Here’s a little news item that made me want to vomit when I read it: Obama uses his BlackBerry to get “prayers” e-mailed to him.

Obama is the first president to carry one of the mobile devices, and said that he uses it to read prayers sent to him by several pastors from around the country who prayed with him during the 2008 campaign.

Really? I guess one of those prayers must have been about humans having dominion over the Earth, and they should go ahead and exploit it for everything it’s got, ‘cuz the President has decided to “drill baby drill,” and open up the East Coast and the coast of Alaska to offshore oil drilling. All that and more nukes, too? Outstanding.

It’s Springtime here in NY, which means the annual tradition of having no budget by the April 1st deadline. Over the past 25 years, the budget has been late 23 times, and this year will be another late one, as legislators have already left Albany for their 10-day Easter/Passover holiday break without a budget deal in place. We here in NY are filled with pride.

And now, a brief inspirational prayer to start the day.

Shocking news this morning: Ricky Martin is gay. I know what you’re thinking: Ricky who? I’m not quite sure who he is either (the name conjures an image of some sort of Ricky Ricardo/Billy Martin hybrid), but I’m pretty sure he used to sorta be famous in a ‘Selena’ kinda way, except he apparently wasn’t shot by the president of his fan club (kinda like having Kathy Bates as your #1 fan). I’ll have more on this development as soon as I figure out why I should give a shit.

In other news about people I neither know nor care about, Padma Lakshmi says she no longer wants anything to do with her baby’s father. Apparently she’s on some show called ‘Top Chef.’ The only cooking show I’ve ever watched (besides the ‘Galloping Gourmet,’ back in the day) is ‘Emeril Green’ on Planet Green, and that’s only ‘cuz I like the way he says ‘gollick.’ As in, “youzuv gotta putta lota gollick in dere.”

The only Lakshmi I’m familiar with is Lakshmi Singh, who’s a newsreader on NPR. But this one doesn’t look too shabby and apparently used to be married to Salman Rushdie, so good for him. I’m more of an Indira Varma fan, personally, but to each his own.

The US Post Office is looking to save something like $3 billion by ending Saturday mail delivery, which I guess makes sense (though they plan on dumping 40,000 employees, which I hope comes mainly from attrition, and not layoffs; we do not need 40,000 angry and unemployed postal workers wandering the streets). We only get useless crap on Saturdays anyway (we get mostly crap Mon – Fri, for that matter), so I guess I can wait for Monday to get my junk mail. Oh, it’ll be a little confusing at first (like when you keep checking the mailbox on Columbus Day, wondering why the damn mail is so late), but we’ll get used to it.

Hell, once upon a time there was both morning and afternoon mail delivery (and, no, I’m not old enough to remember that), and I think everybody managed to get by on “only” once-a-day delivery.

People love to piss and moan about the USPS, but how much do you think FedEx would charge to get a letter from NY to LA in a couple days? Well (since you ask) I just looked it up, and to ship an envelope from my zip code to a residential address in LA by Friday, April 2 at 7PM would be $19.14 (if I drop it off). If I drop an envelope in the mailbox at work on my way in, it would probably get to LA by Friday for 44 cents. And if not, it would be there Saturday for sure (at least for as long as they keep delivering on Saturdays).

Plus, when you take into account the tremendous volume of mail that I’ve received in my lifetime, the percentage that’s been misdelivered is infinitesimal compared to the percentage of packages that FedEx has sent god knows where (hope you’re enjoying that Buddy Jesus Bobblehead, ya bastids).

Sadly, like most people, I have no real reason to send letters any more. It’s too bad. When I was a kid, getting the mail was a big deal (hell, I still get a small but palpable thrill at beating my wife to the mailbox and being first to see the duplicate copies of the NYSUT newsletter and pleas from Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden for money).

The kids in my neighborhood would sometimes follow “Joe the Mailman” around, and he’d talk to us like we were regular people, hand us a stack of mail, and let us “deliver” it to the appropriate mail box (which was probably highly illegal, but nobody cared; these were simpler times). He read our post cards, too, and nobody really cared about that, either. Hell, if we went somewhere and sent post cards home, we’d write “Hi Joe” on ’em.

Joe brought us our birthday and Christmas cards and delivered the notice from the US Government informing my borther that he’d been selected for the honor of serving his country in Vietnam. That one made my mom cry. He also brought the letters my brother wrote home from there (which I still have).

When the neighborhood kids took their road tests, Joe would call before school while he was sorting his route down at the Post Office to let them know they’d passed (based on how thick the envelope was; this was back when they didn’t tell you right away – for fear of the Brownie getting shot or something).

Joe eventually started bringing my dad’s pension and Social Security checks, and of course delivered the life insurance payment to my mom after dad died too damn soon.

Everybody knew Joe the Mailman (and his predecessor, Joe the Mailman), and everybody loved him. He got a free lunch at the Retired Teacher’s Home down the street (the old ladies loved him most of all, I think), and would hustle through his route on Saturday if the SU football game was on, so he could watch it on the TV that the guy had down at the Esso station (four pumps – three that worked), and he was up on all the neighborhood gossip. Even the neighborhood dogs loved him (not the guy that came on Saturday, though, who never stopped to bullshit – on the bright side, the mail came a helluva lot earlier when he was working – and never really looked you in the eye; we used to keep the dogs in on Saturdays until after the mail came). When Joe finally retired, they took up a collection and had huge going away party for him.

Ah, those were the days.

Now, of course, it’s all e-mail, direct deposit, UPS, and instant gratification. And I have no idea what my mailman’s name is.

Big weekend for our War President Nobel Peace Prize winning President, who stopped off in Afghanistan to rally the troops, grab a quick photo-op or two, and in general complement his health care reform victory on the home front with a bit of commander-in-chiefin’. I think he should have waited until Easter and popped over with plastic ham (assuming secret Muslims are OK with plastic pigs). Obama told the troops that “the US doesn’t quit” (other than, oh, Korea, Vietnam, Beirut, and Somalia). The President also told our military men and women that “we can’t forget why we’re here.” Well, you’re there for a photo-op, and I’m not really all that clear just why they’re there (other than you ordered them there), but you got to leave after a few hours, and they’re still stuck there. Anyhow, between the HCR “victory,” the new nuclear arms reduction treaty with the Rooskies, and this quick jaunt over to Kabul, the President is looking mighty presidential. Maybe we can get real financial reform, a real jobs plan, and some real progress toward reversing global climate change now? No? OK, I’ll settle for some good speechifyin’ then.

Looks like insurance companies are balking at one of the centerpieces of the great legislation that provides health insurance to every single American (give or take 15 million, assuming they can afford to buy it from a private health insurance company, which can still triple rates based on age or on health condition, limit annual payouts until 2014, and deny adults coverage based on preexisting conditions until 2014). Apparently insurers are of the opinion that they can deny coverage to children with preexisting conditions as well.

Just days after President Obama signed the new health care law, insurance companies are already arguing that, at least for now, they do not have to provide one of the benefits that the president calls a centerpiece of the law: coverage for certain children with pre-existing conditions.
[…]
Insurers agree that if they provide insurance for a child, they must cover pre-existing conditions. But, they say, the law does not require them to write insurance for the child and it does not guarantee the “availability of coverage” for all until 2014.

And the ink’s not even dry on the parchment yet. I can’t wait to see what other loopholes industry lobbyists wrote into the bill. So just try not to get sick until 2014, I guess, and hope that Republicans can’t make a crappy law even crappier.

Two female suicide bombers are suspected in an attack on a Moscow subway that killed at least 35 people. I didn’t even know they had Subways in Moscow. I thought all they had were Blimpies.

The Huffington Post has an homage to Eric Massa. It’s a good way to take the edge off Monday.

First off, congratulations to West Virginia for making Ashley Judd cry while punching a ticket to the Final Four in Indianapolis. Just watch out for the shit bubbles. Speaking of shit bubbles, on Press the Meat, it’s Mr. Armageddon, Papa John Boehner, Steny Hoyer, DNC Chair Tim Kaine, Bozo the token black Republican, Michael Steele, former Obama WH Communications Director (for like six months) Anita Dunn, and out old friend Ed Gillespie, who comes out of whatever closet he’s been in lately.

Faze the Nation has Jim Clyburn, and Chris Van Hollen, plus ferret face Mitch McConnell, and Dick Durbin.

On Fux News Sunday, Weaselface Wallace has Republican Paul Ryan and Debbie Wasserman Schultz, plus Texas cracker John “Cornhole” Cornyn.

On the Goebbels Network, it’s Eric “they’re shooting at me, too – honest” Cantor, John Larson, David Plouffe, and the Pillsbury Dough Nazi, Herr Karl Rove

CNN’s State of the Union has Orrin “Big Love” Hatch, Dianne Feinstein, John Larson of CT, and Indiana shit bubble Mike Pence.

Speaking of CNN, Fareed Zakaria has a debate on health care between Paul Krugman and sad sack piece of crap Robert Samuelson (seriously; tell me this guy doesn’t have douchebag written all over him).

Also, Fareed travels to Mexico City to speak with the President of Mexico, Felipe Calderon.

Have a good one.

You may have heard there was a big election in Iraq. This is a shining example of why we needed to blow a lot of shit up, kill a shitload of people, and spend a boatload of money on democracizing those people over there. The party of our former puppet, Ayad Allawi, appears to have edged out the party of our most recent puppet, Nouri al-Maliki, prompting al-Maliki to declare (in a most American manner) “No way we will accept the results.”

Speaking of not accepting results, the teabaggers remain up in arms (literally) over the whole health care thing, threatening violence and being generally rude and annoying. Democrats proposed that they and Republicans sign a joint “Civility Statement,” more or less declaring that, rather than encourage violence, politicians ought to be examples of civility. The RNC, via its leader Mike “Bozo” Steele, has, predictably, soundly rejected that idea. Obviously, it’s a trick, and while the Republicans aren’t smart enough to figure out what the trick is, they at least recognize that it is, indeed, a trick and they’re calling bullshit on it.

Speaking of bullshit, Indiana is being attacked by giant bubbles of it. Or, rather, by the giant bubbles of gas released by 21 million gallons of decomposing bull (and cow) shit.

Like many of his neighbors, farmer Tony Goltstein has to deal with the aftermath of the dairy bubble.

But besides his mounting financial troubles, Mr. Goltstein also must contend with bubbles the size of small houses that have sprouted from the pool of manure at his Union Go Dairy Farm. Some are 20 feet tall….

Those are some big shit bubbles.

Another good reason to stay away from Indiana, I guess.

So, the House passed the re-reconciliation bill, and health care reform (for this year, anyway) is a done deal. It really seems to have pissed off the idiot Republicans, so for that alone, it’s a good thing. Congress also passed a vast overhaul to Federal College aid, including larger and more accessible Pell grants, and easier loan repayment. So that’s a good thing, I guess (does nothing for me, so I should resent the fact that people are getting something I’m not, but that’s just not how I run). Some people – like the teabaggers – seem to have such unhappy, miserable lives, and they resent anybody who isn’t as unhappy and miserable as they are.

Republicans – having lost their battle to do nothing on health care – and their ilk have resorted to death threats and racial slurs. This is because they’re a bunch of big whiny babies. Last I looked, somewhere around half of we the people think this was a necessary first step (that doesn’t go nearly far enough), so I don’t see what a minority constituency consisting of ignorant crybabies think they have the right to bully the rest of us. I mean, since when were these people supporters of minority rights?

Speaking of minorities, House assistant minority douche (or whatever his official title is) Eric Cantor called a press conference to declare that, “oh, yeah, well somebody shot out my windows, too.” Of course, it turned out to be bullshit, as somebody fired a bullet into the air, and where it landed? Well, we know where. It landed in the vicinity of a two-story office building in Richmond, breaking a window on the bottom floor. Cantor rents out some offices on the top floor. Poor Eric. A victim in his own mind.

My big hope is that they’ll soon pass an amendment that gives free health care to gay married couples and their children, and subsidize it by a “divorce fine” on straight couples that untie the knot (preferably a fine that increases with each divorce). That’ll make the teabaggers’ heads spin. And a fine on the parents of kids who get knocked up (or knock somebody else up) out of wedlock after taking the “chastity pledge” would be a nice touch, too.

I think I’m gonna start a crusade to stop taking my tax dollars and spending them on roads I’ve never driven on and on schools (since I don’t have any kids in school). I’ve also never called the fire department or the police, so I see no reason to subsidize them, either. If you want security, pay a private company (or the mafia) to protect you. Same with the fire department. I have city water and sewer, so we can keep them, though.

Congratulations to the West Virginia Mountaineers, who didn’t play like complete and total shit last night, thereby making it to the East Regional finals here on Saturday against Kentucky, who beat Cornell. C’mon now, WVU, it’s up to you to uphold the honor of the Big East, and make Ashely Judd cry.

Grigori Perelman is a reclusive Russian genius who solved some ridiculously difficult math problem in 2002 (so complex that it took until recently for other reclusive math geniuses to confirm he was correct). Now, he’s refusing to accept a $1 million “Millennium” mathematics prize for his efforts. Gee, you’d never guess that this guy would be a reclusive Russian math genius by looking at him.

Being no genius myself (though I am somewhat on the reclusive side), I don’t have a million dollar prize to fall back on, so I guess I’d better limp upstairs and get ready for work.

So, yesterday was a wonderful day. It started out with me feeling pretty crappy, toddled along through a 9½ hour day where I was so busy, I didn’t get a chance to take a break (let alone get lunch), which had my foot more or less on fire by quittin’ time, at which point I had to go stare at a dead old lady whom I’d never seen before, before finally getting back home. Things aren’t much better this morning, since nobody bothered to get coffee ready, and I don’t feel like doing it now. On the bright side, it’s a dress down day where we’re allowed to wear our orange. This is what passes for a big thrill in the corporate world, I guess.

Health care reform is heading back to the House, as Republicans found something or other wrong with the reconciliation bill. Maybe they think they’ll be able to intimidate House Democrats into voting against it, what with all the death threats they’ve been getting. Look for Republicans falling all over themselves denying any responsibility when somebody gets shot. Cowards.

I’d kinda hoped I wouldn’t have to hear about this shit once it passed, but it seems there’s no end in sight.

All that, and no caffeine? It’s gonna be a long, long day.

There are a lot of very tall people in town today, as the Kentucky, Cornell, West Virginia, and Washington basketball teams are here for the NCAA Hoops East Regionals. OK, maybe not Cornell. They’re probably still down in Ithaca. But the other fellas (and their fans) are here. I feel kinda sorry for the fans, really. While I think this is a good place to live (if you have a job), it’s not exactly what I’d call a tourist spot. Not at the end of March, anyway. If it was winter or summer, you’d have lots of outdoor activities to partake in, but right now things are kinda yucky (no snow, no green; mostly dirt and left-over road sand), and your choices are pretty much the bars or the malls. Oh, I suppose you could go to the Everson Art Museum or the Museum of Science and Technology, but, well, somehow I don’t see UK and WVU fans as big on modern art (or science). No offense to our friends from south of the Mason-Dixon line, of course. And the Washington fans won’t care either way; they’ll feel at home with the rain, and will probably have real good pot with them, so they can hang in their hotels and chill. But odds are we’ll have some Ashley Judd sightings around here, and it would be really nice to see her cry when Cornell beats Kentucky tomorrow night (not that I want to see her cry, mind you; she’s darn cute, and definitely the pick of the litter in that family. I’d just love to see Kentucky lose – not enough to stay up past midnight to see it, though).

Not that SU fans traveling out West are faring any better. I’m honestly not familiar with Salt Lake City, but I’m guessing the bars aren’t real exciting. My tip for fans would be to rent the first three seasons of ‘Big Love’ and get familiar with the natives.

In one of the most boneheaded scheduling moves ever, the NCAA (or CBS, or whatever cartel calls the shots) has scheduled Syracuse to play at the same time that the Eastern Regionals are taking place here. Pretty stupid, no? This has resulted in “only” 21,000 something tickets being sold (at $148 a pop).

Oh well, a relatively horrible day to deal with today. A stupid meeting at nine, a demo in front of uber-upper mucky mucks at three, and then a wake to attend after work. A very good day to get over with already.

Watch out for runaway monkeys.

And so, the week limps along. We got lots of rain last night by the sound of things, but it seems to have tapered off now. Obama is supposed to sign the health care bill into law today, and then the Senate will supposedly fix all the worst parts of it using the reconciliation process. Or something. It’s all pretty convoluted. Why they couldn’t just pass a law that says if you don’t have insurance you can buy into Medicare at $X per month based on your income (and if your income is low enough, you pay nada), is beyond me. Oh, that’s right, the insurance industry wouldn’t allow that (plus, then I might have to “wait” to get an appointment). Oh well.

I’m lucky in that my insurance only entails a $20 co-pay for an “in network” provider, and that’s it. Plus it doesn’t qualify for the “Cadillac” insurance excise tax, being that the annual premium will hopefully fall under the maximum allowed – which is $8,500 for individuals or $23,000 for a family (including vision and dental benefits) in the current version, or $10,200 and $27,500 (not including vision and dental) if the reconciliation package passes (at least for now; when everybody proactively raises their rates to protect their future profit margins, it might be a different story). The thing is, I’m not sure. My vision and dental benefits are provided by my union, so I don’t know if they count towards the (current, non-reconciliation) limit or not (and, anyway, I have no clue what the premiums are, since it has something to do with what the union negotiated with the employer, I think, plus a part of my union dues). Either way, I think I’m good (better under reconciliation, of course), ‘cuz I take the cheapest insurance available to me (not being particularly fussy about what quack doctor I go to; they’re all the same to me), but there are other people where I work who might get screwed.

St. John McCain says he’s gonna stop being bipartisan. Gee, what a loss. The Republicans will no longer cooperate. They’re vewy, vewy angwy, you know. Papa John Boehner was so mad, he turned a new shade of orange.

The big question is, have Republicans jumped the shark with their rabid opposition to this legislation? Many, if not most, will see no difference whatsoever in their current status. And, really, most of us don’t really spend a lot of time giving a shit about other people (if we did, we’d have universal health care, now wouldn’t we?). Premiums might go up, but, hell, they keep going up anyway. I suppose they can blame increases on HCR, but, mostly, I think it’ll all be forgotten pretty quickly. Except for the people who get to keep their kids on their insurance for a few more years, old folks who start getting “doughnut hole” rebates, and small businesses who start to get real relief for providing health insurance to their employees.

If Democrats were smart (I know, I know), they’d now ram a real jobs bill though (something along the lines of the WPA), while emphasizing that Republicans don’t give a crap whether they rot and die jobless and without health care. Of course, they need to ask their corporate masters for permission, first.

Oh well, time to put the icepack in the freezer, and limp out to face the day.

So, quite a bit after I went to bed last night, and after a lot of Chicken Little histrionics (Republican Devin Nunes says it will bring about a Socialist Utopia; gee, Utopia – how terrible would that be? And, BTW, isn’t Devin a girl’s name?) and faux outrage (and an anti-abortion executive order by that liberal scoundrel President of ours), the House passed Health Care Reform and reconciliation. So, now the Senate has to do whatever it is they have to do, and it’ll be a done deal. Yay. I guess. At least a couple of good things will come out of it. You can keep your kids on your insurance plan (assuming you have one) until they’re 26. Doesn’t do much for me, of course, but I’m sure that’ll help a lot of people. It also supposedly closes the Medicare prescription drug “doughnut hole.” Again, not much help for me, and the way I’ve been feeling lately, I’m starting to doubt I’ll live long enough to get Medicare. Hopefully it’ll make things easier for my in-laws, though.

It gives some subsidies for lower income people (up to 400% of the poverty level, which, for family of four, is $22,050) to buy insurance. Of course, it’s pretty darn good news for insurance companies, too, since it requires you to buy insurance or get fined $695 a year. That’s, what, about $58 a month. A lot less than insurance will cost you, so I’m guessing a lot of people will opt for the fine instead. I have no problem with the “mandate” part, but clearly it should be either you buy private insurance, or you enroll in Medicare (at a means-based rate). But, well, that was just too much of a threat to the for-profit middlemen known as the insurance industry. They collect your money, take their cut, ration your care and tell your doctor what they can and can’t do in order to increase their cut, and add no value to the transaction (unless you consider paperwork, phone tag, and the denial-appeal-denial process valuable).

I was asking a passionate supporter of single-payer health care whether this crappy bill is better than nothing, or if nothing would be better than this (as in, better to have nothing than to have this, not “wow, nothing is better than this!”). It’s a question I don’t have an answer to, personally. I reckon maybe for some people it’ll be better, and for others it’ll be worse. Especially when it allows insurance companies to raise their rates unckecked and still have a captive (mandated) market.

But, whatever. Maybe now that this crappy legislation is in place (once the Senate does their thing and Obama signs it, anyway), they can gradually fix things. But I kinda doubt that.

As for me, I found my insurance card yesterday, so I guess I’m good to go in terms of trying to find a podiatrist. I think I found a picture of what at least part of the deal with my foot is. Looks like, of the two heel spus I have, one is sticking into the bursa where my Achilles tendon attaches. So, it’s kind like I have a nail sticking into it (or them, or whatever they are). No wonder I can’t walk. I don’t think that’s the only thing wrong in there, but I think everything must have gotten so inflamed and swollen, everything was pushing on everything else. Kinda sucks. I’m not sure how I’m gonna be able to keep ice on it all day at work, and I think I’ll have to limit my water drinking, so as to limit trips hopping to the potty. This definitely blows.

Oh well, at least I can spend time reading all about the Sweet 16.

Have a good one.