And how come it's not acceptable for a person to do climate research being for by an oil company, but it's it's ok for them to do climate research by a pro-global warming government group?
Either way they're being paid to find the results that the benefactor want's them to find, or else the money stops. Also, are you aware that scientists have been fired / blacklisted for disagreeing with global warming? Most scientists would be too scared about never working again or not being able to take care of their families to stick by their facts when faced with that kind of threat.
I find it amusing that just because I point out that it's mainly liberals who say that global warming will kill us all and we must sacrifice out society to do so, you start making all sorts of ridiculous insults and claiming I think there is a vast conspiracy. Lying for political gain is no vast conspiracy, nor is bribery. What's more likely? That we somehow have the ability to changed the climate permanently (a horribly arrogant and naive idea)? Or that a political group who want's to secure power is paying people to lie? We've witnessed the latter countless times - give one reason why it can't be true this time. Oh...that's right, because you're a liberal, right? You want to support your boys for fear that an evil Bush III will come to power (and while Bush was a crappy president, at least he's not hell bent on destroying our country like Obama is.....if Obama gets his way, we'll make the Soviet Union look like a utopia).
My motivations for this are NOT political - it's rational. I don't want to destroy our economy and entire way of life just because some guys got paid to do some bogus research, claimed the sky was falling, and then got a power hungry political party (which virtually all political groups are, not just liberals) to force through laws to fix the "problem". Take. Your. Time. The stakes are too high to pass society-damning laws without being 100% sure.
If you don't think evolution is political, then you really do need to experience the real world from time to time and stop spending all day reading slashdot. However, the difference is it doesn't matter if the controlling group believes in evolution or not because doing so won't cause them to try to destroy our economy and tax us back to the stone age because "fuel is evil". There isn't even remotely enough evidence to suggest that temperature changes have anything to do with human actions and instead of saying "We should take our time and be as sure as possible before acting so that we don't destroy our society trying to fix a problem that doesn't exist", we have your lord and savior Obama saying "No, don't think about it, do what I say NOW or we'll all die!!".
I have researched things on this (not that any of you care, your minds were made up the second you found out I didn't agree with you and decided I must be stoned to death as a heathen) and surprise -- every climate research facility or univeristy research study I found (amusing I was looking for PRO-man is causing temperature changes data) said that it's NOT caused by man, nor is there any reason to think this is anything other than warming up from the Little Ice Age.
I'm aware that I really should just stop bothering to try to point out flaws in your religion, but I keep hoping that one day I'll come across someone who'll actually think and not just recite what they're told to do. Only once you allow yourself to consider that you might be wrong can you truly look at what's going on and make a rational decision. Maybe the end result will be that you still think what you do now, but at least you'd have solid reason for that thought. Until you allow yourself to question your current belief, you're merely spouting dogma (doesn't matter if it's politics, economics, religion, etc).
Remember the vast majority of scientists who didn't believe in bacteria? Or that the world was round? Or that the sun was the center of the solar system?
The majority CAN be wrong you know. You're just too scared to be accused of being wrong that you blindly go along with whatever the majority thinks, even if you know it's incredibly stupid.
Very few people in the world actually care enough about principles to stick by them when someone waves a lot of money in their face to ignore them. Scientists are no different. I highly doubt you would stick by whatever you believe in if the government was offering you more money than you could ever dream of making to deny it.
Either you choose to believe that nearly all climatologists are incompetent
Actually, I choose to use Occam's Razor -- the vast majority (if not all) of the "man is destroying the planet" scientists are liberals and therefore have a desire to push their political views on people.....and what better way to get a liberal elected than to have liberals say "the world is doomed and only by electing us can we save it"? It's a tactic that's been used countless times over history....make up a problem (or exaggerate one) and then claim that only you can solve that problem (while the other person rightly says that the problem either doesn't exist or that it's being exaggerated). I also choose to look at the fact that there is a lot of money involved in climate research all of the sudden...and that that money is mostly coming from pro-global warming groups. Sure, you might get a grant the first time around, but it'll be a cold day in hell before you get a second grant from those groups if your research turns up anything that disagrees with their predetermined conclusion. Scientists are still human and still subject to that most common of human desires -- greed.
I also choose to look at the fact that as recently as the late 1800's we were still in an abnormally cold period and that it's only logical that we're still warming up from it. The Little Ice Age didn't happen over night, nor would it stop over night. Just as the Grand Canyon wasn't carved out in a day, the climate doesn't change instantly. In the geological time scale, 100 years is a blink of an eye.
I'm aware that liberals with mod points will probably mod me troll for daring to disagree with them, but I implore you to look at the simple logic of why these people have such good reasons to lie.
I did address them, but not in the way you wanted, by pointing out that the majority of the masses of asses will still go with IE because it's all they know and are terrified of trying something new. As such, by them continuing to use IE they will NOT be encouraging people to code to standards and the effect that you claim would happen probably won't (it might, but I wouldn't bet on it).
Do you really think someone who doesn't know that there are browsers besides IE (or don't even know what a browser is) will choose something other than IE? Most likely not. If they do, it'll probably be Chrome due to Google's name recognition.
Firefox and others haven't had the advantage of this "ballot box" and yet they have a much larger share than Opera. The simple fact of the matter is that most people just don't want to use Opera. People can make excuses of "unfair fight" or your comment about them not being able to render some pages right (I've never had that problem in any other browser), but in the end, you'll realize that the other browsers out there just do a better job than Opera and Opera will never be number 1 (unless they can BS the EU into making it mandatory that Opera be the default browser in Windows 8).
I used to use Opera back in the day (before firefox existed), and I liked it. However, with the other browsers out there now, the last time I used Opera I didn't care for it, nor do I see any reason to give it a try again unless somehow every other browser turns to crap in a few years.
People who actually know what a browser is (sadly, there's many people who don't know what a browser is - they think that IE IS "the internet") are well aware of the other browsers out there besides IE. Some of them, like a few IT people I know, say "IE does what I want, why would I change to another browser?" even though people repeatedly point out all the security flaws in IE. The rest of us already have tried several other browsers and have decided what we want. Most of us did NOT choose Opera and putting a box to select a different browser will probably not increase Opera's market share much, if at all.
If you can "barely tell a difference on TV shows", then you're most likely using coaxial for your HD TV, in which case, no, you wouldn't notice much of a difference because coaxial limits you to 480i. However, using component will let you get up to 1080i and HDMI goes all the way up to 1080p. If you are using HDMI and running HD shows at 1080p and claiming you can barely notice a difference, then you need to get to the doctor pronto to find out wtf is wrong with your eyes.
Yes, but as we all know, Australia was founded by criminals, so I clearly cannot choose the wine in front of you!
Seriously though, it looks like soon the US will make it illegal to have exclusive deals with cell phones and tethering will be available soon (regardless)...it's just a matter of how much it costs. If they end exclusive deals, then that should make tethering cheaper or free.
I have an iPhone 3GS and you CAN get Project Gutenberg on it -- it's just not called that. Download Stanza, then when you open it go to "online catalog", then scroll down and select Project Gutenberg (there are many other free places to get books from with Stanza). It's simple and doesn't require jailbreaking.
There's one thing that everyone is overlooking. If linux would become the dominant OS, there would be a hidden cost - many of us IT people would no longer have jobs fixing / maintaining MS systems. I love linux and have tried to get several people to switch to it, but I actually like businesses using Windows because it means job security.
It's kind of like a conversation we had at work the other day - every IT guy hates idiot users who can't check their email without having to call IT for help, but at the same time if it wasn't for most people being so incompetent when it comes to technology, many of us wouldn't have a job anymore.
Virtually every person I know who voted for Obama has said they regret it. The best part is, we told them he would do this crap, yet they refused to listen.
If you bothered to RTFA, you would see that you can register (via web site) what phones can use your box and that you buy the box OR pay a monthly fee for it. You do NOT pay for the box and then pay an extra monthly fee on top of it.
Too true. I know pharmacists making $100,000 per year (before taxes) that have to pay $20,000+ per year just for their malpractice insurance. That's completely ridiculous that they should lose 1/5 or more of their pre-tax income. Think of how much better use it could be put to (some of the pharmacists I know are religious and would donate at least a few thousand of that money to charities).
I love how every socialist / communist tries to claim that Stalin / Hitler / Castro "didn't follow TRUE socialism / communism". None of you ever stop to think about that fact that letting the government have absolute control over everything is be definition fascism. You can hide behind pretty lies and illusions, but it's not possible to have that amount of government control and still have freedom.
And popular equals good? Come on, this is slashdot. We're all aware that being smart isn't popular. I hardly think that you're going to argue that being smart isn't good.
Start googling what it would cost for a typical person to buy basic health insurance for themselves -- you'll see that it's typically the cost of eating out a few times a month, which yes, even most of the poor people could give up something (beer, smoking, fast food, etc) to pay for that insurance. The problem is that it's easier to cry for the government to steal someone else's hard earned money than to cut out unnecessary things to pay for health care.
US health care may be expensive, but it's also the best. I love how you try to use "everyone else does it" as a reason why government run health care is a good thing. Amusingly, many people each year have to come to the US for treatments that the "superior" goverment run health care can't / won't provide them. Can the government do things to help lower the cost of health care? Yes, and they should. However, turning control of health care over to the government is NOT the way to improve it.
Put down that copy of Marx's collected works, get a job, and you'll see why mooching off others is bad. Try reading something like Frederic Bastiat or an Economics textbook. Don't worry, I know you won't, which is why I'm not bothering to write a long response to you. You live in a narrow-minded world of "anyone who has more than me is evil" and your greed will never let you see more than that.
Again, you bring no actual argument other than "I want free stuff" to the discussion. So common of socialists / communists. I never said anything about me having money, because I don't. I'm a recent college graduate who spent the last few years making $8 an hour and now I'm doing short term contract work until I can find a full time position. But once again, you use lies to try to say "see, this guy is just an evil rich person who wants to hurt poor people". Again, so common of socialists / communists. You prey on the greed of the typical person as well as their jealously against anyone who has more than they do to get them to side with your cause, while wanting their money and possessions for yourself the whole time (but of course never telling THEM that they'll have to "share", you just lie to them and tell them that they'll only receive).
I'm well aware that the US is socialist and is always going further and further into that abyss. We've been that way ever since the 1930's, which is why it's such a joke that we put so much effort into fighting the socialists and communists during WWII and the Cold War, when we WERE them, just not as extreme. However, I will never be a socialist or a communist. I believe in freedom, justice, and being responsible for yourself and your own actions. These are all foreign concepts to you and they aren't ones that you can learn from a book or in a classroom. They are part of who you are. Some people, like you, are born greedy. You're only capable of thinking in terms of "it benefits me, therefore it is good". Would having government controlled health care make my life easier in some ways (not having to hassle with getting insurance, not having to pay a monthly bill, though I still WOULD be paying for it.....or do you think that tax money doesn't come from citizens?), but it's not right for someone else to be punished in order for my life to be made easier. I have no right to your money or other property, just as you have no right to my money or property.
my opinion is that people who can afford should share a little of that with those who cannot.
No one is arguing against people voluntarily sharing -- there's a word for that: charity. I myself give to charities when I have the extra money. I also give money to homeless people when I have the spare money and meet one. However, what you are arguing for is NOT charity. You are arguing that the government forcefully take someone's money and give it to someone else. There's a word for forcefully taking someone's money -- theft.
My opinion is that people who cannot afford health care should take responsibility for WHY they cannot afford it (or choose not to afford it). No one forced them to do drugs. No one forced them to drop out of school at 16. Those are choices that THEY made and now that they have to suffer the consequences of those poor choices, they're sitting there crying "no fair!" when they made the decisions that led to their current situation.
If your friends are "normal healthy people" who suffer from "occasional illness" then they shouldn't be paying more than $50 (absolute tops) for a doctors visit and then maybe up to $100 (most likely about $30) for medicine. Therefore, either your friends are lying, your friends aren't "normal healthy people", or YOU are lying.
People who get sick more will likely pay more because -- SHOCKER!! -- they use more services / need more medicine. These things cost money. Wow, who would've thought that?
As for "charging the poor the privilege of not dying" we actually have free (well, free to poor people, the idiot schmucks like me who actually work for a living pay for it) treatment for any serious health problems for people who can't afford it at any ER.
Now for the thing you idiots always ignore because it destroys your argument completely -- the US does most of the drug research. Do you realize how much money it costs to do research, drug trials, and get government approval for drugs to be sold? I have an uncle who used to work for a pharmaceutical company and only 1 out of 9 drugs that they develop end up getting approved for use. That means that 88.89% of all the money they spent on developing other drugs has ZERO return. The ONLY way for those companies to stay in business (and make new drugs) is to charge enough on the drugs that do get approved that they can make a profit. Also, the skills and education required to do this work are far from common, therefore the doctors and scientists working for them are, by necessity, paid more. Who would go through 10 years of school for $60,000 a year when you could get just as much for 4 years of school? No one. If you want smart, highly educated people, you have to give them a reason to go through the hell required to get that education.
You sir, are fucked, evil, and greedy. You want everything to be free without working for it or doing anything to deserve it. You think that others should be forced to work for your benefit. To paraphrase Office Space, "you know, the Nazi's had Jews to work for their benefit". Want to be a little bitch and cry that I mentioned Nazi's? Fine. How about this, colonial southerner's in the US had African slaves to work for their benefit. Like it or not, what you want IS a form of slavery. Just because in your "utopia" (note sarcastic quotation marks) people would get paid a small pittance doesn't make them any less slaves when most of the reward for the work they do is taken away for the benefit of others.
Oh, want a fun anecdote about the "evil" health care here? A guy I used to know when we were kids got out of college recently, no job yet, but just to be safe he paid for not-so-great $40 a month health insurance. Then he got massively sick with the worst case of ulcerative colitis that the doctors had ever seen. They had to do massive surgery multiple times. He's been in the hospital now for about 4-5 months straight. Guess what. That crappy $40 a month health insurance paid for all of it. Now if he'd been like the uninsured people crying for communist health care, he'd have spent the $40 a month on liquor and tobacco and then he'd be in deep shit. However, he decided to make a smart decision and pay a small amount for health care and everything's working out fine for him now.
But you know, how can you possibly fight an enemy if you don't make up lies so that others will help you destroy them. The funny thing is, the only reason that they're your enemy is your jealousy that you aren't the one making that much money. I'm not making that much, but I accept that I could have gone to school and been a doctor, yet chose not to. You need to quit crying over your bad choices and take responsibility that the life you have is the life you made -- you and no on else.
This is why Slashdot makes me sit and go "wtf?!" from time to time. You'll scream bloody murder if a company or government wants to tell you what you can do with your software or hardware, but yet you cheer them on when they want to take away your freedoms and money. No one is responsible to anyone else (excluding parents being responsible for their children, of course).
The joke is that the people like you promoting socialism / communism claim that people like ME are greedy for merely wanting to keep our liberty and keep what we rightfully earned through hard work. It is YOU who are greedy by wanting your life to be improved by forcefully taking money (and liberties) from people who worked harder than you and you're jealous that they have more.
Yes, jeez, imagine the horror of people actually being responsible for themselves and having to take care of themselves. Why would you possibly want to do that when you could just leech off those with more money (well, for the time being, until the government finally taxes it all away after a couple centuries and everything collapses)?
Some people, like me, are foolish enough believe in things like freedom. Apparently you're not one of them and would rather kiss the butt of someone like Castro or Stalin, just so that you can be lazy and not work hard while taking from those who did work hard.
As for medical care in the US, it's not nearly as expensive as the media makes it out to be (big surprise there, the media lying and blowing things out of proportion -- unheard of!). For a typical single person, you can get decent health insurance that will cover anything truly expensive for about $40 a month. With as much money as the typical uninsured person spends a month on cigarettes, they can easily afford to buy at least basic health insurance for themselves. The problem is that they'd rather keep wasting money on things they don't need (alcohol and tobacco) and cry that the government should force people who made better choices to pay for their health care for them.
You're incapable of seeing the difference between "having a better life" and a necessity. A necessity is food, water, shelter, and (if the climate where you live dictates it) clothing. That's as far as the list of necessities goes. Having a life beyond mere survival is in fact a luxury, even if you don't want to accept that it is.
Internet access in any industrialized country is NOT expensive and people should not be forced to pay money so that someone else can have a better luxury than they currently have.
Oh, and I've had a job since I was 10 and paid for virtually everything I've ever had since then, just a little fyi...
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And how come it's not acceptable for a person to do climate research being for by an oil company, but it's it's ok for them to do climate research by a pro-global warming government group?
Either way they're being paid to find the results that the benefactor want's them to find, or else the money stops. Also, are you aware that scientists have been fired / blacklisted for disagreeing with global warming? Most scientists would be too scared about never working again or not being able to take care of their families to stick by their facts when faced with that kind of threat.
I find it amusing that just because I point out that it's mainly liberals who say that global warming will kill us all and we must sacrifice out society to do so, you start making all sorts of ridiculous insults and claiming I think there is a vast conspiracy. Lying for political gain is no vast conspiracy, nor is bribery. What's more likely? That we somehow have the ability to changed the climate permanently (a horribly arrogant and naive idea)? Or that a political group who want's to secure power is paying people to lie? We've witnessed the latter countless times - give one reason why it can't be true this time. Oh...that's right, because you're a liberal, right? You want to support your boys for fear that an evil Bush III will come to power (and while Bush was a crappy president, at least he's not hell bent on destroying our country like Obama is.....if Obama gets his way, we'll make the Soviet Union look like a utopia).
My motivations for this are NOT political - it's rational. I don't want to destroy our economy and entire way of life just because some guys got paid to do some bogus research, claimed the sky was falling, and then got a power hungry political party (which virtually all political groups are, not just liberals) to force through laws to fix the "problem". Take. Your. Time. The stakes are too high to pass society-damning laws without being 100% sure.
I have researched things on this (not that any of you care, your minds were made up the second you found out I didn't agree with you and decided I must be stoned to death as a heathen) and surprise -- every climate research facility or univeristy research study I found (amusing I was looking for PRO-man is causing temperature changes data) said that it's NOT caused by man, nor is there any reason to think this is anything other than warming up from the Little Ice Age.
I'm aware that I really should just stop bothering to try to point out flaws in your religion, but I keep hoping that one day I'll come across someone who'll actually think and not just recite what they're told to do. Only once you allow yourself to consider that you might be wrong can you truly look at what's going on and make a rational decision. Maybe the end result will be that you still think what you do now, but at least you'd have solid reason for that thought. Until you allow yourself to question your current belief, you're merely spouting dogma (doesn't matter if it's politics, economics, religion, etc).
Remember the vast majority of scientists who didn't believe in bacteria? Or that the world was round? Or that the sun was the center of the solar system?
The majority CAN be wrong you know. You're just too scared to be accused of being wrong that you blindly go along with whatever the majority thinks, even if you know it's incredibly stupid.
Very few people in the world actually care enough about principles to stick by them when someone waves a lot of money in their face to ignore them. Scientists are no different. I highly doubt you would stick by whatever you believe in if the government was offering you more money than you could ever dream of making to deny it.
Either you choose to believe that nearly all climatologists are incompetent
Actually, I choose to use Occam's Razor -- the vast majority (if not all) of the "man is destroying the planet" scientists are liberals and therefore have a desire to push their political views on people.....and what better way to get a liberal elected than to have liberals say "the world is doomed and only by electing us can we save it"? It's a tactic that's been used countless times over history....make up a problem (or exaggerate one) and then claim that only you can solve that problem (while the other person rightly says that the problem either doesn't exist or that it's being exaggerated). I also choose to look at the fact that there is a lot of money involved in climate research all of the sudden...and that that money is mostly coming from pro-global warming groups. Sure, you might get a grant the first time around, but it'll be a cold day in hell before you get a second grant from those groups if your research turns up anything that disagrees with their predetermined conclusion. Scientists are still human and still subject to that most common of human desires -- greed.
I also choose to look at the fact that as recently as the late 1800's we were still in an abnormally cold period and that it's only logical that we're still warming up from it. The Little Ice Age didn't happen over night, nor would it stop over night. Just as the Grand Canyon wasn't carved out in a day, the climate doesn't change instantly. In the geological time scale, 100 years is a blink of an eye.
I'm aware that liberals with mod points will probably mod me troll for daring to disagree with them, but I implore you to look at the simple logic of why these people have such good reasons to lie.
I did address them, but not in the way you wanted, by pointing out that the majority of the masses of asses will still go with IE because it's all they know and are terrified of trying something new. As such, by them continuing to use IE they will NOT be encouraging people to code to standards and the effect that you claim would happen probably won't (it might, but I wouldn't bet on it).
Do you really think someone who doesn't know that there are browsers besides IE (or don't even know what a browser is) will choose something other than IE? Most likely not. If they do, it'll probably be Chrome due to Google's name recognition.
Firefox and others haven't had the advantage of this "ballot box" and yet they have a much larger share than Opera. The simple fact of the matter is that most people just don't want to use Opera. People can make excuses of "unfair fight" or your comment about them not being able to render some pages right (I've never had that problem in any other browser), but in the end, you'll realize that the other browsers out there just do a better job than Opera and Opera will never be number 1 (unless they can BS the EU into making it mandatory that Opera be the default browser in Windows 8).
The person I was replying to specifically mentioned not being able to tell the difference between SD and HD tv shows. =)
I used to use Opera back in the day (before firefox existed), and I liked it. However, with the other browsers out there now, the last time I used Opera I didn't care for it, nor do I see any reason to give it a try again unless somehow every other browser turns to crap in a few years.
People who actually know what a browser is (sadly, there's many people who don't know what a browser is - they think that IE IS "the internet") are well aware of the other browsers out there besides IE. Some of them, like a few IT people I know, say "IE does what I want, why would I change to another browser?" even though people repeatedly point out all the security flaws in IE. The rest of us already have tried several other browsers and have decided what we want. Most of us did NOT choose Opera and putting a box to select a different browser will probably not increase Opera's market share much, if at all.
If you can "barely tell a difference on TV shows", then you're most likely using coaxial for your HD TV, in which case, no, you wouldn't notice much of a difference because coaxial limits you to 480i. However, using component will let you get up to 1080i and HDMI goes all the way up to 1080p. If you are using HDMI and running HD shows at 1080p and claiming you can barely notice a difference, then you need to get to the doctor pronto to find out wtf is wrong with your eyes.
Yes, but as we all know, Australia was founded by criminals, so I clearly cannot choose the wine in front of you!
Seriously though, it looks like soon the US will make it illegal to have exclusive deals with cell phones and tethering will be available soon (regardless)...it's just a matter of how much it costs. If they end exclusive deals, then that should make tethering cheaper or free.
The Veyron has been around since 2005 -- this is the new convertible version.
I have an iPhone 3GS and you CAN get Project Gutenberg on it -- it's just not called that. Download Stanza, then when you open it go to "online catalog", then scroll down and select Project Gutenberg (there are many other free places to get books from with Stanza). It's simple and doesn't require jailbreaking.
There's one thing that everyone is overlooking. If linux would become the dominant OS, there would be a hidden cost - many of us IT people would no longer have jobs fixing / maintaining MS systems. I love linux and have tried to get several people to switch to it, but I actually like businesses using Windows because it means job security.
It's kind of like a conversation we had at work the other day - every IT guy hates idiot users who can't check their email without having to call IT for help, but at the same time if it wasn't for most people being so incompetent when it comes to technology, many of us wouldn't have a job anymore.
Virtually every person I know who voted for Obama has said they regret it. The best part is, we told them he would do this crap, yet they refused to listen.
If you bothered to RTFA, you would see that you can register (via web site) what phones can use your box and that you buy the box OR pay a monthly fee for it. You do NOT pay for the box and then pay an extra monthly fee on top of it.
Too true. I know pharmacists making $100,000 per year (before taxes) that have to pay $20,000+ per year just for their malpractice insurance. That's completely ridiculous that they should lose 1/5 or more of their pre-tax income. Think of how much better use it could be put to (some of the pharmacists I know are religious and would donate at least a few thousand of that money to charities).
I love how every socialist / communist tries to claim that Stalin / Hitler / Castro "didn't follow TRUE socialism / communism". None of you ever stop to think about that fact that letting the government have absolute control over everything is be definition fascism. You can hide behind pretty lies and illusions, but it's not possible to have that amount of government control and still have freedom.
And popular equals good? Come on, this is slashdot. We're all aware that being smart isn't popular. I hardly think that you're going to argue that being smart isn't good.
Start googling what it would cost for a typical person to buy basic health insurance for themselves -- you'll see that it's typically the cost of eating out a few times a month, which yes, even most of the poor people could give up something (beer, smoking, fast food, etc) to pay for that insurance. The problem is that it's easier to cry for the government to steal someone else's hard earned money than to cut out unnecessary things to pay for health care.
US health care may be expensive, but it's also the best. I love how you try to use "everyone else does it" as a reason why government run health care is a good thing. Amusingly, many people each year have to come to the US for treatments that the "superior" goverment run health care can't / won't provide them. Can the government do things to help lower the cost of health care? Yes, and they should. However, turning control of health care over to the government is NOT the way to improve it.
Put down that copy of Marx's collected works, get a job, and you'll see why mooching off others is bad. Try reading something like Frederic Bastiat or an Economics textbook. Don't worry, I know you won't, which is why I'm not bothering to write a long response to you. You live in a narrow-minded world of "anyone who has more than me is evil" and your greed will never let you see more than that.
Again, you bring no actual argument other than "I want free stuff" to the discussion. So common of socialists / communists. I never said anything about me having money, because I don't. I'm a recent college graduate who spent the last few years making $8 an hour and now I'm doing short term contract work until I can find a full time position. But once again, you use lies to try to say "see, this guy is just an evil rich person who wants to hurt poor people". Again, so common of socialists / communists. You prey on the greed of the typical person as well as their jealously against anyone who has more than they do to get them to side with your cause, while wanting their money and possessions for yourself the whole time (but of course never telling THEM that they'll have to "share", you just lie to them and tell them that they'll only receive).
I'm well aware that the US is socialist and is always going further and further into that abyss. We've been that way ever since the 1930's, which is why it's such a joke that we put so much effort into fighting the socialists and communists during WWII and the Cold War, when we WERE them, just not as extreme. However, I will never be a socialist or a communist. I believe in freedom, justice, and being responsible for yourself and your own actions. These are all foreign concepts to you and they aren't ones that you can learn from a book or in a classroom. They are part of who you are. Some people, like you, are born greedy. You're only capable of thinking in terms of "it benefits me, therefore it is good". Would having government controlled health care make my life easier in some ways (not having to hassle with getting insurance, not having to pay a monthly bill, though I still WOULD be paying for it.....or do you think that tax money doesn't come from citizens?), but it's not right for someone else to be punished in order for my life to be made easier. I have no right to your money or other property, just as you have no right to my money or property.
my opinion is that people who can afford should share a little of that with those who cannot.
No one is arguing against people voluntarily sharing -- there's a word for that: charity. I myself give to charities when I have the extra money. I also give money to homeless people when I have the spare money and meet one. However, what you are arguing for is NOT charity. You are arguing that the government forcefully take someone's money and give it to someone else. There's a word for forcefully taking someone's money -- theft.
My opinion is that people who cannot afford health care should take responsibility for WHY they cannot afford it (or choose not to afford it). No one forced them to do drugs. No one forced them to drop out of school at 16. Those are choices that THEY made and now that they have to suffer the consequences of those poor choices, they're sitting there crying "no fair!" when they made the decisions that led to their current situation.
If your friends are "normal healthy people" who suffer from "occasional illness" then they shouldn't be paying more than $50 (absolute tops) for a doctors visit and then maybe up to $100 (most likely about $30) for medicine. Therefore, either your friends are lying, your friends aren't "normal healthy people", or YOU are lying.
People who get sick more will likely pay more because -- SHOCKER!! -- they use more services / need more medicine. These things cost money. Wow, who would've thought that?
As for "charging the poor the privilege of not dying" we actually have free (well, free to poor people, the idiot schmucks like me who actually work for a living pay for it) treatment for any serious health problems for people who can't afford it at any ER.
Now for the thing you idiots always ignore because it destroys your argument completely -- the US does most of the drug research. Do you realize how much money it costs to do research, drug trials, and get government approval for drugs to be sold? I have an uncle who used to work for a pharmaceutical company and only 1 out of 9 drugs that they develop end up getting approved for use. That means that 88.89% of all the money they spent on developing other drugs has ZERO return. The ONLY way for those companies to stay in business (and make new drugs) is to charge enough on the drugs that do get approved that they can make a profit. Also, the skills and education required to do this work are far from common, therefore the doctors and scientists working for them are, by necessity, paid more. Who would go through 10 years of school for $60,000 a year when you could get just as much for 4 years of school? No one. If you want smart, highly educated people, you have to give them a reason to go through the hell required to get that education.
You sir, are fucked, evil, and greedy. You want everything to be free without working for it or doing anything to deserve it. You think that others should be forced to work for your benefit. To paraphrase Office Space, "you know, the Nazi's had Jews to work for their benefit". Want to be a little bitch and cry that I mentioned Nazi's? Fine. How about this, colonial southerner's in the US had African slaves to work for their benefit. Like it or not, what you want IS a form of slavery. Just because in your "utopia" (note sarcastic quotation marks) people would get paid a small pittance doesn't make them any less slaves when most of the reward for the work they do is taken away for the benefit of others.
Oh, want a fun anecdote about the "evil" health care here? A guy I used to know when we were kids got out of college recently, no job yet, but just to be safe he paid for not-so-great $40 a month health insurance. Then he got massively sick with the worst case of ulcerative colitis that the doctors had ever seen. They had to do massive surgery multiple times. He's been in the hospital now for about 4-5 months straight. Guess what. That crappy $40 a month health insurance paid for all of it. Now if he'd been like the uninsured people crying for communist health care, he'd have spent the $40 a month on liquor and tobacco and then he'd be in deep shit. However, he decided to make a smart decision and pay a small amount for health care and everything's working out fine for him now.
But you know, how can you possibly fight an enemy if you don't make up lies so that others will help you destroy them. The funny thing is, the only reason that they're your enemy is your jealousy that you aren't the one making that much money. I'm not making that much, but I accept that I could have gone to school and been a doctor, yet chose not to. You need to quit crying over your bad choices and take responsibility that the life you have is the life you made -- you and no on else.
This is why Slashdot makes me sit and go "wtf?!" from time to time. You'll scream bloody murder if a company or government wants to tell you what you can do with your software or hardware, but yet you cheer them on when they want to take away your freedoms and money. No one is responsible to anyone else (excluding parents being responsible for their children, of course).
The joke is that the people like you promoting socialism / communism claim that people like ME are greedy for merely wanting to keep our liberty and keep what we rightfully earned through hard work. It is YOU who are greedy by wanting your life to be improved by forcefully taking money (and liberties) from people who worked harder than you and you're jealous that they have more.
Yes, jeez, imagine the horror of people actually being responsible for themselves and having to take care of themselves. Why would you possibly want to do that when you could just leech off those with more money (well, for the time being, until the government finally taxes it all away after a couple centuries and everything collapses)?
Some people, like me, are foolish enough believe in things like freedom. Apparently you're not one of them and would rather kiss the butt of someone like Castro or Stalin, just so that you can be lazy and not work hard while taking from those who did work hard.
As for medical care in the US, it's not nearly as expensive as the media makes it out to be (big surprise there, the media lying and blowing things out of proportion -- unheard of!). For a typical single person, you can get decent health insurance that will cover anything truly expensive for about $40 a month. With as much money as the typical uninsured person spends a month on cigarettes, they can easily afford to buy at least basic health insurance for themselves. The problem is that they'd rather keep wasting money on things they don't need (alcohol and tobacco) and cry that the government should force people who made better choices to pay for their health care for them.
You're incapable of seeing the difference between "having a better life" and a necessity. A necessity is food, water, shelter, and (if the climate where you live dictates it) clothing. That's as far as the list of necessities goes. Having a life beyond mere survival is in fact a luxury, even if you don't want to accept that it is.
Internet access in any industrialized country is NOT expensive and people should not be forced to pay money so that someone else can have a better luxury than they currently have.
Oh, and I've had a job since I was 10 and paid for virtually everything I've ever had since then, just a little fyi...