Healthcare in the United States

We have pointed out on here many of the reasons the US health care system is distorted, monopolistic, and inefficient. Obviously there are many things wrong that we did not address. We largely avoided discussing the demand side of the equation, including brokerage services like insurance. From what we have seen, those demand side elements are all that was tweaked in the latest legislation. Thus there remains the entire other side of the equation needing legislative redress.

We are most happy for the moment though that a passage of this bill will finally mean people will stop talking about "Health Care". The protraction of the issue in the public forum with little to no substantive progress has been excruciating. Let us celebrate the end to the collective insanity.

Google Reader Part Deux

In the past few months, I have come to use Google Reader as a source for 95% of my news. Even high frequency sites I have come to accept on the reader as I have better learned to skim the headlines and not read every posting or article. There is now some fracturing of the RSS domain in which some sites give you all the content via the feed so you need not leave the Reader interface, whilst others, usually commercial news outlets, give just a snippet and force you to visit their page to view the entire article. They then can bombard you with adverts, assuming one lacks the appropriate Firefox plugins.

Unfortunately Google Reader can be so useful that it becomes somewhat addicting and time consuming. The more feeds to which one subscribes, the more one feels compelled to read. Technologies are available to distil and repackage customised information from feeds.

Besides the aforementioned sharing ability of the Reader, the Reader finally received a Search box recently which greatly enhances its utility. My shared feed is of course available. I would point to this as the cause of my decline in postings. Many of the things I wish to share with the world speak for themselves in these articles.

Today, on the Companion Page, I have exported and published my current list of RSS feeds. You can import this file directly into your own Reader Account. (More Podcasts to come)

Happy Reading.

Charlie Rose

Charlie Rose is probably the best Interviewer I know. His interview technique is calm, respectful, engaging, and empathetic set in a minimalist black set with an unparalleled guest list. The programming used to be pay-only Google Video (besides being broadcast on PBS). Thankfully, that arrangement has terminated. It now seems his content is available freely and rightly so. Valuable video feed.

NASA

Thanks to one of Bush's brilliant ideas, NASA's budget is now mostly wasted in M2M (the human Mission to Mars) and the rest on the shuttle and ISS. A recent NPR interview put the orginisation further in question. Michael Griffin, director of NASA, doubted whether we would not all be better off under global warming and therefore should not prioritise its abatement.

With regards to the manned Space programme, NASA has recently experienced an astronaut bizarre love triangle and now allegations of drunken flight and systems sabotage. If NASA is to exist, which I believe it no longer should, its beneficial role should be to fund Earth Science, Astronomy, Aerospace Engineering, and general technology research in the public interest.

The Mars Rover and the Galileo and Cassini missions are examples of the incredible benefits that can come from a serious scientifically driven Space agency. The scientific value for those programmes has vastly exceeded the costs because they had the right idea: robotic exploration of outer space. Humans were not designed to live in space and so far the cost of such adventures is no were close to the benefits. Let human space exploration take place commercially as Richard Branson and Burt Rutan are demonstrating. Let scientists do their jobs correctly, and stop distorting their mission and their budgets with a child's fantasy. If children want to go into space, let them finance it themselves.

WTF CNN?

Following up my rant about television news, I find CNN a worthless platform for infotainment. With so much trouble in the World they will not report, I find their assertion of being a news organisation offensive. It is not even funny, typically relying upon shock, fear, and anger as its hook to sell adverts. I question Google's default link to CNN on their personalised page. If infotainment is what you seek, at least watch Colbert or read the Onion before you turn on CNN. WTF CNN seems like a great blog elucidating the absurdity of CNN and is at least distilled comedic infotainment. Video of Jon Stewart's legendary appearance on CNN's Crossfire.

Thanks to Meredith for the link.