Some thoughts from Bob Dylan about living in fear.

While traveling last week, I started reading Bob Dylan's Chronicles: Volume One. In the early chapters, he weaves accounts of his early days in NYC and recollections from his childhood. His words were particularly poignant in one excerpt, where he recalls Cold War era grade school air-raid drills:

"It seemed peculiar. Living under a cloud of fear like this robs a child of his spirit. It's one thing to be afraid when someone's holding a shotgun on you, but it's another thing to be afraid of something that's just not quite real. There were lots of folks around who took this threat seriously, though, and it rubbed off on you. It was easy to become a victim of their strange fantasy. I had the same teachers in school that my mother did. They were young in her time and elderly in mine. In American history class, we were taught that commies couldn't destroy America with guns or bombs alone, that they would have to destroy the Constitution - the document that this country was founded upon. It didn't make any difference, though. When the drill sirens went off, you had to lay under your desk face down, not a muscle quivering and not make any noise."

Newsweek's "The Case for Killing Granny"

Last week's issue of Newsweek magazine had several very interesting and informative articles about health care issues. As I was traveling for the last ten days, and not writing, I had a chance to do some reading. I thought the articles in that issue provided some insight and statistics that seem to have been overlooked in the popular rhetoric.

The front page feature, "The Case for Killing Granny," discussed aspects of end-of-life care. Get past the controversial title - the article itself is not particularly radical. The gist of the piece is that, as a culture, we fear death instead of embracing it as a natural part of the life cycle. That perspective has a dramatic effect on the steps some people choose to take to fight it. Compounding the issue is the fact that death is not something people want to discuss, particularly their own; thus, those close to death are generally ignorant of what the process will be like. As the Newsweek piece points out, this leads to one-third of annual Medicare expenditures going to chronically ill persons.

Go ahead and call me a cold-hearted bastard, but I do believe that with a change in perspective and some real discussion about what we can expect near the end of our days here on earth, we can not only solve some of the financial issues plaguing the U.S. health care system, but we can also bring some comfort and understanding to the issue of dying. As a person who, over the past year, has been face-to-face with mortality, I can tell you that there will never be a cure for death. No matter how far or fast we run, it will catch us all in time. Why not spend those sunset days of our lives enjoying what we can because we have knowledge and we have planned for what is to come?

See other readers' reactions to the article as well.

Newsweek also ran a piece last week comparing health care systems in other western nations - "No Country for Sick Men." I do not have quite the passionate reaction to this article, but I did find it very interesting. I will point out a theme to look for: challenging the idea that the quantity of health care available in the U.S. means that Americans receive the best quality health care. Particularly for the price. Newsweek claims that in a few years, twenty percent of the U.S. GDP will be spent on health care. One-fifth of the money paid for goods and services in the U.S. will be for health care expenses. Think about what that does to discretionary spending, particularly in the middle class. How will we ever make an economic recovery?

Read the articles.

Keep an Eye On...

"Bennett and Romanoff: Two of a Kind"

Whichever party line you vote along, keep an eye on the potential for a Democratic primary for the senate seat vacated by now Interior Sec. Ken Salazar. The primary will not resolve the question of who should have received Gov. Ritter's original appointment to the seat. It could, however, have a significant impact on the ultimate outcome of the 2010 election. Aside from the potential division among Colorado Democrats, a primary could give the GOP challenger plenty of fodder for his/her attack ads during the election season. The primary could also force the candidates to move either left or right of their traditional left-center stances and, as Haley points out, force Sen. Bennett to clarify his positions on controversial legislation like the Employee Free Choice Act, a bill he has yet to take a firm stance on.