The office move/closure is now complete. Try as I might, I have not had a good attitude about it. In fact, my attitude has more or less been what it was when I first wrote about it, and it hasn’t been received well by anyone who had to help.

Moving took what felt like forever. I had to clean/clear the garage so that we could then bring more stuff into it. While it’s improved over what it was before, it’s still disorganized and I’m not even sure where to start, especially given that I’m going to have to drag out the Christmas decorations soon.

It has seemed as though this entire move has been done at cross-purposes. There has been a minimal level of cooperation, probably mostly because of my bad attitude. Even cleaning the garage hasn’t left a sense of satisfaction, since it’s still as much in disarray as before. It’s just that the boxes are cleaner and more recently sorted.

The wind was howling the day I took this picture, forcing the waves to clash as they moved on diagonals in opposite directions (Surfer’s Point is one of the rare beaches where the waves come in on the diagonal and actually join in opposite directions near the pier). As they crossed and smashed into each other, it seemed to me that an enormous power was being unleashed for very little benefit other than possibly destruction, or disruption.

The analogy wasn’t lost on me.

For more moon fun, watch Mickeleh’s (Newsgang cohort and videoblogger extraordinaire…)latest: The sky is not amused

Attention self-employed folks: Before patting yourself on the back for finding that deal with Mega Life & Health for health coverage, think twice, put the pen down, sign nothing and step back.

Anyone reading this blog for any length of time knows I have no great love for health insurers. I believe they bend backwards as far as possible to avoid paying claims while hammering their policyholders for more and more money. One of the primary reasons I supported Barack Obama for President was his promised pragmatic and transparent approach to health insurance.

With that bias disclosed, I have this to say about Mega: There is a special place in hell for insurance companies that victimize individuals who are forced to pay far too much for far too little, especially self-employed individuals who struggle daily to stay above water, much less tread it.

This all started with a friend’s recent onset of chest pain. It continues, and without going into detail that would maybe violate privacy, it should have been resolved already. After all, if one pays exhorbitant premiums to insure for potential catastrophic health conditions, it stands to reason that chest pain is something that should be viewed as an emergency, right?

Maybe it’s not a heart thing. Maybe it’s one of a zillion other things, but without actually getting to an emergency room and being hooked up to an EKG there’s not much chance of knowing for sure. Heart attacks don’t exactly wait until the appointed time to threaten one’s life, after all.

Only one problem: Under one of the weirdest provisions I’ve ever seen in a health insurance policy, if someone goes to the ER and pays for it themselves (because ER services aren’t covered), there is a risk that treatment for the diagnosed condition won’t be covered.

That’s a problem. So instead of being examined, put on that EKG, monitored and diagnosed, another day goes by before getting to an approved non-emergency provider.

Chances are it’ll all be fine, but would YOU willing to roll the dice on that? I wouldn’t. If chest pain isn’t a potential life-threatening emergency I can’t imagine what would qualify. Death? Coma?

This is not cost management. It’s not case management. It’s flat-out profiteering on the backs of hard-working people who pay premiums with a good-faith expectation that claims will be paid and benefits available when they need them. Insurance is not a charity; it’s a contract between insurer and insured. In Mega’s case, it seems that they view it as one-way: Insured pays; they withhold or deny.

Here are some stories from the first page of Google results for this company:

From The Health Care Blog:

Over at Colorado Health Insurance Insider I found this tale of woe of an electrician earning $40,000 a year with no benefits who joined Mega’s front organization the National Association for the Self-Employed after being sold a bill of goods by a commissioned sales rep. His son had cancer and ran up bills of $500,000 of which Mega paid out $45,000.

From the same post, some interesting background on Mega (a wholly owned subsidiary of Health Markets):

Who owns Health Markets? Like many companies it’s owned by “private equity”. But in this case these are not just any private equity companies. The three owners are a) the biggest and now publicly traded private equity firm, Blackstone Partners, b) the most prestigious and most profitable investment bank, Goldman Sachs, and c) a unit of giant European investment bank Credit Suisse. While the owners and employees of these august organizations are making their mega-millions, it’s about time that they paid some attention to what their “investment” is doing to the people it’s supposedly serving.

This post was written in July, 2007, long before the financial market meltdown, but still it’s worthy, particularly since Goldman Sachs has been given preferential treatment by Congress.

It’s also worth noting that just like Firstline, Mega uses inexperienced agents with little knowledge beyond what training they’re given by Mega (which means they’re taught the company line with no knowledge of what they’re selling or whether it’s really best for the client).

For more information on the way Mega scams the self-employed, see the AttorneyPages links here and here.

BusinessWeek has a report from 2004 about Mega’s involvement with the National Association for the Self-Employed entitled “It’s Enough To Make You Sick“. I agree. It is. From the article:

A few months after Doug started chemotherapy, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center refused to treat him anymore, saying he had already used up the MEGA coverage. The problem: It capped chemo coverage at $1,000 a day, even though Doug’s cost up to $18,000 — fine print Dana says they were never told about. The doctor got Doug transferred to another hospital. But after he died in October, 2002, at the age of 48, Dana was stuck with almost $500,000 in medical bills that MEGA refused to cover, and now lives on her boat to save money on rent. “He said to me one day, ‘I know it’s too late for me, but this should not happen to people,”‘ recalls Dana, who says the NASE rep never told them that it functions as MEGA’s marketing arm and only sells MEGA insurance. Last year, she sued MEGA and NASE for failing to disclose the caps and for endorsing a “sham” policy by pretending NASE was an independent group

If I wanted to, I could rant about how unethical it is for a company to send an agent out posing as a representative of this so-called association for the self-employed. But I don’t want to rant; I want the facts to convince anyone reading this to either change insurance companies or not sign up with this one.

Being self-employed is difficult enough in these times without being victimized by investment banks that are being rescued by those same hard-working people, the taxpayers here in this country.

As I said, hell has a special niche for the masterminds of these schemes. I hope that those CSPAN debates that Obama promised will take place soon, rendering companies like this irrelevant. In the meantime, please read the links here before signing on with them.

If you’re already insured by them, look for a Blue Cross/Blue Shield plan or equivalent. It will be more expensive, but they are at least somewhat more reliable about claims, and certainly will cover a trip to the ER for chest pain, particularly when that trip is recommended by the first-line provider.

Excuse me while I consult with Satan about the decorations for the rooms he’s preparing for the executives of this company. I want to be sure they are able to view the hells on earth they created for their insureds while raping their wallets.

Fragments of light left on the water and the sand, reminding that with each moment that passes, things change. Light diminishes or dawns; the tide rolls in and back out again, and we’re given a glimpse of the magnificence, inviting gratitude.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all.

(p.s. this photo actually looks better in this size)

Thank you, Hugh McLeod, for the reminder. Of course I’m not addicted to Twitter. This is because I use FriendFeed, identi.ca, and some different bridges for those. More about that in a different post. Using four different tools that center on Twitter isn’t indicative of addictive behavior, is it?

Well, IS IT?

Now that DG has hit the magic teenage years, she prefers Miss Dancer to Dancergirl. So it shall be.

I’m writing this from Phoenix, where we have been since Thursday afternoon for the Western US Regional Championships for Irish Dance.

Yesterday, my girl tore up the stage in a big way. Pushed her placement to 17th (a ten-place jump from last year), and more importantly, brought her confidence to the stage — something that hasn’t always been easy for her to do. She got up there and left it all on the stage. I was (and am) a proud mama…she really worked hard and the smile on her face is all genuine.

Though she missed world qualification by 2 (!) places, she left the message that it would probably be the last time she’d do that.

So congratulations, Miss Dancer for a wonderful day and such a brilliant performance.

I am thrilled that Julie Amero has no more felony charges hanging over her head. And she is thrilled, too. But you should know that no justice was done here. None whatsoever.

Justice would have been full exoneration with a deep, heartfelt apology from the prosecutor for not fully investigating the possibility that malware had infected the computer in the classroom where she was substituting.

Justice would have been a public statement from the prosecutor and Mark Lounsbury, the so-called police forensic “expert” who gave false testimony in her trial.

Justice would have been a proper investigation at the outset before she lost her baby, her reputation, her job, and ultimately, her good health.

Justice would have been placing the responsibility for the whole debacle at the feet of the school network administrator who did not have a full version of anti-virus or anti-spyware software installed, had almost no security policies in place, and hadn’t updated the virus definitions on what was on the computer for over three months.

Justice would be seeing the jerks who create malware thrown in jail with the key thrown out, forced to watch the same pornographic images they fed to unwitting PC owners over, and over, and over again, while handcuffed behind their back.

Julie Amero was hospitalized last week for symptoms relating to stress and a possible heart condition. Just four short years ago she was looking forward to the birth of her child and a life with her husband in a community she loved. She enjoyed substitute teaching, loves kids, was well-liked by the students in the school where she taught, and had prospects for a nice, quiet, drama-free life.

One day substituting in a classroom with a badly-infected computer changed her life, her future, and her career.

I went ballistic when I read this a few minutes ago:

But since that dramatic reversal, local officials, police and state prosecutors were unwilling to admit that a mistake may have been made — even after computer experts from around the country demonstrated that Amero’s computer had been infected by “spyware.”

New London County State’s Attorney Michael Regan told me late Friday the state remained convinced Amero was guilty and was prepared to again go to trial.

“I have no regrets. Things took a course that was unplanned. Unfortunately the computer wasn’t examined properly by the Norwich police,” Regan said.

“For some reason this case caught the media’s attention,” Regan said.

So that we’re clear, it didn’t catch the media’s attention “for some reason”. It caught the media’s attention and the attention of forensic experts across the country because they all KNEW that typical behavior of a PC infected with malware is exactly what happened to Julie Amero in that classroom on that day. They were utterly appalled when she was convicted on those four counts of endangering the morals of a minor.

They saw unjust justice.

They saw Mark Lounsbury flat-out give testimony to falsehood. I am not saying that Lounsbury testified that way out of malice. I do, however, think he was untrained, had very little knowledge of viruses and spyware, and a full-blown ego that didn’t allow for the possibility he was wrong.

They saw an investigation with very little process or integrity.

They saw Julie. And they knew this was not a woman who would walk into a classroom, boot up a computer, and start surfing porn sites in the middle of class.

They saw the truth. And when they saw it, they knew they couldn’t sit idly by and watch an innocent person go to jail when the truth had not been told.

Experts, lawyers, and loudmouthed bloggers like me said “Not this time.” They stepped up, they gave their time and expertise for free, and the loudmouthed bloggers started doing what we do best — blogging it. Telling the truth. Telling those who want the real story to come over here and read about what really happened.

It is unfortunate that politics, or ego, or self-righteous certitude prevents Mr. Regan from understanding what everyone who has ever had a PC without the proper virus protection knows: Without proper anti-virus and spyware protection, your computer and maybe even your life is at risk.

Regan’s pronouncement of his certainty of her guilt speaks to his ignorance and unwillingness to learn the facts of this case, and the facts of what PC viruses can do to a computer and in some cases, a life.

Julie Amero should have her teaching certificate back. She should have her hundred dollars back. She should be compensated for malicious prosecution. She should have her child in her arms.

She should. But she doesn’t. Because a prosecutor thinks he knows it all, and has listened to a cop with enough information to be dangerous but no facts with which to be right.

Julie deserves better. But she accepts gratefully what she got. I only wish I could do the same.

Other posts about the malicious and false prosecution of Julie Amero.