By the way, one of the many ways you can measure your own decline is to re-read a few of your past attempts at sensible blogging, which I did while searching for blogs about the good Dr Muskett. Well OK, I enjoyed a few of them, mostly those I had borrowed from others. I think I actually improved the blogosphere a little by deleting some. I should have been an editor.

Now then, in today’s Gazette Dr Muskett tells us lots of dark medical secrets,  admitting that surgeons, including himself, actually do the terrible things that our president says we do. Such as taking out perfectly fine tonsils: well, that is actually only done by the evil ENTs of course. He says it in a humorous way, hoping that his readers will think he is being ironic as usual.

After capturing our attention with the light-hearted truth-telling he then goes on to the meat of the matter, which is that the reason we pay more than the rest of world for our medical care is that we are sicker and it is our own fault. He proves his point by citing his own recent need for a coronary stent. What a rhetorical stunt!

Dr Muskett says that our politicians do not tell us the truth because it is politically unacceptable: that we consume way too much health care, that we are too fat and too lazy, that we expect something for nothing, and that we expect to live forever.

What is the cure for these prosperity-related problems? Dr Obama and his friends have their egalitarian answer. Read the article for yourself. As always, Dr Muskett makes a lot of sense.

Those of us left behind are pretty sure it is both and more. Newspapers need talent to do stuff just as much as any other entertainment venue. Chances are our Council members, not being paid that much anyway, think of the trip as part of their “perks,” and the Mayor needs to get his name and maybe a picture in some kind of media, just the usual political theatre. Heck, just a website might be enough.

Besides, everyone knows that Sutton’s Law has been amended: you remember the bank robber, Willie Sutton, some years ago, when finally caught was asked “Why he robbed banks?” He replied, “Because that’s where the money is.” Of course, the money no longer is in banks, but it can apparently be found under the cushions where our congressional masters sit in Washington DC. Hence the need for the amendment of the law and hence the need for our City Council, with begging bowls in hand, to go to Washington DC. And we know they don’t answer phone calls or emails do they?

While we’re on pleasure trips disguised as business, it turns out the Gazette also had one of their premier columnists, the very shy but extremely talented Dr Alan Muskett, write up one of his medical convention junkets in his wise monthly column, called simply Plastic Surgery. In addition to being a certified plastic surgeon he is also a certified member of P.O.E.M., the Professional Organization of English Majors.

He doesn’t give lame excuses for going on trips. He tells it like it is. He goes on these occasional trips to see how others are doing his particular kind of surgery and compares and contrasts what he sees with what is being done right here in River City. He also gets to exercise his humor organ by noting that “Between [I'm sure he meant to say 'among'] the wives and industry reps, there were enough over-sized breast implants that, if dropped on Afghanistan, would crush the Taliban.” Or maybe Dave Barry is writing his stuff. And he has some good things to say about Billings and how we practice medicine.

Now that is an Awesome Creator. We humans cannot create a soul, but we can alter its external appearance as Dr Muskett points out in his recent column in the Gazette, wherein he uses a well known mythical animal to illustrate dealing with the difficult problem of rhinophyma, or Big Red Nose.

I grew up in a small village in Wisconsin. One of my neighbors suffered from this condition. He also happened to be a card-carrying alcoholic, so I naturally assumed that the one followed the other and therefore the one caused the other. Not so says Dr Muskett. Well, I owe an apology to Mr Elmer Hackbarth, now late these many years. Sorry Mr H.