Our 20th question focuses on lowering healthcare costs and enhancing the quality of healthcare services. This question is one of the many thoughtful questions in this set. These questions don’t mention any candidates by name, but each serves as a starting point for personal reflection or group discussion. Here is our 20th question: “Is the candidate committed to lowering healthcare costs, building public health infrastructure, supporting research for chronic diseases, and ensuring universal access to quality healthcare?”
Permission is granted to share these questions, individually or as a set, with social media, organizations, family, friends, and the general public. Here is a printable document with all the questions.
Thank you for your thoughtful reflections on this election. In your own way, please encourage others to do the same.
In the face of adversity, what’s the difference between “try” and “triumph?” Last night I had some interesting sets of dreams. Each time I woke up one word would come to mind right away – then I’d go back to sleep:
first dreams – “misunderstood”
second dreams – “persecuted”
third dreams – “upbeat”
When I woke up the third time, I asked myself, how can I remember these words? MUP, no; PUM, no. UMP or better UMPH, yeah, as in the “umph!” of Umpteen Horizons – and “umph!” as in the difference between “try” and “triumph!”
When I got up in the morning from my bed, other words came to mind right away from “umpteen:” T for “truth” as in conveying and being faithful to the “truth;” E for “eternal” as in living with all time frames in mind and getting beyond our individual interests; E for “energetic” as in working hard; N for focusing on and meeting the “needs” of others “now.”
There’s a clear story coming out of Wikileaks. The “powers-that-be” regularly lie as just part of way they do business. Why should we believe a government who does not tell us the true scope of an ongoing disaster? Why does it take independent researchers using standard methods only hours to figure out how much oil is spewing from the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster? And why are these independent researchers persecuted (see also Empower News tab above and check Gulf Coast news)? And why should we trust the upcoming better-late-than-never government health study? Why should anybody trust the U.S. government when several U.S. administrations including the present one worked with China to derail international efforts to protect the environment?
Of course, not all is lost, people, like the independent researchers, like us, can make a difference. For example, in the health arena, an important Gulf Coast health study was released yesterday. It was conducted by Tulane University’s Disaster Resilience Leadership Academy (DRLA) and the Louisiana Bucket Brigade, and many volunteers helped to make this study possible. This study documents that large numbers of people in coastal communities believe that they have been exposed to oil and dispersants and have suffered from the affects of oil and dispersants (“48 percent of those surveyed reported an unusual spike of at least one health symptom”).
As Jesus said, “Blest are you who are persecuted, insulted, misunderstood … be glad and upbeat … you are the salt and light of the Earth!” (see Matthew 5). You are needed and together we will make a difference!
