Category: Living in Society

Politics mostly social commentary.

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Home Life

50 Years Later

Fillmore at Locust
Fillmore at Locust

LAKE MACBRIDE— The school crossing guard at Fillmore and Locust told me President Kennedy had been shot on my way back to school. I don’t recall walking the last block, but  upon arriving at the sixth grade classroom, our teacher pulled down the window shades while we waited for news.

In the fifty years since, this memory persisted, with immediacy, and its uncertainty. I’m still don’t understand what it meant or what it means.

The crossing occurred three blocks from where I was born, a block and a half from where my mother had just served lunch, and a couple of hundred feet from the Catholic church where my parents wed, my grandmother had worked, and where I was baptized, confirmed and attended my father’s funeral. A couple of hundred feet ahead was the duplex where as a toddler I visited my maternal grandmother. That neighborhood was at the core of who I was.

I don’t recall much from the rest of sixth grade, after which we attended school in the new building, and experienced the first of many renderings. I was placed in a classroom with the group of kids who were bound for college, and separated from most of my neighborhood friends. In high school we were rent further as the boys were separated from the girls. After high school, we belonged to the world, and college, and I left not knowing I was also leaving Davenport for good. None of it had anything to do with the Kennedy assassination, and I’ve known that all along.

50 years later I attended an event in the county seat where a local author, the owner of an independent bookstore, one of my graduate school professors and someone else spoke about the day Kennedy died. Familiar icons were mentioned, and the bookstore had a table full of JFK books for sale outside the room. That hour provoked this post, and that seems okay. Because without the noon event, I would not likely have thought of President Kennedy at all today, as I had long ago moved on, almost forgetting how simple life was then.

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Home Life Kitchen Garden Work Life

Turkey Wrangling and Friday

Loaves
Loaves

LAKE MACBRIDE— With the Thanksgiving holiday upon us, thoughts turn to turkey in a lot of households. Unlike during most of our vegetarian holidays, I am dealing with 100 locally grown, free range slaughtered birds tomorrow. Along with others, we are taking delivery from a local farm, sorting and weighing, and preparing them for delivery in the CSA shares next week. I’ve never been a dead (or live) turkey wrangler before, so despite the implications, I am looking forward to a new experience.

We see a lot of wild turkeys near our home. Mostly, they browse in the field near the lane to the highway, or are seen flying over the road. For those of us that remember when Iowa turkeys were an endangered species, it is always a happy sight. But enough turkey talk.

If the farm work has been winding down, it comes to a halt after delivering the final shares on Tuesday. We’ll settle up and settle in for winter. That it’s snowing as I write this post is a sign of the time of year. Confronted with the end of year holidays, it’s time to take stock of home life and work life, and make plans. This year’s planning will be as important as in any previous year.

Home life is patterned by habits formed over a lifetime: more indoor work— cooking, cleaning, writing and reading— and the part of work life devoted to research and development— studying opportunities and determining viability. As with most who live an alternative lifestyle, funding cash flow during 2014 will be a pressing issue, although I am not yet willing to sell plasma to do so.

If 2013 was anything, it was an experiment in lowly paid work, first in a warehouse, assembling kits for Whirlpool, and then on a number of farms. What I’ve found is my aging frame can take the work, but there are limits to how the tendons and muscles can tolerate increased physical activity. I am optimistic about performing physical work in more active jobs.

That said, I don’t plan to return to the warehouse, even though they invited me to return when the farm season was finished. The pay was low, and the social networking not good enough to distill further benefit. So what’s next? That’s the question for answering during the next few weeks. There are ideas, but no plans yet. I am thankful for the ability to be in this position as the snow falls and winter approaches.

Categories
Living in Society

Precinct Politics

Se.n Bob Dvorsky
Sen. Bob Dvorsky

LAKE MACBRIDE— The Braley for U.S. Senate campaign came to our political precinct last night, and a small group of friends and neighbors gathered near the lake to hear what the campaign staff had to say. They were looking for help this year to contribute to the effort. No surprise there. The event kicked off the campaign in a way that will begin to get local political activists involved.

What was a surprise is that Braley hired Sarah Benzing. The surprise is that even though the hire is old news and was covered in August, it’s the first many of us that don’t follow politics regularly heard about it. Benzing was Braley’s first chief of staff after winning the 2006 election. More recently, she served as campaign manager in high profile U.S. Senate campaigns for Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Ed Markey of Massachusetts. An old, but more complete biography is here. Braley brought in someone he trusts, but more importantly, he hired a top gun in the political operative world.

Congress is in session, so Representative Braley was in Washington during the event and State Senator Bob Dvorsky spoke briefly on his behalf. The message was that despite a dysfunctional congress, Braley has been able to get some substantial work done to benefit Iowans.

What was missing from the two minute campaign video and the discussion was the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Braley sided with Republicans on the recent house vote to “fix” Obamacare, a bill the White House said would gut the ACA. It will become a political liability if Braley walks back his support for the ACA as a senate candidate. President Obama won re-election in our precinct by four votes, so it seems clear why Braley would try to hedge his bets. But fence straddling on this issue is not becoming of a candidate who asserts he is a progressive politician.

In Big Grove precinct, we gave Senator Tom Harkin 64 percent of the vote during the 2008 election, but also gave Senator Chuck Grassley 62 percent during the 2010 election. It’s no secret that the so-called no-preference voters will decide the 2014 senate race. In this precinct, somewhere between 850 and 1,000 people can be expected to vote in 2014, and that means to win the precinct, if Braley is nominated, he will have a core of 35 percent of the votes, and needs to persuade another 15-16 percent, or roughly 130-150 voters. It can be done, but it will not be a cake walk.

The group gathered last night will support Bruce Braley’s campaign going forward. Whatever he may lack as a candidate is made up by the fact that once the Republican clown car drops off their nominee next year, the race will be depicted as a high-profile duel of the titans. Money is expected to pour into the race, and one can only thank our lucky stars that our household does not turn on the television much any more. Politics is local, so what happens in Big Grove precinct has broader meaning. Maintaining the U.S. Senate majority is high on our list of priorities, and that means working now to elect Bruce Braley.

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Social Commentary

Navigating Change in Health Insurance — Part 4

Kathleen Sebelius in Cedar Rapids (2008)
Kathleen Sebelius (2008)

LAKE MACBRIDE— The folks at the insurance exchange caught me in the barn yard, and we had a conversation about the challenges of not knowing what my 2014 income will be. The operator said, “we didn’t anticipate that people wouldn’t know how much they would earn in 2014.” She said they were working on the software to enable us to revise our application and someone would call me back when it was fixed. It has been a couple of weeks since that conversation, so we are in a holding pattern.

The impact of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) on most people I know is nil, mostly because they already have a health insurance policy that complies with the ACA. The requirement to get health insurance is vaguely understood, and there have been zero times someone has talked about the financial penalties for not having insurance. There has been no impetus for people to sign up for a policy any different from before the open enrollment period began Oct. 1.

There is a fee for not having health insurance, and it ranges from $95 or one percent of income up to the cost of buying a specific plan (whichever is higher) in 2014, up to $695 or 2.5 percent of income in 2016. People who pay a fee will also be required to pay the entire cost of their health care. What isn’t clear is how emergency rooms will deal with the group of patients who show up at their doors for treatment without insurance— something else people are not talking about.

What we know is the Dec. 15 deadline to change policies for Jan. 1 will be here soon, and action will be required. The easy decision would be to keep our current health insurance policy. That postpones things for a year, providing time for the bugs to work out of the system. It’s our default position.

When the exchange calls me back, I’ll re-do our application, which will finalize eligibility and costs, and enable us to make a decision to change or hold our policy for another year. Until then, we watch, learn and wait.

Click on the links to read Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.

Categories
Home Life

Random Notes on a Saturday Morning

Last Fresh Garden Tomatoes
Last Fresh Garden Tomatoes

LAKE MACBRIDE— Politicians glom on to veterans like there is no tomorrow. Veterans vote, we live in society, and most of us served and left the military behind without comment or regret. Politicians should work to reduce the number of veterans we are creating as a society, rather than glomming onto our service for political reasons. That could be their service, and the nation would be grateful.

The newspaper work is finished for today. The focus will be on home work. The atmosphere is calm, so the brush pile can be burned, preparing a space for planting garlic tomorrow or next week. There are lots of apples for processing into applesauce, apple crisp and maybe some dehydrated apples. That is, once the dried herbs in the dehydrator are removed and cleaned. The last of the fresh tomatoes will be turned into a pot of chili for supper. There are more turnip greens for soup stock, and a drawer full of root vegetables in the refrigerator— plus whatever else is harvested today. There is a whole afternoon of kitchen work.

Having gone to town this morning I hope to remain on the property, or within walking distance. Maybe once the brush is burned, I’ll take a walk on the lake trail, but no further. It’s what’s called living, and we don’t do enough of it. And it’s time to get on with it.

Categories
Kitchen Garden Work Life

Being a Farm Hand

Wilson's Orchard
Wilson’s Orchard

LAKE MACBRIDE— While we were washing root vegetables, the ambient temperature started at 34 degrees and made it to 51 by the end of our shift. A cold, wet day that yielded the soundest sleep I’ve had in a long time. My hands are chapped, and application of lotion and salve to re-moisturize them has had no effect. The repetitive motion of grasping a carrot and squeezing the water nozzle to wash it would be problematic if continued. Once the carrots are washed, it’s done for 2013.

As a paid farm hand, my view of local foods production is different from the farm owners and managers. Where there is inefficiency, or extra production, there is an opportunity to perform paid work.

Part of local food production is a constant discussion about how to improve efficiencies, and my participation is welcome. However, each planting, at each step of the process, is surrounded with a complex mix of issues, challenges, techniques and possible courses of action. In order to answer a question, broad experience is needed, and usually, I don’t have much to add.

The season is winding down, and eventually the crops will be harvested, prepared and distributed, hopefully by Thanksgiving.  It will be time to move on, richer in knowledge and experience if not in money. That matters in our life on the Iowa prairie.

Categories
Social Commentary

United Nations Comes to Iowa

Jim Leach Remarks
Jim Leach Remarks

IOWA CITY— My World came to Iowa on Tuesday, Nov. 5. It is the United Nations survey to collect grassroots input to the post-2015 Millennium Development Goals (MDG), and one of only 11 U.S. consultations. One of the criticisms of the 2000 MDG process was the lack of grassroots input, and the survey and consultations are intended to address that deficiency post-2015. The goal is to get at least one million U.S. survey responses (if readers would like to participate online, click here).

I was asked to facilitate a small group discussion on access to clean water and sanitation, and was provided a copy of a nine-page handout on the subject.  At our table, we had eight people, including some students at the nearby University of Iowa and one person each from China and India, two countries where along with Bangladesh a majority of people in extreme poverty live.

We had an engaging conversation and took notes for submission in the final report to the United Nations. As University of Iowa law professor Jim Leach said, we should support the United Nations, “and take on those that don’t.” We did our part last night.

The publicity, organization and event itself seemed well executed. The attendees I knew had the experiences and credentials to add value to the discussion as the United Nations prepares its next set of millennium development goals. Still,  something was lacking. On the drive home, it occurred to me that what was missing was any substantial discussion of business concerns that impact global society so pervasively.

When Shuanghui International, China’s largest pork producer, bought Smithfield Foods, the largest U.S. pork producer, what were they after besides the pork? Because China is so polluted, they were after access to U.S. land and relatively clean water to meet their burgeoning demand for protein. In a free-market way, they would co-opt U.S. land and water rights to benefit China. Americans may not see it this way, but it is the same kind of free-market colonialism the Chinese are engaged with in Africa and South America. The implications for the millennium development goals seem clear.

While a focus on human rights and individual needs may be appropriate for the United Nations, the world has become an open shop where corporations ply their trades freely and collect their tithe, accruing it to the wealthiest people on the planet. The role of corporatism, and keeping it in check as human rights are addressed must be part of the formula for the U.N. I don’t see how that would be possible today.

A very vocal minority, whose members are pro-life, anti-U.N. and anti-taxes will stand as a roadblock to the U.S. governance it takes to keep corporations in check. Until now, the our country has been a beacon of hope for good governance, but the 113th U.S. Congress seems incompetent to pass any bill of significance, let alone one that will reign in corporations as they plunder our world.

As I drove north after the meeting, on a highway not much removed from when Dillon plowed his furrow in the 19th century Iowa wilderness, it seemed clear our civilization has not come as far as we might think. That has to change to make the progress needed to sustain our lives in a turbulent world.

Categories
Work Life

Last Day of the Season

Wilson's Orchard
Wilson’s Orchard

RURAL IOWA CITY— Thursday was the last day of the 2013 u-pick season at Wilson’s Orchard. There were a few cars in the lot, and pumpkins displayed outside the sales barn. Out back, the flatbed truck was loaded with a tall pile of pumice left from apples just pressed for cider. Inside, there were five or six types of apples in the cooler, along with cider, apple turnovers and the numerous items in the gift shop. An employee was positioning apples slices on a dehydrator shelf. There was a sense in the air of counting the hours until closing up shop for the season. 2013 has been a great year for apples.

Stopping on the last day is a habit worth forming. It has the potential of being a  personal tradition— the kind we build our lives around. I hope to work at Wilson’s Orchard again next season.

The Gold Rush apples are not in yet. They have parentage of Golden Delicious and were cultivated for their long storage properties, perhaps as long as seven months. It will be the first year we tried them, and it is only one of many varieties sampled this year. I’d say they are delicious, but that would be an apple joke. According to a colleague, the chief apple officer will pick them from the Solon orchard next week, and they will be available for purchase on Nov. 16-17 when the sales barn is open for holiday shopping.

Pumpkin Display
Pumpkin Display

During 2013, Wilson’s Orchard was a local phenomenon. People came from all around the area to pick apples, seeking the fruit, but also family entertainment. Being the mapper, and later in the season, one of four tractor ride drivers, I was part of the show and met people from all over, each with a personal story about what brought them to the orchard. It was great fun, and one of the best work experiences I’ve had since leaving my career in logistics and transportation. The intersection of apples, farming, small business management, customer relations and speaking opportunities hit my sweet spot.

At the end of the season, this unique experience stands out, and hopefully will live long in memory. Lessons learned there will be applied elsewhere in a life on the Iowa prairie in a turbulent world.

Categories
Social Commentary

Navigating Change in Health Insurance — Part 3

Obamacare Upheld
Obamacare Upheld

LAKE MACBRIDE—Like many, I worked hard during the post-911 Bush administration to elect a Democratic president. Investing a lot of myself in politics through the 2004, 2006 and 2008 election cycles, I’m not ready to give up on President Barack Obama now. Not even close. Including this time of implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), something that has already made my individual health insurance policy better.

There are open questions about the changes. As answers are found, in almost every case, the news has been good. For example, my doctor is in the exchange and the exchange policy costs look to be substantially lower that my current policy, with better coverage. Even so, some don’t think the reality of the Obamacare roll out is as good as it is. (ACA = Obamacare, in case you missed it).

Heritage Action, the political action wing of the conservative Heritage Foundation wants us to be scared of the ACA, asserting a basic falsehood about it. “Scarier than any Halloween costume or ghost story, millions of Americans are receiving letters in the mail from their insurance companies saying that their health insurance will be dropped or that their premiums will skyrocket,” Heritage Action wrote in an email the day before Halloween.

What they don’t say is that those being dropped from current  health insurance policies are being done so because the coverage does not meet the standards of the ACA, and the insurance company has chosen not to align the policy with the new law. This is about the insurance company providing cut rate coverage at too high a price, not anonymous health insurance policy holders who can’t see past their own nose.

By my read, it appears that policy holders, pretty uniformly, will get a better deal under the ACA. The impact of the ACA will be to level the playing field so that a health insurance policy has the basic provisions outlined by the new law, disallowing insurance companies from providing mediocre coverage.

Despite their noise, the naysayers provide no alternative to the ACA. What they must know is that as the actuality of the ACA is revealed, the more people will like it, rendering their scare tactics irrelevant. There is evidence insurance companies will like it too.

I was stunned by the rate increase we received from Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield on our individual policy. At 6.8 percent it is the lowest annual rate increase we have had since first buying the policy in 2009. According to a notice from Wellmark, “the only increase to your premium will be an adjustment to account for the new federal fees and taxes required by the ACA.” What the insurance company is saying is that except for Obamacare, they didn’t need a rate increase this year. Can the reform measures really be that good for insurance companies?

There are still a lot of questions to answer about health insurance reform as the ACA rolls out. It is pretty clear that the president will take a hit in the polls over it, whether it is warranted or not. As I have written in my two previous posts, getting facts and working through them is essential, and there is no hurry to make a bad decision. So far, navigating the implementation of the ACA looks like clear sailing.

Categories
Home Life

Daily Chronicle — Autumn Catch-up

Paychecks in a Ball Jar
Paychecks in a Ball Jar

LAKE MACBRIDE— Since July, my agenda has been packed with paid and   unpaid work. As autumn yields to winter, I found myself working twelve days straight. Feeling similar to how I felt after returning to garrison after long periods of military field work, I’m making time to take care of basic necessities, and have created this chronicle of how things went.

3 a.m.— Rise, make coffee, read messages and articles, write emails, daily planning.

5 a.m.— Breakfast of pancakes with apple butter on top.

5:30 a.m.— Read the rest of The American Way of Eating by Tracie McMillan.

7:05 a.m.—Rearrange cupboard above the refrigerator (clean off thick layer of dust on top). Organize shelf stable goods in the pantry.

9:16 a.m.—Create work space in garage and downstairs.

9:45 a.m.— Pick up paychecks and empty canning jars, chat with two of my favorite farmers, take recycling to Iowa City, get groceries at North Dodge HyVee.

11:47 a.m.— Lunch, start dish washer.

12:32 p.m.— Scan paychecks into the bank account.

12:57 p.m.— Take a nap.

1: 27 p.m.— Select the ripe tomatoes from the counter to make pasta sauce, and get started.

2:09 p.m.— Sort cracked garlic for planting/eating.

2:37 p.m.— Finish prep work and start pasta sauce to simmer.

3:03 p.m.— Pay bills. Read mailers from Wellmark and Delta Dental on changes to plans for compliance with the Affordable Care Act.

3:34 p.m.— Take nap #2.

4:25 p.m.— Clean up to do prep work for dinner, and bask in the glory of a day on my own.

4:26 p.m.— Realize the the existential struggle for existence in the post-Reagan society restarts tomorrow.

4:27 p.m.— Was thankful for today.