The effect of TennCare cuts hits home

Thank you Dana for posting a link to this article on Nashville is Talking. It’s a story about people struggling with their health in Lawrence County, following the TennCare cuts. It made me so sad. It’s so different from what happens here in the UK.

It also made me sad, because Lawrence County is where I went to high school (I’m a triple legacy of Law-Co-Hi and UT) My mom and quite a few of my kin live in Lawrenceburg, the county seat.

Before the cuts were made, VolMom attended a lecture where a local doctor told a local audience that TennCare would kill some number of Lawrence Countians each month. I can’t remember what the number was – but it was staggering. Meet a few of those who will die and whose family members have died in that Nashville Scene article.

In the UK, we have socialised healthcare and it’s not a dirty word. Poor people, small business owners, fledgling entrepreneurs, people with chronic conditions and fatal illnesses don’t have to worry about being uninsurable or not being able to afford insurance. We are all covered. Rich people, healthy people, people who want a bit more of a cadillac service can pay to go private. And they are still covered by the National Health Service, too, when they need it.

Yes, it has its problems, particularly in London. A lot of people have their horror stories, and I do too. But at least it’s there. People don’t kill themselves because they think they’re going to get cut off insurance. And I want to stress that there are much better models of universal health care coverage than that of the UK.

I understand that there are all kind of fiscal constraints and that there were management problems with TennCare. But a caring society doesn’t treat people the way these people are being treated.

UPDATE: and now I am a “liar”

He knew he had it comin’

In a letter to the editor of the Tennessean on the 27th of November:

I hear that freedom of speech is an issue. Well, I feel if freedom of
speech is killing our children at the rate that is reported, someone needs to
get to the root of the problem, and I am telling you what that problem is.

In yesterday’s Tennesseean, Mark Forrester has a letter to the editor in response.

In some kind of quasi-defence of rap music, he writes:

Years ago, one of our most beloved country music icons, Johnny Cash, sang
with a snarl in his deep, baritone voice, “I shot a man in Reno just to watch
him die.” To have scorned the Man in Black because he pointed out the darkness
of the human condition would have been a ridiculous denial of the pathos his art
so ably conveyed.

C’mon, man, don’t go after the Man in Black

I first saw Cash lyrics used for this purpose, though in a far less balanced way, in Michael Moore’s book Stupid White Men. Moore selected a few of the fluffier lines from rap music to show how “positive” it could be – and then went on to lambaste Johnny for singing “I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die.” VolBro had bought the book in Florentine bookshop and spluttered and ranted and read the section aloud to me in our Italian hotel room (without a view) so I could splutter and rant, too. He wanted to pitch out the book there and then, but it was the only one he had in English.

As for any work of art, literature, song, etc. You can’t look at a single line to determine the meaning of the piece. Yes, the character in Folsom Prison Blues is sorry example of humanity, but he expresses regret, if not remorse, in the lines:

When I was just a baby, my mama told me, “Son,
Always be a good boy; don’t ever play with guns.”
But I shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die.
When I hear that whistle blowin’ I hang my head and cry.

Followed in the next verse by:

I know I had it comin, I know I can’t be free

Within the context, you know that the character is a bad man, not someone whose actions are to be emulated.

I don’t listen to rap music if I can help it, and there may well be examples of songs which both describe and condemn violence. However, it’s my impression that much of it glorifies and condones violence, criminal activity and promiscuity. I would never suggest that these works be censored or outlawed, but I can’t see anything wrong with avoiding them and encouraging others to do the same.

And if you do want to defend that stuff, for goodness sake, don’t go after Johnny in the process.

Go Vols?

VOLuminous has posted Phil Fulmer’s letter to Tennessee season ticket holders.

I am speechless, or whatever the written equivalent may be.

good speech and a new coat

The presentation today went pretty well, though when I sneaked a peek at the evaluation sheet filled out by my neighbour, I thought she was a little stingy with the points.

I went shopping afterwards and found a delightful overcoat – and two pairs of orange gloves. Unfortunatey, the beautiful gloves at Liberty have spoiled me – they weren’t quite right (one was a Texas orange and the other was medium quality suede) and I bought neither pair.

After I came home, I gave made myself a little drink (Jack and Ginger Beer – good), but I think I made it a little strong, so don’t expect any insightful blogging today.

Though please do welcome Expat Teacher – to my American Expats in London blogroll.

Granddad blogging: Loot

Last week my grandfather managed to get off the front and become a cook in the army. This week he finds a train and gets some booty.

You asked me how I came to have this German silverware that I have. When the war was drawing to an end the Germans were abandoning trains, aeroplanes, buses, cars and tanks and everything else. And I didn’t have any idea why then, but the simple fact was that they were running out of oil. Their sources of oil had all been cut off. The fields that were in Romania and Bulgaria had been bombed. They couldn’t any more from Russia. Their oil fields, limited that they were had been bombed. They didn’t have any tankers that could bring oil into ‘em and they had plenty of tanks and aeroplanes and trains and that sorta stuff but they were all parked and camoflaged.

I remember walking down the autobahn. And I had never seen an autobahn, we call them Interstates here, and there were aeroplanes parked on the right and left and camoflaged. All up and down the autobahn. They used the autobahns for airstrips for the planes to take off and land on. And they were good, new-looking planes sitting there. I knew we hadn’t been strafed or shot at by planes in a long time, and I didn’t understand why. And I didn’t understand why the tanks weren’t running or anything else.

And somewhere between Munich and Nuremberg, I don’t remember where, I probably have it written down somewhere, but I’ve forgotten, we came upon a great long train. It was sittin’ on a track in some woods, and it was covered up with pine trees and everything else. Camoflaged so it couldn’t be seen at all, and when we came up on it we began poking around in it and decided it wasn’t booby-trapped, so we really began poking around then. I was in the cooking end of the outfit at that time, so I was always interested in finding any food that we possibly could. And rattled around in the dining cars and kitchen all along this train. And there were sets of silver and china and crystal, of real fine stuff, I thought. And it was sterling silver, and it was good china and it was real good crystal. And people were lootin’ it pretty fast.

And we could loot it because… Looting’s the wrong word, confiscating it. We could confiscate it because it had DR on it. Deustche Reich. And it had a swastika on it, and it had the German eagle on it, so it was eligible to be taken if we wanted it. And I took a set of silver. Everything that I could get. Knives and forks and spoons and serving spoons and serving pieces and this, that and the other. A whole lot of it.

I had in mind when I took it that I was gonna send it home. And I got it all and wrapped it up the best I could and put it in a tow sack, and took the tow sack or croker sack some people would call it and throwed it in the back of a trailer that was hooked on to a jeep. And the reason I used this trailer is because it was where I carried the crudest of field kitchen stuff that we used to cook for the people that were in this part of battalion headquarters. And I went to one of the officers and asked him if we would sign to let me send this home, because you couldn’t send German contraband home unless it had an officer’s signature on it. And he said, yeah he would sign for it and let me send it home, but he’d have to have all the teaspoons. He wanted them. I gave 12 I believe, I kept a few, but I kept all the rest of it, and I wrapped it up in sacks and got me some boxes and tied strings and paper stuff around it got him to stamp his OK on it and shipped it to [my wife]. And that’s the story of that.

Note: This silverware was used at big gatherings where he and my grandmother didn’t have enough sterling to go around. So often we ate Christmas Eve or Thanksgiving Dinner off Nazi silver. The silver is very good quality, but by this time, the German steelmaking capacity was decreased and that steel that there was, I presume was going to the war effort – so the blades of the knives which were stainless steel have not held up over 50 years of use.

This set of silver is now mine, but my brother and I had a little “dispute” over this. He finally agreed that I could have them so long as I never took them out of the country (for use or donation). One spoon was given to my mother-in-law (by my grandfather) so that’s now in Europe. The rest will stay in America.

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Technorati tags: oral history, WWII, history

Performance anxiety

Tomorrow I’m speaking at a conference. It was supposed to be one of those big conferences with the giant lecture room and the podium and the big screen powerpoint and all.

Friday, I spoke to the conference organisers and found out that there are only seventeen delegates. Great, me and my copresenter D prepared a speech for 100. D couldn’t quite believe it and asked if maybe it was 70. Well, I was pretty sure I heard her right, but I phoned back to check today – and it wasn’t 17 – no it’s eighteen. One more person signed up.

Ok. It’s tempting not to give my all, but these people paid nearly 400 pounds (about 700 bucks) to hear us speak- us and the other people on the panel.

And frankly I want them to walk away saying hey, this conference sucked but Vol Abroad was good. I learned something.

So even though it’s only 18 people, I’m still nervous, and I’m still going to be up late prepping for something lively and informative for a small group.
–________________________________________________________________________

Black Saturday

Apparently, the no-shopping day in Europe was yesterday. Oops, I should have read Mel’s post on Black Friday a little more closely. I went shopping yesterday in the heaving morass that is Oxford Street/Regent Street in direct contravention of European anti-consumerism.

My in-laws were in town and they actually like that sort of thing. I understand that when you live in the provinces it can be exciting to shop in the glam hustle and bustle of London, but they live in Edinburgh. They have a Harvey Nick’s there for goodness sake, I can’t see why in the world they’d want to go to the one here.

We met them for lunch in a cafe not far from the Vol-in-Law’s work. The food was passable, but the toilets were amazing. There were nearly life sized murals of nekkid men painted all over. And these paintings were…anatomically correct as well, no well placed drapery in sight. They were men of all color and different amounts of chest hair and circumcision status. In my stall, the tackle was right at eye level and gently lolling onto his thigh. I wanted to warn the Vol-in-Law’s slightly doddery aunt as she made her way to the loo, but I just couldn’t quite find the right phraseology.

Afterwards, we went our separate ways as I wanted to go to Liberty. I don’t know why, as I can’t afford a damn thing in there. I tried on a smashing hat made of fluffy lamb – but it was actually strikingly similar to the two I already have and it was £150 – which is nearly $300 in real money. (The Cabela’s hat is clearly a better deal) I also saw a beatiful pair of leather gloves in Tennessee orange. They felt like butter, they were so soft, I must presume they were made out of Romanian baby orphan…cows. They were lined with cashmere and fit me like, well, a glove. I wore them for a little bit and they made my existing coat look like the shabby drab second hand overcoat that it is. I really wanted them, but they were £70 (c. $130). I set them down.

We then went on to Dickens and Jones, which is shutting down after Christmas, so I was hoping for some clearance bargains. By this point I realised that I needed an overcoat worthy of those gloves should I break down and go back for them. I tried on a lovely black coat, but even in the process of trying it on I managed to transfer some of Other Cat’s hair to it and that wasn’t so attractive. We then found a clearance area for bed linen. I love stuff like that, so I spent about a half an hour with the Vol-in-Law rummaging through those. (Big points to the ViL for putting up with this.) We got some amazing bargains. We needed a new duvet cover, but we got two.

One was super cheap – 100% combed Egyptian cotton, for £15. The other was slightly more expensive (at £40) but it was Marimekko – and I do love my Finnish design houses. It was this pattern, Unikko designed by Maija Isola. Lovely. Perhaps not my favorite Marimekko pattern, but lovely nonetheless.

I’m so excited, I want to strip the bed immediately, but the ViL said he would prefer not to, and it’s really a two person job.

…and a side of okra

Big Stupid Tommy loves sweet potato. Yumm. He loves it so much that he says – that forced to choose a last meal, sweet potato would be on the menu.

I love the “What would you have for your last meal?” game. It’s kind of like “What would you do if you won a million bucks?” game, but low rent.

I do like some sweet potato and usually serve it instead of white potato as an accompanient to sausage or pork loin. But I’m not sure it would be on my last meal list. The rules of the “last meal game” are: meat and three, drink and dessert. That’s it.

So if the warden came to me, and said “Vol, it’s time to die. What would like for your last meal?” I guess it would be:

• catfish
• fried okra
• hushpuppies
• slaw (but the vinegar kind, not the mayonnaise kind)
• iced tea
• and lemon ice box pie for dessert.

Then if I were granted a twenty-four hour stay, my second last meal would be:

• stewed okra and tomatos
• cheesy grits casserole (that’s polenta for you high-dollar readers)
• sausage
• grilled sweet potato
• beer
• and chocolate chess pie for dessert

And of course, if it were dawn execution, then my last breakfast would be:

• sausage biscuit
• gravy
• grits
• sliced tomato (but not just one measly, gray slice)
• coffee
• and a second sausage biscuit for dessert

What kind of gravy goes with crow?

Well… Go Vols. Hurray, we won a game. I’ve got that same kind of numb feeling that I had following the win over Memphis. To be honest, I’m kind of ambivalent. Perhaps if we had lost that would have meant a real shake-up (though we appear to be sloughing off assistant coaches like so much dead skin).

I’ve just come back from the expat Thanksgiving dinner which was organised through various alumni associations and of course football was discussed. Thankfully I didn’t have to eat too much crow along with my turkey. P – a native Brit, but die-hard Texas fan (he hates teams that wear red even more than I do) had a few little jibes, but did ask rather solicitously about my brother’s mental state. I had to say that VolBro wasn’t too pleased with the current state of Volunteer football. A Vanderbilt graduate was supposed to come, but didn’t make it. He had warned me in advance that I would be ribbed mercilessly.

I don’t need a Vandy grad to torment me about the loss. I can feel it. Besides, the Vol-in-Law seems to be developing some sort of weird affinity for Vanderbilt and has been tossing the pro-Vandy bon mots around like Halloween candy. He went to Oxford himself, so maybe he sees them as some sort of fellow high-tone school. (I don’t even think he’s aware that Ole Miss is in Oxford.)

Hopefully, finally, we can put this season behind us and go move on to victory in 2006. One VOLuminous reader has a list of why Tennessee football bites. It’s a dreadful catalogue of sins of ommission, commission and failed mission, but the variability of Tennessee orange has to be my favorite:

Pick a shade of orange and mandate its consistent usein your licensing agreements. There is no reason why those Orange Nation student t-shirts should be closer to Texas or Virginia orange than to Tennessee orange. Gather all non-compliant clothing and donate it to the poor in third world.

Cop killers

Last week a police officer was shot dead and her partner injured when they responded to an armed robbery in Bradford in the North of England. Three young men were seen running away from the slaying and this morning it has been announced that one suspect was arrested.

Sharon Beshenivsky’s shooting death and the wounding of Teresa Milburn has prompted a number of debates. Some of these debates are open and predictable. Should police be armed? Should the Bobby on the Beat carry? The UK is one of two nations in the world where the police are not regularly armed.

Gun crime has been increasing in the UK. And though it is still more likely that criminals will not be armed than that they will, there are certainly increasing calls for police to be armed. The police themselves, and specifically the body that represents the most senior police the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) are against it. But my sense is that most ordinary citizens grudgingly accept that police should be armed. However, there are some voices strongly against, and given that UK police seem to have a tendency to shoot the wrong guy, I can understand why this is.

My fellow American London blogger, Sarai of Anglofille, wrote:

This incident has renewed the debate over whether police should carry guns. From an American perspective,it’s rather astonishing that 90 percent of the British police force is unarmed. To me, police and guns are synonymous. I can’t imagine the police being able to do their job without having the threat of deadly force at their disposal. But then I guess that’s just the blood-thirsty Yank in me. A survey of the UK police force three years ago revealed that 80 percent of them do not want to be routinely armed.

And I would echo that, except for the bloodthirsty Yank bit, as I would never call myself a Yank.

There’s also a less open debate about immigration policy. At least two of the suspects in Sharon Beshenivsky shooting are Somali. Near my office the other day, I saw a hand drawn sign pasted on the outside of a bagel shop which said:

Somalians fired the gun, but Blair loaded the bullets. How many more people will die as a result of Blair’s misguided immigration policies?

This has not been a part of the mainstream coverage, but clearly there are some rumblings of discontent.

Finally, there’s a debate which doesn’t seem to be occurring at all. And that’s one about Police recruitment and operational policies.

Sharon Beshenivsky was 37 years old and had only been working as a police officer for less than six months, before that she had been working as a childminder. I don’t want to suggest that people in their 30s can’t join the police, but it’s probably not a good idea unless they have just left a career in the military or had been spending the last decade or so in a physically demanding job. I have to wonder why Sharon Beshenivsky was recruited as beat police officers. Her partner, Teresa Milburn who is of a similar age and a former machinist had only been a police officer for around a year.

I also have to wonder why it’s the operational policy of the West Yorkshire police to respond to robberies with two unarmed, relatively inexperienced police officers.

Tags:Politics, Crime, Police