News Roundup for 10/12/09

Dangerously obese

-Headline of the day-
"Insurer refuses to cover baby, says he's 'too fat.'"

The Denver Post is reporting that Alex Lange, "a chubby, dimpled, healthy and happy 4-month-old," is a big fat heart attack waiting to happen. His parents insurer, Rocky Mountain Health Plans, refuses to cover Alex because -- at 17 pounds and about 25 inches in length -- he's in the "99th percentile for infant weight." RMHP won't cover any infants above the 95th percentile.

"I could understand if we could control what he's eating," says dad Bernie Lange. "But he's 4 months old. He's breast-feeding. We can't put him on the Atkins diet or on a treadmill. There is just something absurd about denying an infant." Tell it to your morbidly obese baby, buddy.

Of course, the problem is that the insurer is using a "body mass index" to determine the infant's health, rather than something crazy like a physical examination. A BMI uses weight and height to determine the relative health of an individual and, as accurate measures of health go, it isn't one. For example, basketball star Shaquille O'Neal (no offense, Shaq. I just picked you at random) is 7 feet, 1 and 1/2 inches tall and weighs 325 pounds. Run that through a BMI calculator and you find out he has a BMI of 30.9 -- he's not just overweight, he's obese.

Oddly, he looks pretty healthy to me. But what do I know? I'm not an insurance company bureaucrat coming between Bernie's baby and his doctor. (Raw Story)


-What the %&* are you #!% looking at?-
Politico reports that "an unusual amount of profanity has emanated" from Barack Obama's White House. For example, the president himself called Kanye West a "jackass," Vice President Biden told a senator to "Give me a fucking break!" and economic adviser Christina Romer said that Americans were still waiting for the "Holy shit moment" on the economy.

Of course, this is the worst thing ever. That is, until you get to the second paragraph, where we're told "Team Obama is no crasser than administrations past. It's just that they are being quoted more accurately." Nixon, Johnson, various Bushies were just as bad, which kind of makes you wonder why the Obama administration qualifies for "an unusual amount." I mean, wouldn't that make it the usual amount?

Anyway, I'd cut them slack even if they were more foulmouthed than other administrations. Obama inherited two military quagmires, various diplomatic debacles, an economy in freefall, a country divided by eight years of wedge issue politics, and a media that thinks stuff like this is news. I'd be surprised if the first words out of his mouth every, single morning weren't "Son of a bitch!"

Anyone who thinks otherwise can go fuck themselves. (Politico)


-Bonus HotD-
"Tea partiers turn on GOP leadership."

Remember that scene in Frankenstein where the monster turns on Doctor Frankenstein?

Yeah, it's like that. The only real difference here is that Republicans gave their monster a criminally insane brain intentionally. (Political Carnival)