Wow! This is a big deal for Mexcio I believe. Now if only the US can follow suit and do the same thing. We could start to take some of the power away from the Mexican Cartels.
Mexico Legalizes Drug Possession
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: August 21, 2009
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico enacted a controversial law on Thursday decriminalizing possession of small amounts of marijuana, cocaine, heroin and other drugs while encouraging government-financed treatment for drug dependency free of charge.
The law sets out maximum “personal use” amounts for drugs, also including LSD and methamphetamine. People detained with those quantities will no longer face criminal prosecution; the law goes into effect on Friday.
Anyone caught with drug amounts under the personal-use limit will be encouraged to seek treatment, and for those caught a third time treatment is mandatory — although no penalties for noncompliance are specified.
Mexican authorities said the change only recognized the longstanding practice here of not prosecuting people caught with small amounts of drugs.
The maximum amount of marijuana considered to be for “personal use” under the new law is 5 grams — the equivalent of about four marijuana cigarettes. Other limits are half a gram of cocaine, 50 milligrams of heroin, 40 milligrams for methamphetamine and 0.015 milligrams of LSD.
President Felipe Calderón waited months before approving the law.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Monday, August 17, 2009
Dignity associated with life
"I think we're all on the same page on this one. One of the main problems is that there is no respect for the common man in this country. They are not even granted the dignity of a dog on the street. This extends from the way they are treated by the police down to basic rights to exist such as food and healthcare. Who's is in charge? We the people or some oligarcy. I think we would see the cooperation of the average man in solving this nations problems much more if there was at least a little dignity associated with life." from Kevin in Tucson
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Obama on Why we need healthcare reform
Why We Need Health Care Reform
By BARACK OBAMA
Published: August 15, 2009
OUR nation is now engaged in a great debate about the future of health care in America. And over the past few weeks, much of the media attention has been focused on the loudest voices. What we haven’t heard are the voices of the millions upon millions of Americans who quietly struggle every day with a system that often works better for the health-insurance companies than it does for them.
Doug Mills/The New York Times
President Obama speaking at a town-hall-style meeting in Grand Junction, Colo., on Saturday.
These are people like Lori Hitchcock, whom I met in New Hampshire last week. Lori is currently self-employed and trying to start a business, but because she has hepatitis C, she cannot find an insurance company that will cover her. Another woman testified that an insurance company would not cover illnesses related to her internal organs because of an accident she had when she was 5 years old. A man lost his health coverage in the middle of chemotherapy because the insurance company discovered that he had gallstones, which he hadn’t known about when he applied for his policy. Because his treatment was delayed, he died.
I hear more and more stories like these every single day, and it is why we are acting so urgently to pass health-insurance reform this year. I don’t have to explain to the nearly 46 million Americans who don’t have health insurance how important this is. But it’s just as important for Americans who do have health insurance.
There are four main ways the reform we’re proposing will provide more stability and security to every American.
First, if you don’t have health insurance, you will have a choice of high-quality, affordable coverage for yourself and your family — coverage that will stay with you whether you move, change your job or lose your job.
Second, reform will finally bring skyrocketing health care costs under control, which will mean real savings for families, businesses and our government. We’ll cut hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and inefficiency in federal health programs like Medicare and Medicaid and in unwarranted subsidies to insurance companies that do nothing to improve care and everything to improve their profits.
Third, by making Medicare more efficient, we’ll be able to ensure that more tax dollars go directly to caring for seniors instead of enriching insurance companies. This will not only help provide today’s seniors with the benefits they’ve been promised; it will also ensure the long-term health of Medicare for tomorrow’s seniors. And our reforms will also reduce the amount our seniors pay for their prescription drugs.
Lastly, reform will provide every American with some basic consumer protections that will finally hold insurance companies accountable. A 2007 national survey actually shows that insurance companies discriminated against more than 12 million Americans in the previous three years because they had a pre-existing illness or condition. The companies either refused to cover the person, refused to cover a specific illness or condition or charged a higher premium.
We will put an end to these practices. Our reform will prohibit insurance companies from denying coverage because of your medical history. Nor will they be allowed to drop your coverage if you get sick. They will not be able to water down your coverage when you need it most. They will no longer be able to place some arbitrary cap on the amount of coverage you can receive in a given year or in a lifetime. And we will place a limit on how much you can be charged for out-of-pocket expenses. No one in America should go broke because they get sick.
Most important, we will require insurance companies to cover routine checkups, preventive care and screening tests like mammograms and colonoscopies. There’s no reason that we shouldn’t be catching diseases like breast cancer and prostate cancer on the front end. It makes sense, it saves lives and it can also save money.
This is what reform is about. If you don’t have health insurance, you will finally have quality, affordable options once we pass reform. If you have health insurance, we will make sure that no insurance company or government bureaucrat gets between you and the care you need. If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan. You will not be waiting in any lines. This is not about putting the government in charge of your health insurance. I don’t believe anyone should be in charge of your health care decisions but you and your doctor — not government bureaucrats, not insurance companies.
The long and vigorous debate about health care that’s been taking place over the past few months is a good thing. It’s what America’s all about.
But let’s make sure that we talk with one another, and not over one another. We are bound to disagree, but let’s disagree over issues that are real, and not wild misrepresentations that bear no resemblance to anything that anyone has actually proposed. This is a complicated and critical issue, and it deserves a serious debate.
Related
Times Topics: Health Care Reform
Readers' Comments
Share your thoughts.
* Post a Comment »
* Read All Comments (194) »
Despite what we’ve seen on television, I believe that serious debate is taking place at kitchen tables all across America. In the past few years, I’ve received countless letters and questions about health care. Some people are in favor of reform, and others have concerns. But almost everyone understands that something must be done. Almost everyone knows that we must start holding insurance companies accountable and give Americans a greater sense of stability and security when it comes to their health care.
I am confident that when all is said and done, we can forge the consensus we need to achieve this goal. We are already closer to achieving health-insurance reform than we have ever been. We have the American Nurses Association and the American Medical Association on board, because our nation’s nurses and doctors know firsthand how badly we need reform. We have broad agreement in Congress on about 80 percent of what we’re trying to do. And we have an agreement from the drug companies to make prescription drugs more affordable for seniors. The AARP supports this policy, and agrees with us that reform must happen this year.
In the coming weeks, the cynics and the naysayers will continue to exploit fear and concerns for political gain. But for all the scare tactics out there, what’s truly scary — truly risky — is the prospect of doing nothing. If we maintain the status quo, we will continue to see 14,000 Americans lose their health insurance every day. Premiums will continue to skyrocket. Our deficit will continue to grow. And insurance companies will continue to profit by discriminating against sick people.
That is not a future I want for my children, or for yours. And that is not a future I want for the United States of America.
In the end, this isn’t about politics. This is about people’s lives and livelihoods. This is about people’s businesses. This is about America’s future, and whether we will be able to look back years from now and say that this was the moment when we made the changes we needed, and gave our children a better life. I believe we can, and I believe we will.
By BARACK OBAMA
Published: August 15, 2009
OUR nation is now engaged in a great debate about the future of health care in America. And over the past few weeks, much of the media attention has been focused on the loudest voices. What we haven’t heard are the voices of the millions upon millions of Americans who quietly struggle every day with a system that often works better for the health-insurance companies than it does for them.
Doug Mills/The New York Times
President Obama speaking at a town-hall-style meeting in Grand Junction, Colo., on Saturday.
These are people like Lori Hitchcock, whom I met in New Hampshire last week. Lori is currently self-employed and trying to start a business, but because she has hepatitis C, she cannot find an insurance company that will cover her. Another woman testified that an insurance company would not cover illnesses related to her internal organs because of an accident she had when she was 5 years old. A man lost his health coverage in the middle of chemotherapy because the insurance company discovered that he had gallstones, which he hadn’t known about when he applied for his policy. Because his treatment was delayed, he died.
I hear more and more stories like these every single day, and it is why we are acting so urgently to pass health-insurance reform this year. I don’t have to explain to the nearly 46 million Americans who don’t have health insurance how important this is. But it’s just as important for Americans who do have health insurance.
There are four main ways the reform we’re proposing will provide more stability and security to every American.
First, if you don’t have health insurance, you will have a choice of high-quality, affordable coverage for yourself and your family — coverage that will stay with you whether you move, change your job or lose your job.
Second, reform will finally bring skyrocketing health care costs under control, which will mean real savings for families, businesses and our government. We’ll cut hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and inefficiency in federal health programs like Medicare and Medicaid and in unwarranted subsidies to insurance companies that do nothing to improve care and everything to improve their profits.
Third, by making Medicare more efficient, we’ll be able to ensure that more tax dollars go directly to caring for seniors instead of enriching insurance companies. This will not only help provide today’s seniors with the benefits they’ve been promised; it will also ensure the long-term health of Medicare for tomorrow’s seniors. And our reforms will also reduce the amount our seniors pay for their prescription drugs.
Lastly, reform will provide every American with some basic consumer protections that will finally hold insurance companies accountable. A 2007 national survey actually shows that insurance companies discriminated against more than 12 million Americans in the previous three years because they had a pre-existing illness or condition. The companies either refused to cover the person, refused to cover a specific illness or condition or charged a higher premium.
We will put an end to these practices. Our reform will prohibit insurance companies from denying coverage because of your medical history. Nor will they be allowed to drop your coverage if you get sick. They will not be able to water down your coverage when you need it most. They will no longer be able to place some arbitrary cap on the amount of coverage you can receive in a given year or in a lifetime. And we will place a limit on how much you can be charged for out-of-pocket expenses. No one in America should go broke because they get sick.
Most important, we will require insurance companies to cover routine checkups, preventive care and screening tests like mammograms and colonoscopies. There’s no reason that we shouldn’t be catching diseases like breast cancer and prostate cancer on the front end. It makes sense, it saves lives and it can also save money.
This is what reform is about. If you don’t have health insurance, you will finally have quality, affordable options once we pass reform. If you have health insurance, we will make sure that no insurance company or government bureaucrat gets between you and the care you need. If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan. You will not be waiting in any lines. This is not about putting the government in charge of your health insurance. I don’t believe anyone should be in charge of your health care decisions but you and your doctor — not government bureaucrats, not insurance companies.
The long and vigorous debate about health care that’s been taking place over the past few months is a good thing. It’s what America’s all about.
But let’s make sure that we talk with one another, and not over one another. We are bound to disagree, but let’s disagree over issues that are real, and not wild misrepresentations that bear no resemblance to anything that anyone has actually proposed. This is a complicated and critical issue, and it deserves a serious debate.
Related
Times Topics: Health Care Reform
Readers' Comments
Share your thoughts.
* Post a Comment »
* Read All Comments (194) »
Despite what we’ve seen on television, I believe that serious debate is taking place at kitchen tables all across America. In the past few years, I’ve received countless letters and questions about health care. Some people are in favor of reform, and others have concerns. But almost everyone understands that something must be done. Almost everyone knows that we must start holding insurance companies accountable and give Americans a greater sense of stability and security when it comes to their health care.
I am confident that when all is said and done, we can forge the consensus we need to achieve this goal. We are already closer to achieving health-insurance reform than we have ever been. We have the American Nurses Association and the American Medical Association on board, because our nation’s nurses and doctors know firsthand how badly we need reform. We have broad agreement in Congress on about 80 percent of what we’re trying to do. And we have an agreement from the drug companies to make prescription drugs more affordable for seniors. The AARP supports this policy, and agrees with us that reform must happen this year.
In the coming weeks, the cynics and the naysayers will continue to exploit fear and concerns for political gain. But for all the scare tactics out there, what’s truly scary — truly risky — is the prospect of doing nothing. If we maintain the status quo, we will continue to see 14,000 Americans lose their health insurance every day. Premiums will continue to skyrocket. Our deficit will continue to grow. And insurance companies will continue to profit by discriminating against sick people.
That is not a future I want for my children, or for yours. And that is not a future I want for the United States of America.
In the end, this isn’t about politics. This is about people’s lives and livelihoods. This is about people’s businesses. This is about America’s future, and whether we will be able to look back years from now and say that this was the moment when we made the changes we needed, and gave our children a better life. I believe we can, and I believe we will.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Public Healthcare vs Public Education
Did you hear about the recent Free Healthcare given at the LA Forum? Over 10,000 people showed up for free medical, dental, and vision care. It saddens me that an event like this gets so many people who are denied access to the US Healthcare system. So the guy who gets eyeglasses may now be able to work. The girl who gets dental treatment may now feel good enough to work. The women who got mammograms may be able to get early treatment for something that could get much worse if left undetected. Etc.
Why there is so much opposition to universal healthcare I don't know. But I would like to make a comparison here. Let's use Public education as an example here:
One argument I've heard is that which is free has no value. So then I guess that tells us what we need to know about public schools.
One argument is: "Like anything that is free, people will flock and get in line for any givaway. Every hypocondriac will be getting multiple, unnecessary treatments." Ok, so public education attracts all these poor kids from the ghetto. The all come to school and make it hard for the good non-ghetto kids to learn. They are so concerned with their own problems that they cannot concentrate or behave and so it affects all the "good kids" who want to learn.
Here's a comment I just read: "The picture of the free healthcare at the LA Forum is exactly what free healthcare looks like, long lines, piss smelling hall ways, just plain filthy....Thanks.. but NO THANKS!!!!!" - American --- so public education is similar with it's long lines, huge schools, piss smelling, vomit covered hallways, just plain filthy. Yep, that's right.
Here's another argument against free healthcare I read: "If I offered free cheese for a day, people would line up to get it. That would not indicate that there was a shortage of cheese or any kind of problem with the cheese industry. It would indicate that when you give something away for free (or for less than its value), people line up to get it." hmm? Public education goes even a step futher. Not only is the cheese (education) offered free. But it is "mandated" for all kids under the age of 16.
Well, you get my point here. We also have "socialized police and fire fighters". You know the poor take up so much of the policeman's time. If they had to pay for police service like they have to pay for healthcare then they wouldn't call the cops all the time and the cops would then have time to look after all us more affluent white people who can afford to pay for their services.
So I don't get how we can have socialized education and other public services, but healthcare gets people to draw the line against socialism. Nope, they don't want to pay for that.
My opinion is that healthcare should be a "right" and not a "priviledge". I like the idea of a single payer system. I think if people want to pay for better medical services they should be able to. But some kind of basic care is a "right" for all of us.
Here's an article published in a British Paper on this topic: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/the-brutal-truth-about-americarsquos-healthcare-1772580.html Be sure to look at some of the comments at the end of the article. Quite revealing.
Health to you all.
Why there is so much opposition to universal healthcare I don't know. But I would like to make a comparison here. Let's use Public education as an example here:
One argument I've heard is that which is free has no value. So then I guess that tells us what we need to know about public schools.
One argument is: "Like anything that is free, people will flock and get in line for any givaway. Every hypocondriac will be getting multiple, unnecessary treatments." Ok, so public education attracts all these poor kids from the ghetto. The all come to school and make it hard for the good non-ghetto kids to learn. They are so concerned with their own problems that they cannot concentrate or behave and so it affects all the "good kids" who want to learn.
Here's a comment I just read: "The picture of the free healthcare at the LA Forum is exactly what free healthcare looks like, long lines, piss smelling hall ways, just plain filthy....Thanks.. but NO THANKS!!!!!" - American --- so public education is similar with it's long lines, huge schools, piss smelling, vomit covered hallways, just plain filthy. Yep, that's right.
Here's another argument against free healthcare I read: "If I offered free cheese for a day, people would line up to get it. That would not indicate that there was a shortage of cheese or any kind of problem with the cheese industry. It would indicate that when you give something away for free (or for less than its value), people line up to get it." hmm? Public education goes even a step futher. Not only is the cheese (education) offered free. But it is "mandated" for all kids under the age of 16.
Well, you get my point here. We also have "socialized police and fire fighters". You know the poor take up so much of the policeman's time. If they had to pay for police service like they have to pay for healthcare then they wouldn't call the cops all the time and the cops would then have time to look after all us more affluent white people who can afford to pay for their services.
So I don't get how we can have socialized education and other public services, but healthcare gets people to draw the line against socialism. Nope, they don't want to pay for that.
My opinion is that healthcare should be a "right" and not a "priviledge". I like the idea of a single payer system. I think if people want to pay for better medical services they should be able to. But some kind of basic care is a "right" for all of us.
Here's an article published in a British Paper on this topic: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/the-brutal-truth-about-americarsquos-healthcare-1772580.html Be sure to look at some of the comments at the end of the article. Quite revealing.
Health to you all.
The brutal truth about America’s healthcare
An extraordinary report from Guy Adams in Los Angeles at the music arena that has been turned into a makeshift medical centre.
Saturday, 15 August 2009
The LA Forum in Inglewood, California, hosted dental and medical examinations, for thousands of people thanks to the charity Remote Area Medical.
GETTY IMAGES; AFP
The LA Forum in Inglewood, California, hosted dental and medical examinations, for thousands of people thanks to the charity Remote Area Medical.
They came in their thousands, queuing through the night to secure one of the coveted wristbands offering entry into a strange parallel universe where medical care is a free and basic right and not an expensive luxury. Some of these Americans had walked miles simply to have their blood pressure checked, some had slept in their cars in the hope of getting an eye-test or a mammogram, others had brought their children for immunisations that could end up saving their life.
In the week that Britain's National Health Service was held aloft by Republicans as an "evil and Orwellian" example of everything that is wrong with free healthcare, these extraordinary scenes in Inglewood, California yesterday provided a sobering reminder of exactly why President Barack Obama is trying to reform the US system.
The LA Forum, the arena that once hosted sell-out Madonna concerts, has been transformed – for eight days only – into a vast field hospital. In America, the offer of free healthcare is so rare, that news of the magical medical kingdom spread rapidly and long lines of prospective patients snaked around the venue for the chance of getting everyday treatments that many British people take for granted.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/the-brutal-truth-about-americarsquos-healthcare-1772580.html
Saturday, 15 August 2009
The LA Forum in Inglewood, California, hosted dental and medical examinations, for thousands of people thanks to the charity Remote Area Medical.
GETTY IMAGES; AFP
The LA Forum in Inglewood, California, hosted dental and medical examinations, for thousands of people thanks to the charity Remote Area Medical.
They came in their thousands, queuing through the night to secure one of the coveted wristbands offering entry into a strange parallel universe where medical care is a free and basic right and not an expensive luxury. Some of these Americans had walked miles simply to have their blood pressure checked, some had slept in their cars in the hope of getting an eye-test or a mammogram, others had brought their children for immunisations that could end up saving their life.
In the week that Britain's National Health Service was held aloft by Republicans as an "evil and Orwellian" example of everything that is wrong with free healthcare, these extraordinary scenes in Inglewood, California yesterday provided a sobering reminder of exactly why President Barack Obama is trying to reform the US system.
The LA Forum, the arena that once hosted sell-out Madonna concerts, has been transformed – for eight days only – into a vast field hospital. In America, the offer of free healthcare is so rare, that news of the magical medical kingdom spread rapidly and long lines of prospective patients snaked around the venue for the chance of getting everyday treatments that many British people take for granted.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/the-brutal-truth-about-americarsquos-healthcare-1772580.html
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