Just call me STUD for short, and let me solve societies problems.

    Through out my life I've never really aligned myself with a particular political party or social movement. Not because I didn't believe in some of the things they stood for or thoughts they espoused. I never joined because it just goes against my nature to be part of a group; I've always been a loner.
    
    Not to say that I haven't tried to fit in. First there is the most natural of groups the family. I love my siblings and my mother (my father when he was alive) but I don't feel this strong need to see them or talk to them more than every few months. If by chance I see them more often, great, if not, no big deal.

    For the 25 years I lived in Michigan and my family was here in California I probably talked to my mother on average 4 times a year (birthdays and holidays) and to my siblings twice a year. It goes both ways, it's not because we don't care, we just don't feel the need, so I guess it runs in the family.

     

     I had friends in school and some of those friendships carried over to adulthood but I always still felt like an outsider when there was a group of friends. I have to say that even of those people I consider close friends I barely ever communicate with them. It's not that I don't think of them or wonder how they are doing; it's that I don't make the effort because I don't feel the need. Maybe it’s the loner in me or maybe I’m just self absorbed, either way I'm going way off topic.

    

    Back to my point about politics and social movements. 

    Personally I think that most of the so called “main stream” groups are to polarized, short sighted, and narrow minded. They are just looking out for the self interest of the rest of their like minded group. In essence they are thinking too small. What we need is a group that thinks BIG, real BIG. Not a little big like all of California, or medium big like the United States, not even big big like global. I’m talking SUPER BIG, like the United Federation of Planets BIG. That’s right I’m talking STAR TREK BIG.

    

    OK, done laughing? I’m serious.

    You see, a lot of my personal philosophy about living life can be traced back to the society that was portrayed as our future on the TV show Star Trek.  A society that is referred to as the “Star Trek Utopia”. I have long dreamed of that utopia. I guess you could call me a Star Trek Utopian Dreamer, or STUD for short.

    Please, stop laughing. I’m serious.

    Why can't we strive for a society where everyone's basic needs for food, shelter, health, and education are provided for? A society where if you want, you work for the betterment of the society in exchange for having those needs met. Or if you're so inclined you go off and do your own thing. Either way it's OK and you're not judged.

    I know, it sounds like some kind of socialist / communist society but it's not. It’s also not capitalism either because in my opinion that social model, like the other two doesn't work very well. In this utopia you can still own property and have possessions but they're just not that important, they don't have much value.

    Value, isn't that what kind of makes a society? Having shared values, both moral and monetary? It’s us, the members of the society that dictates the value of any object or thought. Why do we give more value to the wellbeing of a wealthy person than a poor person? Why do we give more value to the right to own a gun than the right to live without fear of guns? Why do we value the rights of a corporation over the rights of an individual? Why do we value the rights of heterosexual couples to marry more than homosexual couples or for that matter why a couple, why not three, four, or more partners? Values, they are what holds societies together and what can also tear them apart.

    I've always wondered, how over thousands of years our loose knit societies have given so much value to Gold? It’s just a shinny yellow metal that can't do anything by itself, yet we as a people give it tremendous value, it's conceptual, it's all in our minds.

    Ultimately I think it's that simple. If we want to create a future that resembles the Star Trek Utopia then all we have to do is change our minds. That might sound a little simplistic but what else do you expect from a STUD like me.

To view the column in it's original form go to page 14 of the following link. Winters Express 3/27/14          

ObamaCare or CorporateCare?

            Hey everybody, long time no writing. I've been a little busy, a little uninspired, and a little lazy. One of the things I've been doing over the past few months is getting signed up for health insurance under the provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act or as it’s more commonly known “ObamaCare”. Not only did I sign up once but I got to do it twice.

            As I've written before, Diane and I already had health insurance through Anthem Blue Cross. It was a high deductible plan that cost us around $600 per month. In October we got a letter from Anthem stating that because of the required provisions of the upcoming PPACA our current policy would no longer be available after the first of the year. The letter suggested we shop for a policy on the new Covered California Insurance Exchange or if we wanted they could put us in a comparable policy for $1100 a month (an increase of only 83%).

            As suggested, I went on the Covered CA website and started looking at policies. I entered all my information including financial and was surprised to find out we qualified for a premium subsidy. A new policy, comparable to my $600 one was now only going to cost me $2 a month. Cool for us I thought, but what was bugging me was the federal subsidy part. Why was the government going to pay $912 for a policy that was the same as my $600 one? That’s an increase of over 50% and that’s our tax money paying for it.

            I went ahead and signed up for a new policy through Covered CA with Anthem Blue Cross. It took a couple of months and a few phone calls to actually confirm that we were enrolled before the January first deadline but we were, so nothing to worry about, or so we thought.

            In January Diane had a couple of routine appointments with her doctors at UC Davis Medical. She gave them our new insurance information and went on her merry way. Then in February, a day before a scheduled follow up appointment she got a call from UCD saying that they wouldn't accept our new insurance because they didn't have a contract with Anthem for that policy. WTF! I thought Obamacare was going to give us better coverage! We had done what we were supposed to do, buying through the exchange and now we didn't have coverage where we needed it. Kind of ticked me off, so I spent the next 6 hours on the phone (most of it on hold) with Anthem and Covered CA getting it figured out. Ultimately we ended up switching to a different policy and company, one that UCD would accept. Now it’s going to cost me $24 a month but that’s still better than the $600 I had been paying. I guess for me personally it’s working out, but what about Obamacare in general, what do I really think about it.

            If you've read my columns in the past you probably know that I’m a politically unaffiliated, left leaning, so called social progressive. You would think that I would be a strong supporter of Obamacare. Well you would be wrong. I am a strong proponent of health care reform and government subsidized health care but as I see it, Obamacare is neither of those things. It is a subsidy to the insurance companies not to the health care providers. It is a monetary windfall for the insurers in exchange for what? Not being able to deny coverage anymore but still able to raise our rates. If I was unfortunate enough to earn more money and didn't qualify for the premium subsidy I would be paying hundreds of dollars more each month and not really getting any better benefits or health care.

            Now that I've climbed on the soap box I might as well lay it out there. What I think we need in this country is real heath care reform. What I mean is government control of pricing (not free market), if the insurance companies can dictate what is a “usual and customary allowed expense” then why can’t our government? At the very least we should have a single payer system, get rid of the insurance companies.

            Unfortunately the biggest reform we need is the hardest. We need to reform our collective attitudes on the balance of health, quality of life, and our inevitable deaths. We have to ask ourselves the question, is health care a human right or a profit center for big business? Do we want to spend our tax dollars on wars, weapons, and corporate bailouts? Or do we want to spend it on “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness (healthiness)? I know which way I want to go, do you?

To view the column in it's original form go to page 15 of the following link. Winters Express 3/13/14