|
Topic Techno
Your responses are encouraged and appreciated - What is your opinion? Reply here: [email protected] Thanks, Jim.
If we ever intend to rid the world of racism, and only the most ignorant among us could fail to recognize the virtues of this goal, we first must stop celebrating the ways in which we are different and begin to focus on the things that make us the same. How can you expect to build a "color blind" society when everyone seems to be clamoring to be recognized as an ethnic group and are, therefore, entitled to a plethora of special considerations to compensate them for their ethnicity.Most of us live our lives quietly, trying to be good people and good neighbors. I don't for one minute think that any of the myriad groups shouting at the top of their lungs for equality really want equality. They want an edge on everyone else, a special set of rules just for themselves. They aren't likely to get that by admitting that we are more the same than we are different. That our lot in life depends more on our own effort and determination than anything else. That the first step to failure is to find someone to blame that failure on.
We should not be celebrating days, events, marches, etc. that divide us into separate groups. We should be marching, celebrating, doing all these things as one group. Not until we stop placing such significance on our differences can we expect others to stop relating to us based on those differences.
Given these facts, it seems it may take much longer to erase racism than we might have thought. Those who are the racists and those who are the victims of racism are two sides of the same coin. Both are obsessed with the differences between us. Not until they begin to see the things that make us the same will there be a true beginning to the end of racism and intolerance.
Well, I might as well get this off my chest here and now. It's something that has been building up for the past eight months. Since my accident (see Gimp Central) my first hand experience with all phases of the medical profession has grown by leaps and bounds! From Orthopedic surgeons to dentists, from anesthesiologists to physical therapists, my opinion of the medical community as a whole is only a notch above that of lawyers and used car salesman.
There are exceptions to every rule of course. Not all lawyers are ambulance chasers and not all used car salesman are dishonest. But after five surgeries, months of physical therapy, in pools, on land, and at home it is has been my experience that the Hippocratic oath has, for all practical purposes, become just a quaint old fashioned notion.
Money, money, and more money is the oath of the nineties. It's not that the medical profession is incompetent, it's just that priorities have changed. The patient is not the focus of caring treatment but the goose who lays the golden eggs. Maybe some examples would better illustrate what I am trying to say.
A surgeon performs major surgery on a patient and then leaves him in the recovery room with no instructions to the nurses on duty. So the patient receives no pain medication and is in agony for more than an hour before the doctor can be located, orders passed down the line, and the patient helped. The operation was an apparent success, but the lack of concern for his patient after his "magic" was performed tells the story.
A physical therapist who is charging the insurance company for an hours session with a patient spends a total of fifteen minutes with him because he is working with two other patients at the same time. An hour has passed, but the insurance company is going to pay for three, and none of those involved has gotten what they bargained for, except the therapist of course.
An accident victim goes to a medical supply house for a neck brace only to discover that if she pays for it herself it will cost fifteen dollars. But she's in luck, it's covered by her insurance. But wait, that's not the end of the story. By the time the price is inflated to forty dollars (the insurance company can afford it, right?) and she pays her fifty-fifty copay it would cost her five dollars more to claim it on her insurance than to pay cash for it!
These are just a few typical examples that show the direction in which the medical profession is heading. And those at the top of the totem pole are the worst offenders. It would not be too great an exaggeration to conclude that the larger a doctors investment portfolio the lower his patients are on his priority list. It is time for those who go into medicine to rediscover the Hippocratic oath. It is time doctors realize that there job is not just in the operating room. It begins with the first office visit and doesn't end until the patient is healthy again!
Barely a week goes by these days that you don't receive a call from one charity or another. The problem is, either you have never heard of them, so they could be your next door neighbor soliciting funds to buy another motorbike which they ride, without a muffler, right outside your window, or you have heard of them but have no way of knowing if they are who they say they are. They won't send you any flyers or other proof, because this would be too expensive, and they don't send representatives door to door. So, there you are, it probably is your next door neighbor soliciting funds to buy more baseballs and bats (any fly ball which hits your house is a ground rule double.)
We all are a bit smarter these days. Hard copy, sixty minutes, and other news magazine shows have taught us that there are more rip-offs out there than you can shake a stick at. We have been repeatedly warned to demand proof that a charity is legitimate before we start handing over greenbacks.
There are charities who are consistently at the top of the list. If I contribute to a charity I would like some assurance that the money I send is going to be used to help people in trouble. I don't want to donate to some telemarketing firm's bank account. I also don't want to donate to the charities director, even if his new Malibu summer home has added a burden to his mortgage obligations. I want to pick the charity that uses the highest percentage of the money it receives to actually, and this may seem a radical concept, HELP THOSE IN NEED! Do you know the organization that year after year is rated, if not first on the list, then close to it. I didn't either! It may be old fashioned, but the Salvation Army has the best track record in the business. If you want to do the most good with the money you donate, you can't do better than the Salvation Army!!
A newer organization, and one which captured my imagination the first time I heard of it is The Make-A-Wish Foundation of America. This organization grants the wishes of children under the age of eighteen with life threatening illnesses. What a simple and beautiful idea! Can you think about the work they do and not have to brush a tear from your eye?
It all started with a 7-year-old boy from Phoenix, Arizona with leukemia who wanted to be a policeman. Officers from the Arizona Department of Public Safety saw to it that his wish was granted, from a custom made uniform to a helicopter ride. The rest is the best kind of history! Volunteers from around the world have made more than 40,000 wishes come true since the first chapter was founded in1980. All because of a seven year old boy with a dream and a bunch of cops who decided it was their "duty" to make a difference!
You can help this special cause by making a donation or volunteering your time. In my state, Michigan, Make-A-Wish is located at:
913 West Holmes Road
Suite 111
Lansing, Michigan
48910-4483
(517) 882-6500
Don't hesitate to make your life, and the life of a special child, more meaningful and fulfilled! Contact your local chapter (use the link above) to see what you can do to help!
I have had a desire to spout off about the internet, in particular personal pages on the net, since I decided to see if I had enough brains to learn HTML. That's when I started viewing homepages in earnest, mostly to peek at the "document source" to discover how they achieved one effect or another. I bought "HTML for dummies" but it really wasn't of much practical use. I guess I was too dumb even for a book for dummies!! Anyway, viewing the pages of others and looking at their HTML coding helped immensely more than any book.
It was during these voyeuristic ventures to the homes of others that I began to actually notice the content of the sites I visited. It seems to me there are basically three categories that most personal pages fall into. The first category I dismiss as just laziness and a lack of creativity. These are collections of unrelated links compiled for no particular reason other than to say "hey, these are my links to others peoples sites because I don't have anything to say and couldn't put two words together if I did, thank you very much." Ok, enough said, on to the second category.
These are the pages that no type A personality has ever seen in their entirety. No type A could wait around long enough for the graphics to load! I have a sneaking suspicion I might be one of these type A's. The animated gif's and blinking lights can be very pleasing to the eye, assuming your still awake, but don't give you any useful information. Another version of this are the pages produced, written, and directed by someone's cat or (and I really saw this one) the cow from "Twister"! A clever idea? Hmm, maybe. Just really, really, cute? Perhaps. But I found myself thinking, "why does this page exist? Just for the sake of existing, obviously." I'm sorry but your wasting my time. I didn't go to the trouble of coming here to see bad clip art of Old McDonald's cow, or to here a midi of an extended moooo. This may come as a shock, but I suspected all along that it was the cows who made that strange mooo sound! Oh well, life has it's little disappointments.
Finally, we come to the third category. Once in a while you stumble upon a site that takes you by surprise. It is well designed, aesthetically pleasing, and uses graphics sparingly. As you gradually wander around you learn about the people who created this place. Over here you are touched by a story about one of their children. In there is where you discover what is important in their lives. Around that corner you find their sense of humor is mischievous! Wherever you look you find some new insight into who created this page and why. These are the sites I relish finding. This is what personal webpages should be. . . . . . personal! I will keep searching for them and consider myself lucky on the rare occasions I uncover, and am touched in some way by, these glimpses into the hearts and minds of their authors!
As an ex-smoker I can't help but notice that some attention has been given lately to this subject! On one hand we have the tobacco industry. A prime example of the American dream. Get rich at any cost. . . . to anyone. You have to admire their dedication to the precept that tobacco is not addicting and for all practical purposes not harmful. And the Earth is flat, Picasso was just a glorified finger painter, and the rumor that president Clinton "never met a woman he didn't like" is nothing but political hanky panky, excuse my choice of words! At least they seem determined to stand by this viewpoint until hell freezes over or a deal is made, whichever comes first.
On the other hand we have the holy guardian of the people, the United States Government. Flags unfurled, banners waving, swelled to the bursting point with righteous indignation, bound and determined to make the worlds air safe for each and every voter!! We can discuss agent orange, the Gulf War disease, the White House as a Holiday Inn, and illegal campaign contributions at some more appropriate time. Preferably long after the scourge of cigarette smoking has been stamped out and the world again made safe for democracy! At least they seem determined to stand by this viewpoint until the last vote has been secured or a deal is made, whichever comes first.
To be completely honest I have always had my doubts about the issue of second hand smoke. Not that I think it's good for you to be sure, but I think the dangers have been exaggerated in the extreme to add fuel to the fire and to promote fear and distrust. Have you ever noticed the militant attitude towards smokers these days? It doesn't seem to occur to many to inquire if this person is a decent human being, a credit to his community, or the second coming . . . . the verdict is in . . . . off with the evil doers head! Don't misunderstand, smoking itself is foolish and dangerous and costs many thousands of lives, but I just don't believe second hand smoke is that serious a problem in most cases. I would rather follow a smoker than a city bus any day. Or the rush hour traffic in any fair sized city. Or the lovely emissions produced at O'Hare, or the industrial pollution that threatens the water supplies of millions. Or the radioactive half-life of the growing nuclear waste we produce. Or the voluminous amounts of refuse being trucked out of New York to smaller communities who don't seem to have their fair share of the stuff. No, smoking is dangerous to your health and should probably be classified as a drug, but let's keep our perspective and not let politicians eager for re-election or tobacco companies eager for profits lead us around by the noses. There are numerous more serious problems that are being pushed aside or ignored simply because cigarettes are an easier target for those who, for the most part, couldn't care less about our health in the first place.
[email protected]
|
 |
[email protected]
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|