What I’m Reading: Massachusetts Health Policy Commission

Is anyone at CMS listening?

http://www.estespark.org/nu_upload/files/2015-2016%20Conferences/community-hospitals-at-a-crossroads.pdf

 

What I’m Reading: The New York Times

David Brooks is not a closet liberal. He cares about the Republican Party and the conservative movement in American politics. I don't usually agree with his politics but he writes and thinks as a rational adult should. Here, he admits he did not understand the depth of anger felt by the Trump supporters but argues that there is a moral center which even a popular vote in a democracy does not override. It is the core debate of democratic government and one of the reasons our founding fathers created a republic and not a truly democratic government. You can fool all the people some of the time. You can fool some of the people all of the time. Elections can be won by fooling enough people for a short time. Political parties can be maintained indefinitely by fooling some of the people for a long time. Even though it is true that you cannot fool all of the people all of the time, that principal does not protect us from a horrible outcome in a single election if enough people are fooled for a long enough time to control an election. The hope is that we do not suffer irreparable harm from one election.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/18/opinion/no-not-trump-not-ever.html

 

 

What I’m Reading: TED

David Brooks is one of the few conservative Republican voices on the regular New York Times "op ed" staff. We corresponded some a long time ago. He was the speaker at last year's Dartmouth College commencement. I do not always agree with him but he is always intelligent and rational. He is also comfortable putting "love" at the center of our business and social lives. He sounds a bit like Mal on Firefly when talking about what keeps his ship flying.

https://www.ted.com/talks/david_brooks_the_social_animal?language=en

http://now.dartmouth.edu/2015/06/david-brooks-commencement-address

David Brooks' favorite writer is C. S. Lewis. If you are ever bored enough to decipher part of Grid, you will find a discussion of C. S. Lewis and Tolkien which describes the moment Tolkien convinced Lewis to become a Christian. If you read enough Brooks, you will find a reference to the Lewis and Tolkien conversion experience. David really should credit me.

 

What I’m Reading: Becker's Hospital Review

As hospitals continue to close around the country, at what point do CMS and congress decide it is a problem?

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/plumbing-repairs-push-tennessee-hospital-to-close.html

 

 

What I’m Reading: USA Today

 

Why more than half of hospital bills don’t get paid

http://usat.ly/1pdG3XO

What I’m Reading: The New York Times

I tend to break political thought into two camps: rational and irrational, not liberal and conservative. There are a number of voters who have said they are either going to vote for Sanders or Trump. There is no rational political position that supports both Sanders and Trump. It is an emotional impulse. I understand the impulse. It is not rational but I understand it. It is an impulse to reject the status quo as violently as possible, hoping to reset the system by wiping the slate clean with blood if necessary.

The rise of authoritarianism Brooks mentions is another symptom of the frightening, irrational, "mob" emotion rising in the U.S. and across the world. Trump has tapped into both the impulse to wipe the slate and to find a bully willing to do it. Fascism and uber nationalism were this popular most recently right before World War Two. I suppose it is something hard coded in our DNA. The human race is genetically programmed to keep population under control by whipping our "tribes" into an irrational frenzy that can only be satiated by attacking another tribe, thus ensuring we kill off enough people to reset the total population at a lower, more sustainable level.

I just wish they would wait to start the inevitable conflagration until after I shuffle off this mortal coil.

Donald Trump’s candidacy is the culmination of 30 years of antipolitics.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/26/opinion/the-governing-cancer-of-our-time.html

 

 

What I’m Reading: Becker's Hospital Review

I am putting the bad stuff all in one email so all this water will clear the slate for a new beginning in 2016.

 

Happy New Year.

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/philadelphia-hospital-to-close-up-to-675-workers-may-be-laid-off.html

 

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/cms-to-expand-rac-program-to-medicare-advantage-6-things-to-know.html

 

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/hospital-cfos-top-concerns-for-2016.html

 

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/hospitals-face-payment-cuts-at-outpatient-sites-under-budget-deal-10-things-to-know.html

 

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/new-york-hospital-to-close-this-week.html

 

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/plan-to-close-ohio-hospital-gets-go-ahead-after-11-months-of-debate.html

 

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/dallas-hospital-closes-after-failing-to-make-payroll.html

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/a-state-by-state-breakdown-of-57-rural-hospital-closures.html

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/31-mississippi-hospitals-at-risk-of-closing.html

 

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/10-hospital-bankruptcies-so-far-in-2015-september15.html

 

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/9-hospital-closures-so-far-in-2015.html