AN ANECDOTE WITH RESONANCE
Re: Reid
Collins’s The MRI and I:
Having my years of “heavy age,” I’ve had to endure a number of
medical tests — especially after the discovery of cancer. I,
too, have had an MRI.
I have a ringing in my left ear and I’ve had it since I first
noticed it in college. After all these years, I asked my ENT
physician if anything could be done. She immediately ordered the
MRI to see if the problem was in the inner ear.
We tried a “closed” MRI first; but my elbows were painfully being
pushed into my ribcage before I was all the way into the tube. So
next was the “open” MRI.
An “open” MRI is much like a “closed” one except you have much
greater room to rest your arms and you can see light coming in
from the room itself. Nevertheless, the top of the scanner is
still only two or three inches from your nose.
In my case, they put my head in a cage which was then bolted upon
the table. I admitted to the nurses that in my old age I have
become claustrophobic. (I have no idea where this came from) One
the nurses then put a dry washrag over my eyes. “People who don’t
like tight spaces find this helps.” With the instructions to
always keep still, I was slid into the machine.
As warned, it made a terrible racket. At times it was almost
frightening. Staying still required some willpower. But what was
the most horrible was the intense disorientation. After a few
short minutes, I could not tell how much time had past. Many
times I wondered if forty minutes had past or only four or five.
I honestly couldn’t tell. The music I had counted on to help me
know how much time I had left to endure was completely inaudible.
I couldn’t see. I couldn’t hear. I had no sense of time. I
couldn’t think of anything much past the noise. I remembered the
passage from Matthew’s gospel: “Then the king told the
attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into
the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of
teeth.’”
I almost begged to be let out several times; but I didn’t want to
give up the effort I had already made. “Go to your happy place.
Go to your happy place.” Funny, I had never considered exactly
what my “happy place” was before.
Suddenly, the machine became quiet and I was being pulled out of
the MRI. “Stay still, Mr. Dooley, we’re putting the contrast
fluid in your arm and then we’ll put you back in for just three
more pictures. Once returned into the MRI, I suddenly realized
that I had no idea how long “three pictures” took. Was it longer
than what I had just been through? Was it less?
It was a bad as it was before; but, thankfully, it ended. After
being taken out of the machine and freed from the table, it was
wonderful to see light and hear normal sounds.
Not remembering how I got there, I almost walked into another
man’s room where he was sitting in a thick leather easy chair.
The room was dim and his nurse was giving him some pills in a
cup. My nurse quickly turned me the right way. “That man is being
sedated for his MRI,” she said. “When they are tranquilized,
often times they don’t even remember being in the MRI.” Now they
tell me.
Don’t get me wrong. Modern medicine is a wonderful thing. But
that “sedated” MRI? I’ll keep that in mind if there is a next
time.
— Mike Dooley
AN EFFICIENT WAY TO WASTE
Re: Eric
Peters’s Safety Inefficiency:
Finally I have been vindicated. This has been my mantra for so
many years. The other part of the emission laws is that they are
not needed. The engine should be cared for, serviced and clean.
No emissions come from these cars. I saw a ten year old Buick way
back when they were first starting to engineer the cataylic
converter. The fellow was a Sears Service Man working at my home.
He insisted the above was true and led me to his car, opened the
hood. There in front of me was a shining gorgeous engine which he
swore gave out no exhaust.
Florida has just passed a higher emission control bill. These
people do not know what they are doing. California could be out
of debt by taking the gas and oil caps off and let the millions
flow. Barney Frank helped ruin our economy by giving to the poor
and asking us to pay. Did they fire the idiot? He is still
handling our tax money. Insane.
— Sarah Baynes
TIGHTROPE WALK
Re: W. James Antle,
III’s Country Clubbing for Growth:
The tension between pure ideology and pragmatism creates a
tightrope few can easily walk. The rare politician who can walk
it is the only hope for the GOP. Certainly Ronald Reagan (before,
through and after the presidency) was one; Governor Jindal looks
to be another. Too often though, Republicans embrace posers who
speak the language of limited government then fold to the
powerful winds blowing out of the left. Both Bushes are a fine
example of this. Senator Specter hardly bothers to even pay lip
service to conservative and limited government ideas.
When given a choice between possibly losing an election by
standing on principle or winning by seriously compromising
principle, the former is a less costly. If the true conservative
loses, a Democrat can be held responsible for actions of the
office. This holds a possibility of a day of reckoning and
another chance to elect a true believer. Compromising and winning
gives Congress a RINO who will often vote with the Left; come
Election Day the Republicans are stuck with running an
unprincipled representative who does not represent the
constituency or losing to the Democrats. So, by running a
principled person, the GOP has a chance to have true
representation every other cycle or they can run the RINO and
guarantee that their ideology will not be represented or put to a
vote for at least two election cycles. Running a RINO simply is a
bad bet.
— Ira M. Kessel
Rochester, New York
THE OTHER TRUE ORIGINS
Re: Peter
Wallison’s The True
Origins of This Financial Crisis:
Now, I would like to see two pieces of evidence to support your
thesis rather than mere verbiage.
1. What are the loss rates for owner occupied homes in the inner
city? Well, before those people lost their jobs due to the
failure of the markets. From my preliminary examination, those
areas have, by far, some of the lowest foreclosure rates. And if
you take out the fraudulent mortgages — the ones where the
broker doctored the application, the rate goes even lower.
2. The most damage has been done because banks packaged the risk
and sold it to other institutions. If they did not do that, we
would not be having the current problem. In fact, the banks that
kept the risk, and thus kept normal lending practices are doing
just fine thank you. Then they came up with Credit Default Swaps
which also did more damage than foreclosures. That is purely the
result of Republican deregulation. The only thing that
Clinton did was to not veto that act. These instruments
account for 10 times more money than defaulted mortgages, and
their bastard offspring, derivatives, account for 100 times that
amount.
Perhaps you will correct me on these matters.
I do not suppose that you will bother to address this.
— Doug Nusbaum
EFFECTIVE FOR ALL
Re: Peter Ferrara’s Repeal Health Care
Fascism:
Yes, I have read the article “Repeal Health Care Fascism.” Now I
would like for you to tell us how to go about a crusade to the
Federal Coordination Council for Comparative Effectiveness
Research. It is extremely important to be heard and to send the
message out that our health care costs are rising and we need to
find a solution for all of us — not just the selected ones. Not
everyone gets the news and I for one would like to have each
American have the right to speak out or what it takes to change
this.
— Carol Kennedy
I’m so happy living in ObamaLand… It’s kind of like DisneyLand,
except everything here is free. Whenever I want something, I just
charge it to my USA Credit Card, and it goes directly onto the
National Debt. The cool thing is that this Debt never has to be
repaid! It’s just handed down from generation to generation, like
an old piece of furniture that nobody likes but can’t throw away.
I feel bad that FDR didn’t know as much about economics as we do
today….He could have avoided the Depression, and also WWII, as
most historians agree that the Depression led to the World War.
I wish everybody could join me in ObamaLand, but for now it’s
limited to federal employees like me.
— C.Baker
Ft.Worth, Texas
BOB DYLAN, THE OLD AXELROD
Re: Brett
Joshpe’s Slickness With a Straight
Face:
To paraphrase Bob Dylan’s “A Sweetheart Like You,” lie a little
and they throw you in jail/ lie a lot and they make you king (or
least a president).
— Ira M. Kessel
Rochester, New York
