Wow.
The noise from the last summer has abated a little bit. The vitriol, however, has not. The so-called Tea Party Patriots, who say they want to take their country back, are really advocating taking the country back to the way it was, to its white ways, to its segregationist ways, to its racist ways, all those ways that we thought were so behind us.
They have Sarah Palin, whose slogan is immutably "common sense" (what does it mean anyway? It's not commonsense when people disagree. She needs to go back to high school) politics, but who really has nothing but a big hollow between her ears. Glenn Beck, whose historionics has the feeble-minded mesmerized, is nothing but a clown who will do anything for a laugh. And both of them are so loud.
Well, the more noise emanates from these people, the farther left I am pushed. And believe me I am not a lefty.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Let's Get Things Done!
I know for a fact that, when Barack Obama was running for president, some people bought guns because they thought that Obama and his thugs would come to their house and loot everything.
Now that fear has has not materialized, these crazy people have concocted another story of how Obama is going to take their "freedom" away. Excuse me, what kind of "freedom" are you talking about? If it was so easy to define what "freedom" was, philosophers would not have been talking about it for the last two millenia.
For crying out loud, stop the craziness and let's get things done!
Now that fear has has not materialized, these crazy people have concocted another story of how Obama is going to take their "freedom" away. Excuse me, what kind of "freedom" are you talking about? If it was so easy to define what "freedom" was, philosophers would not have been talking about it for the last two millenia.
For crying out loud, stop the craziness and let's get things done!
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Pondering the Election Results from Last Night
Doug Hoffmann says the fight isn't over. The battle continues. I am wondering, "who is he fighting?" Surely, he doesn't mean fellow Americans! If he does, is he insinuating some sort of a civil war? That last time Americans fought Americans was a disaster.
Anyhow, the NY-23 election was a referendum on the GOP more than any other election in the country. It voted for the Democrat, something that it hadn't done in about 150 years. WOW.
In my hometown of Wilmington, NC, the municipal election was a clean Democratic sweep. The only thing that saddens me is that the lone woman on the council did not get reelected. I am sure that we will see more of her in the future.
Anyhow, the NY-23 election was a referendum on the GOP more than any other election in the country. It voted for the Democrat, something that it hadn't done in about 150 years. WOW.
In my hometown of Wilmington, NC, the municipal election was a clean Democratic sweep. The only thing that saddens me is that the lone woman on the council did not get reelected. I am sure that we will see more of her in the future.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Mere Mention of the Name Marx Gets People's Blood Boiling!
Wow.
The blog below is the blog that was posted on the Huffington Post.
I was merely proposing the use of that one specific concept of "alienation" to see if that it would work in understanding how we can actually insure our health only to have coverage denied when we need that insurance.
The conclusion I arrived at was that somehow we lose ownership of our health when we insure it. So that's when I saw Marx's "alienation" at work. It dawned on me, we use the term "health insurance industry" for a reason!
Das Kapital is too long, too convoluted, so I ended up using the Manuscripts of 1844. I thought the model worked pretty well in talking about how our health has become externalized to a degree that it can be insured like cars, boats, houses, etc. Then we begin to understand that using our health as capital, the insurance companies make money. Using our health as capital, they make more money. So the insurance companies are the owners of our health, and not us!
Would I propose any type of Marxism for any part of my government? Of course not! I don't even know what that would be! But can we use Marx's thinking, his earlier ones that are less tainted by his political vision, to illuminate on some of the things that are happening, especially health care? Absolutely!
However, some people can't get past the word, "Marx," and are writing almost by the book criticisms of what they call Marxism. However, if you read their comments, what they mean is not Marxism, but some sort of Stalinism or Leninism, that is the Soviet style dictatorship, which had really no semblance to Marx's ideas.
Hmmmm. Some people are coming to my defense. This has been just very, very interesting.
The blog below is the blog that was posted on the Huffington Post.
I was merely proposing the use of that one specific concept of "alienation" to see if that it would work in understanding how we can actually insure our health only to have coverage denied when we need that insurance.
The conclusion I arrived at was that somehow we lose ownership of our health when we insure it. So that's when I saw Marx's "alienation" at work. It dawned on me, we use the term "health insurance industry" for a reason!
Das Kapital is too long, too convoluted, so I ended up using the Manuscripts of 1844. I thought the model worked pretty well in talking about how our health has become externalized to a degree that it can be insured like cars, boats, houses, etc. Then we begin to understand that using our health as capital, the insurance companies make money. Using our health as capital, they make more money. So the insurance companies are the owners of our health, and not us!
Would I propose any type of Marxism for any part of my government? Of course not! I don't even know what that would be! But can we use Marx's thinking, his earlier ones that are less tainted by his political vision, to illuminate on some of the things that are happening, especially health care? Absolutely!
However, some people can't get past the word, "Marx," and are writing almost by the book criticisms of what they call Marxism. However, if you read their comments, what they mean is not Marxism, but some sort of Stalinism or Leninism, that is the Soviet style dictatorship, which had really no semblance to Marx's ideas.
Hmmmm. Some people are coming to my defense. This has been just very, very interesting.
Health Care Industry: How Karl Marx Can Help Us Understand the Health Care Crisis
In order to rethink fundamentally the debate surrounding health care reform, we need to first understand what exactly health insurance is and what it insures. With external objects, such as a home, a car, or a boat, we know exactly what a policy insures: a home, a car, a boat, respectively. We insure for the recovery, whether by repair or replacement, of the products that we buy in case of damage or loss.
How About Your Health Insurance?
With health insurance, if we are lucky to have it, we are able to secure funding for the necessary cost of recovering our health from a catastrophic disease. In this sense, there seems to be no difference between a car policy, for example, and a health policy. However, this does seem quite right.
In the case of a car, we understand without a doubt that it is an external object that is physically separate from us. The same with homes, boats, and other things. Unlike these objects, however, our health is not external. It is what makes us function, what enables us to lead productive, meaningful lives. It allows us to be who we are. It is inconceivable to even imagine that our health is somehow external to us. So then can we talk about the health insurance industry in the same ways as we talk about the property insurance industry?
How Then Is Health Insurance Even Possible? Enter Marx.
In order to understand this problem, I propose that we use the Marxian concept of "alienation." Karl Marx uses this concept to understand the relationship of labor to its product in his manuscripts from 1844, This concept is useful in helping us understand how our health undergoes the same process of "alienation" from ourselves in a dialectic process that makes health both ours, but at the same time not ours. Let me explain.
Let us agree first that to work is human nature. As humans we are defined by the work we do. In fact, we are our work, and our names often reveal that. We are Smiths, Masons, Coopers, Shoemakers, Millers, etc.
However, as soon as these products enter the cycle of being bought and sold for profit, the relationship we have with these products undergoes a fundamental change. They become something alien to us and take on a life of their own, complete separate from us. So as they accrue value, the workers who produced them see their ownership in them diminish while at the same time seeing their own value in proportion to the value of their products diminish. According to Marx, "[t]he greater his [worker's] activity, therefore, the less he possesses. What is embodied in the product of his labour is no longer his own. The greater this product is, therefore, the more he is diminished."
This is precisely how the process of "alienation" starts. The worker starts to be "related to the product of his labour as to an alien object." The "alienation" of the worker in his product means not only that "his labour becomes an object, assumes an external existence, but that it exists independently, outside himself, and alien to him, and that it stands opposed to him as an autonomous power."
So as the worker works, the more he produces through his work, the more alienated his activity becomes from himself. It becomes a "commodity as it enters a fundamentally different relationship, "a commercial relationship, a relationship of exchange, of buying and selling." Thus, our work, that which defines us, that which is our nature, becomes the source of profit, not for us, but for those who control it.
Our Health Has Become a Commodity For an Entire Industry.
This process of "alienation of labor" helps us understand just how the health insurance industry works today. Our health, that which enables us to work, becomes alienated from us. We insure our health as if it were an external object just like a car, a home, or a boat. The premiums we pay according to age, state of health, gender, family history are all components of this externalization of our health put in dollar value. The cost of each procedure that we receive, where the most life-saving interventions are the most costly to the less costly routine exams, is calculated according to how much it will cost to repair and/or replace that specific part of the body.
The way the health insurance industry is set up in today's America, the "industry" insures our health only as long as it is productive. Our health is wrested from us, made into an external object, with which to draw enormous profit, not for us, but for those who control the "industry." It is literally "alienated" from us having undergone the transformation from something intrinsic to us to an external product. The health that is insured , however, is not the whole of our health, from good to bad, but only that part that is productive. Only that part that makes profit. Only that part that generates profit.
The word "industry" itself is apt in describing our current insurance system. Under "industry" we assume that there is a concrete, external object produced through human labor that is insurable. The word itself propagates the idea that our health is capital, curiously not our own, but rather the capital with which the industry itself becomes wealthier and wealthier. The recent revelation of the outlandish salaries of the insurance companies' executives reflects that. Somehow, we feel deep down that this is not right. That our health is not a commodity. That is why there is a great outrage at these exorbitant salaries.
Hence, the problem with this model is that, as Marxian model of "alienation" points out, our health maybe insured, but we are not. As soon as we are not able to produce that desirable external object, our health, we are no longer insurable. And why not? Because we are no longer the owner of our health. The insurance companies are. Those that profit from owning our health are. Hence, the healthier we are, the less ownership we have of our health. This is the Marxian dialectic is at work.
Can You Really Be Alienated From Your Health?
In my opinion, it is absurd to think that our health is something that can be alienated from us, commodified by a whole industry for its profit. Commodities exist solely for the profit of the owners. However, insuring our health is not like insuring a car, a home, or a boat. There is no pretense about these objects being external. If we lose them, we do not die. On the other hand, if we lose our health and our insurance because we are no longer healthy, we die for the simple fact that we cannot afford the care necessary.
It is time to fundamentally rethink the structure of health care. First of all, we need to move away from the notion that our health is something to be insured by an "industry." The notion that it is any part of an industry is a fundamentally wrong. "Health insurance industry" itself is a misnomer. Health is not a commodity. It cannot and ought not to be commodified. Our health should not be used for profit.
We need to take back the ownership of our health. Let's bring the care into "health care" instead of giving it to an "industry." Our lives depend on it.
Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yuna-shin/health-insurance-industry_b_318340.html
How About Your Health Insurance?
With health insurance, if we are lucky to have it, we are able to secure funding for the necessary cost of recovering our health from a catastrophic disease. In this sense, there seems to be no difference between a car policy, for example, and a health policy. However, this does seem quite right.
In the case of a car, we understand without a doubt that it is an external object that is physically separate from us. The same with homes, boats, and other things. Unlike these objects, however, our health is not external. It is what makes us function, what enables us to lead productive, meaningful lives. It allows us to be who we are. It is inconceivable to even imagine that our health is somehow external to us. So then can we talk about the health insurance industry in the same ways as we talk about the property insurance industry?
How Then Is Health Insurance Even Possible? Enter Marx.
In order to understand this problem, I propose that we use the Marxian concept of "alienation." Karl Marx uses this concept to understand the relationship of labor to its product in his manuscripts from 1844, This concept is useful in helping us understand how our health undergoes the same process of "alienation" from ourselves in a dialectic process that makes health both ours, but at the same time not ours. Let me explain.
Let us agree first that to work is human nature. As humans we are defined by the work we do. In fact, we are our work, and our names often reveal that. We are Smiths, Masons, Coopers, Shoemakers, Millers, etc.
However, as soon as these products enter the cycle of being bought and sold for profit, the relationship we have with these products undergoes a fundamental change. They become something alien to us and take on a life of their own, complete separate from us. So as they accrue value, the workers who produced them see their ownership in them diminish while at the same time seeing their own value in proportion to the value of their products diminish. According to Marx, "[t]he greater his [worker's] activity, therefore, the less he possesses. What is embodied in the product of his labour is no longer his own. The greater this product is, therefore, the more he is diminished."
This is precisely how the process of "alienation" starts. The worker starts to be "related to the product of his labour as to an alien object." The "alienation" of the worker in his product means not only that "his labour becomes an object, assumes an external existence, but that it exists independently, outside himself, and alien to him, and that it stands opposed to him as an autonomous power."
So as the worker works, the more he produces through his work, the more alienated his activity becomes from himself. It becomes a "commodity as it enters a fundamentally different relationship, "a commercial relationship, a relationship of exchange, of buying and selling." Thus, our work, that which defines us, that which is our nature, becomes the source of profit, not for us, but for those who control it.
Our Health Has Become a Commodity For an Entire Industry.
This process of "alienation of labor" helps us understand just how the health insurance industry works today. Our health, that which enables us to work, becomes alienated from us. We insure our health as if it were an external object just like a car, a home, or a boat. The premiums we pay according to age, state of health, gender, family history are all components of this externalization of our health put in dollar value. The cost of each procedure that we receive, where the most life-saving interventions are the most costly to the less costly routine exams, is calculated according to how much it will cost to repair and/or replace that specific part of the body.
The way the health insurance industry is set up in today's America, the "industry" insures our health only as long as it is productive. Our health is wrested from us, made into an external object, with which to draw enormous profit, not for us, but for those who control the "industry." It is literally "alienated" from us having undergone the transformation from something intrinsic to us to an external product. The health that is insured , however, is not the whole of our health, from good to bad, but only that part that is productive. Only that part that makes profit. Only that part that generates profit.
The word "industry" itself is apt in describing our current insurance system. Under "industry" we assume that there is a concrete, external object produced through human labor that is insurable. The word itself propagates the idea that our health is capital, curiously not our own, but rather the capital with which the industry itself becomes wealthier and wealthier. The recent revelation of the outlandish salaries of the insurance companies' executives reflects that. Somehow, we feel deep down that this is not right. That our health is not a commodity. That is why there is a great outrage at these exorbitant salaries.
Hence, the problem with this model is that, as Marxian model of "alienation" points out, our health maybe insured, but we are not. As soon as we are not able to produce that desirable external object, our health, we are no longer insurable. And why not? Because we are no longer the owner of our health. The insurance companies are. Those that profit from owning our health are. Hence, the healthier we are, the less ownership we have of our health. This is the Marxian dialectic is at work.
Can You Really Be Alienated From Your Health?
In my opinion, it is absurd to think that our health is something that can be alienated from us, commodified by a whole industry for its profit. Commodities exist solely for the profit of the owners. However, insuring our health is not like insuring a car, a home, or a boat. There is no pretense about these objects being external. If we lose them, we do not die. On the other hand, if we lose our health and our insurance because we are no longer healthy, we die for the simple fact that we cannot afford the care necessary.
It is time to fundamentally rethink the structure of health care. First of all, we need to move away from the notion that our health is something to be insured by an "industry." The notion that it is any part of an industry is a fundamentally wrong. "Health insurance industry" itself is a misnomer. Health is not a commodity. It cannot and ought not to be commodified. Our health should not be used for profit.
We need to take back the ownership of our health. Let's bring the care into "health care" instead of giving it to an "industry." Our lives depend on it.
Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yuna-shin/health-insurance-industry_b_318340.html
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Health Insurance Industry: An Oxymoron
My thoughts lately:
In order for an industry to exist, there has to be some sort of a capitalist notion that there exist a capital in the form of a tradable commodity. As it is traded, it gains more and more capital and as it gains more and more capital, it becomes more and more desirable, etc. Wealth is created for those who trade in it. Hence, the CEOs and the stockholders are becoming rich. This is the typical capitalist theory, the theory based upon capital and the desirability of that capital.
I read somewhere in a blog about someone talking about the health insurance industry. Now that assumes that this industry deals with some sort of commodity that is tradable. I am beginning to wonder, if your and my health a commodity that can be bought and sold for someone else's profit?
The way the insurance industry is run right now it is. However, it is desirable only as long as your health is good. You are dropped as soon as your health starts to deteriorate. Therefore, in this capitalist model, your health is something that can become completely detached from your own self where your body becomes only the vessel of the abstract health that is traded by the insurance industry.
The question then is: can you be detached from your health? Are you a commodity to such a degree that you can be parceled into different parts, corporeal or not, and sold and traded as if they were commodities?
In my opinion, it is absurd to think that your health is something that can be traded, sold, commodified by other people for their profit, not yours. As soon as your health loses its status as a desirable capital, then you find yourself dropped by the industry. Your health, as long as you have it is commodified to the degree that when you do need the insurance, for which you pay, it loses its value as a commodity. You lose control of your commodity, it is at the hands of those whose sole interest is to make money any way possible.
It is time to fundamentally rethink about health insurance. First of all, we need to change our opinion that it is an industry. The notion that it is an industry is a fundamentally wrong. "Health insurance industry" itself is misnomer. Health is not a commodity. It cannot and ought not to be commodified.
Therefore, it seems to me that we need to come away from the thinking that health insurance is an industry. It is not an industry because health is not a commodity. Your health should not be used for profit.
In order for an industry to exist, there has to be some sort of a capitalist notion that there exist a capital in the form of a tradable commodity. As it is traded, it gains more and more capital and as it gains more and more capital, it becomes more and more desirable, etc. Wealth is created for those who trade in it. Hence, the CEOs and the stockholders are becoming rich. This is the typical capitalist theory, the theory based upon capital and the desirability of that capital.
I read somewhere in a blog about someone talking about the health insurance industry. Now that assumes that this industry deals with some sort of commodity that is tradable. I am beginning to wonder, if your and my health a commodity that can be bought and sold for someone else's profit?
The way the insurance industry is run right now it is. However, it is desirable only as long as your health is good. You are dropped as soon as your health starts to deteriorate. Therefore, in this capitalist model, your health is something that can become completely detached from your own self where your body becomes only the vessel of the abstract health that is traded by the insurance industry.
The question then is: can you be detached from your health? Are you a commodity to such a degree that you can be parceled into different parts, corporeal or not, and sold and traded as if they were commodities?
In my opinion, it is absurd to think that your health is something that can be traded, sold, commodified by other people for their profit, not yours. As soon as your health loses its status as a desirable capital, then you find yourself dropped by the industry. Your health, as long as you have it is commodified to the degree that when you do need the insurance, for which you pay, it loses its value as a commodity. You lose control of your commodity, it is at the hands of those whose sole interest is to make money any way possible.
It is time to fundamentally rethink about health insurance. First of all, we need to change our opinion that it is an industry. The notion that it is an industry is a fundamentally wrong. "Health insurance industry" itself is misnomer. Health is not a commodity. It cannot and ought not to be commodified.
Therefore, it seems to me that we need to come away from the thinking that health insurance is an industry. It is not an industry because health is not a commodity. Your health should not be used for profit.
Saturday, September 5, 2009
You'd Better Listen! It's Our President Talking!
My children came home yesterday with permission slips from their school that, when signed and returned, will allow students to opt out of listening to our president tell them stay in school and study hard.
I find it utterly incredible that there is even a controversy over this since it is a positive message that students need to hear again and again. And what better person to bring that message to them than the person who has so immensely benefited from education and who also happens to be the President of the United States?
So, listen to the president and watch the following video. Enjoy!
I find it utterly incredible that there is even a controversy over this since it is a positive message that students need to hear again and again. And what better person to bring that message to them than the person who has so immensely benefited from education and who also happens to be the President of the United States?
So, listen to the president and watch the following video. Enjoy!
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