Health care summit

The health care summit today turned into a gripe session among politicians instead of the doing what it was supposed to do...you know.....GET SOMETHING DONE!!!!!!

I think it's too bad that the republicans want to play politics with the issue and the democrats want to pass something that is too big and too expensive for the country to handle.

I have gotten to the point where I think that the democrats should just go ahead and get the bill passed. Some of it may actually do some good and when the rest of it proves to be too costly for America to handle, The Republicans can take credit for doing everything they could to prevent what happened to the finances of this country.

It's a cynical way to look at this issue but since big issues like this are paralyzed by the politicians it is the only way to look at it. This country is going to hell in a handbasket and the politicians get rich from it.

Next Cubs manager

Many people expect that when the Chicago Cubs manager Lou Piniella retires, hall of famer Ryne Sandberg will be the next Cubs manager. I for one would love to see Sandberg as the manager of the 2011 Chicago Cubs. I do have my reservations about it as well.

Sandberg was one of the best Second basemen of all time and was a quiet leader on and off the field. After he retired he left the game for awhile and then slowly worked his way back when he started off as a coach during spring training. Since then he has manager for 3 years in the minor leagues and is entering his fourth at the Cubs triple A affiliate in Iowa.

By all accounts Sandberg has done very well learning the craft of becoming a manager of a team. Sandberg is a leader and a defender of his teams and has no problem getting in the face of an umpire to stick up for his players. Arguing was one thing you rarely saw when Sandberg was playing. Last year Sandberg led his Double A minor league team to it's playoffs and they did very well.

My concern regarding whether Sandberg is ready to manage in the big leagues is that he has not coached or managed there before. Coaching in the major leagues is different than the minor leagues because the money and the egos are a lot bigger. Granted Sandberg was a hall of fame major league baseball player who played with Sammy Sosa and other players who have had huge egos. My question is how will he deal with the egos Soriano and Zambrano as a manager. He knows how to deal with people like that as a player but not as a manager and it has to be different.

Sandberg may have been better served to be promoted to a coach this year or have Piniella stay another year and have Sandberg be a coach on the team next year. It appears that if Ryno gets a shot as a manager with the Cubs, he will be thrown head first into the fire. I hope he can handle it but only time will tell.

Acting like a grown up

In so many ways it's tough to be a grown up with responsibilities. This issue is never so obvious as days like these when my wife and I have to take time out of our weekend to go to the nursing home/rehab facility that her dad is staying at to get better after falling and fracturing his arm and hip. This is not something wants to do but it is our responsibilities to go see him and keep his spirits up.

Seeing all the elderly people, who have a hard time doing anything on their own, makes one appreciate the independence that you have when you are healthy adult. Once in a while, I used to tease my mom about putting her in a home. Since I have been going to one once a week I have told her that I wont be kidding her any more about it because it really isn't funny.

The responsibilities of being an adult are so much more than just going to a nursing home once a week. It's about getting up everyday to go to work even when you don't feel like it. I have a 60 mile one way commute to my job. If I had my choice, I would quit and find something else closer and that would pay more and have better benefits. I can't just quit my job though because I have bills to pay. I am married and we have rent, utilities, student loans and car payments that we have responsibilities for. We would like to be able to buy a house some day, go on another vacation and be able to buy things that we want like CD's, movies and hopefully someday a large flat screen TV: )

As you can see blowing off work to play video games or sleep in or even quitting is not an option. I have a hard time respecting people who think life revolves around them and don't want to take life's responsibility seriously. I don't want to be one of those guys like DA Coach who says "In life" every other sentence but as one gets older one will realize those two words will mean more and more.

On the other side of being an adult, when you work hard you can enjoy more the pleasure of life. You can enjoy taking a vacation, buying a video game, going to a movie or going to a nice restaurant with someone special. At this point that large flat screen TV will have to wait. I have come to believe that you enjoy these more when you know how hard you worked to get the item that you desire.

My diet

I started a new diet this week to try and lose some weight. I am taking my lunch again eating a bowl of Campbell's chunky Chicken Noodle soup and a turkey and cheese sandwich. The sandwich is optional depending on how hungry I am. I am also trying to eat this same thing for dinner as well. Hopefully it will assist me with losing some weight.

I had been doing a decent job last year of taking my lunch and maintaining my weight in order to try and lower my cholesterol. The past 3 or 4 months I went off the wagon and started to eat out a lot. It started with Subway which is good. After awhile it went to some other places which weren't nearly as good for me. I think I gained some weight and I don't even want to think what it did to my cholesterol level: )

I don't mind what I am eating but it is still leaving me hungry at times. I don't want to be miserable or be miserable to be around which may be why I have been going to lunch earlier than I had been in the past to eat with some friends at work. I think talking and laughing with them helps take my mind off how much or little (depending on how you look at it) I am eating. It also helps me take my mind off of not eating a slice of pizza or a cheeseburger; )

I will make sure that I don't deprive myself of eating something I really want once in awhile. Next week a couple friends will be going to get an Italian beef at a restaurant by work and than our monthly outing for a beer and burger at Finn McCool's in Schaumburg. I just have to figure out a way to off set eating this stuff with keeping to my diet the rest of the time. This means less McDonalds and maybe more Subway and/or Soup. It doesn't help when I walk into my Mother in-Law's kitchen and she is eating McDonalds or my wife buys a bag of mini bagels.

He may be a one termer!!!

After historic election, President Obama faces the danger of becoming a one term president and can thank his own party for that. Congress has a majority of Democrats, whom the President thought would do his bidding on what ever he wanted. As we have seen, that is not the case.

The president allowed Congress to overspend on a stimulus package that has not worked very well. The president’s main mission when he took office was to fix the health care system and he had the majority in Congress to get what he wanted. Politics is politics even in your own party. Everyone in the party has had their hand out in order to secure their vote for the bill. Due to this the bill has been slow to materialize, If the President can’t get his own party to act quickly to get a major piece of legislation passed, what does that say about his leadership?

The president is a powerful speaker and I have a lot of respect for him, but being able to move people by a speech is no longer enough. The president needs to lead and he has not done it. If the President can not exert some leadership soon, voters will be looking for a new leader at the next election. It doesn’t take much for the public to turn against you when you can’t get something done, just ask President Carter and the first President Bush.

The Mass election

On Tuesday January 19, 2010 Scott Brown was elected to the Senate in Massachusetts. This election not only divided that state, but it has divided America on the issue of health care. Congress no longer has a “super” majority to pass the health care plan without some sort of Republican support or filibuster. This insurance plan will be bad for America because it does not fix all the problems in the health care system.



The problem does not just sit with the Democrats or Republicans. The problem lies with both parties. The bill the Democrats have created fails to identify a key issue regarding health care, at least for me. The issue that I do not see getting corrected is the unchecked ability to increase insurance premiums for individual and group plans without a cap. Skyrocketing insurance premiums threaten to hurt the ability of individuals and families to keep their heads above water. In an economy where some companies are not giving out raises and high gas prices, we can not afford to pay significantly higher premiums for less coverage.



The governments health care plan does deal with important issues regarding pre-existing conditions and dropping coverage due to too many claims. The rest of it is expensive “fluff” that will not work. Health care reform is needed but not at the expense of common sense. I have had previous posts with my ideas regarding health care. Short of running for Congress myself, these ideas will not be considered by Congress because the special interest groups take up too much of our Congressman’s time lobbying for their interests.



Our government is broken and anyone who claims they can go to Washington and fix it is either lying or naïve to how the federal government is run. The only way it will get fixed is when Congress starts to listen to the people instead of big money.

Tyrus Thomas and the Bulls

I find it very ironic that when Tyrus Thomas came back from his broken arm, the Bulls started playing better and Vinny Del Negro may keep his job until the end of the year. Why is this ironic? It is because Thomas and Del Negro reportedly hate each other.

One of the funnier parts of the whole thing is BOTH of them may be gone by or at the end of the season. Thomas may be gone because he is a flakey and inconsistent player who the team can not rely on to show up and play hard on a consisten basis.
The coach may be gone because he is not a good coach and has no idea what he is doing.

Admittedly i don't watch too much of the Bulls anymore because they are not a good team and are not fun to watch. The team doesn't play defense very well and are always missing layups or throwing the ball away on offense. Derrick Rose is a good player but is not a focal point of the offense. This is another coaching mistake which should get him fired on it's own.

The team needs to get a better coach and some additional players to build the team around Rose. I don't think think that Kobe, Wade and James will be coming here but it's possible you can get Bosch from Toronto. That would be a start to rebuilding the team.