London NFL game puts spring into Yankee dragon's step

Not that I saw the game—and I'm disappointed about that—but the Pats vs. Bucs game in this fair city yesterday has put a little spring into my step.
One, the Patriots were victorious by a score of 35-7. Any Monday is easier to take when the Patriots win on Sunday.
Two—and more importantly—it's the third year in a row that a National Football League game has been played in London. The crowd at the fabled Wembley Stadium was a sell-out, with more than 84,000 in attendance. (True, many of the people in that audience were ex-pat Yanks, but no matter.) The reaction to American football in Britain has been so impressive over the course of this decade that NFL commissioner Roger Goodell wants two regular-season NFL games a year played in Britain, is considering holding a future SuperBowl game at Wembley, and is seriously mulling over the idea of placing an NFL team in London.
It wasn't that long ago that Brits sneered at American football, laughing at the helmets and the padding that American football players wear. Now, American football is moving ever closer to rugby and soccer as a sport close to the British male's heart. It's joyous for a Yankee boy like me to witness.
Only last autumn, during a walk through the park, the wife and I witnessed a group of 14- to 15-year-olds practicing American football on one of the lawns, and, during an early-morning run, I saw a semi-professional British-American football team going through the motions in the sports stadium on the other side of the aforementioned park. Believe all that you hear: American football is taking off in the U.K.
Soccer still takes great precedence, and with two Premier League soccer games going on yesterday afternoon, that meant little chance of seeing the American football game in a bar. It was shown on the cable station Sky Sports 2, but, alas, we don't have cable TV.
But along with a greatly increased interest in Hallowe'en, American football is a fall-time tradition that Brits have embraced—my boss is a fan—and it makes autumn a time when I'm less likely to be homesick.

Jung typology test result

I took the Jung Typology Test, courtesy of a friend's blog, and scored ISTJ, which stands for Introversion, Sensing, Thinking, Judging. According to this, I am an Introveted Guardian.
I am, among other things, quiet, reserved, serious, loyal, determined, not fond of change, desirous of things being clean and neat and orderly, and secure enough with my experiences to resist trying different approaches. Suffice to say, I'm not very surprised at all by this result.
After all, why should I be? It's a typical dragon personality.

Paying for the fat of the land

The debate over whether the world's fattest man should be helped further is a matter of common sense.


(Previously published by Blogcritics)

Some people say that Paul Mason needs help. I say he's already gotten enough. One million pounds' ($1,666,666) worth of help, to be exact.
Who is Paul Mason, you ask? The world's heaviest man, at a mere twenty pounds shy of 1,000. Yep, you heard right: If this guy gains just twenty more pounds—and gaining weight is obviously his life's sole goal and achievement—he'll be one thousand pounds in weight.
The 48-year-old Mason knows he's in bad shape. He saw his father die of obesity. Yet, he continues to consume 20,000 calories a day. He has received help before, but gained all the weight back soon afterwards. The taxpayer-funded cost for the NHS to treat him over the years totals £1 million. Living on benefits such as he obviously does, he costs the taxpayer a further £100,000 a year.
His mother had to remortgage the house just to pay his food bills and his sister bemoans, "I still love Paul, but what he does just breaks my heart."
Now Mr. Mason needs emergency surgery or he could die. Well, I hate to be this callous, but the phrase "too bad, so sad, never mind" seems appropriate in this case.
Mason is cursed with a serious illness. It's obvious that he's got an incredibly stubborn eating disorder, but he doesn't even have a redeeming personality or conscience to make up for it. He served time in prison for stealing cash from letters during his former job as a mailman. He slimmed down to 280 pounds during his stint in jail, but only because he had no choice but to eat a limited amount. As a free man, Mason cannot keep himself away from fast food, candies, chips and other junk.
His sister alleges that Mason didn't want help from even his nearest-and-dearest. "I let him get away with it. He has suffered from depression and I know I should have been a lot more supportive as a sister," said Mrs. Mason. "But there is only a certain amount you can give someone if they don't help themselves. He didn't want our help."
And there you have it. You cannot help people who won't help themselves. Therefore, Paul Mason must accept his fate. He has no right to demand a £20,000 stomach operation on the NHS when he has already cost the public health care system £1 million. He's had his chances and he's blown them.
Sorry, Paul, but your six-foot girth will land you six-foot under and you have no-one to blame for that but yourself.
Is there something about being fat that blinds people to reality? And how can they be content to live off society? A non-working Scottish couple, who weigh a combined 666 pounds, had all seven of their children taken into custody over concerns about their weights. It's one thing to breed like rabbits when you're on welfare, but for all seven of your offspring to be on the hefty side really takes the cake, if you'll forgive the pun.
The 40-year-old proud mom offered up her heartfelt defense. "All I hear from the two lassies is 'can we come home?' and I tell them 'soon, darlings'. It hurts. I will take my kids to the obesity clinic and help them get the help that they need. I want the best for my kids. That's the kind of mother I am."
Errr, forgive me for asking, but if that's the kind of mother you are, why were your kids taken into care? The local authority in Dundee disagrees, justifying the move with their own riposte. "[T]he welfare and safety of a child or children is the over-riding priority and in some cases, despite the strenuous efforts of the agencies providing this support, the best option is for them to be looked after away from their home." I agree with the council. We don't need seven future overweight shirkers.
This sort of thing is what scares me most about Obama-care. No strangers to those with planet-sized rear ends themselves, Americans will be footing a bill as large as the fat of the land itself to take care of them. Unless, of course, we adopt L.A. Times columnist Melissa Healy's idea to make fatties pay for a public health care system. It's not a bad idea. Sure, it reeks of the ol' liberal stalwart of throwing money at the problem, but it will raise funds and it will make others think twice about what they eat; they just might realize that there was indeed life before trans-fats. The only problem is, of course, the goverment-funded doctor-crats will take this ball and run with it. You daren't step into a health care professional's office without a BMI chart being waved in your face. I can see the two sides of that issue.
But one thing is for certain: Until people rediscover common sense and start taking back responsibility for themselves and their own lives, we will continue to deal with the Paul Masons of the world and the subsequent creaking and groaning of the public services infrastructure that they cause.

Boris' attack on the bankers—now that beggars belief

Can anyone figure out Boris Johnson for me? As recently as two weeks ago, the Mayor of London jumped to the City's defense, calling bankers a "vital part" of the UK's economic recovery. No argument there. We are financially healthy when the bankers and stockbrokers do a robust job.
"[N]ever forget, all you would-be banker bashers, that the leper colony in the City of London produces 9% of UK GDP, 13% of value added and taxes that pay for roads and schools and hospitals across this country," Johnson told the audience at the Conservative Party conference on October 5.
Around this time last year, during the thick of the recession, Boris asked Londoners to stop their "neo-socialist whingeing about City bankers." Sounding the same line as with the Tory conference, Johnson beseeched, "Before you attack the bankers of London, remember that this is one of the few global industries in which we truly excel; the City contributes about nine per cent of Britain's GDP."
So what to make of his recent column, "The Barefaced Greed of Bankers and Their Bonuses Beggars Belief," one must wonder?
This is one scurrilous attack on City culture from the man who took such pains and risked such unpopularity to defend it. Referring to bankers as "a type of cockroach," Johnson opines that, "their interests, and the interests of the community, have been intertwined by the fact of state intervention, and they need to show they understand that."
This is very true as well. Bankers showed off, gambled with leverage they didn't have, and played Russian roulette with the money, not caring if they lost the gamble as the taxpayer would bail them out. And yet they have shown that they've learned nothing and are happy to accept their lavish bonus packages for failing.
In my opinion, bankers need to show humility and forego the huge bonuses for at least a year and demonstrate that they're rediscovering the A-game necessary to help bring us out of recession. Instead, they are treating themselves with our money—and even the banks that didn't fail and remain in private hands are still playing fast and loose with the profits.
I praise Johnson's latest column, but hope that he's truly seen the light as opposed to simply jumping on the bandwagon.

Yea for me: I'm a world traveler!

Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

Until recently, whenever I've told family and friends about our travels, they've tended to reply, "Wow, you guys [me and the wife] are world travelers!"
And I would think that while it certainly seemed that way, hopping across Europe and seeing other cities and states in my own country hardly qualified as world traveling. I felt that I would have needed to step foot in at least three continents before I could claim that much.
As you can see here, I've only been to 10 U.S. states, and six of those are in New England itself:

Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

I've not been west of Illinois. I've not graced the Caribbean with my presence. I've never been to Canada (and wouldn't go these days due to their brutal, indefensible seal cull). There's too much of my native North America that I haven't seen and experienced.
Now then, I'm quite the European traveler. Comparitively speaking, I'm much more experienced with my ancestors' continent that I am with my own:

Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

Well, I think I can live with the title of "world traveler" a bit easier now as a result of our trip to Marrakech earlier this month. For those of you with a shaky concept of geography—I realize that I've got American readers of this blog—Marrakech is in Morocco, and Morocco is in Africa. True, it's North Africa with Europe staring down at it from across the Mediterranean. But what the heck—it is Africa.
See for yourself:

Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

It's another world down there, folks. Marrakech looks much like France will come the year 2050—full of jibbering adherents of that ultra-peaceful religion known as Islam. They put barbary monkeys on your shoulders and then charge you $83 for the pleasure. The men stare passionately at male runners wearing shorts (if not for their Allah-sanctioned self-control, they'd have been drooling and chasing after me). You cannot cross a street there without risking your life. Oh, it was an adventure. Any place that can make me feel like a swashbuckler for just crossing a main road and running three miles around the hotel's neighborhood earns the caveat, "watch your back and hold on to your goolies. And beat the crap out of anyone approaching you with a monkey."
Marrakech makes being in the company of drunks who hop up and down the beach like kangaroos seem almost normal—not that I've been to Australia (yet), but one hears rumors ...

Getting in Obama's way: Might that not be a good thing?

Van Jones has just proven that the Obama administration doesn't really want a Green world. They want a surreal one.

Previously published by Blogcritics

Further proof, if any were honestly required, that we cannot trust Green people to not have Red agendas—and that Mr. Obama does indeed associate with human weasels.
Having previously endorsed a 9/11 conspiracy theory accusing the Bush administration of playing a role in the terrorist attack, and making disparaging comments about Republicans in general, environmental adviser Van Jones "understood he was going to get in the way" of Obama's agenda and resigned via e-mail. Not before decrying the "vicious smear campaign" against him, of course.
He issued a weak mea culpa to Republicans: "If I have offended anyone with statements I made in the past, I apologize." But those nasty sons-of-bitches still demanded that he resign. Oh, the injustice.
Jones worked in the White House Council on Environmental Quality and was one of Obama's officials in charge of his made-up jobs for tree-huggers project. He is your typical acerbic, angry and downright mean-spirited Leftie, desiring a better world for all while poking anyone who dares to disagree with him in the eyes.
It's a shame that the president opposes gay marriage because the good reverend Jeremiah Wright and Jones are a match made in ... well, certainly and most determinedly not heaven. A match made with Gaia's blessing, shall we say?
Regular readers of this blog will know that I tend to side with liberals on environmental issues myself, insofar as I don't agree with the clear-cutting, development-crazy mindset of some avidly pro-business conservatives.
But I honestly have to wonder what these enviro-types are up to when they oppose the construction of incinerators. Technological advances have made them cleaner and more efficient, we can get "clean" energy from them, and we cannot recycle everything, nor can we force people to recycle if they won't. It is a real solution to a solid-waste problem. And yet most of these Earth worshippers oppose them. I can't figure that one out.
And then their eagerness to "dance on capitalism's grave" during G20 protests and embrace Sept. 11 conspiracy theories: More not-so-lovely examples of polluted minds. Clean up your own heads first, folks, before you try to clean up the planet.
What's so troublesome about all this is that environmentalists are very influential, most of them being part of the Left-wing cabal, such as they are, that sets the trend for so many easily-influenced minds as well as government agendas. For instance, if you're so grateful to someone for their environmental activism, then might you not start listening to their warped views on 9/11 or how all Republicans want to sacrifice children or any other nonsense they may spew and taking it seriously?
I'm grateful to environmentalists myself, as long as they stick to serious environmental issues as opposed to simply saying, "The world's getting hotter! Carbon's building up out of control! And it's all the GOP's fault!" I'm not looking for political rants from these people. I want them to do what they've pledged to do: to find sound environmental solutions that don't seek to destroy the capitalist ethic. I do not expect them to engage in proselytizing for the lunatic brigade. Honestly, if they're a couple of sandwiches short of a picnic, I don't think they're to be trusted to play the organ at a ballgame, never mind help set national policy.
Meanwhile, Obama will whitewash the whole Jones incident in his usual I-see-no-need-to-discuss-this style, just as he did with Wright and just as he did with the Islamic terror threat during his love-in tour of the Muslim world.
Yep, it's a crazy world out there. The Jones controversy proves that our president does his damndest to make it just that bit more surreal.

An American health-care skeptic defends the NHS

Although the NHS might not be the role model Americans are looking for, the government-run British health-care system is not evil.

Previously published by Blogcritics

With the health care debate raging in the U.S. currently, the spotlight has been thrown on Britain's National Health Service, NHS for short. Americans are worried that they, should President Obama manage to pass his health care bill in Congress, will be strapped with an inefficient government system that alone will determine how they are looked after.
Inefficient the NHS might indeed be—and this is because not only does it have to care for the needs of 61 million people, but those of illegal immigrants as well. There have also been horrifying examples of neglect, such as at an NHS hospital in Stafford, where up to 1,200 people died from neglect. The NHS also likes to dictate who receives what treatment and when due to cost-cutting.
But the NHS, despite its struggles, does the best that it can, burdened such as it is. And it is not, in the words of that renowned Rhodes scholar Sarah Palin, "evil."
There was a time, during my early years in England, when I scoffed at the NHS. Nothing was guaranteed to make my blood boil more fiercely than Brits who couldn't seem to understand why we Americans won't endorse any form of socialism. I had long arguments with my wife over why the NHS was a waste of money and resources as well as, due to the aforementioned socialist nature of it, immoral.
But then, when I was in need myself, my view toward the NHS ameliorated somewhat. When you are in such pain that you cannot think straight, views are bound to change a little.
In May 2005, I had a serious kidney stone attack and I was in such bad shape that I required an ambulance to take me to the hospital. I was assessed at one hospital, had x-rays and blood taken, and then transferred across London to another hospital with a urology department so that I could be given specialist treatment. I was in this hospital—Guy's and St. Thomas' Hospital near London Bridge—for four days. At no point was I uncomfortable, at no point did I think I deserved better. The paramedics, the doctors, the nurses, the consultants: they were all wonderful.
You'll understand my feelings here, dear reader. If I bash the NHS, I bash these people who looked after me when I was in agony. I can't do that.
Over the years, I have come to appreciate being able to see the doctor without filling out cumbersome forms. I won't say it costs nothing, because that's not true. But I have already paid for it through taxes. The tax rate in Britain has consistently been around 23 percent. That is not unreasonable (even if I say that as a 17% flat tax supporter). The majority of Americans pay the same rate, and they don't have a government health care system.
Sure, the NHS is a bureaucracy and in these lean times, and with more and more people living in Britain, it has shown signs of incompetence. But private health care exists in Britain, for those that demand it, and even that is considerably cheaper than American health care. Unlike Canada, Britain does not demand that everyone use their government-provided health care. The NHS is there for those who cannot afford private health care.
Britain, in my opinion, needs to get serious about trimming welfare rolls, stop doling out cash for every baby born (let people pay for their own children), and strike all but emergency care for illegals. There is plenty of waste to be tackled and any money that is freed up can better assist the NHS.
In the U.S., the situation is different. There are 300 million people to look after. If $10 billion of taxpayers' money is to be invested every year over five years to move American health care toward a standards-based care system that exludes no-one, it's bound to be tricky—and it's no wonder that it's scaring the pants off Americans. From the July 27 issue of The Weekly Standard, Fraser Nelson & Irwin Stelzer report that "patients suffering from diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and other chronic conditions will do it the Obama-Biden way or else be excluded from insurance coverage." Canada all over again.
Americans are in no mood to experiment. They do not like their current health care system, but they fear what they might get—or not, as the case may be—with government-regulated health care. According to Stryker McGuire's report in the August 15 edition of The Daily Telegraph newspaper, "[A] solid majority (62 percent versus 32 percent) is in favor of giving Americans the option of a government insurance plan. But that's all they agree on ... By a 55 to 35 percent margin, they're more worried that Congress will spend too much money and add to the deficit than that Congress will not act to overhaul the health care system. By a similar margin, voters say health care reform should be dropped if it adds 'significantly' to the deficit, and by a much wider margin (72-21 percent), voters do not believe that Obama will keep his promise to overhaul the health-care system without adding to the deficit."
You could write a book—in fact, many have been written—on the inequities, inadequacies, irregularities and idiosyncracies of health care. I obviously do not intend to do that. In fact, my knowledge of the intracacies of health care is hardly in-depth. I know what everyone else does: that drug companies have too much say, insurance company lobbyists are too influential, malpractice lawsuits are a constant worry, and the obesity-producing lifestyle habits of the nation are hardly conducive to a cheap and easy delivery of health care.
But I do not blame my fellow Americans for protesting government health care; in fact, I'm proud of them for it. We are all heirs to Thomas Jefferson's limited-government mindset. His legacy is something we are right to defend so robustly. (One wonders that if Hamilton had won the day, would Americans still be agonizing over health care in 2009?) It is certainly preferable to letting the government control every aspect of our lives as they are wont to do in Europe, where nearly everyone believes that the state will look after them and they'll all live happily ever after as a result. Americans don't believe that rubbish, and more power to them. As Jefferson said himself, a government that big enough to give you everything you want is strong enough to take everything you have.
But the point is, despite all that is wrong with government-run health care, the immorality of socialism, the inadequacy of insurance options, what have you, Britain's NHS is not evil.