THE AMERICAN HEALTHCARE CONUNDRUM

Healthcare in the United States isn't really as advertised. In that, I mean it's not really health care. We are a country consumed by quick fixes and low costs. Also, we don't seem to want to be told how to live our lives. One need look no further than the expanding waistlines of roughly one-third of this country to realize that we don't want to exercise, nor do we want to scale back our massive meal portions.

What's worse is that while most of the country is united in feeling that healthcare costs are out of control, and that greater than 60% of personal bankruptcies are directly caused by medical bills, we're quite divided on how to solve the problem.

For awhile, I have listening to the debate over the public option versus private health insurance. Insofar that I have been covered by almost every major American health insurance company (and been "forced out" of some of them), I feel a vested interest in the discussion.

As the U.S. Congress tackles the intricacies of the healthcare abyss, I intend on investigating just how challenging it would be to put together my own "group" to be insured by one of the major insurance carriers, and how costly it might be. If companies can purchase plans based upon their size, then wouldn't it follow that a group of companies, pooling their workforces, would be able to buy a better plan for less money? And if that is the case, would smaller groups be willing to jump into the pool with each other, or rather, would the leadership of each company be amenable?

I'm not exactly sure where to start this investigation, but I figure that laying out my various questions is a good place to start. Perhaps I'll ask the broker through which my company purchases health insurance.

PLEASE TO EXPLAIN

Living in Los Angeles, one cannot help but notice the preponderance of those gas-powered leaf blowers. They're everywhere. And if they're not being used for their intended purpose, then they're usually blowing garbage down the street and into someone else's yard. I call them "it's your problem now!" My eyes are watering just thinking about them.

A cursory glance on Google for "gas powered leaf blower emissions" yielded many disturbing facts. Whereas I merely regard them as a nuisance, they are actually horrible polluters. First, the emissions from just one of these creatures yields as much exhaust into the environment as 80 automobiles, driven 12,500 each year. Moreover, they contribute to the worsening of allergies, since their essentially just blowing everything into the air, and eventually up your nose, and they're a tremendous source of noise pollution to boot.

My question is thus; have we "advanced" our civilization so far that we are no longer able to use a broom and/or a rake? This article would dispute that claim. Further, why haven't more municipalities, in an effort to "green" their burgs, ban these wretched monsters?

I, for one, intend to find out by querying my own local city council. I'll let you know if anything actually develops. I encourage you to do the same.