Just blasted a freeper and probably soon to be former friend...

[sfwriter]

Hi all,

I just got a letter of condolence from a friend of mine, who has turned into a Freeper over the years. He posts his opinions at http://lesjones.com/">http://lesjones.com/. Over the years I've hired this guy to work for me twice and actually thought highly of him until I read some of his blog posts. I'm sure he expected a touchy-feely response to his congrats and condolences over my new baby and the death of my father.

But after reading what he thought of mine and my father's opinions and our political views, I just couldn't stomach his words. They seemed two-faced. This is what he got instead.

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Thanks for the kind words, and I hope for the best for your family.

I hope the hospital takes better care of your mom than they did my dad. Their treatment cost father three weeks of life and a chance to see his granddaughter.

They were so concerned with the rules for the insurance company that they delayed by several days treatment that would have kept him alive. In fact, they had to wait until he developed pneumonia before they admitted him to the hospital. Then, understaffed, he had to wait two days while the hospital could find someone to drain 1600ccs of fluid from his lungs. By then his left lung had collapsed. That severely hampered him. He made it three weeks more, and Emma came four weeks later.

Back when my mom was a nurse, that procedure, called a thoracentisis, would have been done in the emergency room.

Of course his HMO shows a healthy 28% profit, which judging from your blog is the important thing. That profit motive will keep them providing this crappy level of service. (Never mind that your analysis was based on the fallacy that healthcare in this country somehow obeys Adam Smith's rules of a free market. It does not. It motivates healthcare organizations to maximize profits by serving the healthy and the wealthy.)

For my money, I'll fly to Canada where at least the doctors and hospital will be more concerned with my treatment than my insurance when they look at me. For millenia, the people who treated the sick and injured did it mostly for humanitarian or personal reasons. Now they do it for a BMW and a house in the country.

I can't tell you what a disappointment I felt when I read your blogged opinions. That you would actually defend the Iraq war by saying we hadn't killed as many Iraqi's as Saddam, that you would find comfort in a comparison of liberal patriots to an abusive spouse both came as a shock to me. In the first case, I found the utter lack of empathy and understanding of the cost of those deaths to our cause to be stunning. In the second, I found the comparison to be both offensive and divisive. As if those liberals who served their country like, say John Kerry, or my father, had less claim to their criticisms and opinions than right-wing blowhards of the "my country right or wrong," or "love it or leave it" variety.

Crissy couldn't believe it when I told her about your blog. Neither of us could bring those opinions in line with the Les Jones who once took us hiking in the Smokies and brought us to a Cosby speakeasy.

We are at a crossroads where we decide weather America will be a belligerent, polarized, "might-makes-right," society or a nation guided by high ideals, compassion, reason and the rule of law. You are siding with those who would make our nation into something more sensitive to the rule of the powerful than the rule of law or even the people.

-Sandy