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President Obama last night declared that health care reform would be essential for fixing the economy. With that in mind, here is a petition that is being submitted full of ideas for reforming health care so that it is fair for all and truely promotes health, instead of treating syptoms. It addresses issues such as freedom of choice in health care, alternative medicine, tax incentives for purchases that increase health (such as gym memberships) and proposes a free market friendly version of universal health care which covers everyone while still allowing for choice of health care provider and competition in the market place to drive innovation and bring prices down.
Please follow the link below, read about the proposal, and sign the petition. The more people who sign, the more likely it will be that we will have a health care system like this one day.
Apparently not. But a suddenly bad economy sure seems to cause unhappiness.
Personally speaking, I don’t really see the big deal. My take on the “suddenly” bad economy? Welcome to the world I’ve been living in since mid 2001. I don’t think the economy ever improved between the 2001 recession and this one. I think people just tried to pretend like those of us hurting didn’t exist, until the problems that were hurting us spread and got too big to ignore anymore.
I’m not an expert, but thats what it looks like from where I’m sitting.
Not that it matters, because as the chart in the link above shows, a big GDP doesn’t equal a happy society.
A while ago I posted a plea for help winning an essay contest. I did not win (sadness), but I did say I’d post the essay after a winner was determined. Here it is.
When you get pregnant and have a child, there is a world of information out there about everything that happens to your body. It seemed to me that every doctor, midwife, doula, researcher and expert had toiled for centuries in an attempt to compile every possibility, every symptom, and every side effect that could and would inflict a woman during pregnancy, child birth and beyond.
I read about how my feet would swell, my skin would stretch, and my hair would grow faster and thicker. I read that my taste buds would change and my digestive tract would slow down. I was warned that I might get sick, my teeth might get brittle, and my perineum might stretch and tear. I was told that I would gain weight, lose weight, and be transformed physically. I was informed of more changes to come than I ever thought possible, but no where, not once, was I ever informed about what happens to your eyes.
Not one single book had any mention of how the world will appear bigger, bolder and brighter after your child has come into it. No one told me how outrageously vivid every color, how sharp and dramatic every shape, and how captivatingly intricate every detail would appear to be.
No one told me how what was once timid and harmless would now appear fierce and dangerous. I had no warning that what was once mundane would now be aggravating, what once was bland and sterile would now be over stimulating, and what was once dismissible would now be impossible to ignore. Conversely, what once was aggravating would now appear mundane, what once was boring would now be fascinating, and what I once would have overlooked would now be impossible to dismiss.
Nothing that I read told me how what once appeared to be small would now appear to be vast playgrounds ripe for exploration, or fraught with danger. Nothing that I read told me that what once was gross would now be cute and funny.
So much about how my eyes functioned changed when I became a mother! So much about how they processed information was altered! The change seems so obvious and extreme to me, I do not understand how everyone could have missed it, but it was sorely overlooked in every text that I read.
Nothing touched on how every child I saw from that point on would seem more unique, more independent, more precious, more fragile.
Nothing warned me that every time I saw pain I would flinch and my stomach would roil, as if it were happening to me.
No one mentioned that every injustice I witnessed would cut me to my deepest sinews, as if it were happening to me.
No one prepared me for how personal, how dire, how gravely important every moment in the world would appear to be, or how desperately I would seek to cherish or improve upon it as a result.
No one told me that I would be catching glimpses through my child’s eyes, through every child’s eyes, through every mother’s eyes, and through my own eyes as they were when I was a child.
What great empathy, great sympathy, great youthful caring and admiration have been bestowed upon my eyes since I was honored to receive that promotion into motherhood. What great strength has been revealed in me to act upon my new vision of the world. What great good I feel empowered to do thanks to the change that took place to my eyes when I became a mommy.
No one told me this would happen to my eyes as I began my journey into motherhood, but this is one symptom that cannot fade, like stretch marks, nor resolve it’s self, like morning sickness. It is an awakening that will stay with me my whole life.
I haven’t been here in a while because I decided to take the month of January off from what might be classified as some as my internet addiction. I promise I will start blogging again soon. There is so much I want to blog about.
I’m night weaning Elijah.
Garden plans are materializing.
Juice fasting kicks ass!
Getting out and socializing.
The Colorado Garden and Home Show (I’m a big dork for this stupid event).
And maybe that crazy octuplets lady. If I don’t find something else that I’m ranting over before I get to it.
