My Lovely Daughter

I give my to you Daughter.

I held her as an infant; I hugged her as a girl and through the years she has become my greatest pride and joy.

I love her more than I can say, her life more precious than my own. But gone are the whims and notions of the little girl that I have known.

For the years have passed so quickly since the time it all began, and now she stands before me with the convictions of a woman.

She wants to serve her country, she states aloud with pride, as I try to sort out the emotions that I'm feeling deep inside.

A union of the uncertain fear, which I cannot control, and the allegiance that lies deep within my patriotic soul.

I trust that my years of guidance will serve as a strong foundation as she performs the duties requested from her beloved nation.

God, please guide her as she travels to the places our Soldiers have bled, and walk with her through pathways where those heroes' feet have tread.

Oh, Sweet Land of Liberty, humbly I give you my daughter, praying you'll return her safely home when her work for you is done.

Author Unknown

"Please sir, may I have some more?"

I have had this blog in me, waiting to be written, it’s been in me for several years, it’s not a new idea to me and I have shared it in many public and private forums, including social media.  How do I politely put into written word this idea?  I don’t know, but here goes.

I stopped at Arby’s yesterday for a sandwich, just the chicken sandwich, no drink or fries or shake or turnover, just the sandwich.  There was couple ahead of me.  The cashier asked if they want to donate a dollar to feed the hungry children, and they proudly give, then they write their name on a tag and tape the tag on the window.  How nice, touching, heart-warming to see that spirit of generosity.  NOT!

Arby’s has a foundation with a mission is to end childhood hunger in America.  Toward that end, they are asking their customers to donate money.  It seems to me that if Arby’s wants to feed America’s hungry children that they would give away sandwiches to hungry children.  Oh nooo, they want MY dollar to accomplish their mission.  According to their website, one in 5 children in America struggles with hunger.  But this isn’t about Arby’s.

During the last congressional race, a local fella, whom I respect, included in his platform a statement that said one in six children don’t know where their next meal is coming from, they are food insecure.  I challenged him on Facebook and he quoted “reports.”  Another friend was on the board of the local food bank and we were talking about it one day; he also quoted similar dire statistics.  I challenged him as well.  I googled “childhood hunger in America” and found countless reports by nonprofits organizations.  These reports offer a similar picture of childhood hunger in America; it’s appalling, at least the reports are appalling. 

We have approximately 75 million children in this country, one third under the age of 5, one third of them 6 to 11 years of age, and another third are 12 to 18.  Of the 50 million school aged children, 20 million get free or reduced school breakfast and/or lunch; that is two meals per day, for half of their days between the ages of 5 and 18.  More than 9 million children, birth to 5, receive WIC supplemental nutritional services.  More than 22 million households, that’s households (not children), receive food stamps. In summary, of the 75 million kiddos, 59 million receive individual supplemental food assistance.  And many of them receive additional supplemental nutritional assistance in the form of food stamps.  Government reports contradict the reports of nonprofit organizations whose mission it is to stamp out hunger.  Who do YOU believe?

A few years ago our former congressman was hosting a town hall meeting that focused on the Affordable Care Act.  He too spoke about widespread hunger.  Being who I am, I spoke out, and I ignited the room.  Curiously, the general tone of the conversation that ensued supported my position. 

The conversation centered around treatment for such things as childhood obesity and juvenile diabetes and that’s when I burst into my rant, albeit a polite and subdued rant because it is, after all, a town hall meeting hosted by a congressman.

Here is my position.  I donate a tremendous amount to feed the hungry, even though I don’t see too many hungry people, with the exception of the homeless panhandlers I see on street corners.  I give to WIC, and SNAP, and USDA, and so on.  The US Department of Agriculture has several nutrition programs, including Women, Infants and Children, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Child Nutrition Programs, and others.  The purpose of these programs is to feed the hungry and they are highly successful programs.

How do I know they are successful?  The evidence is quantified.  One third of America’s adults and children are obese or overweight, and more than 65% of them are low to moderate income.  In fact, the higher Americans are on the income ladder, the more fit they are, and conversely, the lower they are on income strata, the more fat they are.  We have been feeding the hungry, it seems, with a fire hose!  They have ballooned and are feeling the adverse health effects of their weight gain.  The rhetorical question: are they really hungry?

I have heard the argument that healthy food costs more.  That’s simply not true, I know because I go to the supermarket on a regular basis.  A bag of potato chips costs more than a dozen eggs.  A bag of cookies costs more than a pound of chicken.  Soft drinks cost more than pinto beans.  Frozen corn dogs cost more than bananas.  Frozen pizza costs more than ground beef.  Milk is cheaper than designer tea beverages.

I was at Wal Mart one day, shopping for my adult daughter and I; I was a single dad at the time.  I have in my shopping cart fruits, veggies, fish, chicken, bread, and stuff.  The total of my shopping trip did not fill the bottom of the shopping cart, this was groceries for two adults.  In front of me at the check-out counter is an overweight family, bordering on obese.  Their shopping cart runneth over with all manner of unhealthy fare: pizza, cookies, chips, ice cream, cokes, corn dogs, etc.  I became angry at the site of the family’s dinner menus.

Their bill totaled $276 and the father handed over his Lone Star Card (food stamps in Texas), but the balance on the card did not cover the bill, so he produced another card cover the difference.  I was angered by what I saw, BEFORE he whipped out his food stamps card.  I was angered by the thought they were feeding this little girl, who was a preschooler, those awful foods.  Already she was quite hefty and the meals ahead of her were sure to increase her girth.  The parents were also voluminous, why must they impart those eating habits to this child? 

I was angry, and THEN they pulled out the food stamp card.  Not only were they feeding this child a diet of crap, but I was paying for it with my taxes.  Here is where I get in trouble, when I see something like this and I jump to conclusions with deduction and logical reasoning.  Stay with me.  They receive income assistance because their earned income is low.  Income assistance includes other benefits, for this argument I refer to Medicaid. 

Now let me state another more egregious example, this one at the 7-11 convenience store.  I am in line to make my purchase.  A family in front of me lays on the counter all manner of junk food, such as cokes, candy, chips, ice cream, etc. and mom pays for it with her Lone Star Card.  I’m next for checkout and I call out the cashier, “hey, is that legal?”  He tells me that it is legal and that it happens frequently.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to buy junk food with my taxes.  This store was adjacent to a public housing complex, more supposition on my part, they were a low income family.  These children are likely on Medicaid, the government’s medical insurance for low income children. 

Back to USDA’s “nutrition programs,” many of these children received the free, or reduced, school breakfast and lunch meals funded by tax dollars allocated to USDA to feed the hungry.  And they receive nutritional assistance from food stamps and WIC.  Why would I give a dollar to the Arby’s foundation to do what the government is already doing with TOO much success?

Stay with me.  These families are receiving too much of the wrong foods.  They get fat, and they get sick.  When they get sick, many of them get medical care with Medicaid.  Tax dollars over feed them and tax dollars treat them for the maladies caused by over eating the wrong foods.  That’s correct, we pay to make them sick and pay to treat them for disease that will likely require a lifetime of medical care.  You know, diabetes does not go away.  A musculoskeletal system injured by over stress does not return to it’s healthy state.  It’s madness. 

Ok, on the public side, with all the good intentions of the War on Poverty launched by LBJ and the Great Society, the country is making poor people sick.  Fret not, we will provide free medical care.  But now the private sector has jumped on the bandwagon creating a public health hazard, aided and abetted by the equally well intentioned nonprofit sector who offers up all these reports that contradict the government reports. 

Pull out your map, or your smart phone, and plot the locations of McDonald’s Restaurants and Wal Mart Super Markets.  Invariably, their locations are overwhelmingly in the low rent district.  I pick on these two because it’s easy.  They offer plenty of low cost, high calorie food for their target demographic.  You don’t find McDonalds or Wal Mart in the same proportions in exclusive neighborhoods.

The nonprofit sector, assuming it is well intentioned, but slightly misinformed, is a collaborator in this public health dilemma.  I attended a $100 per person soiree to feed the hungry.  The place was full of fat cats, including political candidates.  There was an art show, and a musical band, and several restaurants were giving away food, and of course, there was beer and wine.  Everything and everyone was there, except for the hungry we were supposed to be feeding.  What the fuck? 

I have been out in public, at a store or restaurant and have seen people who look hungry.  Recently, I stopped at a convenience store for refreshments.  I noticed a man sitting on a table in the store, counting his pennies.  I told my lady friend to select some food for him, I paid for it, and she gave it to him.  Very gratefully and graciously he accepted saying he needed food to take his meds.  No fuss, no muss, no scene, I fed that hungry person that day.  I’ve done that many times.  I learned that lesson from my mom when she invited a hungry boy into the café to join us that snowy day, and she bought him a bowl of hot soup.

Ok Jaime, now what?  What do you suggest that we do?  We have options.  The government can get out of the War on Hunger, but that is politically untenable.  Actually, I believe that ONE government program got it right and most of you have seen it at the supermarket where certain food items are noted as “WIC Approved.”  That’s the ticket.  Eliminate from the SNAP program all those foods do not have nutritional value.  I know, what is nutritional value?  Let’s go the other way, what is NOT nutritional value?  How many of you will argue that frozen corn dogs are nutritional, or Oreos, or candy, or Gatorade?  I’m not saying that poor people can’t eat those things, I’m saying that taxpayers should not pay for it.  They can buy all the junk they can afford to buy with their own money.

Nutritionist and allied health experts have established nutritional guidelines for us.  WIC and school meal programs should be coordinated with food stamp benefits to provide Americans a supplement.  A supplement is intended to provide that extra assistance needed to reach optimum intake.  It is a supplement, not a sole source of calories; and when taken in combination, calories from WIC, the school nutrition programs, and/or food stamps should be less than minimum caloric requirements.  Yes, less than minimum caloric requirements because these programs are intended to supplement the nutrition provided in the home.  Oh yeah, the home, where home cooked meals are prepared and eaten at the dinner table.  I don’t think anyone intended that the government should be the sole source of food for low income families. 

Yes there will be those families who cannot afford  home cooked meals. That’s where nonprofit food banks can play a minor supporting role, as can food pantries sponsored by churches.  But this current frenzy to feed the hungry children is unhealthy and insane.

Now, a little about me, the author of this blog, I have some personal experience with this subject.  I grew up poor; how poor you ask, so poor that our cockroaches went next door to eat.  We had nothing.  Mom raised 5 of us, alone, a single mom with the meager wages she earned in the food service industry.  She was too proud to apply for the school lunch program or food stamps, we ate what she purchased and prepared, supplemented by the occasional leftovers she brought home from the cafeteria where she worked.  All that poverty, and I never considered myself hungry, or poor for that matter.  Mom prepared meals, we ate beans, oatmeal, eggs, two baloney sandwiches every day for my school lunch for 12 years of public school.  We ate humble food, but we ate.  Hunger never interfered with my learning.

I became a social worker and have been in this profession for 34 years, in one of poorest communities in the country, with a population whose per capita income is well below the national average.  We have a huge percentage of the population that is classified by government standards to be below the federal poverty levels.  Given my profession, in THIS community, why do I not see these hungry children everywhere every day?  I run a nonprofit organization that helps children and we have a childcare center where we have a cross segment of the local population, mostly low to moderate income.  I see them every day at work.  Yet, they don’t “look” hungry and judging from the amount of food that is placed in front of them that they DO NOT eat, I conclude they are not hungry.

So what is the problem?  Where are all these hungry children that we are throwing food at?  I’m sure there are some out there somewhere.  In great part, I think, the social problem is created.  It is created by some not so well meaning people with the aid of some very well intentioned people.  Agri-business has a huge stake in this dilemma.  WIC, SNAP, school meal programs, and government commodity give away programs create a huge market for America’s farmers.   Did you know the largest purchaser of “pink slime” is the US government and the government channels the “pink slime” to public schools for your children to eat, whether they are poor children or not?  Did you that EVERY child’s public school meal is subsidized by the USDA regardless of that child’s income status?

Let me summarize my blog this way.  You and I, as represented by our government, are feeding Americans with a fire hose, creating a public health hazard in the form of maladies caused by over eating.  The low to moderate income Americans receive the greatest amount of food, most of it of questionable nutritional value, and the food makes them chronically ill. You and I, as represented by our government, are treating these same folks for the illnesses that we created with the massive quantities of food we shoved on their plates.  The nonprofit sector, ignorant of these facts, solicits massive amounts of charitable donations to combat a problem that does not exist.  The private sector capitalizes on the situation and markets to the same target population foods that contribute to their illnesses. 

Here is my challenge to Arby’s, if you show me these hungry children, I will put them into my vehicle and drive them to the nearest Arby’s store where you can give them a sandwich.  At Denny’s, they also ask for money to feed America’s hungry, but the sign the on the window says kids eat free on weekdays.  I didn’t find Denny’s strategy to spend the money they  collect as donations, but I saw the sign on the window.  However, I found on Arby’s website mention of their tour bus.  So with YOUR donation, they bought a bus and are on a cross country tour to educate us about childhood hunger and their bus is great advertising for Arby’s.  “Please sir, may I have some more.”

Privacy

Much has been written lately about Julian Assange, Bradley Manning, and Edward Snowden.  Are they guardians of freedom, rebels shedding light on the misdeeds of the war machine, bearers of truth?  Or are they traitors, trying to score cheap points on the pretense of achieving a greater good? 

My pet peeve, for many years has been the corporate spying into the private lives of citizens.  A few weeks after I bought my brand new, 1974 Plymouth Duster, I received an offer, and catalog, from Fingerhut, for custom, plastic covers for my 1974 Plymouth Duster.  How did they know about my purchase?  I didn’t buy the plastic covers, but the catalogs kept coming, month after month, and I continued to throw them away without perusing through them.  I hate mail order catalogs. 

Fingerhut spent a lot of money chasing my business.  They could afford to waste money on me because there were ample customers to finance their loss on me while turning a hefty profit.  They continue doing business with their “buy now, pay later” approach to business.  How did they know about my purchase and how did they get my mailing address?

We all know the answer to that question.  Business sells customer information to business.  I recently purchased a new home.  Within days I was getting phone calls from Amerigroup Mortgage Corporation, at home where, I had a new phone number. They wanted to refinance my mortgage loan.  How did they know about my new mortgage loan and how did they get my new phone number?  They bought my personal information from other companies.

Every time I go online, companies are tracking my movement on the Internet.  Websites will place their insidious cookies on my computer, without my permission.  What gives them the right to do so?  I am a Facebook user.  I enter limited information on my profile, one of those tidbits is my college degree.  Coincidentally, ads appear on my Facebook page for schools that offer my degree.  How do those advertisers know to target me for their products?  I avoid Facebook applications because of the disclaimer that Facebook will share my profile information with the application.  Candy crush will use my profile information, not to play their game but to sell me other goods and services that candy crush users are known to prefer.

There is outrage in this country about the revelations by Snowden that the government has been spying on American citizens by collecting Internet and telephone usage data, presumably under the guise of national security.  I have not seen a commensurate outrage over the spying of American citizens by businesses who sell our personal and financial information for the sole purpose of separating us from our hard earned, accumulated wealth.  Why?

There are proposals before Congress to limit government’s data collecting protocols.  There are NO serious proposals before Congress to limit businesses use of private and presumably confidential information of its customers.  Why? 

I believe that Assange, Snowden and Manning are traitors engaged in a dangerous game of “truth telling” and that their motives are insincere.  Manning took an oath to defend the constitution of the United States against enemies, foreign and domestic.”  He violated that oath and in doing so, he became a domestic enemy.  Snowden worked for the CIA, he had a security clearance and he violated that trust.  Assange is a hacker who publishes official documents for personal gain. 

I also believe that the practice of business spying on American citizens is traitorous.  How often have you seen confidential disclosure statements?  They are meant to protect the company, not the customer.  They will sell out the customer for money and they will buy customer data to target their sales strategies to most likely buyers.  There is no shame in this widely known and accepted business practice, and there is no public outrage either.  Corporate spying on other corporations is illegal, kind like honor amongst thieves, but corporate spying on me is “good business.” 

Think about this the next time you use your credit card at the supermarket.  Corporate America will know if you buy alcohol or cigarettes or advil or motor oil or jelly donuts.  Life insurance companies will base your premiums, in part, on what you consume.  They know who you are because you used your credit card.  You will suddenly receive junk mail from pet stores because you purchased pet food.  Yes, big brother is watching us. 

Personally, I prefer to trust my government’s practice of collecting my Internet or telephone data.  What will they learn?  Who my friends are?  If I visit porn sites?  My travel plans?  I don’t care if they know that.  However, I don’t want my banking institution selling my personal and financial information to anyone else, and I don’t want cookies on my computer.  I can rationalize government’s peeking into my smart phone as being for the greater good to safeguard OUR freedoms.  However, I should qualify that it is an outrageous waste of public resources to throw out a hugely expensive dragnet that should be more precisely cast on likely threats.  I cannot rationalize corporate spying and intrusion for the sole purpose of separating me from my money.  This spying, by the way, is condoned by the very same government that just convicted Manning for espionage. 

Define irony!

State Innovations Models? Really?

I attended a Texas State Innovation Models Initiative Stakeholder meeting, an initiative of the federal government to design and test innovative health delivery and payment models with the intent of lowering health care costs.  I should clarify, the intent, I believe, is NOT to lower health care costs, rather it is to lower government expenditures on health care.  Those are two entirely different goals.  Lowering health care costs saves money for everyone, lowering the government’s health care expenditures nets saves money for the government.  I don’t see any substantive efforts to cut total expenditures on health care, there may be some REAL efforts going on somewhere in the vast country of ours, I just don’t see them.

The meeting was conducted by a private company, Health Management Associates, a consulting company that will collect information from various locations and parties throughout the state and submit a report to the Texas Health and Human Services Commission.  The two company representatives who led the meeting are former state employees.  Now wrap your head around this, the government hired retired government employees to tell the government how to save money.  Doesn’t that sound a bit oxymoronish?

The target audience was health care providers and health care payers.  Consider these two groups for a moment.  Health care providers, they were mostly referring to physicians and hospitals, want to increase their revenue, cut their costs, and simplify their processes.  The payers are insurance companies and managed care organizations that seek to increase their revenue, cut their costs and simplify their process. These two industries have engaged in a cat and mouse ritual, the providers submits claims to the payer.  It is in the provider’s financial interest to extract as much money from the payer as it can; and it is in the payer’s financial interest to reimburse the providers as little as possible.  The missing element in this equation is the source of health insurance premiums, America’s employers and those private citizens who purchase health insurance.

Wrap your head around this, the government wants to spend less on healthcare, and the healthcare industry wants to improve its bottom line.  Am I the only one who sees the inherent contradictions?  Caught in between the proverbial rock and the hard place are health care consumers and purchasers of health insurance.  Will the consumer have better health outcomes?  Will insurance purchasers, mostly employers, have lower premiums.

Enter the government’s initiative to reduce expenditures.  It is pitting competing interests of the government’s expenditures, the provider’s interest and the payer’s interests, against one another.  The challenge to the payers and providers is to come up with innovative ways to cuts costs.  Caught in the cross hairs is the American public, the same public that is actually funding all of this activity.  After the meeting, a hospital executive commented about the low profit margin for hospitals, lost in his analysis is the total dollar amount in profits.  While salaries are growing at 2 to 3%, and inflation is at, or below, that rate, insurance premiums continue to increase by more than 8% annually. 

This, That, and the Other Thing

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Happy New Year

Today is January 2, and it’s my birthday, not that I want to write about my birthday, but it is my birthday just the same.  I’m really curious about all the hoopla about the new year’s resolution thing.

What I hear most is people resolving to lose weight or be a better person or to drop a bad habit like, smoking.  Folks, there is nothing magical about new year’s day.  If you really want to be better, you can do that any day of the week.  Waiting for that one day of the year decreases your chances of success.  If you want to lose weight, waiting until January 1^st to start a diet or exercise program increases the number of days you live with those extra pounds and high blood pressure.  Don’t wait to lose weight, start NOW. 

The same logic applies if your goal is to stop smoking or drinking or whatever bad habit or vice you might want to shed.  I used to smoke a pack a day, for many years.  When my first child was born I became much more sensitive about that habit.  Her mother quit smoking during pregnancy and I often, but not always, abstained in her presence.  I quit smoking on new years day, several times; I gave it up for Lent; I quit on a whim.  Eventually, I quit smoking because I wanted to quit.  Whatever your goal, don’t wait for January 1^st to embark on goal attainment.

Congress has reached a deal to avert plunging over the fiscal cliff.  It was a good deal by modern standards of governing.  But it is a lousy deal. 

It didn’t really avoid going over the cliff, it only postponed hard decisions.  The fact is that our country must make hard choices and our elected buffoons haven’t the stomach or character to do so.  I guess I had forgotten about milk price supports until I read the newspaper article about the “deal.”  Milk price supports and wind farm tax breaks are bad government and bad economic policy. 

Our country was built on a few basic principles, those of free enterprise and capitalism.  We don’t offer price supports for medicine, for clothing, for water, and a multitude of other commodities, why price supports for dairy products?  The price of milk should be set by the market.  Agribusiness is business first and it should compete as any other business.

Back to fiscal cliff though, reaching the deal was not about governing, it was about winning a political battle that has nothing to do with sound fiscal policy.  We continue to spend more money that we earn, and that is bad for America and bad for Americans.  Unfortunately, we lose sight of governing and focus on a deal how that deal will affect us individually. 

Much of the deal centered on tax policies.  The tax system must be reformed, everyone agrees with that, but no one has the balls to do it.  The way to reduce the national debt is to tax the money, follow the money.  The national wealth is held by the largest corporations and the wealthiest individuals, “for unto whomever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more (Luke 12:48).” 

The conventional stupidity is NOT to tax investors because they use their wealth to create jobs, it’s stupid because they do not create jobs, they create, and concentrate, wealth.  Consumers create jobs with their spending habits.  Hence, tax those who are holding the wealth at high rates.  In today’s environment, everyone is waiting to see that happens with national fiscal and economic policy, making us a nation frozen in the headlights.  The deal did nothing to make consumers want to buy, or investors want to invest. 

Corporations holding massive amounts of cash do not want to invest in expansion (jobs) because they don’t know what the near future holds for them.  Fine, don’t invest in jobs; pay a tax instead.  Use those taxes to cut tax rates for middle class Americans who will have more money to spend and watch how quickly companies will start producing goods for consumers. 

Congressmen know this to be true, but they follow a party line that got them elected and prefer to stay in the party box.  This has created gridlock and stalemate for 20 years.  Congress is one of the most reviled bodies in modern American history.  Why then do we not vote them out?  Every community wants to keep their representative because he brings home the bacon and bacon is good for local economies.  I say that “bacon” should be the measuring stick used by an educated electorate to eject a congressman.  Bacon, while good for a community is bad for America.  We need governors and leaders, not politically expedient legislators who sacrifice the country’s future for their reelection.  I vow to vote against all legislators, locally and nationally who put themselves ahead of US.

Last month we had another national tragedy, a school shooting that resulted in 20 children shot dead.  The national outcry was loud, but short lived.

Yes, we need gun control.  We already have gun control, its mostly a matter of where to draw the line.  I cannot buy a .50 caliber machine gun, or a grenade launcher, or a tank.  But I can buy automatic weapons and stockpiles of ammo, with high capacity ammo clips.  These aren’t needed for hunting, or for defending my home.  They are used for recreational purposes – or for warring against fellow human beings, as is the case with criminals.  Guns don’t kill people, people with guns kill people, so we MUST control the guns that criminals can possess.  We must also control guns accessible to mentally unstable people.

Speaking of mentally unstable people, we must do more learn about mental illness, its causes and its treatment.  There are far too many people with mental illness who do get adequate treatment.  They cost us massive resources in lost productivity, in damages families, and daily tragedies.  Whether it’s the lone gunman or the delusional lady in the subway, they cost us a lot.  Yet we continue to cut public dollars to mental health programs and research and we allow insurance companies to limit coverage for patients with mental illness.

Violence is a plague on our society.  It’s everywhere, from video games, to movies, to sporting events.  Is it any surprise that the make believe violence of WWE is played out on playgrounds?  Hollywood dismisses the connection, well maybe YOU and I need to dismiss Hollywood’s products.  People, stop spending your time and money on violent entertainment!