Tim Tebow CBS Super Bowl ad revisited

I had a commenter to my earlier post who pointed out that with $2.5 million, I too could have a Super Bowl ad.  He/she felt that I apparently disagreed with the content of the CBS Super Bowl ad concerning Tim Tebow.

Disagree or not, CBS has made it a practice to pick and choose what ads they show, and that’s okay.  They have the right to do so.  If I had two or three million, I might or might not get an ad run.

Anyway, yes, I am just another windbag with a blog exercising my free speech–and exercising it really more or less for free.  And yes, there’s no doubt about it:  $2.5 million can buy the right to a lot of free speech.

What if Tim Tebow were homeless?

I had a thought while watching all the CBS Superbowl anti-abortion ad hoopla.  What if instead of a high profile football player, the ad had referred to a homeless drug addict?

“My mother could have had an abortion, but instead she chose not to….”

Would CBS have aired that ad?

[Entry corrected:  originally read "NFL football player."]

Health care in America: U.S. loves the emergency room

Listen, folks.  We all pay for everyone’s health care.  This garbage about emergency rooms treating you if you’re not covered, as if they’re doing it for free, is nonsense and  inaccurate. 

The emergency room may treat you (especially if it’s a public one–tax dollars, you know–but may not if it’s private), but they will send you a bill and it will be for thousands of dollars.  Yes, you may be able to beg your way to some sort of relief.  But we all pay for that relief through our taxes and higher health care and insurance costs.

The emergency room is for emergencies, not care of chronic illnesses like cancer and diabetes.  So instead of advocating early treatment and prevention, this is a “system” that rewards proscrastination and reactivity.

It’s so shortsighted (and typically American) to operate on a system of I’ve -got-insurance-who-cares-about-you? and just-put-off-care-till-you’re-desperate-and-the-emergency-room-will-take-care-of-you.  And shortsightedness, in all of life, almost always costs more than its alternatives.

Company run health care and mammography woes

All this hoopla over the new task force recommendations on mammography.  This is what you get when your health culture is tied to insurance companies and “wisdom” dispensed from the medical establishment.

Ooh, companies can give their people more access to health care if they want.  Let’s all bow down and worship them and maybe they’ll grant us the favor of letting doctors experiment on us some more.

Bank of America humbug continues

When my previously mentioned friend with the Bank of America account called the Department of Labor to get the check taken care of, the DOL was appalled that Skank was putting the onus on him to get the matter taken care of. 

Then, when he went into the bank to have the affidavit notarized that he had to get from the DOL, he had DOL on the line asking the BOA rep to fax the item over and get it taken care of on the spot.  Oh no, the Skank employee replied.  We don’t fax to anywhere but other Skank offices.

To top it off, DOL dropped the ball a couple of times too.  First, when my friend called them and talked to the department with the power to send the affidavit and get the check reissue taken care of, they turned the matter over to the wrong person and it didn’t initially get done. 

Then, once they got the fax with the notarized affidavit (faxed from a company across the street at my friend’s expense because Skank couldn’t be bothered with rectifying a mistake their own [subcontractor's] machine had made), they turned it over to a ”new employee” who promptly screwed up the task.  So yesterday my friend not only didn’t get the reissued unemployment check–I said unemployment, as in no money coming in, you know?–but didn’t even get his allotted one.  So that set off another round of phone calls that my stressed friend had to take care of.

But at least the Department of Labor was gracious and cooperative.  While Skank of America justs keeps pocketing the dough and giving just enough customer service to get by. 

Why should they care about the little guy who has his money in their bank when they’ve got all those big corporate customers to keep happy?