The Difference Between a Progressive and a Liberal

February 5, 2016

This posting was originally made on Oct 22, 2014. I believe both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders meet the Teddy Roosevelt definition of a progressive. The difference between them is that Senator Sanders favors greater change at a rapid pace that he calls a “revolution.” Mrs. Clinton wants those changes at a slower pace that she calls “evolution.”

Watching The Roosevelts on PBS has helped me to identify my political and economic position. I am a Progressive as was Teddy Roosevelt.

Progressives want laws that improve society.
Progressives emphasize doing the most for the most – which is how we got socio-economic programs such as Sherman Anti-trust Act, Social Security, Medicare, Obama Care, the 40 hour work week, and a minimum wage.
Progressives want businesses to thrive but do not want monopolies or near monopolies.
Progressives pursue issues; liberals support candidates; so do conservatives.
Progressives have new ideas.

David Sirota, Newspaper columnist and radio host in 1969, wrote this on the Huffington Post:

To put it in more concrete terms – a liberal solution to some of our current problems with high energy costs would be to increase funding for programs like the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP). A more “progressive” solution would be to increase LIHEAP but also crack down on price gouging and pass laws better-regulating the oil industry’s profiteering and market manipulation tactics. A liberal policy towards prescription drugs is one that would throw a lot of taxpayer cash at the pharmaceutical industry to get them to provide medicine to the poor; A progressive prescription drug policy would be one that centered around price regulations and bulk purchasing in order to force down the actual cost of medicine in America (much of which was originally developed with taxpayer R&D money).

Conservatives stand for no change. They want to maintain the status quo. They would turn the clock back if they could. That is the way of the religious members of society. The orthodox religious people want no changes to their practice. Look at those who oppose gay marriage and abortion. They usually hold orthodox religious views. They are part of the conservatives.

Progressives don’t simply support laws that bring about change. It’s just that progressives are willing to consider making changes that will improve life for everyone.

Cancer Research, Cures, and Making Money

Abigail “Nabby” Adams Smith (July 14, 1765 – August 15, 1813) was the firstborn of Abigail and John Adams, founding father and second President of the United States.

In 1810, Nabby was diagnosed with breast cancer, followed by a mastectomy in 1811. … The cancer continued to spread throughout her body, and she died, aged 48. That was 200 years ago.

ABCNews.com says that $415 Million is spent annually by Medicare for the treatment of breast cancer.

Total average Medicare spending per patient for initial phase care of breast cancer (2 months prediagnosis–365 days postdiagnosis) was $21,000 (2002 US$) in 2002 (Figure 2).4 Surgery and radiation cost little on a per-patient basis: $5700 and $4500 (2002 US$), respectively, and were used in 91% and 51% of patients, respectively. In contrast, chemotherapy and other inpatient services were used in about 25% of patients, but at a higher per patient cost ($12,800 [2002 US$]). If the data used for this analysis were expanded to include continuing care and end-of-life care, there would be a marked difference in spending patterns. The United States spent an estimated $62,900 to $94,300 per person for end-of-life breast cancer care during 2010 – See more at: http://www.ajmc.com/publications/evidence-based-oncology/2012/2012-2-vol18-n1/the-economics-of-cancer-care-in-the-united-states-how-much-do-we-spend-and-how-can-we-spend-it-better#sthash.BSrLsaip.dpuf.

So millions of dollars are spent treating people with this horrible disease. Billions more are spent on research for a cure. The National Cancer Institute’s (NCI) budget for FY 2013 was approximately $4.8 billion. Overall, NCI’s budget has been relatively flat in recent years. During the period from 2005 through 2013, the NCI budget averaged $4.9 billion per year.

Lots of people making lots of money.

How dare I suggest this thought? Isn’t cancer cures and cancer research an industry that makes large amounts of money? Lesley Stahl on 60 Minutes discovers the shock and anxiety of a cancer diagnosis can be followed by a second jolt: the astronomical price of cancer drugs.

If you had a cure for just one of those cancers, breast cancer, how many people would need to find another job? How many companies would be earning less money?

Exaggeration of the Week

Today’s Los Angeles Times front page headline is “Latest Ebola case raises U.S. anxiety.” That makes a total of two cases. Hardly an epidemic. The news media loves to beat a story to death. CNN is especially good at this kind of “reporting.” They offered 24 hour a day coverage of the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. That reporting continued until ratings dropped off. Aren’t we all to blame?

As expressed in The Weekly Sift

From googling around and talking with my wife (who specializes in risk management), I’ve concluded that risk theorists do a bad job coming up with catchy names for common fallacies. Let me suggest that the principle in the opening quote be called “the Ebola fallacy”. (If you already know a name for this, please leave a comment.)
Wednesday was the first time a person died of Ebola in the United States. Thomas Duncan (who flew here from Liberia) was also the first person diagnosed with Ebola in the United States. (The handful of previous cases were Americans who contracted the disease in Africa, were diagnosed there, and returned to the U.S. for treatment.) Sunday, we got the first report of someone catching Ebola in this country: one of the people who treated Duncan at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas.

This is about what you’d expect from a hard-to-catch disease like Ebola. As CDC Director Tom Frieden explained: “Ebola has been in existence for decades—and has predominantly infected remote areas lacking basic health infrastructure.”

And yet, from the public reaction you’d think Ebola was the biggest health problem in the country. It’s all over the news. Lakeland Industries, which makes hazmat suits, has seen its stock soar 160% this month. Republican political candidates are citing the Ebola threat to support clamping down on the Mexican border. (So far there have been no Ebola cases in Central America. But when Republicans think about disease-carriers, Hispanics leap to mind.) And three Democrats joined 24 Republican members of Congress in calling for banning travelers from western Africa, and possibly quarantining Americans for three weeks after they return from western Africa .
And that’s just the reaction from people who are trying to look respectable. The conspiracy theorists are going completely crazy. “The CDC is working with Border Patrol authorities and the Department of Homeland Security to disappear potential Ebola victims attempting to cross the border into the United States.”

Meanwhile, about 700 Americans die in traffic accidents each week.
Want to be safer and live longer? Use seat belts. Don’t smoke. Don’t drink and drive. Eat better. Get the sleep you need. Exercise regularly. And if you need any additional motivation not to touch the bodily fluids of people who are visibly ill, maybe then you should think about Ebola. But stop obsessing about distant-but-horrible threats that have almost no chance of affecting you.

Women Shouldn’t Ask for Raises?

The boss of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, has apologised for remarks he made advising women not to ask for a pay rise but to have “faith in the system”.

Could you imagine Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, saying these things?

Microsoft Chief Executive Satya Nadella issued an apology Thursday evening to all company employees following the backlash he received for comments he made about women asking for raises.

Nadella was a featured speaker at a Phoenix conference for thousands of women professionals in computing when he was asked what advice he would give to women who aren’t comfortable asking for a raise.

“It’s not really about asking for the raise, but knowing and having faith that this system will actually give you the right raises as you go along,” Nadella told the moderator, Maria Klawe, in front of the gathering of women engineers. Nadella went on to say that women who don’t ask for raises have an “additional superpower … because that’s good karma, it’ll come back.”

Klawe, a computer scientist and Microsoft board member, immediately shot back, “This is one of the very few things I disagree with you on,” and was applauded by audience members.

The CEO’s response received blowback almost immediately. “Does this mean Microsoft is developing karma currency to pay your bills?” Twitter user Jame Ervin wrote. “Waiting for karma to solve wage gap.”

“I sort of doubt that Satya Nadella got to be CEO by trusting in karmic ‘super powers,’” Twitter user Scott Starr wrote.

Shortly after his speech, Nadella tweeted that he “was inarticulate” about how women should ask for raises. He added that the tech industry needs to close the gender pay gap “so a raise is not needed because of bias.”

Thursday night, he issued a formal apology via email: “I answered that question completely wrong,” Nadella wrote. “I believe men and women should get equal pay for equal work. And when it comes to career advice on getting a raise when you think it’s deserved, Maria’s advice was the right advice. If you think you deserve a raise, you should just ask.”

Erin Burnett on her CCN Out Front program interviewed Susie Orman about the outspoken Nadella. Obviously Orman condemned the Nadella statement. Others that could be interviewed would be Meg Whitman, Sarah Palin, and Hillary Clinton. Do you suppose any of them would be talking about karma ‘super powers?’

Nadella seemed to recognize his mistake, later walking back his comments through Twitter:

Satya Nadella ✔ @satyanadella Follow

Was inarticulate re how women should ask for raise. Our industry must close gender pay gap so a raise is not needed because of a bias #GHC14

1:34 PM – 9 Oct 2014

What can you expect from a man who comes from a country where rape is common place and mistreatment of women is the norm?