Now that I am bloated from eating too much on Christmas I will just write about something light: sports. Of course sports may create more arguments than politics or religion so I may be making a big mistake here. I am going to go over 3 controversies in sports this year and give my 2 cents worth and then I will make some bowl predictions.

The first controversy is about Serena Williams in the U.S. Open. I thought I wrote about it already but I don't see it in my archive. I must be getting senile. Anyway there are still some sports talk shows where her behavior is debated. There are some who said her behavior was justified due to the fact that the call should not have been made at the end of a close match. That is absurd. I understand that fouls are not called at end of close NBA games and penalties are not called at end of close NHL games. But those calls are subjective and can go either way most of the time. A line call is not subjective even though the referee can make a mistake. If Michael Jordan charges into a defender, the ref can call foul either way or not at all. But if he sees Jordan steps on the end line with the ball in his hand, he has to call it out. If the lineswoman saw Williams step on the line before hitting the serve, she is obligated to call it. I would agree her behavior up to the point where she threaten the lineswoman was no where as bad as McEnroe or Connors in the past. But I don't think McEnroe or Connors ever threatened bodily harm to officials. So I think Williams deserve to be fine more heavily. As far as supensions go, I don't think there was ever a consideration to supsend a star player so forget about that.

Some sports writer with the help of Mathematicians are defending Bill Belichick's decision to go on 4th down against the Colts. Well, I have not seen their formula for this decision so I can't say if it is mathematically sound. But I do know this: No football coach, including Belichick, is smart enough to have done that calculation in his head! He made the decision simply because he had no faith in his defense. Whether he went for it or punted, the odds were in his favor as even the mathematical formula showed the the Patriots had a greater than 70% chance of winning either way. But now his defensive players know that their coach has no confidence in them and that is bad coaching.

I like Many Pacquiao way more than Floyd Mayweather so my opinion is biased. But I think all this talk about Olympic style doping test is nonsense. You don't change the rule for a sport for one event just because one competitor demands it. If this is the case, then every sprinter will demand testing be increased for Usain Bolt, even just to hassle him. I have a friend whose son was on the U.S. field hockey team. He said he would get randomly tested 1 or 2 times a year. So if we go by Olympic rules in 3 months, by random chance Pacquiao may not get tested at all until the urine test after the fight. If Mayweather calls for boxing to change its rule so that testing is more strict for everyone, I am all for that. But to demand the rule be changed suddenly for his opponent because he say so, is arrogant.

Finally I want to point out that the college football reporter for LA Times have predicted that the Big Ten will lose every bowl game this year. I am going out on a limb to say that they will win at least one! O.K I will be more brave and say they will win 4 out of 7. The Big Ten is down (again), so everyone will take them too lightly and on any given day the weaker team, if motivated by slight from others, can pull off the upset. Witness Utah over Alabama, and Boise State over Oklahoma in BCS bowls! The four I think will win for Big Ten? Minnesota over Iowa State is easy. Penn State over LSU. Joe Paterno is a better coach than Les Miles. Witness Miles losing a game this year because he forgot to call timeout. OSU beating Oregon because OSU is improving at end of the season and Oregon does not have the home field advantage like USC had at the Rose Bowl. MSU over Texas Tech. I am not impressed with Tech's defense and I think MSU can slow down their offense. I am afraid Wisconsin, Northwestern and Iowa are overmatched although Georgia Tech may overlook Iowa and they are not that good themselves.

Have a happy holiday, everyone.

I am not surprised the climate meeting in Copenhagen failed to come up with a comprehensive agreement. The deal that Obama brokered with China is just a way to save face for all the powers. Of course there was no way that they were going to get a binding agreement that activists like Al Gore will accept. If we can't even pass a water down energy bill in our Congress, why would anyone think that the countries of the world, all with different ideas and needs, will come to a consensus? The U.S. wants China and India to cut down their emissions as they develop. India, China and others do not want a tough limit their energy use as they try to catch up with the west.

My feeling is that basically the developing nations have a better argument. To tell them that they have to cut back after we have increased our standard of living with our factories, automobiles and high energy use is hypocritical. Of course if India and China ever use as much energy per capita as we do now, we might as well say good-bye to earth. So we need to do better ourselves and at the same time convince the developing nations that to improve emission is to their own best interest.

I think despite the fact the Copenhagen agreement is not very good, it is a step in the right direction. I think China, for example, understands that if pollution is not controlled, their economic growth will come to a halt. There will be a high cost to the health of its population as well. I am causiously optimistic that there will be cooperation between the U.S., China and India in green energy in the future. Our survival on this planet depends on it.

Predictably Obama was hit from the left and right after his announcement of the surge in Afghanistan. I think it is the right decision although I think he took too long to make it and the setting of a time line for exit is a bad idea. I know this sounds like Dick Cheney. But I am not part of the stupid administration who abandoned Afghanistan and lied their way into an unjust war in Iraq. And forget about the crazy left wingers like Kucinich and Moore. They don't live in the real world. I don't like wars but Afghanistan is a necessary war. If we run like the Soviets did the Taliban and al Qaeda will not only run Afghanistan again but will inspire others to join them. Kabul will become the capital of terrorism. Pakistan, a nuclear power, will be in danger of falling to Muslim extremists.

Look at things from the perspective of a moderate Muslim. I believe that this Muslim felt we had a right to invade Afghanistan after 9/11. He knows that he would do the same if his country was attacked by terrorists. However, he would likely be persuaded by extremists that the U.S. is the great Satan when we invaded Iraq. To him there was no reason to invade a country that has not attacked us. Now if we pull out of Afghanistan, he will view us as a country of of no heart. We can flex our muscles all over the world, with 60,000 troops in Germany, more than that in Korea, a large base in Japan, aircraft carriers patroling all the oceans. But when the going gets tough we bail out. Maybe we should bring all those troops home from Germany and Korea etc. and save our resources and people to fight wars we needed to win? Why do we have all these troops all over the world but when we are faced with maybe 25,000 hard core Talibans we bail? This moderate Muslim will be convinced that we are a nation of lazy, materialistic people as the extremists claim. I think the Iraq war had converted many moderates into extremists. Only by helping Afganistan become a nation free of the Talibans can we recover our reputation.


It is going to be a difficult task, no doubt about it. But I think it is still a winnable situation if we are together on this. This is where I think Obama has not done as well as he should. I think he understands that this war needs to be won but he is trying not to alienate his liberal base. He will need to convince the American people that victory is necessary. Then he needs to follow yhe advice of generals McCrystal and Petreus. These guys understand that you don't win with forces alone. The added troops buy us more time but we must work with the tribal leaders to provide jobs and security. It can be done because most Afghans don't like the Taliban and they don't think of the U.S. as an occupying force. They will turn against us, however, if we are not helping them and if it appears that the Taliban will take over their villages. So we have a small window of opportunity to turn things in our favor. We must do it now!

I am sure Obama is glad to be on the way home to face the economic crisis, the healthcare debate and Sarah Palin's book. He is glad to be out of Asia because this was his most difficult foreign trip since becoming president. While he was received warmly by the masses in Asia, he was not the rock star that went to Europe, Africa and the Middle East. Other than getting support from Russian president Medvedev on Iran, he didn't get much of anything else, especially in China.

Obama's critic is all over him for appearing weak on the trip. They even criticized him for bowing to the emperor of Japan. This is absurd. Bowing is a form of politeness in much of Asia, especially Japan. The old saying, "when in Rome do what the Romans do", apply here. I mean, what about Bush kissing the king of Saudi Arabia and holding his hand? I find that way more gross! But in all seriousness there is a sense of American power abroad eroding even before this trip. In the past the American president will have been able to work out agreements that he wanted before leaving home. This way it looks like he accomplished something on the trip. Now other contries are not afraid to tell the U.S. "no" ahead of time. I think Obama knows that he had to repair a lot of damage from the past and he cannot show up arrogant and demand things.

The economic crisis also makes it hard for Obama on this trip. In the past American officials can tell China and others that if they want economic growth they have to follow the U.S. With China being our lender now, we can't afford to lecture. As a result Obama did not get anything in regard to Iran, North Korea or the Chinese currency situation. China depends on Iran for oil, and the U.S. depends on China to buy our treasury bills, so why would China offend Iran to please us? China holds a lot of American dollars, so why would it increase the value its currency vs the dollar so that its investment value immediately decrease? Given this situation why would China listen to Obama about Tibet?

There is one good sign that I have not seen anyone talk about. That is Obama was allowed to speak to students in Shanghai. Even though the town hall style meeting was not broadcast on Chinese national tv, it could be seen over the internet without censorship. The setting is significant because Shanghai is where Fudan University is located. The three top universities in China are Peking, Quinghua and Fudan. The first two are both located in Bejing and are where most of the Chinese leaderships came from. Peking is most conservative and Quinghua is more technological. Of the three Fudan is by far the most liberal and has the most relations with international intellectuals. Fudan annually hosts a conference for college students from the Pacific rim which includes the U.S., Russia, Cananda, Australia in addition to Asian countries. My daughter attended the conference couple of years ago and said that there were very open discussions about human rights, Taiwan and Tibet. Chinese professors were openly critical of their own country on these issues without fear of censorship. I think if the future leaders of China come out Fudan instead of Peking or Quinghua, then I think China will become more democratic. The fact that China allowed Obama to speak near Fudan instead of Bejing is a good sign I believe.

Recently my wife and I attended the San Diego Asian Film Festival. We took in 5 movies over a 2 day period. The films we saw, in the order we saw them were: " All About Dad", "The Real Shaolin", "Yang Yang", "Whatever It Takes", and "Shades of Ray". I will rate to a scale of up to 5 and comment on each one.

"All About Dad" is about a Vietnamese American family and is a familiar story of values of parents vs the dreams of children in an Asian immigrant family. For the most part it is a very funny movie. The audience laughed loudly throughout the movie. I like the movie a lot despite the fact the main character, the youngest son who just finished his first year in college, reminds my wife and I of our own youngest child. As usual the Dad is the bad guy. More about that later. I give this movie a 4.2 out of 5.

"The Real Shaolin" is an documentary about 4 people trying to master kung fu in one of the Shaolin schools in central China. The main characters were an American, a Frenchman, a Chinese fighter trying to make it in Sanda, a Chinese version of kickboxing, and a young orphan growing up in the temple trying to become a kung fu monk. It has a lot of funny scenes but also lots of heartbreaking events. I thought it was the best of the 5 movies I saw. I give it a 4.6.

"Yang Yang" is about a half Taiwanese, half French girl growing up in Taiwan with her mother, step father and half sister. She is a high school track star, coached by her step father. She falls in love with her half sister's boyfriend. The first half of the movie was decent as the tension of the love triangle builds. But ultimately the story went flat. It was the weakest of the five movies and I give it a 3.0.

"Whatever It Takes" is a story of a Chinese American business man, unfulfillled in his work, becomes a principal at a new South Bronx magnet high school. It shows him and some dedicated teachers trying to help minority students overcome odds to go to college. It is suppose to be a story of tough love but I find the main character bending over too much for the students. There was still some very poor discipline given that the students supposedly want to go there instead of their neighborhood school in order to better themselves. The main student the film followed was obviously smart but she flunk almost all of her classes because she never did her homework. Despite that she got into Dartmouth's summer program. There were some kids who did much better but were only mentioned in passing. I guessing showing someone who succeeded because he/she studied everyday was not as interesting as someone who worked very little but somehow got chosen by some ultra-liberal institution. I give this film a 3.7.

"Shades of Ray" is about a half Pakistani man who proposed to his white girlfriend but while he waited for her answer, falls in love with a half Pakistani woman his father had set up for him. This was supposed to be one the big film of the festival as it stars Zachary Levi, star of TV show "Chuck" and Brian George who played Babu in Seinfeld. It was very funny but I find it hard to believe that a Pakistani man who married a white woman would insist that his son marry a Pakistani woman. The same with the girl's father. Also while Levi was funny, he acts and sounds too much like Seinfeld. I never saw "Chuck" so I don't know how he usually acts. I like Seinfeld but I would not want him to play a romantic role. I give this film a 4.0.

Overall it was good to see many talented Asian actors, directors and producers show their stuff. It is very difficult for Asian actors to get roles in Hollywood, especially Asian males. Even in "Shades of Ray" both Levi and George are not South Asians. The director Jaffar Mahmoud was at the film festival and he explained that he interviewed every South Asian actor in LA to cast the main character. He just couldn't find the right person. I can accept his explanation that he had to find the best person for the role. But if a South Asian can't play the role of a South Asian, what can he possibly play? One of the actors in "All About Dad" say that there is no decent role for Asian males and that he is thankful he has an engineering degree from Michigan State.

Which brings up my final point. Why is it that the dad is always the bad guy in films of conflict within an Asian family? I am sure that there are dads who are prejudiced but I don't believe that if one is married to someone of another race that he would try everything he can to stop his son from doing the same. Why is it that when an Asian man tells his son that studying hard is more important than trying to make films as the dad in "All About Dad" did is old fashion. But when an Asian man tells his black students that in order to make it out of the slum they have to study hard, then he is a hero? The message is the same but if you deliver it to your own son, it makes you look bad. But if you deliver it to your minority students you look great. I am sure the actor that got his engineering degree is glad that he listened to his Asian dad!

I read an article in LA Times recently about a fight in the Chinese community in Southern California over the use of traditional vs simplied scripts in Chinese language schools and in public schools in the area that offer Chinese courses. Traditional script is how Chinese have been written over thousands of years. It is distinguished by a series of complex strokes that makes for beautiful calligraphy. It is still the official writing in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The simplified version was introduced by the communists in China about 50 years ago to make it easier for the rural mass to become literate quicker. It is supposed to be easier for a child to learn than the complex traditional version.

In the past the Chinese America community was dominated by immigrants from Hong Kong and southern China. Then the Taiwanese came. Since all of these groups use the traditional version there was no controversy. Now there is a big influx of mainlanders who grew up using the simplified version. Obviously they want their children to learn the simplified version. So now school officials are caught in the middle. It is really too bad because it tears the Chinese American community apart over something as beautiful as Chinese writing.

My own feeling is that I want the traditional writings to survive. I am biased because I learned the traditional version. I also feel that the tradition is more beautiful. It has more, pardon the pun, character. I doubt that the simplified version is that much easier to learn. If you want easy, use alphabet! But I am also realistic, with the overwhelming population of China and its increasing influence in the world of commerce, the simplified version will eventually prevail. Just like Cantonese will give away to Mandarin in Chinatowns here and eventually even in Hong Kong, traditional scripts will lose out. It is too bad but it is reality.

Everybody had been waiting breathlessly to see which way Snowe would fall. Would Snowe have ice in her veins? Can she weather the storm of attack from her Republican party? Would she flake out from the middle ground? In other words will the Baucus bill have a Snowe ball's chance in hell of getting a Republican vote? Well after watering the bill extensively, particularly getting rid of the public option in order to woo Republicans, the Baucus bill passed out of committee 14-9. Of course without all that compromise, it would have only passed 13-10. It is nice to claim bipartisan support but it is hardly a great victory for the Democrats.

On a different note, the insurance industry is now against healthcare reform saying it will increase premiums $4000 on average over the next ten years. I think any intelligent person would consider the source of this "research". I can tell you my insurance has gone up over 60% in the last 3 years without reform and in 10 years at this pace my premium will increase way more than $4000. If a proposal is too confusing to me I usually just look at who is endorsing or against it. For example if the tobacco companies are for something, it is probably not going to be good for your health. The insurance industry is looking out for my premium? Come on! People should now root for reform more than ever.

I don't lik Rush Limbaugh. But all the reaction out there against him trying to buy part of the Rams? I think this just plays into his hand. He was not serious about buying in. He knew that the NFL would not let him in. But by trying to buy in it caused an uproar from the players, owners and people like Sharpton. Now he can go on his show and claim that he was discriminated against and get his base rile up again. The NFL owners are not exactly a group of good people. I mean why do they still allow a franchise in our capital to be called the Redskins? They all looked the other way as steroids and other drugs were used all over the league. Criminal records of some of the players are astounding. It is like the kettle calling the pot black when it comes to their complaint about Limbaugh. My question is: Who are the morons who invited Limbaugh into the partnership? Are they trying to sabotage their own candidacy to help Limbaugh get publicity?

The scientists who won the Nobel prize did their breakthrough works about 30 years ago. They are finally being rewarded now. Obama has been president for 9 months and he wins his prize already? He is greater symbol for peace than Gandhi, who had never won the Nobel? Well, I suppose he is able to bring enemies together. Both the Taliban and Rush Limbaugh believe that Obama is worse than Hitler. Both Israelis and Palestinians think that with the award, he will be tougher on them. Both the extreme right and the extreme left don't think he has not done enough. But other than bringing these mortal enemies together against him winning the award, I don't see how he should have even been nominated. At this pace if the world comes out of recession next year, he will win the Nobel prize--for economics.

The question I have now is will this affect his decision about Afghanistan? He is taking a lot of time to make the decision. In the past he has said that Afghanistan is different than Iraq and that we need to win there. I agree with that and hold him to that. As I have said before, I agree with the generals who recommend that we add troops to Afghanistan. The fact that we got side-tracked by Bush in Iraq and that the job is much more difficult today does not change my believe that we have to defeat al qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. Maybe Obama does not need to authorize all 40,000 troops McCrystal asked for, but he should not hesitate to increase the manpower as soon as possible. I hope winning the peace prize does not affect his judgment in this.

One more thing about the Nobel. The winners in each catergory split 1.4 millon. Since there is usually 3 winners, each get less than 500,000. Not bad but not exactly anywhere near the bonuses the Wall Street types get. Without scientific innovations, businesses have nothing new to sell. In the long run we must increase funding to the scientific fields so that the brightest people continue to go into sciences and we get scientists from other countries who want to come here to do research. Inventing the next computer chip or medicine is much more important than creating the next hedge fund.

It is unbelievable that so many Hollywood types come out in support of Roman Polanski. Debra Winger, Martin Scorsese and Woody Allen? If I am Polanski, I don't want Woody Allen to be on my side. Comments and petitions from these people only reinforce the perception to the rest of the country that the powerful in Hollywood don't live in reality. They believe that they are above the law.

In fact Polanski's treatment by the LA justice system 32 years ago make him almost above the law. How is it that the prosecution and the defense were making a deal for probation when someone rapes a 13 year old girl? If Polanski was poor he would have been in jail for more than 10 years. If the judge was changing his mind about the plea deal as both the prosecution and defense contend now, he had a perfect right to do so. The judge is not the one making the deal but he gets to approve or disapprove of it. Until he makes that decision he certainly can change his mind. Now everybody is blaming the judge because he is dead and cannot defend himself. The prosecution should be the one that the public be angry at for making such a sweet heart deal for a heinous crime.

Regardless of the conduct of the judge, the fact remains that Polanski skipped out of the country and would not return for trial. I can now understand why the celebrities are on his side because if Polanski is allowed to go free, then every time a rich person commits a crime, all he had to do is flee the country. Is this the message we are sending? If Polanski cannot be brought to justice because of the length of time and that he is not dangerous at his old age, then why do we drag 90 year old Nazi war criminals out of Argentina or other places to face trial?

Joe Wilson says that Obama lied about illegal immigrants not being covered in any healthcare reform package. I think that if Obama did not lie then he is wrong on this issue. As are most of Americans. All the Democrat's plans do not allow illegals to even buy their own insurance, never mind subsiding them if they are poor. As I have said before, most illegals are doing what you and I would have done, if we have the energy and drive, to risk their lives to work very hard to support their families. If our government don't want their services, deport them. I think it would be worse for our economy but it is a fair legal choice we can make. However, to say that someone who is working and paying taxes but cannot get pay for their own insurance, is morally wrong.

Besides being morally wrong I think it is also impractical. If an illegal has a heart attack or appendicitis e.g. he will go to ER where we have a policy not to turn away anyone. So without insurance or in this case the legal right to buy insurance, the bill will probably be paid by taxpayers or swallowed by the hospital which has to charge others more. Since illegals are younger and in better physical shape than Americans on the average (you don't sneak into the country and work in the fields 10 hours a day in my condition), we should want them to be part of the paid insurance pool. As I said before, if an illegal gets tuberculosis and do not get treated, he may die and also spread it to others. Tuberculosis does not know nationality. Do we want this?

I was quite happy with my football predictions on Saturday. Sure I was wrong about USC and OSU. But I had also predicted to my younger son that Michigan and UCLA were going to lose. Since my alma mater and his school won, it makes me 0-3 in predictions but very happy. The truth is that OSU should have won even though I was wrong about the abilities of the two qbs. Pryor doesn't seem to have improve much as far as passing goes from last year. And I expected him to scramble more which I think would cause more problems for USC and may have opened up the passing. Barkley did better at the end than I thought he possibly could. He didn't panic and certainly did not choke at the end as I predicted. I am not sold on him, however. It is obvious that the USC offense was way more conservative than in previous years. I think with Aaron Corps, who can scramble and throw, USC would have won easily. I hope that USC play this way against Cal in a few weeks.

In continuation on weekend sports: I think Serena Williams got off too easy. She should have been fined a lot more and suspended. But you know that would never happen. Not when they never supended McEnroe and Connors. Truth is tennis was at its most popular time when the two bad boys were playing. Tennis authorities know that controversial personalities sell tickets and bring high ratings. They were not about to have Connors and McEnroe miss tournaments and they are not going to have Serena Williams miss tournaments if they can help it.

McEnroe, by the way, predictably defended Williams. He said that foot fault should not be called in this situation, ie bring on match point. He said refs let fouls go in basketball all the time especially at end of games. I think that is absurd. Michael Jordan may get away with fouls because he is a superstar and because fouls are subjective. But stepping on a line is not subjective. If a ref sees Jordan step on the line with the ball near the end of the game, he is going to call it. In this case if the linesman sees a foot fault, he or she must call it, regardless where we are at the match. Anyways if it was not for linesmen and umpires who "can't be serious", McEnroe would not be making so much money after he retired!

I don't think Obama's speech is going to change any minds. He knows that he will not get any support from any Republicans and is just trying to get more public support and keep the liberal and conservative Democrats from fighting each other. He will improve his approval rating on healthcare as a result of the speech for a few days. This won't last and he will have to push quickly for the House and Senate to push bills through and then reconcile the difference between the more liberal House bill and the more conservative Senate bill in conference committee. This is why he refuses to come out totally for or against the public option. This gives him the flexibility to accept whatever comes out of the conference committee.

Personally I don't think healthcare reform is going to make much difference if there is no public option. Without it I think premiums will keep rising and we will have to revisit the problem in the near future. But I think at this point Obama will accept any bill and declare victory and move on. If there was any victory for Obama yesterday it was thanks to the Republicans. Their response speech was weak and the crazy guy who called Obama a liar probably helped the Democrats more than Obama's speech.

As a side note , I predict that Ohio State will beat USC on Saturday. I think USC is over confident, the game is in Columbus, and USC has a freshman qb who was not tested in the first game. I think OSU will stack the line to stop the run and hope that Barkley makes mistakes. On offense I think Pryor will give USC problems just as Vince Young did a few years ago.

It seems like we are getting bad news everyday out of Afghanistan. The apparent corruption of the central government in the election and the increase in casualties make this war appear unwinable. This is most unfortunate because if we had not gone into Iraq but focused on Afganistan I think we could have defeated the Taliban permanently and captured most of the leaders of al qaeda, if not bin laden himself. The question is what to do now.

When we went into Afghanistan, I felt our goal was not just to defeat al qaeda and the Taliban but to also rebuild Afghanistan. I felt that if we just bomb the whole place up and leave afterwards it will help the terrorist leaders elsewhere be able to recruit more people against us. But in order to rebuild Afghanistan, there has to be leadership within the country itself. Karzai does not appear to be able provide that leadership. Just like the economic crisis, Obama inherited this war from Bush and owns it now. I don't think he has any good choices here.

I think Obama has to increase his troops in Afghanistan as his generals are suggesting. The surge worked well in Iraq and is worth trying here. But even if we have some military success over the next couple of years it will not be enough. The bad guys can afford to wait it out in the mountains if we drive them back. We must be willing to stay for the long run. But if a surge works a little, at least Obama can then convince Congress and the public that it is worthwhile to keep going. We also need to win over the people outside of Kabul. This means that we have to find a way to bypass the corrupt central government and provide aids to the provinces. This will require more civilian aid workers as well. It will not be an easy task but our fight against terrorism depends on it.

There has been some scary stories about the Canadian health system floating around. The idea is to make people think that Obama is trying to put in a single payer system and that it would be a disaster for America. This has made some Canadians upset as most of them think that their system is superior than ours. I will give my opinion on this subject today.

Statistically the Canadian system is better than ours. So are all the systems in the industrialized world. Canadians spend just a little over 50% of what we spend per capita on healthcare and their life expectancy and infant mortality rates are better than ours. There is no worry for any Canadian going bankrupt due to health problems. They go to the primary doctor of their choice and have very low copay. If they pay for their medicine, it is much cheaper than here. They do have trouble with access to doctors in rural areas but that is the case in this country as well. So it will not be a disaster for us to copy their system despite all the scary stories out there. They don't deny care to terminally ill people as some have suggested.

There are delays in nonemergency surgeries. A national health program is going to be tougher on specialists than generalists. The Canadian government pays the doctors according to a fee schedule. For primary doctors the discount compare with private pay in U.S. is acceptable because they have less paper work and less hassle of having to deal with only one insurance--that of the government. Specialists' pay will decrease more so there is less people going to various specialties and probably some who move to the U.S. to practice. I don't think that is necessary a bad thing. But for patients in the U.S. who are used to have their elective procedure paid for and scheduled quickly, this can be an annoyance. Of course if you don't have insurance, then it is not even possible to get elective treatments.

Two things that bother me about the Canadian system is that of low or no copay or deductibles. This drives up the cost as people will tend to use services more. It is human nature if say you can get anything you want at the grocery store and pay only $5, wouldn't you get more items? The other thing is that you can't buy private insurance unless it is for something your provincial government does not cover, such as optometry or dentistry. Why should a free country not allow people to purchase something they want? While it maybe true that if there are privately insured patients, some doctors would opt out of the public program and provide services to private pay patients only, that is not enough reason to deprive people of their freedom of choice.

Right now if someone does not want to wait to get nonemergency treatment in Canada, there is no private choice he can turn to. If he is rich enough, he can go to the U.S. and pay out of his own pocket. So it is not possible to have the same treatment for everyone regardless of income. In fact some of the government officials who support national healthcare, have bypass the system to come to the U.S. for treatment so they can be done faster. So why not allow for private insurance option so the middle class can bypass the public program if they wish? I am all for competition. So give us the public option in our reform. And give the Canadians the private option in their system.

Today's blog is a 2nd part installment on healthcare. Recently someone wrote in our local newspaper asking 2 questions. First is why drug companies charge much more in U.S. than in Canada. The second is why hospitals may charge $10,000 but will accept say $1500 from Medicare. What is the true value of the care they delivered?

The answer to the first question is easy: Because they can. Under Canada's national health, the government determines what a drug is worth and if the drug company won't sell it at that price, it loses the Canadian market. In the U.S. if a company has a patent on a drug, it can sell at any price because there is no competition from a generic. Of course, Medicaid and private insurances can negotiate for a better price, but patients who pay out of their own pocket will have to pay what the company wants to sell the drug for. So if you have no drug insrance coverage, you should buy your drugs from a reputable Canadian pharmacy. It is the same medicine.

The drug companies will argue that the prices are high because they have to pay for research and development costs. If prices are controlled in U.S. like Canada, then it will decrease research and thus decrease introduction of new drugs. Certainly if one develops a completely new drug, a patent of certain length is deserved so that a company will profit. But most of the basic scientific research that leads to creation of new drugs take place in universities, or labs under government funding. The drug companies turn the basic knowledge into making a new drug, get it tested and approved for use. So it is not just the private companies doing all the inventions. If the drug companies comes up with a completely new class of drug that changes the treatment of a disease, they will be richly rewarded under any system. But most of the time they come up with "me too" drugs which change 1 or 2 molecules of previous drugs. I would bet the R@D budget of some of the drugs on the market is less than their advertising budget. I don't advocate total price control but there should be a system where "me too" drugs should not cost $5 a pill.

Regarding the 2nd question we have to look at what is value. If you make a pair of sneakers and you price it at $150, probably nobody will buy it. Then you can lower the price or you can refuse to sell them at all. Obviously a pair of Air Jordans is really not 6 times better than a generic pair of sneakers. But Nike can set the price because people want to buy them. In healthcare hospitals can set their price if the market is really free. If you have a heart attack you are going to pay whatever the hospital charge or else you die. But hospitals can't charge you before you are treated. This is because the law forces hospitals to treat you whether you can pay or not. So if a drug addict who shot a cop comes in with gun shot wound the hospital and doctors there will have to treat him even though he will never pay after he gets out. So in order to make up for those people who have no insurance and have no money to collect from, hospitals have to charge everybody a lot more. But Medicare and Medicaid pay only what they want to pay. So $10,000 becomes $1500. Insurance companies who have a lot of patients can negotiate with hospitals and generally pay a little more than Medicare. So it is hard for hospitals to make up for the losses from the uninsured whom hospitals are forced to treat. Some insurance companies would not negotiate in good faith with hospitals and when their customers go to ER the insurance companies would pay much lower than the norm. Hospitals tried to bill the patients for the balance which upset patients. It appears that politicians are going against the hospitals on this because patients are voters. But unlike the sneaker seller, hospitals cannot hold back service. At least not until they are forced to close the ER.

So who gets screwed? The uninsured who have some money. If you are working and have a house and bank accont but no insurance, you will have that $10,000 debt. You can probably negotiate down the amount but not to anywhere near $1500. This is one of the reason why our system needs an overhaul. The working poor or middle class without insurance are the ones who can go bankrupt if they get a serious illness. If you are a drug addict or an alcoholic you get free medical care in ER which in turn causes someone who works hard for his money to lose everything he has. Is that fair?

It is time for me to weigh in on the healthcare reform debate. The topic is too complex and will take several blogs. That's why I have not tried to start it. But seeing how the debate seems to be going out of control with all these socalled town hall meetings. I will start by making some comments on what people are screaming about in the past week.

1. Debate is good and challenging the government is not only the right of Americans but a duty. But shouting down everybody else so that a civilize debate cannot take place is wrong. I wish those people who said they can't trust the government would have come out and say that when the government sent troops to Iraq for a war that should not have been fought. Whether healthcare reform bill that they eventually pass is better for the country or not, it can't be worse than the decision to spend $2 trillion and cause thousands of American lives and tens of thousands of Iraqis while taking us away from the our real enemies in Afghanistan.

2. Right now there are thouands of pages of possible reform but no final version so I won't say if it is worthwhile. But if there is no public option then you might as well forget it. If everybody is in and we subsidize those who can't afford insurance, the private insurance companies will become richer and our premiums will keep going up. A public option to compete is absolutely necessary or else forget the whole thing. When the prescription coverage for Medicare patients went into effect and is run by private companies, the cost is going up and coverage for elderly patients who had both Medicare and Medicaid went down.

3. The "Death Panel"? People who spread that rumor should be ashamed of themselves. That includes Sarah Palin who talked about the death panel. Totally false info to scare people is just plain evil. One doctor in our area stood up in public recently and said that under the Obama plan, "My 85 year old mother, if she gets breast cancer, wouldn't be treated in favor of some 40 year old illegal immigrant!" That is purely wrong and should not be said by someone who should have known better. There is no such proposal in any of the bills and the AARP's political clout is way greater than those of all immigrant advocacy groups combined. If there is one truth in politics, it is that politicians are most afraid of political clout.

4. Those seniors who say: "Don't let the government take over my Medicare coverage" should be examined for Alzheimers. They didn't know Medicare is by the government? When Medicare tried to cut cost by using private companies to run Medicare HMO, it was a disaster here in our county. After some insurance company couldn't cherry pick the healthy seniors after a few years, they left the program, leaving seniors scrambling to find new doctors.

5. Some people say: "Why change the best system in the world. If we are not the best, why do people from other countries come here for treatments?" We don't have the best system. We spend more per capita that all other industrialized countries on healthcare but have worse outcome than most in many of the health statistics. We do have the best health technology in the world and that's why rich people from all over the world come here if they need the most obscure and difficult treatments. But most people don't have obscure diseases. Given what we spend, we should have better preventive care, better prenatal care etc.

6. I think a reasonable argument against reform is cost. I am a fiscal conservative. I don't like taxes and deficits. Obama and the Democrats are not being honest to say that reform will bring in cost-savings so that deficits won't occur. If there is no deficit increase then there will be large tax hike. This is a legitimate reason to question the Democrats' plans.

7. While I don't like tax increases, I don't like premium increases either. My family health insurance has increased 60% in the past 3 years. We are all in good health, don't smoke or drink much and 2 of 4 kids have their own insurance now. But our premium is going way up each year. People say the government will keep increasing taxes or ration care if they run a deficit with the public plan. What do you think the insurance companies will do if they lose money? They will raise premium, deny care (which they do even when they are making a profit), or go out of business--at which point you are out of luck.

There are many other things I want to talk about but I am out of gas. I welcome any comments or questions on any topic.

Last week Bill Clinton went to North Korea to secure the release of journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling. It was a nice human story and it was nice to see the women reunite with their family, particularly Lee with her little daughter. The nice thing was that officially it was an unofficial visit by Clinton with no official diplomatic effort. Well, everybody understands what I meant anyway. Some people actually said that we gave in to Kim. What is it exactly we gave him? A picture of him and Clinton sitting in chairs without a smile, that's about it. Kim would get some publicity in North Korea out of it, as he really needs publicity there. Elsewhere everybody understands that the U.S. had to do what it had to do and gave away nothing for the women's return.

Having said that, this was a distraction the government did not need. I know that journalists have to take risks but to me it was dumb to be inside of North Korea or close enough so that they can be caught. What can they possibly uncover in that area and tell the world about it? We already know Kim is a terrible dictator and the N. Koreans are living in hell. Why take such a stupid risk? Now there is news that 3 Americans hiking in Iraq wandered into Iran and were captured. What, they can't hike anywhere else in the world other than Iraq? You can't get close to nature at Yosemites? You don't know that Iran and Iraq share a border? I know we don't teach geography well in school, but this is ridiculous. All three were UC Berkeley graduates, which make me wonder what they teach in that famous school. Obviosly not common sense. After these people get home, they and the two women journalists should be sentenced to teach political geography to high school students. After they take a course themselves first, of course.

The economic news have been relatively good lately. The Dow increased by over 700 points in the last month. Housing prices went up by .5%. Not exactly great but better than keep going down. I think we have gone through the worst but I don't think we are out of the woods yet. Certainly the stock market is going to have sell offs in the near future. And unemployment has not peaked yet as companies that had cut jobs are not going to hire until they feel more confident.

The question is how is Obama's economic plan doing? I always thought that a president has much less control of the economy than the people believe. Who really knows if his stimulus plan has anything to do with what improvement there is so far. I like Obama not because I believe he has any great strategy with the economy even though it was the economy that got him elected. I like Obama for his foreign policies and his understanding of the world. I don't know if his economic policies are good or not.

I don't believe that he is killing the country with his policies as the conservatives are saying. They say things are still bad 6 months into his term and that his stimulus plans are going to cause inflation and enormous debts for the future. I think there is a parallel with Obama and Reagan, of all people. Reagan took over from Carter with runaway inflation. Reagan allowed Paul Volcker to raise interest rates to battle inflation. He also enacted tax cuts. But 2 years into his administration inflation and the economy were still horrible. I think it was around 1986 that things turned totally around. Frankly I think if you do nothing things would turn around in 6 years. I think without any stimulus, the economy would turn around for Obama in 6 years also. But the critics of today are complaining after 6 MONTHS. But neither Reagan nor Obama could have done nothing. Reagan had to try to get inflation under control and Obama had to get the economy moving again. If either one said let capitalism take its course, they would have been the next Hoover. I think with some luck Obama will get reelected in 4 years because the economy will have bounced back by then.

That doesn't mean Reagan and Obama were great economists. Obama will have to deal with inflation and deficits and may have to raise taxes. But he won't do it till his second term. Reagan' policy led to big deficits that eventually caused Bush I to raise taxes which led to his loss to Clinton. Obama may do all right during his stint in the White House but he may lead to the Democrats losing after him. Reagan is adored by Republicans today but he helped Clinton get elected. Obama may be fondly remembered by Democrats years from now but I think the next Republican president will be thanking him secretly.

So don't lose sleep over the economy. We will recover and march on. We just need the next Bill Gates, Steven Jobs and Andrew Grove to step up.

As if he does not have enough problem trying to sell health care reform, Obama gets side-tracked into making a comment STUPIDLY! You know he fumbled badly when Al Sharpton praised him! Why was he answering a question about Henry Louis Gates when he doesn't know all the facts as he even admitted? This does not seem like the politically savey Obama we know. I think the pressure of trying to pass health care reform is getting to him. I don't see how he is going to get a good bill to pass. The energy bill, which was suppose to be less controversial, ended up much weaker and with lot of junk added on. And those junks were put in by members of his own party. With lots of people having a stake on how the health care bill shapes up and Republicans determine to make this Obama's Waterloo, I can see why Obama is stressed out.

Having said that Obama stupidly let the conversation drift away from his agenda, I would like to point out that I thought the police acted stupidly from the information I have read. First of all a neighbor called the police because he or she thought that Gates was breaking in his own house. I can't imagine that a 58 year old white or Asian male would be suspected of breaking in by his neighbor even if they don't know each other. If I was Gates and I came home from a long trip and had trouble getting into my house, I think I would be in a pretty foul mood. I admit I have a slight temper. Okay, my wife would say very bad temper. If after I finally get into the house and the police shows up and demand to know if I lived there, I would be pretty pissed. I can see if Gates was a young man but he is older than me! In what way can the neighbor or police think that he is robbing the house? Now, it is very likely things escalated because Gates cursed out the cops. I may have done the same. But there was no report that he was violent. In what way would the cops felt threatened by a man in his late 50's without a weapon? So why was he hand-cuffed? What was he charged with? And why were charges dropped if he did something that required him to be hand-cuffed.

By accounts so far, the cop involved was a good cop who trained others about racial profiling. And it is possible that Gates was out of line with his emotions. But I would have to ask: Would Gates have been led out of his own house in hand-cuffs if he was a 58 year old white professor at Harvard? I suppose it could have been worse. Remember the guy in Texas who shot 2 men in the back because he felt threatened that those guys had broke in his NEIGHBOR's house? So Gates is lucky he does not live in Texas. His neighbor could have shot him and got off for self-defense!

The death of Robert McNamara last week went pretty much unnoticed by the general public as all the media was focused on Michael Jackson's death. Obviously 99% of Americans know who was Michael Jackson but I would bet that less than 10% know who was McNamara. McNamara was Secretary of Defense under Kennedy and Johnson. He was considered the architect of the Vietnam War and many historians hold him responsible for the disaster of this war. To me there is a similarity between him and a more recent Dept. of Defense official.

I am talking about Paul Wolfowitz, the undersecretary of Defense under Bush. While Donald Rumsfeld was the Sec. of Defense, I think Wolfowitz had more influence on Bush to start the Iraq war. McNamara used the Gulf of Tonkin incident to escalate the war. The information on that incident is questionable. Wolfowitz used weapons of mass destruction and link to al qaeda to get support for the Iraq war. Those information turned out to be false. McNamara underestimated the support the Viet Congs had. Wolfowitz underestimated the support for the insurgents. McNamara argues for Vietnam war with the Dominoes Theory. Wolfowitz argues for spreading democracy to the Middle East.

One last thing: When it appeared that these men had failed, they were both given the job of president of World Bank. I wonder who thinks that people who fight bad wars would be good at loaning money?

What a surprise! The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 in favor of the white firefighters in the New Haven case. I am such a prognosticator! I could have told you who is on what side before they heard the case. David Souter, as expected, voted the same way as Sotomayor had. So nothing will change when Sotomayore is confirmed.

I have to say that despite the fact that everyone is biased I think Chief Justice Roberts is trying to get some consensus so that it is not always 5-4. Last week there were actually 2 cases where the vote was 8-1. By narrowing the opinions he was able to get almost all of the justices to agree. I don't usually agree with Robert's rulings but I think he is similar to Obama in that he tries to get beyond partianship. Neither will succeed and both have biases themselves, but they both are trying.

One more item on the justice system. Madoff was sentenced today. Judge Denny Chin sentenced him to 150 years as the prosecutors requested. I think we need some empathy here. One hundred fifty seems like too large of a number. The defense had requested 12 years. I have much more empathy than Chin. I would take the average of the 2 sides and thus give him only 81 years. With such empathy, can I be nominated by Obama for a judge position?

Well, nobody is claiming that Iran's failure to qualify for the World Cup is making the protests last longer. But as I stated before if Iran had defeated South Korea then the regime might have been able to stop the revolt quickly. Now the ending is not in sight and the regime may have to use even more force. While people are not out there because of soccer, the symbolic gesture by the national team in Seoul of wearing green wrist bands had to have encouraged the protesters. I can't imagine Chinese athletes like Yao Ming would have the courage to buck the Chinese government as these Iranians soccer players did on national tv. They are well recognized by the government and thus they put themselves and their family at risk by their actions.

A few days ago I disagreed with people like John McCain who say that Obama has not done or said enough. What did they want him to do? We are not going to send troops so what is the point of meddling in the early part of the protest. It just gives the regime a chance to blame everything on the west and use force against the people. It is not the mind of the hardliners that we are going to change by coming out against the government. It would have actually hurt our standing with moderates and the majority of the Iranians. We have no credibility there. We supported the Shah, we helped Iraq in their war, and we called them the axis of evil. It would be the kiss of death for the demonstrators if we come out strongly agaisnt the regime in the beginning.

Now, however, I think Obama should come out with stronger rhetoric. Again we can't do anything concrete to help the demonstrators but now our moral support will be seen as genuine and not meddling to the average Iranian. You see, the government has resorted to violence already and has already tried to link us to the demonstrators. So we are not endangering the people anymore by condemning the regime. The average Iranian and the world has seen the violence of this regime against its own people. The woman Nada shot by the police has become the face of this revolt. Now Obama can come out and say in no uncertain term that the Iranian government is illegitamate by virtue of actions. Even the Muslim world would have to agree that this is not the doing of the west but of Iranian government itself. It is time for our president to shout out our support for the brave demonstrators.

The news of huge protests of the election in Iran would seem on the surface what the U.S. wants. Following the victory by the pro-western faction in Lebanon, it seems like the tide may be turning in the Middle East. I would caution against such optimism. It is true that Ahmadinejad is reeling with the widespread protest. But this is not a democracy and eventually I think the government will be able to kill the protest just as China did 20 years ago. And while we think that Ahmadinejad's opponents are pro-U.S. I am not sure that is so. Most of the protest is the result of poor economic performance by the government and if Obama tries to inflame the situation it can backfire. Ahmadinejad can use the argument that the U.S. is trying to bring down Iran and nationalism may trump economics.

But even if Ahmadinejad eventually gets thing back under control, the fact that he had to cheat (he may have won without cheating but obviously he did cheat), is going to weaken him. If the U.S. and Israel do not upset the Iranians, Ahmadinejad's days as president will be numbered. Ironically I think if he stays in power the U.S. have a better opportunity to progress diplomatically than if he loses power. This is because the opposition will be seen by the clerics and the people in the rural areas as being influenced by the west. Ahmadinejad, on the other hand, is a hardliner and may think that being little more moderate may quiet down some of his enemies. So will see how this plays out.

As to how long the stalemate is going to continue, I have an idea that everyone is going to dismiss as absurd. I think it will depend on the soccer match between Iran and South Korea tommorrow. If Iran upsets South Korea on the road and somehow qualifies for the world cup, it will give the government a boost as people will run into the street to celebrate and decrease the protestors' volume. This will make it easier for the government to crackdown and disperse the protestors. If Iran loses, then this may run for a much longer time because everybody will be in a foul mood, even more so than before due to economic hard times. This will bring out more people to protest the government. I know it sounds absurd but don't underestimate the power of soccer in the world outside the U.S.

I assume that you all have read the assignment which was my blogs from 7-20-06 and 9-26-05. My favorite political commentator on tv is David Gergen of CNN. Gergen had worked in the Nixon, Ford, Regan and Clinton administrations. He considers himself an independent. I agree with his views about 90% of the time. So it got my attention when Gergen said that Obama's speech was the most powerful by an American president EVER on the Middle East. After I read the excerpts in the newspaer, I thought this was an unusual hyperbole from Gergen. Then I realized that Gergen was not saying much afterall. There has not been any presidential speech ever on the Middle East that was of any significance. So this is actually a small step. But at least it is a small step in the right direction.

Other presidents have tried. Carter got Begin and Sadat to sign a peace agreement. Clinton came close to getting Arafat to agree to a peace plan before Arafat chickened out. I don't know if Obama can even match the achievements of these two men. But in order to have a breakthrough in impossible situations, you need an unexpected person to step up. It took Nixon, a staunch anti-communist to open up China. If Ariel Sharon, one of the biggest hawks in Israel history, had not suffered a stroke, he may have been able to achieve peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Obama, with his unusual heritage and world-wide popularity, is maybe our best bet to succeed here. His speech won't win over any extremists but may win over a few moderates. It is a small step in a marathon but as I wrote before, we can never have stability in the Middle East without solving the Israel-palestinian conflict.

I personally would not have given the speech now. There is very little immediate reward for this as things are not going to change with one speech. In the meawhile back at home every part of speech can be nit picked by his adversaries. They can also criticize him for leaving home while the financial crisis and two wars are going on at the same time. But Obama is not shortsighted. He understands that without winning back Arab moderates and start the path to peace in Israel, we are going to face even more problems in the future. He understands that when Bush ignored Afghanistan and went into Iraq we lost credibility with the moderates in the Arab world. He wants to start the effort to bring them back to our side as soon as possible.

I think his admission that Iraq was a war of choice is right. I don't think that is an apology or a sign of weakness. Let's face it, even the extremists know that we are the most powerful. But threatening our enemies has not work. North Korea and Iran are certainly bolder than before. What he said about the Israel-Palestinian conflict was also good. It is not what Netanyahu wants to hear but I think Sharon would have approved. What I don't like about the speech is when he quotes the Koran, the Bible and the Talmud. That strikes me as kissing up to all the religions involved. The other thing is that he did not address Pakistan, the second largest Muslim country in the world. It also has nuclear weapons. If Iraq was the war that shouldn't have been and Afghanistan is the war that needs to be, then Pakistan may be the war that will be. I would have like to see what he would do to prevent that and try to convince the Pakistanians to be on our side.

Did it change many minds? Probably not but I think maybe a few moderates are leaning back toward us now. I think now that Obama has to come back and work on the financial crisis, it is time for Hillary to keep working on the Middle East. Maybe Bill can help?

One bit of good news. Since Israel's battle with Hezbollah in 2006 the western leaning politicians in Lebanon have been losing ground to Hezbollah. Today the western-backed March 14 bloc won election in Lebanon. Usually an U.S. endorsement in this region is a kiss of death. So victory by this bloc is a pleasant surprise. Did it have anything to do with Obama's speech? I doubted it but it couldn't have hurt. Hopefully Obama is smart enough to not take any credit because that would hurt our allies in the region in the future.

Due to popular demand I am writing about the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. I believe all the senate democrats will vote for her and most of the republicans will vote against. How is that for great insight? The nominations have become so political that everything is predictable. Was anyone surprised by Bush nominating Roberts and Alito? Is anyone surprise that a liberal Hispanic woman was nominated by Obama? Of course not. When Roberts was nominated I wrote that it is obvious that he is well qualified and even though I probably will not agree with many of his decisions, I would go listen to him if I had a chance. The same goes with Sotomayor. I am sure I will disagree with her on many decisions, but if I have a chance I would listen to her speak because she is intelligent.

I can see where people think that she is wrong to say that a Hispanic woman can rule more wisely than a white male. But this is taken out of context. She was talking about an immigrant case and being from an immigrant family she would have a different perspective. She certainly can use a better way of phrasing that but I can understand what she meant. I think I would have a better perspective than my American born friends regarding immigration. I don't buy the argument that you make your ruling just based on the law only and not your personal experience. If judges can do that, then why do most of the Supreme Court cases recently ended up 5-4? If personal opinions don't go into the ruling and every justice knows the laws very well, then shouldn't the ruling be 9-0 every time? How one interprets the law depends mostly on one's experience in life and one's core beliefs.

So now we have this charade call confirmation hearing. This is where the minority party tries to make the nominee say something stupid and where the nominee tries to say as little as possible. At the end unless he/she says something really stupid, he/she will be confirmed. I had no problem with Roberts and Alito, and I have no problem with Sotomayor. They are all well qualified. Now Clarence Thomas....

Been busy the last several days so I was not able to write about several topics that I have an opinion on during the past week. Now that some of these topics are no longer hot off the press, I don't know if anyone is interested about reading my view. So I will throw it out there. If anyone is interested about North Korea, Sonia Sotomayor, California's proposition 8 banning gay marriage, GM going bankrupt, or any other topic; please write in a comment and I will write something about it in the next few days.

Just returned home from Illinois where I attended my eldest son's graduation from a master program. I was a good trip and I found a few things to comment about.

During the graduation ceremony one of the speaker tried to get some easy applause by saying: "Are you happy?" This will usually bring a loud round of applause from the graduates. But this time the response was rather subdued. The speaker tried again: "Last year's class seemed much happier!" Usually the crowd would try to clap and yell louder to that challenge. But again the response was mild. I think the reason is that this year's graduates know the daunting task ahead of them in trying to find a job in this ec0nomy. I can't blame them. At a time where the future should be bright, they face uncertainty. Hopefully things will be better for them soon.

On the bright side Springfield, Illinois where the ceremony took place seem not to be affected by the recession. There is no change from what I saw last August when I was there. The restaurants are even busier and there are not many houses with for sale signs. This is different from California and other areas of the country I heard about. I think the main reason is that Springfield is the capital of Illinois. In a recession one of the few sectors that are still hiring is the government. So while during boom times government towns like Springfield may not benefit much, during recession these towns survive better. I think Sacramento is doing ok compare to other cities in California. Lansing is probably better off than Detroit, I think.

This was the 200 birthday of Lincoln and so Springfield is going all out to promote all things Lincoln. We went to the Lincoln museum. I enjoyed the place a lot. Particularly I like the section of cartoons about Lincoln from when he was president. It just reminds me of the politics today except the Republicans are the liberals then. Some of the stuff was racist and would not be published today, I think. But it is interesting that even back then the president is pulled from both sides. The supporters of slavery obviously hated Lincoln. But the supporters of emancipation also had harsh words for Lincoln as they think he was not moving fast enough and that he was trying to placate the other side. I am sure Obama would appreciate this. The more things change the more it is the same!

The last observation is that despite a Democratic majority in both houses and a Democratic governor, Illinois has trouble passing a budget. They are almost as dysfunctional as California! Forget about bipartianship, we may need dictatorship!

Watched John Stossel on 20/20 last night. In a kind of take off from his "give me a break" segment, he talked about 6 things that would be politically incorrect to debate about. I'll give my take on these items.

The first one was about the law that protect pregnant women from being fired. Stossel says that it backfires on women because employers don't want to get sue so they are less likely to hire women who may become pregnant. As a business owner, I can understand his point. When a woman takes a maternity leave others in the company have to do more or employer has to hire a temp. If a woman is self-emplyed, she certainly can't take a maternity leave and expect her business will not suffer during her absence. The truth is if a woman is a good employee, the employer will hold the job for her until she comes back even without a law.

The second one is about irridiation of food. Stossel says that food poisoning kills 5 thousand people a year and irridiation prevents that and unlike what the fear-mongering activists say, irridiation is perfectly safe. I agree that irridiation is safe but I don't agree that we need to irridiate most of our food. There are 300 million people in the country and so 900 million meals a day are eaten. So 5,ooo deaths from food is hardly a high percentage. Most of the deaths are from old and sick people. I think if the general population is never exposed to germs in the food then they would be more likely to get sick if they go some place where food is not irridiated. So unless there is germ warfare against us, irridiation is not needed.

The third one is about people doing dangerous activities and need to be rescued, then they should have to pay for the rescue. I agree with that wholeheartedly. It is not just the money but this put the people doing the rescue in risky situations. So yes, charge these people or put them in jail for reckless endangerment of the rescuers.

The next one is about saving endangered species such as the tiger by allowing people to farm them. Since places like China want tiger bones for herbal medicine, there is an incentive to poach the tigers and driving them to extinction. The argument is that by farming them the tiger won't be extinct, just like chickens will not be extinct. If I am a tiger I wouldn't like that argument. I would rather be free in the wild and not be eventully killed for my bones. I think scientific studies need to be done to see if there is any medicinal benefit of tiger bones. If not, I think as China becomes more modernized, the demand will decrease, although I am not sure if that will be in time to save the tiger.

The next one is about steroid use in sports. Stossel argues that there is no evidence that steroid is dangerous and adults should be able to use them if they choose. I totally disagree here. There is no epidemiology studies on steroid use because nobody has been able to get enough subjects to study them. There are rumors that the former USSR and East German athletes are dying at a younger age. Obviously the truth of that is not revealed in this country. And we don't know which athletes used them in this country 30 or 40 years ago and see if they are dying at a younger age than expected. It is well known that erythropoietin used in increasing blood count and thus oxygen level can lead to congestive heart failure if used in excessive. Even if you argue that adults should be allowed to take chances with their lives, if steroids are legalize, you know that kids will use them even more than they are now because they will follow their sports heroes.

The last one is about medicare which is a benefit to all seniors regardless of income. Stossel correctly points out that even the ultra-rich seniors get this benefit and at this pace the young people will have nothing left by the time they are old. I agree with that although it is not the seniors' fault. The actuaries who calculated this for the government should have seen this before. The pay in should have been higher years ago. I agree that we need to raise the age of eligibility and decrease benefits for wealthy seniors. Of course instead of cutting benefit, the government added prescription coverage which also covered wealthy seniors and put us further in deficit!

All these topics can be discussed in much more detail. But the only one that is of great importance is the last one because we all will be seniors one day, hopefully. Add to that the deficits we are running as a nation and the cost of heathcare in general, we need to debate this topics more frequently and in greater depth.

I have not written anything for awhile. There are several things I wanted to write about in the past week. But I have been very busy at work and have been too tired to think when I got home. Obviously I have been busy because of the swine flu situation. It is not that I have seen any cases of this disease so far but I have been busy answering questions from patients who have nothing or some other infection symptoms. I don't think this disease is any more dangerous than the usual flu. In fact its symptoms are the same as any ordinary flu. It has probably been working its way through Mexico for awhile but now that it is recognized as a new strain and has a name attached to it, people get more nervous. My guess, and it is only a guess, is that it will fade in 2 to 3 weeks. It may make a come back in the winter season but by then we should be well prepared for it.

There are still couple of important questions that nobody has been able to answer. One is why people in Mexico die and people in the U.S. so far have not? The second one is why does this flu affect young healthy people more than the elderly or infants? I will give my take on these, not that I know anything concrete and maybe proven way off base later. First of all the Mexican death rate of this disease may not be any different that an usual flu death rate. Once we know the exact number infected and the exact number of death then we can see if this really more deadly than other flu. As more Americans get infected we are likely to have deaths from this although again it may not be a higher rate than the usual flu.

As for young healthy people getting sicker my theory is that this disease is causing the body's immune system to overreact and injur itself. In other words like friendly fire in a war. Now healthy young people normally have a stronger immune system which would kill pathogens quicker and more effectively. In this case it may overreact and cause damage to its own cells. Mexicans are probably exposed to more disease than the average Americans and so may have a slightly stronger immune system but in this case it may back fire. Do I have scientific data to back up this theory? No, but my experience is that when Americans go to Mexico and eat in the villages like the natives do, they get sick. But the natives don't get sick eating the same food because they have built immunity. So I think generally the young Mexicans would do better against infections than Americans, but maybe the immunological reaction is too strong this time. Well, I put my 2 cents worth on this subject and will see how it plays out over the next couple of weeks.

It was, of course, great news that Captain Phillips was rescued. The captain, his crew, and the navy SEALS all did their job heroically. What I don't understand is why people are saying that Obama passed his first crisis as president. Just like when people questioned before if Obama had the strength to lead the military, I am confused. I asked then: what strength do you need to send the best trained and best equipped military to fight? It is not as if the president has to pick up a gun and fight the bad guys himself. In this case, he did what he and any other reasonably intelligent person would have done: give the authority to the people on the scene to make the judgment to kill if necessary. It is like going to Afghanistan after 9/11, anyone could have made that call. It is making stupid calls like going to Iraq that really separate the dumb ones from the smart ones.

Obama did what he was supposed to and got lucky. If the captain had been harmed during the rescue, he would have been blamed even though he had given the same order. Luck plays a big role, just ask Jimmy Carter whose rescue attempt of the Iranian hostages ended miserably through no fault of his.

Now what do we do about the pirates. Obviously the navy can't protect all of our ships not to mention those of other countries. Going to Somalia would be a risky proposition even though some have suggested that it would not be like going into Mogudishu during the Clinton years because the pirates are located on the coast. But if we are to attack their position, wouldn't they try to hide among the civilians inland like Hamas do in Gaza? Certainly we cannot go in without support of other countries. In the short term, the commercial companies will have to hire mercenaries to protect the ships. In the long term only by helping Somalia estabish a stable government will these acts of piracy become extinct. Good luck with that!

Two stories in the LA Times touch on subjects that I talked about in earlier blogs. I really have nothing new to say on the subjects, but I am mad again reading about them.

The first is about hospitals having to settle with the city of LA for dumping patients onto streets of skid row after they were discharged. The city uses some obscure law about false imprisonment to extort from the hospitals. As I said before, these people were homeless BEFORE they were hospitalized. The hospitals may have acted on behalf of their bottom line and sent these patients back to the streets, but where were they supposed to sent them? They were from the streets! If the argument is that nobody should be homeless then it is the responsibility of the government to provide a place for them. The hospitals are already giving these people free or only partially compensated care and who do you think will have to absorb the added cost of finding a place for these people to go? The result of this and other mandates on hospitals will be shutting down of ERs which will lead to health crisis for the whole population. Shame on the government for extorting the hospitals.

The next subject is John Yoo, the law professor at Berkeley who wrote all kinds of legal opinions supporting the actions of the Bush administration. In an opinion in LA Times today there were arguments about whether Yoo should be fired as a law professor. As I said before, I don't agree with Yoo's opinions. But crazy liberals can teach at Berkeley, but crazy conservatives can't? He is not flunking his students for going against his opinions nor is he stiffling debate in his class. So what is the big deal? As I said before, if someone admitted to Berkeley's law school can be brainwashed by a professor, then he/she should not have been admitted in the first place.

Watched most of a story on CNN about the violence in Mexico due to the drug war. The violence is spreading to America and despite Obama saying that we are going to help Mexico fight this, I don't think we will succeed. As I have said many times before: where there is a demand, there will be a supply. Our demand for illegal drugs have made the cartels rich. There is a 2 way traffic with drugs coming in and money and weapons going to Mexico. With these money and weapons, the Mexican police are outgunned and government officials are bribed. Illegal drugs are a national security problem and no amount of border control will stopped it.

I say go the way of alcohol and tobacco. Legalize drugs! I hate drugs and I am proud to say that I have never even smoke a joint. But the reality is rich free nations don't seem to be able to curb their appetite for drugs. I am under no illusion that legalizing drugs will decrease the addiction rates. I don't think the Netherland's drug addiction rates has decreased. But I don't think it has increased with legalization either. But by legalizing, we can at least take the profits away from the mob. I am also under no illusion that taxes from drugs will help in prevention and treatment as the politicians will funnel the money to elsewhere. But right now we are not getting anything and we are spending tons of money to police drugs not only here but abroad as well. So legalize now before our streets turn bloody like those in Mexico.

Just returned from Hilton Head, South Carolina, where I watched my daughter's college tennis team played 5 matches during spring break. I was pleasantly surprised by how I enjoyed the trip. I was looking forward to seeing my daughter of course, but I did not think that I would like to watch college tennis so much. I have not played tennis for a while because of my shoulder injury and with only one more child still competing, I had not thought much of tennis lately. But at Hilton Head I saw some incredible matches involving athletes who will not be going pro after graduation. They were playing for the love of the game with genuine joy, something I don't see often in pro or high level div. 1 sports. It makes me want to start playing tennis again!

In contrast to this, I saw an article about this guy started a "rock, scissors, paper" tournament for college students. It is going to on cable tv with bikini clad women and beer kegs. So we are trying to sell a kids' game with sex and alcohol. So this is how low our intellectual level has sunk to? People are actually going to watch this and think these "competitors" are athletes or geniuses who can out think their opponents? And I thought college poker tournaments was the lowest we would get!

Is Obama spreading himself too thin? Obviously, whether his presidency will be judged to be successful over the next couple of years depend on how fast the economy recovers. Many people are criticizing him for not focusing on the economy at this time. Obama is trying to put new policies in healthcare, energy, education, stem cell research, war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and foreign relations. These are ambitious programs and many people think that he should just concentrate on the economy for now. I disagree. It is not like he can spend 24 hours a day on the economy and things will turn around in a month. He promised changes and he is trying to achieve them. I don't agree with all of his ideas but I give him credit for trying to improve the country beyond the next couple of years.

The problem with trying to do all these things is that you make enemies with each program. No matter what you propose there will be people who oppose it. Today, for example, he spoke about changes he want to make in education. You know that things like merit pay and charter schools will get the teachers unions all upset. And they are among the strongest supporters of the Democrats. So you are making an enemy of an ally, never mind what he proposes make sense to most Americans. The truth is most of us are selfish, so our politicians are selfish and try to protect the interest of his district or state even though it is not for the best interest of the country.

Obama has assembled an intelligent group in his cabinet. But so far he has been the only spokesman. He is trying to sell all the programs by himself. About the only one who has been helpful in public has been Hillary. She is carrying out the foreign policies well. Tim Geithner has been of no help with trying to sell the stimulus program. Stephen Chu needs to speak out more about the importance of the energy program not only in the future but also on the economy today. Where was Obama's education secretary today? Where has Joe Biden been? Obama can't do it by himself. He needs his cabinet members to step up. He needs the Congress to be less selfish. Well, that last part we probably will never get.

A few days ago the LA Times had an editorial which supported the release of 17 Uighurs detained at Guantanamo Bay. The Uighurs are Chinese Muslims of Turkic origin from western China. They were detained while they were in Pakistan in 2002 after having received firearm training in Afghanistan. It is obvious that they were not enemy combatants against the U.S. as the Bush administration had claimed. I have advocated from the beginning that we should not detain people who are not our enemy lest they and the family they had left behind will become our enemies in the future. Now the cases are going through the courts with civil rights group demanding that the government let these detainees be released into the U.S. and receive political asylum. I don't think this is a good idea even though I admit that I see no good way of solving this problem myself. I just wished that the Bush administration would not have detained these people in the first place!

The Uighurs would obviously face harsh treatment if they are returned to China. They were training to be potential terrorists in Afghanistan. No other country wants to take them in now because nobody wants to anger China. If we give them political asylum we certainly would anger China. I mean if China had caught someone training to attack the U.S., would we not want to have him extradicted to the U.S.? The fact that the Uighurs are an oppressed minority in China does not excuse them from training to attack China. Someone's freedom fighter is someone else's terrorist.

Besides angering China, which may mean they will not cooperate with us against terrorism in the future, we have to consider whether these Uighurs are dangerous if released into our society. They were obviously ready to use force against China for whatever injustice they faced in China. Were those injustices worse than spending 7 years in jail? They had no reason to attack the U.S. in 2002 but what about now after we deprived them of their freedom for 7 years? So if we release them into our country, we anger China and we have to watch our back for 17 trained foreigners who spent 7 years in our prison. If we sent them back to China they will be punished severely for crimes that they have yet to committ, after we had imprisoned them for 7 years. What a mess!

Two things about racism I found disturbing last week. The first one was not actually racism in itself. It was about lack of discussion about racial relations. Eric Holder, the new attorney general, called the U.S. a nation of cowards. I thought the attorney general is supposed to be an expert on law and not on people's feelings. Calling us the nation of cowards goes way too far. The people who are not afraid to speak their mind about race usually have their own agenda. Some maybe racists, like the KKK. Some maybe extreme liberals, like Al Sharpton, who looks at every perceived injustice through racism. Certainly the majority of the country are not in these two groups. Most people are afraid to offend others and avoid sensitive subjects. This does not make them cowards, just normal people. For example most non-blacks would be afraid to stand up and say that black men need to step up and take care of the children. Can you imagine Bill Clinton, a friend of blacks, saying that? Only a black leader like Obama can say that. This does not mean Clinton is a coward.

The other item was the cartoon of a two policmen shooting a chimp with the inscription: "now they have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill". This was an obvious reference to Obama as a chimp. The writer and the editor tried to deny this saying it was just a parody. They said Obama did not write the stimulus bill so if anything the chimp was Pelosi or Reid, which they claim was not either. That is an absurd explanation. Given the long history of racists referring blacks to monkeys, the inference here is obvious. Nobody would think the cartoonist meant Pelosi or Reid as a monkey. In any case, whoever the chimp is supposed to represent, the cartoonist thinks that the person responsible for the stimulus bill should be shot. Regardless whether you like the stimulus bill or not this crosses the line.

It used to be the hope of baseball fans that Alex Rodriguez would eventually pass Barry Bonds as the homerun king and thus rid of the asterisk on the biggest record in the sport. Now we learn that A-Rod also cheated. I think the problem is way more wide spread than MLB is ready to admit. If the greatest stars of the game such as Bonds, McGwire, Clemens and Rodriguez used steroids to improve their game, would you be surprised if the borderline players use them too? I mean if the superstars are doing it, I would think almost everyone who is trying to get into the Majors or trying to stay in it will do everything he can to improve his odds.

The problem is going to stay with baseball for a long time. One of the great thing about baseball is that it is so statistically oriented. You can compare players even from different generations, fairly or not. But now we may not be able to trust the records for years to come. Can anyone say with certainty that Albert Pujos is not tainted? Or how about young stars like Ryan Howard? For me personally, it is not the records that I care about. It is that steroid use by the pros have and will continue to have influence on high school and college players. They think that they should do what the pros do. Unfortunately very few of them become pros and they are causing great harm to their bodies. To me this the greatest shame of the steroid usage by the stars.

There was a segment on Sat. Night Live's Weekend Update with Seth Meyer and Amy Poehler where the two of them mock certain people's actions with the word "really?". Some of the actions of Obama and the Democrats lately deserve a few "reallys?" Three nominees by Obama had tax problems? Really? His staff couldn't have vetted these people better? Really? Bill Richardson is well known and they couldn't find all the dirt on him before the nomination? Really?

Are the Congressional Democrats really Obama's friends? They come up with a stimulus plan that include things that are easy targets for the GOP. Money for art and STD education in a economic stimulus plan? Really? You don't think the GOP would jump all over these programs? Really? These programs take up less than 1 percent of the package but distract from the whole thing. As I said before, I don't really know what programs will actually stimulate the economy to a great degree. But I know when you propose building bridges and roads and thus creating jobs, it can bring confidence to the country. When you propose programs that seem like pork, you diminish the confidence of the people.

As the leader, the buck stops with Obama. He has acknowledged mistakes with his nominations. Many presidents had nominations that did not get confirmed. This won't hurt him much. He, however, must take control of the stimulus bill. Do not let his "friends" make him a target of the GOP. Tell Pelosi and Reid to cut out the controversial programs and then dare the GOP to filibuster in the Senate. The only idea the GOP has is tax cuts. So tell the members of Congress who only want tax cuts but not spending programs that they won't get any funds from the proposed programs. Then in a few years we can see if the areas in the country that got the spending stimulus is better or worse than those areas that only got tax cuts. No GOP Congressmen will agree to that! I mean, I think every GOP governor and mayor in the country will be upset if they don't get any funds as a result of their Congressional delegation voting against the plans. In summary, Obama should do the right thing by getting rid of some of the things that seem to be pork. After that he should play hard ball with the GOP.

Obama has been working hard in his first week in office. He has already reversed some of the things Bush did. He has sent George Mitchell on a trip to the Middle East. He has gone to the Capitol to meet with Congressional Republicans to sell his stimulus plan. He has appeared on Arabic television to speak to Muslims. I don't agree with everything he has done but overall he has been much more engaging than Bush ever was. He appears to be very much in charge.

Two things I don't like about the economic effort so far. The stimulus plan spends too little on infrastructure, the one area I am all for spending. There are too many liberal spending plans in it. The Republicans are objecting and despite Obama's effort on Capitol Hill today, I don't think he will get much support from the Republicans on the bill. Of course, the Republicans can only complain as the only plan they have is more tax cuts. So even without bipartisan support, I think most of the country will be on Obama's and the Democrats' side. I don't like Tim Geithner being sec. of treasury. A guy who didn't pay his taxes running the IRS? Common! He maybe brillant but he was part of the Paulson team who worked out the bailout. If he has any great idea why didn't he present any a few months ago? He complained about China's monetary policy. In a time of global economic crisis, starting a war of words is not helpful. I think he was just trying to distract people from his tax questions. He does not seem like a good pick for Obama.

I am impressed by Obama's quick action on the Middle East. George Mitchell is a great pick although I don't know if he will step on Hilary's foot. By giving his first tv interview as president on an Arab network, it shows to the world how serious about the the region. He understands that unless there is peace between Israel and the Arab world, there will be no end on the war on terror. This is something Bush never understood. Instead of trying to be an honest broker between Israel and the Palestinians right away, he invaded Iraq. The road to peace is long and filled with traps but Obama has taken the first right steps.

Michael Jordan misses an uncontested dunk. Tiger Woods whiffs a tee shot completely. Tommy Lasorda fails to finish a plate of pasta. These are the things I thought about when Obama stumbled as he took the oath today. The most eloquent politician of our time has just layed an egg. Turns out it was John Roberts who messed up the oath causing a surprised Obama to stop in mid sentence. I hope that this is not an omen of things to come during Obama's presidency. I mean following a Republican who screws up which in turn makes Obama look bad.

I thought the speech was good but not great by Obama's standard. Of course he has set a very high standard. He said all the right things today and looked presidential but I don't think he aroused the people as he had done in the past. Of course, given the enormity of the challenges, it is hard to instill confidence in people on one speech alone. A lot of work ahead of him and his hair will grow even grayer.

I thought Rick Warren tried to be inclusive in his prayer. He asked God to forgive us if we do not treated everyone equal. This seems to be a bone thrown to the gay supporters. I think that shows Obama's idea of reaching out to conservatives is a good one. Warren did use Jesus' name at end of the prayer so it certainly was not a neutral religious theme. But he is a Christian preacher so I don't expect him to deviate much from his regular prayer. Overall a great day and I think the smooth transition of power with a huge celebration will make us look good in the eyes of the world.

Obama is getting criticism from both Democrats and Republicans for his economic stimulus plan. Everybody is talking like he or she knows the best way to turn around the economy. As I have said many times before: nobody really understands economics. It is not an exact science. It is not like chemistry where if you put 2 hydrogen atoms with an oxygen atom, you will always get a water molecule. Nobody knows what plan will get us out of the trouble we are in now, not even the best economists. So even as I don't agree with everything in Obama's plan, I find the criticisms to be of no value except for political purposes.

It is not surprising that the Republicans criticize the Obama plan. They are the opposition after all. It is also reasonable to question the huge amount of money that will be spent. We will run a big deficit with this. Of course we already ran a huge deficit under Bush so it is hard to say that the Republicans are the fiscal conservative they claim to be. And the bailouts, which are of questionable value, was the plan of the Bush's treasury secretary Paulson.

Pat Buchanan argues that Obama should act like Regan during the economic crisis of 1980s rather than like FDR during the Depression. It is a reasonable argument that we may not have come out of the Depression because of FDR's alphabet soup programs which we learned in high school history. Some historians have claimed that the Depression only ended with WWII. Buchanan said that Regan's supply side economics of tax cuts and letting the private sector do the work got us out of the crisis faster. But for every Buchanan, the Democrats can find an economist who says the opposite. For example the situation in 1929 was much worse than 1980s and if WWII stimulated the economy, it was the government and the military that did the stimulating by buying weapons, ammunition, planes, ships etc. In the 1980s the tax rate was cut from 70% to 28%. With the Bush tax cut it is around 35% now, so even if we cut to 28% like Regan did, do you really think it would stimulate growth quickly? And the Bush tax cut has not help the economy and has produce a record deficit. Regan did improve the economy but also left such a big deficit that Bush #1 had to raise taxes even though he had infamously said: "Read my lips, no new taxes." This led to his loss to Clinton.

So why do the Democrats want to go against their president? They don't like tax cuts and think that Obama is caving in to the Republicans by adding tax cuts and credits to his bill. They also want more spending, believing that 800 billions or so is not enough. I agree that tax cuts won't do much right now and tax rebates won't do anything at all. Witness the rebate last year which stimulated nothing. But spending for the sake of spending will not be effective. We are going into big deficit and our children will pay for it. Instead of arguing over how much, we should be looking into how we spend the money. As I said before, infrastructures in the country are in bad shape. So the money we spent there, even if doesn't help the economy as much as we hope, will at least provide us with better roads, bridges and communication systems.

Ultimately there is a limit of what anyone can do. It is usually being at the right place at the right time that makes one a hero. Alan Greenspan was the idol of both Republicans and Democrats when the economy was doing well. Now everybody says he made a lot of mistakes. Even he acknowledges of not seeing the disaster that was looming. FDR and Regan were both at the right place at the right time for them. Their plans were totally different. But they both were able to give confidence to the nation. I think that was the main difference between them and their predecessors, Hoover and Carter. If Obama can continue to inspire confidence his plan will succeed in the eyes of history, whether or not it is the right plan.