7 February 2020
Dear Interested Readers,
What’s Next?
The Valley News, my local newspaper, serves me in two ways, if it is delivered. Delivery has been erratic over the last six months since the delivery man, “Sonnie,” got mad at someone in the circulation department and said “take this job and shove it.” I live at the end of the road. If you keep going past my house you are going to get wet since the bridge on Old Route 11 went out a long time before we bought the house twelve years ago. Our new delivery man misses my box about twice or three times a week which means that I have to read the online edition, and I am running low on old newspapers to help me get a good blaze going in the fireplace. I have given up complaining to the circulation department. The new guy must have me on his list of those to annoy. I don’t think a neighbor is lifting my paper.
This last week I ran out of current newsprint and went searching for some old papers that were stacked in the garage for just such an “emergency.” After moving some of my cache of old newspapers from the garage to the big old black cauldron that my grandmother once used to wash my father’s clothes, and which I now use as a convenient place to hold kindling and newsprint for my fire starting, I took the paper on the top and was wadding it up to place under the logs that I had neatly stacked for my fire when a colorful political cartoon caught my eye.
The paper was open to the opinion page because that is what I read most. The date on the top of the page read April 4, 2019. The cartoon showed a large white circular lifesaver like you might see on a yacht. There were big red letters stenciled on the life saver that said “Obamacare.” Lying next to the Obamacare life preserver was a small partially eaten roll of colorful multi flavoured “Life Savers” candies with lime, cherry, and lemon “Life Savers” scattered about, and the partially eaten roll of “Life Savers” labeled “Trumpcare.” That was it. There was no written message, but underneath the cartoon there was an opinion piece written by Paul Waldman from the Washington Post, that was originally published on April 2,
I decided not to burn that piece of paper, and after I had a roaring fire going, I sat down to read the piece which was entitled “On Second Thought…Trump realized mistake on healthcare too late.”
Waldman was writing in the aftermath of the president bragging that Republicans were going to be offering their plan for healthcare “soon” and that it was going to be “spectacular.” Waldman responded to this unfounded boast by saying that Trump was putting his party at risk when he made promises about healthcare that Republicans had no plans to fulfil. Waldman was feeling the pain of Republicans whom he surmised just wished that the president would keep any thoughts about healthcare to himself since they would prefer not saying anything about healthcare. Waldman went on to say that after the president had advanced his promises for something spectacular, he had come to regret the promise and was backing off. In less than a week he had gone from “something great now” to “we will see what will happen after the election.”
Waldman went on to say that even though the president was backing off from his promise to submit a “spectacular” plan, he had not backed off from Obamacare bashing.
In a series of late-night tweets, Trump continued to bash President Barack Obama’s signature health-care law but said a vote on a replacement would not occur until after the elections — suggesting that he believes he would still be in the White House and that Republicans would control both chambers of Congress at that point.
“Vote will be taken right after the Election when Republicans hold the Senate & win back the House,” Trump wrote. “It will be truly great HealthCare that will work for America.”
It’ll be truly great. In two years or so.
Waldman has been to the political theater of the absurd and was not buying Trump’s promise.
We’ve seen this pattern before: Trump blurts out a promise he thinks everyone will like, but it turns out his party has no interest in pursuing it, and eventually it just disappears. This can apply to both the general and the specific; in this case, Trump promised that the GOP would be “the party of health care” and also said that Republicans “will take care of preexisting conditions better than they’re taken care of now.” But Republicans would like to talk about health care as little as possible, and the last thing they want to bring up is preexisting conditions.
If you have been disconnected from the world for the past three years you might ask, “Why would Republicans not want to talk about preexisting conditions?” Waldman is locked and loaded, and ready to fire off an answer for you, as if you did not know:
That’s because the guarantee that people with preexisting conditions can get health coverage exists only because of the Affordable Care Act, and if Republicans succeed in any of their attempts to destroy the ACA — most recently with the lawsuit the administration is supporting that would tear out the ACA root and branch — that protection would be eliminated. They can swear up and down that they’ll figure out some way to restore the protection, but they know that voters don’t really believe them.
If you watch the administration representatives talking to the media today, it all seems a bit jumbled. They insist that they’re working on a plan like busy little bees, and the vice president’s chief of staff says “the president will be putting forward plans this year” — plural! — but no one is contradicting Trump on his assertion that the phantom plan will not become a legislative reality until 2021.
Waldman anticipates your response. He thinks that you are going to say, “Trumps unwillingness to present a plan before the election makes sense because he does not control the House and Democrats will pull a Mitch McConnell and not cooperate with any Republican attempt to offer viable improvements in healthcare. Waldman disagrees, and argues that Democrats would be delighted to work in good faith on something that would be positive. What is unlikely because of “ conservative principles” is that Trump or anyone in the Republican party would ever offer something that was better for the average person or family than Obamacare. He writes:
You might say, well, of course not — Democrats control the House, and they won’t approve of any Republican health-care plan. But that’s only half true. Democrats would be happy with a plan that did all the “spectacular” things Trump regularly claims — protecting preexisting conditions, insuring everybody, doing it all for much less than we pay now.
What Democrats won’t agree to is the actual things Republicans want to do on health care, which involve taking away coverage from millions of people, removing the protections the ACA provides and making the system much crueler than it is now. Any plan that adheres to conservative principles on health care will be abhorrent to Democrats and hugely unpopular with the public.
So back in April, what did Waldman think was really happening as Trump flip flopped with his grandiose promises and then his “wait a minute until after the election” reconsideration?
Republicans may be hoping that this is their best strategy to make the health-care issue get as quiet as possible between now and next November: Just say you’ll have a plan eventually but remind everyone it can’t be passed until 2021 anyway, so there’s no reason to be too concerned with it, and throw in some fear-mongering about Medicare-for-all aimed at skittish seniors. The trouble with that is that Democrats don’t need a specific Republican plan to attack. That’s because there’s a lengthy and clear record over the past few years of what Republicans want to do on health care, laid out in the occasional legislative proposal, the actions of the Trump administration and a never-ending series of lawsuits. They want to roll back the expansion of Medicaid. They want to remove protections for people with preexisting conditions. They want to take away the ability of young people to stay on their parents’ insurance until age 26. They want to let insurers offer junk insurance that covers almost nothing.
Having shifted to what Republicans were really thinking about the ACA, and Trump’s over the top claims and then quick retreat, Waldman finished his piece by analyzing Republican attitudes about the ACA and Trump’s claim to have something better. He writes:
When confronted about that [the potential take down of the gains under the ACA], their answer amounts to, “Well yes, but then after we do that, we’ll restore all those things about the ACA that you like. Trust us, it’ll be great.” But they know that the public doesn’t trust them, and with good reason.
So their best hope is to persuade voters to think [and I might add, talk] about something else. But after Democrats had such enormous success running on health care in 2018, they’ll be doing their best to make sure the issue is front and center in 2020.
I will leave it to you to decide how effectively the Democrats have managed the conversation about healthcare since early last April when Waldman wrote the article. I did think it would be interesting to see what the president was saying ten months later.
I had a dilemma. I knew that I could not stomach watching him speak on the eve of his “vindication” from the accusations associated with his impeachment. True to my feelings, I did not watch the president’s campaign speech that masqueraded as a State of the Union address. I had the option of seeing the movie version of Bryan Stevenson’s book, Just Mercy and I went for it.
You might have noticed as you prepare for the Oscars on Sunday night that African American actors, writers, directors, and other movie professionals were ignored by Oscar again this year. I have seen many of the nominated films, and none of the ones I have seen have the power of “Just Mercy.” Jamie Foxx’s performance as Walter McMillian, a self employed black lumberman in Alabama who was sentenced to die for the murder of an 18 year old white woman despite the fact that he was miles away from the scene of the crime, and Michael Jordan’s portrayal of Bryan Stevenson, elicited powerful emotions from me, and it was terrific to see the depiction of a real life triumph of justice and mercy. The movie is a very close reproduction of Stevenson’s wonderful autobiographical masterpiece. The movie was truthful. The speech would be laced with falsehoods and exaggerations. I knew the movie would leave me feeling uplifted, and watching the president’s speech would make me want to throw things at the television.
I did believe that I should check out what the president said in his speech about healthcare. Apparently, he did make some declarative statements while he was congratulating himself for doing an amazing job worthy of “four more years.” You may remember that the Washington Post has been keeping score on his lies since his term began. As of December 10, 2019 he had racked up 15,413 false or misleading claims over 1,055 days. To check out his comments, true or false, that he had made about healthcare, I decided to use the fact checking article that I knew the New York Times would write about the speech. The article suggests that he made several misleading statements. Here are a few for flavor.
“We will always protect your Medicare and your Social Security always.”
This is misleading.
Not only has President Trump failed to strengthen Medicare and Social Security, but the financial outlook for both trusts has not improved or worsened. That is at least partly the result of Mr. Trump’s tax law, which has left the Treasury Department to collect fewer taxes from Americans and, in turn, invest less money into each program. Last April, the government projected that Medicare funds would be depleted by 2026, three years earlier than estimated in 2017. The report noted that less money will flow into the fund because of low wages and lower taxes.
“Before I took office, health insurance premiums had more than doubled in just 5 years.”
This is misleading.
The president’s claim is based on a White House report comparing premiums in the individual insurance market before the Affordable Care Act with those several years after its enactment. That report made several methodological choices that tended to increase the difference in prices. Health plans for a far larger group of Americans, who obtain health insurance through their jobs, have increased by smaller margins. Over all, however, health insurance prices have increased in recent years.
“We will always protect patients with pre-existing conditions.”
This is false.
The president has taken multiple steps to weaken or eliminate current protections for Americans with pre-existing health conditions. These efforts include legislation he championed, regulation his administration has finished, and a lawsuit the Justice Department is litigating that would declare the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional.
When the president was not exaggerating or misleading us he was trying to scare us. He has already been showing us in his rallies that a key strategy for the 2020 election will be to introduce fear. If we don’t elect him, the stock market will fall. If we don’t elect him the Democrats will put us on a slippery slope to communism. He is a master of innuendo. The statement that irked me most was sort of true, but a distortion of the truth.
This is weighted but mostly true.
Bills to create a national “Medicare for all” system have been co-sponsored by large numbers of Democratic lawmakers. The bills would eliminate private health insurance, but they would provide those people with generous government health insurance instead. Technically, this would not be a fully socialized health care system, since the bill would allow doctors, hospitals and other health care providers to remain private.
My opinion is that the use of a phrase like “socialist takeover of our health system” is a scare tactic. Many Americans equate socialism with communism of the late forties and early fifties variety under Stalin with the dark and dreary existence of the USSR and the Iron curtain countries that they witnessed in news clips and Hollywood productions. They don’t necessarily associate “socialism” with many of the advanced capitalistic economies of modern Europe that have a much more functional social safety net than we do. It’s good strategy to attack someone else’s strategy and imply that it is un-American, if you have no viable program of your own.
Of note is the fact that the Democrats did “talk back” when the president began to talk about the failure of Democrats to deliver on healthcare. Much has been written and said about Nancy Pelosi ripping up the president’s speech as she left the chamber. Don’t get me wrong, I think Pelosi’s act was an effective response to his trashing of the State of the Union tradition. It makes me said that part of his power is his ability to bring those who are trying to engage him in real debate down to his level of childish behavior rather than have an effective dialog which enlightens voters. USA Today reported:
As the president highlighted healthcare, saying he wanted a new health care system that protects Americans with pre-existing conditions, House Democrats cut off his speech and chanted for him to take up a piece of legislation that addresses the issue.
Many others laughed, booed, and crossed their arms as the president talked about healthcare. Reps. Julia Brownley, D-Calf., and Norma Torres, D-Calif., both lifted their arms into a giant shrug.
As the president said he was combatting pharmaceutical companies, Democrats started to loudly laugh.
Many House Democrats then rose to their feet, holding up three fingers. They loudly shouted and cut off the president’s speech for several seconds as they chanted “H.R. 3,” the healthcare legislation that passed the House last year and has not been taken up in the Senate.
Looking back at the early April 2019 column by Paul Waldman that I almost burned, and comparing it to the healthcare presentation of the State of the Union, I would say that the Trump strategy has shifted from laying low on healthcare until after the election when he can resume the process of dismantling the ACA. The speech suggests to me that he sees an opportunity to capitalize on the confusion and discord over healthcare in the Democratic Party by beating a we don’t want “socialized medicine” drum. When you have no solutions to offer, distortion, misrepresentation, and attacks on constructive ideas might be effective counters to genuine efforts to move toward something like the Triple Aim.
I think we had two very effective demonstrations to the best way to confront the president’s style of demagoguery on the day after the State of the Union Address. Mitt Romney was never my candidate for anything, but he is a man of genuine integrity. I was moved to tears by his explanation of why he voted against his party and for impeachment. [Old men like me tear easily.] Doug Jones of Alabama was the other person who took a difficult stand. The honest bravery and integrity of these two senators stands in stark contrast to the contorted rationalizations of Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and Lamar Alexander. Those three, and the rest of their Republican colleagues in the Senate, denied the American people the opportunity to hear the truth and read the documents that would have shown how vulnerable our system of government can be when we don’t insist on hearing the full truth, or hold the leader of our emerging oligarchy accountable. What’s next?
Wow! What A Big One, And A Follow Up On Ausbon Sargent
Last weekend there was plenty of sunshine, and the air was crisp. The situation just demanded that I be outside. We had visitors from Central Massachusetts who brought along their two year old mut. She is a sweet dog. I think that dogs who have a mixed heritage are sometimes the friendliest and most compatible with strangers. The predominant species that I could recognize was beagle. Our friends have chosen not to be parents, so this dog is living the high life of their affection. It was not a surprise to me to learn that they had gotten a genetic analysis done on their dog. It turns out that she does have a lot of beagle in her, but she also has some dachshund, some lab, and some golden retriever in her mix. Those are all sweet breeds, and she was a sweety, herself.
Our friends had not been with us long before it was clear that the dog wanted to be outside, which was fine with me because that was where I wanted to be. I had been trying to figure out how I was going to get my walk in. Strangely, I have not taken a long walk on our lake this year. There have only been a few ice fishermen out on the ice this year, but by early afternoon we had become enthralled watching an “industrial strength” ice fishing effort being established just off Stanley Point in an area of the lake where I have caught some nice bass in warmer weather. A truck had pulled a large wooden ice house from the landing across the lake about a half a mile away to this sweet spot. The truck then left and was followed by several men riding four wheeled ATVs ( all terrain vehicles). They had used a power auger to drill about twenty holes in the ice that were laid out in wide arcs from the icehouse which was functioning as command central. The portable cabin was the site of their fire pit, and was their bar and grill center. They appeared to be having a very good time, and we decided to walk across the ice to get a closer look, and check out their success.
Rosie, the dog, was just as curious and was dragging my friend along with her leash. I must interject here that whenever I see another fisherman with a big fish, I have mixed emotions. I am simultaneously happy for him, and very envious. I am a “catch and release fisherman.” I have a routine. I catch most of my fish with “barbless” hooks. The hooks always come with barbs, but you can flatten them with a surgical “Kelly” snap which all fishing stores sell. It is easy to quickly remove the barbless hook without tearing the flesh around the fish’s mouth. No barb is good for me also in case I “hook” myself or my clothes, which does happen. With the hook out, I quickly assess the fish, then I give it some advice about impulsive behavior, take its picture, and then ease it back into the water while moving it gently back and forth a little to make sure that it is ok if it does not quickly dart away. The whole process takes less than a minute.
I don’t mind it if other fishermen catch big fish, as long as they follow the ethic of “catch and release.” The largemouth bass being proudly displayed in the picture by the fellow on the ATV had been out of the water long enough for me to know that his future was not back in the lake. He was either going to be eaten, or he was going to be stuffed and hung on a wall as a trophy. I hoped that he would not be thrown in a dump at the end of the day. He was not going back into the lake for me to catch next summer. Despite my sadness about the fate of the fish, and my veiled chagrin and jealousy, we did have a nice conversation with the proud fisherman about the beauty of the day, the immense nature of his “operation,” and his good fortune to have caught such a fine specimen. He tried to tell me that there were plenty more like this big fella “out there,” but I know better. In a dozen years of fishing this lake, I have seen only one fish that was larger, an eight pounder. The biggest largemouth bass that I have caught was a little smaller than this one which I guessed was about 24 inches long and 6 or 7 pounds. Three miles later I was almost recovered. Rosie had a great time.
Last week, I showed you a picture from the town green, and introduced you to Ausbon Sargent. I told you that the local land trust was named for him. I mentioned that he was a very frugal man who worked as a caretaker at Colby-Sawyer College and used most of his salary to buy land which he then put into conservation. I also mentioned that at a local museum that features a great car collection, The Ice House Museum (click on the link to get a six minute tour), I had seen Ausbon’s framed and well worn longjohns that were a testimony to his frugality.
About 20 minutes after the letter was published a local Interested Reader, Steve Allenby, who is a good friend, hiking buddy, partner in charitable activities around town, boiler of maple syrup in the spring, board member of our local hospital, and board member of the Ausbon Sargent Land Trust, emailed me to tell me that I had the story wrong. Later, he also sent me a picture of the longjohns which I tried to describe last week. The man never wasted money on his underwear when a patch would do, as you can see below.
You can read the story and learn more online, but here is the truth about Ausborn Sargent lifted from the site:
Who was Ausbon Sargent?
Ausbon W. Sargent, a retired maintenance worker of no inherited wealth, at age 94 took his life savings and bought the three-acre Main Street “town green” parcel from Colby-Sawyer College. Sargent immediately gave the land to the Town of New London on condition the parcel remain forever undeveloped.
The year was 1985 and land prices had soared amid a building boom. The financially struggling college, where Sargent had worked for 25 years, had offered the parcel for sale. Fearing the town green, the center of community life of his boyhood, would go the way of the mini-mall, Sargent paid $150,000 to guarantee its preservation.
Wishing to remain anonymous, Sargent only took credit for this “living legacy” to the people of New London at the urging of his friend Mary Haddad. “I don’t care one cent about any fanfare,” Sargent told a reporter at the time. “The main thing is to keep it the way it was.” The green has been renamed the “Sargent Common” and the only structure permitted is the Mary D. Haddad Memorial Bandstand.
We need more Ausbon Sargents, and fewer demagogues in our world. I bet old Ausbon would have let that big bass go for another day. He was into preservation, and his legacy lives on and has inspired the preservation of thousands of acres of woodlands crisscrossed by trails for hikers, walkers, and eager puppies like Rosie. I hope that there will be an opportunity for you to be out and about this weekend in some area where some public spirited individual like Ausborn has blocked development so that you can see and be uplifted by a little bit of an uncluttered landscape as a balm for what might be ailing your soul and pulling you down.
Be well, take good care of yourself, let me hear from you often, and don’t let anything keep you from doing the good that you can do every day,
Gene
