A Cat's Eye View

Baxter here. Please, make it STOP! This has been a Very Bad Week and I am Cranky.

I'm Sick of those Republicans being so Obstructionist about Health Care Reform.

My Male Human just doesn't understand how they can be against giving Unfortunate Uninsured Humans health insurance. In My Personal Opinion, what it really comes down to (other than their being on the Payroll of Big Pharma and Big Insurance) is that they will oppose ANTHING that President Obama is for. For instance, if President Obama said he was Against Killing Innocent Kittens, the Republicans would be totally in FAVOR of Killing Kittens, and would probably say that NOT Killing Kittens would be what the Nazis would do, and if we don't Kill Kittens then we will Lose Our Country. (Doesn't matter if it Makes Sense, you understand).

Despite the Watered-Down nature of whatever the Final Bill may be, though, the Senate should go ahead and pass SOMETHING. As a Cat, I am one of the Uninsured, since my Humans never bought that Pet Insurance stuff. So I am a Little Worried about what will happen after my Humans retire and are not rolling in that Money stuff they rely on. Will they still be able to Afford to take Me to the Vet? I have Great Sympathy for the Uninsured Humans. It must be Scary to have to choose between Health Care and, say, Food.

If you Disagree that the Bill should be passed, please go read Paul Krugman's op-ed piece in the NY Times, entitled "Pass the Bill." He points out that, when Everything is Said and Done, the Bill does at least do a couple of Good Things:

It would "prohibit discrimination by insurance companies on the basis of medical condition or history: Americans could no longer be denied health insurance because of a pre-existing condition, or have their insurance canceled when they get sick. Second, the bill would provide substantial financial aid to those who don’t get insurance through their employers, as well as tax breaks for small employers that do provide insurance.

All of this would be paid for in large part with the first serious effort ever to rein in rising health care costs."

Perfect? Certainly NOT. But better than before? This Cat thinks so. As Paul Krugman puts it:

"Whereas flawed social insurance programs have tended to get better over time, the story of health reform suggests that rejecting an imperfect deal in the hope of eventually getting something better is a recipe for getting nothing at all."

I also liked this line in his Column:

"...some of those senators seem motivated largely by a desire to protect the interests of insurance companies — with the possible exception of Mr. Lieberman, who seems motivated by sheer spite."

That Lieberman Human is a real Piece of Work. I don't understand him One Bit. So Spite seems like about the only reason he could have for acting the way he does.

Let's see, what else has my Fur in a Knot? Oh yes, General Motors. What a Bunch of Incompetent, Selfish Boobs. Once again they can't come to an Agreement to sell my Humans' favorite Car Company, Saab, so it looks as if they're going to close it down. Now, as a Cat, I don't care about Cars. But I know my Humans are going to be Very Sad about this, so I am Sad too. We Cats also Frown upon Inefficiency and Stupidity. And the way G.M. handled the whole Saab brand was Reprehensible. They never Understood who the Saab buyer was and they came out with Cars that didn't appeal to them, nor could they compete for the Mainstream Person. Stupid G.M. They deserve to go Bankrupt but unfortunately, as Usual, they've been Saved, while poor old Saab, and over 3000 jobs in Sweden, go down the Tubes.

Then there's this Climate Summit thing going on in Copenhagen. Apparently they came to some kind of Watered Down Agreement but these countries couldn't even manage to put in a Deadline to Finalize a Treaty by Next Year. That's Finalize a Treaty, not Solve Global Warming.

"The accord drops the expected goal of concluding a binding international treaty by the end of 2010, which leaves the implementation of its provisions uncertain. It is likely to undergo many months, perhaps years, of additional negotiation before it emerges in any internationally enforceable form."

Months? YEARS? I'll be Long Dead by then. And my Humans' house will probably be Waterfront Property by then - and New York City will be the new Atlantis! What is wrong with Humans anyway? Why can't they just Agree on Anything? We Cats don't always Like each other, but if we have to Live Together, we can Manage to develop an Understanding and not Fight all the time.

Well, I'm Sorry to have Vented so much today. There are a Few Good Things happening in My Life, so I should be a Little Grateful for them.

For One Thing, my Humans are Back for Good it seems. They aren't going Away every weekend anymore. I don't quite understand it, but from what I can Tell, that Cabin they go to can't be used in the Winter. They're kind of Grumpy, but it's Good for Me, anyway. Now I finally have some Company on Weekends, which is a Nice Change. I make sure to get up in front of the Computer every chance I get to make sure they have plenty of Time to Pay Attention to Me.

Of course, on the Negative Side, That Dog is here All the Time now. Day and Night, Weekends and Weekdays. She just doesn't Go Away. But I'm getting Tougher. I don't let her take advantage of Me.

I'll end This Week's News Roundup with a little Good News.

Let's see. Here's a good story. This Guy is getting a Kidney Transplant because his Son posted the request on Facebook. How Cool is That? I guess Facebook does have its Uses. A lot of people, including my Female Human, spend most of their Time playing Games, posting Useless Information about Which Movie they would be if they were a Movie, and telling people what they had for Lunch, but now and then it Serves a Purpose!

More Good News: Scientists in the UK have decoded the entire DNA of two deadly cancers: Malignant Melanoma and Lung Cancer. This should lead to a Cure at some Point. Interesting Factoid: For every 15 cigarettes you smoke, One Error occurs in your DNA. Glad I, as a Cat, have not had the Opportunity or Temptation to Smoke. However, my Female Human smoked for several years and had WAY more than 15 cigarettes. I'm Keeping my Toes crossed that she Escapes any Dire Consequences.

So that's it for This Week. I hope you Enjoy your Weekends and have Lots of Catnip stored up. I hear it's supposed to Snow on the East Coast over the Weekend so we may be Stuck Indoors a lot!

Friday Meanderings and some Haiku

It's been a stressful week here in Mauiville. My aunt, who was hospitalized a couple of weeks ago with dehydration, turned out to have a growth in her colon which is cancerous. I had to take her to the doctor to hear the news on Tuesday; he had given me a hint of what to expect when the biopsy results came in, so I kind of knew already that the news was bad. She took the news well - she'd had a similar diagnosis 20 years ago, was operated on, and was OK - but of course she was a lot younger then.

My aunt will need to undergo an operation again, if she is strong enough to withstand it. She is 88 and frail, so the outcome would be uncertain. I am hoping she can gain strength back after her illness (which was not caused by the growth). Then we can see whether she is able to undergo the operation, which would probably cure her if she can survive it.

My aunt has always been part of my life and it is hard to imagine the time when she will no longer be with me. Her sister, my mother, is two years older, yet my mother has always been the healthier one. At 90, she is doing well despite her pack a day smoking habit, whereas my aunt has heart failure, high blood pressure, and has always had digestive issues.

It seems as if my aunt always got the short end of the stick in life. My grandparents were not wealthy, and it was my mother who was sent to college; my aunt, who was less sure what she wanted to do in her life, ended up going to some kind of trade school where she was trained in occupational therapy. That didn't work out so well, as she was working with mental patients who were kind of violent, and after one of them knocked her down and broke her glasses, she left that career rather quickly. She then tried to join the WAVES during World War II but was discharged for health reasons shortly after she joined, after she had an allergic reaction to something and fainted.

She eventually found a good career working in a laboratory performing spectroscopy on precious metals and worked her way up to being the group supervisor, so she did finally find her niche.

My mother married and had me, and stopped working at her chosen career of journalism after that; my aunt, who never married, was the one with the career even though she didn't get the college education. She also was the daughter who ended up taking care of her parents in their old age.

When I was young I thought of my aunt as quite glamorous - unlike my mother, she had this career, she had a lot of friends, and used to travel a lot when she was younger. She was also willing to sit on the floor and play with me when I came over to my grandparents' house and was always a lot of fun. I loved going over there.

After she retired, she still kept busy with her church group, she played cards with friends, and did volunteer work. Now of course most of her friends have moved away to retirement communities, are living with grown children, or have passed away. She had to give up her house last year and move into the seniors apartment building my mother had moved into the year before, as taking care of the house was too much for her.

Now it seems her time may be running out, and it's hitting me rather hard. She is not always an easy person to deal with, as she has very strong opinions and tends to be rather contrary sometimes. But she has always been a fixture in my life and it will be hard to imagine her not being there. And she's always been very good to me.

It also makes me realize my mother will not be around forever either (not that I didn't know it, but we always tend to be in denial about these things). That's another thing that's hard to imagine.

I was going to write about President Obama's decision to begin the tribunals in Guantanamo again (disappointing, despite his reassurance that the prisoners would have expanded legal rights).

I am also concerned that he has decided to try to block the release the torture photographs from Iraq. Maybe his motives are correct, and that it would indeed inflame anti-American sentiments, but it is still a concern when he reverses his position on these issues. And we're still waiting for him to reverse "Don't Ask Don't Tell."

But I find despite these concerns, it has been hard to concentrate on them this week with everything else going on. So instead I've used my spare moments to play Scramble on Facebook...or sleep. I'm really good at sleeping, it's a great avoidance technique.

This weekend will be a busy one - after a neighborhood park cleanup we're heading up to the Adirondacks just for Saturday night, to get away and relax a bit. In the meantime, we have received the good news from our contractor that the painting will be done inside the cabin shortly and the well will be drilled soon as well. So by the time the summer really comes we may actually be able to stay in the cabin itself instead of paying to stay in a cabin nearby!

I'll close with a few haiku. Hope everyone has a good weekend!

Cheney is guilty
Of authorizing torture
We all know this now.

Nancy Pelosi
Knew about waterboarding
Way back in '03

She too is guilty
And so are many others
Where is the justice?

On to other news,
GM is closing dealers
And so is Chrysler.

Luckily for us
Our Jeep dealership survived
And will still be there.

And what of the Saabs?
There are two or three bidders
Who may buy the brand.

Times are really tough
For all the car companies
But some may survive.

Saab May Survive - or Not

As I'm sure I've mentioned, we are a Saab household. We still have our original Saab 900 that we bought the same year we got married, 1985. It was one of the quirky, personality-filled Saabs that were a cultlike favorite in the 1980s. Saab owners seeing another Saab on the highway would flash their lights.

The car above looks generally the same as our 1985; it's a 1986 (which was the same style). Our old girl has 250,000 miles on her and DH still drives her to Philadelphia 3 days a week. Right now the car does need a little work but still doesn't burn a drop of oil and still takes corners as if it is on railroad tracks.

Sadly, Saab lost a lot of its distinctiveness when it was bought out by General Motors. We had bought another 900 in 1991 (so for awhile had two nearly identical cars in different colors). But by the time we traded it in, G.M. had taken over the company and had already started their insidious mainstreaming of the Saab trademark. Our 2002 9-5 Sportwagon, while a very nice, serviceable car, doesn't have the same personality.

I've always been angry that G.M. didn't appreciate what it had in Saab. Saab was always an innovative company; they perfected their turbo and had gas-sipping 4-cylinder turbos on their high-end model while G.M. still relied on big V-8s that used lots of gas in order to get power. Saab's old motto was "the most intelligent car ever built."

By rights, given their legacy of innovation, Saab should have introduced the first hybrid vehicle to take this country by storm - not Toyota.

But G.M. had relegated it to a second-rate division among their many divisions and started trying to do the old productivity shuffle - putting Saabs on other platforms, mixing and matching styles. One low point came when they came out with the Saab 9-2 - a "Saab" that most Saab enthusiasts dubbed the "Saabaru" because it was really a Subaru that had been re-badged. But at least Subaru has a certain quirky and independent image of its own and they make good cars. The complete nadir happened when they came out with the 9-7 which was based on a G.M. SUV with a V-8 and lousy gas mileage. It was like the anti-Saab.

With the recent disaster that is the U.S. auto industry, G.M. has announced it will phase out Saab, Saturn and most of Pontiac within a short time as part of its restructuring. In aid of this, Saab has filed for bankruptcy in Sweden, in hope that the Swedish government will bail them out enough to make Saab attractive to investors.

According to the AP,

"With Saab, GM and the Swedish government are saying the other needs to come up with money to keep the brand going.

Preuss said $1 billion was needed to keep Saab operating, of which GM was ready to pay $400 million. The U.S. automaker had asked the Swedish government to guarantee the rest.

The Swedish government, which insists that Saab's survival is GM's responsibility, rejected the request because GM's business plan wasn't 'realistic,' Industry Minister Maud Olofsson said.

More capital is needed to construct a credible and sustainable plan, she said, and 'GM or someone else needs to provide that capital.'"

The New York Times has a more positive spin on the story, making it seem as if it was Saab's idea to go bankrupt and implying it might be successful.

"Saab went to a Swedish court for protection from its creditors, and said it would — with assistance from the Swedish government — reorganize to pave the way for private investors to buy all or part of the company.

After exploring Saab’s options, 'it was determined a formal reorganization would be the best way to create a truly independent entity that is ready for investment,' Saab’s managing director, Jan-Ake Jonsson, said in a statement.

Saab said it would need financing during its three-month restructuring 'from both public and private sources' and 'would continue to operate as usual.'

Elisabeth Thand Ringqvist, a spokeswoman for the Swedish industry ministry, said Saab would be eligible for help through loan guarantees provided to the Swedish auto industry as part of a support package the government approved in December.

'This could be interpreted as the government supporting Saab in the reorganization phase,' Ms. Ringqvist said. But she said guarantees for working capital, like what G.M. is seeking in Germany, were not on the table.

...dealers said they were optimistic about Saab’s future. 'It’s probably a great time for someone to get a bargain deal on a car company,' said Annette Adams, owner of Iowa City Saab.

Her dealership sells about 50 Saabs a year, while her husband’s Saab dealership, Saab Meyer Garage, sells a similar number.

She predicted Saab would thrive under new ownership. 'I look for good things to come,' she added. 'We just have to step across the hot coals to get there.'"

I hope it works and someone does step up to the plate and invest in Saab. I really would love to see Saab return to its roots under new owners who understand what Saab owners valued about the original Swedish Saabs, and bring that spirit back to the company.

As for Pontiac, that's another sad story. They too fell victim to G.M.'s propensity for making all their cars the same. I hope General Motors has learned its lesson or we'll be bailing them out again in a year or two.