Trumper suggests consuming NewsMax as a reliable information source

 I felt like Facebook was too trashy a space to waste thoughtful writing, so, I'm posting a response I wrote on Facebook because I feel like it should be in a blog. Or something.

Here's what I was responding to: please look into a trusted news like newsmax to get the stuff u are not getting so u can know the truth

Note: there were a bunch of other nasty comments from Trump Loyalists, but you've seen those before, so I don't need to repeat them here. The original poster, however, is someone I respect, and she remained civil, which is why I decided to respond. If I can help undo what the conservative media has done to ONE mind, maybe I'll find a way to help others, too.

Here is my response:

So, there's a lot of comment threads at this point, so I'm going to say one final thing before I take a social media break (which I recommend doing at least once a year, it's like a luxury vacation).

Lori, I am very familiar with NewsMax. Its main competitors are FoxNews, BlazeTV, and OAN. These three other right-wing networks, together with NewsMax, each use their own sophisticated workflows to embed pro-trump propaganda and anti-democrat disparagement into both news and opinion shows.

(for more details on media bias, don't just take NewsMax's word for it. Check out http://mediabiasfactcheck.com/ - I think you'll find that they lay out the truth plain as day and are equally as critical of CNN/Huffpost types as they are of NewsMax/FoxNews types - this should help you evaluate your news source and hopefully inspire you to either move toward a network with less bias, more facts, or both)

NewsMax is owned and managed by a man named Christopher Ruddy. Please look him up. You'll discover that Chris Ruddy is a *very* good friend and confidant of Donald Trump. In fact, Ruddy is such a good friend that even if a seemingly negative fact is proven about Trump, Ruddy uses NewsMax to either convince its viewers that it's "no big deal," or to ignore evidence of facts and pretend it's not true.

Not only does NewsMax use selective reporting to keep you away from real news, NewsMax actively reports false "facts" and misrepresents/misinterprets real facts to feed its viewers confirmation biases and emotions.

The techniques are clever and subtle, so most viewers don't even realize that their opinions are being built by subtextual provocation of emotion.

The end result for viewers who are loyal to these four networks is the same. They become one of four things:

1. Ardent Trump supporters who refuse to listen to or believe anything that paints the president in a negative light and are absolutely convinced that all the other news outlets (except for the pro-trump news outlets) are part of an intricate conspiracy cabal trying to "sell out" our country

2. Zealots who insist Trump is the second coming of Christ and there is literally nothing Trump can do wrong,

3. Unhinged and vengeful militia men & women, with weapons, who are ready to cause violence and destruction upon Trump's call to arms, and

4. Conservative internet trolls who use allcaps but no evidence in their arguments and who threaten conservative news media hosts AND other republicans when said hosts or republicans dare to cross the president. See Meghyn Kelly from 2016. Republican woman who, four years later, STILL gets death threats because she asked Trump a question that he decided was "unfair." Also Mitt Romney, who voted his conscience at the impeachment hearings and has been vilified by Trump and the four types of extremely loyal, line toeing, lock-step obedient viewers these false news outlets have cultivated.

So, until you choose to consume news that is 1. Mostly Factual and 2. Less Biased, there will be no opportunity to undo the scramble of disdain for democrats and the pile of admiration for Trump that's been painstakingly engraved into your spirit.

Thus, I ask you, no, rather, I *beg* you, to please, please find a less biased source of information. You and I will very likely continue to annoy each other (and clearly some other followers to this thread have had their fill of me), but that's a thing that happens when 2 GOOD women are each trying to do the right thing by convincing the other to see things from a different perspective.

How about a challenge? I'm willing to consume NewsMax for a *full week* starting tonight if you'd be willing to consume The Atlantic for a full week and then we can discuss and argue our observations. I think that would be fun. We could turn it into a drinking game. Game on?

We can also do this via DM instead of on this thread because it looks like I'm getting under the skin of some of your friends, and I don't want to cause them any more angst than this election is likely already causing them. No matter your politics, we could all use a break from politics.

A letter to my dearest Michigan cousin about Obamacare

Dear Ryan,

I think you and I agree ideologically on more than you’d suspect, but sometimes the context surrounding issues isn’t framed the same way for you as it is for me, which is why we end up having such different opinions about issues regarding politics.

I saw your Facebook post today about Obamacare and I’m concerned that you are misunderstanding some of the facts about the Affordable Care Act, and that if you did understand the facts more completely, you might have a different opinion than the one you’re sharing with your friends and family.

I’m going to share some components of the ACA with you in an effort to put better context around the news you learned about today, which is that the average monthly insurance premium cost on the healthcare exchanges is $250/month.

I think you misunderstood this news, as you indicated in your Facebook post that the average person in Michigan will pay an average of $250/month.  The $250/month average is not for everyone in Michigan to pay.  The $250/month average is the average amount a person who signs up for a plan using the insurance exchange will pay per month, and that’s the amount they pay before employer and government subsidies.

Before we discuss the $250/month and who is going to end up paying that, let’s first discuss how many people (like you and me) get healthcare.

You probably already know that a lot of people already have healthcare coverage through their employer, where each employee is charged the same amount each month for insurance with the employer’s group coverage provider.  

What you may not know is that your employer subsidizes your monthly healthcare premiums.  Here’s what that means: Your employer pays a crapload of money each month for your family’s healthcare premiums.  You pay a small portion of the total premium price out of your own pocket, which comes out of each paycheck.   

Here’s the math breakdown on that (this is the breakdown of the insurance we get through Andrew’s employer, which I’m using as my example):  Andrew pays $218.92 per month for health insurance for his family of three, and that $218.92 is taken out of his paycheck automatically each month.  This insurance is not super awesome (we have a $4500 deductible and ridiculously high copays).  But, the total cost of our insurance premiums is actually $1094.58 each month.  Andrew’s employer pays $875.66 every month toward our health insurance and Andrew pays $218.92.

I suspect that some unionized employees in Michigan may pay even less than $218.92 per month out of their own pocket, thanks to union negotiations for insurance coverage, which means your employer may very well pick up a greater proportion of your family’s insurance tab than Andrew’s employer does.  Check with your HR rep to find out the employer contribution to your health plan.  I bet they pay more for your insurance than you might have ever suspected!

So back to the Affordable Care Act and the news articles today predicting healthcare premiums will cost an average of $250/month.  Please know that if you already have group insurance through your employer, you won't have to pay anything beyond your monthly contribution to your insurance premiums, which typically just comes out of your paycheck.  This $250/month average is only for people buying coverage on the insurance exchanges, which most people won’t do.

So you might at this point be wondering...who is going to pay this $250/month average?  Well, It’s these people:

• Middle class small business owners who couldn’t afford private health insurance at rates that used to be much higher than $250/month
• People who were previously denied private insurance due to a pre-existing condition like diabetes, asthma, chronic back pain or hypertension - fortunately, the new health care law prevents insurance companies from denying benefits to people with conditions like these. Do you know what a private insurance company used to say to a diabetic who wanted health insurance? They said NO! We won't cover you.
• People who got laid off from a job and are currently paying upwards of $600/month for COBRA ($250 is less than $600). If Andrew were to leave his job right now, we would pay the $1094.58 plus a $5.00 administrative fee per month to continue our current coverage under COBRA.
• People who work full time for an employer that doesn’t provide health insurance because it’s prohibitively expensive, and by prohibitively expensive I mean these two things:
• Group health insurance actually is expensive, and often costs more than $250/month per person
• If a company were to pay for insurance for its employees, that means the company nets less profit, which means salaries and bonuses for top executives won’t be so large. Executives don’t like getting lower salaries and bonuses.
• People who work part-time for an employer like Wal-mart, which doesn’t provide insurance to its employees(under the guise of needing only “part time” workers) and pays workers so little they have to go on taxpayer-funded Medicaid if they get sick and want to stay alive.  This causes taxpayers to effectively subsidize Wal-mart’s low prices. Isn’t that weird? We take advantage of Wal-mart’s low prices, not realizing that their prices are so low because they treat their employees like crap, which is actually driving my tax bill higher because Wal-mart won’t behave themselves as an employer.  I’d much rather pay LESS in taxes and higher prices for Wal-mart stuff, because at least I have a choice if I’m gonna be spending my money on Wal-mart stuff.  I don’t have a choice if I’m paying taxes.
• People who have a job, but don’t have health insurance and can’t afford health insurance but actually want health insurance, so they can see a doctor and feel better and stay alive - these folks, while paying the average of $250/month, are the people who will be getting government subsidies.  These are the folks who work at Wal Mart. See bullet above.  Dear Wal Mart: Here’s some of my tax money so you can have healthy employees working for peanuts in your stores so that you can, in turn, pass those savings onto me in the form of lower prices.  You’re welcome for the subsidy. Love, Kara
• People who don’t have health insurance and don’t want health insurance.  This is a group that very few people actually fall into, but it’s the group that’s being represented voraciously by those politicians and pundits who are opposed to the Affordable Care Act.

Now, I realize also that if you currently have group health insurance, you might, at the beginning of your insurance year (January for most people), discover that your premiums have increased.  This is because of two reasons:

1. Insurance premiums often go up based on the insurance company’s evaluation of the total cost of health care for your Employer.  Your employer, instead of absorbing the higher cost, may (and typically does) choose to pass that increase into you.

2. Employers (especially anti-Obama employers) may choose to increase your share of the insurance premium because they are politically motivated.  Your employer may say, “Because of Obamacare, you have to pay more.”  Which is, in most cases, actually true.  Obamacare exists.  Your employer hates Obama.  Your employer raises the amount you pay for insurance because he/she is angry at Obama.  You, in turn, blame the President for this and choose to side politically with your employer.  And around and around you go.

In short, if you already have healthcare insurance through your employer, you either won’t be affected at all by the ACA, or you’ll only be mildly affected with a slight increase in premium costs for the reasons described above.  I hope this helps frame your understanding of the $250 projected average cost of health insurance premiums on the exchange and who is actually going to end up paying that.

And in case you’ve been watching or reading Anti-Obamacare news (such as Fox News, Drudge Report or Breitbart), here are some other properties of the new law that you may find interesting, which are not typically discussed by Anti-Obama news outlets:

• ACA creates a health insurance marketplace, where people who couldn’t get insurance before (individuals, families and small businesses) can now go buy insurance for $250/month.  
• ACA says that health insurance companies can’t sentence a person to illness or death by denying them an insurance plan, benefits or treatment due to a preexisting condition.
• ACA makes it illegal for insurance companies to cancel your insurance just because you get sick.  Insurance companies used to do this a lot.
• ACA says it’s illegal for insurance companies to sue you or refuse to treat your illness because you made a small mistake on your application
• ACA says that insurance companies can’t put a cap on lifetime limits.  What this means: if Obamacare had been in place a long time ago, a lot of people who died from illnesses like cancer would still be alive today (Sorry dude.  This is your last round of Chemo.  You have hit your lifetime chemo limit. You can go ahead and die.  Thanks, bye).  And now, thanks to the ACA, if you get cancer, you can’t be denied treatment simply because you reached your insurance companies treatment limit.
• The 80/20 rule (this is my favorite part!).  Previously, insurance companies could charge you whatever they wanted for insurance, earn ridiculous income, and use that income to pay huge salaries and bonuses, have lavish and expensive conference at fancy hotels and engage in other frivolous activities with all the money the insurance company had leftover from price gouging.  Basically, Obamacare says that no matter how much an insurance company charges people for insurance premiums, they have to spend 80% of that income on actually providing healthcare for people.  Only 20% can be used for non-healthcare related things.  

Anyhow, I know that most of this information is not well-known, especially in anti-Obama news circles.  I can’t and won’t argue that President Obama is the greatest president ever, but I cannot accept the idea that people who want to stay healthy would've been better off if the ACA had never been effected.

Much Love,

Your Favorite Cousin Ever Kara Weez

Words that make me want to barf

Here's where I'll start collecting words I hate:

1. comfy
2. hubby
3. literally
4. mortified
5. tidy



Reasons I might hate a word:

1. Because it's stupid
2. Because it's ugly
3. Because it's hackneyed, trite or redundant
4. Because it's often used incorrectly

2nd best mojitos ever

Well, try as I might, I shall never be able to make a mojito as well as my pal Juan Carlos.

But, having witnessed JC make tons of fantastic mojitos and feeling confident I might be able to repeat the recipe, I recently did a little experimenting using some rum I inherited...and...well...I was able to make a pretty good mojito.

Makes TWO servings:

2 pint glasses
5oz rum
4 large spoonfuls of sugar
Juice from 2 limes
Fresh mint leaves, gently bruised with mortar and pestle
Club soda
2 handfuls of Ice

Mix rum, sugar and lime juice until the sugar dissolves
Stick some bruised mint into each pint glass
Put ice into each pint glass
Split the sweet rum solution between the pint glasses
Cover with club soda & stir
Wait about five minutes, stir again, and drink

YumYumYum. Still not as good as Juan Carlos's mojitos, though.

The sweetest little 'betic that you ever did see...

A few days ago a friend of mine from Camp AZDA was walking along Mill Avenue in Tempe, AZ when she (we'll call her Christina to keep things appropriately anonymous) was drawn into a neat musical number being performed on the sidewalk.

Let me just say that such an experience should be familiar to all who have ever walked along Mill Avenue near ASU, as there is no shortage of musical numbers (some pleasant, some less so) on that particular block.

That day, Christina discovered 9 year old Lelea Fonua, a young smiling face that many from camp remember fondly, playing his ukulele & singing familiar melodies on the street in an effort to raise himself some tuition to attend diabetes camp.

Lelea, it's clear from your Youtube videos that you are a very talented 'betic! I am sure your ukulele and voice will help you earn your camp tuition. Once you earn your way, in addition to being able to attend the best week of any diabetic's year, you will have a fantastically inspiring story to tell.

The Little Drummer Boy Song

This morning Andrew and I sat down to breakfast at 1:30PM in our kitchen. We were feeling rather pleased with ourselves having trotted around the block for exercise and lifting a weight or two at the gym, and our reward was to build a breakfast smorgasbord filled with freshly baked bread, ham, cheese, butter, sugar coated preserves and coffee with heavy cream and pumpkin pie for dessert.

So there we were at the table, listening to Christmas music on Pandora using the Roku box I bought myself for Andrew’s birthday, and the Little Drummer Boy song begins to play.

Just as I announce, “I love this song,” Andrew blurts, “I hate this song.”

I’m appalled. What kind of Scrooge hates the Little Drummer Boy song?

I give Andrew a look that reads, “Explain yourself.” He doesn’t quite get nonverbal communications, so I follow the look with an audible, “What is your problem? Why do you hate Little Drummer Boy?”

While Andrew compiles his answer, I fondly remember a story from my own youth (er...young adulthood), which I’ll share with you now:

I was shopping with my mother shortly before Christmas when I was about twenty or so, and she was driving around like Batwoman with me in the passenger seat, searching every toy store for the noisiest, most obnoxious child’s Christmas present imaginable.

Shortly before we had left the house that day, I remember asking her why she was carrying a shopping list with things like “Drum Set, Cymbals, Child’s Flute, Electric Keyboard, etc.” on it.

My mother explained that she was going to “get” her brothers now that they’ve had children. She just kept saying that she was just going to “get” them and it would serve them right, etc. etc.

Not quite understanding how children’s toys are going to “get” her brothers, I later did a bit of investigating and discovered this: My mother has been forever involved in this (one-sided and mostly good natured) feud with her brothers, who’d apparently bought my brother and me the noisiest, most obnoxious children’s Christmas presents when we were children.

And so it was my mother's mission to buy my various uncles’ children the same, presumably so my uncles could derive the same enjoyment from the toys as she did.

So, as I’m at the breakfast table with Andrew remembering the drum set/noisy Christmas present story and thinking of Drummer Boy and listening to Drummer Boy and wondering what the heck Andrew’s problem is that he has to dislike drummer boy so much, Andrew finally blurts out, “Well, it’s just a dumb song.”

So I give Andrew a look of confusion, indicating with my expression that he should explain what he means by this. Andrew, oblivious to this nonverbal communication and thinking his a perfectly satisfactory explanation, resumes eating his luxurious breakfast. So I respond with my usual response, “Andrew, that is not a satisfactory explanation.”

What comes next is something those who know Andrew well will recognize. He takes a deep breath, rolls his eyes, and begins with, “So...”

Let me just interject here and tell you that when Andrew begins a sentence in such a way, a diatribe is imminent. And so started the diatribe:

“Alright look. I mean, how much sense does the Drummer Boy song *actually* make? You’ve got a little tiny baby, trying his hardest to sleep, which is what babies do, you know, fall asleep, or at least try to, and then there’s some obnoxious kid running around playing what? Not soft lullaby music to help the baby sleep, no, he’s playing a DRUM set. DRUMS. Little kids playing drums is not music, it’s just noise. I don’t know why anyone would write a song about a kid banging on some drums trying to wake the baby. That’s just stupid.”

Andrew looks at me expectantly (awaiting my wholehearted agreement) and I just start cracking up. I just can’t help myself. And so Andrew’s look of incredulity melts off his face and he starts laughing, too.

And as we’re laughing at that darn Drummer Boy drumming around waking up babies, I remember my mother’s story about the uncles, and the drum sets, etc. So to prolong the breakfast entertainment we’re providing ourselves, I thoughtfully append some additional funniness to Andrew’s diatribe by smartly saying, “Yeah, and I bet that obnoxious Little Drummer Boy got that noisy drum set from one of his dumb uncles LAST Christmas...

...

...oh....wait....nevermind.”

An Afternoon at Grandpa Roger's

So, we arrive at Roger's about 90 minutes after the wild-wild-west event begins. We park next to the house and leave the dogs in the car for a few minutes so that I can install Roger's uncooked pizza rolls from the Plymouth Picnic Basket directly into his refridgerator.

We stand outside the car, discussing what to do with the dogs.

Andrew says, "We should put leashes on the dogs."

I say, "I don't think that's necessary. It's a big property and there are lots of people and dogs running around. They don't need leashes."

So we walk up the hill to Grandpa's western town, and we're just in time for the pre-meal prayer.

Next, we stand near the crowd and bow our heads, and soon I hear Grandpa (who is quite near us) grumbling about something, trying to keep himself quiet during the prayer. I glance over at him. And he's pointing at MY dog (Johan), who has decided walk right over to the fencepost and pee on all the western clothes that Dave & Ada's descendants have bought, assembled and sewn for this wild-wild-west day occasion.

Then, with the prayer finished, the family members (of which there are many) begin to file into the dining lodge building (not sure what its official name is). And all of the sudden, our dogs are gone. GONE. Can't find 'em. Where'd they go? So I take a wild guess and saunter casually into the dining shack. There they are, following the numerous children through the buffet line.

Andrew and I grab the dogs and helpfully remove the them from the dining shack. Begrudgingly, they allow themselves to be dragged to the outdoors. The dogs are smacking their lips and each has an exceedingly triumphant look on his face.

Our goal becomes to keep the dogs from the dining lodge building, and those dogs aren't too pleased about that. So they promptly tell me exactly what they think about being dragged from that food by taking big huge dumps right next to where everyone is eating.

I begin shamefully walking down to the car, where we have some plastic bags for just such an occasion. Cubby decides to accompany me. I think, "How sweet, Cubby just loves me so much and wants to go wherever I go...he is such a sweet dog."

As we're walking down the hill next to the livestock corral, we hear a strange (and very loud) sound.

"Baaaaaaaah."

Cubby turns his head toward the livestock corral in slow motion and sees a herd of goats standing at the fence. Cubby's eyes come to life. His tongue immediately sticks out of his mouth, and then he looks up at me, as if to say, "Please, can I have those goats?"

I say, "Cubby, NO, you may not have the goats." He pretty much gives me the bird at that point, because he knows he's not on a leash and he knows I can't restrain him.

Cubby saunters slowly and bravely toward the electric fence, his head low to the ground, sniffing frantically. The goats are unphased. There is a fat black ringleader goat at the front of the pack, looking at Cubby with an attitude that says, "Bring it on, dog."

I'm screaming "Cubby, NO! NO! Bad dog! NO!" but he completely ignores me.

With that, Cubby explodes through the wires of the electric fence, not caring that his entire body is being shocked by God knows how many volts of electricity.

The goats move. The goats move fast. In fact, it is a stampede, with the black goat in front leading the pack, the other wimpier goats chasing the black goat, and Cubby chasing the whole pack. I feel huge gusts of wind as the animal train flies by again and again.

After many ridiculously speedy laps around the corral, the goats grow smart. They split up. The wimpy goats go one way, and the black goat goes another way. The next time Cubby flies into my sight, it's just him and the brave black goat.

Cubby finally catches up to the brave black goat. They are moving slower now, tired and sleepy after their marathon.

Cubby attempts to mount the brave black goat. He succeeds for about 2 seconds. The goat breaks free and runs faster than I've ever seen any animal run.

I shout for Cubby in my meanest voice to get out of that goat corral.

I'm not sure why Cubby chooses to listen this time, but he does. He electrocutes himself again coming through the fance, and then prances down the hill with me to get that plastic bag, as if nothing ever happened...