Category Archives: politics
Malala and Her Would-be Assassin
I was ready for devouring my next book and went looking for Jhumpa Lahiri’s latest, The Lowland. When I got it, I also just happened to get Malala’s new book along with it.
So, this wasn’t actually my first choice for a read that particular day. It wasn’t even a deliberate choice. But since I now had it on my Kindle (oh how I love my Kindle – thank you Mr Bezos!), I read it soon after I finished Lahiri’s book.
I will tell you that I really didn’t expect much from Malala’s book and didn’t even think I would finish it.
After all, thanks to the profusive news media, I already knew Malala’s story and back story (or so I thought), so what more could the book add?
Therefore, it came as a great surprise to me just how gripping and inspiring her story was, told in her words and written in collaboration with journalist Christina Lamb, a respected British foreign correspondent.
I did learn a lot that was news to me. While at a rather broad level, I had read about life in Pakistan and in the Swat Valley of Pakistan – mostly from news reports of Malala and especially after the attempt by the Taliban to kill her, this book digs much deeper, speaking first hand about experiencing life in that beautiful but harrowing slice of the world.
Until I read the book, I had an idea, but there’s nothing like reading a real person’s day-to-day account. Malala was one in millions – just an ordinary girl wanting to lead an ordinary life but one that allowed her to be educated. That’s it.
It turned out that she was an ordinary girl but with extraordinary passion and exceptional courage
The book gave me such deep insight into her world and showed me just how brave this young girl was – as she bucked all the trends surrounding her, immersing her in fact – to stand up and speak loudly for her right to education.
It gave me a much greater understanding of why this brave girl, at the tender age of 16, was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. And deserved to be.
And, yes, I would have been another one in the legion of cheering supporters had she won. After I read the book.
In this strange yin and yang world that we live, just around the time that Malala was (rightly, I can say now) nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, her would-be assassin was appointed as the new leader of the Pakistani Taliban.
Malala has vivid descriptions of this so-called “Radio Mullah” in her book. According to a just published article in the Los Angeles Times, this new leader is going to bring about some horrific changes (demonstrating that the people of Swat Valley in Pakistan have not yet seen the worst of it). And I quote –
Mullah Fazlullah is deemed to be more ruthless and ideologically driven than his predecessors, as his recent leadership of a parallel state in Pakistan’s Swat Valley makes clear.
Can the passionate peace activist Malala ever safely return to her homeland, her beloved Swat Valley? I hope that in her lifetime she can! But sadly, looking there at how a bad situation is about to turn worse, it’s hard to see how anytime soon. That is, and live to tell about it.
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All this Noise about Obamacare!
Let the games begin.
The government re-opened and a new war started. Or was it the same, old war served up with new fervour?
All this hue and cry to defeat, undermine, damage, remove Obama! Oops, did I say Obama? I meant Obamacare.
Actually, they’re one and the same thing when it comes to the haters, right?
It’s actually the Affordable Care Act (ACA) but I wonder if and when people will start calling it that. Next generation, perhaps?
I strongly believe Obamacare is going to survive and get stronger and better with time, as kinks and issues are worked out naturally. It has to!
It will survive despite the hateful spewing of right-wingers who want to see it (and Obama) just disappear. I will be so glad to see their utter disappointment when neither happens and people begin to embrace it instead. When, in fact, people see it as just another natural extension of every other service that the country offers its citizens and residents. Like most other countries in the world.
I found an incredibly useful resource that attempts to explain in very simple terms what the law (aah yes, let’s not forget…it’s the law!) is all about and what all the politics that surrounds it is all about as well. It’s a refreshing non-partisan and factual take on Obamacare and I recommend it highly if anyone cares to review some facts. If!
There’s so much mis-information floating around that it’s really worth the time, in my humble opinion.
Here are the table of contents that will give you an idea of why it can be useful (click on either image to read or download this guide).
It’s not enough to have a law, however. It needs to be implemented well.
That’s where the Obama administration has (unnecessarily) so royally screwed up !
It’s a website, not rocket science! Why all the muck-ups? It’s like they’ve gone and added fuel to the fire of the enemy, and that, at the worst possible time!
Still, this too shall pass.
One day (just like in Massachusetts), people who cannot afford healthcare today -in the most powerful nation in the world, no less – will be able to have the security that they too can get health insurance coverage.
One day soon.
For all the complaints and all the noise and all the naysayers, yes, I understand that the law (and its implementation!) is not perfect. We need to start somewhere though, because it’s so badly needed.
This hits close to home and I can give one of many, many, many (,MANY!) such real, human examples of why:
I have a friend and a previous colleague who has a heart condition for which he was being treated. Unfortunately, during the economic crisis that we are still trying to get out off, he was laid off. Worse, a few months later, as he was doing something as mundane as taking a walk, he suffered a severe, debilitating stroke.
Now, he has what’s called a “pre-existing condition”. Before this law, that simply meant that no health insurance will cover him. None.
What does someone like that do for healthcare when he no longer has a job or health insurance? What??!
I can think of so many such cases, but forget them. Just this one individual represents millions like him who live in this country.
And it’s one of the reasons why I get so high strung and emotional about this topic (more than normal, I mean :-)). And yes, I know that it does mean that many others (more fortunate than him) will have to pay more to cover all those who can now get accepted into insurance programs. But is that any reason to not take this step?
It’s way past time for the United States to offer affordable health care. [Check out this great infographic of how US healthcare compares to the sixteen other countries in the world and this one about the absurd healthcare costs in the US.
And finally, after many, many decades and many, many Presidents who tried and failed, we now have it.
And, lest we forget, it is the law of the land (get over it, folks!). About time, I say.
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The Yin and Yang of Life Anywhere 