Enough is Enough

Enough Carnage

Guns are a Public Health Menace

When is enough gun-inflicted carnage sufficient for American lawmakers to ignore the bribery from the NRA and other purist 2^nd Amendment groups and enact sensible reforms to limit access to firearms whose purpose is to kill people? 

To listen to most republican leaders and even some democrats, the answer is, unfortunately, not yet. 

As of October 1^st, data compiled by the Gun Violence Archive tells us that in the past 1,735 days there have been 1,516 mass shootings in the United States. That averages one shooting that injured or killed four or more people in nine out of every ten days. At least 1,715 people were killed and over 6,000 were injured in those shootings.

Is that enough? Evidently not.

Las Vegas is but the latest in the string of American mass executions that has failed to move Congress into action. The carnage inflicted by unregulated fully automatic weapons left 58 dead, the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. History. What we got from Congress were empty thoughts and prayers.

What do we know about American gun violence from a public health perspective? Very little. This is primarily because Congress, at the bidding of its death-dealing lobbyist masters, has prohibited the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) from conducting research on the pubic health implications of gun violence. 

The CDC can study and make recommendations on every other public health menace, but it cannot even look at why Americans are obsessed with guns or why so many are used to maim and kill. 

Studies conducted by universities and medical researchers shed some light on the death walking our streets untouched. 

The Guardian recently published 17 charts reflecting some of that research. Here are some of the important conclusions.

1. America has six times as many firearm homicides as Canada and 16 times as many as Germany. A Harvard study indicates the increased rate is primarily due to the number of guns in circulation in the U.S., 
2. America has 4.4% of the world’s population and almost half of the civilian owned guns on the planet. They have not made us safer.
3. Under a broader definition, there is more than one mass shooting each day in America. We are told in the aftermath of each that then is not the appropriate time to talk about gun violence. Under this rationale, it is never the right time to talk about gun violence. 
4. Multiple studies show developed countries and U. S. states with more guns have more gun deaths. 
5. States with tighter gun control laws have fewer gun related deaths. Epidemiologists looked at the worldwide research and concluded that with new gun regulations comes a drop in gun violence.
6. Even though mass shooting incidents are horrific and command attention, a majority of gun deaths are suicides, not homicides. Suicide researchers have demonstrated that greater access to guns dramatically increases the risk of suicide. 
7. The states with the most guns report the most suicides. Guns allow people to kill themselves much more easily. It follows that limiting access to guns reduces the number of suicides. An Australian study demonstrated that buying back 3,500 guns per 100,000 people correlated with a 50 percent drop in firearm homicides and a 74 percent drop in gun suicides.
8. In states with more guns, more police officers are killed on duty. The American Journal of Public Health study supports this conclusion. Every 10% increase in gun ownership correlated with 10 more officers being shot on duty.
9. Mass shootings have done little to change public opinion about gun ownership. Most still support gun rights. 
10. Specific gun control measures are fairly popular. 89% support preventing the mentally ill from buying guns. Over 80% support not letting those on no fly lists buy guns. Over 70% support background checks for gun show and private gun sales. More than 50% would ban assault weapons. A similar number support a federal database tracking gun sales. 

Other public health menaces that killed or maimed have brought swift legislative responses even though opposed by powerful lobbyists.

In 1980, the MGM Grand Hotel in Law Vegas caught fire killing 85 and injuring more than 500. What followed were stricter fire codes, improved construction and building safety regulations. 

The Tylenol tampering scare in 1982 led to and immediate recall and prompt implementation of sealing procedures we now take for granted even though far fewer were killed.

Horrific roadway accidents led to seat belts, automobile safety regulations, texting while driving laws and other highway safety measures. 

When is enough carnage enough? I’ve had enough. Have you? Call your lawmakers and write them letters. End it now.

Waring R. Fincke is a retired attorney and serves as a guardian for the elderly and disabled.

Graham-Cassidy will Kill People

Trumpcare 3.0 will kill people

Single-payer deserves consideration

Just when you thought that the health insurance you could finally afford under the Affordable Care Act was finally safe, two heartless and downright cruel Senators bring up one last repeal and replace bill with the sole justification being, “that’s what we campaigned on.”

The latest edition of Trumpcare 3.0 is decidedly worse than any of its predecessors when measured by the damage done to the 25-35 million people stripped of health insurance, those stripped of basic healthcare all together and the families who will have to pick up the care costs for their young, disabled or elderly parents. All this on top of further restrictions on reproductive healthcare and reductions in other healthcare programs for women

The Graham-Cassidy healthcare bill is being ramrodded through the Senate by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell who will stop at nothing to undo everything the Black former president put together. They need to get it done before the end of next week when the Senate rules revert back to a 60 “yes” vote requirement for any bill to pass.

Putting the bill together behind closed doors with no public, much less Democratic, input or review, it is being cast as a choice between states rights and the dreaded socialism of the government run single-payer Medicare for All healthcare system gaining increased public support daily. It is being rushed to a vote, before the Congressional Budget office can complete its review and provide the impartial numbers on the damage it will do and the costs involved. It is a true pig in a poke.

What we know is that Graham-Cassidy will roll back Medicaid expansion that gave 14 million Americans health insurance coverage for the first time. The rest of Medicaid, care for the elderly in nursing homes, the disabled, young people in poverty and others, will also be trimmed and converted into lump sum payments to the states with insignificant controls on how each spends the funds allotted creating 50 different healthcare systems for the sickest and most vulnerable. The savings will go to fund GOP tax cuts for the wealthiest and corporations who need them the least.

With insurers being allowed to charge sick people more, health insurance premiums for those still covered will skyrocket. With the elimination of required coverage for pre-existing conditions, the cost of insurance will quickly rise to levels that most Americans cannot afford. One analysis puts surcharges, in addition to the regular premiums, for opioid addicts and those with rheumatoid arthritis at $20,000, $50,000 more for those with serious heart conditions, and over $140,000 for those with metastatic cancer. Another puts a $4500 surcharge on asthmatics, $17,300 on pregnancy and a $72,000 bump on lung cancer.

The state block grants would punish the Democratic states that took Medicaid expansion dollars and reward the GOP states that did not. States receiving the grants will be allowed to apply for waivers from many of the Affordable Care Act requirements that the bill does not repeal directly. If you need a service not covered, you will have to pay for it. ACA premium subsidies will be phased out by 2020. The slow death of federal healthcare funding will continue to 2027 when all federal dollars for the nation’s health will cease.

The deadlines for figuring out your insurance for next year loom. Insurers must sign final contracts for 2018 by the end of next week. If ACA subsidies vanish next year, premiums will explode.  ACA enrollment starts November 1^st. The new bill will eliminate the requirement for everyone to have insurance or pay a penalty. With that gone, many believing themselves to be healthy might not buy insurance at all. That too will drive up premiums as insurers scramble to cover a larger pool of sick people with fewer premium dollars.

Even with the developmental secrecy, negative reaction to the latest

Trumpcare has been swift and severe. Governors from both parties have condemned the bill. The American Medical Association, AARP, the America Hospital Association, most of the major disability advocacy groups, and representatives from just about every significant healthcare organization have urged Congress to reject the bill. Health insurers oppose it too. All 50 of the state Medicare directors oppose it too.

The three holdout GOP Senators’ objections to Trumpcare 1.0 and 2.0 have not been addressed in the new legislation. Hopefully, they will continue to stand up for their constituents like all of the Democrats in the Senate who will vote “no.”

This bill must fail, paving the way for serious consideration of a universal single payer system similar to those used for decades by most of the countries on the rest of the planet. It is time to stop the madness spawned by hatred of all things Obama and for bi-partisan solutions for America’s health.

Waring R. Fincke is a retired attorney and serves as a guardian for the disabled and the elderly.

Protect the Dreamers

Protect the Dreamers

No Hate Allowed Here

Immigration reform has been a hot button issue since people started travelling to new places. We are a nation of immigrants and those who settled here in the first instance would claim that all those who came after them and took their lands are here illegally. We white folks settled those claims in the Indian Wars of the 1800s by brute force and genocide, but never you mind that part of our history.

The current effort to rid our shores of brown skinned immigrants was announced with a smirk by Attorney General Jefferson Beauregard Sessions this week. President Trump made the call, but left it to Sessions to announce the decision and he did so gleefully.

Former president Obama tried without success to fix immigration in Congress, but the republican majority prevented a comprehensive fix. As a last resort, President Obama implemented DACA, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, to tackle what appeared to be an easy part of the problem. He protected the Dreamers, kids who were brought to our shores by parents who entered this country without proper documents.

DACA made it possible for the Dreamers to remain under certain conditions. Almost 800,000 received DACA protected status because they met conditions that include registration, proof of entry while a minor with parents without documentation, educational attainment or military service and lack of a criminal record. They paid a hefty fee for the privilege to boot. As adults with a protected status, they are productive members of our communities.

The average DACA recipient is 26 years old and came here at the age of six. Ninety-one percent are gainfully employed. One hundred percent have no criminal record. They pay $500 to renew their status every two years. One, a Houston paramedic, died rescuing people in his flooded city after Hurricane Harvey.

With the stroke of a pen, the Trump/Sessions administration took away DACA protection for these neighbors of ours, subjecting them to easy incarceration and deportation, unless Congress acts to solve the problem by next March.

The GOP controlled Congress has not been able to pass a single piece of significant legislation yet. Internal divisions between ultra conservative members of the Freedom caucus and more moderate GOP pragmatists have prevented House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell from advancing a budget, passing healthcare reform, or much of anything else. Tax code reform bills are next, along with funding the wall on our southern border, infrastructure repair and natural disaster relief measures. With all this on the congressional plate, and little GOP interest in talking with Democrats, comprehensive immigration reform or even protection for the Dreamers appears well beyond the horizon for consideration in this short period of time.

Make no mistake. This move is just another of the racially motivated actions by those currently in power to Make America White Again. Trump’s rhetoric and actions increasingly appeal to those white Anglo-Saxon evangelical racists who voted for him as he tries to shore up his political base against the rising tide of opposition from those in both parties and the Independent middle who fear further erosion of our democracy.

Former President Obama took the unusual step of weighing in on President Trump’s action and concluded his condemnation of it with the following:

“Ultimately, this is about basic decency. This is about whether we are a people who kick hopeful young strivers out of America, or whether we treat them the way we’d want our own kids to be treated. It’s about who we are as a people – and who we want to be.

“What makes us American is not a question of what we look like, or where our names come from, or the way we pray. What makes us American is our fidelity to a set of ideals – that all of us are created equal; that all of us deserve the chance to make of our lives what we will; that all of us share an obligation to stand up, speak out, and secure our most cherished values for the next generation. That’s how America has traveled this far. That’s how, if we keep at it, we will ultimately reach that more perfect union.”

We must protect the Dreamers just like many Germans did when they hid the Jews from Hitler’s thugs. We must stand up for our neighbors, friends and co-workers who share in the American Dream. Hate, prejudice and discrimination must not be allowed to triumph.

Waring R. Fincke is a retired lawyer who serves as a guardian for minors, the elderly and disabled.

Eclipse in Small Town America

The Solar Eclipse

Best in Small Town America

Our family went to Virginia, Nebraska to watch the solar eclipse this past Monday. We watched the sun dance behind the moon above constantly shifting bands of clouds before a muted darkness descended during the brief totality. While not as dramatic as seeing the corona of the sun surrounding a black moon, our experience was quite satisfying and I got a t-shirt memorializing the event to complete the bargain.

Our experience was shared by about 100 people who decided that a small, almost ghost, town surrounded by corn and soybean fields in southern Nebraska was the place to be. Virginia, Nebraska has a population of about 20 on a good day. Downtown is three blocks long with the major hub being the grain elevator. Large trucks pulled in and out the whole time we were there dumping their loads and going out for more. No time to stop to watch the once in a lifetime event happening in the clouds.

There were three small places open on the main drag to welcome the population surge. Terry’s steakhouse is evidently the only restaurant in the area for miles around and called in every worker to prepare and serve a special eclipse styled breakfast, lunch and dinner to all who came. There was a steady trickle of customers in and out of Terry’s all day with folks retiring to lawn chairs set up in the empty lots on either side of the building, food and drinks in hand, to gaze upward. Across the street, the five people who work at Citizen’s State Bank closed up from 11 to 2 and brought their lobby and desk chairs into the street to watch the show.

The American Legion Post, a vacant lot down the street from Terry’s, put on the best welcome for traveling strangers. They opened the doors so visiting sun gazers could use the bathrooms. Legion members prepared pulled pork in roaster ovens and set out sides of coleslaw to sell to the hungry that did not bring picnic supplies. They put out a clearly homemade sheet cake decorated with a large sun at the total eclipse phase to share with the anticipated revelers, asking only that visitors fill out a large poster board with their name and hometown along with how many miles they had traveled to get to small town Virginia for the eclipse.

The rest of Virginia’s main street is made up of long empty small buildings. The faded sign for Staples Store hovered over windows boarded up and most of the rest had broken windows or none at all speaking to the town’s decline as a local center of commerce.

We set up our chairs in the town park across the street from the grain elevator and a small deserted shop that locals opened to set up their picnic table. The park had oak shade trees, a swing set, a half basketball court and a push me, pull you merry go round that I went round on with my grand daughters and some other kids who stopped by the red painted antique. The two picnic tables used hand welded farm wagon wheel rims to support the seats and tabletop. We got there around 10 am and by 11:30 there were 6 other families looking up through the clouds at the sun with our special glasses or welding goggles brought from work. Two local young teen boys walked around with a cardboard sign proclaiming tongue in cheek, “The End is Near,” before playing some hoops and then pulling out their glasses for the event.

We chatted amiably with others who came to look up into the sky. There was a three generation local family, a couple from Minnesota with a fancy filtered camera, a family from Texas and two guys with very fancy drones that hovered 400 feet up while filming the event at opposite ends of the street. I could not understand what they gained from a higher aerial view that was still under the cloud cover, but to each his own. When the totality arrived, all the watchers cheered and whistled.

It was refreshing to be at that small town event, bigger than all it held, and share it with family and quietly nice people who just wanted to see something they had never seen before. It was a thoroughly positive and genuinely American event.

Waring R. Fincke is a retired attorney and serves as a guardian for the elderly and disabled.

Foxconn is a con.

Foxconn is a Con

It must not pass

Praise was almost due to a few remaining sane GOP Wisconsin Senators who refuse to get sucked into the latest Scott Walker/Robin Vos con job. Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald recently told the Governor that the Senate republicans may not have enough votes to pass the Assembly bill approving Walker’s deal with technology giant Foxconn. Fitzgerald and some of his colleagues appeared concerned that the Foxconn con is truly a bad deal for Wisconsin taxpayers and our environment. Fitzgerald soon retreated to safe GOP ground, introducing the bill in the Senate and sending it to the Joint Finance Committee.

It should have been easy to heed the non-partisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau’s numbers showing that a child starting first grade now will be suffering from the tax payments to Foxconn until they are well into their thirties before Wisconsin starts to see a financial break-even point in 2043.

When Republicans tell us they cannot pass the current state budget because they cannot find the money to pay for transportation and education commitments, where do you think they will find an extra $250 million plus per year for the next 25 years to give to Foxconn? They will either have to raise taxes or make further cuts to already strained transportation and education funding. Not a good choice for the “no new taxes” crowd faced with mounting pressure to fund roads and public schools.

Sen. Fitzgerald was also initially concerned with the lightening speed with which Walker and Vos, backed by President Trump who put no federal dollars into the deal, got the Assembly to move on this latest bait and switch con. Only one official public hearing monopolized by invited guests who support the deal before the bill gets a vote next Tuesday is a new low point in the current GOP dominated public discourse. Now Fitzgerald appears on board with speedy passage as well.

Critics from the business community, led by Bloomberg, tell us that this is a truly terrible deal. $3 billion for 13,000 new jobs, many of which will go to folks from Illinois who live close to the border, amounts to a $1200 per Wisconsin family tax payment each year for a good portion of their working lives. When coupled with the $50 million in lost sales tax revenues each year from additional Foxconn tax incentives, the GOP senators with sense should pause to jump on this train.

Even pro-business, anti-government regulation members of the GOP Senate should balk at the wholesale abrogation of state environmental protections in Foxconn’s Walker/Vos proposed new technology district. If the package is passed, Foxconn will alter the course of rivers and streams, fill wetlands with dredged material and divert significant amounts of water from Lake Michigan, all without DNR oversight or burdensome state regulatory filings. The DNR has already hired a project manager to show Foxconn how to avoid environmental laws. Have no doubt, there is going to be little federal oversight either from the newly gutted Trump/Pruitt led Environmental Protection Agency. Wisconsin residents will suffer from Foxconn’s environmental damage long after the sting from their increased tax burdens and spending cuts has vanished.

These objections to the con that is Foxconn should be sufficient to scuttle the deal, but there is more. Topping the list is Foxconn’s history of failed promises to deliver economic prosperity with new facilities. The tech giant failed to follow through on a deal with Pennsylvania to build a new facility there. It has not delivered promised economic benefits in deals in Vietnam, Indonesia, Brazil and India. Next, consider Foxconn’s failure to protect workers in its existing factories from long hours, unsafe working conditions and abusive labor policies. Its leaders have compared their employees to animals and imposed animal behavior modification techniques for control. Hardly a Wisconsin model employer. Fitzgerald complained there is no timeline for the promised job creation in the plan, but backed away from this limited concern for jobs.

Other concerns should give legislators pause. The plan is to give the job of negotiating and then policing Foxconn’s economic promises to Wisconsin’s troubled Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WDEC). You will remember WDEC’s stellar record with shady loans and incentives to businesses that promised to create jobs that never materialized and its subsequent multiple failures to recoup taxpayer money spent to incentivize the failures. It is no surprise that many of those failures were with folks who made substantial campaign contributions to Walker and the GOP.

Gov. Walker is gearing up to run for another term in 2018 and desperately needs an economic victory to distract from his past failed job promises and inability to shepherd a budget through a legislature with solid republican majorities. Here’s hoping there is enough sanity in the GOP Senate ranks to stop this boondoggle in its tracks, even if it costs Walker his re-election bid.

Waring R. Fincke is a retired lawyer and serves as a guardian for the elderly and disabled.