Please flag the first comment on this diary as TOTAL SPAM!

I would like to be the contrarian voice in at least some aspect of this. For one thing, medical care – and here I am speaking of surgical procedures, or actual care, not pills or items like syringes or tubing but actual care – is different for every patient. You cannot compare one mastectomy to another.

I recently had a quadruple heart bypass surgery. For the so-called average patient, this surgery takes about 4-5 hours, so the time for the surgeon and the use of the surgical suite and the nurses and technicians and the anesthesiologist are also around that same amount of time. I, however, was on the table for nearly 12 hours due to difficulties with first the vein-stripping portion (getting the veins to do the grafts) and then with the actual grafting itself. So comparing the cost of my surgery with someone elses is like comparing apples with oranges. I had a difficult post-op, complicated with a rare but not unknown inflammation, pericarditis, followed by a bunch of infections (mostly because I am immune compromised), followed by another bout with pericarditis. So my end result is a total costs that is nearly double what the average hospital bill is for this procedure.

Even for this particular hospital. And comparing my bill to other hospitals is an exercise in being ridiculous. I have no idea if this hospital charges more than other hospitals. I really don’t care. This hospital is one of the top 50 cardiac hospitals in the entire country and I knew I was going to have problems – because I always have complications when I have surgery. Since I was lucky enough to have a choice – I chose them.

Sometimes price is not the object – the quality of the surgical staff is. And sometimes you have to dig a bit deeper and find out if the difference in the price is more about the patient – and what is actually wrong with them, rather than the hospital being a bunch of gougers. In my case – that IS the case.

Just sayin’.

Hmmm…seems to me that if I understand that Nazarene fellow correctly that he would have been dancing at the wedding, not doing what this bishop is preaching.

Too bad that so many of the followers of the Nazarene are so bigoted and prejudiced and so worried about others’ relationships (both with their various gods and with other people) they fail to discern and follow the basic teachings of the one they profess to admire and follow in their own lives. Sad really.

The parable about plucking the log from one’s own eye first comes to mind…

More answers: google is your friend.

Shaker Aamer is a legal permanent resident of Britain. He and his family live in Battersea, South London, England. He is a Saudi national. That’s why they want to send him there. His wife and five kids are in London, and they and all his friends and the MP who represents his district all want him back there (of course!)

He was picked up in Kabul, Afghanistan, where he had gone to do some work with a Saudi charity he is/was affiliated with. Apparently, if you are a Muslim (Islam requires daily works of charity) getting involved in charity work is an automatic “conviction” of a terrorist plot or something.

Sorry, just answered my own question. Just because we cut some secret deal with MI5 and MI6 to send him to Saudi Arabia….

I have no idea where his family is. I just assumed that since he is a British citizen that they were in England. I did not assume they were in Saudi Arabia. I still don’t think that’s where they are. The whole thing stinks to high heaven.

He’s a British citizen. Why would you assume they are in Saudi Arabia?

Just askin?

Actually, the ACLU has been representing several of the detainees in many of the idiotic proceedings against them. The ACLU has been challenging many of the extra-judicial pronouncements (mostly by the Bush DOJ but recently some by the Obama DOJ) regarding these detainees and the circumstances around those cleared for release. The ACLU has been doing a lot – unfortunately it is like pushing a giant rock uphill and finding Congress , judges of the 5th Circuit, and blowhards like you at the top to send it rolling back to the bottom where they pick up the pieces and start all over again.

The ACLU HAS been busy fighting against the drone assassinations, AND indefinite imprisonment without charges, AND torture and all that stuff. Of course, our lame-stream media doesn’t cover all that librul crap so you mostly don’t know about it. Those of us who really care about it, contribute to the ACLU to help pay for all of it cuz it does cost money. So we get a newsletter each month where they tell us all what they are doing.

And today they are trying to get the PTB to follow the rule of law and actually read the Marathon bombing suspect his Miranda rights before he is interrogated. He is, after all, an American citizen, like it or not.