Don’t miss this opportunity. It only comes once every four years! We’ll be stuck with our President for a while, and if you didn’t take this chance to make your voice heard, you could regret it.

AND, besides that, many places have other important ballot initiatives for you to sound off on. Should gambling be allowed near your home? Should marriage be allowed for everyone?

PLUS, there are Congressional-level and lower elections we need to be concerned with. Sometimes these touch us much more personally and more quickly than the Presidential election.

I understand if you may be disgusted with all the debating and arguing, I sure am. But it’s time for the big pay off. Cast your vote. Negate the vote of someone you disagree with. Make your citizenship count.

Make your voice heard! Get out there and vote, Tuesday, November 6!

When I hear people worried that the Government is going to get between them and their doctor, I suggest they take a good look at the decisions being made about their health care dollars now.

My insurance tells me which doctors and hospitals I can go to, which drugs I can order, which orthopedic apparatus I can use should I sprain or break something. If I wanted psychological counseling, my insurance tells me how much of that is allowable. Seriously. Not my doctor, my therapist or the government. In my case, it’s Aetna that determines what is best for my well-being.

My insurance insists that I pay EXTRA for the birth control medicine that DOESN’T make me break out, because it’s BRAND NAME MEDICINE. That’s Aetna getting between me and my doctor. Why should it cost more for me to use the medicine that works better?

My husband decided to work for himself a couple of years ago. His former company offered him a COBRA plan. At $600+ per month! How is that reasonable? In the 90s I took advantage of the COBRA deal at less than $100 per month, and it was very helpful between jobs. But at over $600 per month, he was better off paying full price for prescriptions and hoping he didn’t break any bones until we came up with another solution.

I suggest that some government regulation of the health care industry is needed.

1. Prescription coverage should be simplified. Why can’t all drugs have one price? Why are there lists A and B? I remember my grandmother had a rainbow of pills to take, and I am rapidly catching up to her at 38 years old. This stuff gets confusing. There’s no reason for it, though. Why should I pay $1 for antibiotics and $60 for brand-name birth control? Even it out and pay $25 for each.
2. No one can be rejected for coverage. Even if we don’t reach the standard of requiring health care for everyone, we absolutely cannot reject people for pre-existing conditions. These are the people that need coverage most, and should be given credit for getting coverage.
3. COBRA has to be brought down to earth. $600 is not a reasonable monthly payment for insurance. And it’s not near what the estimates were for individually purchased insurance. So why was COBRA that high? We cannot expect a person who is leaving a job to pay such a high amount for insurance.
4. Dental and vision need to be included. These are medical benefits. Treatments for your eyes and teeth cost real money. Neglecting these parts of your body is just as dangerous as neglecting your knee or your finger, if not more so. Putting this insurance into a separate category is simply a joke.

We do need more, but these changes will put us well on our way.

The President has once again spelled out his thoughts on Why We Need Health Care Reform, in The New York Times Op Ed page, and I agree. I hope you’ll read his thoughts and chime in. And call your Senator and Representative.

UPDATE: Here’s the White House point of view, at WhiteHouse.gov/RealityCheck.

Just to be clear.

I’ve been watching this silly debate about our President’s citizenship, and I’m certain there’s nothing worth debating. I did a good bit of marketing work for the Office of Personnel Management, and I’ve seen the forms that need to be filled out when one applies for a government job. I’ve got confidence that when Obama first came to Washington, his paperwork was well worked through. His birth certificate, passport, resume and urine sample have all been screened. They have already gone down in his PERMANENT RECORD.

The silliest argument of all that I’ve heard is that people don’t trust the certificate that has been shown because Obama’s birth certificate is a CERTIFICATE OF LIVE BIRTH. Well kids, take a look in your scrapbook, safe or underwear drawer. Wherever you keep your important papers.

I’ve got a Certificate of Live Birth, too. Not only that, I’ve got a COPY. It’s issued one month after my birth and it has a raised seal from the DC Department of Human Resources. (Accordingly, I updated my About page.)

Take a look. I’m curious. Who out there is holding an original BIRTH CERTIFICATE?

I’m blaming this on government double-speak. Why call something a “certificate of live birth” when you’re really talking about a birth certificate?

W had his big press conference yesterday and the press gave him some face time. But why did SO MANY front pages choose to give him the same kind of face time? Is there a conspiracy in the layout departments of our nation’s newspapers? What gives?

I am quite excited about the Inauguration of Barack Obama as President of the United States.

I was one of those who was sorely disappointed by Al Gore’s defeat, which has made every misstep over the last 8 years all the more painful.

It was not important to me that Obama’s father was African as I placed my vote, but I do believe this is a great milestone in cultural understanding for our country, and it makes me proud.

I am concerned about rights like Choice and Privacy and Habeas Corpus. I’m concerned about health care and housing, both for my family and for poor Americans. I’m concerned about our environment.

I believe that Obama is concerned, too. So after all the tourists leave town and we’ve sold our last Commemorative Coffee Cup, the work can begin in earnest, and I hope the excitement and trust doesn’t fade too fast. We will all have to pull together.

What that means is hard to say, but a dialogue with the President is hard for Americans to have. Congress was developed to give people a voice in Washington, and Americans should be certain that their representatives are speaking for them as life carries on.

The past 8 years have taught me that the entire democratic process must work together: voters, representatives, senators, states and governors. And that couldn’t be clearer than this month, as two senators are in question due to votes and a governor.

So we’ll celebrate our exciting new president, but don’t forget your job isn’t ever over as a citizen.

*

Addendum:  I was privileged enough to be able to attend some of the Inauguration events. It was amazing. I’ve lived in the area for about 20 years now, and it’s been some time since I bothered to join festivities on the Mall. The We Are One concert was fun, and I honestly was surprised to see the Obamas and Bidens there. I volunteered on MLK Day at RFK Stadium in D.C., and was surprised to see Michelle Obama and Jill Biden there, and they stayed long enough for many of us to be able to go up and meet them. On Tuesday, we went to the Mall again for the Inauguration itself, and were counted among the 1.8 million there to witness Barack Obama’s swearing-in in person. In 20 years in Washington, I’ve never seen that many happy people together in D. C. at once. I didn’t have tickets, but I enjoyed every minute of shared jumbotron viewing with my fellow Americans, and I’ll never forget it. For one weekend, Obama was the great uniter.

I wrote a while back about how disappointing the Inauguration can be for Washingtonians.
The Inauguration: Welcome to the District of Clusterfu@%

The sad thing is, every time I get more excited, something happens to let me down. There are now nearly 100 balls scheduled, starting on the Saturday before the Inauguration. Yes. A full three nights before the actual Inaugural ceremony, there will be balls. Washington will have more balls than a stud farm.

I was very excited to get my Inaugural ball invitation. Wow! Then I got a second. And a third. Now Obama has sent a couple of invitations that rely on essay contests. What is this, a college application? Then I got two more invitations to “Grassroots” balls, thrown by Obama’s fund-raising crews. Aren’t those the folks that should get the invitations to the official balls?

When you get down to brass tacks, the event itself, the Inauguration, will be the MAIN EVENT. And that’s going to be in the cold morning, likely accented by a harsh wintry mix. That’s what the weather man calls it when it’s raining and snowing at the same time. If you want to witness the Main Event, then you have to wait through some prayers and speeches and put up with a few million of your fellow citizens stepping on your muddy toes.

BUT – you will feel what it is like to be one of the huddled masses yearning to breathe free! You will hear, with your own ears, thanks to the hard work of some very talented sound engineers, (including my own dear brother-in-law), a real historic event. One of the largest feats of sound engineering ever.

I mean, the first African-American to take the oath of office to become President of the United States.

And as you pass out in a hotel lobby, waiting in line for hot chocolate at the Starbucks counter, you will be glad you came to Washington. Please tip your barista. She had to figure out how to get to work early.

I have faith in our President-elect. Really, I do. I trust him, and his new administration, and I sort of trust the Presidential Inaugural Committee, but I’ve been in Washington for a long time, and I’m starting to feel the same old familiar doormat feeling. Welcome to your Nation’s Capital! Ouch! That’s my toe! And hey, stop crowding the Metro, I need that to get to work!

• Inaugural planners have announced that the entire Mall will be open for spectators to be within history-making distance of Senators Obama and Biden as they take their oaths of office on January 20, 2009.
• There are already dozens of Inaugural Balls and Galas planned for Tuesday and Monday night to celebrate the event.
• Aretha Franklin is playing at the Kennedy Center, and if that’s not enough to create a mob of divas, she’s playing for FREE.
• Diva alert #2: Oprah is landing at the Kennedy Center during Inaugural week, too.
• In the highly annoying category, D.C. bars will be open until 5 a.m., so as I head home from work, they will party on. And perhaps as I get up for work, they will be heading home.
• Meanwhile, Metro will be running at peak capacity, with many escalators turned off, for 15 hours. Tell me there won’t be an “incident” that causes a delay. I dare you.

All of this fun, and at my office, Inauguration Day is NOT a holiday. I had been thinking about taking the day off to celebrate the Obamanon, but what to do? Camp out for a good seat on the parade route? Fight the crowds to be one of the million on the Mall? So I can see our proud brown dot on the white marble staircase? When I see all these tourists (I know, you are Americans, too) littering our fair city, staring at Metro maps and wearing fanny packs, I don’t know if I want to be trampled, or frozen, into the American ice sculpture. I could see and hear it all better from the TV at work, and get paid doing it.

But there’s the next dilemma. If I try to get to my downtown DC office to get paid watching the Inauguration on TV, I STILL have to go through all the crowds and hassle. I won’t be able to drive to work, because I work a short distance from the parade route. Roads will be closed. Chances are garages will be full. I will still have to ride the subway to work with the elated Inaugural masses and probably give directions all the way. (Because Washingtonians are friendly like that.)

Some readers may laugh at my quandry. At least I don’t have to pay for a hotel in the area, if I could find one.

It’s just that the rest of the year, we hear the motorcade coming, we pause in our travels, and if it’s the President – Washingtonians know how to tell – we glance at each other and nod, “Hm, he must just be back from Kyoto.” We know how to deal with Presidents in D.C.

But this one, grand, celebratory day, the REST of the country is invited to come by and make a big fuss of things. It would be so much simpler if it was a nice, quiet tea party somewhere in Georgetown, but we did ask for Change, didn’t we?

I’m thinking that somebody sent out too many invitations for our little garden party, but luckily I’m not in charge of baking the cupcakes or ordering the folding chairs. Change is good, but scary. And I’m a bit scared that some flowerbeds may get trampled.

So, America, if you’re visiting your Nation’s Capital for the Inauguration, welcome to Washington. Please consider your hosts. Wipe your feet before you come in. Try not to litter. Ask for directions. We really are glad you came. Really.