Author: coastcontact

I am a somewhat cranky but mostly optimistic 65 plus who refuses to give up on this maddening world. The purpose of this BLOG is to express my feelings, thoughts.

We Need A Real Health Plan

Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of Health and Human Services, was not prepared for her appearance on Meet the Press yesterday.  David Gregory ate her alive.  David used the interview techniques that proved so valuable to his predecessor, Tim Russert.  He simply used her own words in questioning the administration’s plan for health care.

 

President Obama’s objectives were repeated by Mrs. Sebelius in an NPR interview.  She did not disavow those goals. 

 

  1. lower costs
  2. cover all Americans
  3. drive quality
  4. and be paid for (without impacting the federal budget)

She was unable to explain where there are any consequential savings in the Obama health plan.  Then she went on to admit that coverage for all Americans isn’t a priority but it is one “of the goals.”  As to quality of care she admits there will be limits but argued, fairly well, that limits exist now in currently available insurance plans.  Finally Mrs. Sebelius told viewers that the president has not taken a position on taxing the wealthy to pay for the federally sponsored plan.  He has not offered any ideas on how to pay for his plan.

 

All in all, the secretary’s appearance gave me no assurance that any part of this plan has been well researched.  I agree with those that say health care should be available to everyone just like police and fire department services.  The problem is that 85% of the population has health insurance through their employers.  The second problem is the current cost is too high.

 

If all of the above goals are equally important congress will have to devise an alternate plan.  Mrs. Sebelius confirmed that the cost of health care has reached 16% of GDP.  That should be enough of a motivator to make this happen.

Walter Cronkite

The legendary CBS News Correspondent Walter Cronkite lived in everyone’s living room every weekday night.  He told us everything we needed to know about the world.  From D Day to JFK’s assassination, to landing on the moon, and the Vietnam War; he told us the way it was.  We all trusted his reporting.  He will be remembered as the total embodiment of the best news reporter that could exist in the 20th century.  I will never forget Walter Cronkite.

Buy and Hope

I heard this expression just the other day.  It describes the behavior suggested by many stock brokers to their clients.  They frequently tell their clients that they shouldn’t panic just because the market has experienced a significant drop.  Their reassurance is that the long term market averages are high.

 

What’s wrong with this strategy?  The S&P 500 was at 1282.71 on July 1, 1999.  It’s been a roller coaster ride ever since.  So if you were 55 years old back then and your broker said stick with your plan and you will be far better off in 2009, you just might hate that broker.

 

The problem is most people don’t want to take responsibility for their own future.  The brokers did not know what would happen but they did know that a loss of clients would not be good for their bottom line.  So the “buy and hold” idea was born.  It really was a “buy and hope” plan.  If you didn’t learn anything from the tech bubble of 2000 then maybe you deserve this result.

 

My philosophy is trust no broker.  Research every buy before it is completed. Watch your stocks and bonds carefully.  Do not follow the crowd thinking about what constitutes a “bear market.”  It’s your money and you cannot re-save it easily.  If you have the suspicion the market is heading down; sell while the market is high.  Put those sold dollars into a savings account and re-buy when you are convinced the market is near it’s bottom.  You may not time it precisely but you can most certainly do at least as well as the brokers.

 

At least once a year UCLA Anderson Business and the Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation provide their forecasts for Southern California.  Those mainstream predictions never provide any worth while insights on things that could significantly impact business in either a positive or negative way.  They may be great for economic students to develop their skills but have no useful purpose.   

 

The guests appearing on CNBC and Fox Business Channel are all qualified individuals but their take on the current situation or their forecasts are too vague in detail.  They might be valid but how many of us will do the homework on those individuals?  I listen in to learn about the economist who did not follow the pack.

 

As to our federal government financial leaders, well look at the recession we are now experiencing.  Where was Henry Paulson, Ben Bernanke, Larry Summers, or Timothy  Geithner?  None were visible until after the economic collapse.

     

I am listening and watching for the individuals who do not run with the herd.  That has brought me to Nouriel Roubini, an economics professor at New York University, who stood before an audience of economists, in 2006, at the International Monetary Fund and announced that a crisis was brewing.  It was reported in the New York Times Magazine in August of 2008.  The article is titled Dr. Doom.  Nouriel Roubini has predicted that the recession will be over this year. Correction: Roubini says at the end of the year.

 

Of course this was unknown to me and even if I was a subscriber of the New York Times would I have understood the significance of the presentation?  Probably not.

 

My solution?  You can’t read too much.

FYI

Just thought I would answer the question, what has the author of this web site written that has attracted the most attention?  Of the six most read articles posted to this BLOG, I wrote five. The sixth was written by another person.  Listed in order of number of views they are:

Why are most Mexicans in Mexico so poor?

The Countdown to January 20, 2013

An Israeli Beauty – Thanks to Sports Illustrated

A Tired Old Man For President

English Should be the Official Language of the United States

The First Hispanic Supreme Court Justice

The United States Does Not Provide the Best Medical Care

When I grew up in the United States I was taught that this country is the greatest in the world. Furthermore the rest of the world was far behind the United States in every way from technology to literacy to whatever.  I soon understood that the teachers were either misinformed or were intentionally misinforming the students.  You see up until the age of nine my family visited their home town, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada every summer.  That city looked like most cities in the United States (i.e. street cars, tall buildings, telephones, radio, etc.).

The teacher in my 4th and 5th grade classes told us that Winnipeg still had farmers bring in their crops in horse drawn wagons.  I tried, in vain, to correct this ridiculous image.  I realized that the students were probably being given incorrect information about many other things.  It was my first understanding that teachers were not infallible.  When my own mother became a teacher, as I entered college, I knew my earlier suspicions had been confirmed.

Now I find that another “fact” about the United States is called into question.  Conservative talk radio show hosts keep telling us that we have the best health care in the world.  The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the United States government has a web site that provides mortality table for every country in the world.  Our country is in 50th place out of a total of 224.  Macau is in first place and Japan is in 3rd.  Canada is in 8th place.  Isn’t Canada the country most criticized for its “socialized” medicine?  Oh yes, that’s the country that still uses horse drawn wagons to bring their crops into the towns to sell at markets.

Oh, wait minute those CIA figures are all estimates.  President Obama has probably influenced the results of that survey.  The problem is that every other web site places the United States well below Canada and below many other countries in 36th to 50th place.

The reality is that 45 million Americans are not covered by any health plan.  Arguments that no one is turned away from an emergency room, does not mean they are covered by a plan.  No plan means that you only go to the doctor when it is an emergency.  The consequence is the individual pays the full fee for every visit and those visits are more likely than not to an ER.   

Have you gone to an ER when you are covered by a plan?  My daughter had chest pains that lasted for half a day.  She thought she was having a heart attack.  She has Blue Cross medical insurance.  It’s a plan that requires her to pay 100% of the first $3,500 of annual medical fees.  Her cost for that visit was over $1,100.00.  If you do not have any insurance plan the ER will charge you an even higher rate and payment is due immediately.

Do I support abandoning our employer provided insurance system? NO!  The objective is to provide coverage for every American.  That probably means some type of Medicaid system.  How will that be accomplished without destroying the employer based system?  That’s the trillion dollar question.

It’s Called PORK

The $787 billion stimulus package signed into law this past February has not resulted in the promised thousands of new or saved jobs.  The reason is clear.  Nearly 90 percent of the stimulus money has not yet been spent.  This is very bothersome to me because President Obama emphasized “shovel ready” projects to invigorate the economy. 

The boulevards and primary avenues in the San Fernando Valley certainly need repaving but there are no road graders to be found anywhere near those streets.  There are plans in the works for widening the infamous 405 freeway and extending the Orange Line Busway but little or no action has occurred even though those projects have been on the table for years.  Los Angeles City officials are asking for more than $7.3 billion of the stimulus money.

Based upon the mere 10 percent of the package being spent to date one can only conclude that this entire effort was a “feel good” action that played well politically at the time but likely will not pay well in the 2010 congressional elections.

I notice that the press has not done a good job of tracking the many projects that the stimulus package was going to aid.

The stimulus money will undoubtedly be spent but it won’t be on “shovel ready” projects.  Perhaps it will be spent on every congressman’s pet projects.  It’s called PORK.       

Mexico is Not Safe to Visit

I have no personal vendetta against Mexico.  I took a 10 day vacation there in 1967.  The trip included a few days in Mexico City, a night in Taxco, and another few days in Acapulco.  It was a lot of fun.  I have been to Tijuana many times.  There was never an issue about my safety or others with me.  Things have changed in that country.  The unending reports about attacks on Mexican citizens and visitors to Mexico have convinced me that travel there is not safe.  It is not safe for the citizens of Mexico either. A Mennonite community in Chihuahua that dates to the 1920s is the latest in a series of continuing attack victims conducted by drug cartels.  The U.S. government has issued warnings.  They should be heeded.

Defense Secretary During the Vietnam War

For all his faults Robert S. McNamara (June 9, 1916 – July 6, 2009) took on the job that few of us would take.  America’s leaders really believed that the fall of Vietnam would result in communist domination of South East Asia.  Forgotten by most of us is the fact that the West was in the midst of a war with the U.S.S.R. on the future of world economies.  Both McNamara and LBJ were wrong but thought they were right.  I do not buy McNamara’s contention that he thought the war was wrong.  He adopted that view after he saw that it was a losing proposition costing thousands of American lives.  American right wing radio still believes we did the right thing and so do many Americans.   As recently as last week radio show host Hugh Hewitt was talking about the war and why it was the right thing to do.  I initially supported the war until I realized we had no offensive plan to end the war and the South Vietnamese were not interested in winning the fight.

Toronto Is a 21st Century City

We took a five day trip to Toronto, Ontario, Canada this past June.   We had a wonderful time.  This was a fortieth anniversary celebration.  I had suggested a cruise around the Mediterranean Sea but she said “no.”  You never know when you might need that IRA money for something serious.  Well she is probably right as it hurts to pull even $3,000 out.

The only part of the trip that was distasteful was the air flight.  You are squeezed in to seat spaces that are too small and too close to the next passenger unless you are in love.

Toronto is truly a city of the 21st century because it is so international.  They seem to have almost every race, religion, and nationality represented with equal respect for all.  That is a goal the entire world should attempt to achieve.

We stayed at the Courtyard by Marriott Downtown on Yonge Street.  Not the most expensive hotel but certainly one of the most comfortable I have known.  Despite four full days there we did not see many sights and only left the downtown area for one day at Niagara Falls.

After all it was a holiday trip and we did sleep late and took our time.  So here is what we saw: Casa Loma, Royal Ontario Museum, Kensington Market, China Town, Harbour area tourToronto Skyline from Boat #1(a ride out to the islands that act as a breakwater), an evening at the Toronto Centre for the Arts, Eaton Centre, and two tour bus rides  around the entire downtown area.

I took over 100 photos and that wild woman, my wife, took well over 200.   Of course mine were the better pictures.  These were taken with the new Panasonic DMC -FZ28.  http://picasaweb.google.com/coastcontact/TorontoNiagaraFallsJune2009 

We are already talking about another trip to Toronto.