Oaxaca, Oaxaca, Oaxaca

Here's where I am headed... Oaxaca, Mexico for three weeks and then to the Yucatan for some time with family and friends. Our ministry time will be spent drilling one or two water wells, planting corn for a late spring harvest, setting up a couple of small green houses and finishing up construction of a training center for Zapotecan church pastors and leaders. I will post as I can to keep folks up to date. Blessings all and remember to pray for us!

A Short Break...

While much of the country frets about snow, cold, ice and the recent shootings in Tucson, sometimes it is better to focus on our personal stuff. My 86 year old dad has taken a turn for the worse, so I am off to see him. Right now that is more important than the next football game or some idiot with a gun who needs to be in a mental institution. Peace

Pop-a-Shot Busboy Schools Kobe Bryant

As we wait for the new Congress to come up with some sensible, practical solutions to high unemployment, out of control health care costs, and things like crumbling infrastructure, let's take a moment or two to focus on something even more important. FUN! That's right, FUN. Something we tend to ignore as we get older and problems seems to mount. This Jimmie Kimmel video is just fun. I mean what else can you say when NBA great Kobe Bryant gets schooled in the fine art of shotmaking by Ricardo the Bus Boy! Enjoy.

Congress, Health Care, and Politics

Congress is getting to their first order of new business, repealing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act [PPACA] signed into law by President Obama last year. It is interesting to note that the justification the GOP is using to repeal the act is that they have heard the voice of the people, and the people, in the recent election, resoundingly rejected the direction of the Obama administration. Well here are a few central parts of the PPACA that are already in force, as detailed in this column by Eugene Robinson at truthdig. No child can be denied insurance coverage because of a pre-existing condition. Coverage can no longer be canceled when the policyholder gets sick. Insurance companies can no longer impose annual or lifetime limits on payments for care. Adult children can remain on their parents’ policies until they turn 26. Policyholders cannot be charged extra for seeking urgent care at an emergency room that is not in the insurance company’s approved network of providers. A rule that gives seniors free screening for cancer and other diseases. A requirement that insurance companies spend a certain percentage of the premiums they collect on actual care. Does the GOP really think a majority of Americans do not support these provisions? Certainly there are things in the new law that need to be fixed, and even the Democrats want to do that, but when they tried last year, the GOP said no, preferring the chance to be able to tell their base they stood for total recall. Instead of fixing the bad parts of this legislation, a common Washington practice, the GOP played politics. So I look forward to the next few months as Republicans try and convince us that since they won a majority of seats in the last election, they have a right to legislate as they see fit, because the American people said so. I just don’t understand why they did not support that right after the 2008 elections when the Democrats won big. Can someone answer that question for me? Please.