"a threat to the apolitical nature of public school governance and academic content standards in California."
That (laughably) implies schools in general are apolitical entities. The supposed apolitical nature of textbooks is just an example of this. The GP was pointing out a specific example of a definite political bent in recent news involving the CA school system... The GP could have have spent hours dredging up examples of systemic bias in public schools in the USA, but I'm sure it was just easier to refer to a recent example fresh in his or her memory. This in no way implies a lack of understanding by the GP. It may be true that the GP does not understand the difference, but such a conclusion cannot be reached solely on that one comment.
One of the reasons I use the Enterprise editions is to *not* have to update my primary system every six months or so -- indeed, I'm waiting for RHEL 6 before I go through the process.
'Every six months'? RHEL 5 is three years old. It (and it's derivatives like CetOS 5) has reached the point where we can't even compile our latest code on it without replacing every library we use on the system. And you're running the version before that. Are you really surprised that Adobe isn't supporting your platform?
Meanwhile the x86_64 Flash plugin for Mozilla works pretty good on my (old) Fedora Core 10 workstation. I think Linux is the only platform you can even get a native 64bit binary of Flash for. So yeah, I think Adobe's Flash support on Linux isn't half bad.
You didn't understand the point. The routers are working on different channels, but everyone connected to a single wireless router are all on the same channel. So unless each device has its own AP, the bandwidth is shared.
One of my fondest possessions is a thank-you card with crayon drawings on it I received from Tulane's Children's Hospital in New Orleans for some video games I sent them through CP a couple years back. The donations get to the kids, and it really does make their lives better.
Well, I suppose instead of conflating wild theories, you could go ahead and read the law that the person you were responding to linked:
4. IF THE ENTITY REQUIRES PROOF OF LEGAL PRESENCE IN THE UNITED STATES BEFORE ISSUANCE, ANY VALID UNITED STATES FEDERAL, STATE OR LOCAL GOVERNMENT ISSUED IDENTIFICATION.
Of course that would be silly... We don't read articles here.
Caveat: Last time I got my Louisiana driver's license, I don't remember much of a requirement to prove I was in the US legally, so a Louisiana driver's license may not be sufficient (but that's Louisiana's fault, not Arizona's fault). It has been about four years, though, and I'm not in Louisiana anymore, so I could be mistaken.
I know they'd better accept a NJ driver's license! It was easier to get my security clearance than it was to meet the documentation requirements for my license here...
This is my one snarky comment at the beginning about the poor grammar, poor spelling, personal attacks, and logical fallacies found throughout your post: Wow, really?
Starting here, I'll do my best to treat you as a reasonable adult and do you the courtesy you failed to do me...
You are really the media's bitch, aren't you?
It is wrong to make someone have to show their papers that fact that someone may not ahve another solution doesn't change that. This behaviors is no more then 'OMG won't someone think of the children' knee jerk reaction.
Actually I kinda agree with you there. I don't think a peace officer should be able to walk up to someone and demand to see identification without reasonable cause. Arresting someone solely for failure to produce identification is stupid. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court disagrees with both of us.
However, I do believe that if someone is unable to produce identification when they've been stopped for some other reason (running a red light, investigating a robbery, etc.) it's perfectly reasonable for a peace officer to determine whether the individual is a legal resident. To use a car analogy: Checking if someone is illegal should be a secondary offense, not a primary offense. If the law is written in such a way that an officer can stop someone solely to determine their citizenship, I don't think it'll stand up to challenge in court... But I think a law that said an officer had an obligation to determine someone's citizenship during a stop for another reason would be reasonable and would probably withstand challenges.
And the fact that you don't have another solution does matter. You're not adding anything to the discussion, therefore you're safe to ignore.
So let me get this straight: When republicans have control of all 3 branches, it's the states responsibility to handle immigration. And those damn states that have democrats in them are the problem.
When a democrat is in the white house is suddenly 'the feds don't do anything' it's the dems fault.
You don't see a fucking logical flaw there?
Did I mention Democrats and Republicans? I don't recall doing it... Because the honest truth is BOTH PARTIES are complicit in not enforcing immigration law because BOTH PARTIES benefit from it.
And no, it's always been a Federal problem. Whether it was Obama, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan... The Federal government has absolutely failed at its responsibility of securing our national borders. I'd really like to see you back up your claim that people were blaming the states for border enforcement!
Now there are examples (to this day) of states that have codified 'safe harbor' laws to protect illegal immigrants from federal authorities, and I think that's pretty ridiculous. You have municipalities and states that have laws on the books that make them complicit in assisting individuals in violating federal law! If we were talking about laws that hid tax evaders, smugglers, drug dealers, etc. from federal authorities no one would accept that sort of behavior from a state or local government!
Immigration is a federal issue, not a state issue. And at no point did local officials illiberally enforcing imigration make the feds look bad.
Actually, yes it did. Last I checked, there were something like sixty local law-enforcement agencies signed up under a DHS/ICE program to empower local law enforcement officers to track down illegal aliens.
Here is in idea you can try and wrap your walnut sized brain around: How about we actually look at the tlaking point claimes and see if they ahve any merit. AThen lets determin the level of enforcement we should apply to deal with risks.
Which claims? I don't care about talking points, I care about the law. People are here illegally. They are breaking the law. They should be punished, if for no other reason than to do otherwise i
I find it funny that people are now using H1B/Student visa holders as an example of why enforcing immigration laws are bad, considering for the past four or five years they're the reason I've been pushing for immigration enforcement.
I had several really good friends back when I was in graduate school who were here on Student Visas. These guys were stellar, and our program benefited greatly from their presence. But seeing the legal hoops they had to jump through, seeing their families having to mortgage their homes to pay not just tuition but all the fees associated with their staying in the country, seeing the constant sense of dread that they'd be sent back home due to some screw up (which did happen to one of them for a semester), seeing the horrible restrictions on their ability to work to support themselves while they were here... And then while all this is going on, seeing the speaker of the US House of Representatives say that illegal aliens should be given in-state tuition! When she said that, my lab partner turned to me and said "If that passes, I'm tearing up my Visa and claiming I'm from Mexico. Being a legal alien isn't worth it."
The current state of US immigration law enforcement actively PUNISHES H1B and Student visa holders, while rewarding those who thumb their nose at the system. This is the first step to rectifying that. It has nothing to do with being a "redneck" and everything to do with wanting the law to be enforced.
If you don't like this law, then what's your solution? The Federal Government is NOT willing to enforce immigration law themselves (and they had even started farming enforcement out to local officials, until the officials started doing a good job which made them look bad), so what option does Arizona have?
The accompanying FAQ says that email with customer info stored on portable devices has to be encrypted ON THE DEVICE. That means no corporate email for iPads, smartphones, etc. Think about it.
Must I encrypt my email if it contains personal information? If it is not technically feasible to do so, then no.
The property is currently assessed at about 2/3 of the value I'm buying it for. They don't reassess unless you specifically request it in this township. The yearly tax on the property is (based on my calculation of dividing tax bill by assessed value) ~6% of the assessed value. There are areas in the state with a lower percentage (all the way down to 1-2%), but they come with high crime rates and very bad schools. So, yes, the existing residents happily allowed elected officials to raise their taxes that high. I can't understand it. Back in my home state, the first $75k of your primary residence was non-taxable. No such luck here. TOWNSHIP WANTS YOUR MONEYS! The new governor that took office in January is promising property tax relief (as opposed to the old governor, who thought the taxes were fair because he paid $16k on his $3m home), but we'll see what comes of that.
I'll be shortly "buying" a house myself. The monthly cost of the property tax on it is equal to 80-90% of the monthly cost of the mortgage! Property tax is practically DOUBLING my monthly out-of-pocket expense for "owning" the home. If anything, the GP's property tax amount is too low to reflect reality in many places!
You know, I'm usually on the side of "GPL/FSF is a bit too fundamentalist" myself... But I find your obvious troll to be laughably ridiculous.
You're saying a court case that says "You can't use Open Source software in violation of said software's license" will cause companies to not use Open Source software? Then these are probably the companies we DON'T want using it in the first place! How is that not obvious to everyone?
Someone using your code in violation of the license you picked for it is not a "win" for you. If all a developer cared about was having as many people as possible use his or her code, then it would be released in the public domain. A developer of Open Source software obviously has different goals in mind.
So, because of the 'set up as self-employed and then get a long-term job with the exact same role as you would have if you were employed' tax scam, the IRS is undoubtedly within its remit to investigate.
What's the scam here, exactly? The self-employed person will pay at least as much, but most likely more, taxes as the employee would bring in as tax revenue.
Except, as someone else has said, the MMR vaccine was introduced in 1971. The increase in autism diagnosis coincided with the 1980 release of DSM III (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), which changed the methods of diagnosis so that many patients that previously would have been considered 'mentally retarded' were now considered autistic or suffering from an autism spectrum disorder. So no, the rise in diagnosis followed the introduction of the MMR vaccine by a decade.
I also have a chart, by the way, that shows a direct correlation with the decrease in pirates and the increase in global sea temperatures.:)
I've tried three times now to write a response to you at the end of the day after my work was finished... And all three times the X server on my workstation locked up after I was 3/4 of the way through. Today I'm off of work, so let's see if my home PC is up to the task...
I did not so argue. I said they could. The reason I take that position is because they have an innate advantage no private concern can match: 100% decoupling between their operating costs and continuing viability and the job they do. This is, as we know, also part of the reason they can (and often do) perform poorly.
The other--even bigger, in my opinion--reason that often perform poorly is that there is for all practical purposes a 100% decoupling between their PERFORMANCE and continuing viability. More on this later...
That's a matter of getting better at government.
If that's all that it's a matter of, then why hasn't anyone else been able to do it yet? The government plans elsewhere in the world don't solve problems you cite with the system.
I think it can be done; I reject your argument that government is inherently going to wreck anything it touches.
You could reject my argument that the sky is blue, as well, but it won't change the sky's color.:)
drive on marvelous highways over immense amounts of area;... I have crossed some of the most beautiful bridges in the world,
I have been inside, and used, the library of congress, and I have experienced the stunning beauty of monumental art in the nation's capital and elsewhere.
That's a great example of what Government is extremely good at, actually: Taking care of itself. This played out during the health care debate, as well--even in the most radical "single payer" type plans that were suggested, our senators and representatives would have kept their cushy health benefits.
Government can do things well. Does that mean they should get a pass here? No. It means we should try, rather than cowering in our boots because we know also that government has failed us in other areas.
I'm generally willing to give people trying visionary, risky, or even crazy things the benefit of the doubt. But only with a catch: They bear the burden of their failure. This is never a feature of massive government social engineering programs. We already have two Federally managed health systems: Medicare and Medicaid. Both are over budget, under performing, and end up making health care more expensive for everyone else. They're embarrassments. And they will never be in any danger of being shut down because of their poor performance. There will never be a reckoning.
And on top of that, we're supposed to trust the people who couldn't run two health care systems with a third system that's larger than the other two put together? Without requiring them to fix the first two? How is this anything but madness?
Note I didn't even touch on how heartwrenchingly embarrassing the VA Health System is... What's most infuriating about that is that it's not even an example of some stupid attempt at social engineering, it's supposed to be us paying a debt that's owed to those who serve. And we can't even do that right!
No. I'm saying you should have your benefits, and so should they. How you got to the point of making
You're approaching this as if I had declared that eliminating private insurers was the only factor.
No, I'm approaching this as if you've argued that government will provide a superior service. It won't.
As far as your friends with chronic illness... I agree with you that something should be done, but I disagree that it's 'evil' for insurance companies not to cover them. Not even considering *profits*, any company that accepted them would only stand to lose money. Lots of money. It's not just a responsibility to shareholders, but also to those people currently using their services that would drive a company to not take on such a burden. Insurance companies insure against future misfortune, the couple you spoke of is well past that point.
I'm just saying that one of the things that needs to be done is to remove the profit motivated, skimming entities from the middle of the process.
So what you're saying is I should give up my benefits so that we can all have equally bad care, instead of trying to improve the situation of those at the bottom. And you wonder why people oppose you?
They add cost, and they deny people care, and they aren't part of the actual medical process - they are not the sick, and they are not the health professionals.
All those things are even more true about the government.
I honestly cannot understand why people in the USA, of all places, where equal opportunity, as best as we can manage, is such a strong basic precept... I can't understand why they want to skimp.
Equal opportunity does not mean equal results.
Truly, I don't understand how we can let (approximately) 35 million people sit at home (presuming they have a home) suffering from all manner of medical problems that we are fully capable of addressing, or at least, ameliorating.
How many of those 35 million are without health coverage by choice?
Maybe I'm just stupid. But I really don't get it. And it makes me very angry.
You're not stupid. I think you're just letting your emotional need to "Do something!" override everything else.
Government health care will not improve the problems you cite with the current system. People are routinely denied care (either explicitly via fiat or implicitly via reduced availability of services) in existing government systems, leading to the creation of private alternatives and patients fleeing to other countries for help... Bringing us back to the same situation of "haves" getting good medical care and "have nots" suffering under a broken system.
If you truly believe the profit motive is the real culprit behind all health care woes, then the Non-profit Coops should be a good alternative for you to support. Honestly that's the way my car insurance is handled, and I've been pretty happy with them. I'd even be willing to support the creation of such things, but it seems no one wants to take the time to do things correctly and instead we have to accept an "all or nothing" option designed to completely wreck the system for the majority of us.
First, I'd like to thank you for making your point in a calm, respectable manner, as opposed to the frothing puddle of vitriol I was responding to.
An open profit requirement is a toxic ingredient in such an undertaking, absolutely guaranteed to damage the process. Which is exactly what we see here in the USA.
Your argument would be convincing except for the overwhelming evidence that government run (therefore, not profit motivated) health care in other nations is also guilty of denying (or at least making difficult) necessary treatments to the sick, making decisions based purely on cost and not necessity/effectiveness, etc.
For a large number (if not the majority) of Americans, the medical system isn't that broken. Most of us are happy with the care we're receiving now and that's why we're so opposed to the way things are going. Want to help those who can't help themselves? Fine. But we refuse to believe that means lowering our quality of care in the process.
My "profit motivated" insurance company has done a damn good job taking care of me and my wife. My parents' "profit motivated" insurance company did the same for me beforehand. The same is true for my entire (employed) extended family. And don't claim it's because we didn't get chronic illnesses or some such silliness... I've had about a dozen family members with cancers of various types, four with chronic heart conditions, and one with AIDS. None of them were denied necessary treatments. None of them were bankrupted due to medical bills. Heck, I can't even really think of any cases where they were denied treatment that would only ease their suffering, not actually cure the problem.
On the other hand, I can point to recent examples of the NHS in Britain deciding "This treatment is known to alleviate the symptoms of a chronic problem, but we will no longer cover it due to cost and require patients to try alternative therapies." Is the NHS motivated by profit and therefore subject to a toxic conflict of interest?
1. One bound in servitude as the property of a person or household.
2. One who is abjectly subservient to a specified person or influence
American Heritage Dictionary
That sounds like what's being proposed to me.
Palin loving Fox News watching? Seriously? Wow.
Why am I even arguing with an AC, anyway...
slavery is not a raft of measures to prevent health insurance companies placing profit before peoples' lives.
Health insurance companies make less profit than Yahoo. If they're placing their profits before people's lives, they're doing it wrong.
This push isn't about making health insurance companies behave, it's about destroying them and increasing the power and scope of the government. It's about further redistribution of wealth from those willing to provide for themselves to those willing to accept government payouts in return for votes.
If this was about doing the right thing, they'd take time to do it right, not try to rush it through before anyone can understand it.
This profit-over-human-life doctrine is eventually going to be abolished, and it will be remembered in the future the way slavery is remembered now.
One day I hope the new government enforced slavery being rammed down our throats is remembered the same way the Jim Crow laws and Prohibition are remembered, as flagrant violations of our rights by idiots who think they know better than anyone else.
Musashi created and perfected a two-sword kenjutsu technique called niten'ichi ("two heavens as one") or nitichi ("two swords as one") or "Ni-Ten Ichi Ryu"
Musashi was famous for, amongst other things, his two-sword style. Yes, he did switch to a wooden sword later in life (partially to prove how superior he was), but after he stopped dueling he taught that a warrior should be able to fight with a long sword in each hand.
The oral records of his fights do not mention him wielding two weapons, but in The Book of Five Rings he does advocate it (and explicitly mentions that using a "small sword" in the offhand was inferior to using a "long sword").
I've fought against people proficient in "dual wielding" and I have to say in my experience it does provide a significant advantage in situations where you'll be fighting multiple opponents and/or with little to no armor. No, it's not the type of style you'd use against a knight in full plate, but such heavily armored opponents only represent a very small sample of the type of warriors that existed throughout history.
Slashdot Mirror
That (laughably) implies schools in general are apolitical entities. The supposed apolitical nature of textbooks is just an example of this. The GP was pointing out a specific example of a definite political bent in recent news involving the CA school system... The GP could have have spent hours dredging up examples of systemic bias in public schools in the USA, but I'm sure it was just easier to refer to a recent example fresh in his or her memory. This in no way implies a lack of understanding by the GP. It may be true that the GP does not understand the difference, but such a conclusion cannot be reached solely on that one comment.
Too bad Canadians don't...
'Every six months'? RHEL 5 is three years old. It (and it's derivatives like CetOS 5) has reached the point where we can't even compile our latest code on it without replacing every library we use on the system. And you're running the version before that. Are you really surprised that Adobe isn't supporting your platform?
Meanwhile the x86_64 Flash plugin for Mozilla works pretty good on my (old) Fedora Core 10 workstation. I think Linux is the only platform you can even get a native 64bit binary of Flash for. So yeah, I think Adobe's Flash support on Linux isn't half bad.
You didn't understand the point. The routers are working on different channels, but everyone connected to a single wireless router are all on the same channel. So unless each device has its own AP, the bandwidth is shared.
You're so full of shit.
One of my fondest possessions is a thank-you card with crayon drawings on it I received from Tulane's Children's Hospital in New Orleans for some video games I sent them through CP a couple years back. The donations get to the kids, and it really does make their lives better.
Well, I suppose instead of conflating wild theories, you could go ahead and read the law that the person you were responding to linked:
Of course that would be silly... We don't read articles here.
Caveat: Last time I got my Louisiana driver's license, I don't remember much of a requirement to prove I was in the US legally, so a Louisiana driver's license may not be sufficient (but that's Louisiana's fault, not Arizona's fault). It has been about four years, though, and I'm not in Louisiana anymore, so I could be mistaken.
I know they'd better accept a NJ driver's license! It was easier to get my security clearance than it was to meet the documentation requirements for my license here...
Well it was either the smiley or the sarcasm tag, and I've never really liked the sarcasm tag...
This is my one snarky comment at the beginning about the poor grammar, poor spelling, personal attacks, and logical fallacies found throughout your post: Wow, really?
Starting here, I'll do my best to treat you as a reasonable adult and do you the courtesy you failed to do me...
Actually I kinda agree with you there. I don't think a peace officer should be able to walk up to someone and demand to see identification without reasonable cause. Arresting someone solely for failure to produce identification is stupid. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court disagrees with both of us.
However, I do believe that if someone is unable to produce identification when they've been stopped for some other reason (running a red light, investigating a robbery, etc.) it's perfectly reasonable for a peace officer to determine whether the individual is a legal resident. To use a car analogy: Checking if someone is illegal should be a secondary offense, not a primary offense. If the law is written in such a way that an officer can stop someone solely to determine their citizenship, I don't think it'll stand up to challenge in court... But I think a law that said an officer had an obligation to determine someone's citizenship during a stop for another reason would be reasonable and would probably withstand challenges.
And the fact that you don't have another solution does matter. You're not adding anything to the discussion, therefore you're safe to ignore.
Did I mention Democrats and Republicans? I don't recall doing it... Because the honest truth is BOTH PARTIES are complicit in not enforcing immigration law because BOTH PARTIES benefit from it.
And no, it's always been a Federal problem. Whether it was Obama, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan... The Federal government has absolutely failed at its responsibility of securing our national borders. I'd really like to see you back up your claim that people were blaming the states for border enforcement!
Now there are examples (to this day) of states that have codified 'safe harbor' laws to protect illegal immigrants from federal authorities, and I think that's pretty ridiculous. You have municipalities and states that have laws on the books that make them complicit in assisting individuals in violating federal law! If we were talking about laws that hid tax evaders, smugglers, drug dealers, etc. from federal authorities no one would accept that sort of behavior from a state or local government!
Actually, yes it did. Last I checked, there were something like sixty local law-enforcement agencies signed up under a DHS/ICE program to empower local law enforcement officers to track down illegal aliens.
Which claims? I don't care about talking points, I care about the law. People are here illegally. They are breaking the law. They should be punished, if for no other reason than to do otherwise i
I find it funny that people are now using H1B/Student visa holders as an example of why enforcing immigration laws are bad, considering for the past four or five years they're the reason I've been pushing for immigration enforcement.
I had several really good friends back when I was in graduate school who were here on Student Visas. These guys were stellar, and our program benefited greatly from their presence. But seeing the legal hoops they had to jump through, seeing their families having to mortgage their homes to pay not just tuition but all the fees associated with their staying in the country, seeing the constant sense of dread that they'd be sent back home due to some screw up (which did happen to one of them for a semester), seeing the horrible restrictions on their ability to work to support themselves while they were here... And then while all this is going on, seeing the speaker of the US House of Representatives say that illegal aliens should be given in-state tuition! When she said that, my lab partner turned to me and said "If that passes, I'm tearing up my Visa and claiming I'm from Mexico. Being a legal alien isn't worth it."
The current state of US immigration law enforcement actively PUNISHES H1B and Student visa holders, while rewarding those who thumb their nose at the system. This is the first step to rectifying that. It has nothing to do with being a "redneck" and everything to do with wanting the law to be enforced.
If you don't like this law, then what's your solution? The Federal Government is NOT willing to enforce immigration law themselves (and they had even started farming enforcement out to local officials, until the officials started doing a good job which made them look bad), so what option does Arizona have?
I didn't say it was okay for them to do it either.
But at least they'd be doing something constructive with the money. :)
As long as the guy who wants to help people isn't doing so by shaking me down for the money to do it, it's all the same for me.
Did you read the things you linked at all?
Yeah, that pretty much sums it up.
The property is currently assessed at about 2/3 of the value I'm buying it for. They don't reassess unless you specifically request it in this township. The yearly tax on the property is (based on my calculation of dividing tax bill by assessed value) ~6% of the assessed value. There are areas in the state with a lower percentage (all the way down to 1-2%), but they come with high crime rates and very bad schools.
So, yes, the existing residents happily allowed elected officials to raise their taxes that high. I can't understand it. Back in my home state, the first $75k of your primary residence was non-taxable. No such luck here. TOWNSHIP WANTS YOUR MONEYS!
The new governor that took office in January is promising property tax relief (as opposed to the old governor, who thought the taxes were fair because he paid $16k on his $3m home), but we'll see what comes of that.
Are you insane?
I'll be shortly "buying" a house myself. The monthly cost of the property tax on it is equal to 80-90% of the monthly cost of the mortgage! Property tax is practically DOUBLING my monthly out-of-pocket expense for "owning" the home. If anything, the GP's property tax amount is too low to reflect reality in many places!
You know, I'm usually on the side of "GPL/FSF is a bit too fundamentalist" myself... But I find your obvious troll to be laughably ridiculous.
You're saying a court case that says "You can't use Open Source software in violation of said software's license" will cause companies to not use Open Source software? Then these are probably the companies we DON'T want using it in the first place! How is that not obvious to everyone?
Someone using your code in violation of the license you picked for it is not a "win" for you. If all a developer cared about was having as many people as possible use his or her code, then it would be released in the public domain. A developer of Open Source software obviously has different goals in mind.
What's the scam here, exactly? The self-employed person will pay at least as much, but most likely more, taxes as the employee would bring in as tax revenue.
Except, as someone else has said, the MMR vaccine was introduced in 1971. The increase in autism diagnosis coincided with the 1980 release of DSM III (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), which changed the methods of diagnosis so that many patients that previously would have been considered 'mentally retarded' were now considered autistic or suffering from an autism spectrum disorder. So no, the rise in diagnosis followed the introduction of the MMR vaccine by a decade.
I also have a chart, by the way, that shows a direct correlation with the decrease in pirates and the increase in global sea temperatures. :)
I've tried three times now to write a response to you at the end of the day after my work was finished... And all three times the X server on my workstation locked up after I was 3/4 of the way through. Today I'm off of work, so let's see if my home PC is up to the task...
The other--even bigger, in my opinion--reason that often perform poorly is that there is for all practical purposes a 100% decoupling between their PERFORMANCE and continuing viability. More on this later...
If that's all that it's a matter of, then why hasn't anyone else been able to do it yet? The government plans elsewhere in the world don't solve problems you cite with the system.
You could reject my argument that the sky is blue, as well, but it won't change the sky's color. :)
And yet we've heard constantly for the past two years how our infrastructure is crumbling around us. We have roads being built solely to prevent giving money back to the federal government, the Federal Government has declared that 75,000 bridges are "structurally deficient," etc., etc...
That's a great example of what Government is extremely good at, actually: Taking care of itself. This played out during the health care debate, as well--even in the most radical "single payer" type plans that were suggested, our senators and representatives would have kept their cushy health benefits.
I'm generally willing to give people trying visionary, risky, or even crazy things the benefit of the doubt. But only with a catch: They bear the burden of their failure. This is never a feature of massive government social engineering programs. We already have two Federally managed health systems: Medicare and Medicaid. Both are over budget, under performing, and end up making health care more expensive for everyone else. They're embarrassments. And they will never be in any danger of being shut down because of their poor performance. There will never be a reckoning.
And on top of that, we're supposed to trust the people who couldn't run two health care systems with a third system that's larger than the other two put together? Without requiring them to fix the first two? How is this anything but madness?
Note I didn't even touch on how heartwrenchingly embarrassing the VA Health System is... What's most infuriating about that is that it's not even an example of some stupid attempt at social engineering, it's supposed to be us paying a debt that's owed to those who serve. And we can't even do that right!
No, I'm approaching this as if you've argued that government will provide a superior service. It won't.
As far as your friends with chronic illness... I agree with you that something should be done, but I disagree that it's 'evil' for insurance companies not to cover them. Not even considering *profits*, any company that accepted them would only stand to lose money. Lots of money. It's not just a responsibility to shareholders, but also to those people currently using their services that would drive a company to not take on such a burden. Insurance companies insure against future misfortune, the couple you spoke of is well past that point.
So what you're saying is I should give up my benefits so that we can all have equally bad care, instead of trying to improve the situation of those at the bottom. And you wonder why people oppose you?
All those things are even more true about the government.
Equal opportunity does not mean equal results.
How many of those 35 million are without health coverage by choice?
You're not stupid. I think you're just letting your emotional need to "Do something!" override everything else.
Government health care will not improve the problems you cite with the current system. People are routinely denied care (either explicitly via fiat or implicitly via reduced availability of services) in existing government systems, leading to the creation of private alternatives and patients fleeing to other countries for help... Bringing us back to the same situation of "haves" getting good medical care and "have nots" suffering under a broken system.
If you truly believe the profit motive is the real culprit behind all health care woes, then the Non-profit Coops should be a good alternative for you to support. Honestly that's the way my car insurance is handled, and I've been pretty happy with them. I'd even be willing to support the creation of such things, but it seems no one wants to take the time to do things correctly and instead we have to accept an "all or nothing" option designed to completely wreck the system for the majority of us.
First, I'd like to thank you for making your point in a calm, respectable manner, as opposed to the frothing puddle of vitriol I was responding to.
Your argument would be convincing except for the overwhelming evidence that government run (therefore, not profit motivated) health care in other nations is also guilty of denying (or at least making difficult) necessary treatments to the sick, making decisions based purely on cost and not necessity/effectiveness, etc.
For a large number (if not the majority) of Americans, the medical system isn't that broken. Most of us are happy with the care we're receiving now and that's why we're so opposed to the way things are going. Want to help those who can't help themselves? Fine. But we refuse to believe that means lowering our quality of care in the process.
My "profit motivated" insurance company has done a damn good job taking care of me and my wife. My parents' "profit motivated" insurance company did the same for me beforehand. The same is true for my entire (employed) extended family. And don't claim it's because we didn't get chronic illnesses or some such silliness... I've had about a dozen family members with cancers of various types, four with chronic heart conditions, and one with AIDS. None of them were denied necessary treatments. None of them were bankrupted due to medical bills. Heck, I can't even really think of any cases where they were denied treatment that would only ease their suffering, not actually cure the problem.
On the other hand, I can point to recent examples of the NHS in Britain deciding "This treatment is known to alleviate the symptoms of a chronic problem, but we will no longer cover it due to cost and require patients to try alternative therapies." Is the NHS motivated by profit and therefore subject to a toxic conflict of interest?
That sounds like what's being proposed to me.
Palin loving Fox News watching? Seriously? Wow.
Why am I even arguing with an AC, anyway...
Health insurance companies make less profit than Yahoo. If they're placing their profits before people's lives, they're doing it wrong.
This push isn't about making health insurance companies behave, it's about destroying them and increasing the power and scope of the government. It's about further redistribution of wealth from those willing to provide for themselves to those willing to accept government payouts in return for votes.
If this was about doing the right thing, they'd take time to do it right, not try to rush it through before anyone can understand it.
One day I hope the new government enforced slavery being rammed down our throats is remembered the same way the Jim Crow laws and Prohibition are remembered, as flagrant violations of our rights by idiots who think they know better than anyone else.
You mean that wikipedia article?
Musashi was famous for, amongst other things, his two-sword style. Yes, he did switch to a wooden sword later in life (partially to prove how superior he was), but after he stopped dueling he taught that a warrior should be able to fight with a long sword in each hand.
The oral records of his fights do not mention him wielding two weapons, but in The Book of Five Rings he does advocate it (and explicitly mentions that using a "small sword" in the offhand was inferior to using a "long sword").
I've fought against people proficient in "dual wielding" and I have to say in my experience it does provide a significant advantage in situations where you'll be fighting multiple opponents and/or with little to no armor. No, it's not the type of style you'd use against a knight in full plate, but such heavily armored opponents only represent a very small sample of the type of warriors that existed throughout history.