see another doctor. She did and they said her blood pressure measurements wasn't all that high (this time about 160/100). She told the doctor that she had been using a blood pressure monitor at her home for over a year and saw that her blood pressure was steadily getting higher. The doctor wouldn't write a prescription and wanted her to come back in again in two more weeks. She realized that the doctors were just jerking her around and milking her for cash...and cancelled the appointment.
Sorry Danne I have to respectfully disagree with you. In theory that all sounds great but in reality our single payer isn't perfect. first off all people have to look after themselves with or single payer. Knowing all your medical needs are taken care doesn't help them do that It just makes it worst. The bottom line is if you have a good private plan now when you go to single payer your health will probably get worst and if you don't it will get better. There is some problems with our system because there is no fee to see a doctor some people abuse it. My Doctor has the same elderly lady see him every Wednesday even though there is nothing wrong with her. My son waited 10 months to see stomach specialist. But at least we all see one. I guess I am just hoping you don't get your hopes up too much health care is expensive no matter how you do it.
Who will protect us from the volunteer armed guards? also: never forget the strong connection between "unexplainable" massacres, suicides, etc. and the SSRI's. This will get virtually no press, as it offends the god-almighty drug companies. oddly, they stand to benefit from the killings, as people call for more "mental health-care". (translation: more drugs)
Dear Thom:
I first called you about the Equal Access Amendment. https://www.facebook.com/groups/152631684794770/doc/216291868428751/ This is a compilation of needed laws/rules to make voting fair for the candidates and the voter. You instructed me to put this on your page. You have so many places so I put it in the forums. I doubt you've read it. In any case I continued my attempts to find people to help me accomplish this task. I found that there were some groups that focused on one voting flaw and some that focused on a few.
I have always contended that we need to address all the issues at once because they are interelated. One can not get money out of politics to be defeated by gerrymandering and two party ballots. I searched and searched and queried. No one agreed that all the issues needed to be worked on together.
I spoke to you about one of the issues, the right to vote. And I had hoped to bring a different issue to you on other occaisons. (It has been difficult to get through the screener) Then one day I saw a request for support, in case the 2012 elections were stolen. And when I searched their pages I found the Voter's Bill of Rights. Imagine my surprise when I discovered you worked on that with a group of people. And even more that you also included a comprehensive plan for voting. The group that I discovered is No More Stolen Elections. http://nomorestolenelections.org/voter-bill-rights I have contacted them and they only make changes to their document via council.
In any case we are working on specific rules and not generalities. One issue is IRV. We have found people much smarter than us at the google+ group called center for election science https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!forum/electionscience (must be relatives of yours Thom, they're egg heads) and they have shown that IRV while well intentioned, only delays the inevitable. "A two party choice". http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDzYRDTVRS8 What is needed is a proportional congress where all parties win, but they may win a different amount. And the people need to hear about these different options so they can understand them and ask for them.
This is a little bit long so I'll end it here. Can you ask your screener to let me thorough when i call, and I'll tell you each piece we're working on as we do it. Norman Goldman says there is a group of conservative planning a JUly 4th request to change the constitution. Article V is trying to get an audience with congress to do the same, on the liberal side. One conservative http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpyqZlvuVt0 says that we should make an agreement that when we ask for the constitutional amendment under article V we should acquiese to only discussing certain things or else people will be afraid that we (any of us) will try to rewrite the WHOLE constitution. Marcia p.s. you still should make the correspondence course, but maybe go in on it with Norman Goldman and Mike Papantonio. Your callers may be smart, but there's a lot of us out here that don't know how to find these answers ourselves. for example reading a supreme court summary.
OK bye
Marcia
An example of how important preventive medicine is would be the case of my brother-in-law's injury in Mexico. He received third degree burns on his chest. He was seen and treated for free within minutes. He was not even a citizen of Mexico. If he had to wait till he returned to the US for treatment he risked an infection that could have taken months to treat; in addition to other potential consequences of infections.
Thanks to the generosity of the good tax payers of Mexico my brother-in-law and our private insurance industry here was spared having to pay for expensive and very painful treatments to cure unnecessary consequences of his injury. Most important of all, he was able to fully enjoy the rest of his vacation and returned healthy.
Single Payer is the answer to a plethora of problems.
The Twain Report
All The News That Mark Twain Says He Would Report If He Was Alive Today
1-12-2013
Usually the Twain Report tries to steer clear of any story that does not involve putting big red rubber noses on republicans and poking them with licorice sticks. But every once in a while, just to keep things properly jumbled-up, we like to do some factual reporting. The following was written by The Twain Report's editor:
I just noticed a corollary between republicans and some victims of toxic chemical exposure.
My toxicology clients usually call me when they are sick and not responding to conventional or alternative medical treatment. When I point to a specific chemical in their house and say, "This chemical is known to cause or trigger the medical condtion that you have," some of them respond by using the chemical in front of me.
This phenomenon puzzled me. I mean, the chemical is toxic, it's poisonous, it's not safe, it hurts people, pets, and wildlife. Why in the world would people knowingly do that to themselves and to the world around them? It took about fifteen years for me to find the answer: those people are obeying the chemicals. Looking at their body language, their facial expression, and most importantly looking in their eyes while they used the chemical, they always have a far-off look in their eyes, they appear to be in a hypnotic trance- on mental autopilot.
Here's my explanation. Everything in this universe has an innate intelligence. In general people are at the top of the scale in intelligence. But as many meditators and shamans agree, animals, plants, and even rocks have at least a rudimentary form of intelligence. And they have the will to survive.
So, if everything has the will to survive, do toxic chemicals have the will to survive, even if their survival is at the expense of every life form on this planet? My experience indicates that clearly toxic chemicals do have the will to survive on those destructive terms. The "mind" of a toxic chemical doesn't work like our human minds work. It doesn't reason things out or engage in discussions. It's much more simple and basic. But nonetheless its will to survive is very strong and as occurs often in the human, animal, plant, and mineral realms, that will reaches out in an attempt to create an environment favorable to its survival. So, what needs to happen in order for toxic chemicals to "survive?" Only one thing: the cooperation of people. Because people make and use toxic chemicals.
Once I became aware of this phenomenon, I also saw it occurring with mold infestations. I saw people repetitively doing things that increased their exposure- and other peoples' exposure- to mold. And I saw some of those people actively resisting anyone's efforts to convince them to get rid of the toxins. They were obeying the mold.
Now, does this "survival at all costs" attitude of chemical and biological toxins and their ability to cause some people to help them, remind you of anything that's happening in our world today? It reminds me of the republican party. I mean, republicans reflexively choose the anti-human position on virtually every issue- women's rights, childrens' rights, education, civil rights, consumers rights, fiscal responsibility, social responsibility, control of corporations, war, etc.. Their eyes have the same far-off, hypnotic trance, mental autopilot look as the people who obey the chemicals and mold, and their only arguments are sound bytes; there is no logic, no sequential thought, none of the characteristics you have the right to expect in a dialog between human beings. I wonder what the republicans are obeying.
Kend, It's not just quality of care and cost. With Single Payer we can drastically reduce not only cost but waiting time to see Doctors. The biggest factor in health care is preventive medicine. By being able to see Doctors quickly without cost many expensive, costly and dangerous health problems can be treated early and expensive consequences reduced or prevented.
In addition, by removing the cost of care from patients and their employers we drastically help solve our current fiscal and unemployment problems; as well as, eliminate all the unnecessary health problems created by it. Malnutrition, emergency room violence, lack of early diagnoses of illnesses, mental illness, aberrant alcoholism, and manic depression, are all results of wide spread unemployment. By switching the burden of health care costs to the taxpayer, employers will no longer be hobbled by this bureaucracy and can hire more people and pay them more; and, we as a nation, can better complete with the labor forces of other nations with public health care; and, as a result, we can start to actually pay off our national debt.
In essence, the current monopoly over health care in the US by private health insurance companies is directly responsible for our unemployment and fiscal emergencies. In addition, this monopoly is responsible for causing more health problems and higher healthcare costs.
Until we heal the root causes of our nation's problems we can never expect a full recovery from them.
Halfonts: Your argument doesn't hold water, sorry. a) I own a number of guns, each one of them registered. b) I have a conceiled carry permit (call it a "license"). c) I purchased each of my guns legally, retail, and paid tax on each. d) I own two vehicles and multiple guns. It would probably be easier for an unauthorized person to steal and use one of my vehicles in an illegal or irresponsible act than to gain access to one of my guns. Of course, I am a law abiding and conscientious gun owner and take gun ownership seriously, just like 99.9 percent of the gun owning public (I'll negotiate that number, but I won't reduce it by much). Face it, guns have been demonized as symbols of death and destruction in the hands of paranoids or maniacs in a way that automobiles never could or will be, even though the carniage wrought by automobiles in the hands of drunk drivers, inattentive elderly people and reckless teens exceeds by many times over the damage done by guns. It's an emotional issue that has reached the level of hysteria in this country. It clouds reason, as demonstrated by your logic. Please understand, I'm not attacking you personally. I just tire of these "pseudo logical" arguments. As someone here suggested "we don't need to ban guns, just the ammo". How about, "we don't need to ban cars, just the fuel, as that would surely stop needless traffic deaths". I fully respect your right to ban firearms in your own home. Please respect my right to have mine.
Actually Ken, I have had good experiences with Kaiser. Simply, not the Kaiser of Oakland or Hayward. I know of no one who has anything good to say about these hospitals and both these establishments have horrible reputations. My good experience was with the Kaiser of Fremont. Much further away from my house but worth the drive. They fixed my hernia and my carpul tunnel in my right hand. I don't have any complaint about that hospital; and, both have and continue to recommend it. I hope your daughter is fortunite enough to have such a resource at hand. If so, than I agree she's in good hands.
"Blaming the gun is like blaming the car in a fatal accident and not bothering to find out if the driver was fit to drive."
No one is blaming the car (or gun) itself. However, we do register, license, tax, monitor, lock and restrict access to cars by young, untrained or incompetent people. Irresponsible individuals do not purchase multiple race-cars by mail-order and proceed to use them irresponsibly, puting the public at risk. The analogy works only if carried to it's logical conclusion.
You know, Thom (assuming you're reading this),
I am hugely disappointed in your so called "polls". I'll tell you right up front that I disagree with having armed guards in schools (even the cops now on patrol) as a solution. I'll tell you that I am a gun owner and feel the 2nd Amendment should be interpreted literally as the right of a law abiding citizen to bear arms. And finally, I'll tell you that I view the NRA as a lobby for arms manufacturers and don't support them materially. But these "polls" you post are laughable. Give me a yes or no answer on this Thom; "are you still beating your wife?" If the answer choice does not support the intent of the question, in this case "should armed guards be used in schools (yes or no), but instead provides only one answer ( NO! We shouldn't be telling kids that guns are a solution and NO! There was an armed guard at Columbine) then your so called "poll" is meaningless and reduces a harangue in front of a crowd that in this case likely supports your "NO" premise. It's OK to editorialize, but please don't insult the intelligence of your readers by calling these things "polls". Thank you.
Rarely is the question asked as to why someone would kill so many people and often times themselves, the last few mass murders were done by young males in their twenties, with a history of mental illness. Were they given psychotic drugs as children to make them sit still in their seats, killing their spirit and sense of empathy? Were they then given some other psychotic drug as adolescences? And then another as young adults? How does the brain develop while being marinated in psychotic drugs? There are millions and millions of guns owned by millions of people without incident. Blaming the gun is like blaming the car in a fatal accident and not bothering to find out if the driver was fit to drive. Guns are tools made to kill. If we can’t ban guns then ban the ammunition. Tommy Chong spent 18 months in federal prison for illegally making glass bongs. Make the ammunition illegal to make, and let people keep their guns.
A worse solution to a bad problem. Are these people insane? Are they lacking gray matter in their brains? Are we being taken back to the Wild, Wild West? From day one I indicated the solution is the Australian Plan from the 90's.
What's with all the gibberish posted after my message? Not of my creation.
Ken Ware has said: "MS. Obama, I refer to him as Ms. after his lack of any aggressiveness when dealing with the Repubkinuts..."
"MS" Obama?! Excuse me Mister Testosterone, but I don't appreciate the sentiment. It reeks of misogyny. I agree with your assessment of Obama, along with may points your have made, but can do without the sexist remarks. Surely you could find a better way to express an opinion than to illustrate your point with tired old stereotypes of this sort, which are not only denigrating but passé.
Normal
0
false
false
false
EN-US
JA
X-NONE
/* Style Definitions */
table.MsoNormalTable
{mso-style-name:"Table Normal";
mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0;
mso-tstyle-colband-size:0;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-parent:"";
mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt;
mso-para-margin:0in;
mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:Cambria;
mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}
Normal
0
false
false
false
EN-US
JA
X-NONE
/* Style Definitions */
table.MsoNormalTable
{mso-style-name:"Table Normal";
mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0;
mso-tstyle-colband-size:0;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-parent:"";
mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt;
mso-para-margin:0in;
mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:Cambria;
mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}
No I understand your system very well if you have money you get the best care in the world if you don't you don't. I think the biggest misconception is that government health care is the be all and end all but the truth is in Canada the wealthy here don't wait like the poor. They go to a private hospitals and get great care. I have lots of friends who worked down there and yes they pay more personally for health care but there taxes are a lot less. So it works out at the end. Also keep in mind Canada has a tenth of the population as the US about 33 million but it has 10 times the resources that are owned by the government and we still struggle to keep up with the rising costs of health care.
TY
DAnneMarc - Cat in a box, hilarious!
God Bless your Daughter. I hope and pray her experience with her Kaiser and the Kaiser of everyone else is better than mine. Good to hear from you Ken. I wish I could find a photo of myself that I could share. Heres a little something I did a while ago you might get a kick out of. I sure did get a kick out of doing it. This one's for you Ken:
http://timemeoutbloggosphere.blogspot.com/
May God Bless your family!
Not to sound like I am just taking the opposite point here, but my daughter has had Kaiser for 10 years and has never had a problem with the care she has received there. She is pregnant and has access to her Dr. faster than I do with my PPI plan. They have upgraded their computer system where a patient can log on and get their test results or E-mail their Dr. and get a reply in a reasonable time period. They are one of the few HMO's that I would recommend to others. In fact their service had been so good I am thinking about switching from my plan to theirs. I guess everyone has had different experiences with their medical provider.