Calhouns Can(n)ons

Take Two Aspirins . . .

If you want a perfect example of just how creeping corporatism has taken over our lives, I offer the following AP story: “Regulators admit they didn’t try to collect Blue Cross fine.”

Remember in’ 07, when the Department of Managed Health Care, a STATE regulator, funded and created by the STATE OF CALIFORNIA to protect the PEOPLE of the STATE of California from predatory companies and consumer rip-offs and murderous health care practices that kill people?

Like the practice of “rescission,” wherein an insurance company takes all your nice money for years and when you get deathly sick, pulls the policy out from under you on the bogus basis that you accidentally misspelled your middle name on the application or forgot to mention on the same application that you had the flu in 1957 when you were 13 and so you’re left with no coverage, bankrupt, and soon dead. And so forth? And the STATE said, Nuh-huh, that kind of crap is ILLEGAL, you can’t do that. And a few smaller companies complied but Blue Cross didn’t so the STATE sued Blue Cross for millions of dollars in fines but hasn’t collected a penny.

Why? Here’s what the AP notes: “The [managed health care] department’s director, Cindy Ehnes, told the Associated Press on Thursday that, when it comes to rescissions, the agency has had success in forcing smaller insurers to reinstate illegally canceled policies and pay fines, but Blue Cross is too powerful to take on.

“’In each and every one of those rescissions (Blue Cross has) the right to contest each, and that could tie us up in court forever,’ Ehnes said of the approximately 1,770 Blue Cross rescissions between Jan 1, 2004, and now.

“They have the largest number of rescissions, so as a practical matter for the department it does present some practical challenges that are different from a Health Net (of California) or a Pacific Care,” referring to providers who, along with Kaiser Permanente, have made settlements with the state to reinstate health care coverage.

“That means that although Anthem Blue Cross has the highest number of alleged illegal rescissions, it may face the least regulatory consequence simply because of its sheer size, and aggressive legal defense.

Even though the STATE has been at the negotiating table with Blue Cross for a year, attempts to reinstate those ILLEGALLY rescinded policies had failed. I’m sure a lot of the policyholders have failed (died or gone bankrupt) also. And now the state has promised to pursue “vigorous enforcement.”

Bwa-hahahah. Sure. Maybe the STATE could ask the two suit boys from the AG’s office to drop the really, really, important case against the hapless Los Osos 45, and have them help out on a case that has trashed thousands of people most in need of real help.

And for the rest of us, a question: Just how did it come to pass that we citizens allowed ourselves to become corporate pawns, suckers ripe for corporate fleecing, with a government too weak to protect the interests of its own citizens? Worse, why do we citizens accept such behavior? Do we have low self-esteem issues? Self described, chest-thumping, Red-Blooded Americans with the mentality of abject serfs?

And Blue Cross is just the tip of the iceberg.

Flyyyyy Meee to the Moooonnnn. . .

Speaking of ordinary citizens, the ordinary citizens of SLOTown who want to fly somewhere have to finangle a seat on the only airline and flight left leaving this joint. High fuel costs have sent several air carriers scampering for financially healthier climes.

HOWEVER, if you’re very, very rich, and live in SLOTown and want to fly to Riyadh to visit your nice oil money, or bank money, the Tribune reports that “San Luis Obispo-based Le Bas International has expanded its private charter flight services with a new branch if Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

“The company said it hopes to cultivate a new elite client base of high-net-worth individuals, royalty, heads of state and corporations base in Saudi Arabia.” Who apparently might want to fly into and out of beautiful SLO town on a wonderful private air charter to visit their grape vineyards and or get an order of incredibly delicious Belgian fries at Bel Frites. Complete with a selection of yummy dipping sauces.

As for the rest of us chumps, if we want to leave town, better stick out our thumbs and stand by the side of Highway 101.

And now your Saturday Poem, from the March 10 New Yorker

History
By Stephen Dunn

It’s like this, the king marries
a commoner, and the populace cheers.
She doesn’t even know how to curtsy,
but he loves her manners in bed.
Why doesn’t the king do what his father did,
the king’s mother wonders –
those peasant girls brought in
through that secret entrance, that’s how
a kingdom works best. But marriage!
The king’s mother won’t come out
of her room, and a strange democracy
radiates throughout the land,
which causes widespread dreaming,
a general hopefulness. This is,
of course, how people get hurt,
how history gets its ziggy shape.
The king locks his wife in the tower
because she’s begun to ride
her horse far into the woods.
How unqueenly to come back
to the castle like that,
so sweaty and flushed. The only answer,
his mother decides, is stricter rules –
no whispering in the corridors,
no gaiety in the fields.
The king announces his wife is very tired
and has decided to lie down,
and issues an edict that all things yours
are once again his.
This is the kind of law
history loves, which contains
its own demise. The villagers conspire
for years, waiting for the right time,
which never arrives. There’s only
that one person, not exactly brave,
but too unhappy to be reasonable,
who crosses the moat, scales the walls.