Sunday, December 27, 2009

Should We Support the Senate Health Care Bill?

So the Senate finally passed a health care reform bill the morning of Christmas Eve. While the president hailed it as a landmark event, for many others who voted for President Obama especially because of his support for health care reform it was a bittersweet moment. Those who were hoping for real reform in the form of a public option or even a Medicare buy-in for those 55-65 years of age were disappointed to see the proposed bill systematically taken apart by various senators such as Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson in exchange for their votes to reach the magic number of 60 to defeat the Republican filibuster that would have killed the bill.

Indeed, noted liberal commentator Keith Olbermann offered one of his
Special Comments which in effect said that the Senate bill was ruined to the point of being unsupportable. Before that former Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean said the same thing although he has softened his stance since then and said that he now reluctantly supports the bill.

There is a lot not to like about the Senate bill that was passed. For one thing, those of us without insurance coverage from employers would be required to buy health insurance from the private insurance industry under threat of a fine. Even worse, without any public insurance plan to compete, it is unclear what if any constraints there will be on premiums or if they will even be affordable to everybody. In an attempt to make the insurance affordable, federal subsidies will be available which in effect will amount to a massive transfer of tax dollars to the already wealthy insurance industry.

While the House which has a larger Democratic majority approved a bill that includes a public option and is much more reform-minded, the Senate cannot effectively pass anything with less than the 60 votes needed to avert a filibuster. And with the Republicans not offering a single vote in favor of the bill, the 58 Democrats and 2 Independents must all vote in unison or be defeated.

As NYT columnist Thomas Friedman has suggested, in the Senate we now have what can effectively called one party rule (the Democrats) in a two party system (with the Republicans serving as obstructionists) which makes passing needed legislation most difficult. Without any bipartisan support from the Republicans, the Democrats need absolutely all of their votes to prevail which means that tremendous compromises (which water down the bill) are needed to get the few stragglers such as Liebermann and Nelson to come on board.

The next step will be to reconcile the House and Senate bills to provide a single bill for both houses to vote on. While there are some who still think they can fight to reform the Senate bill into one more to their liking, the Senate stragglers out of the 60 who voted for the bill before have pledged that any changes would result in losing their support for the final bill.

So like it or not, we will most likely have to choose between the Senate version of the bill or no reform bill at all. For all of its warts, getting millions of people finally insured is better than no reform at all. Eliminating refusals to insure people for pre-existing conditions will be a major step forward for these individuals.

But how will this all work out? Will the insurance industry still be able to game the system to get the upper hand while too many people will still be unable to obtain affordable health insurance? The answer is probably yes. But if that happens, there is always the opportunity to pass legislation later on to try and correct those inequities. And it is true that Social Security and later Medicare first had gaps in their coverage that were fixed by later legislation.

While making these mid-stream corrections might well be difficult in this extremely polarized Congress, it’s a whole lot easier to work with an existing program later on than with no program at all which is what we have now. Especially considering that this is the best we can hope for with the Senate rules the way they are, the pragmatists amongst us who support health care reform have little real choice but to hold our noses and support this bill.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Why Did Tiger Stray?

The announcement by Tiger Woods that he is taking an indefinite leave from golf is the latest chapter of a story about a man so universally admired before he crashed and burned among the accusations and now his admitting of having affairs with perhaps many other women. But the question remains: How could this have happened? This was a man who truly had it all — a fabulous career, incredible wealth, a beautiful wife and two beautiful children.

Before going further, I need to stress that this is not an attempt to justify Tiger’s behavior but is instead to try and explain why it may have happened. Granted, we do not know about the nature of the relationship with his wife, Elin since Tiger has so zealously protected their privacy. But Tiger does have a lot in common with other rich and powerful people who have been part of sexual scandals. And that gives us some clues.

So how did Tiger get to the pinnacle of the golf world? Of course talent has a lot to do with it but that by itself is not enough. To reach the pinnacle of any field whether it’s golf, or politics, or any other endeavor requires an incredible amount of drive and ego. People like this are certainly not like you and me. These people have an insatiable appetite for success and new conquests.

For Tiger, it was not just about becoming a pro golfer. It was about becoming the greatest golfer of all time. Unlike even most other PGA Tour golfers, it wasn’t about trying to win a major tournament or two sometime during their careers. It was about surpassing the all-time majors record of Jack Nicklaus. And despite all of his wins, his hunger for victory remains undiminished. Despite his wealth which may now be close to a billion dollars, he is still a money generating machine with not only his golf winnings and overseas appearance fees but also through his many lucrative endorsements. So when is it all enough? For many such people, there is no such thing as enough.

Presumably, Tiger when he was one of the world’s most eligible bachelors did just fine on the dating scene. But for many of us, that is not enough so we seek something more lasting in the form of a permanent partner and perhaps some children which is what Tiger chose when he married Elin. And for most of us, that is enough. Yes we have to choose one partner but we get something in return in the form of a loving and stabile relationship.

But for those who have this almost superhuman drive, is settling for one partner always enough? Why not try to have what they see as the best of both worlds which is to have the stability of a wife and children and also prowl for women on the side? Here for most of us, common sense gets the better of our egos. Important moral issues aside, for most of us, we know that if we cheat we will likely get caught sooner or later and suffer the consequences.

Surely the famous should know that they are far more likely to get caught getting into trouble in this age when a famous face can now be caught even on a cell phone camera. This is what happened to Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps when he inhaled from a marijuana bong at a party. And then there is the inevitable trail of E-mails, cell phone records along with text and voice messages to satisfy the hunger of the 24/7 news operations and gossip tabloids.

Making it even worse is that a wealthy public figure who engages in sexual escapades is especially vulnerable to blackmail or extortion threats as David Letterman found out. Anybody with a normal ego would know their limitations. But for those with such powerful egos, they can somehow assure themselves that even though most others sooner or later get caught, it won’t happen to them.

But no matter how much a man like Tiger wishes to stray, he can’t do it without willing accomplices. While there is understandable outrage at Tiger’s behavior, there appears to be considerably less outrage at the endless parade of women who are proudly boasting to the world about their alleged affairs with a man they most certainly knew was married.

Interestingly enough, instead of a married man being a turn-off for many women, a NYT blog by John Tierney,
Do Single Women Seek Attached Men? offers evidence to the contrary.

Now there’s experimental evidence that single women are particularly drawn to other people’s partners, according to a report in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology by two social psychologists, Melissa Burkley and Jessica Parker of Oklahoma State University.

Noting that single women often complain that “all the good men are taken,” the psychologists wondered if “this perception is really based on the fact that taken men are perceived as good.”
But more to the point…

To the men in the experiment, and to the women who were already in relationships, it didn’t make a significant difference whether their match was single or attached. But single women showed a distinct preference for mate poaching. When the man was described as unattached, 59 percent of the single women were interested in pursuing him. When that same man was described as being in a committed relationship, 90 percent were interested.

Again, this is not meant to justify Tiger’s behavior. But if true, this all goes a long way towards explaining how it could happen.

So now that Tiger has been caught, he now knows that he has to make a choice between philandering and keeping his marriage intact (assuming Elin doesn’t leave him). While leaving golf for a while to sort out their relationship may well be the best thing for them, Tiger’s insatiable drive to be the best golfer ever will never go away. Hopefully, Elin realizes this and won’t make it a choice between her and golf for too long.