Passing the Healthy Families Act is Sensible

The swine flu (aka H1N1) appears to be milder than experts initially anticipated, but what if it had turned out to be much worse? What if people felt early symptoms coming on and had to chose between staying home from work or going in and exposing their coworkers? That could be problematic.

...millions of Americans can’t just stay home because they’re under the weather. When EPI looked at corporate sick leave policies in 2007 it found that some 43% of all private-industry workers have no paid sick days. Rather than the common sense precaution the President advices, these workers have a more difficult choice of going to work sick or staying home without pay and risk losing their jobs. In this current climate of high unemployment and even higher job insecurity, workers without any formal sick leave are even less likely to risk taking a day off.

Even more problematic, access to time off for health reasons is especially rare in low-paying jobs. In a 2006 compensation survey, the Bureau of Labor Statistics found that 79% of those earning more than $29.47 per hour had sick time, but only 16% of those earning less than $7.38 an hour had the same benefit.

The EPI also points out what a challenge it is for working parents if their children get sick.

The Huffington Post, citing data from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, notes that fewer than one in three U.S. workers who do have sick leave are allowed to use that time to stay home and care for a sick child.

The Institute argues that "workers who lack paid sick time are more likely to go to work with a communicable illness, and parents who cannot stay home with a sick child are more likely to send them to school or day care." That just spreads germs around even more.

In Michigan, 1,725,000 residents — 48 percent of Michigan workers — are not able to take a paid sick day when they are ill.

It's time to revisit "the Healthy Families Act, which Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) plan to reintroduce in Congress next month. The bill would “guarantee workers up to seven paid sick days a year to recover from an illness or care for a sick family member.”

There is also an economic advantage to passing the legislation.

According to the National Partnership for Women and Families, “when sick workers are on the job, it costs our national economy $180 billion annually in lost productivity. For employers, this costs an average of $255 per employee per year and exceeds the cost of absenteeism and medical and disability benefits.”

At least 139 other countries already provide some paid sick leave to workers as a matter of national law, and four out of five Americans think paid sick days should be a basic labor standard, so passing the legislation should be a no-brainer. This is clearly one of those "changes" Americans voted for last November.

Made in Michigan

My daughter and son-in-law wanted to do something to help stimulate our economy and this is what they came up with:


Meet their little stimulus package - Alexis Michelle (a.k.a. Lexie). She was born in a Michigan hospital on April 2, 2009 and weighs 6 pounds, 14 ounces and is 20 inches long. That picture was taken just seconds after she entered the world.

Her impact on the economy was immediate. Grandpa dashed to a local florist to buy flowers for Lexie's mom and Grandma made plans to hit the mall over the weekend.

Lexie is expected to have the biggest impact on local Michigan products. We all know kids have voracious appetites, and Lexie is expected to consume copious amounts of Kellogg's cereal, Cole's garlic bread, Faygo pop, Jiffy Mix muffins and pancakes, Koegel's hotdogs, Little Caesar's pizza and Better Made potato chips over the course of her lifetime.

And looking really far into the future, Lexie will definitely drive a G.M., Ford or Chrysler vehicle!

(Mother and child are doing well and are expected to come home today. Grandma is still on cloud nine, but expect her to share some more pictures soon!)

I'm Thankful for Socialism

Republicans can't whip people into a frenzy over Iraq, terrorism, gay rights or abortion anymore, so they've settled on a new target - socialism. For some reason, they're under the impression that Americans are just genetically opposed to it. That's because Republicans sit on their high horses, out of touch with average Americans like me. I'm thankful for socialism, in particular social security, Medicare and Medicaid, and I'm not alone.

In the past 5 weeks, I've attended 4 funerals, including my mother's, and I've learned that most families are very thankful that their loved ones had Medicare to cover medical bills and Social Security to cover part of their daily living expenses.

I also learned that young people wish they had something like Medicare to fall back on. They're worrying themselves sick because they don't have health care, and they're more than willing to pay extra taxes in return for coverage.

In my mother's case, she also received Medicaid, which enabled us to put her in a nursing home 2 years ago. She was 86-years-old at the time, had outlived her money a long time ago, and was in the end stages of Alzheimer's. We couldn't emotionally and financially care for her at home anymore and Medicaid was a godsend. My mother had round-the-clock nursing care, and for the last 6 months she even had hospice, which meant she was kept pain free up till the end.

Incidentally, don't buy into the Republican myth that socialized medicine prevents you from choosing your doctor. My mother had physicians from the best hospitals in the area to choose from. Ditto nursing homes. We visited several places before deciding on the one we liked. (I guess Republicans haven't heard of choice limiting HMOs or PPOs.)

My mom was a blessing to us, just like all of your loved ones are blessings, and it makes me angry when I hear people like Mike Huckabee say, "Lenin and Stalin would love this stuff," or other Republicans who throw around terms like "Comrade," as though socialism is dirty and disgusting, and by extension so are the beneficiaries of it. How dare they insult people like my mother. She did the best she could in life to work hard and pay her fair share in taxes. And even if she hadn't worked a day in her life, she deserved health care and a death with dignity because she was one of us.

It's not socialism to provide health care or a roof over a person's head, it's the right thing to do. It's the Christian thing to do.

Thank you America for looking after my mother. Your tax dollars made her last few years here on earth more comfortable. God bless you all.

How will the Big 3's cries for help be answered?

Tom Walsh has a very thoughtful column at the Free Press that reminds certain GOP senators of the Big 3's response after Hurricane Katrina:

...the automobile companies of Detroit did not harrumph that the Gulf Coast should have been better prepared.

They didn’t sit back and wait for New Orleans to submit a detailed plan for future repair of the ruptured levees.[...]

Between them, the three Detroit auto companies gave more than $18 million in cash and vehicles to the Katrina relief effort in the ensuing months. No strings attached.

That's just one example. Detroit's Big 3 are known for their charity and generosity in communities across our country. Now its their turn to ask for help. Before you just brush them off and say no, consider what else Walsh had to say:

If you see a fellow American is drowning, gasping for air, do you quiz him for awhile about whether he’s drunk or why he never learned to swim better? Or do you throw him a lifebuoy and ask questions later?

That, it seems to me, is where we are with America’s car companies.

You can do nothing and watch them die, senators.

Or you can rush in immediately with emergency aid – as GM, Ford and Chrysler did in the case of Hurricane Katrina, and after the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, and during countless other disasters.

And you can hold their feet to the fire afterward, empowering a strong auto czar to make sure they do what’s needed to withstand future shocks.

Millions of lives are hanging in the balance, senators, including those of children, seniors and others who rely on the workers for their incomes. Please consider them when you make your decision. This is about more than unions or poorly managed companies. This is about families. They don't deserve to have their feet held to the fire.

“The quality of mercy is not strained, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven, Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest, It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.” - William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice.

(Cross-posted at Blogging for MI.)

Can institutions learn from their mistakes?

What happened to this 7-year-old boy after he consumed Mike's Hard Lemonade probably harmed him more than the alcohol itself.

Here's the scoop. Leo Ratte and his father Christopher, a professor of classical archaeology at the University of Michigan, were at a Tiger's baseball game three weeks ago when his dad stopped to buy him lemonade as they headed to their seats. Unbeknownst to the father, the lemonade he bought contained alcohol (the sign at the concession stand even called it Mike's Lemonade, no mention of the word "Hard"). Long story short, at the top of the ninth inning a security guard noticed the bottle in Leo's hand and asked the father if he knew it contained alcohol. The father replied, "You've got to be kidding me," but Detroit Police and Child Protective Services didn't find anything to laugh about. The child ended up being placed in a foster home for two days.

I'm the first one to err on the side of caution, especially when vulnerable children are involved, but this was a case of over-zealousness from square one. First, a physician at Comerica Park decided to send Leo to the hospital by ambulance after examining him because the boy complained of feeling a little nauseated. This was in spite of the fact the boy showed no signs of inebriation and had only consumed 12 ounces of the hard lemonade, which contains 5% alcohol. Leo's blood was drawn by the ER doctor 90 minutes after the security guard found the child with the drink and the test came back negative.

Most children aren't too fond of doctors and needles, let alone hospitals. Those factors, along with the ambulance ride and police presence, probably scared the poor child half to death. If that didn't scare him, the decision to have Child Protective Services step in did. Leo ended up crying himself to sleep in front of a television inside the CPS building that night.

It took two days before Leo was allowed to return home to his mother, but his father was forced to move to a hotel while an investigation continued. It was another three days before the juvenile referee dismissed the complaint and permitted Ratte to move home.

I realize we live in a society where everyone feels the need to cover their backside against criticism and lawsuits, but the adults in this situation should have paused to listen to what was being said by other people in authority. The police officer who interviewed the father and son at the hospital was convinced the drink was an accident. The ER doctor wrote in his report that the child was "Completely normal appearing...he is cleared to go home." And one of the child protective workers told Rattke, "This is so unnecessary," before driving away with his son. Key people showed common sense, yet CPS ignored them.

As you might imagine, the Rattke's have filed a formal complaint with the CPS ombudsman's office, and Mr. Rattke even apologized to his son for the "silly mistake that got him into this mess." He also told his son that "what happened afterward was an even bigger error, and I would like to be able to say to him that institutions, like people, can learn from their mistakes."

For the sake of children everywhere, I sure hope so.

Merry Christmas

You may believe Jesus is "the reason for the season" or you may believe in Santa Claus. Whatever you believe is fine with me. I don't want to fight. I don't want a "war on Christmas." In fact, what I do want is peace on earth, but that looks impossible for the immediate future, so I'll simply wish everyone a Christmas day filled with love, peace of mind and goodwill.

I also wanted to share a couple pictures of my granddaughter Gracie with you because I think children exemplify the unconditional love of Jesus - and in my opinion, that love is the true spirit of Christmas.

I hope she brings a smile to your face and lightens your spirits like she does mine.

Merry Christmas and God bless.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Today is about counting our blessings, sitting down to dinner with family and friends, and watching the Lions play the Packers. The experts are giving the game to the Packers, which is fine by me...I love Brett Farve! (Shhh...don't tell my husband!)

I don't have anything poignant to say today, so I thought I'd share a timely joke a friend sent me.

A young man named John received a parrot as a gift. The parrot had a bad attitude and an even worse vocabulary. Every word out of the bird's mouth was rude, obnoxious and laced with profanity.

John tried and tried to change the bird's attitude by consistently saying only polite words, playing soft music and anything else he could think of to "clean up" the bird's vocabulary.

Finally, John was fed up and he yelled at the parrot. The parrot yelled back. John shook the parrot and the parrot got angrier and even ruder. In desperation, John threw up his hands, grabbed the bird and put him in the freezer.

For a few minutes the parrot squawked and kicked and screamed. Then suddenly there was total quiet. Not a peep was heard for over a minute.

Fearing that he'd hurt the parrot, John quickly opened the door to the freezer. The parrot calmly stepped out onto John's outstretched arms and said, "I believe I may have offended you with my rude language and actions. I'm sincerely remorseful for my inappropriate transgressions and I fully intend to do everything I can to correct my rude and unforgivable behavior.

John was stunned at the change in the bird's attitude.

He was about to ask the parrot what had made such a dramatic change in his behavior, when the bird continued, "May I ask what the turkey did?"

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Giving Thanks for our Troops

The Department of Defense has a website that makes it easy for us to send our message of support to the troops - America Supports You. You can e-mail service members by clicking here or you can text your thanks to them between now and midnight on Thanksgiving.

By Samantha L. Quigley / American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Nov. 16, 2007 - For those seeking a quick way to show appreciation to troops serving far from home this holiday season, look no further than “Giving Thanks,” a new initiative from the Defense Department’s America Supports You program.

America Supports You connects citizens and corporations with military personnel and their families serving at home and abroad.

“This is a simple way to connect our citizens to our soldiers using modern technology,” Allison Barber, deputy assistant secretary of defense for internal communications and public liaison, said of the text messaging program.

The program, which already has received nearly 4,000 messages, officially kicks off at 6 a.m. EST Nov. 17 and concludes at midnight PST Nov. 22. Between those times, people wishing to express gratitude to the troops for their service can text a brief message to 89279. Each text message sent will receive a response from an active-duty servicemember in return.

Major mobile wireless providers, including AT&T, Verizon, Sprint Nextel, and T-Mobile, will provide access to the Giving Thanks text messaging program.

“We know that thousands of families will be sitting down for Thanksgiving dinner and thinking about loved ones who are far away from home serving their country,” Barber said. “We are counting on other American families to take a moment during their holiday celebration to think of those families and their family members who are serving and say, ‘Thanks.’

“The reassurance that others are thinking about them will mean a lot to our troops,” Barber added.

Those who send a message during the six days of the Giving Thanks program also will be directed to the America Supports You Web site. There, they’ll find a sampling of messages from the public and a running tally of how many messages have been received. They’ll also be able to read messages from the troops.

Get busy texting and add your message to the more than 27,000 that have been received already! What easier way is there for us to tell the troops we're thankful for them.

Road Trip: Pittsburgh

Hubby and I went to Pittsburgh for a few days to visit family and enjoy the fall colors. Since I couldn't take you along, I did the next best thing and took lots of pictures. (I heard that groan!) The colors weren't as nice as we expected (I read that global warming is to blame), but Mother Nature didn't disappoint either. This first shot was taken on the Ohio Turnpike as we zoomed through the Cuyahoga Valley area, which is east of Cleveland. (You can try clicking the pictures to make them bigger. It works in Firefox, but I'm not sure about other browsers.)



It was pretty cloudy on the way there as you can see. The next picture shows downtown Pittsburgh as seen from the North Hills area. Those white awning-like objects are part of the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.



After driving through town, we crossed the Liberty Bridge (over the Monongahela River) and headed into the Liberty Tunnel, which goes through the hillside on Mount Washington. I'm always a little nervous while we're inside, especially if traffic backs up and we have to stop. We breezed through this time, but I had a moment of panic when my flash went off and I wondered if Homeland Security saw it and was ready to pull us over. I guess they were sleeping or I look pretty harmless!



Our trip home was much sunnier as you can see from the next picture taken as we crossed the Allegheny River. The bridge you see is for trains.



Have you heard of Joe Namath? Well, the next picture was taken on the Pennsylvania Turnpike as we crossed over the Beaver River, a tributary of the Ohio River, in Beaver Falls, home town of Broadway Joe. You can't tell from the picture, but that bridge is really high above the water. If that bridge ever collapses, you'd better hope you're wearing a parachute.



Michigan readers will recognize the next picture showing Bronner's Christmas Store in Frankenmuth. The billboard is on the Ohio Turnpike just as you leave Pennsylvania. It's been there as long as I can remember, and in fact it looks like it's been refreshed. I guess the advertising must pay off.



Finally, home sweet home. I wish Michigan had a snazzier looking sign welcoming people to our state. It looks cheap and it's pretty pathetic that Bronner's has a nicer looking billboard than the one welcoming people to Michigan. Sigh...I guess money for a new sign is out of the question, huh?

Republicans don't even try to pretend they care anymore

Several news items caught my eye this week that showed the Republican Party's true colors and/or total disregard and disrespect for American citizens. First, from the WaPo, comes this:

The Justice Department notified Chiquita Brands International yesterday that it will not seek to criminally charge its former top executive and other former high-ranking officers over the company's payment of bribes to a Colombian organization on the State Department's list of terrorist groups.

Corporations trump taxpayers and soldiers. How typical. Why should they be held accountable or have to sacrifice for the war on terror? That's what we have soldiers and taxpayers for according to Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH). From Think Progress:

In an interview on CNN today, Wolf Blitzer asked House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) about “the Americans who are killed every month” in Iraq and “how much longer” the “military commitment is going to require?” “The investment that we’re making today will be a small price if we’re able to stop al Qaeda here,” replied Boehner.

What arrogance. Even one life is too much to pay for Bush's lie. But, wait, there's more:

...it's not only going to be a small price for the near future, but think about the future for our kids and their kids.

Does Boehner honestly think we believe he cares about our children? Bush and friends only care about corporations. Take the recent toy recalls by Mattel as an example. This is how Dana Milbank described the testimony of Nancy Nord (acting chairman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission and Bush appointee) when she appeared before legislators to answer questions about all that lead:

Actually, the lawmakers' drilling of Nord made it sound as if every day is a sad one for her agency. Product safety regulators, broke and undermanned, have been powerless to prevent millions of Barbie dolls, Polly Pockets, Dora the Explorers and Thomas the Tank Engines from entering the country from China with lead paint and other defects. Parents -- and therefore lawmakers -- are furious. But instead of showing contrition, Nord treated the lawmakers as if they were impertinent children.

"Are you saying that the Chinese have now adopted a new and different standard when it comes to lead paint?" asked Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), chairman of the panel examining the issue.

"I think, sir, that that's a question you would really need to put to the Chinese," Nord replied curtly.

Durbin, with some of the offending toys on the table in front of him, asked why the commission didn't do more to block lead in children's jewelry.

"Well, the law is what it is" was Nord's brushoff.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) asked Nord if she knew what percentage of toys get lead tests.

"No, I don't."

After much hemming and hawing from Nord about her agency's ability to stop dangerous toys coming from China, Brownback got cranky: "Chairman, what I want to hear is you say these products are not going to enter our shores if that's what you continue to find."

"Well, I'm happy to say that," Nord retorted.

It's pretty obvious Nord doesn't care about our children, which turns out to be a plus for corporations.

While dismissive of the senators, the acting chairman was solicitous of the manufacturers. She "commended" the industry for its safety initiatives. A toy manufacturer reciprocated, calling Nord's agency "exemplary."

If Nord sounded a bit like a corporate fox guarding the consumer henhouse, consider her previous employers: the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the American Corporate Counsel Association and Eastman Kodak.

Among the nuggets served up at yesterday's hearing: The CPSC's staff, once 978, is down to 401; its budget is half of what it was three decades ago, in inflation-adjusted terms; its toy-testing department consists of one man, Bob, who drops toys on the floor in his office; and its toy-testing lab is an overloaded workbench in its outmoded headquarters.

So the toy testing department's budget has been drowned in a bathtub. Let me guess. The Republicans trust corporations to do the right thing and test their own products, those same corporations that cut costs by outsourcing jobs to China. The same corporations that never stopped to think that the Chinese might cut costs too.

Why is lead paint — or lead, for that matter — turning up in so many recalls involving Chinese-made goods?

The simplest answer, experts and toy companies in China say, is price. Paint with higher levels of lead often sells for a third of the cost of paint with low levels. So Chinese factory owners, trying to eke out profits in an intensely competitive and poorly regulated market, sometimes cut corners and use the cheaper leaded paint.

So you can see why I don't believe the Republicans and their corporate friends when they say they care about our children. Their actions speaker louder than their words, and because of them, our children are dying or in danger.

Social networking for old people

I find the tone of this article insulting:

New Social Sites Cater to People of a Certain Age

Technology investors and entrepreneurs, long obsessed with connecting to teenagers and 20-somethings, are starting a host of new social networking sites aimed at baby boomers and graying computer users.

The sites have names like Eons, Rezoom, Multiply, Maya’s Mom, Boomj, and Boomertown. They look like Facebook — with wrinkles.

Eons? Wrinkles? I admit I don't have experience with these social networking sites, but alluding to my graying hair and age doesn't do much to convince me to click over. Couldn't they have come up with more flattering names? Maybe "Sage" or "Savoir-Faire?" Or how about "Venerable" or "Seasoned?"

I will admit I've been curious to see what all the fuss is about. I'm also curious about those online dating services. My neighbor recently spent an evening telling me about her mother's matchmaking success through eHarmony and it was quite interesting. Her mother credits the matchmaking service with pairing her up with someone compatible, and saving her the time and effort of having to ask questions in order to learn about her dates.

Sigh...the world is changing. So is the way we do things, particularly when it comes to communicating. The internet has opened up a whole new world to "venerable" people like myself. I especially love webcams. When my granddaughter was born this summer, we bought one so we could keep in touch with her and watch her grow (we live a distance away). I didn't want to leave anyone out so I screen captured a picture of Grace to share with you.


I can't even begin to imagine what technology will be like when she's a seasoned woman like me.

My "Pure Michigan" Moment

I spent the weekend with my family at a campground near Jackson enjoying nature and sitting around the campfire. We had a great time. The weather was perfect - hot days and cool nights - and we never had to use our bug spray even once to ward off the mosquitoes! It can't get much better than that, but it did. A hot air balloon club out of Stockbridge spent the weekend entertaining us while they practiced maneuvers over the water. It was a "Pure Michigan" moment.

I took dozens of pictures so I thought I'd share a few with you.







I've never been in a hot air balloon because I'm not crazy about heights or water, (don't laugh... I even wear a life jacket when I ride on a pontoon boat) but after watching this group all weekend, I just might get up the courage to try it someday. How about you?

AFL-CIO: Quality health care for ALL in 2009

Earlier this week, the Census Bureau released figures showing the number of Americans without health insurance increased for the sixth straight year to 47 million people. The problem isn't limited just to the poor either. The fastest growing group of people without health insurance includes those in households making $75,000 or more.

Having a job used to pretty much guarantee you'd have health insurance. That's no longer the case, and it's gotten the attention of labor unions. Michigan Liberal reports the following from Mark Gaffney, President of the Michigan AFL-CIO:

Union members are very concerned about the cost of health care and if they become unemployed, its availability. Polls show union members generally are favorable towards their own coverage, but understand the crisis of the un-insured. Unionized workers generally have better coverage and unionized employers generally cover more of the cost of health insurance. Yet unions and their members understand America needs a national solution to our nationwide problem.

John Sweeney, President of the AFL-CIO, is speaking out too: In America, No One Should Go Without Health Care

[...]One of the greatest economic burdens working families face today is the insane, out-of-control cost of health care. One in four Americans say their family has had a problem paying for medical care during the past year. The cost of health care -- rising far faster than workers' wages or inflation -- is a major factor in housing problems and bankruptcies. In fact, every 30 seconds in the United States someone files for bankruptcy in the aftermath of a serious health problem.

Meanwhile, insurance and drug companies are making stunning profits, health insurance CEOs averaged $8.7 million in 2006 compensation and pharmaceutical company CEOs pulled down an average of $4.4 million.

The rest of us aren't faring so well. The annual premium cost for a family health plan has close to doubled since 2000, from $6,351 to an astonishing $11,480. Soaring health coverage costs are crippling U.S. companies' ability to compete internationally -- health benefits accounted for an estimated $1,300 of the cost of a new car made by the Big Three in 2005, for example. As costs grow higher, fewer employers are providing health coverage for employees--and fewer workers are able to afford their share of the costs or to buy policies on their own. The outrageous price tags on insurance policies are driving increases in the number of people without coverage. The federal government just let us know that another 2.2 million people -- including 600,000 more children -- lost health insurance last year, meaning 47 million of us now cannot afford to get sick.

In the wealthiest, most powerful nation on earth, that is just not acceptable. In America, no one should go without health care.

The union is doing more than simply talking, they're putting their words into action:

The AFL-CIO is turning Labor Day 2007 into the start of a drive to win quality health care for all in 2009. With 10 million members and nearly 3 million union retirees, we intend to make the 2008 elections a mandate on health care. The union families who made up a quarter of voters last year are going to mobilize as never before to elect a Congress and a president who will enact the kind of real health care reform America needs.

You don't have to look far to see that winning health care for all is going to be tough. President Bush has vowed to veto legislation that would extend health care to millions more children -- now, that's cold! He's protecting insurance interests rather than children's health, saying this could be a dangerous first step toward health care for all. He's right -- getting this legislation passed and overriding a Bush veto is the first step.

This fall and throughout 2008, union members will be mobilizing in their workplaces, in their neighborhoods and in their communities to demand that candidates and elected officials at every level commit to work for working families.

You can sign their petition asking for quality, affordable health care too. That's the first step. The next step is to vote only for those politicians willing to bring serious solutions to the table - solutions that leave no one uninsured.

Can I get my social security converted into pesos?

I'm a grandmother now, so I need to start thinking about my - gulp - old age. Will my money last as long as I do? What happens if I get sick and need to go to a nursing home? If you're like me, then you've probably worried about these things too, but don't despair, we might make it to the end before our nest egg does after all. USA Today has the scoop:

Seniors head south to Mexican nursing homes

After Jean Douglas turned 70, she realized she couldn't take care of herself anymore. Her knees were giving out, and winters in Bandon, Ore., were getting harder to bear alone.

[...] After searching the Internet for other options, she joined a small but steadily growing number of Americans who are moving across the border to nursing homes in Mexico, where the sun is bright and the living is cheap.

For $1,300 a month — a quarter of what an average nursing home costs in Oregon — Douglas gets a studio apartment, three meals a day, laundry and cleaning service, and 24-hour care from an attentive staff, many of whom speak English. She wakes up every morning next to a glimmering mountain lake, and the average annual high temperature is a toasty 79 degrees.

According to USA Today, retirement homes are relatively new in Mexico and there's little government regulation, but the U.S. Embassy doesn't report any complaints against Mexican nursing homes. That doesn't mean residents haven't complained though. One woman reported her home was staffed by "gossips and thieves" and another claimed "It was filthy, and the food was very bad. It was all made in the microwave."

Those are legitimate complaints, but they're also similar to ones lodged against nursing homes here in the U.S. My mother is in a nursing home and she often complains about people stealing from her, but 90% of the time the missing item ends up being found in her wastebasket or pocket. Gossip is one of her complaints too, yet she's guilty of the same behavior. I think some old people just like to complain. That's not the case for this gentleman:

Residents such as Richard Slater say they are happy in Mexico. Slater came to Lake Chapala four years ago and now lives in his own cottage at the Casa de Ancianos, surrounded by purple bougainvillea and pomegranate trees.

He has plenty of room for his two dogs and has a little patio that he shares with three other American residents. He gets 24-hour nursing care and three meals a day, cooked in a homey kitchen and served in a sun-washed dining room. His cottage has a living room, bedroom, kitchenette, bathroom and a walk-in closet.

For this Slater pays $550 a month, less than one-tenth of the going rate back home in Las Vegas. For another $140 a year, he gets full medical coverage from the Mexican government, including all his medicine and insulin for diabetes.

Hmmm...the health care issue could be a problem. I haven't really heard much about the quality of health care in Mexico. Slater relies on the Mexican SSI, which runs clinics and hospitals nationwide and allows foreigners to enroll in its program even if they never worked in Mexico or paid taxes to support the system, because Medicare, Medicaid, the Department of Veterans Affairs and most U.S. insurance companies will not cover care or medicine as long as patients are outside the United States. Slater has firsthand experience with their medical care though. He recently had gallbladder surgery and reports he paid nothing.

Any doubts Americans may have about retiring to Mexico haven't gone unnoticed by developers and officials, who see an opportunity to fill a need and make a lot of money.

Developers of "independent living" facilities for seniors are also beginning to look to Mexico. A Spanish-U.S. venture is building Sensara Vallarta, a 250-unit condominium complex aimed at Americans 50 and older in the Pacific Coast resort of Puerto Vallarta. And in the northern city of Monterrey, El Legado is marketing itself as a "home resort" for seniors.

Academics and government officials are beginning to take notice. In March, the University of Texas at Austin held a forum for developers, hospital officials, insurance companies and policymakers to discuss health care for retirees in Mexico.

"With the right facilities in place, Mexico could give (American retirees) a better quality of life at a better price than they could find in the United States," says Flavio Olivieri, a member of Tijuana's Economic Development Council, which is seeking funding from Mexico's federal government to build more retirement homes. "We think this could be a very good business as these baby boomers reach retirement age," he says.

Mexico could give American retirees a better quality of life at a better price than they could find in the United States? That's disturbing to even read those words. I think we should be taking care of one another here at home. If a person makes the choice to move to Mexico because they like the climate, culture or country, that's their choice. However, if a person moves to Mexico because they can't afford to maintain their same quality of life here, that's just wrong and we should be ashamed.

It's great to know Mexico is an option for retirees, and we all like to have options, but our golden years should not be at the whim of dollars and cents - or pesos.

Indulge me, I'm a grandma!

I seem to remember reading somewhere that grandmothers are allowed to brag about their grandchildren. In fact, I think it's mandatory!

Grace is two weeks old in these pictures. Just think, she could grow up to be president someday.



Grace is smiling because she likes the idea of being called Madame President!



Sorry fellas, but I think it's time to turn our country over to women so we can clean up the messes you've made!

My wish for future generations

As a parent and grandparent, I'm like most people in that I'd like future generations to have a bigger piece of the American Dream than I did. What I'm seeing isn't too encouraging. Consider this statistic from the EPI:

Employer-provided health coverage declining for college grads in entry-level jobs

A college degree is no guarantee of receiving health insurance on the job. Over the recent recession and recovery, college graduates in entry-level jobs (defined as employed college graduates between 23 and 27 years old) have become increasingly less likely to receive employer-provided health insurance coverage.1 The Chart below illustrates the recent trends in employer-provided health insurance for this group. Their incidence of employment-based insurance has fallen roughly nine percentage points from 1999-2000 to 2004-05, from 69.6% to 60.5%.

Among those lucky enough to have employer-provided insurance, how many pay a hefty monthly premium toward the cost? Jobs for the college-educated used to include health insurance that was totally paid for by the employer. Not anymore.

Maybe the stock market will provide a good life for future generations. After all, the market just surged past 14,000. That's not too realistic according to DetNews columnist Brian O'Connor:

Dow: Big number, big disconnect

As a reflection of the biggest and best public companies in the nation, a healthy Dow means a healthy stock market, and a healthy stock market means a healthy economy.

If by "healthy" you mean "all but completely disconnected from the reality of U.S. citizens." [...]

Sure, many (OK, some) of us participate in the broader economy thanks to mutual funds in our retirement plans, and it's nice to see those go up with the Dow. That way, if we hang on until retirement we'll have money for milk, gas and mortgages.

For right now, though, we're seeing very little of the growth from "the economy" showing up in our personal economies.

Money isn't everything though. It can't buy piece of mind or health, and it can't buy security. Those are all intangibles that make up what I believe to be part of the American Dream. The rest of America appears to see it that way too according to Democratic pollster Celinda Lake.

"There have been times in our history when the American dream was rooted in opportunity, and there have been times in our history where the dream was rooted in security. This is a time, and has been for a couple for years now, where the dream is rooted in security."

There's not a lot of security in a fast-paced global economy where workers get ahead by chasing opportunities (not obediently following office rules), by constantly reinventing their careers (not relying on seniority), by self-investing their savings (not counting on company pensions).

Face it, the global economy is here to stay, but that doesn't mean the American Dream is no longer relevant. Looking into the future, my dream includes health care for all, social security for our elderly, children who never have to go to bed hungry, and jobs that pay a living wage.

There's no good reason we can't leave future generations some security and peace of mind.

Welcome to the world...

Grace Lynn, my granddaughter. Gracie was born yesterday, July 12th. She's 6 lbs, 13 oz, 20 1/2 inches long, and quite beautiful in my unbiased opinion!



God is good.

Democrats' health care plan would help red states most

Sorry I haven't updated you on the Democrats plans to fix health care, but we've been busy moving mom into the nursing home this week. My husband and I live more than an hour away from her and the rest of my family, so we spend quite a bit of time on the freeway traveling back and forth. I'm happy to report that the transition went smoother than we anticipated and mom seems to be adjusting well in her new environment. We're immensely relieved, as you might imagine.

Anyway, as soon as I get a decent block of time, I'll put together my information and post it. In the meantime, I wanted to share this article from Mother Jones that illustrates perfectly how people continue to vote against their own self-interests when they vote for Republicans.

Democrats' Plans for Universal Health Care Helps Red States Most

Let's say a Democrat wins the 2008 election and institutes universal health care. Who benefits the most? Republicans.

That's right -- a new study shows that the red states (mostly in the South) consistently rate at the bottom of the country in terms of health care for residents. The Commonwealth Fund report ranked states according to 32 indicators of health care access, quality, outcomes, and hospital use. Consider the political leanings of the top ten and the bottom ten.

States 1-10: Hawaii, Iowa, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, South Dakota.

States 50-41: Oklahoma, Mississippi, Texas, Arkansas, Nevada, Louisiana, Kentucky, West Virginia, Florida, Georgia.

This shouldn't be a surprise. States led by Republicans are more likely to have laissez faire attitudes towards health care and be less sympathetic to the plights of those who cannot afford it. It doesn't help that these states are often the most hostile towards workers' rights, thus driving down wages, and often have the highest number of single mothers, due to the nation's highest rates of divorce and out-of-wedlock births. Get all the details and schadenfreude at PERRspectives Blog.

Click the PERRspectives link to read more, but the bottom line in their post says it all:

By almost any measure of societal breakdown that so-called Republican "values voters" decry, it is Red State America where moral failure is greatest.

And part of that moral failure includes 44 million uninsured women, men and children.

If you want my vote, fix the health care problem

Pollster John Zogby thinks the Iraq war will be the top issue in the 2008 presidential campaign and he's probably right, but my vote will go to the candidate with the best plan to fix health care. Next to the war, it is also the one issue I find my baby boomer friends and I discussing when we get together. We're caught in the middle between our adult children and parents. We worry about our children who don't have employee provided health insurance and the ones who have it and struggle to pay increasingly expensive deductibles and co-pays, not to mention our children who simply don't have insurance at all.

On the other side, we have our elderly parents who find it difficult to pay for prescriptions, home health care or - God forbid - long-term care. One serious medical emergency can wipe out a lifetime of savings and leave our parents destitute. The fortunate ones will have children they can turn to for help. The others will be at the mercy of the overburdened and underfunded Medicaid system they'll be forced to turn to when they become penniless.

I'm speaking from experience here. Several months ago, I told you about my mother who was then in a skilled-care nursing home covered by Medicare and her supplemental insurance plan. She regained her health and was discharged to go back home to live with my sister and brother-in-law. Mom is almost 90-years-old and has had Alzheimer's for nearly a decade, but she moved in with my sister years ago simply because she outlived her money and couldn't afford to live on her own. Her only source of income is social security, and mom was too proud to live in a rent subsidized senior apartment.

Moving in with my sister turned out to be a godsend. We noticed the early symptoms of Alzheimer's sooner than we might have and got mom the help she needed, which included the extremely expensive medication Aricept (one month's supply was more than $350). Over time, however, the disease progressed and it became clear that mom needed someone with her 24 hours a day, so my brother-in-law retired a few years earlier than planned and stayed home to care for my mom.

Out of respect for my mother's modesty, we hired an aide to come in to help her bathe, wash her hair, etc., and that worked out well until my mother became totally incontinent and we needed the aide 5 days a week. My sister and I were splitting the cost of the aide and mom's medications and the expenses were becoming a burden. We eventually turned to Medicaid for help and mom was instantly approved. She is now considered dual-enrolled since she has Medicare and Medicaid, in addition to the prescription program.

How does all of this relate to what I said at the top about voting for the candidate with the best plan to fix health care? Simple, I think Medicare and Medicaid have provided my mother with a level of care that all people should have access to - regardless of age.

That being said, Medicare and Medicaid don't do enough to help families caring for loved ones in their homes. Medicare only covers a home health aide for a short period of time after hospitalization or transition from a rehab facility. Medicaid provides home care assistance, but there's a long waiting list in our area (my mom's been on the list for 18 months). Respite care isn't available either, unless the person is terminal and a doctor certifies the patient has less than 6 months to live.

The government is penny wise and pound foolish when it comes to helping loved ones care for family at home, as we found out firsthand. Overwhelmed by the level of care my mother has needed for years, and the out-of-pocket expense of having to hire aides to deal with her daily hygiene, my sister and I decided last week it was time to put mom in a long-term care facility. It was the hardest thing we ever had to do. We cried and we prayed. We wanted to honor mom's wishes to die at home someday, but we just don't have the strength or the financial means to do so anymore. Instead, mom will soon be going to live in a nursing home that accepts Medicaid.

This is where the government is being foolish. They limit the funds available to provide home health care support, but they'll spend thousands of dollars a year to keep someone in a nursing home. In my mother's case, my sister saved the government thousands of dollars over the years by caring for my mother at home, and we waited for years after my mom exhausted all her resources to apply for help...help that just wasn't enough and didn't come in time. How many other people can't manage to hold on as long as we did?

So, my vote, my sister's vote, my husband's vote, and I'm sure the votes of millions of others will go to the candidate that has a plan to insure all Americans and expand the level of home care available to families taking care of loved ones.

Iraq may be the top issue, but among my friends there's a lot of anger about health care in this country. Our thinking goes something like this: If there are tax dollars available to keep an American presence in Iraq for up to 50 years, then there darn well better be tax dollars to take care of people here at home.

(I've started researching where the candidates stand on this issue and I'll be posting something on it real soon. In the meantime, here's a link that gives more information on Michigan's Medicaid Program.)

Another Casualty of Conservative Values

Here's another casualty of conservative values according to Harold Meyerson - the American family. He makes a good case that the rise in divorce rates and the number of children born out of wedlock can be blamed on the Reagan '80s and not the permissive '60s.

Keep this statistic in the back of your mind as you read:

The percentage of households that are married couples with children has hit an all-time low (at least, the lowest since the Census Bureau started measuring such things): 23.7 percent. That's about half the level that marrieds-with-children constituted at the end of the Ozzie-and-Harriet '50s.

It's also important to note that working-class families are affected more than college-educated ones. Taking into account all households, married couples with children are twice as likely to be in the top 20 percent of incomes, and their incomes have increased 59 percent over the past 30 years, while households overall have experienced just a 44 percent increase.

Financial instability is responsible for the decline of American families according to Meyerson.

To be sure, the '60s, with its assaults on traditional authority, played some role in weakening the traditional family.

But its message was sounded loudest and clearest on elite college campuses, whose graduates were nonetheless the group most likely to have stable marriages. Then again, they were also the group most likely to have stable careers.

They enjoyed financial stability; they could plan for the future.

Such was not the case for working-class Americans. Over the past 35 years, the massive changes in the U.S. economy have largely condemned American workers to lives of economic insecurity. No longer can the worker count on a steady job for a single employer who provides a paycheck and health and retirement benefits, too. Over the past three decades, workers' individual annual income fluctuations have consistently increased, while their aggregate income has stagnated. In the brave new economy of outsourced jobs and short-term gigs and on-again, off-again health coverage, American workers cannot rationally plan their economic futures. And with each passing year, as their level of economic security declines, so does their entry into marriage.

So, families across America can thank the conservative movement for this financial insecurity and the decline of marriage. Right-wingers put profits and business ahead of people.

The right-wing ideologues who have championed outsourcing, offshoring, and union-busting, who have celebrated the same changes that have condemned American workers to lives of financial instability, piously lament the decline of family stability that has followed these economic changes as the night the day.

American conservatism is a house divided against itself. It applauds the radicalism of the economic changes of the past four decades -- the dismantling, say, of the American steel industry (and the job and income security that it once provided) in the cause of greater efficiency. It decries the decline of social and familial stability over that time -- the traditional, married working-class families, say, that once filled all those churches in the hills and hollows in what is now the smaller, post-working-class Pittsburgh.

Problem is, disperse a vibrant working-class community in America and you disperse the vibrant working-class family.

Which is how American conservatism became the primary author of the very social disorder that it routinely rails against, and that Republicans have the gall to run against.

The party of family values? Please. If that's the banner that Republicans continue to wave, then they should certainly make Rudy Giuliani, who couldn't bestir himself to attend his son's high school graduation or his daughter's high school plays, their presidential nominee. No candidate could better personify the sham that is Republicans' and conservatives' concern for the American family [emphasis added].

Like I've said before, just because they say they're the "values party" doesn't make it so.