Don't Mess With Texas

Two weeks ago, the Texas Legislature began its session in Austin, the state capitol. The state is in big trouble.

Thanks to a series of foolish tax cuts set in place a couple of years ago, as well as the generally poor national economy, the state now faces a $27 billion deficit.

As the session opened, instead of focusing on this pending disaster a dozen legislators spent an enormous amount of time and energy in filing over 60 bills seeking to punish immigrants. Apart from insisting that local police do the federal government’s job of enforcing immigration law (without offering a penny in return for the costs that this would incur), the laws propose that teachers and principals investigate school children’s immigration status, and that the state tax any money being sent, for example, to a man’s hungry wife and children in Mexico.

The sheer number of the laws that were filed, along with the extraordinary nastiness of the language that followed their introduction, is alarming. Texas politics will always have a few ducks in the crowd, but the quacking has reached a deafening pitch.

The normal reaction to politicians and government waving big sticks is to duck and cover. We have learned, rather well, to be helpless in the face of undeclared wars and of macro-economic decisions.

This is particularly true for the “working poor” (as if a poor person living in Texas has any other option than to be working).

Last Saturday, however, more than a 100 folks braved a chilly, rainy morning to gather in a local Chamber of Commerce meeting room. They came to stand up and be counted in a rousing protest against the anti-immigrant legislation being filed.

There were the usual players there: the good guardians of the commonweal that are the churches and the community organizations. But on this morning there were also some less-typical voices.

“The Alamo Dollar Store denounces these laws!”

“El Gato Bakery formally protests the introduction of such legislation.”

“Papo’s Wrecker Service from Alton is against these laws.”

More than eighty small businesses joined in the protest against a series of laws that would cast suspicion over anyone who “seemed” to be of “foreign extraction.” They offered resolutions which were signed and delivered to our state legislators who came to meet with us, their constituents.

This was a week to the day that, in a similar gathering in Tucson, several people were shot while meeting with their government representative.Yet I found no fear in this room. What I did discover was outrage at the idea that someone would dare to mess with Texas.

Our Texas.

As I was leaving the meeting, I saw an older fellow that I knew from other protests. “How about them Cowboys?” I said to him, teasing him about the disaster of that football team.

“No te preocupes,” he said to me in Spanish, “¡Verémos el año que entra! Es el equipo nuestro--no se puede fallar!"

"That's our team," he had said, weirdly joining at least one part of his life to that of the East Texas legislator and long-time Cowboy fan who wants other Texans to fear this fellow.

The Spanish-speaking Cowboy fan said good bye to me, and walked out into the misty rain. He was smiling, his step confident. He had refused to follow the orders to "duck and cover."

It was a good day.

This post was written by Michael Seifert, a network weaver with Equal Voice in the Rio Grande Valley.

59% Hike? Thank You, Blue Shield Insurance

Insurer says the increases result from fast-rising healthcare costs and other expenses resulting from new healthcare laws. The move comes less than a year after Anthem Blue Cross tried and failed to raise rates as much as 39%.

Another big California health insurer has stunned individual policyholders with huge rate increases — this time it's Blue Shield of California seeking cumulative hikes of as much as 59% for tens of thousands of customers March 1.

Blue Shield's action comes less than a year after Anthem Blue Cross tried and failed to raise rates as much as 39% for about 700,000 California customers.

San Francisco-based Blue Shield said the increases were the result of fast-rising healthcare costs and other expenses resulting from new healthcare laws.

"We raise rates only when absolutely necessary to pay the accelerating cost of medical care for our members," the nonprofit insurer told customers last month.

In all, Blue Shield said, 193,000 policyholders would see increases averaging 30% to 35%, the result of three separate rate hikes since October.

Nearly 1 in 4 of the affected customers will see cumulative increases of more than 50% over five months.

While most policyholders received separate notices for the successive rate hikes, others were given the news all at once because they had contracts guaranteeing their rate for a year, Blue Shield spokesman Tom Epstein said.

Michael Fraser, a Blue Shield policyholder from San Diego, learned recently that his monthly bill would climb 59%, to $431 from $271.

"When I tell people, their jaws drop and their eyes bug out," said Fraser, 53, a freelance advertising writer. "The amount is stunning."

Like many people who hold individual policies, Fraser is self-employed. Others who carry such insurance include people who aren't covered by employer plans or who have been laid off.

The Blue Shield increases triggered complaints to new Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones, and they could prove to be an early test of how the former Democratic state assemblyman deals with rate hikes and the insurance industry.

Anthem's attempt to raise rates by up to 39% led to national outrage and helped President Obama marshal support for his healthcare overhaul. The insurer was ultimately forced to back down, accepting maximum rate hikes of 20%.

Jones said the Blue Shield move underscored the need for the Legislature to give the insurance commissioner legal authority to regulate insurance rates the same way he does automobile coverage.

At present, the commissioner can block increases only if insurers spend less than 70% of premium income on claims. Jones' office said Blue Shield's March 1 increase was under review.

Photo: Dave Jones, CA Insurance Commissioner, says the Blue Shield move underscored the need for the Legislature to give the insurance commissioner legal authority to regulate insurance rates the same way he does automobile coverage.

Article By Duke Helfand

Copyright LA Times 2011

On Seeing

Gaspar is a tall, handsome young man who grew up amongst a large family in a crowded rental home in a tough neighborhood near Brownsville.

In middle school, he decided that he really, really wanted to play the clarinet, and so he joined the band class.

On the first day of class, the teacher apologized, telling him that there weren’t enough instruments to go around and that he, being amongst the youngest students, would have to come back next year.

The gleam in Gaspar’s eye, as well as his disappointment, allowed the teacher a creative moment. He told Gaspar, “Look, I don’t have an instrument you can play, but you can mark out time for us by tapping on your desk.”

Gaspar eventually got to borrow a clarinet from the school.

He went on to receive a full scholarship to the university, and, later, won the offer of a scholarship to the Julliard School of Music.

Gaspar turned down the Julliard offer, opting instead to teach high school band.

“Just returning a favor,” was his take on a courageously unselfish career move.

Tradition considers Gaspar (“Caspar”, in English) to be the name of one of the three wise men who, searching the skies for a sign of Divine Intention, came upon the infant Jesus. Gaspar, the wise man, saw something in this child born into a crowded stable. In an unselfish gesture, Gaspar gave the newborn a gift of gold.

Tradition does not tell us what the poor family did with this gold. Perhaps they paid for a couple of nights in a local hotel. Perhaps they put the money away against troubled times.

I quietly hope that they invested in clarinets.

This post was written by Michael Seifert from his blog, Musings From Alongside the Border.