A few links, since I can’t seem to properly blog at all anymore.
Scott Rosenberg’s book on the history of blogging, Say Everything, will be released shortly. A couple of chapters are already available online. I read the chapter on journalists vs. bloggers this morning and it was excellent. Among other things it’s one window into how the traditional print media establishment has basically screwed itself. Speaking of, given that the Post in its infinite wisdom has fired Dan Froomkin (and yet keeps paying those hacks Charles Krauthammer and George Will), we’re just about ready to cancel even the Sunday delivery and be done with it.
Marion Nestle is twittering and blogging. She points out that apparently at least one company whose product was found to be contaminated with salmonella simply repackaged it and sent it out again. What a disgrace. Obama needs to add fixing our food supply and food safety system to his long list of ToDos.
Speaking of Obama, at his press conference today he called out the shrieking whiners who are moaning about the idea of a public option in a reformed healthcare system undercutting their precious free market (which, by the way, has demonstrably FAILED):
Why would it drive private insurers out of business? If private insurers say that the marketplace provides the best quality health care, if they tell us that they’re offering a good deal, then why is it that the government — which they say can’t run anything — suddenly is going to drive them out of business? That’s not logical.
Now, I think that there’s going to be some healthy debates in Congress about the shape that this takes. I think there can be some legitimate concerns on the part of private insurers that if any public plan is simply being subsidized by taxpayers endlessly, that over time they can’t compete with the government just printing money.
So there are going to be some I think legitimate debates to be had about how this private plan takes shape. But just conceptually, the notion that all these insurance companies who say they’re giving consumers the best possible deal, that they can’t compete against a public plan as one option, with consumers making the decision what’s the best deal. That defies logic, which is why I think you’ve seen in the polling data overwhelming support for a public plan. All right?
If he does nothing but instill some real sanity into the healthcare system, he’ll have been a success in my book. How much does it grate that so many choices individuals might make – so much individual freedom – is completely hindered by either having no health insurance or having health insurance tied to their employer? I can think of half a dozen things my family might want to do in the next, say, 5 years that are simply not possible because of the way health coverage is structured. It’s a national disgrace.
I’m working on a post to give an update on TheLittleGuy and to commemorate the fact that we all seem to have survived his first year. In the meantime, feast upon his gorgeousness:
