Democracy’s Wane

January 23rd, 2010

The world is in a ‘freedom recession.

After the West won the Cold War, democracy flourished in the world as never before. No more. The tide of political and human freedom hasn’t merely slowed but in recent years has turned in the other direction. Seeing that the U.S. midwifed the post-1989 world, these trends are of more than passing interest.

Democracy’s troubles are summed up in “Freedom in the World 2010,” the yearly report card published today by Freedom House. We’re in a “freedom recession,” the advocacy group says. For the fourth consecutive year, more countries saw declines in political and civic rights than advances, the longest such period of deterioration in the 40 year history of this widely cited report.

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2009: Second Warmest Year on Record; End of Warmest Decade

January 23rd, 2010

Very little doubt, except among the denialists and those who don’t understand science, that we are seriously losing ground with the climate.

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Jan. 21, 2010

2009 was tied for the second warmest year in the modern record, a new NASA analysis of global surface temperature shows. The analysis, conducted by the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York City, also shows that in the Southern Hemisphere, 2009 was the warmest year since modern records began in 1880.

Although 2008 was the coolest year of the decade, due to strong cooling of the tropical Pacific Ocean, 2009 saw a return to near-record global temperatures. The past year was only a fraction of a degree cooler than 2005, the warmest year on record, and tied with a cluster of other years — 1998, 2002, 2003, 2006 and 2007 1998 and 2007 — as the second warmest year since recordkeeping began.

“There’s always an interest in the annual temperature numbers and on a given year’s ranking, but usually that misses the point,” said James Hansen, the director of GISS. “There’s substantial year-to-year variability of global temperature caused by the tropical El Niño-La Niña cycle. But when we average temperature over five or ten years to minimize that variability, we find that global warming is continuing unabated.”

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– Research thanks to John K.

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It’s natural to behave irrationally

January 9th, 2010

“With the enemy’s approach to Moscow, the Moscovites’ view of their situation did not grow more serious but on the contrary became even more frivolous, as always happens with people who see a great danger approaching.

At the approach of danger there are always two voices that speak with equal power in the human soul: one very reasonably tells a man to consider the nature of the danger and the means of escaping it; the other, still more reasonably, says that it is too depressing and painful to think of the danger, since it is not in man’s power to foresee everything and avert the general course of events, and it is therefore better to disregard what is painful till it comes, and to think about what is pleasant.”

Leo Tolstoy – War and Peace

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Climate change is just the latest problem that people acknowledge but ignore

To a psychologist, climate change looks as if it was designed to be ignored.

It is a global problem, with no obvious villains and no one-step solutions, whose worst effects seem as if they’ll befall somebody else at some other time. In short, if someone set out to draw up a problem that people would not care about, one expert on human behavior said, it would look exactly like climate change.

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Insurance outside the U.S. (read it and weep too)

January 5th, 2010

insurance1– Another American Expatriate, Curtis Owings, here in New Zealand writes (below) about insurance and how it is a different experience from what folks in the U.S. know.

– Wake up Americans.   It doesn’t have to be as bad as it is.

– Here in New Zealand, the government has created the ACC (or Accident Compensation Corporation) to cover all accidents for New Zealand residents or visitors.

– The result of this is that businesses do not require Liability Insurance and Vehicles do not require accident insurance.  And, there are NO lawsuits over who was responsible for an accident.

– Nice, eh?  These are major simplifications and cost savings to the people living here.

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There is no requirement for “insurance”. In NZ the “insurance” providers only have access to more (and generally faster) elective medical options. But every one legally in the country is entitled/covered by the national health care system. The optional health insurance agencies provide all the same services, but do so from private facilities that have more capacity–so you’re really paying for convenience, not better care. If you need to file an insurance claim then visit http://www.itsaboutjustice.law/, for legal advice.

Some things are not covered by the national system like basic dentistry (check-ups), emergency rescue, and eye glasses. But the things not covered by the system are also *affordable* by comparison to the US. In Wellington we have “free” emergency rescue services by donations and fund-raising drives. These services are not always free in other areas, but again are much more affordable than in the US.

For us, the only difficulty was changing prescriptions from what we had in the US. If you are currently taking something regularly, the odds are pretty high that it will not be the same thing they prescribe here. NZ uses a single system which means that treatment methods are highly standardized across the country. If the treatment is approved and preferred, then everyone will use it. This often does not match up with practices in the US which tend to follow more options (some that work and some that don’t). There may not be 10 drugs for a particular ailment; there may only be two or three.

But the upshot is that there are never any claim forms to deal with, you can never be rejected for “coverage”, you never have to pick a coverage option, the costs do not vary, and how you get treated is consistent regardless of your job/insurance. (Again, insurance as we know it doesn’t exist here.)

~Curtis

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Healthcare outside the U.S. (read it and weep)

January 5th, 2010

Healthcare– I like to report on how health care works in other countries outside of the U.S.    I do this mostly for my U.S. readers who are constantly besieged by propaganda from vested interests in the U.S. that are attempting to convince them that what they have in the U.S. is the best that can be had.

– Au contraire, mon ami.

– There’s an entire world of amazing health care options outside the insular U.S.  In all the other advanced western nations, in fact.

– It is a world wherein people automatically expect that one of the functions of their national government is to provide health care for its citizens.  Free.   And, if not free, then certainly easily affordable.

– Recently, in one of the on-line groups I participate in for immigrants (and wanna be immigrants)  to New Zealand, a discussion started up about how health care in New Zealand works.  One of those who spoke up had just been kidded (in a good natured way) about being a ‘Socialist‘ because she thought that the socialized medicine system here in New Zealand was a good thing.

– Here’s her reply just as she delivered it.   I love it and I think readers in the U.S. should be exposed to more information like this.

– To my friends in the U.S.:  You do not live in the best of all worlds with respect to health care.  And those who are trying to convince you that you do have serious financial skin in the game.  The longer they can keep you convinced that the U.S. system is the best system, the longer their profit making streak runs hot.

– Seriously folks, you’ve got to get out there and smell the roses outside the U.S. borders.  At a bare minimum, take a vacation to Canada and talk, seriously, to the Canadians you meet about their health care system – you will be amazed and shocked at how badly you are being treated.

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Hey there – Socialist???

Might take me a second to get use to the idea as I was raised that was a “bad” word.  But guess what?  If LOVING New Zealand health care makes me a Socialist, then a Socialist I am.  I cannot say enough about how GREAT the health care here in Kiwi Land is, and as you know it is one of the main reasons we came here and one of the main reasons we stay here.  Not only was all of my IVF treatment completely FREE of charge, all prenatal, birth and post op care (including the Plunket and Karitane nurses) was included. The Lactation Consultant in the hospital charged me $6 for a nipple shield and I had to buy my own toothpaste in the gift shop as I had an unexpected early admission prior to birth. We pay $37 for a visit to our GP.  ANYONE can walk in off the street (even a visitor who has just arrived) and pay $50 to see my doctor and get the exact same medical care.

A PRIVATE eye specialist charged my husband $95 for the full and complete 45 minute glaucoma workup-medicine included.  He goes yearly as his eyes are not bad enough to qualify for the hospital’s eye clinic but bad enough that we want to keep them from getting worse.  And here a 45 minute Doctor consultation means you get to speak WITH the doctor one on one for up to 45 minutes.  I could not believe how inclusive and involved the Doctors here are. As an American nurse I am use to docs flying in and out of patient rooms for 6 minutes and billing them for the hour.  When I finally did get pregnant, I called up a SPECIALIST OB/GYN as I did not want to trust the delivery of my baby to a Midwife.  They said it would be $1200 ALL INCLUSIVE for all prenatal, delivery, and post op care.  Lucky for me I developed Diabetes before I could get in to see the specialist, so all of my care was transferred to Endocrine Gynecologists for FREE as public health pays for all complicated pregnancys.   There is a $6 charge for blood draws unless of course you are willing to walk your procedure form over to Med Lab (4 blocks away)-wait 5 minutes, and then it is TOTALLY and completely FREE.

Can’t go on enough and despite everything (both good and bad) that has happened to us over the years – the one consistent and GREAT thing that we have had is PREVENTIVE, low intrusive medical care.  Unless you happen to work in the medical insurance business, I think you will find the care here far exceeds anything that I ever worked for or found in the United States.  The idea of ever having to go back to an American doctor while in the United States sends chills up my spine.  Here, I am a person and we are a family.  There, I often felt like a lab rat.  Relax – no one in true need of medical care would ever be denied treatment while waiting for a few pieces of paperwork to get sorted.  The system is set up so that you would be covered under ACC as a visitor until you were covered.

Chanah Luppens
AKA Melissa Luppens RN BSN (an RN for 18 years in the U.S.)
Missouri Nursing Liscense
chanahluppens@yahoo.com
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– Here’s a glossary of some of the terms Chanah used here for those who are not in New Zealand or do not have a medical background and thus might not be familiar with them:

IVF -In Vitro Fertilization

Plunket – a (New Zealand) not-for-profit national organization whose people are passionately committed to supporting families and young children. We are the country’s biggest provider of Well Child/Tamariki Ora services. These include parenting advice and support, child health promotion and health education. They are offered to all New Zealand children and their family/whanau from birth to five years.  Most services are completely free.

ACC – The Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) provides comprehensive, no-fault personal injury cover for all New Zealand residents and visitors to New Zealand.

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Banks Bundled Bad Debt, Bet Against It and Won

January 4th, 2010

– I’ve long said that corporations are like junk yard dogs; in their search for unending profits, they will bite anything and everything that looks likely.  Here’s a lovely story along that line.

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In late October 2007, as the financial markets were starting to come unglued, a Goldman Sachs trader, Jonathan M. Egol, received very good news. At 37, he was named a managing director at the firm.

In late October 2007, as the financial markets were starting to come unglued, a Goldman Sachs trader, Jonathan M. Egol, received very good news. At 37, he was named a managing director at the firm.

Goldman’s own clients who bought them, however, were less fortunate.

Pension funds and insurance companies lost billions of dollars on securities that they believed were solid investments, according to former Goldman employees with direct knowledge of the deals who asked not to be identified because they have confidentiality agreements with the firm.

More… ➡

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A tale of 2 insurance approaches

December 27th, 2009

– Great article from the CBC in Canada about the U.S.’s new approach to health care and how it differs from Canada’s approach.    For me, the bottom line seems to be that the new U.S. health care approach is better than what the U.S. had before – but it is still a long way from what all the other advanced western nations have.

– The idealistic push by President Obama for real health care reform has run into the entrenched profit-centric corporations with financial skin in the game and the result is going to be a compromise that’s neither fish nor fowl.

– So far, it is better than what I feared and far worse than what I hoped for.

– And even saying this may be premature.  The long knives of the lobbyists and entrenched special interests will very likely come out in the murky adjustment processes as the Senate and the House work to meld their two version of the bill together.   These ninjas do their best work when the public’s not watching too closely.  And most of the public, at this point, think that the new face of health care is set.   But, cynics know that it is not.

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The U.S. Senate passed landmark health-care reform legislation on Dec. 24, a nearly $1-trillion bill pledging to extend coverage to an estimated 30 million Americans.

The bill still needs to go through the process of reconciliation, in which legislation passed in the House of Representatives is harmonized with the Senate’s bill. Negotiations could extend until at least February 2010. But U.S. President Barack Obama hailed the vote for bringing the country “toward the end of a nearly century-long struggle to reform America’s health-care system.”

Others say it ensured — for the most part — that the way health care is delivered in the United States would not change very much. What was approved by the Senate — and the House of Representatives before it — was not a march to Canadian-style “socialized medicine,” but rules that maintain the U.S. as the only industrialized nation in the world without universal health-care coverage.

The countries that make up the World Health Organization adopted a resolution in 2005 encouraging countries to develop health financing systems that would provide universal health care, which it defined as “securing access for all to appropriate promotive, preventive, curative and rehabilitative services at an affordable cost.”

More… ➡

– Research thanks to Van!

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Why Britain faces a bleak future of food shortages

December 21st, 2009

Britain faces a ‘perfect storm’ of water shortage and lack of food, says the government’s chief scientist, and climate change and crop and animal diseases will add to future woes. Science is now striving to find solutions.

It was an ecological disaster that occurred on the other side of the planet. Yet the drought that devastated the Australian wheat harvest last year had consequences that shook the world. It sent food prices soaring in every nation. Wheat prices across the globe soared by 130%, while shopping bills in Britain leapt by 15%.

A year later and the cost of food today has still to fall to previous levels. More alarmingly, scientists are warning that far worse lies ahead. A “perfect storm” of food shortages and water scarcity now threatens to unleash public unrest and conflict in the next 20 years, the government’s chief scientist, Professor John Beddington, has warned.

In Britain, a global food shortage would drive up import costs and make food more expensive, just as the nation’s farmers start to feel the impact of disrupted rainfall and rising temperatures caused by climate change. “If we don’t address this, we can expect major destabilisation, an increase in rioting and potentially significant problems with international migration, as people move to avoid food and water shortages,” he told a conference earlier this year.

The reliable availability of food – once taken for granted – has become a major cause for alarm among politicians and scientists. Next month several of Britain’s research councils, together with the Food Standards Agency, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Department for International Development – will announce a taskforce that will channel the UK’s efforts in feeding its own population and playing a full role in preventing starvation in other nations.

The problem is summed up by Professor Janet Allen, director of research at the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC). “We will have to grow more food on less land using less water and less fertiliser while producing fewer greenhouse gas emissions,” she said.

No one said science was easy, of course. Nevertheless, the scale of the problem is striking. It is also unprecedented, says Professor Mike Bevan, acting director of the John Innes Centre in Norfolk. “We are going to have to produce as much food in the next 50 years as was produced over the past 5,000 years. Nothing less will do.”

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Can We Feed and Save the Planet?

December 21st, 2009

Challenges of population control and food production need to be tackled in tandem

We are eating ourselves out of house and home. Recently, in the September 24 issue of Nature, Johan Rockström and his colleagues proposed 10 “planetary boundaries” to define safe limits of human activity. (Scientific American is part of the Nature Publishing Group.) Those limits include caps on greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity loss, the global conversion of land cover to cropland, and other mega-impacts on the earth’s ecosystems. Yet humanity has already exceeded several of them and is on a trajectory to exceed most of the others. The rising demand for food plays a large role in those transgressions.

The green revolution that made grain production soar gave humanity some breathing space, but the continuing rise in population and demand for meat production is exhausting that buffer. The father of the green revolution, Norman Borlaug, who passed away in September at the age of 95, made exactly this point in 1970 when he accepted the Nobel Peace Prize: “There can be no permanent progress in the battle against hunger until the agencies that fight for increased food production and those that fight for population control unite in a common effort.”

That common effort was inconsistent at best and sometimes essentially nonexistent. Since 1970 the population has risen from 3.7 billion to 6.9 billion and continues to increase by around 80 million a year. Food production per person has declined in some big regions, notably sub-Saharan Africa. In India the doubling of population has absorbed almost all of the increase in grain production.

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Indonesian minister blames disasters on immorality

December 21st, 2009

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — An Indonesian government minister has drawn sharp criticism from earthquake victims and alienated some of his Twitter followers by blaming natural disasters in Indonesia on immorality.

Communication and Information Minister Tifatul Sembiring linked disasters to declining public morals when he addressed a prayer meeting in the city of Padang to mark a Muslim holiday on Friday.

“Television broadcasts that destroy morals are plentiful in this country and therefore disasters will continue to occur,” national news agency Antara quoted Sembiring as saying in the Bahasa Indonesia language.

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