Other news

I wrote about my view on the news of the day, mainly our failures in the Iraq and Afghanistan to bring a government of the people, for the people and by the people (catchy phrase, huh?) and the Seattle Mariners. So I'll write about the other issues I read yesterday in the newspapers. And that is?

Secretary Gates' statement about strategic change in the Defense Department (DOD) procurements for weapons systems. It sounded so good but analysist specializing in military affairs said quite the contrary, it's business as usual. They said everything Gates said was the same under President Bush, everything had been planned and only now being implemented under President Obama.

So, in the end, it's still all about appearances. The appearance of change. An illusion. Tell Congress and the American people what they want to hear and the do what you had planned anyway. Nothing's changed, just spun differently.

Computerizing medical records. Sorry, I'm against it. Not totally, but to the extent President Obama and supporters want. I don't want my entire medical history on a computer shared with other healthcare providers, health insurance companies, pharmasuitical companies, government agencies, employers and worse hackers. And anyone who can and will sell it to anyone wanting to buy it.

That's the worse case scenarios except the credit companies and government agencies have shown a terrible record of information security. If you think identity theft is bad, consider medical informatioin can be a nightmare. As far as I'm concerned, if you want my history, ask me and I'll tell my doctor to contact you. Otherwise, the answer is no.

Ok, I'm a curmudgeon, but I don't like that young people today will never really know privacy, their own about themselves. They're forever in the information sharing age where nothing is hidden or secret, except the government's. They'll know everything about you as will the companies, the credit companies, and anyone willing to buy it.

Social Security. They're at it again, in the name of the recession. Folks, LEAVE IT ALONE. Understand? It's safe and at worst needs tweaking but not overhauling in the name of whatever you're selling to the American people.

Enough said as has already been said. So take it off the table, out of the discussion and let it be what it does. If you want to help it, legalize immigrants to start paying into it.

Gender neutral marriage. As much as you want to make the arguments for or against this issue of marriage, this is really what it's about. All other things being the same, just make legal marriage gender neutral. And leave it to the individuals to define their marriage with their faith or religion.

I would only add to this that while religions and the priests, paster, father, etc. who are legally recognized to perform the ceremony, they can exercise their right to say yes or no, but no civil-recognized person, meaning in government at some level, can refuse, despite their personal objections.

It's the same logic that applies to pharmacists who can refuse to fill prescriptions against their believes, except government officials who are recognized by their position or legal status should not refuse to perform a marriage ceremony between two people who are allowed under the law. Or else face dismissal of their job, title or status.

That's not hard to understand. There's a simple solution here to equal rights to a legal marriage. Religious marriage belongs to the religion but that should change the legal right. It's about being equal and having equal rights under the law.

Well, that's it for this week, for a Tuesday anyway. I still have two more days of newspapers left to read, so I'll keep you posted.