Month: December 2009

Abortion foes almost kill the US universal health insurance bill

Abortion foes (so called pro-lifers) in the US want to interfere into other people’s business.

None of the proposals under discussion would ban abortion. None would take away your right to buy abortion coverage with your own money. None would force you to pay for somebody else’s abortion. These are the conceptual parameters on which all sides have, for the time being, agreed.

So they already clobbered Congress into making special complicated arrangements for abortion foes (so called pro-lifers). Only for this vociferous group. Not for other special interests or religious convictions.

Abortion, we’re told, is different from other issues caught up in the health care debate. It’s a question of ultimate values, impervious to compromise. […]
Each side has legitimate worries. Pro-choicers fear that insurers will abandon abortion coverage. Pro-lifers fear that insurers will be forced to include it. Pro-choicers fear that women won’t buy abortion coverage if the premiums are separated up front. Pro-lifers fear that abortion opponents will be suckered into abortion coverage if the premiums aren’t separated up front. We’ll have years of studies, hearings, legislation, and lawsuits to follow up on these concerns and fine-tune the policy.Source: http://www.slate.com/id/2239647/

  • “Pro-lifers” are opposed to abortion and thus want to make sure their money does not go towards funding someone’s abortion
  • Well I am opposed to paying for the war in Iraq.  Did they make special income tax arrangements for me? Those in favor of the Iraq war can pay a special additional war tax.
  • I am also against nuclear weapons. Those who want the US to have nuclear missiles should opt into a special nuclear tax option.
  • I am opposed to keeping people alive in intensive care, when they are brain dead in a coma. Or when they are terminally ill and in pain and are not allowed to die.
    • Some of these guys live for 15 years in intensive care in a coma.
    • Very expensive.
    • Can I please have a health insurance exemption so I don’t have to pay for that?
  • I am totally profoundly against this artificial prolonging of life,  I consider this torture.  It is against my consciousness and against my religion.
  • It is unnatural. In nature, very sick animals and people get mercy killing by predators.

The above items are ultimate values for me. No compromise is possible. They are my religious belief, so by no means I must be forcet to pay for unjust wars of aggression and painful prolonging of life a against a person’s will. My beliefs on the follwing items are a little less strong, still I think I deserve exemptions in order not to pay for the following items:

  • I am also against paying for diseases people caused to themselves. I don’t want to pay treatment for people who
    • committed suicide attempts
    • abuse alcohol and drugs
    • do extreme sports and have accidents due to their recklessness
    • engange in criminal activities and get shot by police or rival gangs
    • overeat
    • don’t exercise
  • I live in a hot state. I am also opposed to treat people for frost bite. That should be an add-on.
  • I live on ground floor. I don’t want to pay for elevator maintenance.

So we should have 15 different voluntary private add-on insurance options for each of the following: comatose, terminally ill, obese, self-endangering, reckless, criminal, drug addicted, alcoholics, ……

Note the absurd idea that parents or young people will, at extra cost,  add insurance for abortion, criminal activity, drug addiction. They will presume that they will not engange in these behaviors, that they will not need the insurance.

This is religious zealots’ terror.  If you are against abortion, then don’t do abortion. But leave other people alone.

Actually, I agree that one should use better birth control, to make efforts to avoid needing abortion. But the same people who are against abortion are the ones that are sex education and promotion of birth control.

Should Parents of Obese Kids Lose Custody?

[:en]parents should be obliged not only to give enough food, cleanliness and schooling, but also HEALTHY quality food in corrrect amounts and exercise. Government food and exercise policy is dangerously deficient[:de]Eltern sollten nicht nur die Pflicht haben genug Essen, Hygiene, Schule zu geben, sondern auch GESUNDES Essen in richtiger Menge, und körperliche Bewegung und Sport[:pt]Pais deveriam ser obrigados não somente a dar comida suficiente, cuidados com higiene, e eschola, mas também comida SAUDÁVEL, de qualidade, em quantidade correta, exercicio saudável

But obesity appears to be the primary reason South Carolina mom Jerri Gray lost custody of her 14-year-old, 555-lb. son in May. She was arrested after missing a court date to examine whether she should retain custody after doctors had expressed concern about her son’s weight to social services. The boy is currently living with his aunt, and his mother is facing criminal child-neglect charges. […]”It’s happening more than the public is aware of, but because these cases are usually kept quiet [as a result of child-privacy laws], we have no record,” says Dr. Matt Capehorn, who sits on the board of the U.K.’s National Obesity Forum.

Source: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1930772,00.html

Parents have an obligation to care for their little children. Parents face legal sanctions or loss of paternal rights if they do not provide basic care for their children, for example if children are

  • undernourished
  • unkept and dirty
  • truant missing school education.

It actually makes a lot of sense, to add this list

  • morbid obesity, obviously.
    • Unless if  proven it is not the parent’s fault andit persists after
      • medical
      • nutritional
      • and physical education interventions.
  • any minor kind of obesity and overweight
  • lack of healthy exercise.
  • unhealthy food at home

    • The epidemic of obesity that kills more people then all wars together, needs more serious attention. Actually, any lack of movement, any overweight should be considered abuse. The child has no recourse against it, and when it is a fat overweight diabetic adult it is too late.
    Of course, this suggestion to require responsible parenting contradicts all  the

    Faulty government policy regarding obesity & other health hazards (alcohol, …)

    • Promote interest of big beef farmers.
    • Let Coca Cola and McDonalds reign and advertise to children without health warnings.
    • it is totally insane that the government does not have EMERGENCY plans against all these health epidemics.`Rather, government should be engaged in
      • promotion of healthy nutrition
        • natural,
        • low salt,
        • high in vitamins, l
        • low in sugar,
        • little additives
        • people should NEVER imbibe enough alcohol to get drunk or even tipsy. Alcohol should be taken like in mediterranean countries (Italy, France) who have a tradition of taking one glass of wine with meals.  Society should shun people who drink excessively and get drunk.
      • promotion of healthy exercise
      • there should be government emergency programs to promote exercise for children and adults.

    Killer’s human rights: German killers sue Wikipedia to have their names expurged

    In 1990, Bavarian actor Walter Sedlmayr was brutally murdered. Two of his business associates were convicted, imprisoned for the crime, and recently paroled. Who killed Sedlmayr? Its a matter of public record, but if one of the men and his German law firm gets their way, Wikipedia (and EFF) will not be allowed to tell you. A few days ago, the online encyclopedia received a cease and desist letter from one of the convicts—represented by the aptly named German law firm Stopp and Stopp—demanding that the perpetrator’s name be taken off of the Sedlmayr article page.

    At issue is an apparent conflict between the U.S. First Amendment—which protects truthful speech—and German law—which seeks to protect the name and likenesses of private persons from unwanted publicity.

    Source: http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/11/murderer-wikipedia-shhh

    Human rights became a weapon to protect criminals. German courts convincingly take human rights protection to their logical conclusion. Convicted criminals should have a chance in life to re-socialize, after they get out of jail and finished their punishment.

    Would it not be interesting if Walter Sedlmeyer’s heirs were fined or imprisioned for publishing the name of their father’s murderer?

    Maybe off-line paper encyclopedias should be burned to expurge history? What about Hitler’s and Stalin’s rights to be forgotten?

    Devil’s advocate’s irreverant suggestion

    Maybe we should re-think human rights for criminals. Maybe like in old times, criminals should be executed, or permanently marked and mutilated.

    Or maybe we should go all the way with human rights and government should employ or financially support criminals for the rest of their life, This is more honest then deceiving citizens into employing ex-criminals  who were given a deceptively clean police record. Some hard labor jobs where they can earn their living but not threaten law abiding citizens would be a good option.

    Brazil takes human rights for adolescents to the extreme: underage (under 18 years) criminals can get a maximum of 3 years of “educational measures” even if they killed, raped, and mutiliated many people). And after these three years, their criminal record is wiped clean. So you can do a background check on your new baby sitter or house maid, and get a clean police record, even though she is a multiple rapist and serial killer. This is “human rights” taken to their extreme. It is strange: law abiding citizens have no human rights to be protected from criminals.

    Praise the US constitution and the First Amendment.  No discussion in the US about censoring truth. Not a chance.

    Of course, on the other end of the spectrum are kids who will be on sex offender lists all life long for having had consensual sex with a 15 year old when they were 17 or 18 year old.

    Latest News: the German Supreme Court decided that the freedom of press archives is more important then the right of criminals to have their records deleted (Bundesgerichtshof urteilt gegen Sedlmayr-Mörder Dec. 15, 2009)

    Read more press reports about human rights and secrecy for German murderers

    Self Deception: "False beliefs are helpful" paradox

    Life is complicated. There actually are paradoxes that are very hard to solve.

    Example: I am convinced religion is wrong. There is no God. But, on the other hand there is lots of research proving “miracles” of religion like

    1. Imagine a poor, uneducated, violent neighborhood. If any church can gain foothold there, crime decreases, the entire community starts improving and working better. It is good, it is an improvement. So even if the church teaches wrong things, even if the church is run by a fraudster who just wants to siphon away part 10% of the faithful’s income (Tenth, Tithe), the church can have a positive effect. It is false, but it does good.
    2. James Randi (“Flim Flam”) is a great guy who relentlessly preaches against false beliefs, astrology, wonder healers, dowsing rods etc.
      3. Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions by James Randi $22.98 0879751983 James Randi has a US$ 1 Million bet that anyone can win who can show any paranormal effect to him. He never had to pay. For example, James Randi debunked a US$ 1000 dowsing rod that was sold to US police departments. These dowsing rods could identify criminals! But James Randi himself admits that the dowsing rods worked. They helped police identify criminals they otherwise would not have identified.
    3. People who are very religious, people who have supersticious beliefs about their breast cancer recover better then average from breast cancer (research by Professor Shelley Taylor). So if you take their beliefs away, you are reducing their chances of recovery. Positive Illusions by Shelley E Taylor $16.95 0465060528

      4. Health Psychology by Shelley E. Taylor $64.50 0071283609
    4. Placebo effect in Medicine: if you believe in healing power, you have a good chance of getting healed. And the more invasive the method is the better it works. A huge european study on acupuncture found that sticking needles into someone has a stronger placebo effect then pills. So let us assume that acupuncture and homeopathy are quackery ( I don’t want to discuss the merit of this here and now). But it has effects when done by a professional doctor who is strongly enough self deceived that he honestly believes in it.

    So maybe the truth does harm. Very disturbing idea! Maybe I should start praising the virtues of human stupidity, self deception and unconsciousness.