Rationing Now On The Menu

Being a woman is never an easy thing. For all the reasons that I don’t need to quote here.

It’s getting more difficult lately.

While everyone has been talking about the hidden dangers of rationing for the elderly and terminally ill in the current healthcare plan being touted by Congress - a backdoor has been thrown wide open.  That of targeting preventive screenings for women.

Earlier this week it was about pushing for mammograms after age 50, rather than the standard of age 40.  According to a new study by the US Preventive Service Task Force:

The United States Preventive Service Task Force announced Monday that it recommends against annual mammograms for women age 40 to 49 because, they say, the benefits of testing do not outweigh the "harms" and risks. 

…

The task force also recommends against teaching breast self-exams for all women and said evidence was insufficient to recommend mammograms for women older than 74.

I read earlier this week (and I can’t remember where nor can I find the link, sorry…) that just 6 months ago this same Task Force went publicly apoplectic at a 1% drop in mammograms in women over 40.  Yet now they recommend waiting another decade.

The statistic is that 1 out of every 8 women will get breast cancer in her lifetime.  When I look around my group of close female friends and apply this statistic, at least one of us will get that diagnosis. According to the American Society of Breast Disease:

For most women, predicting breast cancer risk on the basis of possible risk factors can be unreliable. Fully 70 percent of all women diagnosed with breast cancer had no known risk before the time of diagnosis. . . . To advise women age 40 and older to skip annual screening because they have no family history of the disease is imprudent, irresponsible and places their lives at unnecessary jeopardy."

Now we get pushback on screenings for cervical cancer:

Women in the United States should start cervical cancer screening at age 21 and most do not need an annual Pap smear, according to new guidelines issued Friday that aim to reduce the risk of unnecessary treatment.

According to new studies the risk of cervical cancer in young women under 21 is extremely low.  In fact, according to the same article this new recommendation is in complete contravention to statistics about cases of cervical cancer:

In the past 30 years, cervical cancer rates in the United States have fallen by more than half, due in large part to widespread use of cervical cancer screening.

So for cervical cancer screening changes, tell that to my friend Lisa who was diagnosed with cervical cancer at age 20.  She had routine pap smears since she was about 17. Contrary to the information quoted above, they were all normal until she was 20. She’s had 2 recurrences of the cancer since then. Thankfully Lisa has gone on to live a normal life; she even has a child of her own.  By these new screening standards, Lisa would be dead today – the cancer gone too far by the time she was 21.

Of the women I know who have had or are battling breast cancer – all were in their late 30s/early 40s when it was diagnosed. Another, a family member, was 78 when she was diagnosed. No family history of the disease for any of them.

By these new mammography standards – they would all be dead today.

These are all vibrant women with families and futures. With a disease that is treatable and in some cases curable with early detection through preventive screenings and testing.

I am 46 years old and have never had children.  I have been told by a friend who works as a director of a palliative care clinic that statistics say that I am 60 times more likely to get breast cancer than a woman who has had children. According to these new screening standards I shouldn’t get another mammogram for 4 years. During which time I could fall into that statistic unknowingly, with treatment coming too late.

One of the articles above talks about the anxiety caused by mammograms that screen things that, in the end, are too small for a woman to be concerned about – the anxiety of further testing and procedures.

I’d rather face that kind of anxiety with a happy ending, than the anxiety of a diagnosis received too late for any treatment to prevent death.

I read earlier this week (and I can’t remember where nor can I find the link, sorry…) that just 6 months ago this same Task Force went publicly apoplectic at a 1% drop in mammograms in women over 40.  Yet now they recommend waiting another decade.

All of which made me stop and wonder…who or what is the US Preventive Services Task Force.  The Internet is a beautiful thing:

According to the Agency for Healthcare Research Quality, US Preventive Services Task Force is "an independent panel of experts in primary care and prevention that systematically reviews the evidence of effectiveness and develops recommendations for clinical preventive services." The task force, a panel of experts, is funded and appointed by the government of the United States. [emphasis mine]

How independent can they be when they are appointed, paid for and likely controlled by the government – a government currently trying to ram a damaging and costly healthcare bill down the country’s throat with vastly dwindling support.

So what is this all about then? Money of course. As Congress prepares to unleash their deficit-producing, tax-increasing, vomit-inducing healthcare plan on the nation, they need to find ways to keep costs down so their lies have some kind of tint of truth to them.  Reducing expenses for preventive care is one of the ways – and they’ve decided to focus on women’s issues first.

Or let's call this what it really is - the start of healthcare rationing.

Because some dried up prune in Congress – yes, Nancy Pelosi I’m talking about you, a traitor to your sex – is more interested in their precious agenda than in true preventive healthcare that saves lives. How many hundreds of thousands of women, like the ones I’ve known, will go without these screenings because suddenly their insurance (public or private) won’t pay for them and they won’t be able to afford it on their own? How many of them will die because tests were administered too late?

Shame on all these people.  I just don’t know what else to say.

Success...It Does Taste Sweet

Well...I did it. I jumped so far outside of my comfort zone today that I think I entered another universe.

It's no secret that I love jewelry - the more it glitters the happier I am. I love all of it - gems, stones, crystals, silver, gold...and my jewelry boxes show that.

So much so that in the past 18 months I've started making my own jewelry. It's not hard - you just have to be able to "see" a piece completed in your head, find the materials you want and get to work. It's relaxing and really helps you tune out the crap in your life so you can focus on the task at hand.

In a moment of pure insanity, I agreed to share a table with a friend, Mary, at an Employee Craft Fair at work. Since August I've been busy on weekends and evenings make handcrafted, mostly one-of-a-kind pieces to sell.

Yes. Sell. Create a business - Jewels in Bloom. Put my stuff out on a table and hope people like what I did enough to spend their hard-earned money in this economy.

You have no idea what a big deal this was for me.  Most people are surprised to find out that in groups of people where I don't know anyone, I am shy. I find making small talk at social gatherings quite painful - get me going and comfortable and I can talk like schizophrenic magpie; it's a rare occurrence.

Until now. As it turns out - I'm good at this jewelry-selling gig. Really good at it.

The craft fair was today. 7 hours of sitting by our table, chatting it up with people I knew ... and even more people I didn't. Making small talk as if I've been doing it my entire life.

And selling my jewelry. I didn't sell out - given the economy I never expected to. I hoped to break even - and I nearly did.  I'm surprised because not all of my pieces were - affordable.

I use high quality materials - including a few "gem quality" items - and my prices reflected that.  While I worked hard to keep everything under $100, I did have several pieces that were close.  And I sold many of them.

In truth - I had a blast today.

I wish we had sold more stuff, but there are a few pieces I'm not disappointed to come home with...if you know what I mean.

I learned alot about how to set up for a craft show, what the demand is, how to get customers to come to your table and keep them looking. I'm not pushy - I'm no salesman believe me. I did discover that because I'm passionate about jewelry it is very easy for me to slip out of my shyness and into an outgoing, gregarious and happy-go-lucky person.

At the very least it was a great escape for me from the shitstorm I've been trapped in recently.

I will keep making jewelry - for myself, for friends, as gifts. And I'll likely do another craft show in the future, perhaps in the spring. Give myself the winter to build up an inventory. I may also try out setting up an account on Etsy - the "eBay of handcrafted items".  Could be good timing for holiday shopping.

In the meantime, I'm exhausted and happy. Proud of myself for doing something that, until today, I never thought I could do without having my palms sweat all day long.

Who Needs Protocol When You Are...The One

On the heels of Obama’s disastrous bow in Japan, we learn that there will be an important State Dinner at the White House next week.

Except that this isn’t actually a “State” Dinner:

In the past decade, India has been honored twice with lavish dinners, a sign of its growing global importance. In 2005, President George W. Bush set the table for Singh in the first state dinner of his second term. In 2000, President Bill Clinton hosted Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee for the last state dinner of his second term. (The upcoming dinner is technically an “official” dinner because Singh is not the head of state. That position belongs to President Pratibha Patil. But the Obama administration is referring to this as a state dinner.)

The event will see Michelle Obama, who has been the guest of honor at similar events in other countries, in the role of hostess in chief. And while every move will be scrutinized, she’s expected to put her own stamp on the dinner — while maintaining protocol. [emphasis mine]

I had to laugh out loud at that last bit. Just what exactly does the Obama Administration know about maintaining protocol?  They can’t even call this dinner what it really is. Obama keeps bowing to foreign heads of state as if he is subservient to them.

He’s making this country a laughing stock on an international stage.  

I can’t wait to see what Michelle Obama considers her own stamp on the dinner. My first advice to her would be to ditch the plaid shorts, child-sized sweaters, wide belts and veils. Watch those facial expressions around the pesky Press Corps. Then – turn the planning and execution over to a professional party planner.

Although that may be a useless exercise for the planner.  Because while it’s very clear that the Obama administration’s own Protocol Office has no clue what they are doing, it also seems obvious now that even if the Protocol Office did have a clue – the Obama’s would still do whatever they wanted.

And to prove my point:

But White House aides say the approach is deliberate — part of Obama’s determination to deliver on his campaign promise of directly engaging friends and enemies alike, giving America a less belligerent posture abroad.

“I think it's very important for the United States not to assume that what is good for us is automatically good for somebody else,” Obama told the students at the town hall, in Shanghai. “And we have to have some modesty about our attitudes towards other countries.”

I agree with Vice President Dick Cheney on Obama’s self-styled “diplomacy of deference”:

Cheney said: "There is no reason for an American president to bow to anyone. Our friends and allies don't expect it, and our enemies see it as a sign of weakness."

Obama may want to extend a handshake to anyone who asks - but that doesn't mean he should.

Saturday Symphony

Music is very personal, isn’t it?  Music can trigger memories, bring up long dead feelings, soothe you or enrage you.  For me lately I need music with powerful messages about hope, healing and love.

And because music is so personal to me, this post will lean to the person side.  Just a little bit.

In times of turmoil in my adult life there has always been one person I can count on without fail.  Of course it’s The Oracle.

He will let me rant, allow me to vent things off in any way that is the most helpful for me; he listens in a way that no one else ever has. The Oracle “gets me” on a very fundamental level – and always has. He provides me with a safe haven for my emotions – cradled in the nook of his arm I know that I’m loved and protected. That no matter what is going on outside of us – there is just us. The 2 of us united against whatever threatens us as individuals or together. And frequently it is the latter because we never know where one of us ends and the other begins.

You’re always on my mind
And when it all becomes too much
You’re never far behind
And there’s no one that comes close to you

Looking at you looking at me is the only thing that matters

The Oracle always makes me feel special.  He can look at me at my most basic – end of the work day, make-up off, face laid bare, hair all askew from the stresses of the day, hanging out in my grubbiest most mismatched pajamas – and he only sees the most beautiful woman in the world – he actually says “ahh, there’s my girl”. And it may be corny or even make you cringe – but when he looks at me I really do know that I’m the only thing that matters to him.

So baby why don't we just dance
Down the hall, maybe straight up the stairs
Bouncin' off the wall, floatin' on air
Baby why don't we just dance

We are blessed beyond measure that we have each other – and we don’t ever forget that or take it for granted.  Because in the end – no matter what happens outside of us – it’s all about us.

Coward-in-Chief

My god.

After months of deliberating, President Obama opted not to accept any of the Afghanistan war options presented by his national security team, pushing instead for revisions to clarify how and when U.S. troops would turn over responsibility to the Afghan government, a senior administration official said Wednesday. 

Clarify what exactly? 

The man spent the better part of 18 months of the presidential campaign saying over and over that Afghanistan is the right war, the necessary war. And here he is, nearly one year into his actual presidency, sitting on intelligence reports and recommendations from the ground for months.  

Obama has had more than enough time to review the recommendations from General McChrystal and ask questions or seek additional strategic options.

You’d think that after campaigning on it and having several strategic options in his hands for nearly 4 months Obama would know what he needs to do. Yet he continues to play international footsy with the lives of our warriors. 

Men and women who Obama isn’t fit to be within 100,000 miles of.

If it hasn’t been clear before, it is now.  Obama is incompetent.  He is supposed to be Commander-in-Chief; looks like he’s Coward-in-Chief for putting politics over the safety and well-being of our warriors.

A$$hole.

Veteran's Day

What better tribute is there for our returning warriors than the love of ... their pets.

Thank you to all Veterans for your service and commitment to this great country.

Ducks on Parade

I haven’t said anything in this space about the Fort Hood massacre.  My heart and soul grieves deeply whenever our warriors are killed – at home or overseas, in accidents or in battle.

But when they are killed by one of their own – a terrorist masquerading as a compassionate mental health professional – I lose my ability to speak coherently.  And I frequently say things that I mean wholeheartedly but that could get me in trouble later; I damn sure am not going to send those thoughts into the ether.

The Fort Hood killer is a terrorist of the Muslim variety – that cannot be disputed as anything except fact. An Islamist who began behaving like someone going to his martyrdom in the weeks prior to the massacre.  An Islamist who attended the same mosque visited by some of the terrorists of 9/11.  An Islamist who shouted Allahu Akbar as he brutally murdered 13 of our warriors and wounded over 30 more.

Islam.  While being a terrorist isn’t exclusive to this community, it does seem to be more than common – the vast majority of international terrorist attacks of the past 30+ years have been committed by members of Islam – Iran Hostage Crisis 1979, Marine Barracks in Lebanon 1983, WTC 1993, Kenya & Tanzania Embassies 1998, WTC, Pentagon and PA in 2001, Bali Bombing 2002, London Bombings 2005 … and the list goes on. When the Muslim community worldwide stands together and condemns actions such as those committed at Fort Hood – I may start to believe that they aren’t a religion that preaches violence and foments hatred of anything that isn’t Islamic. Until that time…

Walks like a duck. Talks like a duck….

This should be required reading for all Americans. 

But why confuse ourselves with facts? The narrative has been set down: the problem involves not killers shooting innocents for pathological reasons, but nonexistent mobs running the streets of America, waving ropes and looking for anyone wearing a dishdash. It's not Islamists who are responsible; it's us, America and the people who inhabit it. The great thing about multiculturalism is that it can be cut down, trimmed, reshaped and refurbished and made to fit anything. Here it has been reworked to serve as the cover for the murder of thirteen servicemen and the maiming of thirty-odd others. And we're supposed to sit back and nod and say, "Obama knows best. If anything's wrong, Obama will tell us."

Because what is happening now with the whitewashing of the Muslim connection to the Fort Hood killer portends further evil and attacks on our own soil.  It will embolden others like Nidal Hassan – look at the American appeasers? We can slaughter their own people on their own lands and the American government won’t do anything except defend us.

Joe Biden said during the campaign that Obama would be tested, likely in his first year. And that the reaction would be something we would question but that we had to trust that Obama would do the right thing.

Is this it?  Is the Fort Hood massacre the “test” – terrorism committed by a Muslim on American soil; terrorism directed at our armed forces. Because so far the reaction from Obama has been sub-par for the President of a country just attacked from within.

The Oracle has joined a weekend league at our range that focuses on defensive, tactical shooting. I’ve been thinking about trying my hand at it; I’ve been thinking about purchasing an LCP for conceal/carry purposes.  So far these have only been thoughts.

I’m beginning to see that getting our permits to conceal & carry earlier this year may have been one of the most intelligent decisions we’ve ever made. I’m also beginning to move from “thinking” about an LCP to actually getting one.

The Waiting Game - At Grave Expense

Rome is burning and Caesar continues to fiddle … with the lives of our warriors.

President Barack Obama is nearing a decision to send more than 30,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan next year, but he may not announce it until after he consults with key allies and completes a trip to Asia later this month…

“Later this month” means after November 19.  After which there is a meeting with our NATO allies on November 23 – which is supposedly when Obama will unveil his long-awaited Afghanistan strategy and look for NATO’s approval of the use of our own troops.

Americans represent nearly 2/3 of the total number of troops in Afghanistan.  I understand NATO is made up of our allies, but since when do we allow the minority to dictate the strategy of the majority?  This isn’t about who pays for dinner or being fair or politically correct.

This is about the lives of American men and women.  Each of whom possess more character in a single eyelash than Obama could ever claim in 10 lifetimes.

And … what happens right after that NATO meeting?  Our nation’s holiday – Thanksgiving – and you know the prevaricator-in-chief will further postpone a decision on Afghanistan in favor of eating turkey at the White House.

The 30,000 troops Obama will purportedly recommend are 50,000 less than requested by General McChrystal – back in July.  By the time Obama makes a decision he will have had the report from the ground for nearly 5 months.  5 months where Obama played more golf that President Bush did in over 2 years, where he made a public spectacle of himself regarding the Olympics, where he appeared in numerous press conferences about … well about anything he felt like talking about that held the spotlight on him.

And in those 5 months, 155 of our warriors gave their lives in service to their country – more than half of the 286 total to date in 2009.  A fact that Obama can only honor with a photo op. Where every opportunity to potentially do the right thing is consistently viewed thru the lens of politics:

Administration officials also want time to launch a public relations offensive to convince an increasingly skeptical public and a wary Democratic Congress — which must agree to fund the administration's plan — that the war, now in its ninth year and inflicting rising casualties, is one of "necessity," as Obama said earlier this year.

"This is not going to be an easy sell, especially with the fight over health care and the (Democratic) party's losses" of the governors' mansions in New Jersey and Virginia last week, said one official. [emphasis mine]

Yeah, those Democrat losses mean so much to our warriors on the ground.  I bet they all huddled around a campfire, bemoaning those losses as tracer fire echoed overhead.  I bet those warriors were more concerned about the outcome of the New Jersey governor’s race than about the IEDs blowing up in front of them.

Seeing how Obama is treating his “war of necessity” should be a sobering call to the rest of the country; it’s the perfect illustration of how he will deal with issues as president - if it’s not about him it’s not important.

Saturday Symphony

Beautiful melodies. Stunning voices. Deeply moving lyrics.

It's a combination you don't always get in music - sometimes you have to sacrifice one to get the other two - or worse.

With Annie Lennox - you always get all three ... and so much more. She is an aural feast. I have loved her voice since her days with The Eurythmics. They introduced a militant sound to music, yet still retained the melodies, the emotional impact of their lyrics. Lush arrangements filled with that sound - Annie Lennox's voice is definitely one for the ages.

One of my fave songs from the Eurythmics is Missionary Man.  All embedding is disabled by YouTube for any decent version of this song, so go here if you aren't familiar with this tune.  It's aggressive and erotic. The video is classic 1980s style - lots of fun to watch.

As a solo artist, Annie Lennox continues to outdo herself.  This version of Why is haunting - spare in its arrangement and filled with the howling emotions of the song. And there is that voice. There are over 20 years between what you hear in The Eurythmics and what is here - and her voice retains that gorgeous deep tone, resonating with every heartbeat. Tempting you with the promise of the next note, the next emotional wave.

One more for today - this from the soundtrack of the The Lord of Rings: Return of the King. Listen to the incredible control of her instrument - feeding the words to you thru a lens of rich experience. Into the West is a melancholy song about passages - and it suits my current frame of mind.

The New Math

The Obama administration is introducing a new kind of math to the general public.  Did you know that 1+1=14,330?  No? 

Well, educate yourself please and check it out:

The Obama administration last week released the first round of data designed to underpin the worthiness of its economic stimulus plan, which so far has directed $1.25 billion to Illinois schools. That money has helped save or create 14,330 school jobs in the state, the administration claimed.

But those statistics, compiled initially by the Illinois State Board of Education, appear riddled with anomalies that raise questions about their validity, according to a Tribune analysis of district-by-district stimulus spending and other state data. Many local school officials were perplexed by the stimulus data attributed to their districts.

In the official report, Wilmette Public Schools District 39 was credited with 166 jobs saved by stimulus aid. Superintendent Raymond Lechner said the number should be zero.

At Dolton-Riverdale School District 148, stimulus funds were said to have saved the equivalent of 382 full-time teaching jobs — 142 more than the district actually has.

A similar discrepancy was found in data for Kankakee School District 111, where the stimulus report logged the equivalent of 665 full-time jobs saved. “That’s impossible,” a top Kankakee school official said, adding that the entire payroll — full and part time — is 600 workers.

In addition to a new counting system, the Obama administration rolled out a new corporate merit system.

Did you get a raise this year?  I did.  Did you know that means your job was saved through the economic stimulus package, aka porkulus?

About two-thirds of the 14,506 jobs claimed to be saved under one federal office, the Administration for Children and Families at Health and Human Services, actually weren’t saved at all, according to a review of the latest data by The Associated Press. Instead, that figure includes more than 9,300 existing employees in hundreds of local agencies who received pay raises and benefits and whose jobs weren’t saved. [emphasis mine]

I wasn’t aware the employees got raises to save their jobs.  The Obama administration wants us to believe it:

“If I give you a raise, it is going to save a portion of your job,” HHS spokesman Luis Rosero said.

Well … not really. See, here in the real world where most people live, a raise usually means you’ve done a good job in the past year and that your employer expects that you will continue that trend in the coming year.  

The real world – a place that no one in the Obama administration has ever spent time. What I’d like is this – some of whatever they have put in the water supply in Washington, D.C. Cuz that is some good shit.