by James Glaser
January 31, 2003

Monday morning I woke up and my heart was out of rhythm. One moment my heart would be beating at 165 beats per minute and the next 72. I have to tell you it scares the hell out of you. So it was a call to the first responders who are community volunteers that get there quickly, monitor your condition, give you oxygen and most important make you feel like help is there. Then comes the Ambulance, which for $995.00 will give you a ride to the Bemidji hospital, which is forty two miles away.

Once in the Emergency Room everything slows down while you wait for a doctor. The Ambulance crew had put an IV in me and had fluids started, ran a monitor on my heart, and printed out a strip showing what my heart was doing, so that the hospital could look at. While I was laying in the emergency room waiting for the doctor, my heart went back into rhythm by itself. They put me in a room with a heart monitor on me just to see if it would stay in rhythm. I said I wanted to go to the VA hospital in Minneapolis, they called, but there were no beds. They called the Fargo VA Hospital and they said they would send a Ambulance for me, but if I needed anything they would have to send me to Minneapolis.

Well I opted out of Fargo as a 500 mile or more ride in the back of an Ambulance didn't seem right and can you even imagine the cost to ride to Fargo, North Dakota then down to Minneapolis, Minnesota? Then I would be two hundred and fifty miles from home with no way back. Well they kept me for two more days to see if my heart would flip out again and it didn't. I have an outpatient appointment for the Minneapolis VA for Monday afternoon where I hope to see a Cardiologist as I never saw one in Bemidji.

In the hospital I was subjected to non stop Fox broadcasting as my roommate had the remote and was a strong pro-war man. I listened to the Fox crew out and out praise the President's speech, so I would not call them news men as much as propagandists. There was never any attempt to be fair or unbiased. In fact they actually held many Democrats in contempt. I can see where Republicans get their information.

The Speech? My question is, just where is all the money coming from for Bush's over one trillion dollars in new programs. Also, if there is going to be a Volunteer Mentor program, how the heck is it going to cost $450,000,000.00? I sure would like to see just who is going to make money off of this very worthwhile program.

The next day President Bush was in Detroit and in his speech he said that he knew how War effected families and worried about that. He said he understood what it meant to go to war with Iraq. Well I think that is a bunch of baloney because he never mentioned that innocent lives will be lost and his saying he understands war without ever seeing it or participating in one would be akin to him saying he understands what it is like to be pregnant. War is something you have to personally experience to understand the true scope of the horror inflicted on both those fighting and those who just live in the battle zone. George Bush might have read books, watched movies, and talked to his Dad, but he is Bullshitting when he says that he understands what a war is or its consequences.

Back to his State of the Union speech. I think it is great that we will be helping a small percentage of the people that have Aids in Africa, but what about some sort of plan to help all the people right here in the United States that have Aids and no medicine. How many thousands of people in our country are terminally ill and have no medical insurance and have to go beg at Medical Assistance for some help. These are working, productive, tax paying people that fell to a medical illness that took everything from them. If we can give fifteen billion to Africa we should have no problem giving a hundred and fifty billion to our own people. In fact I think all Americans should have the same health care that the President and all of Congress have, at tax payer expense. Every one of those people are better off than those in our country dying of some illness or and old person without enough money to buy their prescription drugs and food too, but do they offer to share? NO! But those same people will spend hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars, so that America has the best equipment to kill other people. Great huh?

When the President said that those who pay taxes will get tax relief, I would just like to know who does not pay taxes? Even the total drunk living in squalor pays sales tax, liquor tax and if they have a house or apartment they are paying property tax. If they have a car they are paying gas tax and license plate tax. Nobody gets away from paying taxes in America. Sure they don't pay as much, but by percentage of income they are paying the most. Don't forget that cigarette tax.

Some day America will have to decide if we are a Christian country or not. If our top goal is to get to heaven, then playing rich against the poor is not they way to go. George Bush has spread hate and fear in worldly terms for all America to feed off of ever since he has come to power. More and more of the world fear America and in a recent poll in Europe, George Bush was rated the biggest danger in the world today by over 80% of those polled.

Everyone has a choice. Some want to back our President so that we can kill and slaughter who ever gets in the way of our corporations and with this approach a few of us will attain worldly power and money. The other choice is for America to follow the teachings of God, try to help all of those that share this world with us and make it to heaven. Seems pretty simple to me.