Woodstock CT Café

from John

On March 31st, 1997, I left work at 6PM and headed on to Route 84 from Storrs Road. It was snowing quite hard and I was in a hurry to get home but I was already questioning the route through Union. Twenty minutes up the highway I came upon a wall of semi-trucks crawling and sliding sideways blocking all traffic. Because of the crawl and slippery conditions drivers started to burn their clutches. I lost my clutch in the third lane next to the snowbank and could go nowhere, not that there was any place to go. About 30 feet up the road (with no cars in between) was a car in the first lane that was still trying to crawl behind a truck. I saw flaming clutch fluid dripping from the bottom of the car in the driving snow. Within a minute, the car was engulfed in flames, but the driver had narrowly escaped the flames running from his car. I couldn’t go anywhere along with the cars in the second and first lane on my right flank… and the wind was driving the flames and debris in our direction. That car burned to a crisp and then I sat in my car until 5 AM. Fortunately I could still run my motor to heat the car. Throughout the night I watched as towtrucks removed the cars with blown clutches one by one. At 5:30AM it was my turn and I ended up at Whitehouse’s Garage in Ashford. I finally made it to my home at about 9:30AM walking the last quarter mile through about two feet of snow. It was April Fools Day 1997.

One or two years later we had one of the coolest summers on record. I kept track of the high and low temperatures each day, and I did not record a day that was above 83 degrees. My corn was stunted that year. But the highest temperature that year was 89 degrees on March 31st. Go figure.

“…the right care at the right time and in the right amounts…”

from Frank Corden

The most alarming statistic in the health care debate seems to me to be the % of GDP that it represents. We spend around 17% of GDP on health care. Whereas many comparable countries like Australia, Canada, Western European countries spend about 10%. That’s a huge drain on our economy. If we spend 7% more of our GDP on getting or staying well (and we aren’t as healthy as the countries spending less), that’s money that isn’t being spent on other productive parts of the economy.

When we look at whether the current laws will have a positive impact on the cost, we need to look at health care spending from two standpoints. How much do the goods and services cost AND how much of the goods and services do we consume.

Health care reform opponents assume that the cost of goods and services isn’t going to go down (and historically they’re right), the only way to reduce cost is by reducing consumption. Then these opponents cry foul, we must be prepared to “Ration Care”.

What if we reduced consumption by needing less care? Focus on disease prevention like weight reduction, better diets and reducing smoking will reduce the need for care. Taking better care of our bodies and accepting ownership for our health will reduce consumption and should reduce overall cost.

Likewise, addressing the quality of care will reduce cost. A 2004 study estimated almost 200,000 deaths annually were attributable to preventable hospital errors. What was the cost to treat those patients prior to their deaths and what was the cost to treat the patients who experienced errors but didn’t die.

The introduction of new drugs into the market place also drives unnecessary cost. Many new drugs don’t treat the intended illness on average any better than the older and cheaper drugs. So where is the national effort to study which drugs really work well for a patient and then make sure we are prescribing the most inexpensive AND effective drug. Let’s give folks the right drug, not just the newest one. The emergence of personalized medicine which at the moment is being opposed by many in the industry will help identify the “right” treatment which should reduce costs.

I have worked with professionals from all over the world. Our health care system isn’t anything to write home about. Many of these other western countries are doing it better. Its about time we recognized that and made the effort to improve. I’m not saying we should adopt what is done in other countries in total, only that we look at what they do well (and what we don’t) and fix it. The solution can and must be an American solution.

In the end, our health care system shouldn’t be government run, but we as Americans can and should have a better system, one that delivers the right care at the right time and in the right amounts to keep us competitive as a country.

from Becki 

Mrs. Hayes’ class of 4th graders participated in Congressman Joe Courtney’s Black History Month essay contest last month with amazing results! Over 150 essays were submitted. A committee narrowed down the essays to ten finalists and four of those were from Woodstock Elementary School!!!

Graham Arthur, Kalianna Dingui, Olivia Perry and Diana Sackman were recognized for their exceptional writing. The school was just notified that Olivia Perry was chosen as the contest winner. Congressman Courtney will be coming to WES to present her with an award for her writing.

Congratulations to ALL the contest entrants with special kudos going to Woodstock’s Final Four! Keep up the great work!

from Con

The notion that that this will prevent Obama’s second term is contrary to History: That result would be so rare and uncommon that it’s a tough trivia question to find precedent for such a ‘predictable’ outcome.

One reason it would be so rare and unlikely is that Voters always, always forget the first couple of years as long as the second couple of years brings them good things – as long as their situations are improved. Happy Voters always re-elect Presidents, even Presidents who may have been down in the dumps during year one.

Historically, Presidents are nearly always elected to a Second Terms unless there is some specific, negative issue at the time of that Election which is important enough to prevent it. A second term is his to lose and current affairs will not have much effect on the issue. See Presidential History for plenty of back-up.

An improved, healthy Economy would suffice easily…

Valley Girl’s comment related to the passage of the Health Care Bill:

I think this made OWE BAMA a one term president just like Lowell Weicker was a one term Governor. Both of them made it a personal mission/vendetta to pass something at all costs that a majority of the electorate was/is opposed to.

Now that would indeed be “historic” a sitting one term president who didn’t seek reelection. When was the last time that happened (not counting guys like LBJ and Truman who became president after the death or assassination of their predecessor)?

Who can answer that trivia question first? I think it was Hayes but I’m not sure…..might have to go as far back as Buchanan because I think Hayes said he’d only do one term even before he was elected which counts as a correct answer but Obama certainly didn’t make that promise. Anyway, I’m sure someone out there knows better than I do on this on.

from Taxpayer 

The reconciliation proposal from the House of Representatives represents one component of the health care legislation being considered by the Congress. The other component is a bill, H.R. 3590, that the Senate passed in December.

The house Reconciliation package is an essential component to consider in the process of determining the content and cost of the changes we will face in part now, and at large in 2014.

However, even if one were to read both bills in entirety and all the supporting CBO reports that go along with them, one would still have a difficult time speculating on the ultimate cost of these bills because its cost will dependent on one thing: congressional discipline over a period of decades to ensure that the legislation as proposed and speculated on by the CBO is actually enacted.

In the words of the CBO director, Doug Elmendorph, “the calculation reflects an assumption that the provisions of the legislation are enacted and remain unchanged throughout the next two decades, which is often not the case for major legislation. For example, the sustainable growth rate mechanism governing Medicare’s payments to physicians has frequently been modified to avoid reductions in those payments, and legislation to do so again is currently under consideration by the Congress.”

I mentioned in an earlier post the frightening spectre of cutting medicare reimbursement to hospitals and healthcare providers, but while they may be offset to some degree by the expansion in coverage under these bills, the existing scenario being revealed in Massachusetts (under the Romney plan) tells us that hospitals are hurting from the effects of this reimbursement. I found it unusual that the model of “RomneyCare”, which ironically resembles that of “ObamaCare” was never fully or transparently discussed or compared by our politicians as a measure of successes or failures. I also find it peculiar that Romney is now a strong opponent to HR 3590, bit then again, he is a noted flip-flopper. The reality is that the pain created by these medicare reimbursement cuts on patients and hospitals, that we are seeing in Massachusetts, are not nearly as painful as they are to congressional candidates seeking re-election. Spending cuts don’t win elections, promises do. Read the rest of this entry »

Dear Friend,

Last night I had the honor of voting for universal health care – a historic step forward for our nation. After a year of deliberation and decades of waiting, Congress passed historic health care reform legislation for the first time. What the late Senator Kennedy once referred to as “the great unfinished business of our society”, has finally become more than a dream.

This bill comes at a time when we urgently need reform. Over 47 million American are uninsured, often shut out of the system due to so-called “pre-existing health conditions” such as high blood pressure, heart disease, or even a cesarean section. Over the past decade, health care costs have increased four times faster than an average worker’s wages and since 2000, small business premiums have risen over 129%.  Every day, I hear stories of small businesses closing their doors due to sky rocketing premiums, people who were denied coverage due to a pre-existing condition and families unable to pay their soaring medical bills. The status quo is simply unacceptable.

Opponents of the bill would like you to think that the costs of this reform will bankrupt our country. However, this past Thursday the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that the health care bill would in reality reduce the deficit by $138 billion over ten years. In fact, not only will this bill reduce the deficit, it does so while offering the largest expansion of federal health care guarantees since Medicare and Medicaid were enacted over 40 years ago. This bill ultimately will ensure that Americans have access to affordable and quality coverage. 

• Extends coverage to 32 million uninsured Americans.
• Provides a 35% small business tax credit to help businesses make coverage for their employees more affordable.
• Ends the “Donut Hole” in Medicare Part D to provide seniors with real savings on their prescription drug benefits.
• Enacts insurance reforms to protect consumers from insurance company worst-practices – like denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions, capping total coverage, and dropping or watering down coverage when you get sick and need it most.
• Creates a health insurance exchange that pools small businesses and their employees with millions of other Americans to increase purchasing power and competition in the insurance market.
• Ends the practice of “rescission” of claims or benefits after the fact.

This bill does not solve every problem in our health care system, but it’s a solid foundation that we can continue to build upon. Read the rest of this entry »

from Newcomer

It would take me weeks to pick out everything that I don’t like, or am skeptical of. Since many of my posts run way too long, I’ll try to just pick one or two quick complaints with HR 3590 (aka: Patient Protection And Affordable Care Act). I’m referring now to the 6th version of HR 3590, which is the one passed by the Senate in December, 2009. We’ve all been keeping track of how many versions of this bill have gone around, right? Yes, it’s 6. This is the Senate version that the House passed tonight.

Here’s the first piece of it that scares me:

SEC. 2708. PROHIBITION ON EXCESSIVE WAITING PERIODS.

`A group health plan and a health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage shall not apply any waiting period (as defined in section 2704(b)(4)) that exceeds 90 days.’.

Right now, I don’t have to wait at all (per my insurance company) for a doctor appointment, nor for a test. I sometimes experience a slight wait of anywhere from a few days to a week if my doctor’s own schedule is full, but it has never been what I would term excessive. Now, millions of more people will be covered, which is great. But we aren’t adding more doctors, hospitals, labs, walk-in clinics, etc. So if it turns out that adding more patients and not increasing the amount of board certified medical staff to see the patients results in a waiting period, any of us could go from presently being able to put a call in to our doctor and be seen within the same day, to (under this bill) waiting for up to 3 months to be seen. If you have pneumonia and don’t know it (maybe you just think you have an especially horrible cold and would like your doctor to find out for sure) you could well die if you indeed have pneumonia and have to wait weeks or God-Forbid, 3 months to be seen by your doctor and have the visit be covered. What happens if you CAN’T wait that long and seek ER treatment once you’ve already been told by the insurer that you have to wait? Will you be on the hook for the ER bill because you didn’t wait in line for 3 months like you were supposed to? Not everyone can afford to just go to an ER and pay for it out-of-pocket to skirt the waiting period. I sure can’t.

Here’s another one: Read the rest of this entry »

from Proud Liberal

Independent did say some good things. He is a very intelligent man. If only John had heeded the suggestion for greater regulation of cafe comments you would have been eliminated long ago and we could have avoided all this confrontation.

As far insulting however, I disagree with Independent. As the saying goes, “if the shoe fits wear it”–and in my criticism of you, the shoe fits perfectly so why mince words? For political correctedness sake?? I don’t think so. Your comments have been rude, dishonest, manipulative, child-like, and bizarre in nature and style, so I have said so. Call it an insult, I call it the truth.

You have wrongly gone after every contributor here including administator who does his best to run a decent website (another area in which I disagree with Indie). The cafe may not be perfect and we may not all agree all the time, but the level discourse you have brought here has sunk it to a new low. Your comments are destructive and they contribute nothing of substance. I think that Independent would agree with this. Again, you may call it an insult, I call it as it is.

Obviously you have some knowledge of the political process and if you weren’t so angry and child-like you could be a huge resource, but instead you come to the cafe for your own self-aggrandizement. It’s as if by degrading other people, you feel better about yourself. My advice to you is to not stoop to such a level. First, no one buys it and second, you deserve better. Read the rest of this entry »

from Independent

Let’s stick to the issue, which is straightforward (to Kevin).

I believe the nominating committee represented the majority view of the RTC, and the RTC represented a majority view of the Republicans, in exiting Frank from their ticket based on his positions relative to the Academy.

This is precisely how this system is supposed to work. I think this is basically what WVG was saying, despite your too-literal interpretation of the phrase “all Republicans”. Again, the nominating committee does not control the vote of the RTC, it just recommends. And Frank does not have to be present to be nominated, and he certainly would have been nominated if that is what the RTC wanted. So these points do not support your proposition that he would/could/should have been nominated. The RTC simply did not want him.

The political results have been overwhelming for a number of years – the Academy issue is the “third rail” of Woodstock politics, and everyone who has touched it – on either side of the aisle – has been given the political hook. The simple fact is the school is very popular; has developed a strong independent political base through alumni and parents; successfully sells its “private” status to a demographic that thinks it is a private preparatory school; and exercises its substantial political muscle very effectively in the local political arena. I obviously don’t believe this is right, and I think it is based on a great deal of misinformation about the school’s financial and educational results – but that is the actual political result.

Any primary outcome would show a majority of Republicans would either support or not support Frank (except in the case of a statistically remote tie); one or the other must be true. So challenging the actual political result in the RTC leads to the possibility that the opposite result might have been true. Based on plentiful political evidence, I think this is extremely unlikely, but I would agree not impossible – stranger things have happened. Read the rest of this entry »

Woodstock Valley Girl has repeated many times something to the effect that no one visits the Cafe anymore (not an exact quote). I used to kid another frequent visitor when he asked how many visit the Cafe by telling him that it’s just you, me, and Taxpayer . An educated estimate is that there are about 600-800 Woodstock-relevant visitors, some of whom come every day and some of whom visit once or twice a month “to catch up” as one Woodstock resident told me recently.

For someone who doesn’t like anyone here Valley Girl seems to be here a lot. In fact, he has submitted the last 12 comments. Why bother if no one visits to read his attacks and insults other than the few of us that write at the Cafe?

Valley Girl has said that most of our visitation is spam. Of course he has no idea about our activity because he does not have access to our server stats. Stats measured directly by the server are accurate unlike the indirect services like StatCounter, Compete, and Google Analytics. We do get spam, but that stat is tallied as “non-viewing hits.”

The reason I think we have about 600-800 Woodstock relevant visitors is that I can sort those who turn multiple pages from those who turn only one or two pages. If I limit the list to those who have turned 5 pages in any particular month, I find more than 700 unique IPs. It doesn’t matter to me where they’re from if they are interested enough to turn the pages. Those with dynamic IPs will not register multiple page turns because their IP changes with each page turn (AOL for example). So the majority of unique visitors and visits represent “others” from outside our community. Many of these visitors come to the Cafe by searching Google or Bing … and many of these come to the Cafe by searching Images. For example, someone may be searching for one of the actresses or actors in Hollywood Comes to Woodstock and they end up viewing a picture at the Cafe. We have a lot of this minute by minute. Another example is searching “Jennica Heifer” in quotes in Google Images. In case you forgot, Jennica was the Ace Reporter for the Villager at the time . If you search Jennica in Images, you get a picture of Stephen Spielberg or a poster for the movie “Murial’s Wedding”which were published in “Hollywood” at the Cafe.

It’s the page turns (clicks) that are the mosts telling because turning pages suggests that some reading is going on. Lately we’ve had over 70,000 page turns per month (see Table below) and “in-and-out visitors” contribute little to this number. Our bandwidth is also very high suggesting that visitors stay for a while.

Valley Girl might suggest that since we have few commentors, there’s nothing going on at the Cafe. I took a look at some ‘mega’ websites to see their level of comments. Take the Courant for example which has 666,937 unique visitors and 2,312,408 visits per year (these stats can be obtained at compete.com but they are surely an under estimate). If you check the comments of the Courant Columnists, you will find that Ubinas got 37 comments on her most recent post, our friend Rick Green got 17, and Colin McEnroe got 3.  I went to the next level at USAToday. This newspaper had an article on the Dems final push to pass healthcare which had 1942 comments at the time I looked (there are many repeat commentors per article). So I guess some of their 13,804,558 unique visitors during their 44,240,220 visits (I go there multiple times a day) got up the gumption to leave a comment. The point to be made here is that only a very low percentage of visitors ever comment – this is the norm for web surfers and it’s the norm in Woodstock. See the stats for the last 14 months below. 

There is also a visitor map below. Even though we receive spam from Russia, these so-called visitors do not show up in our visitor map. This is because these spammers are not counted as ‘visitors’. Read the rest of this entry »

from Frank Corden

Businesses are neither Republican nor Democrat. Businesses large and small are about making money, and there isn’t anything wrong with that. In fact there is everything right with it, our country is a good place to live because anyone regardless of their economic standing at birth can rise to wealth.

Were we have a breakdown is principally with big businesses, especially big public companies. These organizations (and I’ve worked for several) are overly focused on stock price and what the numbers are for the next quarter. Since leadership in these companies is often in place for only a handful of years (and retire as multimillionaires), these companies have lost sight of the strategic picture 25 or 50 years from now.

It’s this short term focus coupled with a lack of both regulatory enforcement for the regulations we have and enactment of new regulations appropriate to the times that led to the current financial debacle. If one bank took on high risk and showed good returns to shareholders, this pushed the other institutions to follow. If they didn’t jump on the bandwagon, the investor money would follow the “better” returns and the more conservative institution would have a drop in stock price. Thereby leading to the untimely departure of the soon to be wealthy CEO.

Conversely, many family owned small businesses at least have an incentive to plan for the next generation. Their horizon is often longer. Also, family businesses are better connected to their community so there is a greater desire to maintain good will with their community. So I would agree that overly regulating or burdening small business is bad economics and bad social policy.

However, not all small business owners or corporations are benevolent. Safety, environmental, consumer protection and financial regulations are all necessary to keep businesses large and small in line. I’m not an expert on the Clean Air Act (though I am very familiar with it) but I have been an expert on Superfund and the Resouce Conservation and Recovery Act (hazardous waste regulations). Though I’ve seen over zealous enforcement of these regulations, the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Superfund et al, have left us with much cleaner rivers, safer drinking water and better air quality. Case in point salmon’s return to the Connecticut river along with eagles. The use of lawyers occurs as a result of businesses’ desire to avoid the responsibility to “do no harm” to others. Read the rest of this entry »

from Frank Corden

No doubt some (including WVG) may object to my characterization of Woodstock conservatism. Sadly, what I’ve said above isn’t a lie, I really wish it wasn’t true.

Case in point, look at the Town Garage issue and go from there. We ignored state and federal environmental rules as well as just good management practice (and being a good neighbor) and have created a likely multimillion dollar liability.

We have a long history of doing the same thing. In the late 70’s and early 80’s we squeezed Woodstock Academy so hard financially, we almost put this institution we value so highly into bankruptcy. That’s in large part the source of the lack of trust and cooperation between WA and the town.

I saw it for 6 years on the BoE. Every budget year was a bad year. Every year we couldn’t fund the basics we needed, maybe next year would be better. So defer maintenance and needed improvements, until next year. Well we’re finally in a really bad year, likely a bad stretch of years. Tell me what it takes to be a good year.

Will we get smarter? Good question. We are about to enter the next business cycle. In the next year or two we are likely to start a string of 3 or 4 of the better years we are going to have over the next decade. Will we commit the resources to address the liabilities we have and all that defered infrastructure maintenance? Or will we claim that “We just can’t do it this year”. Pretty soon it will be 2016, or 2017 or 2018 and the next recession will hit.

We do this year in and year out because there no sense in Woodstock that we are stewards of the community institutions we’re entrusted with. What I stood for the last 6 years was the best interest of those 1000 Woodstock citizens who happened to be too young to vote? Where is their voice? Who’s looking out for their interest? Their the citizens who need us to be the good stewards.

from Con

I hesitate to bring it up because it’s WAY beyond the pale, but even certain so-called ‘Mainstream’ websites contain the worst comments I have ever read, bar none. I’m referring to YOUTUBE.

While there are plenty of websites allowing totally unregulated, uncensored and probably unread (by staff) comments, most often they are ‘Hate Sites’ (which speak for themselves), and the like: easily identified and avoided (or whatever – you know what you’re getting into when visiting the site). But when referring to YOUTUBE I must be naive – I would have thought that such a popular, mainstream website had some form of rules and policies regarding comments. Not so – it’s “anything goes” for comments.

Some of the comments I’ve read (depending on the video subject) are literally of the most outrageous, ugly, despicable, appalling and shameful garbage I’ve ever read on the internet (or anywhere) – most especially when it comes to racism and the extreme racist language and thoughts these people publish.

I don’t know how to say “please don’t look/read unless you are fully prepared for what you’ll read” because the visceral hate, racism and contempt for a human’s life and brutal death by beating was beyond anything I was prepared for.

I found the video and comments about that young man who was beaten to death in Chicago (and which made National news months ago) and while the video was horrendous and wrenching, I was not prepared for the incredibly despicable comments which followed – it was a literal Free-for-All with seemingly no limits on profanity, indecency, racism in it’s most extreme form, racist comments and verbiage, etc., etc. etc. And there were hundreds and hundreds of them… Read the rest of this entry »

from Kevin

Sorry ‘Independent’, I read WVG’s post differently from you but I never stated a conclusion on what would have happened if a vote occurred or even offered an opinion on how it would have gone. What I did say was, “That is why you have no idea how such a primary would have turned out, nor do I. There was no poll done and the rank and file majority, who generally keep their heads down, may be thinking something very differently than either one of us believes.” I’ve consistently said, we don’t know. If you can find where I stated differently, please show me where. I’ve also never implied that he was “illegitimately run out of the party by a renegade group of Republicans” or the I “have a monopoly on interpretation of these events”. All I’ve said is we don’t know and maybe there is some room for grey.

Others have read WVG’s post with the same interpretation as I have. WVG made a special point to say that it wasn’t just the RTC but all Republicans which read charitably at least means the vast majority of Republicans in town don’t support Frank and not just the ones on the RTC. At the end of the day, we will never know what would have happened if Frank showed up on the day the slate was voted on; he bowed out before then.

Party committees are made up of the interested and the willing but don’t always reflect the thoughts of the voters. I believe the RTC recognized that they needed to stay connected to what the “non involved” voters are thinking which may be part of the reason why they conducted the exit poll after the last election. They needed to test the waters on what concerns were bringing people to the polls and by extension what types of candidates have a good chance of carrying elections because maybe they weren’t sure if that was changing. Good for them. Groups that don’t realize this eventually get surprised.

My entire point in bringing up people on the RTC who saw the possibility of that vote going differently had he been there is to illustrate that we don’t know, period. Even people on the RTC are not in agreement as to the outcome. Anything else is idle speculation.

I do believe that I’m tilting at windmills here. The only reason why I bring up our past is because the past between us does exist and I feel is relevant. From my point of view our conversations mostly consist of me reading your posts and trying to figure out how you came to the conclusion you came to about my position and wondering why you feel compelled to intermix personal insults into your posts. It feels to me that you believe you know how I think and read all my posts through that lens and I just shake my head wondering how you read things in. I never actually identified you but I will reiterate my point, I don’t think we can have a reasoned debate because from past experience all we will do is talk past each other. Read the rest of this entry »

from Con

I’ve recommended before that readers look at as many similar examples from other Blogs, newspapers, etc. they can find, review their rules & policies and decide which are appropriate – this stuff has already been well thought out and there are excellent examples out there. They start with Who are our Readers? and How far are we willing to go to ‘protect’ (Who?) from bad language, etc. I think the CAFE’ current Guidelines are appropriate.

One main issue is profanity and who may read comments (like children). It’s said that ‘When you scream and swear at other drivers with your kids in the car, you’re teaching them how to “get along with others…”‘ The same applies here – the level of language and discourse teaches young ones, but how many truly young ones are Cafe Readers?

I don’t think there are that many readers who are minors. Check the Policies/Rules of: nytimes.com; wsj.com; cnn.com, etc. A lot of thought went into them, but I believe they must be more strict than the cafe does – I like the notion that readers can use a more full range of expression and other readers are certainly smart enough to recognize idiotic, insulting and personal attacks – they speak for themselves and reflect appropriately on the writer. It also tends to be periodic and short-lived: after a flurry of nastiness from a certain few, things tend to always go back to a more civil level of discussion – check ‘history’ of the site for proof of that. Occasional outbursts which escalate ought not dictate full-time policy.

For example, the repeated hypocrisy of WOODSTOCK VALLEY GIRL on this subject always gives me a laugh Read the rest of this entry »