I agree with a lot of what you said. Health insurance is some kind of weird racket. Did you know that Sen. Bill Frist and his brothers are either at or close to billionaire status from the HMO business? I mean, good work should have its reward but that money's coming from somewhere, and I'm afraid a lot of it is coming out of employers who are struggling to pay it.

Some of the wealth we're seeing today is just a bit sick, IMO. Probably always been that bad, I dunno.

Food stamps might be different. I've heard that it helps to keep farmers afloat and if it keeps starving people from begging on the streets even more than they do (you oughta see it in San Fran...Lohd have mercy) might be worth it. At least with a food stamps only setup, they have the health to go find work and the need to, because all they're getting is the food, ideally anyway.

I hate to admit it, but when I was on an HMO plan for a few years, I did go in more often than I ever had, and some of it was probably unnecessary. Oh well, I'm back to the economy model -- scraping it up however I can.

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