News from Around the Country...

For the last few days I've been seeing random articles on the Internet and they cause you to think. Anything that inspires critical thinking I feel deserves a post.

Contest Offers Engaged Couples Who Abstain a $10,000 Wedding

Thursday, October 23, 2008

An abstinence education program in Georgia is offering couples who abstain from sex before marriage a chance to win a $10,000 wedding.
The nonprofit Marriage Appreciation Training Uplifting Relationship Education is offering the Marriage of a Lifetime contest to couples who live in Rockdale, DeKalb and Newton counties, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. But so far, there have been no entries, despite the looming Oct. 31 deadline.

“There is a romantic end of it, but we are also looking for a couple that is committed and who will work through struggles,” Phillippia Faust, the director of the abstinence education program, told the paper. “And we are looking for a couple that is choosing a lifestyle that is not compromising, and premarital sex is a compromiser.”

In addition to promising not to have sex before marriage, couples must agree to allow the public to attend their wedding as well as undergo premarital counseling, the paper said. FoxNews Yes I read foxnews.


What sort of test do you think exists to test the virginity of a man or a woman? If they had sex how would you really know? I know for a women you can check the hymen but even that test has flaws. What if you had sex but decided at a later date to choose the path of abstinence. Should you be penalized for past indiscretions?

The flip side of this are the people who are not signing up for this. I guess since there have been times in my life where I have gone years without sex holding out for a little while seems sweet. How special is your wedding night going to be when you have not been with the person you love in 6 months. I think people take that feeling of love and sex for granted. You have the rest of your life to do it.

Moving on...

Hospital bills woman who never saw a doctor
Nurse checked her vitals during 19-hour wait for treatment of broken leg

DALLAS - A woman says she waited 19 hours at Parkland Memorial Hospital’s emergency department for treatment of a broken leg and never did get to see a doctor — but still got a bill for $162.

Amber Joy Milbrodt, who said she broke a bone in her leg while playing volleyball, received the bill two weeks after her Sept. 24 visit.

Parkland officials say the bill was appropriate because a nurse spent time checking her vital signs to assess her level of need.

But that’s not how Milbrodt sees it. “It should have been more like them paying me for having to sit in the emergency room for 19 hours,” she told The Dallas Morning News.

The assessment by the nurse, which lasted a few minutes, established her place in line that night. By that time, Milbrodt said, she had already been waiting about 3½ hours.

She still had not been called more than 15 hours later, so she gave up and went home. She had an X-ray taken at a chiropractic school where she is a student, and that had already confirmed that she had a fracture.

“She’s not paying for waiting,” says Rick Rhine, the hospital’s vice president in charge of billing. “She’s paying for the assessment she received.”

Milbrodt, 29, who has no insurance, said she does not plan to pay. After leaving the ER, she rested at home for a few days and then put her leg in a brace, which she still wears. It seems to be healing, she said.

Now the initial question is, "who is to blame for this"? Can you blame the hospital? I say no and I will tell you why. Hospitals are bombarded daily with patients who come because they have no health care and need routine care. The emergency room is supposed to be for emergencies only. How are ER doctors supposed to address emergency when Bobby's mom brings him there for an earache.

So if we can't blame the hospital who should we blame the patient? I say no as well. At 29 years old (and I can attest to this) it is very easy to be a hard working adult with no health insurance because at one time in my life that was me. And I looked for health insurance. Medicaid, Family Health Plus, Healthy NY, Insurance through the temp agency I worked for and there was a problem with them all. Didn't qualify for Medicaid or Family Health Plus. I qualified for Healthy NY but the coverage was so basic it was more cost effective to just be sick or hope I didn't get sick. The same thing went for the health Insurance the temp agency was offering.

Who do I blame? I blame the government and the people who feel health care for all is a socialist principle. Universal health care will help everything. In addition to cutting back unnecessary visits to the ER, we will have less delinquent hospital bills. Maybe if those medical bills didn't exist people would have more money for bills or to be consumers.

The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist <-- Unknown

The greatest accomplishment of the GOP is convincing poor people should stay poor because it's American and patriotic <---Me

The greatest accomplishment of the GOP is convincing poor people that someday they too will be rich. <--- Me