Healthcare in America: The Fix, pt. 4

Good day, family and friends!

As I mentioned last May, "identifying a problem without offering solutions is just bellyaching." So, with that in mind, let me begin to lay out my suggestions for addressing the issues facing the best healthcare system in the history of mankind...

The first place we have to start is with Tort Reform. As previously noted, out of control litigation in this country accounts for between 19% and 27% (depending on which study you choose to believe) of healthcare costs every year. Getting the ambulance-chasing shyster weasels and the morally-deficit shiftless scammers under control will knock off a fifth of the cost of providing healthcare and healthcare coverage to physicians, clinics, hospitals, and insurance companies.

The first step to this end is to restore Personal Responsibility to the basic tenets of our legal system:

Allow judges and juries to consider "reasonable expectations" when deliberating on the merits and evidence of a case. (id est: if one orders hot coffee and it arrives steaming, there is a reasonable expectation that spilling it on one's self may result in one's flesh being scalded);

If an attorney or law firm accepts a case that is tenuous at best, and brings it before the courts, and that case is deemed by the presiding judge to be without merit and is dismissed, and that there was no intent to defraud on the part of the plaintiff, then the attorney or law firm (and not the plaintiff) will be required to reimburse the defendants all legal expenses, including lost wages and travel expenses, that they incurred;

If an attorney or law firm knowingly accepts a case that is bogus or outright fraudulent and brings it before the courts, then the attorney or law firm will be subject to the same criminal penalties as the plaitiffs, and, along with the plaintiff, will be required to reimburse the defendants all legal expenses, including lost wages and travel expenses, that they incurred;

I believe that human life is sacred and priceless and that a dollar amount cannot be attached to it. I also believe that the tragic loss of a family member should never be viewed as a bonanza by their survivors. Having stated this, however, I do believe that families should be reimbursed for the loss of a loved one due to negligence or criminal activity. To this end I believe that an equitable way to determine this reimbursement should be as follows:

If the victim is under 68 years of age (10 years shy of the average life span of a citizen of the United States): The age of the victim subtracted from 68 times the average annual total compensation (including value of benefits) someone of the same age/career/educational level in the same federal congressional district can expect to make before retirement times 133% plus any rescue/medical expenses incurred by the family as a result of the event that led to their loved one's death plus legal costs.

Or, as a formula: [(68-A)x1.33W]+MEDX+LEGX = Compensation

(for example: A 42 year old man with a Bachelor's degree who has been working as a Customer Service manager in the computer industry in federal Congressional District Texas-31 dies through the negligence or outright incompetence of a surgeon. To determine the compensation his family should receive, the formula would be: [(68-42)x($46,280x1.33)]+MEDX+LEGX or $1,600,362.40 plus any medical/rescue and legal expenses the family incurred from this tragedy.)

If the victim is 68 years of age or older (10 years shy of the average life span of a citizen of the United States): The average annual total compensation/retirement income for someone of the same age/career/educational level in the same federal congressional district times 3 plus any rescue/medical expenses incurred by the family as a result of the event that led to their loved one's death plus legal costs.

Or, as a formula: 3W+MEDX+LEGX = Compensation

(for example: A 72 year old retired Mechanical Engineer who, thanks to diligently saving money and contributing to a retirement fund, has an annual retirement income of $75,000, dies through the negligence or outright incompetence of a surgeon. To determine the compensation his family should receive, the formula would be: 3x$75,000+MEDX+LEGX or $225,000 plus any medical/rescue and legal expenses the family incurred from this tragedy.)

It may seem as if these formulas place a greater value on the younger person than on the older. Quite the contrary; these formulas are designed to be completely neutral and not attempt to establish any sort of relative value on the lives of these two individuals. Instead, the formulas are merely designed to compensate the survivors for potential loss of family income due to the negligence or incompetence of the surgeons in question. The survivors of the younger victim would have lost 20 - 25 years of his contributions to the family income while the survivors of the older victim would still have the retirement savings he (or she) had established and worked to create, so they would not be facing a financial crisis as a result of the tragedy.

Next time, keeping bureaucrats out of medical decisions.

Until then, best regards...



© James P. Rice 2011

Healthcare in America: The Fix, pt. 3

Good day, family and friends!

Let's get right to it...

Amendment XIV, Section 1 of the Constitution states, "All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State in which they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

In the simplest terms, this means that, if you are born in the US, or have gone through the naturalization process and are no longer subject to a foreign government, then no one can make any sort of law or regulation requiring you to pay a fee, purchase a commodity, or take any sort of test to maintain your citizenship status or to exercise your rights as a citizen. The only exception to this is in cases where a person has been convicted of a crime and either fine or imprisonment has been imposed as their punishment, or if they have had a civil penalty rendered against them.

Basically, this clause states that it is unconstitutional to require law-abiding citizens who have neither been accused of a crime, nor received a judgment against them in a civil proceeding, to purchase health insurance in order to maintain their status as a law-abiding citizen.

I know, I know. I can hear some of you out there decrying, "but what about auto insurance?!? The government dictates that we must have auto insurance in order to legally drive a car. Isn't this the same thing??"

No, it isn't. This argument is nothing but a spurious attempt to compare apples to eggplant. Here is the difference: the Right to Life is one of the unalienable Rights bestowed upon humanity by The Creator (also known as one of Nature's Laws); while driving an automobile is a privilege granted by society. The Constitution was created and designed to protect those unalienable Rights that are an inherent part of our humanity by limiting the ability of government to encroach upon and violate them. Forcing citizens to pay in any form in order to exercise one of our unalienable Rights is in direct conflict with this protection.

On the other hand, automobile insurance was created in order to help citizens more readily comply with the regulation that, before they operate any motorized vehicle on a public thoroughfare, they prove that they can and will be financially able to pay for any damage to another person, vehicle, or other property if they are found to be the cause of an accident. But it is also a misunderstanding that the government forces drivers to purchase auto insurance. Citizens actually have the options of either establishing an escrow account with the minimum balance dictated by law (I believe that, at this time in Texas, it is $100,000), or they can simply not operate a motorized vehicle.

See? Not the same thing.

Okay, I went a bit long this time. Next time, I really will start laying out my suggestions for repairing and improving the best healthcare system in the world.

Until then, best regards...



© James P. Rice 2011

Healthcare in America: The Fix, pt. 2

Good day, family and friends!

Well, now! It seems Real Life reared its ugly head. This is my first post since 30 July 2010. For those of you new to my blog, I started this series of articles in August 2009. If you want to bring yourselves up to speed, I suggest you start with my first post on Healthcare in America located at http://smellthetruth.blogspot.com/2009/08/healthcare-in-america-just-how-sick-is.html.

Now, let's continue the discussion...

Amendment X of the Constitution states, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." In other words, if the Constitution does not specifically say the Federal Government can do something, then it is automatically prohibited from doing it. Not only that, but anything the Constitution does not specifically permit the Federal Government to do is the jurisdiction of the individual States, or the individual citizens themselves and can't even be touched by the Federal Government. Once again, the Founders were brilliant when they created the Constitution. They knew that it was inevitable that like-minded individuals would try to band together, gain control of the nation, and impose their personal opinions and philosophies on this country. To prevent this from happening, they created a series of checks and balances in an attempt to make certain the United States was under the Rule of Law and not the Rule of Man.

"What does this have with Public Law No. 111-148," you ask? A better question to ask is this: Where in the Constitution does it grant the Federal Government the power to...

1) ...take over (not just impose and enforce safety regulations that span all the States) an entire industry and its corollary industries?

2) ...dictate that private, law-abiding citizens must purchase a commodity in order to remain a citizen in good standing?

3) ...confiscate legally-gained income from one group of citizens and redistribute it to and supplement the lifestyles of a different group of citizens who have chosen to be less productive and focus more on personal gratification?

4) ...establish that the worth of one citizen is greater than another based on the citizen's age and ability to contribute to society?

The answer to those questions is, "No where." The Constitution does not grant any of those powers or abilities to the federal government. There are some who have tried to stretch and twist the sentence in Article I, Section 8 that grants Congress the power "to regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes"...what is commonly referred to as the "Interstate Commerce Clause"...to apply to these four areas. Only the most twisted, creative mis-interpretation of a clause written to be straight forward and self-explanatory can be used to justify such unconstitutional actions.

Next time, I finish up with the violation of Amendment XIV and start laying out my own suggestions to fix Healthcare in America.

Until then, best regards...



© James P. Rice 2011

Healthcare in America: The Fix, pt. 1

Good day, family and friends!

This time, I am going to begin looking at the cure for the issues facing healthcare in our nation. As I have stipulated all along, while we may have the best healthcare system in the world, it does have some serious problems that need to be addressed. Because of this assertion of mine, I've been asked by numerous people (including one of my daughters), "if you acknowledge that the current system is broken, why do you oppose the Healthcare Reform Act that Congress passed this spring to fix it?" The short answer is this; because it's unconstitutional.

Public Law No. 111-148, formerly known as H.R.3590 - The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, signed into Law by President Barack Obama on 23 March 2010, violates the Article I, Section 8; Amendment IX; Amendment X; and Amendment XIV. Further, this Law dictates that, for the first time in the history of our great Republic, ordinary law-abiding citizens automatically become criminals unless they purchase a government-sanctioned commodity.

In Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution of the United States of America, it is clearly stated that, "...all Duties, Imposts, and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States." In Part I: Subpart I: Section 2701, entitled "Fair health insurance premiums", the Law establishes variable premiums based on age and annual income. This is in addition to Subtitle E: Subpart B: Sections 1411 - 1415, which provides special tax credits and 'cost-sharing' for citizens below the government-defined 'wealth' threshold. In other words, if you choose to work hard to earn a good education, apply yourself to your career and become successful, this Law forces you to not only pay more for your healthcare coverage, but you will be subsidizing the lifestyle choices of pot-smoking, minimum-wage slackers (like the characters of Dante and Randall from the "Clerks" movies) who have chosen to never apply themselves and perpetually exist on the fringe of society.

Amendment IX of the Constitution states, "The enumeration in the Constitution of certain Rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." In other words, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights highlight select Natural Rights, but by no means lists them all. One of the Natural Rights the authors of the Constitution believed we posses by virtue of our very Humanity is the Right of Property. In other words, I, and only I, am entitled to the fruits of my labors and I am the final authority on how best to enjoy those fruits, as long as it does not infringe on the Rights of another. The Founders believed that only a despot would attempt to confiscate the property of one law-abiding citizen and deliver it to another all in the name of some nebulous 'greater good.' They intentionally crafted the Constitution as they did in an attempt to prevent the sort of draconian actions by the Federal government we've seen for nearly two decades. Whether you call it "Leveling the Playing Field" or "Social Justice", the redistribution of wealth prevalent throughout Public Law No. 111-148 is a clear violation of the Right of each and every American citizen to legally strive, legally succeed, and enjoy the legal results of that legal success.

Next time, we look at where this new Healthcare Reform Act runs afoul of Amendments X and XIV



Until next time, best regards...



© James P. Rice 2010

Another Open Letter to the Motion Picture Industry

Good day, family and friends!

Just about one year ago, I posted in this blog an open letter to the motion picture industry...particularly to the corporate boardrooms in Hollywood and New York City that control the 'mainstream' production companies. In that letter, I posed the question, "where has all the creativity gone?" Well, it's been a year. In the original letter, I noted seventeen movie remakes or 'revisionings' over the 13-year period spanning 1996 - 2009. I suspected my comments would fall on deaf ears...and I was right.

About two months ago, as the media blitz for the Summer releases began in earnest, one of my friends and I started discussing the culture of 'cash over creativity' in the motion picture industry. I decided to start doing a little casual research on projects currently underway. What I found appalled me. The following list is of movies that have been announced, have at least begun pre-production*, and are slated to be released sometime between April 2010 (when I started the list) and Summer 2013. I've divided it into three categories: Remakes/Revisionings, Old TV Series being made into Motion Pictures, and Animated Series being made into either Live Action Movies or Movies with CGI characters interacting with the real world. Remember, this list is from a casual search from very public sources and not from some sort of special 'insider' sources:


Remakes/Revisionings:

1. “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” (1954) – two different versions are in production…one scheduled for 2011 and one for 2012;
2. “All Quiet on the Western Front” (1930) – 2012;
3. “Barbarella” (1968) – 2012;
4. “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” (1992) – 2012;
5. “Captain America” (1944, 1966, 1979, 1990) – 2011 (as “Captain America: The First Avenger”);
6. “Carousel” (1956) – 2013;
7. “Charly” (1968) – 2013 (as “Flowers for Algernon”);
8. “Dune” (1984) – 2012 (already remade once as a low-quality mini-series in 2000);
9. “Escape from New York” (1981) – 2011;
10. “Excalibur” (1981) – two different projects scheduled for 2012: one definitely listed as a remake of the 1981 John Boorman film, the other only defined as an ‘action fantasy’;
11. “Flash Gordon” (1980) – 2012;
12. “Footloose” (1984) – 2011;
13. “Harvey” (1950) – 2011;
14. “Highlander” (1986) – 2012 (after a number of progressively worse sequels and two half-way decent TV shows, it looks like the franchise is being completely reset to the beginning);
15. “Logan’s Run” (1976) – 2012;
16. “M*A*S*H” (1970) – 2010 (as “M.A.S.H”);
17. “My Fair Lady” (1964) – 2012;
18. “Poltergeist” (1982) – 2011;
19. “Popeye” (1980) – 2013;
20. “Red Dawn” (1984) – 2010;
21. “Romancing the Stone” (1984) – 2011;
22. “Short Circuit” (1986) – 2011;
23. “Soylent Green” (1973) – 2012;
24. “Spider-Man” (2002) – 2012 (complete reboot of the franchise with a petition being circulated to change Peter Parker's ethnic background to 'African American');
25. “Tarzan” (1932, 1966, 1981, 1984, 1999) – 2011;
26. “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas” (1982) – 2011;
27. “The Dirty Dozen” (1967) – 2012 (as “Dirty Dozen”);
28. “The Evil Dead” (1981) – Renaissance Pictures alternates between saying this is a ‘revisioning’ of the first “Evil Dead” movie and that it’s actually going to be “Evil Dead IV”. Tentatively set for a 2011 release;
29. “The Hobbit” (1977) – 2011/2012 (should probably be in the ‘animation to live action category since the 1977 version was animated);
30. “The Karate Kid” (1984) – 2010;
31. “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” (1975) – 2010;
32. “The Thing” (1951, 1982) – 2011;
33. “The Wizard of Oz” (1939) – 2011 (following the original L. Frank Baum story as “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”) and 2013 (a ‘revisioning’ from the point of view of the Wizard as “Oz, the Great and Powerful”);
34. “True Grit” (1969) – Coen Bros. version due in 2010;
35. “Westworld” (1973) – 2012;
36. “Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?” (1978) – 2010 (as “Who is Killing the Great Chefs?”)


Old TV Series becoming Movies:

1. “I Dream of Jeannie” (1965) – 2010;
2. “Knight Rider” (1982, 2008) – 2012 (after failing to resurrect the franchise on TV, they are now trying to bring it to the big screen);
3. “Kung Fu” (1972) – 2011;
4. “The A-Team” (1983) – 2010;
5. “The Green Hornet” (1966) – 2010;
6. “Hawaii Five-0” (1968) – 2012


Animated Series becoming Live Action Movies:

1. “Avatar: The Last Airbender” (2005) – 2010 (as “The Last Airbender”);
2. “Cowboy Bebop” (1998) – 2011;
3. “Ghost in the Shell” (1995) – 2011;
4. “Scooby Doo” (1969, 1972) – 2010 (as “Scooby Doo! Curse of the Lake Monster”. This is a complete reboot of the live-action Scooby Doo movies with a whole new cast and some revisioning…including making Velma Asian.);
5. “The Smurfs” (1965, 1976, 1982) – 2011 (combination live action/CGI);
6. “Thundercats” (1985) – 2012

Where my previous casual research found 17 remakes spread over 13 years, this list is 48 movies coming out over the next 36 months! (A couple have already been released since I began compiling this list in April.) Come on, people! Show some artistic integrity. Once again, where has all the creativity gone? Don't get me wrong...there are some wonderfully creative projects coming out of the big studios; adaptations of both comic books and novels and completely new creative works such as "The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag", "Jane Eyre", "The Green Lantern", "Hamlet", "Despicable Me". Unfortunately, these seem to be the exceptions rather than the rule. It should be the other way around; remakes of old movies and TV shows should be the exception.

The bottom line, film moguls, is stop underestimating the intelligence of the average American and start backing more creative and unique projects. Keep in mind that, when you are taking a chance on something new and unique, you can probably do so for a lot less than you would pay for an established, over-used formula. Will there be flops? Of course! But that is true of the big-budget movies with A-list stars now (how much did you lose with "Alexander", "The Adventures of Pluto Nash", and "Gigli"?) Who knows, your creative courage may result in the discovery of the next "Star Wars", "The Matrix", or (heaven forbid!) "Napoleon Dynamite".


Best regards...



* pre-production is the state of motion picture production where the parts are being cast, locations are being scouted and obtained, and sets and props are being made.



© 2010 James P. Rice