• Mom

    It’s been a while since I’ve written anything about my mother, but it hasn’t been because nothing’s happening. I just don’t know what to say, or if I want to say it. That makes it sound kind of bad, but it isn’t; not really anyway.

    The second sudden recovery came and went, but it was encouraging in that she didn’t lapse back quite as far as she had been. They haven’t needed to send her back to the hospital for fluids or medication, so that’s been good. However, they did have the Baker Act hearing for the involuntary six month commitment, which was ordered last week. The good news is she won’t be sent off across the state to one of the state institutions. She’ll get to stay where she is, close to home.

    And there’s even more good news. My father found a way to pay for her care: Medicaid. It seems that there is a way to get long term care for your spouse. You just have to get a lawyer, and let him or her get creative with your assets.

    But isn’t that really the American dream, to have the means to have your own attorney on retainer?

  • BBC NEWS | US lawmakers’ plane evades shots

    BBC NEWS | Middle East | US lawmakers’ plane evades shots

    Three U.S. Senators were taking off at Baghdad.

    The lawmakers said their plane, a C-130 Hercules, had to avoid three rocket-propelled grenades over the course of several minutes.

    After taking evasive action, they safely completed their journey to Amman in Jordan.

    “It was a scary moment,” said Republican Senator Mel Martinez.

    I wonder if they think the surge is working.

  • Universal health care and democracy

    From the book Sick, by Jonathan Cohn:

    To its critics on the political right, universal health care is an imposition on liberty that weakens individual initiative. But this is the classic bait-and-switch of modern conservatism – to make us forget that in a democracy, the government is merely an expression of our will and resources as a community. Universal health care is really about finding collective strength in our individual vulnerabilities – about helping a family member, a neighbor, or a fellow citizen because, next time, any one of us could be the person who needs help. It isn’t about them. It is about us.