Caduceus Cash

Those snakes have a grasp on money, not health.

I don’t trust doctors. Why not? That’s not the not-so-rhetorical question that should be asked. Well, how could you?  That’s the question! Really, how could anyone trust a doctor? After all, doctors are humans, and according to Alexander Pope, “to err is human.” The second half of the proverb is ”…to forgive divine.” Maybe if a person’s car is accidentally damaged, she can easily invoke her inner Clementia, but when you needlessly injure that person’s most important asset - her self, her body – it’s much more difficult to be divine.

Maybe I know too much. From professional and personal experiences, I have learned that trusting doctors is akin to trusting a car mechanic. If one goes to a mechanic knowing nothing about cars, they should prepare to come away knowing more about P.T. Barnum (or whomever said his most famout line).  One really wants to completely believe the oil-and-grease-covered-my-name-is-Jim mechanic when he says you need four new tires, new rotors, pads, calipers, and an alignment, and if you don’t get it done right now, your car will blow up - but one shouldn’t. (Funny how just like doctors, mechanics have their names embroidered on their smocks. I can’t think of another profession where this is so commonplace.)

So why shouldn’t the same healthy cynicism apply to doctors’ orders? No one is going to deny that Jiffy Lube or Meineke are businesses out to make money, so why should anyone say physician practices are not the same? Unfortunately, in most minds, they are not. And that’s sad and very scary. Medicine is a very money driven business, dominated by the large, publicly traded pharmaceutical companies and surgical supply companies. Though doctors are purported to follow the Hippocratic Oath as a moral guide, the oath fails to mention anything about conflicts-of-interest.

Doctors are out to make money. But heck, who can blame them. Most medical specialties require a total of eleven years of formal schooling – undergraduate (4), medical school (4), residency (3). Those are many years of toil and stress, and I am sure most physicians feel they should be handsomely (monetarily) compensated. And I agree. But we, the public, should know that. We should know that doctors, like most working people, are out to make a dollar - and that every prescription, every referral, every procedure, every surgery is potentially tinged with green. A doctor’s best interest nor only interest is not our health. The public should be warned and advised: question everything. Don’t believe the first opinion, nor the second opinion. Do your own research. Trust only your intuition and your body’s own feedback. (Do I actually feel better? Does it still hurt?)

Are all doctors so mercenary? No. But neither are all snakes poisonous - doesn’t mean I want to be bitten by one. Is there a solution to this? Yes. Publicly finance doctor’s education. The same way West Point pays for an Army officer’s education, then requires years of public service – let America educate doctors for free, then guarantee a good salary and job security in exchange for their career as a public servant. If we remove the six-figure-debt-ridden doctor from the hospital, we remove much venality.

Tax-payers might say this is unfair, whey should we pay for doctor’s education? Should we pay for lawyers’ too? Accountants’? No – we know those professions are businesses, no one takes that for granted. If America fails to do something about the health care crises, everyone is liable, everyone is at risk. Why not start from the top-down, rather the bottom up? Start with the doctors, and then the trickle-down effect will change everything. Less physician venality equals less insurance fraud, fewer extraneous procedures, fewer overpriced, brand-name drugs prescribed, and so on.  It’s a start. And it’s better than Socialism.

A World You Will Never See If You Live By HDTV

Save the plane ticket - just hit power!

If I feasibly could, I would travel the world. I would jump into the National Geographic channel and experience the terra firma of Earth firsthand. Unfortunately, most modern-day human lives don’t permit this unbridled peripatetic freedom. So I, like everyone else I know, am stuck in the humdrum of life – going to and fro, but not yonder and beyond.

But alas, there is now HDTV – high definition television. No need anymore to actually be in the dunes of the Sahara myself, contending with nasty scorpions and even nastier heat. I can see the desert as if I am standing in the sand myself looking from behind a pane of freshly Windex-wiped glass, seeing the world with my own eyes – no cathode ray tube needed.

Or with the click of a button (and TIVO), I could see the steamy geysers of Iceland, ancient Stonehenge in the verdant countryside of England, or the splendor of Acadia National Park in Maine.

HDTV gives shows like Survivorman a whole new feel – I am in the action, feeling like that jaguar is breathing only three yards away from my neck.

So yes, I can vicariously experience the world now – but I know and I am sure it’s not the same.  After all, they (supposedly those not constrained by bills and ambition) say life is short, so one better enjoy it while he/she can, and get out and experience the world. So although I have yet to visit any of the ancient wonders, I know no digitally-produced virtual experience can replace feeling the awe of the Pyramids at Giza. That’s why I don’t own a TV.

Voting In Vogue

These Arizona Voters Aren't At Disney World (Photo Credit: Arizona Republic)

Why vote? If I were to utter that question out loud, I might get an earful. Though it has been statistically proven that one single vote does not matter, many people are amazingly passionate about this subject. I’m not one of them. To me, it just seems like a popularity contest – and since I didn’t vote in any high-school pageants, I see no need to vote in political ones either. I don’t personally know any candidates, nor do any candidates in this election have any local connection to me. So why stand in line (potentially for hours) like a steer waiting for slaughter? Why take the time off from work to create a hanging chad? My logic: if one doesn’t vote, then he/she reserves the right to complain. “Heck, I didn’t vote this guy (gal) in!”

Now, please don’t get me wrong. I know that if everyone thought like me, this country would be in trouble – but that’s obvious slippery slope. I trust that the candidates are relatively benign choices – meaning, my world won’t change too drastically no matter who wins the election. Though I admit I could be inspired (either negatively or positively) by the right candidate to vote,  it just didn’t happen this year. Why not? Mostly, because I am not registered to vote; I missed the deadline. So even if I wanted to feel like an insipid farm animal and do my civic duty, I can’t. I’m sure the ire of many voters may be cast upon people like me, but when their taxes go up, or when their neighbor’s son is sent back to the Middle East, their ire will have a new target – and I probably still won’t be registered to vote.

Heaven, Harvest, Horsepower

Heavenly Hawaii: The CNN website allows users to post their own photo galleries. This gallery is a hodgepodge of many different photographers’ photos, though all are taken in Hawaii. Hawaii is quite possibly the most beautiful state in America, and second would probably be Alaska. It’s a good thing America didn’t stop growing at 48.

The World’s Harvests: Time.com displays fourteen pictures of different harvests from around the world. It’s amazing to think that farming is basically the same no matter where one is on the globe;  the Chinese-grown corn and apples looks exactly like their American-grown versions.

2008 Paris Motor Show: The NYTimes’ website posts a slide show of the most intriguing new cars revealed at the Paris auto show this month. Many car manufacturers are going green, including smart car, which is releasing an electric version of its fortwo. Venturi Automobiles, maker of the electric car Fetish, revealed their new electric car models, some with horsepower of up to 300!

This sporty electric car, the Venturi Volage, has 300 horsepower!

Sports Crazy

If it weren’t for spectator sports, Mars would already be colonized. Think about it – think about all the man-hours spent watching sports. This weekend alone, there are well over a hundred locally or nationally broadcasted events. A sampling: 13 NFL games, about 30 MLB games, innumerable college football games, a major golf event, and even a few MLS (that’s soccer) games. And that’s only what’s happening in America.

Soccer worldwide? There’s no need for parenthetical explanations there. If all of the collective man-hours spent sitting idly watching a game were put to good use, just imagine the potential! (And yes, it is mostly men watching sports, sorry WNBA fans.) World peace? No problem. After all, sports are really just another way to split people apart. Mets vs. Yankees, Cubs vs White Sox, Ohio St. vs. Michigan. Doesn’t religion create enough divisiveness? Imagine if we were all on the same team? World Vs. Mars – can we colonize it? Must watch TV! Global Warming – all of that aggregated brain power could figure something out. Maybe there could be bicycle-pedal-style hamster wheels that fans must spin if they want to indolently sit and watch a game. Maybe we could make a game out of this – the fan who generated the most stored energy got a free soccer ball, or baseball bat, or hell, the right to just sit there the next game?

Look at Nascar – many races top over a 100,000 in attendance. The Indianapolis 500 attendance maxes out at about 300,000 fans! 300,000 * 3 hours = almost a million wasted hours… and lots of consumed alcohol. A million hours! That’s 25,000 40-hour work weeks – and that’s only for the people actually at the race.

The World Cup? Humankind could already have achieved intergalactic space travel if it weren’t for this jingoistic/xenophobic-inducing soccer event which entrances the entire world every four years.

One can easily think that I am being too harsh. What, should we all just work all the time, and not have any fun? I’m not saying that – I’m all for PLAYING sports. But why root for a team of people whom we don’t even know? As Jerry Seinfeld says, you are essentially rooting for laundry – the players switch teams so often, it’s only the uniforms that stay constant. Rather than idly sit and watch sports, let’s all play sports, or read, or spend quality time interacting with the family, or do something active, something productive. (And no, fantasy sports leagues do not qualify as time well spent.)

I just think mankind could use its time in a much more lasting and meaningful way than watching sports. I’d come up with a few solutions… but the Jets game starts soon.

No MSG For Me

I drive many miles for my job. My travels take me to remote hospitals all over the verdant countryside of New York and western New England. Being in the serene, green countryside is what I enjoy most about my job. It’s nice to be able to just stop and smell the proverbial roses of the corn fields, or the apple orchards, or yes, even the unadulterated manure piles. In the country!

My travels also take me to the relatively urban hospitals of Syracuse, Albany, Springfield and beyond. I admit, these trips aren’t enjoyed in the same life-is-more-than-work and I-am-one-with-nature vein. There is a very distinct demarcation between us and nature in urban environments – and that bold line seems to widen further every year. One can now easily imagine a day when our food will be made in test tubes and petri dishes and the only daily green urbanites will see will be in the form of currency.

So it is with this sentiment that I recently found myself wondering what all those MSG signs out in Cooperstown, NY were referring to. There is no easy way to drive to Cooperstown, and this, I feel, has kept the town quaint and sparsely populated. No matter from what direction one arrives, it’s a pastoral scene, Amish and all.

“No MSG For Me” and “Yes To MSG” – what? MSG? Monosodium glutamate? Is Cooperstown expecting a China Wok invasion? Madison Square Garden? Are the Knicks relocating? Is MSG some kind of secret code for “”Mid-Summer-Game” referring to bringing back the “Hall-Of-Fame-Game“? Is Cooperstown aggressively trying to replace that now-defunct nostalgic summer ritual? Not exactly.

Madison Square Garden Entertainment and some out-of-town businessmen want to bring the urban to the verdant. Call it Coopers-Stock, or Woods-Town, or more accurately, call it a disgrace. Anyone remember Woodstock ‘99. Let’s hope not. MSG hopes to bring about 75,000 people to a large outdoor concert in 2010, for a weekend of peaceful, harmonious, good-ol’-time music enjoyment. Yeah right. It will be much more than that. As one local citizen was quoted as saying, “you’re going to need septic fields the size of the City of Binghamton.”

I’m all for progress, but isn’t the Cooperstown name already famous enough? Does it really need the glorious infamy of Woodstock? I’m a supporter of urban gentrification – turning the old into the new. This is much different though from turning the pristine into the muck. But of course, what green really matters? Definitely not the organic kind. It’s the real estate agents, the promoters, the shop owners – these are the Otsego County citizens who would gladly turn earth into pavement to see more paper green, and less chlorophyll.

I just hope the 189 Cooperstown area residents who have already signed the petition to support the music festival make sure they stop to smell those proverbial sweet roses. Because after their desired music concert, their bucolic land will smell a lot more like, well… urban.

To Feed A Mill…oops, Billion

I recently read Upton Sinclair’s 1906 tale “The Jungle”. And like anyone else who has read the book, I will never view food the same again. To summarize: food is a business, and it’s not always pretty and sweet. I also recently read Michael Pollan’s highly engaging and informative book “The Omnivore’s Dilemma”. Pollan makes it clear that food is a world concern, and reminds us not to take anything for granted about our daily meals. From these two affecting works, one definitively learns that food is a complicated business. And when corners are cut to make extra profits, or to just break even, it’s the trusting, hungry public that suffers the most.

A recent article about milk in China provided a stark reminder of this point. How does a country with over a billion citizens feed everyone? Not well apparently. A Chinese milk producer was putting a potentially harmful chemical called melamine into its milk powders meant for human consumption, primarily infants. This is the same chemical that recently caused quite a few pet deaths after it was purposely added to animal feed to artificially increase the protein content. The contaminated milk product was not shipped overseas, but just imagine if it were. It was a major controversy when the chemical was fed to the cats and dogs of America, imagine the uproar if it were fed to the children of the Western civilized world?

Melamine - the harmful chemical added to powdered milk

The chemical was causing babies to have kidney stones, and even was blamed for at least one death. I think it is necessary for a modern-day Upton Sinclair to investigate the food factories of China, and let that nation, and the greater world at large, know that the real travesty of the most populous country on the planet is not its politics.

The Dark (And Long) Night

I don’t see many movies. Mostly because, I admit, I have a hard time participating in suspending my disbelief. While watching The Dark Knight, the new Batman movie, my failure to excel at this practice was no exception. This movie just recently grossed more than 500 million dollars – and I don’t know why. But I seem to be the only one.

People (my supposedly not-easily-influenced friends and family) who I don’t expect to simply agree with the critics and the crowds have said it’s great, said it was the best movie in years, and that the performances were top notch. How? Why? What?

The main actors were in make-up and costumes the whole movie – so to say they gave a great performance is like saying Alf was a great thespian. I know Heath Ledger has passed away, but it doesn’t mean critics have to get carried away. The movie was lauded as excellent with four stars from none other than veteran movie critic Roger Ebert. That same Ebert gave the powerful Tom Hank’s movie “Philadelphia” only three and a half stars. In other words, dying from AIDS just isn’t as entertaining as being blown up by a purple-vest-wearing clown.

Ebert says, referring to the skyscrapers Batman jumps from: “Through these heights, the Batman moves at the end of strong wires, or sometimes actually flies, using his cape as a parasail.” Ebert says it as if it’s, well, believable. I just expect a venerable critic like Ebert to be a little more skeptical. I guess what chance would my friends have to think critically if the movie critics themselves are obsequiosly praising the film .

My main points of contention are: The true acting was very limited (costumes were doing most of the acting), the story line didn’t make any sense (Why’s the joker so angry? Why is Batman so benevolent?), the movie didn’t seem to end (How many buildings need to blow up?), there was no positive moral story to take away (A determined DA is thoroughly defeated and honest cops are bought off). After watching a child’s comic book movie, shouldn’t one leave the theater with a the-world-is-all-good feeling?

I can’t stand why the villains are incredibly competent and ubiquitous, while the heroes are always amazingly inept and never there when needed. How was the Joker able to successfully rig hospitals, boats, warehouses, police-stations, trucks, etc, all with unbelievable powerful explosives – reminiscent of 9/11 (is that really entertaining?). Blowing up a hospital? Done – and easily. To catch one villain – it takes a whole police force and criminal gang to try… yet fail. Why and how are we the public so amused and joyously entertained by this?

I know I contributed $11 to the $500 million, but I am still not sure why.