Paul Krugman: The Waiting Game. Why Bush wants the sick to pay the rich. Being without health insurance is no big deal. Just ask President Bush. “I mean, people have access to health care in America,” he said last week. “After all, you just go to an emergency room.”–NYTimes. Raising Young Voices for Illegal Mexican Immigrants. Politicians betta watch out. With Washington having failed to pass an immigration overhaul, advocates are increasingly turning to immigrants’ children as allies in their political efforts. Many young people raised in this country know their way around a system that sometimes baffles their parents. Those who are citizens can speak out for those who have yet to get their papers. And they can vote –NYTimes. Dallas comic to Comedy Central. Indian comedian even reads funny on paper. Check this. "We rely so much on e-mail that we don’t even write letters any more," he says, launching into a joke. "So you know that, 10 years from now, pens and pencils will become obsolete. They’ll be replaced by computers. Which will change first grade forever. The most dramatic thing? Right over there, where the pencil sharpener used to be? Just an Indian guy giving tech support."–Dallas Morning News In the Lawless Post-Katrina Cleanup, Construction Companies Are Preying on Workers.Ugh. Steele worked for more than a week before his first employer belatedly provided him the vaccines he needed to avoid illnesses like tetanus and hepatitis B that were idling in the toxic stew fermenting throughout much of the city. Most nights he slept on floors in houses and hotels with about seven other men, sharing a bathroom and scrounging for Meals Ready to Eat (MREs) that the National Guard had trucked in for workers and residents.–Alternet.org. How racism hurts — literally. Another extrapolation. Black women who pointed to racism as a source of stress in their lives, the researchers found, developed more plaque in their carotid arteries — an early sign of heart disease — than black women who didn’t.–The Boston Globe. Democrats court a confident NAACP. Obama, Clinton, talk straight up, for once. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on Thursday decried the lack of outrage over gun violence in urban America and criticized President Bush’s decision to commute the prison sentence of former White House aide I. Lewis Scooter" Libby while black men serve time for lesser crimes.–Chicago Tribune. Hot Ghetto Mess a hot-button issue. More on mess. "It’s the concept of the show," McCauley said Wednesday. "You’re basically holding people up to scorn them. It’s a modern day freak show, and I have a problem with my insurance company paying for the show, or my soap company paying for the show or my cell phone company subsidizing the show. If I think it degrades African-American people and women, why should I buy the products of the companies that are helping subsidize the show?"–Houston Chronicle. Music stars unite against racism. Amandla! "It sends out powerful messages too – that we are happy and proud to live in a multicultural city and that racism will not be tolerated in our communities."–BBC Soldier Shoots Himself to Avoid Iraq. He actually paid a man $500 to do the job. Apone had joked with his wife about getting shot in the leg so he could avoid another tour, according to the complaint. His wife took the remark seriously, and said she knew a man named who could do the job.–The Associated Press. Racism rarely overt, LI firefighters say. Shhhh. In the overwhelmingly white brotherhood of the firehouse, Long Island’s black firefighters say they often feel unwelcome. It’s rarely overt racism like that alleged recently in Coram, where a white fire district employee told a black firefighter, "I don’t like black people."–Newsday.