Florida, the elder state

Hippocrates Lament

Rub-a-dub-Scrubs,
Paramedics in Gloves,
Our Health Care Systems in Taters,
Lawmakers forgetting what Matters,
With the grip of Big Pharma,
HMOs with Bad Karma,
Plain as the nose on my face, the Olfactors,
Our most pressing need is More Doctors.

Meeno Shel Silverstein



The movie that is moving us closer to a truth about Americas shortcoming.

from todays NY Times:

WASHINGTON — Obama administration officials, alarmed at doctor shortages, are looking for ways to increase the supply of physicians to meet the needs of an aging population and millions of uninsured people who would gain coverage under legislation championed by the president.

“We’re not producing enough primary care physicians,” Mr. Obama said at one forum. “The costs of medical education are so high that people feel that they’ve got to specialize.” New doctors typically owe more than $140,000 in loans when they graduate.



Old and Young Alike... they have special needs from us in betweens.

I have been taking care of my dear aging mummy who called me last week at 2 a.m. to say "I've fallen and I can't get up". By the time I got to her place, the Rescue guys had busted through her front door like tazmanian devils with the swift prerogative of those who save lives. They are angels with dirty faces. Dear mamasita is in a pickle with multiple fractures and now with 24 hour care... and hopped up on pain-killers. She will recover, but dear old-bones will never be the same. Thanks be to mary mother of god, that her mind is still ok and that her mouth works just fine... to the detriment of my auditory nerve.



Everyone knows the swamp, aka Florida, is a favored resting ground for the silver-years crowd. It is a nice place to ride off into the sunset. It may also be the epicenter (as with the housing market bubble crash) of the health care system collapse. If we don't find the medicine to fix it, to socialize the health care system, our very selves are in peril. Not surprising with the condition South FL is in today, a costly urban nesting ground, fewer people are retiring here.



When it comes to elder care, there is no shortage of loving hearts and able-bodies in need of jobs, work that is not only socially redeeming but would also heal our notions of humanity. Our collective bags of bones are at the mercy of the winds of change.

Meanwhile we shall laugh to keep from crying.



Lick in a Good Way.

Making light of a bad situation. Who doesn't love a sit-com. One of my stock questions for people in the very real world of health care providers is: Do you watch/like the TV show SCRUBS? Answer is an overwhelming, Yeah!

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Screw Guns

I am the proud owner of a screw-gun, a nail-gun, a heat-gun, a glue-gun , grease-gun and several other guns replete with enough ammo to get me through most jobs. I wield them with deft unapologetic. Each of my lovelies are kept safe and in fine working order, they never let me down. My guns are used to make stuff, to make a living not a killing. I have no use for guns that destroy with dumb lead slugs. I'll leave those toys for the folks who have nothing better to do than stockpile hunks of metal designed to hurt others and intended to comfort their most inner baseline psychosis, the thought that a mob is surely coming for them someday soon.




Charlton Heston is the Face, Bushman is the Brand.

If you want to understand the why's and WTFs , look no further than the NRA and the clowns/apes who uphold their principals "over their dead bodies". Look and listen more with alarming disbelief at the Eliminationist loud-mouths, not in the fringe, but currently on mainstream TV. Listen , if you have the stomach, to the crazies on Fox; Gloom Beck, Jerk O'Reilly, Rube Limbaugh, Same Hannity and what's her face Mann Coulter.
Their contrived hate-talk is intended to entertain and radicalize the American Right fringe.




There is an element in our culture that is whak. Michael Moore got it right in Bowling for Columbine. "...It is a film about the state of the Union, about the violent soul of America. Why do 11,000 people die in America each year at the hands of gun violence? The talking heads yelling from every TV camera blame everything from Satan to video games. But are we that much different from many other countries? What sets us apart? How have we become both the master and victim of such enormous amounts of violence?



The PopeMobile - Luxury Lunatic Edition.

Many our friends around the world look at America's love affair with violence and make the necessary arrangements when visiting our glorious developed nation. They know what we seem to refuse to accept, that in a civilized society there are safeguards for avoiding tyrannical tendencies and jack-boot thuggery. But then there is the little matter of stun-guns. Tasers don't kill people, people do.

When we visit them in the Old Country, they make the necessary arrangements also.



But this blog is about the swamp... and this post is also about Guns in Art.
Florida leads the nation in rampant irresponsible gun sales and there is an unnerving tilt by ordinary folk towards packing heat. The "law under my pillow" crowd is alive, well and trigger-happy. Then there are the rest of us who are feeling a bit edgy on the side-lines.
Ironically and without pity the artist as spectator will find endless material to express the profound impact that fire-arms have on our psychic collective. A painting of a gun is not a gun, it can not hurt you physically but it can and will at best affect you mentally. Are there really only two kinds of people; those with guns and those with shovels?







In a nutshell: Bad-ass equals Dumb-ass.

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