Under Obamacare My Cancer Would Not Have Been Even Diagnosed in Time

From Tranquilla 2 on The Back of Eddy Creek on Lake Barkley ---

Rush Limbaugh is a "Big Fat Idiot," according to my progressive friends, so let's also throw in Glenn Beck, the best-selling populist author of "Common Sense" and Mark Levin, the best-selling author of "Liberty or Tyranny" as well. That should really titillate the "snipers" and "bomb-throwers."

However, if we are going to get into calling names let's be as childish on the "conservative" side as well and add Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and let's not forget Al Franken and Michael Moore, Chuck Schummer and a few others - maybe they can be called "Big Fat Air Heads." or something equally childish.

What's my point?

When people can no longer debate with reason, logic and facts and on principles they have to resort to name calling.

Sean Hannity becomes Sean Vanity; Ed Schultz becomes Ed "Big Mouth" Schlitz.

You get the idea.

The problem is name calling doesn't get us any where in the world of ideas nor does it move us toward solutions.

Frankly my friends this current administration is wrought with lots of ideas; they have never met a crisis they couldn't take advantage of and in my opinion they are using "Chicago-style" rough house politics on us all to force programs on many of us who simply don't want their "help."

I personally prefer to debate these issues on the merits and the ideals of liberty and freedom and not on silly name calling. But then, of course, even the administration has even gone back to the old playbook of "The Vast Right-wing Conspiracy" theory as to why they can't sell these ideas to the general public. They have become desperate.

However, let us not let Congress - those political hacks - that have become more arrogant and self-serving than we can measure off lightly in this debate. The problems in our country are on both sides of the political aisle as well as in the administration.

It is self-serving and to the Congress's advantage to keep us fighting with one another over "parties" so they can reach out into our pockets and solicit their campaign funds.

It is time for a new political party and agenda. It is time for part-time legislators at the state and federal level. It is time for the farmers to come from the fields, the factory worker from the production lines, the office managers from their desks to give to public service once again.

It is simply time we threw them all out and started all over. It is time we resorted to some "common sense" - we simply can not continue down this road to perdition.

Our debt is beyond the pale, each of us now owe the government more than $44,000 and the interest is climbing daily.

Progressives are asking that we sacrifice systems that work albeit they need improvement for systems run by the government such as Medicare and the Medicaid. If there is a single person reading this that doesn't understand both of those "government" programs are broke, wrought with fraud and mis-management and shamefully run then they have not lived the past 50-years watching government screw it up. They are uneducated and choose to be.

The money being borrowed to run these programs today is on the backs of our children and grandchildren.

The health care "advocates" on both sides want government to run health care - they want to give up their "rights and freedoms of being responsible for themselves" -- they want government to make decisions on the most personal of the decisions that we as free men and women now make.

I simply won't stand for it.

Had I been in an Obama health care system I would not have gotten my cancer diagnosis in time to have saved my bladder and quite possibly my life. That is a fact. I went from the diagnosis to surgery in 4-days friends an unheard of situation under any government program - I know I used to be a fed.

Listen carefully -- leave me and my health care and my family alone. I prefer to work harder and longer if necessary to buy my own insurance.

I choose to be a free man and make my own decisions thank you very much.

No Mr. President you are not a JFK and certainly not an Abraham Lincoln that you supporters are so fond of making you out to to be like.

My philosophy is appropriately stated below Mr. President.

Or, if I can make it simpler for you - I choose "Liberty or Death - Don't Tread on Me!" - Dr. D.

For your reading pleasure ---

These words are often attributed to Abraham Lincoln, but according to the book They Never Said it: A Book of Fake Quotes, Misquotes, & Misleading Attributions, they are not from Lincoln.

The quotes were published in 1942 by William J. H. Boetcker, a Presbyterian minister. He released a pamphlet titled Lincoln On Limitations, which did include a Lincoln quote, but also added 10 statements written by Boetcker himself.

They were:

1. You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
2. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong
3. You cannot help the poor man by destroying the rich.
4. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
5. You cannot build character and courage by taking away man's initiative and independence.
6. You cannot help small men by tearing down big men.
7. You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
8. You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income.
9. You cannot establish security on borrowed money.
10 You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they will not do for themselves.

"Why Do I Shave My Head?"

1976

From Tranquilla II on the Back of Eddy Creek on Lake Barkley --- Someone usually asks me about this time of the year: “Why do you shave your head?” "Are you taking chemo?" "Or, geez you are going bald aren't you?"

Well, the explanation as to why this time of the year I have a bald head is sort of simple and then again not.

A few years ago when I was diagnosed with cancer my dear-sainted Mother was still living. She had suffered through the passing of my Dad who initially had had colon, then lung, and then brain cancer. She had seen him go through the horrible radiation and chemo treatments and he had, of course, lost his hair. My Dad always had a fine mane of hair and it was one of those traits that my Mother did indeed like about him. My Mother even tried to get my hair to groom like my Dad’s when I was little --- I can remember her putting a silk stocking on my hair after she would wash it and comb it to try and make it lay in the manner she wanted it to lay.

My Father’s Mother when she died in her 90s still had natural jet-black hair, a trait that my Dad had inherited and my Mother liked. So, hair you see was important to my Mom and I suspect even more so because she always had a hard time with her hair and fixing it just right.

Well, after seeing my Mother suffer through all the treatments with my Dad and the consequences of those treatments including losing his hair, I told Kay at that time that if I ever had to have such treatments I would never want my Mother to overtly know that. If you have not figured this out we were big on secrets in my family.

So, the first time I shaved my head was really to deceive my Mother in anticipation that I might have to have chemo or radiation treatments. I was fortunate in that I didn’t have to have either. I simply told her that I had some friends going through chemo and radiation and I was shaving my head to empathize with their plight, which also was partly true as well as I did have a friend who needed such encouragement.

However, I have always let my hair grow out somewhat in the winter time even when I went to Tybee this past year. Yet, when summer comes along and we start talking about Relay for Life and I see my fellow survivors some of whom are going through the bald ordeal I figure the least I can do is shave my head and show my empathy for them.

At one time I was very vain about my hair. Hell, I was pretty vain period. Caryle Simon was probably thinking of me when she wrote "You Are So Vain." I was not only vain, I was also conceited, egotistical, terribly young and immature, very stupid about lots of things, and very confused about life and relationships.

And also like many of us I thought I was invincible. I was wrong on all those points.

Well, I have worked on the vanity piece I suppose and I try and work daily on all the other faults --- some of which I still need help on but I take it one day at a time.

The good news is I grew up and learned a lot in the past 30 years of living and seeing life, people suffering and all the heartaches that go with it.

Shaving my head makes me stop and think about a lot of those past days, the many mistakes and all the regrets and shaving my head has become a Zen sort of thing in that it makes me slow down and take the time to do it right --- one of the few things in my life that maybe I do get right.

And so, now you know. That is the rest of the story of the old bald head.

Love, peace and grace and goodnight Mrs. Calabash wherever you are ...

Dr. Darryl

"I'm Cured" - Kind of Sorta ....

From Tranquilla II on the Back of Eddy Creek - Lake Barkley -- Have you ever met a fellow and just knew from the outset you would be good friends? Such was the case when I met my buddy Matt Figert. It has been a while since I had a hunting, running, drinking and shooting buddy and certainly a while since I had a friend with as weird a sense of humor as I have.

My old pal Doug, as many of you will recall, got killed in a car accident a few years ago. One of the toughest eulogies I have ever delivered was at his services attended by law enforcement officers from across Tennessee and a most humbling experience to hear Amazing Grace played on the bag pipes followed by the lonely words that "Doug Bailey has gone 10-7." Doug was like a brother to me. He actually got me out of my shell from the loss of my dear old friend Bert Ballard and had me enjoying shooting and hanging out again.

When Doug died I kind of went back into the shell I am known to occupy from time to time in my life. I kept on "chopping wood and hauling water" but with little joy.

Then along came John - er I mean Matt.

A retired CPO and now a resident expert on an offshore oil rig, Matt and his wife Janette became fast friends. Matt liked good food and a variety of books, wine, beer, hard liquor, dogs and guns. He enjoyed deer hunting and breakfast at Miss Peggy's! Who was I to question the Universe? What more could you ask for in a good buddy?

So, when Matt sent me this cartoon it resonated.

This week I had a sonogram of one of those male body parts we don't speak of and having gone to a urologist now for four years I have come to appreciate the humiliation of stirrups and probes that women have long gone through.

The sonogram was fine. The blood tests are fine. The exam went as usual - it sucked. However, I have once again come through another year cancer free.

Am I "cured"? Well that is still to be determined but then I just couldn't resist sharing this cartoon with you as it so aptly sums up my feelings.

Kay and I will be off to work in Florida next week, I will be home for a day and then head to Iowa and Arizona. However, I will stay in touch as best I can.

Enjoy my friends. Simper Fi, De Oppresso Liber, God Bless America and yes Nancy, BHO and Harry those "Tea Parties" are for real and we are serious!

Love peace and grace,

Dr. D