Meta tags:
Headings (most frequently used words):
the, february, 2010, sunday, thursday, of, compass, rose, 28, 25, 21, 18, 14, friday, 12, archives, blogs, about, me, universal, health, and, global, economy, matter, taste, how, we, sense, flavor, louis, simpson, war, generation, survivor, part, ii, la, confidential, ellroy, poem, to, noir, southland, irving, penn, small, trades, glitz, grits, trouble, with, poetry, circa, 1960, who, dat, ne, plus, ultra, for, big, easy, earth, is, grave,
Text of the page (most frequently used words):
the (597), and (274), that (109), for (70), with (47), our (47), are (45), which (45), but (42), have (39), his (39), this (38), will (38), may (35), from (35), was (34), care (34), world (32), there (30), more (29), would (28), health (28), like (26), can (25), their (25), has (24), taste (24), all (23), other (22), they (22), been (22), these (22), what (21), one (21), life (20), about (19), #february (19), not (19), who (19), new (19), bly (19), penn (19), out (18), into (18), america (18), language (17), universal (17), how (16), its (16), when (16), simpson (16), american (16), over (15), any (15), end (15), sense (15), certain (15), poetry (15), both (15), much (15), some (15), species (14), part (14), also (14), many (14), people (14), march (13), than (13), being (13), were (13), just (13), terms (13), against (13), work (13), january (12), july (12), october (12), december (12), only (12), seem (12), time (12), had (12), today (12), flavors (12), june (11), september (11), november (11), increase (11), population (11), know (11), them (11), 1960 (11), poets (11), such (11), still (11), could (11), april (10), august (10), those (10), earth (10), things (10), food (10), ability (10), between (10), most (10), history (10), well (10), ellroy (10), economy (10), coverage (10), view (9), curtis (9), faville (9), down (9), eventually (9), though (9), seems (9), war (9), merwin (9), never (9), him (9), written (9), real (9), something (9), comments (8), posted (8), individuals (8), ever (8), set (8), single (8), fact (8), through (8), probably (8), 2010 (8), first (8), early (8), open (8), every (8), during (8), while (8), images (8), point (8), human (8), system (8), cost (8), term (7), last (7), then (7), present (7), each (7), numbers (7), result (7), even (7), own (7), forms (7), instance (7), flavor (7), big (7), made (7), writing (7), 1950 (7), style (7), called (7), class (7), high (7), quality (7), two (7), here (7), white (7), crime (7), take (7), california (7), far (7), upon (7), short (6), you (6), nature (6), same (6), limits (6), scale (6), already (6), too (6), see (6), effect (6), great (6), natural (6), mean (6), deep (6), based (6), form (6), rich (6), among (6), make (6), poems (6), might (6), generation (6), around (6), since (6), etc (6), contemporary (6), approach (6), century (6), sophisticated (6), working (6), land (6), everyone (6), cultural (6), sensation (6), national (6), costs (6), insurance (6), medical (6), whom (5), death (5), different (5), simply (5), larger (5), control (5), occur (5), effects (5), long (5), run (5), small (5), rapidly (5), boundaries (5), context (5), attempts (5), progress (5), choices (5), limit (5), whole (5), sets (5), energy (5), rate (5), order (5), level (5), become (5), tradition (5), himself (5), using (5), foreign (5), middle (5), almost (5), after (5), matter (5), fall (5), published (5), fashion (5), decades (5), once (5), isn (5), social (5), studio (5), degree (5), position (5), smith (5), separate (5), unlikely (5), burden (5), think (5), because (5), capital (5), smell (5), eat (5), foods (5), economies (5), resources (5), government (5), priorities (5), comprehensive (5), reason (5), planet (4), game (4), truly (4), consequences (4), uncontrolled (4), born (4), die (4), back (4), process (4), person (4), millions (4), enough (4), individual (4), use (4), allow (4), power (4), indeed (4), amount (4), unless (4), share (4), way (4), off (4), shelter (4), vast (4), state (4), settled (4), sun (4), including (4), somehow (4), purpose (4), traditional (4), continent (4), americans (4), either (4), post (4), inside (4), figures (4), 1930 (4), 1940 (4), beginning (4), away (4), poem (4), now (4), kind (4), black (4), literature (4), heavy (4), usually (4), easily (4), generally (4), prose (4), late (4), whitman (4), european (4), problem (4), close (4), third (4), europe (4), possible (4), under (4), always (4), seemed (4), book (4), noir (4), get (4), times (4), childhood (4), spacey (4), captain (4), crowe (4), expressed (4), police (4), cop (4), little (4), strong (4), read (4), serious (4), pacific (4), given (4), must (4), road (4), least (4), another (4), military (4), describe (4), highly (4), sensations (4), means (4), less (4), parents (4), cream (4), decline (4), profit (4), budgetary (4), becomes (4), debt (4), posts (3), mass (3), suffering (3), reproductive (3), doomed (3), half (3), ten (3), scarcity (3), main (3), humanity (3), does (3), conflict (3), continue (3), growing (3), consciousness (3), limited (3), bottom (3), humankind (3), reproduce (3), itself (3), keep (3), general (3), populations (3), primary (3), wish (3), temporary (3), created (3), available (3), variations (3), consequence (3), themselves (3), simple (3), rates (3), balance (3), past (3), events (3), dead (3), line (3), whatever (3), phenomenon (3), smooth (3), side (3), parts (3), fresh (3), easy (3), call (3), vogue (3), perhaps (3), nearly (3), suggests (3), did (3), academic (3), robert (3), light (3), verse (3), free (3), ended (3), instead (3), oral (3), fixed (3), others (3), western (3), mind (3), years (3), later (3), carried (3), course (3), especially (3), weird (3), used (3), gone (3), try (3), circa (3), problems (3), stand (3), sunday (3), identity (3), running (3), felt (3), true (3), modern (3), range (3), street (3), common (3), appear (3), feel (3), dilemma (3), regard (3), hand (3), tradespeople (3), paris (3), seen (3), sought (3), celebrity (3), come (3), seeing (3), york (3), trades (3), confidential (3), compromised (3), devito (3), film (3), where (3), household (3), lines (3), played (3), having (3), movie (3), basis (3), good (3), won (3), best (3), three (3), oil (3), solved (3), includes (3), combination (3), until (3), entire (3), cannot (3), realtors (3), wine (3), looking (3), dreams (3), wagons (3), addressed (3), place (3), moment (3), saw (3), reaction (3), policy (3), depression (3), developed (3), sort (3), excess (3), include (3), without (3), four (3), complex (3), malt (3), tasting (3), physical (3), sensitivity (3), buds (3), actually (3), distinctly (3), literally (3), unable (3), grown (3), several (3), industry (3), staggering (3), companies (3), global (3), growth (3), priority (3), public (3), provide (3), federal (3), why (3), china (3), holders (3), money (3), petroleum (3), society (3), expense (3), beyond (3), demand (3), 1900 (3), older (2), imagine (2), tendency (2), solutions (2), pathetic (2), performance (2), play (2), analysis (2), save (2), prevent (2), integral (2), reduced (2), increased (2), equation (2), lives (2), bargain (2), decide (2), constantly (2), hunger (2), expansion (2), devastating (2), important (2), very (2), thing (2), vantage (2), intelligence (2), effective (2), senses (2), self (2), doing (2), within (2), environmental (2), further (2), crises (2), putting (2), effort (2), rapid (2), nevertheless (2), convenience (2), begins (2), reproducing (2), winning (2), space (2), crisis (2), resource (2), words (2), create (2), potential (2), act (2), completely (2), humans (2), virtue (2), programmed (2), minds (2), chemical (2), overcome (2), tend (2), perfected (2), forces (2), coexist (2), occurred (2), astronomical (2), giant (2), obvious (2), man (2), evidence (2), holds (2), existence (2), geologic (2), ultimate (2), ourselves (2), thinking (2), support (2), grave (2), south (2), shaken (2), orange (2), plus (2), ultra (2), came (2), invented (2), mix (2), glitz (2), song (2), possess (2), forth (2), explore (2), syntax (2), trapped (2), transform (2), writer (2), wright (2), hecht (2), examples (2), active (2), tools (2), employed (2), structures (2), whose (2), look (2), description (2), day (2), immediately (2), lyric (2), expression (2), found (2), earlier (2), political (2), yet (2), became (2), adventures (2), argument (2), eliot (2), williams (2), leading (2), voice (2), descriptive (2), spiritual (2), versifying (2), models (2), employ (2), interest (2), historical (2), 1970 (2), shared (2), mountain (2), group (2), emphasize (2), objects (2), objectivism (2), goes (2), add (2), subject (2), paradigms (2), driven (2), destructive (2), centuries (2), year (2), anxiety (2), elements (2), fifties (2), primarily (2), medium (2), application (2), allen (2), ginsberg (2), journalism (2), science (2), readers (2), admired (2), essay (2), interesting (2), points (2), seventies (2), magazine (2), knowledge (2), civilized (2), dense (2), platinum (2), palladium (2), 20th (2), except (2), remain (2), generations (2), respects (2), forever (2), documentary (2), controlled (2), industrial (2), toward (2), condition (2), before (2), chimney (2), sweep (2), subjects (2), anachronistic (2), museum (2), portraits (2), economic (2), lower (2), classes (2), crucial (2), necessary (2), frequently (2), fully (2), low (2), publicity (2), portraiture (2), outfits (2), dry (2), saying (2), setting (2), exploiting (2), straight (2), primitive (2), definition (2), anything (2), original (2), detail (2), eye (2), textures (2), photography (2), production (2), consumption (2), towards (2), irving (2), los (2), angeles (2), apprehension (2), climactic (2), art (2), genre (2), lived (2), lost (2), characters (2), dream (2), abandoned (2), fiction (2), serve (2), troubled (2), obsession (2), clear (2), character (2), wife (2), academy (2), novel (2), wrong (2), kevin (2), show (2), taking (2), cromwell (2), going (2), violence (2), bracken (2), doesn (2), along (2), mood (2), prostitution (2), raw (2), music (2), scandal (2), department (2), typical (2), corruption (2), trying (2), anyone (2), vincennes (2), pearce (2), exley (2), murder (2), plot (2), spiced (2), hours (2), tale (2), james (2), role (2), tough (2), guy (2), shoulder (2), career (2), scene (2), mother (2), substance (2), experience (2), situation (2), impression (2), thursday (2), didn (2), haven (2), murmur (2), coast (2), meant (2), understand (2), rest (2), sit (2), finished (2), laid (2), eastern (2), dark (2), face (2), cloud (2), west (2), across (2), merely (2), let (2), turn (2), old (2), city (2), lie (2), walt (2), gate (2), preoccupation (2), troubling (2), reading (2), poet (2), conflicting (2), columbia (2), digest (2), tried (2), suspension (2), unlike (2), perform (2), five (2), ways (2), facts (2), popular (2), tell (2), revolt (2), backlash (2), majority (2), exploitation (2), populist (2), sentiment (2), brought (2), left (2), lingering (2), politics (2), wave (2), tended (2), undeveloped (2), apart (2), opportunity (2), apparently (2), somewhat (2), underlying (2), louis (2), age (2), distinction (2), jewish (2), cosmopolitan (2), describing (2), components (2), say (2), descriptions (2), tiny (2), pleasure (2), often (2), taster (2), scotch (2), fruit (2), exactly (2), find (2), quite (2), smells (2), don (2), she (2), tastes (2), her (2), brain (2), sensitive (2), intense (2), normal (2), compared (2), turns (2), interaction (2), tongue (2), producing (2), involves (2), produce (2), smelling (2), consume (2), ate (2), mushroom (2), soup (2), experiencing (2), behavior (2), research (2), shown (2), texture (2), mushrooms (2), thought (2), revulsion (2), eating (2), business (2), peppers (2), recall (2), loss (2), jobs (2), resulting (2), per (2), capita (2), income (2), treatment (2), else (2), moderate (2), pay (2), private (2), treatments (2), zero (2), sum (2), grows (2), nations (2), shortfall (2), deliver (2), margin (2), controlling (2), model (2), countries (2), administration (2), elsewhere (2), disease (2), happening (2), obligations (2), fail (2), nation (2), depend (2), trillion (2), dollars (2), budget (2), republicans (2), partisan (2), realize (2), interests (2), lending (2), chinese (2), living (2), inevitably (2), spent (2), corporations (2), decrease (2), country (2), publicly (2), reserves (2), systems (2), meet (2), actual (2), addressing (2), issues (2), really (2), compass (2), rose (2), skip (2), complete, profile, blogs, archives, subscribe, atom, home, newer, endgame, total, flagrant, obliviousness, trashed, proving, again, stronger, mediation, dicker, fixes, touching, essentially, win, matters, ones, sacred, descent, plan, fold, dies, abject, hardship, humanitarian, palliatives, practice, footnotes, voluntarily, slow, challenge, pursuing, path, waste, grand, pestilence, pretending, perpetuate, trends, frequent, futility, olympian, harmless, despite, pain, delusions, maintain, security, perseverance, false, ironically, region, subsistence, boundary, ameliorating, scarcities, regional, fires, feeding, conflagration, fuel, firefighting, succeed, devastation, address, causation, strike, influence, leave, instinctual, urge, decision, fast, encounter, exceeds, killed, stops, artificial, competition, hastening, extinction, manipulation, utilization, finite, entity, expended, pockets, loops, delay, hedges, entropical, tiniest, whatsoever, scheme, irremediable, selfishness, overtaken, exceeded, competing, exist, necessity, instincts, exceed, depredations, reduce, periods, stasis, relationships, longer, segments, extinctions, meteors, suspect, viruses, outsmart, startling, sudden, ascent, geological, alive, live, elaborations, dissipate, exhausted, inception, animate, minute, blip, blink, convulsions, next, millennia, clocks, tick, shouldn, fool, purposes, actions, friday, evoke, alligator, soothe, savage, beast, hard, served, garnish, lemon, juice, herbsaint, mandarin, liqueur, bourbon, ingredients, proportion, flawless, marching, tuesday, celebrate, superbowl, victory, saints, dat, lyricism, scandinavian, mystics, answered, passed, popularity, rumi, figure, requirements, program, lacked, linguistic, skill, invent, daring, insight, signifier, hollander, wilbur, hill, merrill, nemerov, closing, unsuccessfully, experimental, finkel, hall, silkin, kinds, richard, kenney, pinsky, strive, finely, crafted, traditionally, constructed, ogden, nash, phyllis, mcginley, jorie, graham, leslie, scalapino, possibilities, endlessly, enticing, unfocused, resisted, impulse, regarding, stale, vehicle, conveyance, cathartic, messages, ritualistic, sublimation, speech, apprehensible, accessible, transparent, dependable, suggest, manipulations, augmentations, signification, formal, eccentricities, paradigm, prosaic, printed, hackneyed, repugnant, 1967, unite, activism, stream, imagery, designed, liberate, archetypical, strictures, confining, sexual, roles, predictable, ethical, categories, body, strident, advocate, peace, vietnam, east, 1962, attacking, pound, descendants, inner, unconscious, mere, outward, pictures, conscious, concepts, repository, wisdom, banality, encouraging, mystical, notions, buried, awareness, enlightenment, abandon, stripped, inspired, largely, french, continued, proposes, renewed, image, sees, practiced, abroad, neruda, trakl, vallejo, lorca, indictment, summons, commonplace, realized, kinnell, levertov, absorption, charles, olson, william, carlos, trend, require, classical, myths, ancient, movement, remarks, adopts, sooner, adopt, archaic, futile, reintroduce, intensity, keeping, phenomena, twenty, yvor, winters, school, understood, recommended, england, speculate, seventeenth, eighteenth, continues, yeats, abruptly, break, radical, sensing, becoming, prosy, fusing, indisputably, poetic, namely, rhymes, strict, meters, elaborate, sestinas, emergence, nineteen, criticism, proposition, transformed, influenced, print, calls, feels, versification, diverse, lowell, says, prey, basic, contradiction, sociological, utterance, unsuited, adapted, introduced, contemporaries, translation, occasionally, offer, polemical, assaults, regarded, faults, issue, above, criticizing, criticizes, pertinent, criticisms, offers, ironic, correspondences, shifting, changing, allegiances, doubt, whether, behind, charges, compare, attitudes, cycles, repeat, succeeding, sixties, edited, trouble, organ, grinder, swept, propulsive, flux, capitalism, meaning, accoutrements, rhythms, lyrical, gradually, sucked, extended, snapshot, maintenance, cities, elegy, ode, hardly, recognizable, anymore, function, reliable, adaptations, contrast, hygienic, scrubbed, remoteness, represent, respectful, imperious, artifacts, archeological, file, untouched, pathos, exists, undertaker, immediacy, editors, disappearing, correct, travelers, journalists, moved, reluctantly, forced, acknowledge, reconstitution, ancien, régime, automation, communication, speed, curtain, charming, daily, lady, wrestler, employs, suggestive, periodical, illustration, previous, eras, hogarth, cruikshank, daumier, nast, beerbohm, hirschfeld, levine, searle, ralph, steadman, responses, caricatured, identities, precise, aesthetically, methodology, absurdly, pompous, sadly, objectivization, type, cast, technological, picaresque, seediness, urban, efficiencies, consolidations, squeezed, contract, circus, performers, vendors, iceman, trainporter, blacksmith, milkman, curiosities, wax, metaphorical, undertone, quaint, dated, distance, presumed, separation, leisured, balloon, seller, breaking, dirty, repetitive, dreary, apprehended, irony, company, ennoble, honor, unfettered, cleaner, initial, specimen, condescension, picturesque, absurdity, portraying, functional, paraphernalia, hanging, emphasized, exaggerated, sepia, ranged, quoted, respect, diligence, specific, dignity, revealed, strengths, integrity, dimensions, enterprise, starting, preference, below, coarse, theatrical, canvas, backgrounds, primitivistic, visual, qualities, atget, series, caricatures, profiles, eccentric, separated, respective, milieus, isolated, neutral, repeatedly, successive, exotic, mud, men, guinea, paid, dozens, picked, persuaded, oriented, circumstances, utmost, photo, journalist, perfectionist, clarified, instances, accidental, portrait, everything, reproduction, vision, painstaking, devotion, exhibits, tension, careful, illustrator, naturalistic, gritty, verité, surfaces, everyday, creating, occasion, elevated, artistic, fantasized, idealized, wealth, conspicuous, demonstration, aspiration, esteem, paul, getty, 2009, anti, termed, london, originally, intended, reproduced, feature, article, illustrations, full, prints, format, negatives, printing, emulsions, mall, project, grits, valentine, reality, authenticity, tells, story, material, outsider, stance, perfect, imaginative, cartoon, versions, nightmare, filled, unsolved, mysteries, verdicts, unpaid, debts, court, resort, personal, code, justice, statement, books, extension, movies, difficult, youth, brushes, madness, pornographic, gave, bird, psychological, stress, formulaic, board, fictional, relationship, abusers, emotional, core, drama, gladiator, usual, steals, slick, portrayal, detective, payoffs, arrests, menacing, ought, gotten, oscar, owes, scorcese, flat, plane, cartoonish, cubism, dimensional, deeper, raised, abusive, drives, rage, profound, affection, bassinger, plays, restores, punch, incorporating, neglected, sleaze, homosexual, racial, goodfellas, chinatown, jerry, goldsmith, score, leavened, clips, swing, torchy, hits, punctuated, eerie, sound, brilliant, combined, framing, device, sheet, touting, chamber, commerce, attractions, sunlit, suburbia, glamour, gives, nostalgic, scandals, bad, trope, bridge, cliches, films, atmospheric, evocations, consolidate, drug, rackets, crumbling, empire, recently, imprisoned, boss, mickey, cohen, bumping, threatens, bar, stumble, accidentally, onto, disturbing, contradictions, cases, dragooned, illegal, brutality, sessions, thickened, machinations, smut, peddler, sid, hudgens, danny, hooker, lynn, beautifully, kim, basinger, award, actress, telescopes, manages, trifle, cramped, hurried, places, involving, ranking, dudley, finest, vamping, irish, operator, heart, goon, subordinates, pits, confederates, russell, bud, chip, bowling, ball, ambitious, young, chief, vindicate, father, memory, jack, heroes, finds, violent, motel, derricks, obsessed, petty, abuse, poverty, rootlessness, educated, 1981, golf, caddy, 1987, volume, quartet, 1990, mature, complexly, plotted, features, colloquial, telegraphic, reads, blotter, rap, patois, takes, getting, contingent, pull, punches, soften, blow, counted, choose, emphatic, fried, inkling, fan, hardboiled, maybe, southland, note, kingston, jamaica, memoir, birth, upbringing, contributes, difference, citizen, proper, ________, ending, tame, restless, journey, begun, 500, ago, southern, discover, route, fabled, indies, arc, efforts, investigations, ends, facing, seeming, endless, expanse, fantasy, striving, escapes, dorado, nirvana, xanadu, pioneers, looked, shading, eyes, please, beds, preparing, thrones, english, colonists, tables, returning, sea, follow, mad, columbus, follows, right, marines, unsettled, air, rejoice, banks, thrive, wretched, hilltops, cheap, housing, valleys, gas, drums, waiting, sad, night, closes, intimations, distillation, observations, near, san, francisco, concluding, outwardly, comic, bald, sheepish, tone, collection, portrays, ambassador, establishment, regards, playground, exploited, paradise, seabord, promised, immigrants, empty, sailing, orient, arrival, quench, wanderlust, seduced, forefathers, stirs, ambition, onward, dreaming, move, sleep, reins, slack, stay, planner, cortez, tenochtitlan, herodotus, babylon, rectangular, blocks, astonished, subdivided, valley, divide, stars, infinite, spaces, bear, faces, rock, round, row, marina, fabulous, raft, king, duke, angel, rising, incense, sight, heaven, voices, banjos, tennessee, ohio, epical, clatter, tennis, players, bearing, bracketed, define, watershed, union, perched, edge, stuff, editorial, office, handled, professionals, interviewed, mademoiselle
Text of the page (random words):
siness interests and foreign debt holders what is happening today is that china and arabia are lending america the money to run its government programs each new obligation we add to the burden means america its economy becomes that much more dependent upon the pleasure of the holders of our paper at some point too america s position as the primary consumer of commodities begins to decline when the chinese and indians realize they have no reason to prop up a failing giant will they have any reason not to call in those obligations or to stop lending to us altogether on balance then our declining economy will mean that our ability to care for our own population will also decline in several senses americans have been living on borrowed time over the last three decades nearly every indicator points to a lower standard of living for the great majority and that includes health care as well rather than controlling health care costs we will end up choosing whom to exclude whom to privilege the criteria for that will inevitably be cost the marketplace ultimately will decide debt obligations aren t open ended faith in institutions no matter how big does have limits our federal government will never be too big to fail what is the tipping point at which our ability to sell our debt becomes untenable when do u s bonds get reduced to junk status when unemployment rises to 20 when we close our public schools when we stand down our uniformed forces how far are we from a general national collapse based on the amount of debt we seemed determined to take on can you think of any reason why china probably the most selfish nation in the world today would be inclined to help america if we fell into a deep 1930 s style depression the only argument i ve ever heard is that they depend to an inordinate degree upon american markets for their goods but if that market were to dry up what then the world s resource balance is not open ended our ability to provide comprehensive health care isn t either the ultimate rebalance against the world s ability to provide for its excess population will result in human suffering on a frightening scale nationally we can look elsewhere with remorse upon the millions of humans who suffer from hunger disease and early miserable death because we refuse to control our populations this is the unavoidable consequence the fact that it s happening elsewhere allows us the comfortable complacency of believing that there don t have to be any losers that it s not a zero sum game expressed in terms of health coverage it may appear as an illusion of priorities if only we could be smarter about allocation everyone could be saved but the hierarchy of priorities the bell curve of who gets what across the spectrum of nations and economies will eventually involve choices but there won t be any good choices _____________________________________ addendum 3 3 10 i wish i believed that the government could organize and administer health care while controlling costs the government system model is being tried in several countries presently but the jury is still out on how successful those models will continue to perform in the long term but the point of my post isn t to set up a dialectic between private and public administration of coverage my purpose is much larger and may be pointlessly conceptual to restate the earth s population has literally outrun the resources both natural and human needed to support it that shortfall notably includes medical care our view of american health care seems to be controlled by a couple of spurious assumptions 1 that it would be possible given the available resources to deliver health care to every american without somehow compromising every other budgetary priority and 2 the amount of profit to be derived from any for profit social insurance system provides enough excess margin to make up for any shortfall in the cost of running a universal system if we extend the context to include the vast numbers of uncovered individuals in the so called third world it becomes clear that global universal health coverage is truly unattainable with the growth of the so called global economy we re seeing that our traditional american historical insulation from other participants in the world economy is evaporating the world economy truly is a zero sum game everyone can t be rich and as population grows the numbers of those who stand to be excluded grows not just in terms of separate nations but in terms of discrete classes of patrons america has a capitalist economy socialistic revisions of that system have been made which moderate certain of its more destructive effects it may well be that the american health insurance industry could be nationalized that would allow us to claim that we had universal coverage but it wouldn t generate more revenue if we went on a pay as you go basis the budgetary compromises would end up looking exactly like the arbitrary measures private insurance companies engage in i e some treatments and some individuals would end up being deferred or denied the idea that the only thing standing between the present situation and a fully functioning universal health care system is the elimination of the profit motive is a serious delusion what we could end up with would be a two tiered system in which the rich would still acquire high level treatment while everyone else would be thrown into a third rate system with compromised quality all down the line because the cost to insure and treat the bottom 25 would easily drag the rest of the population down in my view the real culprit in all this is the decline of the american middle class with the resulting decline in real per capita income occurring at just the moment in our history when health care costs are climbing rapidly take the auto industry america s on the verge of losing all automobile production to other national economies the loss of that capital and the fruit of that capitalization is staggering millions and millions of jobs lost buying power gone and all the things which that capital once afforded including good health care policies gone posted by curtis faville at 9 11 am 19 comments thursday february 25 2010 a matter of taste how we sense flavor like most people i think i took the phenomenon of taste for granted for most of the first half of my life as a child growing up in a household comprised of two midwestern parents who d never been very adventurous in their eating habits i tended to regard spicy or unusual flavors with suspicion and even revulsion there were certain foods and food flavors which i found intolerable my stepfather who had traveled around the world while working as a deck hand in the merchant shipping business during the 1920 s had developed a strong distaste for highly spiced foods especially garlic and peppers my mother had grown up in a poor household during the depression and like many of her generation welcomed the convenience food revolution of the 1950 s preferring canned and frozen food alternatives to fresh for my part i had a severely restricted range of acceptable flavors and was usually unable to consume certain foods or flavors i can recall distinctly being unable to eat dairy cream spinach asparagus brussel sprouts mushrooms fruitcake peppers avocado liver fish creamed corn beets artichokes and several other things which i can t recall at the moment i remember distinctly being unable to eat campbell s cream of mushroom soup and being punished by being made to sit in front of the bowl at the table for hours after meal time forbidden to play until i ate my lunch both the flavor and the texture of mushrooms literally made me spontaneously retch a horrible sensation my parents somehow thought my resistance was deliberate and irrational and that by forcing me to eat the offending food i would get over my revulsion my reaction to certain flavors and textures in foods was thought to be a kind of immaturity or childish unreasonableness in refusing to try new things or to act more grown up about eating like most kids i loved sweets and wanted my foods to be bland and predictably consistent in texture or sensation i liked hamburger and mashed potato ice cream and cookies chocolate milk and sliced apples chicken legs and watermelon my parents would be shocked i imagine to learn how broad and cosmopolitan my tastes have become as an adult surprised and perhaps even vindicated in their campaign to enhance my childhood appetite but it turns out that my behavior in childhood was completely normal research into the behavior of tasting has shown that children generally have much more sensitive though much less sophisticated taste than adults generally do as people age their taste sensitivity changes growing less keen also those who smoke or consume alcohol in large amounts or have other environmental or vocational exposures or stresses may also lose taste sensitivity both of my parents for instance smoked heavily so it s quite likely that when they ate cream of mushroom soup it didn t have nearly as intense a flavor as it did to my immature taste buds they were literally experiencing something different than i was or at least experiencing it differently or were they most people are familiar with the general knowledge that human taste is composed simply of four simple flavor sensations sweet sour salty and bitter certain other secondary sensations have been associated with piquancy and savoriness but these may simply be another sensation such as heat or slipperiness i e not true flavors thinking about these childhood memories got me wondering how the devil does taste work and how do people feel so many contradictory and complex sensations about food food is cultural taste is a physiological process describable in purely scientific terms but where do these separate spheres of apprehension and empirical data intersect it turns out that we perceive the sensation of taste through the interaction of certain chemicals which are present in what we eat with taste receptors on our tongue the taste buds at the molecular level what this means is that the chemical structure of taste producing substances actually comes into structural interaction with the fungiform papillae of the buds producing the sensation of a certain flavor which is then transmitted to the brain through the nerve tree incredibly then taste is actually a physical process like two sets of tinker toy structures mating but taste isn t simply the physical inter reaction perceived by the tongue taste involves the olfactory sense smell as well attempts to categorize the range of smells apparently hasn t yet been conclusively accomplished i read somewhere that there are eight distinctly different types of odor any combination of which might produce a myriad of variations of smell s when we eat something we are also simultaneously smelling it so taste is a combination of both tasting and smelling working together to produce a complex array of effects how do we describe flavors some people seem much more sensitive to taste and smell and still others seem to possess a highly sophisticated aptitude in perceiving and describing such sensations there are in fact so called super taster people whose sensitivity to taste and or smell is many times finer and more intense than normal human animals as a matter of fact are fairly low on the scale of smell sense compared to some other creatures the ability to describe smells with a fine sense of distinction has always intrigued me my wife for instance has a much greater ability to describe the flavors of a given substance than i do i don t mean she tastes more different things just that the separate flavors seem to summon up their descriptive signifiers more readily in her brain than in mine or that she is able to sort them into hierarchies more easily than i can is this something one is born with or is it a learned ability probably both as a single malt scotch and wine and beer connoisseur i am frequently reading taste descriptions i often find these quite ingenious and usually accurate though how i react to a certain described flavor often differs from the sentiment of another taster single malt scotch taste descriptives may include such unlikely components as leathery charcoal smashed bugs woody soapy phenolic fresh mown hay slaty briny buttery peppery floral and so forth put all the fruit and vegetable flavors into this mix and shake it vigorously what exactly do i taste when i sip a little kistler chardonnay or some 16 year lagavulin or some orval trappist ale a description for a complex single malt may say something like nice forward warmth strong caramel burnt almond with orange zest and a lingering crackerjax evanescence these descriptions sometimes seem like little poems tiny epiphanic moments which seems perfectly appropriate tasting for pleasure or curiosity after all is one of life s great delights and deserves to be appreciated just as any other physical or mental sensation which brings enjoyment i just wish i were more adept at identifying and describing the flavors i sense in food and drink some people can take one bite of something and immediately describe the four or five spice components which are present me i m lucky if i can name more than one posted by curtis faville at 10 11 am 3 comments sunday february 21 2010 louis simpson of the war generation a survivor part ii louis simpson now at age 86 is one of the last survivors of the generation of poets who saw military service in wwii and lived to tell the tale during the post war boom when polite polished versifying was still the honored approach to literary distinction and notoriety he shared with anthony hecht and karl shapiro and delmore schwartz a jewish heritage which both sharpened his sense of ethnic peril and provided a somewhat uncharacteristic for american poets cosmopolitan sense of european cultural connection as a jewish american poet simpson enjoyed a sort of spiritual dual citizenship which enabled him to view american cultural paradigms from a position both in and outside of context not unlike that of philip roth bernard malamud saul bellow or elia kazan this sense of the alienated insider is in many respects simpson s saving grace his best work collected in his pulitzer prize winning at the end of the open road wesleyan 1963 uses the impression ism of disorientation common to many veterans of the war as a rhetorical platform to criticize cultural excess and embarrassment while re stating the terms of the multi cultural diaspora which all americans share as a jew he is both a part of and apart from the history of american literature his thematic componants include both walt whitman and sholom aleichem ellis island and the golden gate what this suggests in concrete terms is a divided allegiance between on the one hand the intellectual sophistication the new critics the fugitives etc which would be expressed as a contempt and impatience with the ...
|
