Tuesday's Most Active Threads

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "AITA: Getting crap for not attending a Friday wedding because we have no childcare" and posted in the "Family Relationships" forum. The original poster explains that she and her husband have been invited to her husband's cousin's wedding which will be held on a Friday afternoon at a location two hours away. The original poster has two children and has not been able to arrange childcare for them. Moreover, both the original poster and her husband are planning to use their paid time off for an upcoming vacation. Therefore, they have decided to skip the wedding. This has led to some family drama due to another relative coming into town with two kids. He first asked whether he could share childcare with the original poster and when told they were planning to miss the wedding, suggested renting short-term housing at the wedding location and hiring a local babysitter. The original poster is not interested in having her children cared for in a strange house by a stranger. Then the original poster's in-laws suggested that she care for all four kids while her husband went to the wedding. This does not solve the problem of a lack of paid time off and the original poster doesn't want to care for four kids. She wants to know if she is wrong in this situation. This thread is 12 pages and I don't have time to read it so I can't say what happened in most of the thread. But, from what I did read, some posters think the original poster is wrong because she doesn't appear to have tried very hard to find a solution for this issue. Others disagree and put blame on the others who are looking to the original poster to solve both her and the relative's childcare problem.

The next most active thread yesterday was posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum. Titled, "Name a song you think tells a beautiful story", the original poster suggests the songs "Leader of the Band " and "Piano Man". I find it very difficult to summarize this type of thread in which the replies are just suggestions or lists of suggestions. I did notice that one poster suggested "Turn the Page" which is a good suggestion — indeed several Bob Seger songs would be good candidates for this thread — but the poster actually recommended Metallica's cover of the song. Until just this moment I had been unaware of that version. I guess it sounds okay but I have to agree with a poster who responded saying that the music video "totally destroys the intention of the original". I also agreed with the inclusion of "Cats in the Cradle", but also agreed with the criticism of the song by another poster. It's a good song that tells a beautiful story. But, there are better choices including by Harry Chapin.

Next was a thread titled, "MCPS Announces New Attendance Plan and Policy on 8/22" and posted in the "Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)" forum. This thread was started on Monday when the original poster embedded a Youtube video which was suppposed to eventually show a press conference by Montgomery County Public Schools officials to discuss a new attendance policy that had meant to be announced last Spring but had been deferred until now. The video now shows an error message saying that it has been removed by the user. Apparently the school system disabled the live video feed. When the press conference finally commenced, posters relied on Xs (nee tweets) to keep abreast of what was happening. Some of the first news from the press conference was that chronic absenteeism was up almost across the board. Graphs were presented showing absenteeism across various demographic groups. This led to considerable discussion about what conclusions could be drawn from the data. There were disputes about who, if anyone, was to blame for the increased absenteeism. Many posters identified COVID as a factor, leading to discussion about how Covid should be addressed. Somehow the discussion ended up focused on welfare and other assistance programs but I didn't read closely enough to understand how the thread got there.

The final thread at which I'll look today was posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. Titled, "ObamaCare ruined primary care medicine", the original poster claims that nearly every primary care physician in the area is switching to concierge service because "No one wants to take ObamaCare any more". This doesn't make a whole lot of sense. The Affordable Care Act, frequently referred to as Obamacare, includes a number of programs and modifications to America's healthcare system. However, there is not a thing called "Obamacare" that doctors can accept or refuse. Presumably, the original poster is referring to health insurance which can be obtained through multiple ways, but most commonly through an employer. In any case, this insurance comes from private providers rather than the government. Alternatively, the original poster could be referring to Medicare since he references CMS — the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services — several times. This is more likely because the government directly controls reimbursement costs in this case. Despite the original poster's inability to deliver a coherent message, even with several follow-ups, he insists on referring to others as "dum dum". Many posters respond to say that they have not encountered primary care physicians changing to concierge services. The original poster calls them "dum dums". Some posters say that they are only able to have a primary care physician because Obamacare allowed them to get insurance. They are all "dum dums" according to the original poster. The original poster also claims that doctors are refusing to take insurance and now "nobody can get healthcare". This is not the experience of most of those responding. But, of course, they are "dum dums" and, as an added insult, are accused of living in a bubble. Several posters ask the original poster what he suggests for replacing Obamacare, but he has no ideas. As best I can tell, the original poster's primary care physician has switch to a concierge-style service so he has been personally impacted. But, rather than gaining an understanding of the reasons for this change, he has simply blamed Obamacare. His reason for blaming Obamacare doesn't make any sense, but that's not stopping him. Of course, his reasons probably would make sense if I wasn't a "dum dum".