common-sense

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*update*
Spending in Iraq and Afghanistan stands at $6.4 trillion through fiscal year 2020, according to a new study from the Cost of War project at Brown University.

The health care system in Canada is funded by a mix of public (70%) and private (30%) funding. The U.S. spends more per capita than any other nation in the world, but is the only wealthy industrialized country in the world that lacks some form of universal health care. In 2006, 70% of health care spending in Canada was financed by government, versus 46% in the United States. U.S. government expenditure on health care was just under 83% of total Canadian spending (public and private).

All Canadian citizens are covered with a provincial Medical Services Plan, which receives funds from the federal government via tax transfers. The system is therefore a single-payer one, whereby everyone contributes to the care of all citizens. Individuals choose their own physicians, who decide what care is required - not the government, regardless of what you might hear on radio and TV talk shows - and they do not have to ante up large sums for emergency and intensive care or even for infant delivery. The system works very well.

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Photos courtesy of costofwar.com and docotube.com  read more »

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The State Parks use less than 1/10th of 1% of the budget, yet return $2.35 for every dollar spent in revenues from surrounding communities whose economies are boosted by (or based on) proximity to the parks.

Proposed state parks closure list is not for the faint of heart

"This morning, I glimpsed the list of California state parks earmarked for closure if Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger successfully cuts funding, and I became sickened and angry. There are 220 parks, reserves and beaches on the list. That would leave a mere 59 parks for our continued enjoyment." (Comment posted by Maggie Wolfe Riley: "The State Parks use less than 1/10th of 1% of the budget, yet return $2.35 for every dollar spent in revenues from surrounding communities whose economies are boosted by (or based on) proximity to the parks.")

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The military tracks about 18,000 pieces of orbital debris. On Tuesday, the census of space-garbage suddenly jumped by 600, the initial estimate of the number of fragments from a stunning collision of two satellites high above Siberia.

Space is now polluted with the flotsam of a satellite-dependent civilization. The debris is increasingly a hazard for astronauts and has put crafts such as the Hubble Space Telescope and communications satellites at risk of being struck by an object moving at high speed.

The military's radar can spot objects about four inches in diameter - roughly the size of a baseball - or larger. This collision, however, may have produced many thousands of small, undetectable pieces of debris that would still carry enough kinetic punch at orbital velocities to damage or destroy a spacecraft.  read more »