He's smallifying National Monuments, allowing, he says for the biggering of Utah's economy, ignoring the fact that tourism is the state's largest industry, anchored by The Mighty Five national parks and monuments.
He's going after Medicare, lowering payouts to physicians and increasing co-pays. If you're too young for this to remind you of the difficulty you'll have finding a gerontologist, remember that now there's no incentive to buy insurance if you would rather let those of us who do protect ourselves shoulder your fair share of the burden.
A fetus now has "personhood." There's no CHIP funding to help finance health insurance for those cells when they are here in the world with the rest of us, there may not be free pre-natal vitamins available as there were under the ACA nor lactation support, but that fetus may well receive some tax benefits.
And that's only what I can write off the top of my head.
I can't watch Rachel Maddow any more; she's suffering and so am I. Brian Williams's dry humor is, suddenly, off-putting. Saturday Night Live's cold opening was scarier than it was funny. There's too much sturm und drang for me right now.
I want to surround myself with elves and Hanukah lights and shiny wrapping paper. I want to revel in the smell of brownies, fresh out of the oven, imagining the recipients, those I love-and-who-send-me-thank-you-notes-and-are-therefore-on-the-Brownie List. I have cards that make me smile, holiday specific and generic, peace-filled and colorful. I have matching pens, too.
There are baby lizards jumping off the lantana. Black birds with white primary wings are zipping around, but I can't identify them, though I just spent a few lovely minutes with my bird identification books (Watchable Birds of the Southwest by Mary Taylor Gray, Peterson's Western Birds Field Guide, and the Golden Guide to Bird Classification).
I'm going to try to avoid the news for a bit. I'm halfway through Karin Slaughter's latest (The Good Daughter; it's as good as all her others) and there are a few others awaiting me on the shelf. I have last minute errands (baking powder, snack bags, Penzey's spices for vanilla before the price goes up) and Pilates and a massage.
If that doesn't distract me, I can't imagine what will.
Remember all of that was in the bill but not yet a dun deal. It goes to reconciliation. I imagine the personhood, for purposes of setting aside money for college, will survive, ridiculous as that is, probably the Arctic Reserve also as it's another GOP want with no thought to the cost. While they did cut back the size of Bears Ears, it's left and the state can figure out what to do as far as whether tourism will trump something else. I've heard there are no oil or gas reserves right near us but with news as wrong as it often is, who knows what is true.
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