UHF: EcoSneaks

I didn't really feel like it was necessary to include this as an Undercover Hippie File, but Craig wasn't going to let me get away with buying them and not telling you.

You see, I needed shoes for d.c. I wanted them to be somewhat fashionable (i.e. even I didn't want to wear running shoes with skirts) but I knew we would be walking all over dc and my cute work shoes are okay for working in the lab all day but would definitely have given me blisters by hour 6 of our 12 hr sightseeing days. So off to the mall I went.

I had a type of shoe in mind but as soon as I saw these
I loved them. I didn't even notice till I was actually trying them on that they were Ecosneaks made by Simple Shoes (shoes for a happy planet).

Now, a happy planet sounds nice but I didn't buy them because the sole is made from recycles tires, or the lining is organic cotton and hemp, or they use old plastic milk jugs for the cushion. I bought them because I liked them. But since they costs less than the other shoe I also liked so I was getting them anyway, I will say that it's pretty cool they are so UH friendly. And they did an excellent job of keeping my feet happy during my trip too.

CraigCare

Obama's drive for health care reform seems to be floundering, which is good. Considering that Medicare is a fraud-riddled beast that threatens to swallow our entire federal budget in 10 years or so, I don't know how anyone can want the government to take over more of health care. And all the stories that come out of our neighbor to the north about long waits and denied treatments make the Democratic plan even more unpalatable.

Although Obama likes to set up the dichotomy of "my plan or nothing," there are other ideas out there. Here are my health care reform recommendations:

• Medical malpractice reform, to reduce frivolous lawsuits and the unnecessary procedures that doctors perform in order to avoid these lawsuits. This "defensive medicine" is estimated to increase medical costs by 10%. Texas has had good results from its medical tort reform.

• Allow people to buy health insurance across state lines. A lot of states impose ridiculous mandates on their health insurers, requiring them to cover acupuncture or in vitro fertilization for everyone. These mandates drive costs up. People shop nationwide for car insurance and mortgages, so why not health insurance?

• More use of "retail health clinics," like those located at CVS or Wal-mart. There, people can get quick, low-cost, walk-in service for minor ailments, usually from a nurse practitioner. These clinics reduce costs, free up emergency rooms, and expand access. Of course, doctors' groups oppose them.
  

• Tax employer-provided health insurance. There is currently not much of a link between the people that use health care and those that pay for it. People don't think about what procedures cost, because insurance will cover most or all of it. Similary, when people get insurance from their employer, they usually have no say in what plan they get. Taxing employer-provided insurance would push more people to get their own insurance, in which case they would buy the plan that is best for them, not for their employer. At my last job, my employer was definitely paying more for my insurance than I would have paid for a basic individual plan.

• Related to the above point, I'm not sure about offering tax credits for people to buy health insurance. It seems like offering such credits could cause inflation of premiums, cancelling out whatever good the credits do. Maybe these credits could be offered exclusively to the poor and/or the young.

• More use of Health Savings Accounts. These accounts allow people to have tax-free savings accounts to use to pay health costs, and are used in conjunction with high-deductible plans, which create incentives for people to shop around for health care and question the benefit and necessity of costly procedures.

• Much is made about the benefit of being in a group plan versus an individual plan for spreading risk around and decreasing costs. Currently, this is done by getting insurance at work. It seems like people could instead get insurance through other types of groups. For example, there are credit unions for people who work in certain fields or live in certain areas. Similar groups could be formed to get health insurance. People could also buy into plans through their college alumni association, for example.
  

Thoughts?

Flowers

My favorite part of the DC Botanical Gardens was being able to take pictures of all the flowers. I'm fairly picky with the types of flowers I like, but there were still lots of interesting ones to shoot. After narrowing down my set of about 30 to just a few favorites, I had an evening of fun with Photoshop. I'm thinking about getting a set of four (the vertical ones, I wish I had another good horizontal one as the white is my favorite, but I can't do a set of 3 vertical and one horizontal!) printed for our bedroom. Which set is your favorite?

Foreign Affairs Friday: Swine Flu

As the Northern Hemisphere flu season approaches, talk of swine-flu vaccines is increasing. The disease has hung around below the equator all summer, and so should be resurgent up here this winter. I think this is all overblown, and I'm not to eager to participate in a rushed, government-organized vaccination campaign. But the question of international competition for vaccines in the case of major problems with swine flu (or some other disease) is an interesting one to consider in this week's FAF segment.

According to the AP, "about 70 percent of the world's existing flu vaccines are made in Europe, and only a handful of countries are self-sufficient in vaccines." This becomes a problem when multiple countries decides to engage in mass vaccination, or when lots of people in multiple countries demand vaccines. Contracts that countries have with foreign vaccine makers may be broken by the host governments:

"This isn't rocket science," said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. "If there is severe disease, countries will want to hang onto the vaccine for their own citizens."

Experts say politicians would not be able to withstand the pressure.

"The consequences of shipping vaccine to another country when your own people don't have it would be devastating," added David Fedson, a retired vaccine industry executive.

In such a situation, each country would be looking out for itself. The US, for one, would not have enough vaccine to treat every citizen. At the same time, the World Health Organization and poor countries would be demanding that rich countries share vaccines with them. Their demands would likely go unheeded. The threat of "vaccine wars" is even raised in the linked article, but I'm not sure if this means actual war, or merely figurative war.

How vaccines are distributed within each country is another consideration. I suspect Congress would try to put themselves, their families, their nannies, and their mistresses atop the list. That's a subject for another post, however. As for me, I'll just retreat to my underground bunker in the woods.

Lock Him Up

This black Harvard professor, Henry Gates, who was arrested the other day at his home, is an absolute ass. He was trying to get into his house, but had to force the door open because it was stuck. A suspicious neighbor called the police, who showed up to check on things. Gates, instead of being glad that the police were responding to a potential burglary, goes off on a tirade, getting himself arrested. Now, of course, he claims racial profiling.

What gets me is the way CNN covered this. They gave two options: either there was a misunderstanding, or there was racism. They didn't stop to think maybe this guy deserved to be arrested. CNN, like the Washington Post did in the attached article, repeatedly insists this guy is "renowned." CNN suggested that the neighbor who called police and the cops themselves should have recognized this guy on sight and left him alone. I am pretty knowledgeable about current events, and I've never heard of this guy before. If he's like most ethnic studies "scholars," I'm sure he's a quack. He probably saw the cop approaching and knew he could get some headlines by getting himself arrested. That's probably why he's "renowned;" he knows how to play the media.

I'm glad to see the cop in this situation is standing his ground. I hope his superiors don't hang him out to dry.