STOP PAYING FOR YOUR HEALTH INSURANCE! Don't You Silly Americans Know You Can Get Free Care at Your Local Hospital ER?? Duhhhh!! . . .

The Gadfly did not need a prominent progressive blog to tell him that medical services rendered via a hospital's emergency room are ridiculously costly and much more so than if an individual had a robust health insurance plan that actually was designed to do what it is supposed to do:

The rising cost of medical services is driving up the price of health care throughout the industry. There’s perhaps no better illustration of that phenomenon than hospitals’ emergency departments, since ER trips are the most expensive type of health care delivery. In fact, a new NIH-funded study finds the average cost for an ER visit was over $2,000 — about 40 percent more than most people spend on their rent each month.

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/03/01/1659021/average-er-trip/


But then again that is what Republicans have been flogging as a feasible health care plan repeatedly over the past few years as they try to destroy the fledgling (PPACA) Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) before even the most cost saving provisions kick in in 2014.

Prominent GOP'ers such as Rep. Paul Broun and Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant are on the record as stating that "all" Americans have health care because they can just show up at their nearest hospital emergency room and be attended to:




Hell - even failed (thankfully) 2012 Republican Presidential nominee Willard Romney was touting this idiocy in his effort to defeat Barack Obama:

WASHINGTON -- Downplaying the need for the government to ensure that every person has health insurance, Mitt Romney on Sunday suggested that emergency room care suffices as a substitute for the uninsured.

"Well, we do provide care for people who don't have insurance," he said in an interview with Scott Pelley of CBS's "60 Minutes" that aired Sunday night. "If someone has a heart attack, they don't sit in their apartment and die. We pick them up in an ambulance, and take them to the hospital, and give them care. And different states have different ways of providing for that care."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/23/mitt-romney-60-minutes-health-care_n_1908129.html


That's one of those "bold" new leadership ideas that the conservanuts tried to foist upon America in the last election.  Fortunately a majority of Americans rejected it outright.

But The Gadfly wonders exactly what are we to make of this foolishness when one of the major political parties in the country is so fucking insane and radical in their thinking where their view that exorbitant care dished out on the fly in hospital emergency/trauma rooms is a viable form of "health care?"  How is it that we as a nation are not just simply laughing these ignorant and uncaring morons out of the national discussion on the critical issue of the very real health care crisis that exists and is worsening in this country?

While The Gadfly feels that the PPACA falls far short of the benefits that a single-payer or national health care plan would provide Americans, there is no doubt, except in the feeble brains of these neanderthals on the right, that at the blind rate that we are going with our present bloated and costly for profit system, it is just a matter of time before the whole house of cards that it is implodes in upon itself.

So The Gadfly begs those of you who are sane enough to understand this stuff - the next time you hear some right winger mindlessly bashing Obamacare, ask them what their solution is - and if it is anything like the solution that the Paul Brouns and the Phil Bryants and the Willard Romneys of the world are advocating - just laugh out loud in their faces - let some spittle fly to underscore your scorn.  Perhaps collectively humiliating these cretins on a regular basis and denying them a seat at the table of the national discussion on the issue will result in some progress on solving the health care nightmare that all too many Americans have faced, are facing or at some point in their lives will undoubtedly face.


----TFG

We Got Your Fucking Sequester Right Here Beyotch!!

The Gadfly strongly urges anyone who is sincerely interested in the recovery of the American economy and the return to prosperity and vitality that has made us the most powerful democracy and capitalist engine in the world to read this piece by Robert Borosage.

It is absolutely the clearest and most accurate analysis of what this whole fucked up situation, known as "the sequester" is all about.

Pay particular attention to the part where Borosage methodically ticks off the list of "unsustainable imbalances" that have contributed directly to our nation's current Great Recession.  It goes without saying that the preponderance of the blame in Borosage's view (and The Gadfly adamantly concurs) lies squarely at the feet of the whack job GOP and their lunatic wing - The Tea Party.

To put this in some form of coherent, layman's perspective, The Gadfly will state this for the record.  The Gadfly is more than willing to concede the obvious - that President Obama shoulders his own share of blame for this sequester clusterfuckery.  Having said that, The Gadfly sees the situation as such - - think of the sequester as a stick of dynamite.  Obama, in his never ending haggling with the intransigent, reactionary Republicans, pulled the stick of dynamite out of his pocket and waved it in warning under their noses.  And the Republicans have now done the unthinkable - they have purposely lit the fuse of the stick of dynamite, snatched it from Obama's hands, and tossed it through an open window into the American people's house, which one can view as the equivalent of the slowly but surely growing national economic recovery.

Poll after national poll indicates the American people are much more distrusting of the Republican party to manage this country's economic affairs and implement policies that result in doing the most good for the most people.  If the wingnuts are truly of the belief that blowing up the fragile recovery and sending the economy back into the deep recesses of a second recession is a fantastic and wonderful idea, than all The Gadfly can say is that he hopes the fallout becomes the worst case scenario.  The Gadfly actually hopes that not just a return to recession but the beginning of a full blown depression will be triggered.  For if anything is going to teach the hard headed American people a fucking unforgettable and painful lesson as to who's side the modern day Republican party is on and actually gives a shit about, there's nothing like a 1920's style depression, a stock market crash and 30% national unemployment rate to get such a point across.  For the most important outcome of such a period of national pain and misery would be the permanent destruction of right wing conservatism - particularly the virulent strain which permeates and dominates the mindset of the modern day GOP.  That outcome, in and of itself, would be the saving grace for the long term perseverance of this Great American democratic experiment.

Therefore, in conflict with his most inner feelings of humanity and hope, The Gadfly implores the GOP -- GO FOR IT!  JUMP YOU FUCKERS!!


----TFG

Got a Bead on him JimBob??? FIRE!

From the 'You can't make this shit up files.'

Officials in Texas announced on Thursday that State Troopers would no longer be allowed to open fire on suspects from helicopters after the recent killing of two immigrants.

"Why Rhett I do declare!"  "That's mighty fucking white of you boys!!"

The Gadfly is not surprised that prior to this new legislation, Texas was the only state in the union that allowed law enforcement officers to shoot fleeing immigrants from a helicopter.  Big game is big game right?  An immigrant's head blown off is the same as a nice set of antlers right?

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/02/22/texas-bans-shooting-immigrants-from-helicopters/


The Gadfly knows that there are a great many good people in the south - and yes - even in Texas.  Hopefully they will multiply and at some soon future time the good people will outnumber the fucking hateful assholes and this country can get on with the business of being a model democracy that the rest of the world aspires to emulate.



----TFG

Republican-to-be in training . . .

The Gadfly rarely states 100% certainty about anything, but in this case it is simply a no-brainer.

The Gadfly most definitely sees a bright future as a GOP politician, or just as likely - a Fox News pundit, in this cute little bugger's future:






----TFG

Birth of the Aper Movement . . .

Priceless!

The Gadfly cannot express his thankfulness deeply enough to comedian Bill Maher for his relentless crusade to publicly humiliate one of the biggest assholes and most smug pricks to ever disgrace the face of the planet - Donald Trump.

Watch the beauty of seeing The Donald quartered and drawn and then his torso less head hoisted on a pike by Maher - - and marvel at the skill with which it is done:



BADA BING! BADA BOOM!!



----TFG

America - Teach Your Children Well . . . For Democracy's Sake

The Gadfly is in no way surprised by this and in fact, along with other observers who saw the writing on the wall years ago, more or less predicted it:

The charter school movement gained a foothold in American education two decades ago partly by asserting that independently run, publicly financed schools would outperform traditional public schools if they were exempted from onerous regulations. The charter advocates also promised that unlike traditional schools, which were allowed to fail without consequence, charter schools would be rigorously reviewed and shut down when they failed to perform.

With thousands of charter schools now operating in 40 states, and more coming online every day, neither of these promises has been kept. Despite a growing number of studies showing that charter schools are generally no better — and often are worse — than their traditional counterparts, the state and local agencies and organizations that grant the charters have been increasingly hesitant to shut down schools, even those that continue to perform abysmally for years on end.

If the movement is to maintain its credibility, the charter authorizers must shut down failed schools quickly and limit new charters to the most credible applicants, including operators who have a demonstrated record of success.

That is the clear message of continuing analysis from the Center for Research on Education Outcomes at Stanford University, which tracks student performance in 25 states. In 2009, its large-scale study showed that only 17 percent of charter schools provided a better education than traditional schools, and 37 percent actually offered children a worse education.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/02/opinion/more-lessons-about-charter-schools.html?_r=0

The Gadfly always saw the push for the privatization of education as nothing more than an ideological attack from the right wing on the constitutional mandate of a secular (no religious interference) taxpayer funded education system.

The right wing fundamentalist crowd are not satisfied with the idea of a secular public education system having a say in teaching America's children.  Ironic considering that they do have the choice of enrolling their children in religious institutions of their choice or home schooling them.  But since their goal is to proselytize every aspect of American culture and society to conform to their own right wing Christian world view, secular education in their eyes is a monstrosity that must be destroyed and thus the rapid rise of the privatization profiteers in the arena of K-12 education.

One look at the backgrounds of the people at the core of the movement to privatize K-12 education will reveal an unsurprising amalgamation of fundamentalist religious organizations and corporate entities, who not wanting to miss out on a chance to snatch up government (state and federal) subsidies that are (wrongly) being handed out like candy, have snuggled up to the religious right with the vision of dollar signs dancing in their heads - yet with nary a concern for the quality of education being provided to the children being funneled into these schools.

Unfortunately many Americans, convinced by the hackneyed religious nuts and the hucksters in the right wing media that the bad old public educators are reeling in $100k salaries and living high off the union hog, have uncritically and unthinkingly bought into the lies and the privatizing schemes hook, line and sinker.  The problem is - and one need not be a rocket scientist to arrive at this conclusion - that if the statistics borne out in this study have any degree of accuracy to them, it does not bode well for the long term economic prospects of the dumbed-down alumni that are being churned in an assembly line manner out of these severely deficient "learning" academies - which in turn does not bode well for an expanding American economy trying to compete on an intellectual level with up and coming economic powers like China and Europe in the global economic arena.

The Gadfly believes the solution is two-fold and straightforward - if the privateers want to keep their schools as viable alternatives to public education institutions that is fine, however, they then must be held to the same rigorous testing and and performance standards as public schools are.  The privateers need to demonstrate their seriousness in this area by quickly identifying the failing schools under their purvey and either correcting the problems at those schools or closing them down quickly.

In addition - on the public education side of the coin - adequate funding of public education must take precedent in our national spending priorities.  Take some of that tax payer money that is being gambled away on unnecessary wars, corporate welfare, and wasteful defense spending and shift those funds to shoring up the foundation of our free public education infrastructure as well as streamlining and standardizing testing and performance goals nationwide.

If the leaders of this country believe that the wholesale destruction of one of the crown jewels of the greatest democracy experiment in the history of mankind -free public education - and the privatization of that noble enterprise - is going to allow America to continue competing at the top of the ladder among other emerging economic powerhouses around the world -- they better pull their collective noodle heads out of their asses and start talking to people who do not have a for profit self interest in such matters -- such as public educators and people at high levels of American enterprise who are products of our, admittedly flawed, but overall very successful public education system.


----TFG

El Puerco Gordo Bastardo Habla . . . .

Conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh lashed out at Mexican immigrants Wednesday in a radio rant that portrayed them as lazy and government-dependent -- the latest in a series of anti-Mexican statements spouted off by far-right conservatives angered by the possibility of a deal to pass a bipartisan immigration reform.

Ok - The Gadfly wishes to state something for the official record here.

The Gadfly, having lived now for 27 years in the bastion of Mexican immigration, Southern California, can unequivocally report that he has met many Mexican immigrants, both legal and illegal (not to mention other immigrants from all parts of Latin America).  To nearly the every single one, The Gadfly can tell you that he has not met harder working, more grateful, more friendly, more all around decent human beings than these.

The immigrants whom The Gadfly speaks of, quite simply put, are significantly more honorable individuals than the fat ass, pill popping, thrice married, riches flaunting human dildo who calls himself Rush Limbaugh - as well as all of his ditto head fan boys and girls who populate trailer parks and rural asshole pits across America.

In fact, The Gadfly refuses to even put these good immigrant people whom he has met on the same level of worthiness of respect as Mr. LimpBalls and friends.  There is, frankly, no rational comparison.

Nonetheless, Mr. LimpBall's hateful tirade was wholly expected.  The President is talking about immigration reform this week and Limpy Dick needs something to whip his brain dead dildo head followers into a frothy mouthed frenzy over.  It must be factually observed, however, that Limpy doesn't contribute anything positive to American culture.  He's never worked a hard day in his life.  He has enough money to buy his way out of drug offenses and failed marriages and to live in a heavily guarded and gated community.  And so since he really is nothing but a human pile of shit - he plies his stock in trade -- hate, misinformation and goggle-eyed xenophobia, and targets the lowest common denominator goons in the country to parrot his bile among their kind.

It is quite the sad spectacle - knowing that Limpdick's pathetic folowers refuse to see what he truly is - a selfish, hateful, hypocritical know-nothing with a big mouth who has some deep pocketed puppet masters in the right wing media mafia.  Those followers might be impressed by Limpball's money and exalted position within the (thankfully) dying conservative movement -- but The Gadfly is not, never was and never will be.


----TFG

If You Can't Beat 'em . . . . Cheat 'em . . .

Momentum for an RNC-backed plan to rig blue state electoral votes in favor of GOP presidential candidates appears to be stalling as more Republicans come out against the idea.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2013/01/key-republicans-back-away-from-electoral-vote-scheme.php?ref=fpnewsfeed



After coming off an election shellacking which saw the Republican vision wholesale rejected by a crushing majority of Latinos, Blacks, Asians, women and youth - the fact that the national GOP's answer to that conundrum is to try and rig the electoral college system at the state's level to favor their candidate - even if said candidate loses by a clear majority in the statewide vote count - says everything one needs to know about the bone-chilling fear that the Republican party is facing as rapidly changing national demographics steadily trend against them.

If the poobahs in the GOP hierarchy truly believe that they are fooling anyone with their juvenile Dr. Evil plan of playing bait and switch with the state's electoral votes, they have underestimated most American's penchant for a fair fight --- infinitely more than they over estimated Mitt Romney's viability as a likable Presidential candidate.

The Gadfly sees this form of election manipulating nefariousness as an outright admission by conservatives and the GOP that they cannot compete on a national level in the arena of ideas and vision and likability.  The GOP, if they go through with these plans to jury rig the state electoral apportionment process, can, and should, very well be considered the Lance Armstrong of political parties --- lying, conniving, unscrupulous, cowardly cheaters.

Hopefully the few remaining sane and honest Republicans will convince the Teahadists that election rigging simply will make the GOP no different than the 3rd world banana republics which they rail against and like invading.   However, The Gadfly is not convinced that these gutless radicals will listen to reason though so it is up to the American people to slap them down and demand that the bastards fight fair or suffer the wrath of a people who don't take kindly to cheaters and frauds who might monkey around with the constitutionally guaranteed right of a citizen to cast a vote and have it count as it should count.


----TFG

My Gun Is Bigger Than Your Gun - Neener! Neener!! . . .

Oh dear lordy!

The Gadfly has been waiting for quite some time for a public figure to address the gun goonery/manhood dynamic in American culture.  As seems typical about important subjects like this these days, it is addressed by a comedian.  The Gadfly isn't going to complain though, as the comedians appear to be the only public figures who entirely get these issues and therefore their perspective is the one most likely to get through to a wider audience as opposed to one of the talking puppetoons in our lapdog news media.

Watch HBO's Bill Maher address the subject.  Watch him ask the important questions.  Then ask yourself whether Maher has a valid point or not.

It goes without saying that the Gadfly does not need to ask himself this question.  The Gadfly has seen evidence of this American manhood issue up close and personal and has been alluding to this problem in his posts for some time.

It reflects on our entire culture and it drives our political discourse and to the rest of the world it truly does make us look like a bunch of fearful little boys, who unable to deal with the world around us, resort to using weapons and macho behavior as a substitute for maturity and thoughtfulness and courage - specifically courage in doing the right thing at the right time.

It is also reason #1 why The Gadfly attempts (not always successfully) to avoid debates with his gun goonery pals as he knows it is the equivalent of arguing with adult versions of Eddie Haskell.

Watch the video.  Tell The Gadfly Bill Maher is wrong (and if you do, explain why you think so).






----TFG

Gun Goons Gone . . . . Oh Fuck It . . .

5 People Shot At 3 Different Gun Shows On Gun Appreciation Day...

http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/01/19/1473881/two-people-accidentally-shot-at-a-gun-show-safety-checkpoint-on-gun-appreciation-day/

Kinda sorta makes The Gadfly think that perhaps we should make every day Gun Appreciation Day.

Might thin out the herd of the gun goon morons a bit.


----TFG