Doctor Bentivegna is an ophthalmologist living in Connecticut. He has written numerous op-ed pieces for The Hartford Courant and The New York Times regarding health care, tort reform, and the political situation in Haiti.

Joseph Bentivegna, M.D.March 15, 2019

Cheating to Enter Elite Schools is about Social Status

March 15, 2019 My best friend from high school and I were both accepted to Ivy League schools. We declined. We both received substantial scholarships, so it wasn’t the money. But we felt more comfortable attending schools close to our rural Pennsylvania homes with both family and friends nearby. But more important, we did not feel that attending an Ivy League school would make any difference in our lives. And we were right. Both us did fine in our respective careers. But forty-five years later, America has changed and getting into an elite school has become an obsession for America’s wealthy and upper middle class. Our kids are tortured with SAT prep courses, diarrhea contracted during some Third World humanitarian project and personal coaches trying to turn them into world class lacrosse players. Thus, it is not surprising that a recent scandal has unearthed a ring of corrupt coaches, mercenary SAT takers and unscrupulous test correctors dedicated to gaming the system. Attending an elite school makes entry into America’s Ruling Class much easier. … [Read more...]

Politicians Like Ned Lamont are Why Donald Trump is President

Anyone who wonders why the general public was so outraged that they put Donald Trump in the White House has only to look at the behavior of our new governor Ned Lamont. Taking a page from the playbook of his fellow Greenwich plutocrat, Lowell Weicker, Lamont deliberately misled the voters by promising to place tolls only on incoming trucks, just like Weicker misled the voters in 1990 into believing he would not initiate a state income tax. Like Weicker, Lamont knew that if he had been honest, he would have lost. We witnessed the usual kabuki theater that precedes a middle-class fleecing, as Governor Lamont assembled a team of business leaders, Goldman Sachs cronies and reached out to Republican leaders for input. We saw learned men and women with furrowed brows pondering the complex dilemma of responsible stewardship. It was a huge scam of course. Lamont had every intention of imposing tolls. As a scion of the J.P. Morgan fortune (his great grandfather was a partner in Morgan’s firm) and a respectable entrepreneur in his own right, he knows how to read a balance … [Read more...]

Journalism Needs to Regain its Credibility

Years ago when I was running for the Republican nomination for US Senate, a patient was referred to me for decreased vision. This patient was aware my campaign and was an unrepentant liberal. Thus, our meeting began with a spirited but cordial discussion over our political differences. Eventually we agreed to disagree. Our attention then turned to the real reason for his visit, his eyesight. I examined him and concluded that changing his glasses would result in minimal improvement in his vision and that if he wanted to see better, he needed cataract surgery. Without hesitation, this patient consented to put his eyesight in my hands. I am not recounting this story to market my skills as a physician. I am telling it because even though this patient knew I had strong political differences with him, it never even dawned on him that it would affect his care. This patient knew that I was a member of a profession that promised to always put his interests first, regardless of his race, social class, insurance status, gender or political views. Perhaps there was a time when journalism commanded such respect, but not anymore. While journalists have always been left of center, most … [Read more...]