Brookfield Basics

When was the last time you visited the gravesite of a Revolutionary War Veteran?  Or walked amongst the resting place of several Civil War Veterans?

On Memorial Day my family and I did this.

We did not travel to Massachusetts or New York; we drove about four miles from our home to Oak Hill Cemetery, right here in Brookfield.

Located on Brookfield Road and immediately adjacent to Brookfield Academy, this beautiful piece of land and history lies in the heart of our own community.  Buried there are the remains of Nathan Hatch, a man who served America in the Revolutionary War.

Do you want a giant does of perspective in just a few minutes?  Then take a half-hour this fall to walk under the trees of Oak Hill, and to gaze at the headstones bearing 18th Century dates and names.  Go back over two hundred years to the lives these people led and the times in which they lived. 

Let’s respect this Brookfield treasure in the best way we can.

By visiting it.

 

By now we are all sickeningly familiar with the story of the Brookfield East football field. 

How proud the vandals must be, accomplishers of a tremendous feat that required the cloak of darkness to achieve.

How gleeful they must be as they boastfully recount their exploits.

How devastating the impact on the Spartan community. 

To paraphrase Winston Churchill – never have so few ruined so much for so many. One or a few punks really showed us what they are made of, didn’t they?  I say “punks” fully acknowledging that we don’t know who did this, or what their age is.  But be they students or adults, be they younger or older, they are most certainly punks.

Let’s call this action what it so clearly is: cowardly, malicious, and criminal. Let’s let the retribution fit the crime if we are fortunate enough to find out who did it.

It’s Packer time, and I can’t let this particular summer end without some historical comment.  This summer notes the forty-year anniversary of 1967, a period that is euphemistically known as the “Summer of Love”.   I believe the 60’s are very relevant today, because the explosion of social and public policy which then occurred serves as a crucial backdrop to the current content of social discourse and governance at the national, state, and local levels.

 A while back I wrote and delivered an extensive talk on the subject of Western Civilization and American culture, part of which contained an in depth look at the 60’s.  Names such as “The Summer of Love” and “The Age of Aquarius” are vapid and sadly misplaced, for they ascribe all kinds of noble and altruistic motivations to the 60’s.  To the contrary, I believe it was an era that witnessed an unprecedented elevation of “the self”.    

Now if I am to treat this subject seriously I must begin with some honest disclosure.  I was nine years old in 1967, and had no intellectual awareness of the tectonic shifts that were occurring in the geology of American politics and culture.  But I came of age in that era’s immediate aftermath, and for many years my life and my behavior reflected that reality.

 With a few notable exceptions (civil rights, music, and some others) the results of the 60’s have been an unmitigated disaster for our society and our culture.  The dissolution of the family, the rejection of and disregard for authority, the Warren Court’s emasculation of the criminal justice system, the craven collapse and metamorphosis of America’s once proud University system, and the trickle-down effect it has had on all public education, the unrelenting assault on all things ecclesiastic, the sexual revolution and its shattering impact upon the emotional well-being of our young people, Timothy Leary’s tacit vindication of drug use as something innately liberating and noble, the open flirtation with and legitimization of violence so brilliantly captured in Tom Wolfe’s Radical Chic, the list could go on.

 It was the 60’s where the erosion of so many pillars of American culture began.  It was the 60’s where the pursuit of one’s personal pleasure replaced such antiquated notions of self-control and social responsibility as being the highest attainable goal.  It was the 60’s where the time-honored practices of our collective cultural responsibilities, the very fabrics that weave a society together, began to tear.

We can’t change what occurred.

But can’t we at least start calling the summer of ’67 what it really was?

The summer of “SELF love”.

Put this one in your “You can’t make this stuff up” file.

Just over one month ago, the esteemed American Medical Association decided by the narrowest of margins, that it should NOT classify the excessive playing of video games as a psychiatric addiction.  This decision was taken after much debate of an AMA generated report, which strongly argued that young people who spend inordinate amounts of time playing video games actually suffer from a “psychiatric addiction”.  The AMA called for “more research” into this question. 

To this level we have arrived – that a matter of laziness and self-discipline is, at the highest levels of medical science, seriously considered to be a “psychiatric addiction”.

An area youth was quoted as being critical of the Association’s decision, saying he was “certain” that this behavior was an addiction, and adding, “my grades were horrible; I failed the entire first semester.  It’s like they’re your life”.

I have no doubt that this teen’s grades were horrible, and that his video game habit “became like his life”.  But to hide behind the cloak of a supposed psychiatric addiction, rather than face up to his behavioral problem, is ridiculous to the point of being surreal.

So why should you care if someone else’s kid plays video games for ten plus hours a day, as this youth claims to have done?

Well normally you might not.  But under the umbrella of universal health care, a decision by the AMA to classify such tripe as an addiction could soon have us all paying for the “treatment” of such addictions.

And why not?

It certainly couldn’t be an issue of individual responsibility.  And it certainly couldn’t be his parents’ fault.

The lad just has an addiction.

Last week the UAW began negotiations on a new contract with the “shrinking three” - Ford, GM and the Chrysler Group.

The question is not “WILL these companies go bankrupt” it is “WHEN”. They cannot survive the insupportable “cradle to grave” package of benefits for their employees and retirees. We all have skin in this game, because our public sector unions continue to insist on maintaining similar packages, with similar financial ramifications for their employers.

At the core of these negotiations lie health care and pension costs, and the Detroit-based bargaining will be a precursor for much of the coming Presidential campaign and attendant policy discussions.

One major problem is that employees covered by such insulated and monolithic plans (be they public or private sector) are not CONSUMERS of health care. The term “consumer” implies that “shopping” occurs, shopping in which options are presented, different features evaluated, and choices made. The term “consumer” implies that there are differences between users that are reflected in the pricing structure. The term “consumer” implies that, when facing the need for expensive surgical procedures, the person undergoing the surgery is motivated to make COST one of the factors in their decision.

At the company I work for, employees who face such expensive operations are presented with a menu of providers. One recent example is that of a knee or hip replacement. In the greater Milwaukee area there are dozens of hospitals that perform these same procedures – all with great success. They all execute the same operation, use the same materials, and generate the same high levels of patient satisfaction. But the costs on this menu vary by as much as $40,000. What other industry do you know of, where the provider of a given service that is not measurably different from those of its competitors, could survive such price variances?

Since our company is self-insured, it is enormously motivated to see employees choose the less expensive options. So employees who do some shopping and choose one of the lower cost providers, personally receive a portion of the company’s savings. Imagine that – people SHOPPING for health care.

My employer offers a variety of coverage to meet a variety of needs - and guess what? The prices of those plans vary, as does the employee’s share of the costs. Thus, the employees at our company are CONSUMERS of health care, and their choices are made accordingly. What’s the result? Our total health care costs have been flat for nearly five years.

Our choices in health care and public governance are to continue the use of such insulated, inflexible plans that will lead to the disaster of universal, government sponsored health care, or to implement market driven reforms that will finally position users of health care to become informed and motivated consumers.

Only then will we slay the dragon of health care costs, and prevent financial upheaval in the public sector.