Culture Crisis - Dr. Starner Jones

[MA_PE]

anyone else get this e-mail? The snopes reference is somewhat misleading because the e-mailed version is slightly different than the original posted on Snopes. Discuss?

Snopes says this is correctly attributed......

CULTURE CRISIS...

Pictured below is a young physician by the name of Dr. Starner Jones. His short two-paragraph letter to the White House accurately puts the blame on a "Culture Crisis" instead of a "Health Care Crisis". It's worth a quick read:

Dear Mr. President:

During my shift in the Emergency Room last night, I had the pleasure of evaluating a patient whose smile revealed an expensive shiny gold tooth, whose body was adorned with a wide assortment of elaborate and costly tattoos, who wore a very expensive brand of tennis shoes and who chatted on a new cellular telephone equipped with a popular R&B ringtone.

While glancing over her patient chart, I happened to notice that her payer status was listed as "Medicaid"! During my examination of her, the patient informed me that she smokes more than one costly pack of cigarettes every day and somehow still has money to buy pretzels and beer.

And, you and our Congress expect me to pay for this woman's health care?

I contend that our nation's "health care crisis" is not the result of a shortage of quality hospitals, doctors or nurses. Rather, it is the result of a "crisis of culture", a culture in which it is perfectly acceptable to spend money on luxuries and vices while refusing to take care of one's self or, heaven forbid, purchase health insurance. It is a culture based in the irresponsible credo that "I can do whatever I want to because someone else will always take care of me".

Once you fix this "culture crisis" that rewards irresponsibility and dependency, you'll be amazed at how quickly our nation's health care difficulties will disappear.

Respectfully,

STARNER JONES, MD

 

[NCcarguy]

It may not be real....but it's probably the truth. Did you ever see the picture of Michelle Obama working at a soup kitchen feeding homeless, where many were taking pictures of her with thier cell phones???? Wonder where verizon sends the bill?

 

[Exengineer]

Aside from the smoking a pack a day, I see nothing wrong. Maybe the woman got all her "goodies" in a good job before the plant was closed up and the jobs shipped off to China. Lots of welfare recipients have cell phones, expensive clothes, late model car, big screen TV etc. because they got all that stuff before going on welfare. You don't just chuck everything out when your last dollar slips away especially if it's all paid for.

 

[Fluvial]

And, you and our Congress expect me to pay for this woman's health care?

Dr. Jones seems to be unaware that we are all paying for the indigent's health care anyway, through inflated prices at the doctor's offices and at the hospitals. I'd at least like to know what I'm paying out up front, rather than the costs being hidden behind $25.00 aspirin as they are now.

 

[benbo]

Aside from the smoking a pack a day, I see nothing wrong. Maybe the woman got all her "goodies" in a good job before the plant was closed up and the jobs shipped off to China. Lots of welfare recipients have cell phones, expensive clothes, late model car, big screen TV etc. because they got all that stuff before going on welfare. You don't just chuck everything out when your last dollar slips away especially if it's all paid for.

Knowing how little people make on public assistance, it is hard for me to believe that they acquire all sorts of luxuries based on welfare.

However, the question is whether a person should be supplied free health care without having to make any sort of sacrifice, while others have to pay for it one way or the other - either directly or as part of their employment compensation.

If I am desitute but have expensive clothes or any other luxury items I acqjuired in an earlier stage in life, I am generally required to sell those things or make some other sacrifice of time or effort if I want to buy some other good or service. Why should health care be any different?

As far as cell phones, I'm not sure I consider that a luxury. I-Phones maybe. Or expensive cars, jewelry, etc.

 

[MA_PE]

I interpret the Dr's point to be that today's culture in the US is that everyone should be enjoying the good life and these amenities become necessities at the expense of saving money for things like health care or even retirement. What was that fable about one animal storing food for the winter while the other one played around? Then winter came and the playful one was cold and hungry.

Flu: good to see you posting again. I hope things are going well for you.

 

[Dexman PE]

Go visit some of these low-income neighborhoods sometime and you will see more of what this Dr is describing. You will see a new Escalade on 22" chrome spinners sitting in front of a run-down beat to **** mulit-plex. The pack of kids playing in front will be either wearing nothing but a diaper or Fubu, Sean Jean, or some other high-end clothing, while momma is sitting on the porch, grossly overweight, some overly ellaborate hairstyle, a ton of "bling", cigarette in hand, 3" fingernails, waaaayyy to much makeup, chatting on her cell phone about the last episode of some daytime TV show. Parked next to the house is a motorcycle, snow-mobile(s), and a trailer to haul them. When her husband comes home from his minimum wage job, he'll be driving a brand new lifted F-250 with custom rims, body kit, exhaust, and some overly retarded custom paint job.

You'll see them sometime later in the store buying groceries with stamps. You'll also see a cart full of cigarettes, liquor, soda, chips, cookies, twinkies, etc, which somehow they manage to have the cash for.

Having a wife that works in a not-for-profit hospital (read: they cannot refuse treatment to anyone who walks in the door because they're federally subsidized), you would be surprised how many people fit the Doctor's description that my wife sees ON AN HOURLY BASIS. Not once or twice a week, or one a day, we're talking a large percentage of her patients are like this. Many of these people return ON A REGULAR BASIS because they know they can get treated for free in the ER instead of paying for healthcare, living a healthy lifestyle, and sacrificing something. Why should they sacrifice their Escalade and 22" chrome rims, when they can get medicaid/welfare for free?

My wife and I lived in or near some of these neighborhoods from college through a couple years ago while the family grew and we worked to get into the jobs we have now. We saw this on a daily basis.

I understand a certain percentage of these people fell on hard times with the current economy, but the economy wasn't this way back in 2005, and it was just as bad then. Just sayin.

 

[Dexman PE]

I should also note that both my parents (pharmacist & ER Charge nurse in Kentucky) as well as my mother-in-law (insurance billing clerk at a hospital in NE Colorado) experience the same types of patients as the Dr described on a regular basis where they work/live.

When my wife did her clinical training during nursing school, she worked at several different hospitals/clinics across the Denver metro area. She did notice a correlation between the quantity/type of "bling" and the liklihood of having insurance.

 

[jeb6294]

Two things...

1) My wife has some relatives (aunt, uncle, cousins, etc.) who live in Buttcrack, Georgia. They call my MIL all the time crying about how they may get their electricity shut off because they can't pay the bill and whenever they come into town the MIL foots the bill and then takes them to Wal-Mart and sends them home with a trunk full of stuff. I just saw on Facebook that they are all excited because they just got their hot tub hooked up.

2) When I worked for the county, we were right across the street from WICS. The beginning of the month the parking lot would be full of shiny new SUV's and fancy cars while people collected their "free cheese". There was a big Ford transmission plant in town and all the guys who worked there wouldn't get married, they would just live together so the wife and kids could get food stamps and free healthcare. Of course, the plant closed and now those guys are screwed because they can't find another factory job making $80,000 a year.

 

[DVINNY]

Whether this doctor's story is real or not doesn't matter.

If anyone doesn't recognize that is a very good description of what is happening in this country, then they are not aware of their surroundings. Any of us with connections/relatives in the health care industry all hear about what goes on.

When is our ''silent majority" going to stand back up? That's my question.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

You see the same thing in the schools. Kids on free breakfast/lunch with brand name clothes and expensive hair treatments and name brand clothing. I saw it in the HS, but the same was seen at my wife's elementary school.

I say it is a culture of misplaced priorities.

 

[MA_PE]

You see the same thing in the schools. Kids on free breakfast/lunch with brand name clothes and expensive hair treatments and name brand clothing. I saw it in the HS, but the same was seen at my wife's elementary school.
I say it is a culture of misplaced priorities.

"misplaced priorties", "fiscal irresponsibility", "sponge" "leech"......"a rose by any other name is still a rose"

 

[Capt Worley PE]

Johnson's 'Great Society' couldn't have more effectively decimated the work ethics of the poor if they tried.

 

[snickerd3]

I recently started volunteering at our local food pantry, they provide food for 50 families twice a month. The last time I was there they passed out the numbers about 10 minutes before we opened and they had to turn away at least 5 families. I saw 3 distinct groups of people. The people who deseparately needed the help, those who recently hit hard times and needed a little boost to get through, and those who fell into the "culture crisis" category. This last category however was only 1 or 2.