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Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan recently published a book about his days at the Bush White House titled “What Happened.” It is just another tell-all book about how Bush lied us to war. The whole affair was orchestrated and we should NOT be in Iraq, he tells his readers.

McClellan, like Bush, Cheney and a host of others is simply another of the scum bags involved in this ugly affair that has seen more than 4,000 American soldiers lose their lives, 10s of thousands come home with injuries — both physical and mental, and hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis have also perished. If McClellan new Bush was wrong, lying and manipulating us into this disastrous situation we’re still in, why did he not speak up when he was part of it?

The guy is a low life. All he wants to assure is sale of his book. Lives being lost because of an unjust and illegal war be damned… says McClellan with this Johnny come lately attitude.

Alvaro F. Fernandez

I will never forget a comment uttered by Jean-Robert LaFortune, president of the Haitian American Grassroots Coalition, made over coffee in a Cuban restaurant on Northwest 7th Avenue in Miami.

“Everyone should be a Haitian for at least one day,” a serious LaFortune told me. I stared at him after listening to his words, allowing them to sink in. The more I thought about them, the more I thought of the old Indian adage of walking in someone else’s shoes. In the case of the Haitians, I believe it would take more than just walking.

Here in the U.S., especially Miami, Haitians have been relegated to second and third class status. They endure degradation, bigotry and are too often treated as less than human. While Cubans stay in the country once U.S. territory is stepped on, Haitian families are torn apart (literally) from each other simply because they are deemed “illegal.” A Cuban facing deportation will probably have the media, politicians and the masses screaming bloody hell to save them from whatever problem they face. A Haitian facing deportation usually deals with it as family members looked on covered in tears — and usually without a word from media or our leaders.

Thank you to Ana Menendez, the Miami Herald columnist, for her Sunday column, a wonderful but sad piece detailing the problems faced by Haitians in Miami. Read it at:
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/columnists/ana_menendez/story/520300.html

She ends by stating, “Surely, in these times of global calamity, this country can find more pressing things to do than round up men and women whose only crime was to wish for a better life for their children.”

I second Ana’s thoughts and ask every person to consider LaFortune’s statement. Could we survive as Haitians for one day?

Alvaro F. Fernandez

Health care and its costs are a continued and real problem in this country as this troublesome article by The New York Times continues to demonstrate. President George W. Bush has helped to make it worse, focusing his administration’s attention on issues that will help his friends in the industry get richer while the vast majority falls deeper and deeper into an ever-spinning black hole of health insecurity.

As for the presidential candidates, most media would rather have you take your eyes off what’s important and have you concentrate on the Reverend Wright, Obama’s bowling score and Hillary’s tears. At this rate, we should fear for what’s ahead…

Alvaro F. Fernandez

Even the Insured Feel the Strain of Health Costs

By Reed Abelson and Milt Reudenheim

Taken from The New York Times of May 4th.

The economic slowdown has swelled the ranks of people without health insurance. But now it is also threatening millions of people who have insurance but find that the coverage is too limited or that they cannot afford their own share of medical costs.

Many of the 158 million people covered by employer health insurance are struggling to meet medical expenses that are much higher than they used to be — often because of some combination of higher premiums, less extensive coverage, and bigger out-of-pocket deductibles and co-payments.

With medical costs soaring, the coverage many people have may not adequately protect them from the financial shock of an emergency room visit or a major surgery. For some, even routine doctor visits might now take a back seat to basic expenses like food and gasoline.

“It just keeps eating into people’s income,” said James Corbin, a former union official who works for the local utility in Tucson.

Mr. Corbin said that under their employer’s health plan, he and his co-workers are now obliged to pay up to $4,000 of their families’ annual medical bills, on top of about $1,600 a year in premiums. Five years ago, they paid no premiums and were responsible for only about $2,000 of their families’ medical bills.

“That’s a big jump,” Mr. Corbin said. “You’ve just lost a month’s pay.”

Already, many doctors say, the soft economy is making some insured people hesitant to get care they need, reluctant to spend a $50 co-payment for an office visit. Parents “are waiting longer to bring in their children,” said Dr. Richard Lander, a pediatrician in Livingston, N.J. “They say, ‘The kid isn’t that sick; her temperature is only 102.’ ”

The problem of affording health care is most acute for people with no insurance, a group expected to soon exceed 48 million, but those with insurance say they too are feeling the pain.

Since the recession of 2001, the employee’s average cost of an annual health care premium for family coverage has nearly doubled — to $3,300, up from $1,800 — while incomes have come nowhere close to keeping up. Factor in other out-of-pocket medical costs, and the portion of the average American household’s income that goes toward health care has risen about 12 percent, according to the consulting and accounting firm Deloitte, and is now approaching one-fifth of the average household’s spending.

In a recent survey by Deloitte’s health research center, only 7 percent of people said they felt financially prepared for their future health care needs.

Read the rest of this article at: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/04/business/04insure.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp