I know we've moved on, but regarding the hospital in McAllen, Texas featured in the New Yorker article that was referenced in the previous posts, check out the front page story from today's N.Y. Times, and in particular the graphic showing per capita Democratic fundraising per 1,000 of population across the country, turns out that not only is McAllen is second in the country, well ahead of Aspen CO and just behind Jacksonson Hole WY, but when it comes to this Congress, its contributors get what they pay for:

July 30, 2009

Texas Hospital Flexing Muscle in Health Fight

By KEVIN SACK and DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

McALLEN, Tex. — One of the largest sources of campaign contributions to Senate Democrats during this year’s health care debate is a physician-owned hospital in one of the country’s poorest regions that has sought to soften measures that could choke its rapid growth.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee collected nearly $500,000 at a reception here on March 30, mostly from physicians and others affiliated with Doctors Hospital at Renaissance, financial disclosure records show.

The event was held at the home of a prominent McAllen developer, Alonzo Cantu, a hospital founder, investor and board member who has raised prodigious sums from the Rio Grande Valley for an array of Democrats.

Another event at Mr. Cantu’s home, in September 2007, brought in at least $800,000 for the committee’s House counterpart, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, according to disclosure reports. The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, was in attendance and cut a ribbon at the hospital’s new women’s center while in town.

The hospital, which is in Edinburg, adjacent to McAllen, is working both sides of the aisle. Its political action committee, Border Health PAC, split $120,000 last year among House and Senate candidates, including Republicans.

Although Congressional negotiations over health care legislation are continuing, Doctors Hospital seems to be getting much of what it wants. Thus far, physician-owned hospitals have been insulated from some of the most onerous potential restrictions in the health care legislation moving through Congress. . . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/30/us....html?_r=1&hpw

This is a lesson kids in my son's sixth grade learned big time this year, money talks now 'days in this blessed land, as it hasn't since before the Great Depression. Separate and apart from those students requesting financial aid, admittance to what was largely regarded as the best private high schools in the city was much more a function of family income (and ability to pledge large five or lower six figures in annual donations) over and above the not insignificant tuition that my mother in law is advancing us, than any metric pertaining to the kid or his/her performance. Having said this, my son came out fine but too many highly qualified kids didn't.

The only "good news" in all of this, at least from my prespective, is that with all these abject lessons of the disproportionate influence of wealth on matters of influence in our society, we're well on our way to breeding the next real generation of campus radicals.

Mike