I believe it's right there in the preamble and in article 1 section 8:
...and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States...
So if you're a U.S. corporation made up of U.S. citizens you're protected. Although there is no guarantee of profit, there is tons of precedent for the U.S. government protecting the "profits" of its people.
My question to you is: why do you dislike U.S. citizens making money in such a general way. Me and two of my friends formed an LLC to shield us from liability were one of our programs to accidently take over the world. Am I evil simply because I entered into a capitalist venture (to pay the rent!)?
How about you complain about corruption and nepotism in government instead. There can be no doubt about the evil in corruption and nepotism, and that is the real complaint you have I believe. The best way to lessen this inherently human trait in government is to lessen the scope and size of government.
The simple act of selling goods and services at a profit is not evil. Preventing people from selling goods and services is the evil act. Nobody can know better than the individual what the individual wants and needs. Don't buy into the idea that the government can know what's best for everyone, viz: do you believe that someone, that you have never met and will never meet, knows more about what you want and need than yourself?
The government exercising its power to preserve and protect the “profits” of the citizenry may be the only legitimate function of the government, and is certainly the only reason we resort to government in the first place. All else is explicitly prohibited by the constitution.
Unfortunately the firewalls of the constitution were long ago breached and we can only hope that strict constitutionalist are elected to the various branches of government to try and reverse the massive expansion of the federal government.
Always err on the side of less government control.
This quote from C.S. Lewis best describes the scourge I'm talking about:
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
I'm pretty sure that if someone at the NSA had destroyed evidence that they had committed a crime they would be going down for a felony as well. The ironic part is that the guy was politically motivated and is now a felon and can no longer vote. Now that's a laugh. Sara took his right to vote away. There's some poetic justice in that fact alone.
In other news: Staying on the menu screen in quake II significantly improves frame rates and battery life over entering into the game and actually playing.
@0:08:"..every corner of the United States. I've now been in fifty seven states? and I think one left to go one left to go and uh Alaska and Hawaii I was not allowed to go to even though I really wanted to but uh my staff would not justify it"
So lets count. he says 57 very clearly - then he goes on to say one left to go (58) then he says "and uh Alaska and Hawaii" (60). And I'm curious where you attribute your quote from. I've given you the actual video, meanwhile a google search for the phrase "Fifty sovereign states"+ obama returns nothing about an Obama quote.
This shows a level of naivete has never been displayed in a president. Everyone knows that Russia is a veto wielding member of the UN security council and any threats made against Russia by the UN security council are totally meaningless. That this guy is now president and didn't know that one month prior to taking office speaks volumes of his knowledge and the knowledge of the people he surrounds himself with, or at least him and the people who write his speeches.
You always see people on the left trying to censor political opinions using laws with misleading fuzzy titles like "fairness doctrine". This is nothing more than a tool to silence the opinions of people the government does not agree with. It reminds me of a saying I once heard:
Conservatives are afraid you don't understand what they're talking about, liberals are afraid you do.
The 1st amendment was first for a reason, and when you start censoring anyone by fiat, and by an unelected political appointee no less, you've opened the flood gates for abuse of power. Why is it that the democrat party and the federal government no longer have a clearly defined line, but rather act in each others own best interest. For example the EPA: The EPA rules by fiat and is a political ally of the democrat party. The EPA does what it can do make sure democrats do well in the polls because the EPA - a branch of the government mind you - knows that when democrats are elected that more money and power will flow into the EPA apparatus. And that's just the EPA. All agencies in the government, unless specifically labeled 'conservative' are run by the democrat party. Many of the agencies are so large that they have taken on a life of their own and operate as a company that seeks power and glory rather than to serve the greater public good. And to that end they know that a vote for democrat is a vote to increase funding, scope and power of the federal government.
The only problem is that the government does not produce anything. All the government can do is tax people who do produce something and spend it on something else, filtering through a never-ending maze of bureaucratic red tape, nepotism and corruption and when it finally reaches its destination, only a fraction of what was taken from the taxpayer actually goes towards the problem in the first place.
No, really, I'm going somewhere with this.
I'm sure there are tons of people who want to rip holes in my argument and tell me that the EPA and the federal government aren't part of the democrat party. Whatever, you have your right to be wrong. Others will say that there is a military industrial complex that is beholden to conservatives. That's wrong too. You have privately owned defense contracting companies that actually produce something. Even if what they produce rubs you the wrong way, they are a hell of a lot more productive than the EPA. They are also private citizens and corporations of the US that are totally within their rights to lobby congress to their own best interests as it is every citizen and corporations[group of citizens] right in this country. Besides all that, Boeing isn't run by the RNC and doesn't really care who is running the country so long as they keep buying death rays from them they are happy to do business with whatever party is in the WH. I'm sure they are very happy with Obama because Obama means more sales for them. And it's hardly controlled by conservatives.
In the supreme court, the last bastion of conservatism. The two ideologies play out here with one side, the conservative side claiming to be strict constitutionalists. And the liberal side of the court is more happy to say the constitution is a living document that can be reinterpreted from time to time as the language changes - in direct contradiction of the framers. I'm not saying that the court shouldn't revisit old decisions and undo precedent, Dred Scott v Sandford for example. But we must adhere to some rule of law. Long ago liberals stopped adhering to the constitution and only bring it up as a weapon to strike out at their opponents with and is something to be ignored while it suits their agenda.
How can you say that the changing meanings of words in a language changes the sprit of the contract that was written long ago? When you
The leader of the free world came down from on high and told this guy to stop. The day after Obama speaks they pull his site down. Now if they had pulled it down immediately after this guy started talking about koran burning that would have indeed been all Rackspace and totally within their own rights to serve whomever they please. But once the POTUS comes down on the guy I'm sure Rackspace though "IRS(FCC,CIA,NSA,FTC etc) Audit time, this guy has got to go.". They obviously want to save their own skin not just from the political fallout but more from any retaliation from an openly hostile government.
Whether or not you agree with the guy you must admit that the government has no right to speak negatively about what this guy is doing, without giving equal feigned outrage at the burning of our flag, bible, constitution etc... Strange he[POTUS] only speak up now. Whatever happened to equal protection? If you say burning the koran is bad, why not through in the bible and the flag too.
But of course Christians and patriots don't go all jihad on people, so really the government is even more pathetic than first thought. Not only are they stopping out this guys rights to free speech but they are doing so at the behest of foreign invaders whom we are at war with. If the government isn't going to protect the rights of its citizens from foreign invaders what the hell good is it?
The chain of events is undeniable:
Obama speaks out publicly against this guy's speech > Rackspace takes him down.
If that's not government suppression of free speech rights - what is? How far does the government have to go in condemning what you say before you call it an infringement? When do you say "enough bad mouthing this guy just because of how he feels about Islam."
I'm sure that the amount of regulation in plant creation, "green" subsidies for solar and "politically correct" as opposed to "environmentally correct" disposal of waste serves to distort the true price of these sources.
Besides, anyone who has played sim city knows that nuclear is much cheaper.
I would like to point out that it's not just counting someone 6 times, it's making everyone else's vote count as 1/6th the vote of people "selected" by the government. What a great way to bring people together. This will just infuriate the people who are now worth a fraction of a vote and further isolate "selected" groups from the mainstream.
Since the government selects the multiplier and the "victim" group of people, it will be no surprise that the group will vote for a larger and more authoritarian government that gave them this power over the "regular" people. What obvious and malicious tampering, why secretly steel votes when you can just make a new law that does it for you!
And why stop at 6? Why not 10? Why not 100? Why not 1000? Once you have made the leap of logic that one person's vote is worth more than another person's vote there is no limit to how much you can alter the outcomes of elections to favor whatever candidate the controlling party likes. This is just pure banana republic, Hugo Chavez style lawlessness.
And this is from the same folks that think that a different test for everyone depending on their skin color is fair, but the same test for everyone regardless of skin color is unfair.
More liberal logic: These people, what the liberals have forced me to call them, are not smart enough to take the same tests as "regular" people. But they should be given a vote that is worth 6x the vote as "regular" people, which by the liberal's standards, are smarter than them? That's just as stupid and contradictory as the two ideas on their own!
In this country, as it should be everywhere, everyone should be treated exactly the same regardless of their skin color, gender, age, religion. "These people" are "regular" people. It is only a label given to them by liberals and the government (ever fill out a government form?). There should be no arbitrarily payoffs by power hungry politicians of this group and that group. We are all humans. We live together in a society of laws that cannot be arbitrarily tossed aside when you want to get a few more votes.
To say, as liberals do, that one race is inferior to another is a crime against nature but it's said over and over by these people in the guise of helping. But the only result, and their only real interest, is a more authoritarian and power hungry government that has more interest in tricking, hiding and asserting total control over the people than helping the people.
We get excited about the idea of one platform for web development (HTML5). Why are we so fearful of one platform for native application development?
Because it only works on Apple's devices, and is only allowed to exist at the draconian whim of Apple's secretive approval process. HTML5 works on any browser in any OS, no lock-in, ever. The W3C has no app review process. HTML5 is completely free to use or develop, Apple's app's cost at least a dollar to use, and untold (until you get approved, right?) heaps of money to develop . That's why.
Steve Jobs is a smug, prick, coward. Rather than argue based on the merits of your idea, or defend your ideas based on the fallacies or demerits of your opponent, he just tries to discredit the person. And what a smug way to do it: "What have you done that's so great?". Anyone who regresses into that has lost the argument. You see, it really doesn't matter what the hell someone else has done when you're defending your ideas Steve. And that makes you a intellectual coward. The turtleneck isn't doing anything to dispel the rumor that you're a smug prick either.
1. The panel said their conclusions where correct, yet where is the methodology they used to prove this? Or are they relying on the CRUs methodology to confirm the results of the CRU methodology? Sounds like post hoc ergo propter hoc.
2. Why are they suggesting they need professional statisticians if the conclusions were correct? Are they going to become more correct?
3. How can they know if their conclusions are correct without themselves reconstructing the experiments using the raw data that is now lost?
4. How can they on one hand say that there was no fraud, yet there was obviously an effort to subvert the FOA laws? Is this act somehow made ethical because it cannot be prosecuted?
5. And last of all, if this data and program that created the statistics are as "publicly available" as proponents of the CRU believe, then show me the link. This is the internet; just show me the URL to the data that convinced you that this data really is "publicly available".
6. If raw data is missing, how can they, or these auditors, even check their own calculations to see if the statistical models they used are correct?
And to the obvious responses to 5:
Don't give me the run around "oh you can download it from the various sources that they got it from" bullshit, it's not my job to prove the CRU's theory, it's the CRU's job to prove it, all anyone else has to do is sit back and poke holes in the abundant logical fallacies. And if it's so damn important, the fate of the world and all, I would expect some talented CRU proponent, hell, the CRU themselves, to have packaged the whole dataset, including the "deleted" parts, into a XXXgb/tb/pb whatever b size.tar/.zip/.rar whatever and upload it to bittorrent/rapidshare/wikileaks whatever so anyone can access it. At the very least, do not become an impediment to the data's release, as has been shown beyond any reasonable doubt here.
While I may not be a climatologist, I am a computer programmer, and I can tell when someone has written a program that will produce invalid data, for a non programmer to write a complex computer program, and have the countries of the world base their economies on it just seems insane to me. Would you have a stock broker write the code for the stock exchange? What if they are doing something like adding up temperatures as floats e.g.:averageTemp = (75.88+37.77+22.77...+200 more)/203 to get an average. A layman will look at the calculation and say "that looks great to me!" but even a first year CS student will see the huge problem adding so many floats, maybe the climatologist at the CRU didn't see a problem... But then nobody can really check to see if they have a problem, because they won't show anyone their source code, and subsequently how they even arrived at their conclusions, this alone makes this inquiry suspect. I would like to hear people say "You're not a computer programmer, you don't understand" as frequently as I hear people say "You're not a climatologist, you really don't understand..."
PS. The fact that you refuse to acknowledge that the first of your alleged quotes of Jefferson is pseudepigraphical proves that you're only interested in scoring "talking points" and not in actually having a reasoned discussion.
"Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then, be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question." --Thomas Jefferson: 1st Inaugural, 1801. Memorial Edition Volume 3 Page 320
I hope that's cleared that up. I would have a reasoned discussion but your claim that each state is not a republic, and your insistence that any proof I provide is inadequate somehow is just ridiculous. And you're hung up on a Jefferson quote, which it turns out you're wrong about, again. All you really need to do is put it in google with quotes around it and look around a little, and not come back and tell me the quote was something I made up.
I'm not sure how you can read Tocqueville and then became a defender of FDR. I said Kant's critique of pure reason creates a lot of the theories that we use in litigation today, "a priori" being one of them, not that Kant created the system of government. Then you blast me for showing you some books, only to then... show me some books, all of which I've read, and sadly came away with something different than you. I suppose you believe then that the constitution is living and breathing? I can't say anything to convince you, but here's James Madison's take:
"...I entirely concur with the propriety of resorting to the sense in which the Constitution was accepted and ratified by the nation. In that sense alone it is the legitimate Constitution. And if that be not the guide in expounding it, there can be no security for a consistent and stable, more than for a faithful exercise of its power. If the meaning of the text be sought in the changeable meaning of the words composing it, it is evident that the shape and attributes of the Government must partake of the changes to which the words and phrases of all living languages are constantly subject. What a metamorphosis would be produced in the code of the law if all its ancient phraseology were to be taken in its modern sense. And that the language of our Constitution is already undergoing interpretations unknown to its founders, will I believe appear to all unbiased Enquirers into the history of its origin and adoption."
-James Madison
Who can say it better than the father of the U.S. Constitution?
"...I entirely concur with the propriety of resorting to the sense in which the Constitution was accepted and ratified by the nation. In that sense alone it is the legitimate Constitution. And if that be not the guide in expounding it, there can be no security for a consistent and stable, more than for a faithful exercise of its power. If the meaning of the text be sought in the changeable meaning of the words composing it, it is evident that the shape and attributes of the Government must partake of the changes to which the words and phrases of all living languages are constantly subject. What a metamorphosis would be produced in the code of the law if all its ancient phraseology were to be taken in its modern sense. And that the language of our Constitution is already undergoing interpretations unknown to its founders, will I believe appear to all unbiased Enquirers into the history of its origin and adoption."
-James Madison
But you have one misquoted reference from Wikipedia, so obviously I'm a fool.
No, actually you're a fool because you're wrong. State law trumps all federal law unless the state law is unconstitutional. In fact, any law that is found unconstitutional by the courts is null. That's why it's legal to smoke pot in some states, and is not federally. You obviously lack the basic understanding of what a constitutional republic is.
Are you denying that the states are subordinate in authority to the federal government in the ways outlined in the Constitution?
I did not say that and it is not some misquoted Wikipedia reference, all states have the same branches of government the federal government has, each state has its own constitution, that's what makes it a republic. But I don't have all day to give you a lesson. Just chalk it up to being ignorant, read about what constitutes a republic, and call yourself richer for the experience.
all of my other unrelated arguments are therefore invalidated for some inadequately explored reason.
Like I said before, I was going to rebut them, one at a time, like I do with most comments, but once I read that, I quit taking anything you said seriously. Look, you seem like a nice enough guy, you're obviously just uninformed, everyone has been like that at one time in their life. But the good news is, they hide knowledge in books. Here are two books that make up the basis of our legal system. It's really fun to read about how this stuff all got formed. These two books introduce/expand upon the ideas of "natural law" and "a priori knowledge". If you don't know what that is, you really should! Anyhow, good reads if you plan on learning about constitutional republics. They're also really short. Most smart phones have book reader programs you can grab, these books can be downloaded in plain text, my favorite format, and you can stand on the shoulders of giants while you take a shit.
I actually started to rebut your comments one at a time then I found this one. I guess you don't have any clue what you're talking about so I'll just leave you to your own devices. California is governed as a republic.
OH SNAPS! Guess what! Every state is it's own republic! And that would make you.
Didn't we just pass legislation that for the first time forces private citizens to buy a product from a select set of other private citizens. The constitution is no longer relevant to the party in control of our government. They have deemed it something that can be reinterpreted to mean whatever they need it to mean at the time. All they need to do is redefine what words mean and suddenly the constitution means all sorts of things!
Here's a few examples:
1895: Wage is now the same as income! Democrats begin their long march towards socialism! With the help of the Socialist Labor Party of the 1890's, they pass an amendment so they can now collect income tax from everyone! The sucking noise begins.
1935: Now retirement and health care are a RIGHT and the government is required to provide for the "happiness" of the people by collecting money from one group of people and giving it to another. Democrats, unhappy with the difficulty of getting constitutional amendments, so they decide to craft laws that skirt the letter of the constitution, arguing that social security/medicare is an retirement benefit to the people, while arguing to the SCOTUS that it is a tax. When the SCOTUS rules the initial law unconstitutional, democrat FDR runs personal smear campaigns against SCOTUS justices and has them replaced with justices that are willing to interpret the constitution the way he needs it. And thus begins the largest ponzi scheme in world history!.
begin rant: The government then took from the ponzi err. social security fund as frequently as pleased to and for whatever reason it deemed important enough to do so. Which was of course any reason. Now, were this a REAL business, at this point the CFO would be thrown in jail, but this is the U.S. government! They buy the jails! Social security has been bankrupt for decades, the debt is around 17 trillion. But this week, for the first time, even on paper, the government is giving out more money in social security than it is taking in..
I ask you, if the government can force you to buy something from someone, is there anything there anything the government can't force you to buy? And if the government can arbitrarily come in and tell me what I must buy, what I can buy, and what I can't buy, can we truly say we live in a free society?
And for you fools in control. What makes you think the next generation is going to pay any attention to the laws you so haphazardly pass when you completely ignore the laws of the previous generations? That's anarchy!:end rant
I would be remiss to point out that Thomas Jefferson was like a fricking Nostradamus in predicting what would happen in this country. And how can I possibly follow the words of Jefferson with my pathetic waxing? So adieu!
The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.
-Thomas Jefferson
Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question.
-Thomas Jefferson
Great innovations should not be forced on slender majorities.
-Thomas Jefferson
Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms [of government] those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny. -Thomas Jefferson
I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of the
No, it is not. The assertion was that it unconstitutional for the government to require anyone to enter into a contract as a reason why this bill is ill-conceived. I gave a clear and accurate counter-example.
You pointed out another example where the government is violating the constitution. You're making a logical fallacy called "begging the question". Because it is being used elsewhere without legal contest is not proof of its constitutionality. In fact dozens of AGs from various states are suing the federal government on the constitutionality of the bill. Here's one.. So maybe you can point out where in the commerce clause it says the government can force you to enter into a contract. Last time I checked the commerce clause only effected TAX. And I will also argue that the SCOTUS got that decision wrong. The idea that you can't grow your own food without the government taxing you because you're "effecting interstate commerce by not buying food" is ridiculous and more than a little tyrannical. If you support that decision it really speaks to your ideological background.
Massachusetts has had this exact system in place for years and has had NO constitutionality issues.
Just because it wasn't challenged does not make it automatically constitutional. And it's completely broke, totally out of money, and yes, it is exactly like it. If you read to the second page they're even skirting around the issue of rationing out care because " it cannot fall back on the strategy used by other states in hard times -- to simply remove people from the public insurance rolls by restricting eligibility. ". Why don't you think the same thing will happen here? Perhaps the same way the government has bankrupted social security and medicare? The examples are pretty obvious, just watch the line on your paycheck, hope you don't think you're getting that social security back when you retire. It's already gone. And now we're bowowing money from generations that have yet to be born, so we can start paying for a program for 10 years, but it only starts after 4? Non of this stuff troubles you?
This survival rate thing is total baloney. The US runs more screens so it detects the disease earlier. So obviously if you detect the disease before it progresses much the n-year survival rate will be better even if you do no treatment what-so-ever.
If you're a cancer survivor, as I am, I think survival rate is everything! I really don't understand how "survival rate will be better even if you do no treatment what-so-ever." The only example given is completely made up, there is no 5yr toe cancer. The breast cancer example is just really stupid. The guy points out how the U.K. doesn't screen for breast cancer till 50 as a cost savings method, yet at age 40 you have a 1 in 68 chance of getting it before your 50.. And the U.K. has determined that if you live in the U.K. you simply cannot have the screening till you're 50 even if you really want it. I guess 1 in 68 are just fucked? I'm sure the 1 in 68 care a lot about how soon they get screened. That's probably why our breast cancer survival rates are so much better than the U.K.'s. Just because you're covered does not mean you're going to get care, the U.K. is a great example of that. Care denied is coverage denied. Think of the Donner party, they were on the right track, they just didn't get there in time. Even the hack who wrote the article admits at the end "UPDATE: This in no way means I'm opposed to mammography and/or early detection for breast cancer. That can absolutely make the difference in outcomes." Which is to say: His hypothetical is totally made up
Which is why you can receive a subsidy to purchase insurance if you can not afford it or "opt out" by paying a fine. Moving on...
You can't just breach the constitution and say "moving on..." it does not work like that. The fact that you total ignore the rule of law speaks volumes of your ideology.
Unless you are simultaneously reducing costs for Medicare by similar amounts or funding the proposals in other ways .
I actually did read the CBO report. They claim that they will save money by cutting reimbursements for medicare by %20 and add that into the bill as a savings, but there is already legislation in place that will reimburse medicare doctors that %20, canceling out any savings (300b they estimate for that line alone) made from the cut. Then they say that they will use 500b from medicare to fiance the new plan, and write that up as a savings, as if taking money from medicare is somehow magically saving money. Maybe you should read the CBO report.
Really? Your example truly shows the lack of understanding and confusion perpetrated about this bill. Please cite to me the section within either bill that states a government panel will hear cases on liver transplants and decide their validity, expediency, etc.
Unlike allocation by sex or race, allocation by age is not invidious discrimination; every person lives through different life stages rather than being a single age. Even if 25-year-olds receive priority over 65-year-olds, everyone who is 65 years now was previously 25 years.
-Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel
*(not professional governmental accountants or the CBO) Your point? Long distance forecasts are entirely less than accurate. Which is why they call them "official estimates." There are also provisions within the bill to take steps to meet the necessary reductions should the plan not work as intended. Next?
Your trust that the government will manage this system effectively are not only unsupported by evidence, but is actually contradicted by hundreds of years of the government being totally infective in doing just about anything. Not only did they get the estimate wrong, they also blew all the medicare and social security trust fund money on... well not social security or medicare to say the least. You're told that the government is running a total 9 trillion dollar deficit. But that's not counting the over 100 trillion in unfunded medicare and social security liabilities. What on earth makes you think that the government can now be trusted with this third trust fund that dwarfs the other two? Isn't the definition of stupid doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result? If they couldn't be trusted then, and obviously they could not be, what makes you think that the situation has changed for the better?
Your trust in the government scares the crap out of me. Maybe it should scare you a little too.
I would continue but I need to get some sleep sooner or later. I look forward to your response.
The U.S. infant mortality rate is not higher; the rates of Canada and many European countries are artificially low, due to more restrictive definitions of live birth. There also are variations in the willingness of nations to save very low birth weight and gestation babies.
Definitions of a live birth, and therefore which babies are counted in the infant mortality statistics very considerably. The U.S. uses the full WHO definition, while Germany omits one of the four criteria. The U.K. defines a still birth "a child which has issued forth from its mother after the twenty-fourth week of pregnancy and which did not at any time after being completely expelled from its mother breathe or show any other signs of life.
So then all laws requiring motor vehicle insurance are unconstitutional? That would be interesting.
The car insurance analogy is like comparing apples and oranges. First of all the government does not make you drive, but if you do drive you need insurance to have the privilege of using public roads. But to further tear up your argument. The government can revoke your license if you drive poorly, can the same be said for health care? Wouldn't that be like telling people who smoke that they can't go to the doctor anymore? Driving a car on public roads is a privilege that can be revoked. Living is not. Simply being born under this bill will require you buy something, and if progressives get a single payer plan, you will most likely buy from the government.
We spend 17% of our GDP on health care right now. Other nations get the same or better overall results spending less than half of this. Yes you might have to wait for some services but there is clearly huge inefficiencies in the current system, so much so that it is easy to argue that even a government run program would be better.
If you are diagnosed with a disease like cancer, time is your #1 enemy, and oftentimes it is how long it takes to get a CT scan or see an oncologist that makes the difference between life and death. So, you see, this is a really major issue. If you had a sucking chest wound would you want to wait more or less time? For that matter, if you had anything wrong with you, would you want to wait a longer time? You say there are huge inefficiencies in our system, but then fail to point out a single one. Here's a link that pretty much blows that whole argument out of the water though: Most Cancer Survival Rates in USA Better Than Europe and Canada. This is due to our better health care system. By the way, can you produce a list of high profile individuals that flew from the U.S. to the U.K. or Canada to receive medical treatment? Because they sure come here in droves! You also fail to point out how out health care system will compare when 1/3 of the doctors quit, and incentives (high pay) to practice medicine decrease.
Other nations get the same or better overall results
I'm going to have to call you on that one. Maybe you can point out another country that has a better medical system, since they are so numerous and all. Be nice if you provided a link. Something real too, I don't want to hear about how the U.K. has more coverage, even if they have to wait for 6 months for a CT scan. Coverage delayed is coverage denied.
it is easy to argue that even a government run program would be better.
There is quite a bit of evidence that the US has a huge and expensive overcapacity in exotic medical devices brought about by our current insurance system. We also clearly pay far more for the same drugs than people in other countries.
If there is quite a bit of evidence, I'm sure it wo
Let me count the ways:
Constitutionality:
The constitution says people cannot be coerced into signing a contract. By anyone. If you don't like it amend the constitution, but you cannot just make up your own laws. That's called anarchy. So right there the bill is dead. But let me go on.
Common sense
The kings of inefficiency. The same people who spent so much of your social security and medicare money on things besides social security and medicare, to the point that the two programs have unfunded liabilities of over $100 trillion, are now going to, according to the bill, take 500B from medicare to pay for the new program and supposedly expand the roles of people on medicare and the new plan. Do some simple math! If you have a system that's already out of money, and you take more money from it to start a similar system, more than triple the number of people receiving benefits, it's going to cost more not less! You have to be insane if you think adding people to the government's dole will somehow lower costs as progressives claim. Keep in mind that in 1965 lawmakers predicted it would only cost 9$ billion by 1990, unfortuanly the real cost was $67 billion. But don't worry they were only off by A FACTTOR OF 7. I'm sure they are better and more trustworthy in making cost estimates today. Congress would never deceive us!
This bill causes lack of care (not coverage)
Sure the government will cover you for all preexisting conditions, there will just be no faciliteis or doctors to treat you! OH BUT YOU'RE COVERED!!! Tell it to the people in the UK or Canada who are waiting 6 months for a CT scan, where here in the U.S. it's unusual to wait for more than a few days. The New England Journal of Medicine estimates that a full 1/3 of doctors will "QUIT PRACTICING MEDICINE" if the bill passes, further eroding our resources. So ya, you're covered, but you're going to have to wait a few years for that liver transplant now. People other countries will no longer have a "capitalist health care system" to save them, unfortunately nether will we. We will have a government panel deciding who is worth said liver transplant and deciding who gets to live and die, instead of your doctor or a panel of your doctors. A healthy 19 yr/old kid, who hasn't put a dime into the system will be placed higher on the list than say a 60 yr/old man who has paid into the system his whole life. In essence the 60 yr/old man worked his whole life paying into a system that will deem him unworthy and spend his money on someone whom he has never met while he suffers and dies while younger "more economically viable" people will get treatment first. In the existing system, the same 60 yr/old man would be able to do whatever it takes for him to get his liver (insurance,debt,sell car/house etc.). While dems try and portray private insurers as evil for turning down procedures, drugs etc. keep in mind that the number 1 denier of care per capita is medicare! So there's another false argument made to try and pass this bill.
How much is too much?
People in this country continue to live longer and longer. This is attributable not to better diets or healthier living, but as a direct result of having invested such large sums of money into our health care system. I've heard 17% from democrats, decrying the amount. Dems say that our private insurance is increasing at too fast a rate (3%/yr) but they want to change us to a system that is similar to the unfunded medicare, but medicare is increasing at a rate much faste
Software pirates have had a 100% success rate at cracking games with any sort of protection. I'm no pirate cracker guy, but couldn't a creative hacker just host the 'magic same game server' on the local computer? I'm thinking using a little hosts lookup like suck.ubisoft.com = 127.0.0.1? Why is this approach so 'revolutionary'? If people can crack other online activation schemes why is this one significantly different?
To date, the only activation scheme that I haven't seen cracked properly is Arma 2, and I think the only reason is that it's really not apparent when the game "isn't working", it just causes accuracy with all your weapons to be off a little, just enough to make you miss 20% of the time. I'm sure the cracker got the game to start and said "done!".
So I look forward to watching the BT hordes downloading the fully operational crack for assassins creed 2, as they have with every single DRM / copy protected game ever made.
Here's a new idea for the DRM pushers... Don't do it. It does not help prevent piracy and really pisses off your legitimate customers. Today, someone who pirates a game is going to have a better experience than a person who bought the game and does not circumvent the DRM. And to what end? The people who you were trying to fetter are actually having a better experence with your game than your paying customers. Nothing was accomplished and many bridges were burned. The worst part for UBI was that the people pirating the game probably were not going to buy the game anyway, so the idea that preventing piracy would increase sales is a flawed theory in the first place. It would be like stopping a 17yr old meth addict from pirating autoCAD. To what end? To what end? Seems like nobody really thinks things all the way though these days.
Slashdot Mirror
Or you can keep your old computer running and play PSX games for years... and every other console that's more than a few years old.
So if you're a U.S. corporation made up of U.S. citizens you're protected. Although there is no guarantee of profit, there is tons of precedent for the U.S. government protecting the "profits" of its people.
My question to you is: why do you dislike U.S. citizens making money in such a general way. Me and two of my friends formed an LLC to shield us from liability were one of our programs to accidently take over the world. Am I evil simply because I entered into a capitalist venture (to pay the rent!)?
How about you complain about corruption and nepotism in government instead. There can be no doubt about the evil in corruption and nepotism, and that is the real complaint you have I believe. The best way to lessen this inherently human trait in government is to lessen the scope and size of government.
The simple act of selling goods and services at a profit is not evil. Preventing people from selling goods and services is the evil act. Nobody can know better than the individual what the individual wants and needs. Don't buy into the idea that the government can know what's best for everyone, viz: do you believe that someone, that you have never met and will never meet, knows more about what you want and need than yourself?
The government exercising its power to preserve and protect the “profits” of the citizenry may be the only legitimate function of the government, and is certainly the only reason we resort to government in the first place. All else is explicitly prohibited by the constitution.
Unfortunately the firewalls of the constitution were long ago breached and we can only hope that strict constitutionalist are elected to the various branches of government to try and reverse the massive expansion of the federal government.
Always err on the side of less government control.
This quote from C.S. Lewis best describes the scourge I'm talking about:
It is ironic that he hacked the account for political reasons and now has lost his right to vote. That alone seems like the ultimate poetic justice.
I'm pretty sure that if someone at the NSA had destroyed evidence that they had committed a crime they would be going down for a felony as well. The ironic part is that the guy was politically motivated and is now a felon and can no longer vote. Now that's a laugh. Sara took his right to vote away. There's some poetic justice in that fact alone.
In other news: Staying on the menu screen in quake II significantly improves frame rates and battery life over entering into the game and actually playing.
Nice try: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpGH02DtIws
@0:08:"..every corner of the United States. I've now been in fifty seven states? and I think one left to go one left to go and uh Alaska and Hawaii I was not allowed to go to even though I really wanted to but uh my staff would not justify it"
So lets count. he says 57 very clearly - then he goes on to say one left to go (58) then he says "and uh Alaska and Hawaii" (60). And I'm curious where you attribute your quote from. I've given you the actual video, meanwhile a google search for the phrase "Fifty sovereign states"+ obama returns nothing about an Obama quote.
Here's another funny one from the great leader. @1:49:"We should continue to push for a United Nations security council resolution to calling for an immediate end to the violence"
This shows a level of naivete has never been displayed in a president. Everyone knows that Russia is a veto wielding member of the UN security council and any threats made against Russia by the UN security council are totally meaningless. That this guy is now president and didn't know that one month prior to taking office speaks volumes of his knowledge and the knowledge of the people he surrounds himself with, or at least him and the people who write his speeches.
You always see people on the left trying to censor political opinions using laws with misleading fuzzy titles like "fairness doctrine". This is nothing more than a tool to silence the opinions of people the government does not agree with. It reminds me of a saying I once heard:
Conservatives are afraid you don't understand what they're talking about, liberals are afraid you do.
The 1st amendment was first for a reason, and when you start censoring anyone by fiat, and by an unelected political appointee no less, you've opened the flood gates for abuse of power. Why is it that the democrat party and the federal government no longer have a clearly defined line, but rather act in each others own best interest. For example the EPA: The EPA rules by fiat and is a political ally of the democrat party. The EPA does what it can do make sure democrats do well in the polls because the EPA - a branch of the government mind you - knows that when democrats are elected that more money and power will flow into the EPA apparatus. And that's just the EPA. All agencies in the government, unless specifically labeled 'conservative' are run by the democrat party. Many of the agencies are so large that they have taken on a life of their own and operate as a company that seeks power and glory rather than to serve the greater public good. And to that end they know that a vote for democrat is a vote to increase funding, scope and power of the federal government.
The only problem is that the government does not produce anything. All the government can do is tax people who do produce something and spend it on something else, filtering through a never-ending maze of bureaucratic red tape, nepotism and corruption and when it finally reaches its destination, only a fraction of what was taken from the taxpayer actually goes towards the problem in the first place.
No, really, I'm going somewhere with this.
I'm sure there are tons of people who want to rip holes in my argument and tell me that the EPA and the federal government aren't part of the democrat party. Whatever, you have your right to be wrong. Others will say that there is a military industrial complex that is beholden to conservatives. That's wrong too. You have privately owned defense contracting companies that actually produce something. Even if what they produce rubs you the wrong way, they are a hell of a lot more productive than the EPA. They are also private citizens and corporations of the US that are totally within their rights to lobby congress to their own best interests as it is every citizen and corporations[group of citizens] right in this country. Besides all that, Boeing isn't run by the RNC and doesn't really care who is running the country so long as they keep buying death rays from them they are happy to do business with whatever party is in the WH. I'm sure they are very happy with Obama because Obama means more sales for them. And it's hardly controlled by conservatives.
In the supreme court, the last bastion of conservatism. The two ideologies play out here with one side, the conservative side claiming to be strict constitutionalists. And the liberal side of the court is more happy to say the constitution is a living document that can be reinterpreted from time to time as the language changes - in direct contradiction of the framers. I'm not saying that the court shouldn't revisit old decisions and undo precedent, Dred Scott v Sandford for example. But we must adhere to some rule of law. Long ago liberals stopped adhering to the constitution and only bring it up as a weapon to strike out at their opponents with and is something to be ignored while it suits their agenda.
How can you say that the changing meanings of words in a language changes the sprit of the contract that was written long ago? When you
The leader of the free world came down from on high and told this guy to stop. The day after Obama speaks they pull his site down. Now if they had pulled it down immediately after this guy started talking about koran burning that would have indeed been all Rackspace and totally within their own rights to serve whomever they please. But once the POTUS comes down on the guy I'm sure Rackspace though "IRS(FCC,CIA,NSA,FTC etc) Audit time, this guy has got to go.". They obviously want to save their own skin not just from the political fallout but more from any retaliation from an openly hostile government.
Whether or not you agree with the guy you must admit that the government has no right to speak negatively about what this guy is doing, without giving equal feigned outrage at the burning of our flag, bible, constitution etc... Strange he[POTUS] only speak up now. Whatever happened to equal protection? If you say burning the koran is bad, why not through in the bible and the flag too.
But of course Christians and patriots don't go all jihad on people, so really the government is even more pathetic than first thought. Not only are they stopping out this guys rights to free speech but they are doing so at the behest of foreign invaders whom we are at war with. If the government isn't going to protect the rights of its citizens from foreign invaders what the hell good is it?
The chain of events is undeniable:
Obama speaks out publicly against this guy's speech > Rackspace takes him down.
If that's not government suppression of free speech rights - what is? How far does the government have to go in condemning what you say before you call it an infringement? When do you say "enough bad mouthing this guy just because of how he feels about Islam."
http://news.google.com/news/more?pz=1&cf=all&ned=us&topic=h&ncl=d1QWPuXxsUx51TMtOVUme7-2SzXLM
I'm sure that the amount of regulation in plant creation, "green" subsidies for solar and "politically correct" as opposed to "environmentally correct" disposal of waste serves to distort the true price of these sources.
Besides, anyone who has played sim city knows that nuclear is much cheaper.
I'm so happy to own a Droid X, so happy it's been rooted and I'm so happy to hear it from slashdot first!
I would like to point out that it's not just counting someone 6 times, it's making everyone else's vote count as 1/6th the vote of people "selected" by the government. What a great way to bring people together. This will just infuriate the people who are now worth a fraction of a vote and further isolate "selected" groups from the mainstream.
Since the government selects the multiplier and the "victim" group of people, it will be no surprise that the group will vote for a larger and more authoritarian government that gave them this power over the "regular" people. What obvious and malicious tampering, why secretly steel votes when you can just make a new law that does it for you!
And why stop at 6? Why not 10? Why not 100? Why not 1000? Once you have made the leap of logic that one person's vote is worth more than another person's vote there is no limit to how much you can alter the outcomes of elections to favor whatever candidate the controlling party likes. This is just pure banana republic, Hugo Chavez style lawlessness.
And this is from the same folks that think that a different test for everyone depending on their skin color is fair, but the same test for everyone regardless of skin color is unfair. More liberal logic: These people, what the liberals have forced me to call them, are not smart enough to take the same tests as "regular" people. But they should be given a vote that is worth 6x the vote as "regular" people, which by the liberal's standards, are smarter than them? That's just as stupid and contradictory as the two ideas on their own!
In this country, as it should be everywhere, everyone should be treated exactly the same regardless of their skin color, gender, age, religion. "These people" are "regular" people. It is only a label given to them by liberals and the government (ever fill out a government form?). There should be no arbitrarily payoffs by power hungry politicians of this group and that group. We are all humans. We live together in a society of laws that cannot be arbitrarily tossed aside when you want to get a few more votes.
To say, as liberals do, that one race is inferior to another is a crime against nature but it's said over and over by these people in the guise of helping. But the only result, and their only real interest, is a more authoritarian and power hungry government that has more interest in tricking, hiding and asserting total control over the people than helping the people.
Because it only works on Apple's devices, and is only allowed to exist at the draconian whim of Apple's secretive approval process. HTML5 works on any browser in any OS, no lock-in, ever. The W3C has no app review process. HTML5 is completely free to use or develop, Apple's app's cost at least a dollar to use, and untold (until you get approved, right?) heaps of money to develop . That's why.
Steve Jobs is a smug, prick, coward. Rather than argue based on the merits of your idea, or defend your ideas based on the fallacies or demerits of your opponent, he just tries to discredit the person. And what a smug way to do it: "What have you done that's so great?". Anyone who regresses into that has lost the argument. You see, it really doesn't matter what the hell someone else has done when you're defending your ideas Steve. And that makes you a intellectual coward. The turtleneck isn't doing anything to dispel the rumor that you're a smug prick either.
1. The panel said their conclusions where correct, yet where is the methodology they used to prove this? Or are they relying on the CRUs methodology to confirm the results of the CRU methodology? Sounds like post hoc ergo propter hoc.
.tar/.zip/.rar whatever and upload it to bittorrent/rapidshare/wikileaks whatever so anyone can access it. At the very least, do not become an impediment to the data's release, as has been shown beyond any reasonable doubt here.
2. Why are they suggesting they need professional statisticians if the conclusions were correct? Are they going to become more correct?
3. How can they know if their conclusions are correct without themselves reconstructing the experiments using the raw data that is now lost?
4. How can they on one hand say that there was no fraud, yet there was obviously an effort to subvert the FOA laws? Is this act somehow made ethical because it cannot be prosecuted?
5. And last of all, if this data and program that created the statistics are as "publicly available" as proponents of the CRU believe, then show me the link. This is the internet; just show me the URL to the data that convinced you that this data really is "publicly available".
6. If raw data is missing, how can they, or these auditors, even check their own calculations to see if the statistical models they used are correct?
And to the obvious responses to 5: Don't give me the run around "oh you can download it from the various sources that they got it from" bullshit, it's not my job to prove the CRU's theory, it's the CRU's job to prove it, all anyone else has to do is sit back and poke holes in the abundant logical fallacies. And if it's so damn important, the fate of the world and all, I would expect some talented CRU proponent, hell, the CRU themselves, to have packaged the whole dataset, including the "deleted" parts, into a XXXgb/tb/pb whatever b size
While I may not be a climatologist, I am a computer programmer, and I can tell when someone has written a program that will produce invalid data, for a non programmer to write a complex computer program, and have the countries of the world base their economies on it just seems insane to me. Would you have a stock broker write the code for the stock exchange? What if they are doing something like adding up temperatures as floats e.g.:averageTemp = (75.88+37.77+22.77...+200 more)/203 to get an average. A layman will look at the calculation and say "that looks great to me!" but even a first year CS student will see the huge problem adding so many floats, maybe the climatologist at the CRU didn't see a problem... But then nobody can really check to see if they have a problem, because they won't show anyone their source code, and subsequently how they even arrived at their conclusions, this alone makes this inquiry suspect. I would like to hear people say "You're not a computer programmer, you don't understand" as frequently as I hear people say "You're not a climatologist, you really don't understand..."
I'm not sure how proving the author of the quote wrong proves your point, but you're still wrong anyway. http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff0600.htm
I hope that's cleared that up. I would have a reasoned discussion but your claim that each state is not a republic, and your insistence that any proof I provide is inadequate somehow is just ridiculous. And you're hung up on a Jefferson quote, which it turns out you're wrong about, again. All you really need to do is put it in google with quotes around it and look around a little, and not come back and tell me the quote was something I made up.
I'm not sure how you can read Tocqueville and then became a defender of FDR. I said Kant's critique of pure reason creates a lot of the theories that we use in litigation today, "a priori" being one of them, not that Kant created the system of government. Then you blast me for showing you some books, only to then... show me some books, all of which I've read, and sadly came away with something different than you. I suppose you believe then that the constitution is living and breathing? I can't say anything to convince you, but here's James Madison's take:
"...I entirely concur with the propriety of resorting to the sense in which the Constitution was accepted and ratified by the nation. In that sense alone it is the legitimate Constitution. And if that be not the guide in expounding it, there can be no security for a consistent and stable, more than for a faithful exercise of its power. If the meaning of the text be sought in the changeable meaning of the words composing it, it is evident that the shape and attributes of the Government must partake of the changes to which the words and phrases of all living languages are constantly subject. What a metamorphosis would be produced in the code of the law if all its ancient phraseology were to be taken in its modern sense. And that the language of our Constitution is already undergoing interpretations unknown to its founders, will I believe appear to all unbiased Enquirers into the history of its origin and adoption."
-James Madison
From: Writings of James Madison Oh ya, read the federalist papers!
Who can say it better than the father of the U.S. Constitution?
"...I entirely concur with the propriety of resorting to the sense in which the Constitution was accepted and ratified by the nation. In that sense alone it is the legitimate Constitution. And if that be not the guide in expounding it, there can be no security for a consistent and stable, more than for a faithful exercise of its power. If the meaning of the text be sought in the changeable meaning of the words composing it, it is evident that the shape and attributes of the Government must partake of the changes to which the words and phrases of all living languages are constantly subject. What a metamorphosis would be produced in the code of the law if all its ancient phraseology were to be taken in its modern sense. And that the language of our Constitution is already undergoing interpretations unknown to its founders, will I believe appear to all unbiased Enquirers into the history of its origin and adoption."
-James Madison
From http://books.google.com/books?id=B0waAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=WRITINGS+of+James+Madison
No, actually you're a fool because you're wrong. State law trumps all federal law unless the state law is unconstitutional. In fact, any law that is found unconstitutional by the courts is null. That's why it's legal to smoke pot in some states, and is not federally. You obviously lack the basic understanding of what a constitutional republic is.
I did not say that and it is not some misquoted Wikipedia reference, all states have the same branches of government the federal government has, each state has its own constitution, that's what makes it a republic. But I don't have all day to give you a lesson. Just chalk it up to being ignorant, read about what constitutes a republic, and call yourself richer for the experience.
Like I said before, I was going to rebut them, one at a time, like I do with most comments, but once I read that, I quit taking anything you said seriously. Look, you seem like a nice enough guy, you're obviously just uninformed, everyone has been like that at one time in their life. But the good news is, they hide knowledge in books. Here are two books that make up the basis of our legal system. It's really fun to read about how this stuff all got formed. These two books introduce/expand upon the ideas of "natural law" and "a priori knowledge". If you don't know what that is, you really should! Anyhow, good reads if you plan on learning about constitutional republics. They're also really short. Most smart phones have book reader programs you can grab, these books can be downloaded in plain text, my favorite format, and you can stand on the shoulders of giants while you take a shit.
Here's a good place to get started
The Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant
Common Sense by Thomas Paine
I actually started to rebut your comments one at a time then I found this one. I guess you don't have any clue what you're talking about so I'll just leave you to your own devices. California is governed as a republic.
OH SNAPS! Guess what! Every state is it's own republic! And that would make you.
1. Ignorant
2. Stupid
3. A liar
I'll let you pick.
Didn't we just pass legislation that for the first time forces private citizens to buy a product from a select set of other private citizens. The constitution is no longer relevant to the party in control of our government. They have deemed it something that can be reinterpreted to mean whatever they need it to mean at the time. All they need to do is redefine what words mean and suddenly the constitution means all sorts of things!
:end rant
Here's a few examples:
1895: Wage is now the same as income! Democrats begin their long march towards socialism! With the help of the Socialist Labor Party of the 1890's, they pass an amendment so they can now collect income tax from everyone! The sucking noise begins.
1935: Now retirement and health care are a RIGHT and the government is required to provide for the "happiness" of the people by collecting money from one group of people and giving it to another. Democrats, unhappy with the difficulty of getting constitutional amendments, so they decide to craft laws that skirt the letter of the constitution, arguing that social security/medicare is an retirement benefit to the people, while arguing to the SCOTUS that it is a tax. When the SCOTUS rules the initial law unconstitutional, democrat FDR runs personal smear campaigns against SCOTUS justices and has them replaced with justices that are willing to interpret the constitution the way he needs it. And thus begins the largest ponzi scheme in world history!.
begin rant:
The government then took from the ponzi err. social security fund as frequently as pleased to and for whatever reason it deemed important enough to do so. Which was of course any reason. Now, were this a REAL business, at this point the CFO would be thrown in jail, but this is the U.S. government! They buy the jails! Social security has been bankrupt for decades, the debt is around 17 trillion. But this week, for the first time, even on paper, the government is giving out more money in social security than it is taking in..
I ask you, if the government can force you to buy something from someone, is there anything there anything the government can't force you to buy? And if the government can arbitrarily come in and tell me what I must buy, what I can buy, and what I can't buy, can we truly say we live in a free society?
And for you fools in control. What makes you think the next generation is going to pay any attention to the laws you so haphazardly pass when you completely ignore the laws of the previous generations? That's anarchy!
I would be remiss to point out that Thomas Jefferson was like a fricking Nostradamus in predicting what would happen in this country. And how can I possibly follow the words of Jefferson with my pathetic waxing? So adieu!
The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.
-Thomas Jefferson
Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question.
-Thomas Jefferson
Great innovations should not be forced on slender majorities.
-Thomas Jefferson
Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms [of government] those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.
-Thomas Jefferson
I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of the
You pointed out another example where the government is violating the constitution. You're making a logical fallacy called "begging the question". Because it is being used elsewhere without legal contest is not proof of its constitutionality. In fact dozens of AGs from various states are suing the federal government on the constitutionality of the bill. Here's one.. So maybe you can point out where in the commerce clause it says the government can force you to enter into a contract. Last time I checked the commerce clause only effected TAX. And I will also argue that the SCOTUS got that decision wrong. The idea that you can't grow your own food without the government taxing you because you're "effecting interstate commerce by not buying food" is ridiculous and more than a little tyrannical. If you support that decision it really speaks to your ideological background.
Just because it wasn't challenged does not make it automatically constitutional. And it's completely broke, totally out of money, and yes, it is exactly like it. If you read to the second page they're even skirting around the issue of rationing out care because " it cannot fall back on the strategy used by other states in hard times -- to simply remove people from the public insurance rolls by restricting eligibility. ". Why don't you think the same thing will happen here? Perhaps the same way the government has bankrupted social security and medicare? The examples are pretty obvious, just watch the line on your paycheck, hope you don't think you're getting that social security back when you retire. It's already gone. And now we're bowowing money from generations that have yet to be born, so we can start paying for a program for 10 years, but it only starts after 4? Non of this stuff troubles you?
If you're a cancer survivor, as I am, I think survival rate is everything! I really don't understand how "survival rate will be better even if you do no treatment what-so-ever." The only example given is completely made up, there is no 5yr toe cancer. The breast cancer example is just really stupid. The guy points out how the U.K. doesn't screen for breast cancer till 50 as a cost savings method, yet at age 40 you have a 1 in 68 chance of getting it before your 50.. And the U.K. has determined that if you live in the U.K. you simply cannot have the screening till you're 50 even if you really want it. I guess 1 in 68 are just fucked? I'm sure the 1 in 68 care a lot about how soon they get screened. That's probably why our breast cancer survival rates are so much better than the U.K.'s. Just because you're covered does not mean you're going to get care, the U.K. is a great example of that. Care denied is coverage denied. Think of the Donner party, they were on the right track, they just didn't get there in time. Even the hack who wrote the article admits at the end "UPDATE: This in no way means I'm opposed to mammography and/or early detection for breast cancer. That can absolutely make the difference in outcomes." Which is to say: His hypothetical is totally made up
You can't just breach the constitution and say "moving on..." it does not work like that. The fact that you total ignore the rule of law speaks volumes of your ideology.
I actually did read the CBO report. They claim that they will save money by cutting reimbursements for medicare by %20 and add that into the bill as a savings, but there is already legislation in place that will reimburse medicare doctors that %20, canceling out any savings (300b they estimate for that line alone) made from the cut. Then they say that they will use 500b from medicare to fiance the new plan, and write that up as a savings, as if taking money from medicare is somehow magically saving money. Maybe you should read the CBO report.
It's called the "Medicare Advisory Panel" And it's in the Senate bill
From one of the Doctors on the MAP:
Your trust that the government will manage this system effectively are not only unsupported by evidence, but is actually contradicted by hundreds of years of the government being totally infective in doing just about anything. Not only did they get the estimate wrong, they also blew all the medicare and social security trust fund money on... well not social security or medicare to say the least. You're told that the government is running a total 9 trillion dollar deficit. But that's not counting the over 100 trillion in unfunded medicare and social security liabilities. What on earth makes you think that the government can now be trusted with this third trust fund that dwarfs the other two? Isn't the definition of stupid doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result? If they couldn't be trusted then, and obviously they could not be, what makes you think that the situation has changed for the better?
Your trust in the government scares the crap out of me. Maybe it should scare you a little too.
I would continue but I need to get some sleep sooner or later. I look forward to your response.
Cancer survival rates are a much better indicator of the quality of the medical system than the life expectancy. And since the top 50 countries are within 4 or 5 years of each other there is no way anyone can say that "this one thing" is the reason for that disparity.
The U.S. infant mortality rate is not higher; the rates of Canada and many European countries are artificially low, due to more restrictive definitions of live birth. There also are variations in the willingness of nations to save very low birth weight and gestation babies.
Definitions of a live birth, and therefore which babies are counted in the infant mortality statistics very considerably. The U.S. uses the full WHO definition, while Germany omits one of the four criteria. The U.K. defines a still birth "a child which has issued forth from its mother after the twenty-fourth week of pregnancy and which did not at any time after being completely expelled from its mother breathe or show any other signs of life.
You are being deceived, but not by me.
The car insurance analogy is like comparing apples and oranges. First of all the government does not make you drive, but if you do drive you need insurance to have the privilege of using public roads. But to further tear up your argument. The government can revoke your license if you drive poorly, can the same be said for health care? Wouldn't that be like telling people who smoke that they can't go to the doctor anymore? Driving a car on public roads is a privilege that can be revoked. Living is not. Simply being born under this bill will require you buy something, and if progressives get a single payer plan, you will most likely buy from the government.
If you are diagnosed with a disease like cancer, time is your #1 enemy, and oftentimes it is how long it takes to get a CT scan or see an oncologist that makes the difference between life and death. So, you see, this is a really major issue. If you had a sucking chest wound would you want to wait more or less time? For that matter, if you had anything wrong with you, would you want to wait a longer time? You say there are huge inefficiencies in our system, but then fail to point out a single one. Here's a link that pretty much blows that whole argument out of the water though: Most Cancer Survival Rates in USA Better Than Europe and Canada. This is due to our better health care system. By the way, can you produce a list of high profile individuals that flew from the U.S. to the U.K. or Canada to receive medical treatment? Because they sure come here in droves! You also fail to point out how out health care system will compare when 1/3 of the doctors quit, and incentives (high pay) to practice medicine decrease.
I'm going to have to call you on that one. Maybe you can point out another country that has a better medical system, since they are so numerous and all. Be nice if you provided a link. Something real too, I don't want to hear about how the U.K. has more coverage, even if they have to wait for 6 months for a CT scan. Coverage delayed is coverage denied.
I pointed out in my earlier post that medicare is the #1 denier of claims. I pointed out how medicare costs are rising almost 2x as fast as private insurance, And cost estimates were wildly underestimated (predicted $9b actual $67b). How does that jive with your argument that the government run program is better? We have the proof that it is not run better right there! Where is your proof that the government is going to be more effective? Seems like you just want to debate the points you think you have a shot at winning, or so you thought!.
If there is quite a bit of evidence, I'm sure it wo
Let me count the ways:
Constitutionality:
The constitution says people cannot be coerced into signing a contract. By anyone. If you don't like it amend the constitution, but you cannot just make up your own laws. That's called anarchy. So right there the bill is dead. But let me go on.
Common sense
The kings of inefficiency. The same people who spent so much of your social security and medicare money on things besides social security and medicare, to the point that the two programs have unfunded liabilities of over $100 trillion, are now going to, according to the bill, take 500B from medicare to pay for the new program and supposedly expand the roles of people on medicare and the new plan. Do some simple math! If you have a system that's already out of money, and you take more money from it to start a similar system, more than triple the number of people receiving benefits, it's going to cost more not less! You have to be insane if you think adding people to the government's dole will somehow lower costs as progressives claim. Keep in mind that in 1965 lawmakers predicted it would only cost 9$ billion by 1990, unfortuanly the real cost was $67 billion. But don't worry they were only off by A FACTTOR OF 7. I'm sure they are better and more trustworthy in making cost estimates today. Congress would never deceive us!
This bill causes lack of care (not coverage)
Sure the government will cover you for all preexisting conditions, there will just be no faciliteis or doctors to treat you! OH BUT YOU'RE COVERED!!! Tell it to the people in the UK or Canada who are waiting 6 months for a CT scan, where here in the U.S. it's unusual to wait for more than a few days. The New England Journal of Medicine estimates that a full 1/3 of doctors will "QUIT PRACTICING MEDICINE" if the bill passes, further eroding our resources. So ya, you're covered, but you're going to have to wait a few years for that liver transplant now. People other countries will no longer have a "capitalist health care system" to save them, unfortunately nether will we. We will have a government panel deciding who is worth said liver transplant and deciding who gets to live and die, instead of your doctor or a panel of your doctors. A healthy 19 yr/old kid, who hasn't put a dime into the system will be placed higher on the list than say a 60 yr/old man who has paid into the system his whole life. In essence the 60 yr/old man worked his whole life paying into a system that will deem him unworthy and spend his money on someone whom he has never met while he suffers and dies while younger "more economically viable" people will get treatment first. In the existing system, the same 60 yr/old man would be able to do whatever it takes for him to get his liver (insurance,debt,sell car/house etc.). While dems try and portray private insurers as evil for turning down procedures, drugs etc. keep in mind that the number 1 denier of care per capita is medicare! So there's another false argument made to try and pass this bill.
How much is too much?
People in this country continue to live longer and longer. This is attributable not to better diets or healthier living, but as a direct result of having invested such large sums of money into our health care system. I've heard 17% from democrats, decrying the amount. Dems say that our private insurance is increasing at too fast a rate (3%/yr) but they want to change us to a system that is similar to the unfunded medicare, but medicare is increasing at a rate much faste
Software pirates have had a 100% success rate at cracking games with any sort of protection. I'm no pirate cracker guy, but couldn't a creative hacker just host the 'magic same game server' on the local computer? I'm thinking using a little hosts lookup like suck.ubisoft.com = 127.0.0.1? Why is this approach so 'revolutionary'? If people can crack other online activation schemes why is this one significantly different?
To date, the only activation scheme that I haven't seen cracked properly is Arma 2, and I think the only reason is that it's really not apparent when the game "isn't working", it just causes accuracy with all your weapons to be off a little, just enough to make you miss 20% of the time. I'm sure the cracker got the game to start and said "done!".
So I look forward to watching the BT hordes downloading the fully operational crack for assassins creed 2, as they have with every single DRM / copy protected game ever made.
Here's a new idea for the DRM pushers... Don't do it. It does not help prevent piracy and really pisses off your legitimate customers. Today, someone who pirates a game is going to have a better experience than a person who bought the game and does not circumvent the DRM. And to what end? The people who you were trying to fetter are actually having a better experence with your game than your paying customers. Nothing was accomplished and many bridges were burned. The worst part for UBI was that the people pirating the game probably were not going to buy the game anyway, so the idea that preventing piracy would increase sales is a flawed theory in the first place. It would be like stopping a 17yr old meth addict from pirating autoCAD. To what end? To what end? Seems like nobody really thinks things all the way though these days.