Hand in hand via ChrisK4U. Poignant, lovely shot.

Imagine living in a society which valued its elders, instead of just using them as political pawns by scaring them half to death and then shoving them to the side. 

Imagine compassion and care, and a desire to make certain that the last years were filled with comfort.

Imagine health care decisions made based on actual health care needs instead of just what was most profitable:

Geriatric specialists hope the program and others like it help generate interest in the profession, one of the most underrepresented fields in medicine. Medical schools and residencies require little to no geriatric training, and many students are reluctant to get into the field because it is among the lowest paid in medicine.

In 2005, there was one geriatrician for every 5,000 people over 65, according to the American Geriatrics Society; by 2030 that ratio is expected to increase to one for every 8,000 patients. Geriatricians must participate in a two-year fellowship program after medical school to become certified. In 2007, only 253 of 400 fellowship slots were filled, and only 91 of the physicians graduated from medical school in the United States.

“It’s kind of a crisis,” said Dr. Cheryl Phillips, president of the society. “I don’t think many seniors recognize this.”

Our priorities in this country are utterly and completely bass-ackwards.

Kudos to the folks who started this geriatric medicine fellowship, and to all the medical students and caregivers who have taken advantage of it. 

Seems a fitting tribute to the resilience and strength of the human spirit that we saw from so many in NOLA to post some pictures of how beautiful areas are, and how far things have come for so many who have been working to rebuild in the aftermath of Katrina.

But don’t let these pictures fool you, there is still a lot of work to be done.

As you’ll see in the video, there is a desperate need for health care and mental health services still in New Orleans. 

I was fortunate to meet Dr. Janet Johnson, who helped found Project Rising Sun, at reader Lindy’s house while we were there.  It’s an amazing community effort to help folks rebuild their inner lives while working to rebuild their own communities as well. One of their efforts has been to work on community garden projects along with the drumming circles featured in the CNN report above, and many, many other efforts as well.

This is just the sort of stepping up within our own communities that makes such a huge difference, one person at a time. New Orleans is fortunate to have them.

We didn’t get out to the Lower 9th Ward or any of the parishes that are still so devastated from the storm while we were there.  It was a desperately needed vacation and we could only do so much in a single trip. 

But, as you’ll see, New Orleans certainly has the power to pull us back for another trip.  We loved it, and I hope you enjoy this stroll in pictures through some beautiful spots all over town.  And, if you are considering a trip at some point, New Orleans is a great place to spend some vacation moolah — I’m just sayin’… (more…)

Hurricane Katrina marked a real low point in human compassion and decency in this country on so many levels.

But it also brought out some of the best in so many people from all over the country — and the world.

Neighbors helping each other cope with their horrible losses.  Rescue workers sweeping in from all over to pull folks off their rooftops and back to safer ground. Donations pouring in of clothes and food so quickly that aide organizations could not sort and ship it fast enough.

We saw that same common purpose of spirit and hope after the attacks on 9/11, when we lifted each other up during such a time of tragedy and loss.

But each time?  Whatever feeling of community and connection we briefly held began to ebb as we all went back to our own daily grinds and personal frets.

We lose sight of the "we" and grab hold of the "me" far too quickly these days, in my opinion, and it is to our detriment that we do so.

For it is our connections — the things that bond us to one another — that make us far more strong than we could ever be standing alone.

Digby’s faith in individual humanity got renewed recently by a simple act of decency.

Wouldn’t it be something if we could all find a way to renew each other? What if we could reach past all the trumped up divisions that line the pockets of those who trump them up, but really do nothing for the rest of us, and find some common ground?

I don’t know what the answer is to all of our problems, but I do know this: they won’t be resolved by hate.

And the folks all along the Gulf Coast who lost so much in Katrina’s disastrous wake? Imagine what we could have accomplished if the whole of the nation had come together to help out our fellow citizens in an act of true compassion and decency? We can never know what could have been, but we can certainly do better in all of the disasters to come.

We have a responsibility to each other — e pluribus unum…out of many one. Imagine what we could do if we all started living that slogan instead of just carrying it around on the money in our pockets.

On this anniversary of Katrina, let’s talk about our connections. And reach out to folks we know who need a hand, forge those connections anew. Just as we should have done from the moment the waters and wind began to lap at our nation’s shores.

We have an obligation to lift each other up when one of us stumbles, and we can’t just wash it away. Pull up a chair…

Having only recently watched “Walk the Line,” that somehow makes this all the more amusing.

Johnny Cash.

Miss Piggy.

Singing Jackson.

Classic stuff. Here’s a great older video of Cash with June Carter Cash (YouTube) at San Quentin. Seriously classic stuff.

Compare to the version with Muppets? Hilarious.

Enjoy.

The DOJ appointment of a special prosecutor has the Beltway press all aflutter. Why? Because it’s that thing they do:The art of the hissy fit lies in your ability to bring the entire media over to the fainting couch over even the most absurd allegations of impropriety and insensitivity.

Yesterday was Women’s Equality Day — and the 89th anniversary of women winning the right to vote with the passage of the 19th amendment. I spent an hour yesterday on a call organized by the White House regarding health care and inequality of coverage and services for women.

Ted Kennedy, the lion of the Senate, has passed. His legacy of political achievement is long: his constant and continuing fight (YouTube) for the child health insurance program (CHIP), support and legal equality for Americans with disabilities, reforms of mental health programs, national community service, the voting rights act, substantial work for years on civil rights and civil liberties concerns.

Today, it’s another inane installment of the continuing saga of the GOP’s longest-running program wherein the buck stops anywhere but here. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the overwrought and not-so-dulcet tones of Kit Bond and friends, in Accountability For Thee, But Not For Me…