I’m in the initial stages of setting up my del.icio.us bookmark list.  You can find it here.  At first, I thought I would add clever note to each entry.  But I stopped feeling clever after the six or seventh entry .

 

I had my hair chopped and colored today, which means I’m feeling quite metrosexual right now.  Perhaps I’ll get off the computer and hang pictures or arrange my closet or something. 

My friend Jay Weiner, who writes for the Star Tribune, is in Turin reporting on the Winter Games.  And he’s gone all New Media with a daily podcast.  Not a bad gig.  Go give him a listen.  These Olympics have kind of snuck up on us, haven’t they?  They don’t appear to be drenched in the same amount of hype that has preceded other Games.  Which is fine with me.  Anything is better than the jingoistic circle jerk that was the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta.  Maybe some European anarchists will storm the ice rink during the ice dancing competition, which would be the best thing that ever happened to the “sport” of ice dancing.

Richard Dawkins is one cranky atheist.  Dawkins, a well-known British scientist who has penned several popular science books on evolution, recently did a two-part documentary entitled The Root of All Evil.  It’s an unabashedly critical look at religion’s role in global culture and history.  The series aired only in the UK, but I harnessed the arcane powers of the internets to score myself a copy.

 

I don’t disagree with much of the substance of Dawkin’s arguments.  I spent several years struggling to believe in some vague notion of a watchful, if distant, God.  But in the end, it never added up for me.  To believe in a supernatural agent that has ultimate authority over the universe seems to diminish the chaotic elegance of this reality.  It’s too pat an explanation.  I can’t believe in a divinely created universe anymore than I can believe that the tooth fairy left all that pocket change under my pillow when I was a kid or that UFOs are responsible for all those crop circles. 

 

But back to Dawkins.  Sure, I chuckled when I watched him verbally spar with a rather smug evangelical pastor.  But I’m not sure I would have told the pastor that his megachurch service reminded me of the Nuremberg rallies .  Dawkins sees religious faith as a dangerous relic of less enlightened times that has no place in this age of scientific reason, which explains his blunt words to the pastor.  And after living through the last five years under a president who, like the Blues Brothers, believes he’s on a mission from God, it’s hard to deny Dawkins this point.  But I’m a little less willing to condemn the faithful.  If biologists like E.O. Wilson are correct, humans are genetically hard-wired to believe in the supernatural.  A genetic legacy like that, reinforced by thousands of years of human history, is not likely to disappear anytime soon. 

 

Which means I’m a mutant in more ways than one. 

 

Last night, I saw Match Point, Woody Allen’s new thriller.  If there’s anything I’ve learned from Hollywood films, it’s never, ever have an affair.  Sure, it’s fun for a while, but then it all ends in tears sooner or later.  And the logistics of maintaining an affair are nearly impossible.  There’s always the chance that you’ll leave some incriminating evidence lying about or that one of your buddies will screw up the story about how he and you are going on a fishing trip when you’re really shacked up in some cheap motel on the interstate with that waitress from Denny’s.

 

And what’s up with Scarlett Johannsson’s voice?  Don’t get me wrong, it’s incredibly sexy, but it sounds like she goes through a pack or two of Virginia Slims a day. 

The budget bill that squeaked through the House a couple days ago contains bad news for thousands of Medicaid recipients, including those with disabilities.  States will now be able to impose premiums and co-pays on even the poorest enrollees.  Most of these co-pays will range from $1-$5 dollars, which might not seem like a lot of money to most of us.  It’s important to remember, though, that most Medicaid recipients live on a few hundred dollars a month and every few bucks that go towards co-payments are a few dollars less that go towards food or housing or other basic necessities.  The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that 65,000 people will be driven out of Medicaid because of their inability to pay these newly enacted premiums and co-pays. 

 

If anything, these cuts will make health care more expensive for everyone.  These people will not stop needing medical care.  They will present themselves at emergency rooms where they cannot be turned away.  Their conditions will generally be more severe and more expensive to treat because they lacked access to preventive care.  And the costs for treating those people will be reflected in the higher health care premiums and co-pays that everyone else will have to pay. 

 

Congress has never shown much aptitude for taking the long view of things.  However, the deliberate myopia behind these particular cuts is shameful.  They do nothing to address the long-term pressures that are ballooning Medicaid costs.  Instead, they simply delay the final reckoning for a few more years.