What’s up Doc?

Or three issues that plague you every day!

October 14th, 2009 – Kanook – Tlingit Nation

Before we walk into the jungle of what individuals, you and I, would like to
have tagging along with us as we crisscross this planet, it would probably be a
good idea to scan some of the issues facing us in this journey today.
If you live in the United States today there are a three issues facing the
population, albeit some are the product of the sitting government, which
depending on what side of the card you punched in November-2008, could
either be a thorn in your side or an issue that some perceive as being fair and
square.
Number one on the list is the economy, which some perceive as on the mend,
while others see as a free fall towards death and the Fall of the US Empire.
Some, like me, see similar events as were experienced in the Fall of the
Roman Empire, while others see a rosy picture ahead of the United States in
their continued dominance of the world’s economy. I, as many of you know,
make it through the day by examining the issues and their causes that herded
us to this position.
Many point their fingers at the mass exodus of our jobs to the overseas
market, while others point to the mass influx of illegal immigrants wandering
across our land. Short of stationing a soldier armed with two or three
automatic weapons every six feet along our borders, illegal immigration is a
fact of life. It is a worldwide problem, and as long as there are powerful
nations with more opportunity than their neighbors, it will continue –that too is
a fact of life. People are strange you know, this have this desire to survive,
whether it be on their land or someone else’s they want to eat, and provide for
their families. I would hazard a guess that within the last 24-hours in the U.S.,
you have are someone you know has eaten some food that was either picked
or processed by an illegal immigrant. In doing so you’re contributing to their
livelihood.
More important today in the world is jobs, whether they are in America or in
the outback of Australia, they are in short supply – there are too many reasons
to count why employment has become a crisis. Our fiscal oversight of the
large financial houses in the west was lacking, but then again some of us had
our investments tied up in these house and were happy we were riding along
with them when the dollar bubble was expanding, and when it burst we
wanted their necks.
We could increase our finger pointing to our involvement in a war in the
Middle East, yet we couch our finger pointing simply because we drive or heat
our homes and it has become apparent that our action in Iraq was oil driven
and still is. But our involvement in Afghanistan gives a greater majority of
American citizen’s pause, after-all there is no great amounts of oil only a few
radicals running around shooting up the place and shipping a load of poppy
seeds outside of the borders to survive.
War, which hasn’t touched the shores of the United States since the war
between the States, and its implications flies over the head of at least 60% of
the population within its borders. The adversity to war in a foreign country
boiled over in the 60s, with the bearded people of the west coast starting a
movement that eventually embarrassed our government enough for our
military forces to tuck in their tails and leave Vietnam – many maintain if the
politicians had stayed off the front line (along with Jayne Fonda) we’d have
won the war. I realize that we lost a lot of American lives fighting the war, my
relatives among them, and I know good men who when they returned were
shunned or spent a good part of their lives recovering from the wounds they
had from the battles. So, in one sense we have veterans who fought and lost
in a way that a minority within our borders convinced the left-at-home
population the war was not only killing our young men, but was illegal in the
first place. The question today with the conflicts (wars) we’re involved in
outside of our borders is not just, should we be there or why are we there? But
now that we’re involved, how much is it costing us, and when will our fighting
men return home. Consider the consequences of us fighting overseas, where
a good majority of our people say, and “we’d rather battle outside of our
borders than inside!” Albeit the statement rings true, in some circles it begs to
be answered, especially the ambiguous phrase “collateral damage” and where
do any of the battling parties consider the innocent people involved.
If you are a student of history, you’d reason that what is going on today is not
different than the actions that took place during the Crusades, the goals are
the same, but rewards are a bit different. One was to invade and drive the
barbarians from a once Christian site, the other is to drive or control the same
perceived anti-Christian barbarians to get their oil.
Unfortunately along with good lives lost, we’ve spent billions in our effort
achieve our ends, be them overthrowing a dictator and his weapons of mass-
destruction and gaining access to his country’s oil – or the argument that he
was harboring a gang of thugs that pulled a kamikaze attack on New York City
and the Pentagon, which did not hold water, a point that was feebly argued
between our Congressional representatives in that they didn’t want to appear
anti-American or to appear as letting the anti-Christian barbarians get away
with killing people on our soil.
Our sitting government, along with the previous one, pumped a goodly
amount of cash into our financial houses and agencies of the US Government
to dole out on loans and some grants that was supposed to stimulate our
economy … which through the assistance of the media and the inefficiency has
tanked like the Exxon Valdez grounding on a reef in Prince William Sound,
difference being when the banks and financial houses ran aground money
didn’t spill over the landscape, due to their poor financial navigation.
 The stimulus money was slated to, among other things, rebuild our falling
down infrastructure, provide massive amounts of broadband access to people
so they could read the up-beat news from around the world, and help the
homeowners who had lost their jobs keep their overpriced homes. Extend
unemployment, and so-forth and so-on. What some, but not most, realized
that under the guidance of Federal Agencies with their multi-layer bureaucrats
and forms a Philadelphia lawyer would find hard to interpret, it wasn’t going to
happen overnight and it has not. The economy is still sputtering along on one
or two cylinders, where today although the DOW tipped past the 10,000 mark
for a few seconds the rest of the economic picture is still pretty sour with
unemployment figures spinning out of control in the lower teens. And talk
among some countries who want a different base for the worldwide currency,
and other telling us that the dollar will regain its power and life will be good
once again. In a nut shell, the American public is a little put out, not only with
the value of their dollar but by the in-action of all of our leaders punching their
time clock on the banks of the Potomac.
The second issue clouding our minds is healthcare, where it is said that over
one-third of our population has no health insurance which translates into 107.7
million people with no insurance, a high-figure to be sure, government figures
put it at 47 million without health insurance. How factual this is we can only
look to our leaders to confirm, that is the agencies keeping the statistics.
There are about 50% of the figures who carry the “don’t get sick” insurance
plans.
This issue is dividing the country, as it has in the past causing some
administrations to either ignore it or dropping it once they ran into a brick wall
over any sort of plan to provide insurance for the population that did not have
health insurance. One of the big issues within the healthcare bill that recently
made it through the senate finance committee is the amount of “pork” hidden
or added onto the health issue.
This is a bill supported by President Obama that has within in its pages
billions of dollars for walking paths, street lights, jungle gyms and even
farmers’ markets – this a bill that is supposed to be the hard work of a few to
improve the nation’s health infrastructure, a bill that has met with increased
criticism on both sides of the aisle. Defenders of the bills add-on’s say this
pork is meant to promote healthier lives and in the long run cut medical costs,
maintain they are just ‘community transformation grants’.
Other say, “listen to get all the cash for the healthcare problem is have
Congress repeal the authorization on spending for the remaining sums in the
record-breaking, non-stimulating $787 billion stimulus bill.” Whereas over 9
months have passed since the “rushed” signing of the bill to solve the job
crisis sweeping the country, and today less than 15% of the funds have been
spent.
It is noted that all politicians were quick to line up and get their hands on
money for their pet projects, but slow on the draw when it came to quickly
designing the type of pro-growth, pro-business legislation that would have
actually stimulated the creation of jobs in the private sector – oh I take some
of that back we did get for our money a $4million paving job on a parking lot
for private jets in Aspen, a $550,000 new skateboard park in Pawtucket, Rhode
Island. This from a package that was supposed to create 3.5 million jobs
within two-years. Well guess what the shovels are still hanging and over 2
million additional jobs have been lost – now you can understand why over 50%
of the population in the United States is scared to death of its government
guiding our healthcare.
Congressional committee’s along with the Congressional Budget Office has
taken a close look at the actual numbers of people without health insurance,
whereas the 47 million claim is made up of at least 11 million illegal’s, with
another 17 million are people who earn more than $50,000 a year and decided
not to carry health insurance, with a great number already who are eligible for
care under Medicaid and other government programs, and millions more
between jobs. Deducting a reasonable amount from the 47 million the
detractors that don’t care to see a government healthcare bill state that
approximately 10 million are classified as the ‘chronically uninsured’, where
the Kaiser Family Foundation says the number could be as low as 8 million.
Today, the figure for those “in between jobs” stands at 13.2 million; add this to
the 10 million and the “chronically uninsured leaps to 23.2 million. Detractors
beware, the other side can add also!
Now on average in America and average insurance policy for a “family” is
going to run around $10,000 per year for a family of four, multiply this by 23.2
million for the heavy side cost of and you’re talking approximately $232 billion.
Even if we cut that by 50% it is still a pretty big number.
If as some in the GOP say, the President was to kick loose $116 billion from
the stalled money in the stimulus bill that would only pay for 1 year’s
premiums for the Chronically uninsured, then what? But, in estimating the
cost of the Chronically Uninsured, you can now see the amount that the
insurance companies are fighting over.
On the other side of the picture, doctors are more than worried with a cap on
their charges, in that they would never be able to pay their higher-education
loans they borrowed to be licensed to practice medicine, or the skill they
acquired over a period of 8 plus years in school and internship. Other’s look at
the cost of a government sponsored bill producing over the next ten-years of
over $1 trillion in red ink, while cutting the profits of medical businesses, which
in turn would not bring in any revenue to help pay the government run
programs. And last but least, the government would be running it and like I
mentioned before this just scares the hell out of people, the same people who
spend at least 2 hours in traffic on the way to work in some cities are citing
waiting in a doctor’s office waiting for service just does not fit in their life plan
– well have you ever waited in a drivers license bureau?
 Number three on the list of things to worry about is the Global Warming
debate reverberating around the world, where if it is to warm – Global
Warming too much CO2, and it is too cold – Global Warming too much CO 2.
Pick a flavor!
I read today that 2009 Atlantic hurricane season was very quiet, this the
scientists reported was due to the Pacific warm-water phenomenon known as
El Nino playing a role in suppressing the Atlantic cyclones. If it was the end of
the season for them, which it isn’t ending in November, it would be the lowest
number of storms since 1997, the last time an Atlantic season produced only
two hurricanes was 1982. Insurance companies are breathing a sigh of relief,
whereas there was no hurricane damage in the United States this year.
It was also noted that the sea temperatures in the tropical Atlantic are cooler,
by about 2°F on average, than the blistering season of 2004, when four
hurricanes hit Florida, and in 2005 when a total of 28 storms were generated,
the highest single-season in recorded history.
Global Warming advocates will more than likely jump on this like crows on a
cornfield, and the question is which way will they spin it? My guess, the cold
water from the melt in the Arctic is affecting the Gulf Stream causing the chilly
drop in temperature in the tropical Atlantic.
If they do, their spin won’t have too much effect in that measurements this
year at the end of the Arctic summer that this year more ice cover was evident
this year, albeit remained they are couching this by saying that it still isn’t up
to par with what it was in during the past decade.
It was also reported today that Chicago has registered some the coldest days
recorded this last week in over 82-years and is forecasted to bounce around
the low to upper 40s for the next week, another extreme that our expert
Global Warming experts will leap on, be sure!
Marlo Lewis a Senior Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute mentioned
at one time the rhetoric flowing from between the lips of Global Warming
advocates, “that is not how science operates, it is how propaganda operates.”
And then there is a news item posted on the BBC today, “Scary Climate
message from the Past”, where Doctor Aradhna Tripati from the University of
California (UCLA) and some researchers analyzed some ocean sediments in
plotting CO2 levels back 20 million years, that told them that the sea levels
were 80-130 feet higher today with approximately the same levels of CO2
we’re experiencing today. She says even though Ice Cores have been
analyzed, the records she has give a much more accurate analysis of what
really happened.
Their data comes from the ratios of boron and calcium in the shells of tiny
marine organisms called foraminifera, whereas the ratio indicates the pH of
sea water at the time the organisms grew, which in turn allows scientist to
calculate the carbon dioxide content from the atmosphere.
According the Jonathan Overpeck of the IPCC (UN PANEL) this method
provides a more accurate look at how past CO 2 values relate to climate than
previous methods. Kind of makes you wonder don’t it, is he saying that the
data before was suspect?
Dr Tripata did say, “The new research does not imply that reaching CO2
levels this high would ‘definitely’ result in huge sea level changes, or that they
would happen quickly, just that sustaining such levels on a long timescale
‘might’ produce such changes.” She went on to say, “There aren’t any perfect
analogies in the past for climate change today or in the future. I think we
should use our knowledge of the physics of climate change in the past to
prepare for the future.”
In my opinion it is the lack of any applied physics in making a determination
of past weather changes that is feeding the scientific community’s debate
today – as in fact we know very little or next to nothing what factor or set of
factors that caused the Ice Ages or even when our last experience of a very
warm period that took place, and event our scholars have named the Medieval
Warm.
Even the exact levels of the CO2 concentrate has been debated till the blood
has flown down the halls of buildings around the globe, where some say we’re
at the tipping point and if it reached 510 ppm in our atmosphere, storms and
rising sea’s will destroy all but the high-plains of Kansas, a new bill in the US
Senate introduced by Senators Boxer and Kerry state 450 ppm is a dangerous
level.
Dr Overpeck says, “trouble is, we don’t know where the critical CO 2 ppm is or
the temperature threshold will have to be to bring on an inevitable ice sheet
collapse.” He continues, “if we overshot the 450 ppm on the way to
stabilization we ‘could’ be playing with fire.”
Scholars and other scientists around the world have said CO2 plays a minimal
role in whether or not the earth is cold or warm, and even if the advocates of
Global Warming were even 50% correct the doubling of CO 2 ‘might’ rise the
temperature by 0.1°F by 2030 – maybe!
You have to remember that from 1850 to 1940 the average temperature
increase was 0.5°C and from 1940 till today was another 0.3°C, whereas most
of the warming in the 20th century was between 1900 and 1940, in other words
the only real increase in ‘hot air’ has been from Al Gore and his crowd.
But there again, Time Magazine had one cover story that screamed, “Special
Report on Global Warming: Be Worried. Be Very Worried”. Despite this fear
spreading when 17,000 expert climatologist, meteorologists and
astrophysicists endorsed Dr Arthur Robinson’s Petition Project, which said the
Kyoto Accord was bunk said, “There is no convincing scientific evidence that
human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is
causing, or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the
Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.” It didn’t even make
the papers in a conservative newspaper in the middle of Idaho. Whereas the
media has declared in most cases the climate issue settled.
 30 years ago Newsweek said, “The central fact is that after three quarters of
a century of extraordinary mild conditions, the Earth’s climate seems to be
cooling down. Meteorologist…are almost unanimous in the view that the trend
will reduce agricultural productivity for the rest of the century.” Well like that
really happened! The flip side being warmer weather will improve agricultural
productivity – you’d think.
I believe that Global Warming advocates suffer from a great conceit when
they shout from the rooftops that human activity has or will have a significant
impact of climate change. Consider, the UN sponsored Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (“IPCC”) that estimates human activity is responsible
for 7 billion metric tons of global carbon dioxide out of a total of 157 billion
tons or about 4.5% that is annually released. 57% comes from out oceans,
19% from decaying vegetation, and 19% from plant and animal respiration.
Bjorn Lomborg a well know economist said in 2001 (8 years ago) that
“implementing Kyoto will cost $150 billion to $300 billion globally every year,
merely to postpone the temperature rise by six years from 2010 to 2016. It’s
a very expensive way to achieve so little.”
I have said it over and over again, and in closing this short number of Global
Warming I’ll say it again. Climate change is as old as our planet and predates
human life. Remember they named it “Greenland” not “Iceland” for a reason,
the ice sheet was melting there and it was an ideal location for the barbaric
Vikings 1,000 years ago. The Great Ice Age covered much of the Earth more
than a million years ago, when SUVs were not part of the equation – and we’ve
had several lesser Ice Ages since, and we’ve been warming since the Little Ice
Age that started in the 15th century and ended in the 19th.

I know and you know that all three of the preceding does not dictate how fast
you swing your feet over the edge of the bed in the morning, but I’ll guarantee
you that sometime during your day one or maybe even all three items will
become part of your brain function during the next 16 or so hours you stumble
about doing what it is you do during the day. The first two will eventually
come to some sort of a conclusion, the first we hope and pray will be sooner
than later, the second no matter the result will piss off at least 50% of the
population and the last until you breath your last it will debated and debated
until the sun expands, and even then there will be some who blame it on man.

Have a good day and if it’s chilly put a coat on and piss off some advocate
you meet at work!

Kanook