Following the Data: COVID-19 and the State of New Mexico

July 13, 2020

by Devin

When a new SARS-type virus from China began to make the news this past winter, like so many others before it, my first inclination was to ignore it. It sounded just like all the others to me, much to do about nothing. But then it became much more apparent that this one was going to be different. As momentum started building and the disease we now call the all-too-familiar name COVID-19 was formally declared a pandemic, states and countries started mobilizing their health agencies to gather data on this novel coronavirus. Various organizations began compiling all this state and international data, collating it, and posting it on their websites. At this point I began taking a much greater interest in it. Looking around online, I found?The COVID Tracking Project(https://covidtracking.com), sponsored by?The Atlantic. Drilling down I was able to locate the historical data for New Mexico (https://covidtracking.com/data/state/new-mexico#historical).

The first thing I noticed is that the data are presented in a less-than-optimal way to understand what they mean. While the numbers for New Tests are given as a daily total, the numbers for Cases, Hospitalized, and Deaths are provided as cumulative totals going all the way back to the beginning of the data set. Cumulative totals are deceptive in that they are much larger than daily totals and they don?t tell the real story. In order to find the real story, you have to subtract the previous day?s total from the current day?s total to get the current daily total, for every single day of the data set. So I did this, and the results are very interesting.

As I did the math to get the daily totals, I typed them into three spreadsheets. The first spreadsheet tracks the daily deaths from COVID-19. These numbers are among the most important, because most people agree that the state of being dead is not particularly debatable and because ultimately, death is the worst and most feared potential result of becoming infected with this disease. The second spreadsheet tracks daily new cases of COVID-19. The key metric in this data set is not so much the number of cases, but the daily number of new cases per daily number of new tests. This value is expressed as a percentage since there are far fewer cases than tests. This value is so important because it removes the effect of variability in the daily new tests numbers. In other words, what we really want to know is not how many new cases there are, but are more people really catching the disease? The third spreadsheet combines the data for daily new cases, new deaths, and new hospitalizations, so that we can see how they compare.

What the Data Actually Tell Us

The Death Count

Starting with the daily number of deaths the first thing we notice is that deaths from COVID-19 peaked around mid-May with an average daily value of approximately 8 deaths statewide per day. Daily deaths continued to decline after this until early July when the average daily value bottomed out at approximately 3 deaths statewide per day. The daily average rose back up to 5 by the end of July and lately has been trending back down. New Mexico is currently averaging approximately 4 deaths statewide per day. The overall average daily number of deaths since the first case was recorded in New Mexico is approximately 4.5. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the most recent estimated population of New Mexico (for 2019) was 2,096,829, or roughly 2.1 million.

As of August 11, 2020 the total number of deaths from COVID-19 in New Mexico was 688. Given a population 2.1 million people, that means that we have experienced approximately 32.5 deaths per 100,000 residents for the entirety of the pandemic. By comparison, during the 2018-2019 influenza season (Oct.-May), New Mexico experienced 11 deaths from pneumonia and influenza per 100,000 residents and in the prior season, 14 deaths per 100,000 residents (New Mexico Epidemiology, Vol. 2019, No. 10). So far, that means that in New Mexico, the chances of a random resident dying of COVID-19 are roughly two and half to three times their chances of dying from pneumonia or influenza in recent years. Not to diminish the value of every human life, but these are not large numbers. On any given day, a random New Mexico resident has approximately 2.1 chances in a million to die from COVID-19. Those are pretty good odds. A graph of the daily new deaths from COVID-19 is shown here:

The dotted trendline approximates the running average and notice that generally speaking, the line is relatively flat and there is no spike in deaths corresponding to the ?spike? in cases. A very slight uptick, yes, but nothing anyone could realistically call a spike.

New Cases

Moving on to daily new cases, what we see in the data are two things. First, from the beginning, we see a rise in daily new cases, which leveled off in early May at around an average of 140 new cases per day and declined slightly until the beginning of June, settling at around an average of 130 new cases per day. Second, starting in early June, we see another significant rise in daily new cases, peaking most recently in late July at around an average of 300 new cases per day. For the most recent two weeks, daily new cases have been trending downward with the most recent 3-day average as of August 11 being around 160 new cases per day. At first glance, these numbers would seem to support the claim that New Mexico experienced a ?second wave? of infections from COVID-19, which has now passed (see the graph below); however, a closer look at the data reveals the truth.?

First, as testing began, our testing capacity was extremely limited. As time progressed, our testing capacity increased; however, in order to make sure we had enough tests to go around, we limited testing to those who were experiencing actual symptoms of COVID-19. That made sense. If you?re not sick, you?re not in immediate danger of death from COVID-19. Second, in late April, our testing capacity increased dramatically and we opened up testing to anyone who wanted to be tested. A ?case? was redefined in the process from being someone who exhibited symptoms?and?tested positive for COVID-19 to?anyone?who tested positive?for COVID-19,?even if they were entirely asymptomatic. To find out the impact of increased testing and the new definition of a ?case,? we have to remove the effects of these variables from the data. To do so, we simply divide the number of daily new cases by the number of daily new tests performed. The result is startling. As you can see quite clearly in the graph above and the graph below, the daily number of new cases correlates very closely to the number of daily new tests performed since the beginning, with very minor small-scale variations.

The next thing to notice is the difference in the scales of the two graphs. The scale for New Tests is approximately 23 times as high as the scale for New Cases! To see what that means visually, the next graph, below, shows the two data sets on the same scale. It is difficult to see a spike in new cases in this graph.

And now, the most important graph of all, the graph that tells the real story, is the graph showing the weekly average number of new cases per test, below.

The peaks on this graph are artifacts of the data set that resulted mostly in the beginning of the pandemic when data collection was still being organized and the initial challenges that go along with any major data collection effort is undertaken. As you can see, over time, as the data collection process became more streamlined, the line becomes more stable. The trendline, shown as a dotted line, provides a more accurate picture of reality. And the reality is, since the beginning of June, when the ?spike? in new cases began, the weekly average number of cases per test has not exceeded 5 percent and for the last 4 weeks this average has been in decline. For the most recent week recorded, that average number of cases per test was 2.9 percent. The bottom line is, the ?spike? in cases was caused by the spike in new testing and the testing of people who were and are asymptomatic. The reality is, fewer and fewer residents of New Mexico are coming down with COVID-19 and at some point no amount of testing will give the appearance otherwise. This also means that there isn?t going to be a third wave, because there never really was a second wave. If you start hearing about a third wave, follow the data. Therein lies the truth, but that?s not the end of this story. We have one more data set to look at: Hospitalizations.

Hospitalizations

The third spreadsheet includes daily new hospitalizations from COVID-19 along with daily new cases and daily new deaths. A graph of these data is shown here:

This graph clearly shows that the number of daily new hospitalizations and deaths did not dramatically increase with the number of new cases. This is further evidence that the ?spike? in new cases was caused entirely by the extreme increase in new testing.

So what does all this mean? The number one justification for all the public health orders mandating the closure of ?non-essential? businesses, social distancing, mask wearing, self-quarantine, and staying at home except for emergencies and absolute necessities, was the oft repeated mantra of a spike in cases, the ever growing number of deaths and hospitalizations, and the rationalization that if these measures ?save just one life? they will have been worth it. The question before us is, is it worth it? Has it been worth it? I?ll leave that for you to decide for yourself, because as New Mexicans, that?s what we’re going to do anyway!

If you would like to have a copy of the Excel spreadsheet file from which these graphs were derived, you can download it here:

Bathrooms, Hate Crimes, and the Progressive War on Women

by Amanda

I have to get this out of the way: I don’t hate transgendered people. My best friend for many years was TG. Progressives equate that to me saying, “I’m not racist because my maid is black,” but I’ll assume that anyone reading this has at least half a brain. Also I used to do a bit of cross-dressing as a teenager. I guess you could say I was gender confused. I don’t have an opinion about whether I was deranged or mentally ill. (I sure did suffer from depression.) I came across a bunch of jocks before school one morning, and they called me a fag. I thought it was funny.

Let me get another thing out of the way. I have shared a public bathroom with a TG person any number of times (in addition to my best friend) and it never bothered me. I never saw it bother anyone else, either. I’m sure I have shared a bathroom with a TG I was never aware was TG, because that person passed. These laws and regulations are useful only to protect Transgenders who do not pass.

Given that, why do I rant about these new bathroom laws? First, because they are laws. If a law does not fall under the Non-Agression Principal, then in my book, that is government overreach. Target and Planet Fitness are private businesses which have the right to make whatever bathroom, locker room, and changing room policies they want. If I don’t like it, I can shop or work out somewhere else. But once bully government gets involved in my naked spaces, I no longer have a choice. Well, I do have a choice. I can be more vulnerable to straight morons who are going to take advantage of the laws to stalk and assault women, or I can be pushed out of the public sphere, living like my great-grandmother did, or like a woman in a Muslim country.

Talk about “Get your laws off my body!”

The second thing that infuriates me about these laws is how proponents justify them: as a civil rights issue, and as a safety issue. Gender fluidity begins with internal feelings that may result in an action being taken. It may be controversial for me to say that a person can control their feelings. I happen to think it a necessary skill for every adult. But for sure a person can control their actions. So if a non-passing TG does not feel accepted in certain situations, such as employment, that person can refrain from going TG to an interview. Can an African-American refrain from being African-American? No, black people actually were “born that way.” Being African-American or a woman is a state of being; it is not possible to refrain from being that. Transgendering is a behavior. Should TGs have to constrain who they are and what they do to maintain equal treatment in society? No. Of course they should not. Nor should anyone. The point is, they CAN; African-Americans can’t.

The other justification I hear for having transgender people use the bathroom or locker room of their gender identity is that bathrooms and locker rooms are places?where non-passing TGs experience violence. Violence against TG people is horrible. It is inexcusable. It is unacceptable. A Time article dated August 17, 2015 titled: “Why Transgendered People Are Being Murdered at a Historic Rate” states there had been 15 murders of TGs up to that point in 2015, primarily TGs of color. In 2014, there were 1,359 incidents of hate violence against LGBT individuals, of which TGs were the largest share.

No one deserves to be a victim of violence. Every individual human is a child of God who has a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. No one deserves to be harassed. But since we are asking women and girls to be the safe harbor for TG individuals, and to bear the brunt of straight jackasses who will inevitably abuse these?laws, how are women faring?

TGs are undoubtedly harassed, but harassment is also a fact of life for many women. When I was young, I was sexually harassed at school, at work, on public transportation, walking down the street, at the YMCA. I could go on. The last time I was harassed was a few months ago in a grocery store parking lot at noon. Does our world feel safe to women? Survey your women friends. How many look in their back seat before getting into their car? How many would go to a bar alone? How many feel safe on a walk or jog alone? Or staying at the office past business hours? How many walk through a parking garage alone without a second’s thought? Or are afraid to be at home alone?

According to the CDC, nearly one in five women has been raped in her lifetime. One in six women has been stalked. Of raped women, 40 percent experienced their first rape as children, and 12 percent were children under age 10. I say first rape because 35 percent who were raped as children were also raped as an adult. Doing the math on those numbers yields about 2 million American women raped in 1 year. Most of these women experience PTSD, and are much more likely to experience asthma, diabetes, irritable bowel syndrome, frequent headaches, chronic pain, difficulty sleeping, and poor mental and physical health.

The PTSD that literally millions of female rape survivors experience is only going to be aggravated by opening up bathrooms, locker rooms, and changing rooms to biological males. There are laws against indecent exposure, and laws against voyeurism, but these laws would seem to be, nonsensically, suspended in the very places where men and women are most likely to be undressed, particularly shower or swim facilities. Our girls will be forced to endure voyeurism against themselves, and exposure to post-adolescent penises, at the very tenderest ages. Our government is not just allowing, but requiring, sexual violence against women and girls.

So are Progressives telling us it’s worth it to put millions of women and girls into trepidation and fear about being exploited, in order to protect a tiny minority of TG individuals from feeling uncomfortable? To prevent whatever percentage of a few thousand hate crimes that may occur in a changing room, bathroom, or locker room–by replacing those with an untold number of acts of voyeurism and indecent exposure against untold numbers of girls and women?

I guess the right to safety and privacy is non-existent for women and girls, unless that woman or girl was born with a penis, or pretends to have one. It’s the penis that confers the rights. If that isn’t male privilege, what is? TG behavior being equated with blackness makes it white male privilege.

There’s the Progressive war on women for you.


PP in Our Schools: It’s Time to Grow Up

by Devin

Recently, my children’s schools notified me via email that Planned Parenthood would be at their schools to give age-appropriate presentations on reproductive health to their students. The email requested permission allowing my children to attend the presentations. The consent form for my 5th grader contained the following:

(Our) students have participated in Social Emotional Learning Curriculum throughout the year and are ready to move into making positive self-care choices. This curriculum will be built upon every year, as they are developmentally ready. In appropriate groups, they will participate in a health class supported by the Planned Parenthood Education Program. Educators from PP will lead our discussions and all sessions will be attended by the school’s Administration.

Students will be instructed in the follow health education topics:

-General Hygiene/Self Car
-Age Appropriate Hormonal Changes/Puberty
-Taking Responsibility for one’s health
-Healthy Relationships

The class will be held (next) Tuesday. Students will be separated by gender and grade level.

So I responded as follows to my 5th grader’s school:

I do not consent.

I think Health Education is a very good thing. I just think it might be a good idea to consider looking for someone else to provide it, as Planned Parenthood’s values do not match up with mine and I suspect, given the controversial nature of the organization vis-a-vis the recent media exposure they have received from the Center for Medical Progress, there may be others who feel similarly, whether they speak up about it or not. Of course, this is Santa Fe, so maybe not.

My negative opinion of PP is centered on my deep and profound respect for women and life and my intense desire for men to know they will be held accountable for their actions. The premise of PP’s existence is acceptance of the idea that women will never be respected and men will never be held accountable and that these facts are immutable, thus they, PP, are there to assist with the consequences. Unfortunately, this simply leads to an even greater surrender to, and acceptance of, this idea throughout our national culture. As a father who intensely loves his daughter, I want the very best for her as she grows up. (When she grows up) I believe any man who would disrespect her by expecting her to engage in sex with him without a lifetime commitment to her through marriage is not worthy of one microsecond of her attention. And if one ever does, he better find a new State to live in.

The following is excerpted from email from my 8th grade son’s school:

Dear 7th and 8th grade parents,

This coming week, we will be conducting age-appropriate workshops about reproductive health for our 7th and 8th graders during science class periods and study halls. These are offered through our partnership with Planned Parenthood of Santa Fe and are offered at all of the public schools in Santa Fe, as well as at the vast majority of our community’s private schools. The topics to be covered are listed below:

7th grade: Healthy Relationships and Exploring Personal Values Around Sexuality
8th grade: STIs (Transmission & Risk Reduction), Pregnancy & Contraception

I responded as follows to my 8th grade son’s school:

I don’t have a problem with my son attending this presentation, but I wish you would find another provider in the future. PP is, in my opinion, an extremely controversial organization that clearly does not respect human life before birth at any stage of development.

My dilemma is that while I would prefer that he get this information either from another provider and from me, I don’t want him to be the only kid (in school) having to be accommodated while all the other kids are attending the presentation. Also, I am not one to over protect him from the world in which we live.

So, if there are going to be a number of other kids whose parents are not giving their permission to attend, then my preference would be that he not attend. If I am the only parent, or one of only two or three parents withholding permission, then I would prefer that he go ahead and attend.

Either way, I appreciate the request for permission and I will certainly follow up with him on the subject. We have already discussed this subject to some extent and I continue to discuss it with him as he is maturing.

As a side note, this information was not given to children in public schools until the 10th grade when I was in school and frankly, while I know times are different and children are sexually active at even younger ages now than they were then, I still don’t think it is really necessary before high school. Furthermore, the implied message coming from us adults is that we somehow condone and expect children to become sexually active before they are mature enough to handle it responsibly. If you know my son, then I’m sure you know he is not the kid who is likely to be needing this information just yet. I would like to think that he is not the only kid in the 8th grade who doesn’t yet need it! And if you know something about him that I don’t, then please, by all means, let me know!

Before you judge me as some kind of pro-life activist who stands on street corners with anti-abortion signs yelling at traffic driving by, let me make it clear that I am not. Not even close! Furthermore, I only converted from pro-choice to pro-life about five years ago, when I came to the conclusion that the pro-choice position is 99.9 percent about convenience and that there is absolutely no way anyone can say with absolute authority at what point in prenatal development a fertilized egg becomes a human being with a soul.

Of course, atheists will say they never do, but for those of us who are not atheists and believe in the concept of eternal life and the sanctity thereof, this is an important matter. There are many, many justifications for the selection of different points of development as being that point at which a developing human in the womb should be considered a human being that should not be aborted, and many pages or even books could be written on the subject, and probably have. Many of these justifications attempt to be based on science. Never-the-less, the one thing they all have in common is that they are all based on convenient criteria. The only one that is not, is the one that says life begins at conception. Plenty of people disagree with this, but disagreement does not equal proof.

So what do I think we should be teaching our children and expecting of them? Simple. Sexual relationships are sacred and as such, should be reserved for marriage. In a word, abstinence.

I do not buy into the idea that young people are incapable of controlling their sex drive and that it must be assumed that they will be sexually active before they are old enough to be married and when they are old enough to be married that then, suddenly, pre-marital sex is okay and expected. I think this kind of idea has come about because we live in a culture that has a media that has become saturated with sex. You cannot turn on a television set anymore without seeing this. And people in our culture have become so accustomed to seeing it that we hardly even notice it (unless, of course, you are a teenager in the throes of raging hormones. Then you notice it!)

Of course if you grow up in an environment such that everywhere you look, from the checkout line at the grocery store to school, to television, to radio, and the internet, scantily-clad women, and in many cases, young girls, are on display or singing songs about sex and how awesome it is, then naturally a young person is going to be tempted at every turn to do just exactly what seems to be expected of them; to start having sex as soon as possible! Add peer pressure to that and parents who seem to think it is inevitable, and what kind of chance does a young person have?

Does this mean that a parent has to overprotect their children and shield them from what sex is all about and where babies come from as they grow up? Of course not. Only an idiot would think that. What it means is that parents need to reject the idea that saving one’s self for marriage is impossible. Young people need to be taught that the facts show, statistically speaking, that pre-marital sex leads to a much higher divorce rate and a much higher rate of single motherhood. It also leads to young men, and sometimes even mere boys, becoming buried in child-support debt before they are old enough to earn the kind of money it takes to raise a child.

Is pre-marital sex fun? Oh yeah. Who can deny that? But the fun ends when somebody gets pregnant. Then it literally becomes a life and death situation. Not fun. Particularly for the one who’s life is on the line.

And when a young person knows that there is a backup plan, however distasteful it might be, that can save them from the responsibility of having to raise a baby and child before they themselves are grown up, well, let’s just say that when things are hot and heavy in the back seat of the car, the heat of the moment is going to win out more often than not. Take away that safety net and suddenly, at least one of the pair has solid ground to back them up when they decide to say no, go no further.

And if we, as a society, as the adults and leaders of our communities, would stand up and tell our young boys and men, we will not tolerate such behavior and it will have severe consequences, then the number of children and young adults finding themselves about to engage in a very risky behavior will have been given more than enough justification for backing off and saving themselves for marriage.

Think about it. If, as a young man, you know that if you get your girlfriend pregnant, she will have to have the baby and you are going to be ostracized from your community and will be facing the fact of having to grow up really, really fast, guess what? You can look your peers squarely in the eye and tell them they are fools if they ignore such a fact.

You say, “well, what about in cases where the mother will die if the baby isn’t aborted?” Sure. In such a case, someone is going to die. Possibly both. So, of course, there can be exceptions. This kind of case is so rare as to be more of a philosophical question than a real circumstance that must be reckoned with. What about rape? Incest? What then, you say? Let me just ask you, if you had been the product of either of these situations, would you prefer that you had been aborted? These are complicated issues, no doubt, and I am oversimplifying them here for the sake of brevity, because the real point is, the baby is not at fault here, so why should the baby pay the price? In such cases, the perpetrator should pay the price. And let me just say that said price should be so gigantic, so terrible, that only the sickest of the mentally sick would ever contemplate taking the risk.

Former President Bill Clinton once said, “Abortion should be safe, legal, and rare.” Imagine that coming from a man who won the Latin American “Man of the Year” Award when his extramarital affairs became front page news. None-the-less, that last part rings true. Unfortunately, as long as abortion is legal, and particularly in states where it is legal right up to the moment when a woman is going into labor, “rare” is not a practical possibility. And it never will be.

Finally, I want to close the loop on PP in our schools. By saturating our grade schools with their mere presence, they succeed in institutionalizing their brand. Kids grow up knowing what Planned Parenthood is and that they have been around forever. Planned Parenthood becomes an accepted fixture in our communities. It is brilliant strategy for an organization whose primary business would be utterly unnecessary if only we parents would instill in our children the self-discipline to reserve sex for marriage and arm them with a keen understanding of the severe consequences awaiting them for not doing so.

Culture vs. Race: Why so much confusion?

by Devin

In the Beginning

When I entered first grade in Greenville, South Carolina, it was the first year of the newly mandated school integration. My class at Sara Collins Elementary School suddenly went from around 30 students to 40. I was six years old.

My new class now had a proportionate component of black children and because the class size was so big, we also had an extra teacher, who was black.

I was a wide-eyed little boy who had no concept of racism in spite of my short life having been spent entirely in the South. My mother had always had a maid who came once or twice a week to help out with the laundry and a few other house chores. She was black. Her name was Mamie. My siblings and I felt like she was practically a member of our family. Mamie retired before I finished elementary school and her sister, Violet, came to work for us until she retired, sometime after I had graduated from high school. We loved Violet. She always had a cheerful attitude and worked diligently all day long when she was at our house. Whenever we would walk in from school in the afternoon, she would say, “How you be doin’ by this hour?!” and we would reply that we were doing fine and ask her how she was doing? She would always reply by saying, “Oh, pretty good for an old cripple woman!”

I don’t honestly know why she said that. Other than being overweight, she never seemed to be physically handicapped in any way to me. But I think it was just her way of humbly saying that no obstacle was too difficult for her to overcome. Violet was a strong and faithful Christian with a strong sense of Christian values. She was a gem. Violet passed way many years ago having lived a long and joyful life. I have no doubt that she is in heaven with God and having a glorious eternal life in paradise. For that, I am truly grateful.

My parents taught me from a very early age that there is no difference between black or white, or yellow or red for that matter. That all people are “created equal.” As a young child, that made perfect sense to me. Children have a pretty good bullshit detector and if things don’t add up, they can tell. My parents were, of course, absolutely right.

As I got older and progressed through elementary school I got to know some of the black kids in my classes. I never once had a negative opinion of even one of them. When I got to middle school, I began to discover that some black kids had a sensitivity to their skin color. This was new to me. I did not understand it. By the time I reached high school, I began to notice that outside of athletics, few black kids were socially integrated with the white kids. A few of them definitely were. I remember occasionally seeing some of them at parties and, of course, they came to school functions like the prom and homecoming, etc., just like everyone else. Quite a few of my former black classmates regularly attend our class reunions. But most of them drifted away from the white social circles.

I can only surmise that as they grew older they were being influenced by external sources and those influences made them feel less comfortable around white people. I don’t know. All I know with certainty is that I never saw even once during my grade school years a white student treat a black student any differently than another white student. Never.

When I reached college I began to hear people talking about the prevalence of racism in the South and I was surprised. I really had no idea that racism still existed. I certainly knew that it had in previous generations. There were no secrets about this, but I genuinely thought it was a thing of the past. I thought to myself, what are people talking about?

Fast forward to the present.

Now days it seems, if you believe the media, if you believe black leaders, racism is rampant in the United States. Why is that?

Well, I firmly believe that history has demonstrated beyond any doubt that where there is an advantage to be gained by anyone through the promotion of discord between any two or more groups of people, then someone will surely step in to exploit it. This is a universal truth that exists external to any human ethnicity; from the Ku Klux Klan (started and dominated by Democrats in the South) to Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton; from the Nazis in Germany and their persecution of Jews to the Japanese and their hatred of the Chinese in the first half of the 20th Century. It happens all over the world and this has been so since the dawn of human history.

Stop.

Let’s take a look at the facts for just a moment. We now know that there are some incredibly bright people among every skin color on the planet. We now know that there are some incredibly stupid people among every skin color on the planet. We know that evil presents itself in people of every skin color on the planet. No race has a monopoly on either perfection or failure in terms of personal character.

With these facts, these premises, we can conclude that the statement “all men were created equal” (translated as equals in that no king, no dictator, no president, no rich person, no poor person has superior value as a human being to any other human being) is factually true. It is undisputable. The Founders of the United States of America knew this and enshrined it in the Preamble to the United States Constitution. That said, all of us are fallible. All of us. Every single human being on this planet is fallible (yes, even the Pope) and not long after learning to think and communicate we begin to make mistakes.

Why does racism exist?

Let’s examine a phenomenon that has been widely observed in the United States. When integration of public schools was implemented back in the late 1960s, that was a period of time in US history when blacks and whites were the most proportionately represented in public schools. It was true then, as now, that there were all white neighborhoods and all black neighborhoods, but students were bussed, if necessary, to schools outside of their district in order to ensure all schools had a black to white student ratio that matched their representation in the community at large. In the South, this was somewhere in the ballpark of around 20/80.

So what do we see now in terms of black to white student ratios in public schools in the South? We see that over time, schools have slowly, but surely, resegregated. Why is this?

Culture vs. Race

Let’s take a moment to step away from the discussion of skin color and talk about culture. What exactly is “culture?” A brief search online for the word will return an abundance of definitions, but one that seems particularly well suited to this discussion is as follows:

A culture is a way of life of a group of people–the behaviors, beliefs, values, and symbols that they accept, generally without thinking about them, and that are passed along by communication and imitation from one generation to the next.

If you’ve read this far you probably already had a pretty good understanding of what a culture is. You probably also know that you have a culture of your own. It is the culture in which you were raised, or possibly adopted as a young adult. Culture is something that becomes ingrained in humans and becomes a part of who they are. Few people change their culture late in life, but some do and it is entirely possible. You simply have to make up your mind to do it.

Now ask yourself, why has there been such a strong effort over the last few decades to celebrate cultural diversity? If living among multiple cultures was an easy thing to do, then it follows that there would be no need for such a campaign. Another, more direct question: why is it that cultural groups tend to remain groups, rather than simply dissolving into each other until there are no cultural groups? I think the answer is obvious. People feel more comfortable around other people who accept the same “behaviors, beliefs, values, and symbols” as they themselves. This is an undeniable fact. I have observed many times people who come from one culture who have moved to a new city or state leaving their own culture behind. Almost as often, I have seen those same people adopt the local culture in order to fit in.

Now let’s focus again on the last part of our culture definition above. Culture is “passed along by communication and imitation from one generation to the next.” Your culture comes from how you are raised from birth, or shortly thereafter. If you are white and raised in a white home, and your parents and grandparents have a culture they inherited from their ancestors, then you will also have that same culture, which becomes part of your basic nature. If you are black and are raised in a black home, and your parents and grandparents have a culture they inherited from their ancestors, then you will also have that same culture, and it will become a part of your basic nature. Obviously, cultures change over time, with each generation leaving its own mark. No one would argue that American culture today is the same as it was in 1776!

If you are old enough to be interested in reading this article, then you surely have witnessed situations where people of one race have completely integrated culturally with people of a different race. I have witnessed black people chastising other black people for being “white” or even just being “too white.” Of course, what they mean is that the black person on the receiving end of their criticism has adopted some form of white culture. As you can see and probably already know, culture and race are so closely associated by people that rarely does anyone make a distinction. And certainly the race baiters never do.

And this, my friends, is where the rubber meets the road. When you observe someone who is discriminating against another person of a different race, it is far, far more likely not because of their race, but because of their culture. Let me say this again in a different way. People are far more inclined to associate with those who share a similar culture, and conversely, they are far more inclined to not associate with those of a different culture. People self-segregate based on culture, not race, but because culture is not nearly as visible as skin color and because culture is so often tied to skin color, people naturally assume such self-segregation is based on race, not culture. And it is a fact that no race is immune to this tendency.

Let me take this a step further. Every single human being on the planet who has any friends at all has used some form of discrimination to determine who they will accept into their inner circle of friends and who they will exclude. This includes people of identical color and culture! Human nature is imminently pre-disposed to discerning which personality characteristics in other humans are attractive to them and which ones are not. This is a fact. If it were not, then all it would take to be in someone’s inner circle of friends is to be from the same culture! That means that you and I might have thousands, if not millions of friends in our inner circle! That is obviously not the case.

Each and every human being practices discrimination in the process of deciding with whom they will associate. We generally prioritize our relationships starting with our best friend, then our close friends, then our not-so-close friends, then members of our socioeconomic class, then those who share our political views, then other members of our culture, then acquaintances, then maybe our neighbors, our community, our region, our country, and finally, the world. Everyone does this. Everyone. We have to. We cannot be close friends with everyone in the world! And some people within our own culture, oftentimes within our own family, are not only not close friends, but sometimes even downright repulsive to us. None of this is racism.

Cultural Relativism

With the rise of anthropology as a scientific discipline in modern times, has come the concept of cultural relativism. Cultural relativism is the belief that no culture is superior or inferior to any other culture. This is an important concept and a very useful tool if you are an anthropologist because it helps you as an observer not to make judgments about any particular culture you may be studying. The removal of judgment helps the anthropologist to minimize bias when observing cultures other than his or her own.

Relativism vs. Absolutism

There are those who argue that there are no absolutes. Everything is relative. “It depends on how you look at it” is a common refrain. But this idea can very easily be put to rest by this simple logic: If someone says, “there are no absolutes,” then they have just disproven themselves by stating an absolute.

Cultural relativism is a very recent and modern theoretical construct. Throughout history, humans have always been cultural absolutists. And for good reason. Some cultures truly are inferior to others! So while all humans are created (as) equal(s), all cultures most definitely are not.

That’s right! It’s true. Now before you go and start hyperventilating about what I’ve just said, let me just say that every culture is flawed. They are all flawed because they are devised by humans, who by their very nature are flawed. Anyone who would believe his own culture is perfect is only fooling himself. And if you believe that some other culture than your own is superior to your own, then you are free to adopt that culture which you believe is superior.

How do we know some cultures are superior to others?

To start this discussion, let me point out (and I hope you agree) that there must first be some generally agreed upon criteria that define what a superior culture looks like. Now, if you merely agree with this, then you have also just acknowledged that it is possible to rank cultures by degrees of superiority and inferiority. If you don’t agree with this, then read no further. You are either too young or too unreasonable to understand what I am saying.

If, more likely, you take issue with exactly what those criteria are and then say that no one has the authority to decide them, then I would ask you, do you believe that a culture that has being nice to others as one of its values (think Canada) is superior to a culture where being cruel to others is one of its values (think Islamic State)? If you say yes to this, then you are a normal, rational human being and you would be correct. If you say no, and I am certain there are those among us who would (if for no other reason than to be contrarian), then you fall into a very tiny minority of people who are willing to try and twist themselves into a pretzel to find a way to avoid what most of us instinctively know to be the truth. If this is you, then ask yourself, would you prefer to live in Canada or in the Islamic State? No need to tell me your answer.

This is a critical point. The fact cannot be overstated that while you have no control over what color your skin is or into which culture you are born, you and you alone ultimately have total control over choosing whether to remain within it or leave it behind and change to another. Sure, if you happen to live in a jungle in South America where you have never observed any other culture but your own, then maybe adopting a new culture is not available to you, but in such a case, it wouldn’t be necessary and quite likely would be fatal if you did.

Why is this a critical point? Because if you find yourself on the receiving end of what you believe to be racism, it is almost a sure thing that if you were to adopt the culture of the person or people you believe is or are engaging in this racism, then you will, practically always, find yourself no longer on the receiving end of it. I say “practically always” because I recognize that true racism, unfortunately, does exist in the world. Fortunately, it only exists among a very small percentage of the cultures in developed countries. In undeveloped countries, it may be more prevalent, but those countries are not at issue and they are usually home to an extremely poor and uneducated populace (think India). And even in those countries, you are likely to find many people who are not racist.

As a born and raised Southern white male, I observed first hand black people who adopted Southern white culture and were completely accepted into Southern white social circles. Think Herman Cain. If Southern white culture were truly racist at its core, then such a thing would not be possible. And let me further state that in a nation where black people make up a very small overall minority, we citizens of America still elected a black man as our President, twice. How was this possible? I will tell you. Because in the words of the esteemed former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, he is an African-American “with no negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one.” In other words, as a black man, he has adopted enough of white American culture to be accepted by enough white people to get elected. If you are still not convinced, then how far do you think a white man who had adopted black inner-city street culture would get in a bid for the White House? Case closed.

Culture vs. Racism: Conclusion

I probably don’t need to say anymore about this, but just to be sure and to provide a clear statement regarding the whole point of this article, here goes. Racism, although it does exist on this planet as it always has and always will, is by far the exception rather than the rule. Culturalism (meaning discrimination on the basis of one’s culture) is by far the most common explanation for what many believe to be examples of racism. Racism is despicable and evil at its core because people are unable to choose the color of their skin. Culturalism is an absolutely necessary part of civilization. Without it, all cultures would resolve to the lowest common denominator. And finally, every single human being on this planet practices discrimination simply by choosing with whom they will accept into their inner circle of friends. Even you.

So the next time you see someone playing the race card, be suspicious. Most likely, it’s not.

And if you still have doubts, watch this video:

This post was updated on June 22, 2016 to add the YouTube video link.

Individual rights are more important than the common good of the population at large? Say what????

by Devin

I was having a conversation with a Canadian friend of mine recently that went like so many others I’ve had with my American friends, that I finally decided I needed to write about it. The topic of the conversation is one that should have been discussed in every school in America at some point or another, but apparently is not. I can excuse my Canadian friend, because he’s Canadian, but all Americans should know this from grade school on. Our conversation went something like this:

Me: A totally free market (obviously with some necessary regulation to minimize corruption) for health care services and insurance is a necessary element of reducing health care costs in America.

Canadian Friend (CF): Okay, but shouldn’t the purchase of health insurance still be mandatory, so that everyone is covered?

Me: No. That’s draconian, and frankly, un-American!

CF: But what happens when someone has a major medical problem and they don’t have insurance?

Me: They should have had it. They took a risk and lost.

CF: Well, that’s fine for people who can afford health insurance or are wealthy enough to pay the bill, but what about the poor?

Me: In a free market, with minimal regulation mostly aimed at preventing corruption, costs would be far lower than they are now, so we’re only talking about a very small percentage of the overall population. There are charities out there to help them. And even if there weren’t, each and every American has a responsibility to take care of themselves.

CF: So, when someone who is uninsured and too poor to buy insurance, let alone pay the medical bill, has a major medical problem, the public at large gets stuck with the bill?

Me: And how is that different from what happens everywhere, regardless of how healthcare costs are managed, regulated, or controlled? Besides, many of the illnesses experienced by the poor are of their own making. Smoking or drug abuse, for instance.

CF: Exactly. Why should the public have to pick up the tab for someone else’s lack of personal responsibility? Why shouldn’t we pass laws that tax or outlaw certain types of behavior that are detrimental to our health?

/End Conversation

Alright. Let me just address this head-on. First and foremost, this country was founded on the radical concept of individual freedom. America’s Founders placed a higher priority on individual freedom, than they did on protecting the benefits of the public at large. This means, at its core, that we, as a nation, value our individual rights and the freedoms that come with those rights MORE than the rights of “the people.” When I say, “the people,” I am referring to the public at large, the collective, the masses, etc., as they are most often referred to by those in favor of social justice and socialists in general.

I know this is a difficult concept for many people to get their head around. It is counterintuitive. What I am saying is nothing less than that we, as a nation, are willing to sacrifice benefits to the majority in order to protect the rights of even just one person (don’t forget that “the majority” is made up of individuals). If many have to suffer so that one may enjoy the freedom that comes from protecting his or her individual, unalienable rights, then so be it.

This is a radical idea. It’s so radical, that it had never before been established in any other nation prior to the founding of the United States of America. Never in the history of mankind. And it is the number one reason behind why America has enjoyed success on an historically epic and unprecedented scale. That, and a profound respect for, and observance of, the rule of law.

It’s also so radical and counterintuitive, that if it isn’t taught in the schools and by parents to their children, it is virtually unknown.

Here’s the catch, though. With these rights and the freedoms that come with them, also comes great responsibility. If a person has the right to own a gun, he or she also has a responsibility to not use that gun for evil.

Take the gun issue as an example. We are faced with two possible choices in this country, just as other nations are. We can either opt for allowing individuals to own guns and then enact laws to punish those who use them for evil, or we can opt to not allow individuals to own guns and thus try to prevent them from having the freedom to choose between using the gun for evil or not.

The entire basis of this nation is that when faced with this choice, we nearly always opt for the former and NOT the latter. This is the very heart and soul of our nation’s founding and for what it stands. We, as a nation, are willing to allow for the potential suffering that may come from an act of violence with a gun, in order to protect to the maximum extent possible, individual freedom.

Ben Franklin said it best, “Those who are willing to trade freedom for security, deserve neither.” This means, in America at least, that we are willing to subject ourselves to the dangers posed by those few who choose to use their rights and freedoms for evil, in order that the rest of us may retain those rights and freedoms to enjoy life and pursue happiness.

The person who acts irresponsibly and chooses not to have health insurance, particularly in a market where it is affordable or accessible to all but the poorest unemployed, is subject to the consequences of his or her choice when illness strikes. Fortunately for them, we are, in addition to being the most prosperous nation on the planet, the most generous and giving people on same said planet (proof of this is so abundant on the internet, I’ll leave it to you to do your own homework). We have charities and many of them are designed specifically to handle hard cases like these. And because they are locally run and by people who are passionate about it, they are the very best suited to do it.

And at the end of the day, if someone falls through the cracks and is unable to get charitable assistance, and they default on their medical bills, the public at large is ultimately going to pay for it, one way or another, whether they like it or not. And I ask again, how is that different from a universal health care system, where the public pays for everyone’s health care? Only in one way, the individual experiences a bad credit rating. That’s it. And let’s face it, for those who choose to be utterly responsible, or irresponsible for that matter, credit is unnecessary. Just ask Dave Ramsey!

I have no doubt that there are a nearly unlimited number of special circumstances that someone who vociferously disagrees with me and what this country was founded upon can come up with to challenge what I am saying in this post. And I am certain that there is an answer for ALL of them. The answers probably all look very much alike. And some will also probably seem harsh to the gentle soul. But the truth isn’t always what we want to hear. And I would suggest that if you don’t like the principles that this country was founded upon, rather than trying to “fundamentally change” it, do the rest of us a favor and either accept it, or, if you cannot accept it, feel free to find a country that is more to your liking and emigrate. My respect and admiration goes out to those who do!

Healthcare – the dirty little secret…

by Devin

Probably one of the biggest political topics of our time has to be healthcare. It’s the giant problem that everyone seems to want to solve. No doubt, it is a giant problem, but why is that so? Has it always been that way? If not, then what happened that caused it to be such a problem? In this essay, I’m going to try to illuminate two major factors that no one, anywhere, that I know of, is talking about, which just might answer these questions. But first, I want to emphatically state, right up front, that it has NOT always been such a huge problem. In fact, if you go far back enough, historically, in the United States, it wasn’t really much of a problem at all!

Factor number one: LBJ. Huh? LBJ? What’s LBJ got to do with anything??? Answer: The Great Society. Let’s go back to the late 1950s and early 1960s, the pre-LBJ era, and take a look at how healthcare was administered before it became such a huge mess. In those days, just like in these days, and all the centuries that came before, there were people who needed medical care that were not sufficiently wealthy to pay for the kind of medical care they needed. Nothing new there; however, those people still received the same quality medical care as those who were insured and those who were wealthy enough to not need insurance. How did that happen, you ask?

Well, back in those days, doctors and other medical professionals, including hospitals, were allowed to deduct losses from unpaid accounts from their gross income or revenue for tax purposes, just like any other ordinary business expense. The key to doing this was keeping a good set of books for your practice or business that showed which accounts went unpaid each year. Such accounts were backed up by the evidence of medical records for each patient and each patient was a verifiable real person with a real, verified medical condition. Of course, no doubt there were a few fraudsters out there. When has there ever not been? But by and large, indigent patients who could not pay their bill received the same medical care as everyone else and got a pass. Smart doctors understood that if they took enough indigent patients each year, they could actually end up paying no taxes at all!

Of course, from where the federal government stood, that was an utterly unacceptable situation! What’s this? Doctors are getting rich and paying no taxes!!! That could not stand! Nevermind that these doctors, and don’t forget hospitals and other healthcare professionals, were in fact paying their taxes in a big way in the form of unpaid medical services rendered to the poor of our society. Thus, along came LBJ’s Great Society solution: create a government program to pay for healthcare for the needy and then prohibit medical professionals and hospitals from deducting losses from unpaid accounts. (Eventually tax law was written such that no service-providing businesses could deduct uncollected debts.) From this point forward, medical professionals and hospitals were required to pay tax on all of their income/revenue (minus normal business expenses such as equipment, insurance, staff costs, etc.) and file a claim for payment for services rendered to those qualified and enrolled in the government program.

One of the arguments in favor of this new system was that now, instead of medical professionals and hospitals having to absorb losses from unpaid accounts, they would be in the superior position of being able to collect that revenue, which would otherwise be lost. From a tax accounting standpoint, it is always better to collect payment than to take a deduction, so it sounded good, well, at least, at first. Ask any doctor nowadays how much these government programs, officially known as Medicare and Medicaid, pay compared to their standard rates or even what private insurance companies pay. It’s pennies on the dollar. They would be far better off deducting the losses.

So this is how, pre-LBJ, poor people in America got the medical care they needed. And this is how the federal government stepped in and began the process of destroying what was once a very efficient and simple solution to the problem of getting healthcare to the poor. Ask any doctor over the age of 75 if there was a golden age of medicine and they will all (except those who live in la la land) tell you that indeed there was, once upon a time. They will also tell you that it is long past and they are so thankful to be out of the profession and retired (due to the destruction of the industry by the federal government.)

Of course, once the government puts its fingers in the pie and starts the process of screwing it up, it is never capable of backtracking to the last known good situation. Oh no. It just figures that it needs more tweaking to get it right; thus they (our wonderful politicians) never admit a mistake and repeal anything. Instead, they pass even more legislation trying to fix the problems they created with the first mistake. These “fixes” ultimately lead to even more unexpected consequences, which in turn lead to even more faulty legislation, ad nauseum, ad absurdum. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the Affordable Care Act, otherwise affectionately known as Obamacare, a roughly 2,700 page behemoth of a law passed in the wee hours of the night on a weekend over the holidays which no one had read and no one really understood. This law was supposed to lower everyone’s annual healthcare costs by an average of $2,500, so stated by its strongest proponents and President Obama himself.

It was also not supposed to affect anyone who had an insurance policy they liked or had a doctor they liked. I guess we all now know the truth on that one. Furthermore, instead of lowering the average annual healthcare costs, it actually increased them by as much as four to eight times. Go ask anyone who pays for their own health insurance if they got to keep the policy they had and what has happened to their premiums and deductible. Virtually no one experienced a lowering of any kind in the cost of their annual health care expenses.

But lest I go on for too long about Factor number one, let me get on to Factor number two. This one is a little trickier than Factor number one because it involves a moral question and a cultural factor. Factor number two is the result of the technology revolution.

Just 50 years ago we were barely on the cusp of the technology revolution. The standard method of diagnosing medical conditions was clinical. No fancy computer tomography or magnetic resonance imaging machines yet existed to provide highly detailed pictures of soft tissues inside the human body. The best that existed was a simple x-ray machine.

Back in those days, doctors (and that’s what people called them, NOT “health care providers”) had to rely on their training and experience to recognize what was causing an illness based on direct observations and patients’ responses to a series of questions. As is the nature of being human, some doctors were better than others at arriving at the correct diagnosis, but all doctors had to be able to make clinical diagnoses or they would be out of business in pretty short order.

Then along came technology.

New advances in technology gave doctors, for the first time in history, the ability to see inside the human body in great detail. Furthermore, developments in biochemistry resulted in tests that could provide all kinds of information to doctors which had never before been available. And to top it off, pharmaceutical companies began to sink giant amounts of money into developing medicines that could treat, cure, or prevent illnesses in ways that had never previously been imagined. But all these new advances came with a cost. And not a small one.

The rapid introduction of high technology equipment, tests, and medicines into the field of healthcare changed forever the way doctors go about diagnosing illnesses. As these new technologies became more and more available, doctors coming out of medical school and residencies began to rely more and more heavily on tests and equipment to figure out the causes of their patients’ illnesses. Old school doctors who already had clinical diagnostics down found the new technologies to be exciting new tools to add to their abilities, but were primarily useful for confirming what they already knew. Newly minted doctors, who did not yet have the years of experience at making clinical diagnoses began to use the new technologies to help them make a diagnosis. Finally, as the older doctors began to retire, clinical diagnosis was relegated to use only for the most basic and simply identifiable illnesses. The “no brainers.”

There was something else going on in American culture at the same time as the technology revolution that further pushed doctors to rely on tests and equipment to, at a minimum, confirm their own diagnoses, and more often, to make the diagnoses: medical malpractice. As soon as the question, “did you confirm your diagnosis with such-and-such test or machine?” came up in a malpractice trial, that was the end of the doctor’s discretion to decide whether or not a particular test or scan was needed. From that point forward, fear of lawsuits began driving doctors to order every test and scan they could think of that might provide some supporting evidence to confirm or make a diagnosis.

As I mentioned before, these new technologies came with a cost, literally. New tests, machines, and medicines cost millions of dollars to develop and manufacture. Many millions. Without the ability of those companies who develop the technologies to recover their costs, and without the motivation to make a profit, none of these technologies would ever be developed. Period. End of story.

As proof, I offer an examination of countries that do not have free market economies and where profits are taxed out of existence. How many such countries have contributed in any significant way to current medical technology? The answer, if you don’t already know it, is practically, if not entirely, none. And if you travel to any of those countries and are able to receive medical care that involves the use of any modern technologies, guess what? They most likely got them from the United States of America. They didn’t invent them. They bought them.

But I digress. The point of this discussion is to make clear the fact that these new technologies are not cheap. But if you look back through modern history, you will find unlimited examples of new technologies that started out so expensive that only the super-rich could afford them. The first cars and airplanes, for example. Over time, as the companies who develop new technologies begin to recoup their investments, their patents expire, competitors begin making alternatives, and the benefits of economies of scale begin to kick in, the costs of the technologies come down, making them more and more available to more and more people; the not-so-rich.

And herein lies the moral dilemma. People can live without cars and planes (although some people probably think they can’t.) But without some of the new medical technologies now available, some people will die.

That’s right. Some people will die. And, in fact, it happens every day. Not only in the USA, but all over the world. Particularly in third-world countries. This is actually nothing new. For as long as some countries have been more medically advanced than others, people in those lesser advanced countries have simply died. Or, in less extreme circumstances, suffered for the rest of their lives from something curable in a more advanced nation. The advent of high medical technology has, in this area, served primarily to highlight the difference.

But what about people right here in America who are not wealthy enough to take advantage of all these new technologies and thus suffer and/or die as a result? Doesn’t everyone have a right to these new technologies, regardless of their wealth? That is the $64 billion dollar question. It is the very moral question at the heart of today’s medical controversy. As an aside, I find it interesting that many of those arguing that it is our moral duty as a nation to make all these new technologies available to everyone are also people who do not have any moral values of their own! But again, I digress.

So, I have established that throughout history some people have always had access to better medical care than others. It’s undeniable. I have also established that the main difference between now and then is the cost and capability of the old medical technologies versus the new medical technologies. The moral question has not changed. It is simply more directly in the spotlight.

I propose that we ignore the fact that the new technologies cost radically more to develop and manufacture than the old technologies. If we do this, then the answer to the moral dilemma remains unchanged. Those who have the money will pay for the new technologies and over time, the prices of those technologies will eventually come down to the point where all but the poorest can afford them. If we accept this situation, then we can also expect that there will always be newer and more advanced medical technologies on the horizon. If we refuse to accept this situation, then we cannot expect that there will always be newer and more advanced medical technologies under development.

To make it, possibly, maybe, just a little bit easier to accept this situation, one has to understand that if we had never accepted this situation in the past, we’d still be treating fevers with leeches.

So, what about “the poorest?” When do they get to take advantage of the new technologies? The answer to this question is found in our culture. The United States of America is the most charitable nation on planet Earth. Bar none. When natural disasters strike in foreign countries, who comes to the rescue with millions in donations and billions in equipment? The United States of America. That’s who. Do any other countries do the same? Well, a few help out, but none have the capacity or the desire to help to anywhere near the extent of our great nation. So the answer to the question, “what about the poorest?” comes from within. It comes from charity. It does not come from the government. Private charities have the ability to provide financial support at the individual level like no other entity in the world. And they do. As a nation, we should be doing everything possible to promote and facilitate charitable giving. It is the total solution.

Will some people still fall through the cracks? Absolutely. No system is perfect. But as a free democratic nation, where we value both individual rights and rule of the majority, no one can do better.

So is all we have to do to solve the healthcare problems in this country is simply allow medical professionals and hospitals to deduct unpaid accounts from their taxes and its “Problem Solved?” No. I wish it were. But there are many other things we most certainly can do to fix our broken healthcare system. And, naturally, I know what they are! But they will be the subject of another blog on this site, when I have time write it.

Until then, here is to your good health!