And not even that - I'd have to get an ExpressCard, as the Macbook Pro's ain't taking PCMCIA no more.
It's been a while since I bought a new laptop...guess it's gonna be a while before I buy the next one.
Heh.:) I'm one too. Since Windows 95, I've followed a specific policy of always waiting at least 1 1/2 years before installing a new Windows Product.
Especially when they put out that early version of Windows NT, I think it was back in '96, that would randomly corrupt a file every time it rebooted, until it finally took out something and became a doorstop.
Yep, Vista can wait a while longer...the way Microsoft basically does beta testing on paying customers is frakking ridiculous.
Oh *that* sucks! I'm really glad now. I'd have to get a PCMCIA fireware card to even be able to edit video. Which is the whole reason why I got a Mac in the firstplace.
Now that Obama's elected, I really do want to move on. But I am still compelled to correct misinformation about his positions.
So, I'll refrained from criticizing any conservative or GOP positions, and simply deal with what's incorrect.
1. NAFTA - that story you link to is incorrect. A couple of days after the article you cite, both the Obama campaign and - more importantly - the Canadian embassy itself declared that no such assurances were made. So either they're all lying, or the first article that you cite got it wrong.
2. Obama's position on coal is: We will probably need some coal as a transition away from foreign oil. But coal also comes with environmental risks, so clean coal is better than dirty coal.
That's not shifting, that's reasonable. Sometimes reality is nuanced. That's addressing different circumstances in a complex world.
3. There was and is absolutely no change in Obama's tax plans, or anywhere near it. That link you cite is not even from Obama speaking. That's Biden making a gaffe-tastic misstatement in a speech. The Obama campaign restated it's policy after Biden's misstatement - it says that in the very same article you cite.
4. As for Biden's transcribed dialogue - it seems quite clear to me. It's just transcribed from live human speech. Biden's saying "When the US and France kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon, Barack and I wanted NATO forces moved in to fill the vacuum. Otherwise Hezbollah would walk back in."
So, in conclusion, I'd like to propose that, from this point forward, we criticize what people's actual articulated positions are, and see how their actions match up to those positions. Because, as an Obama supporter, I *want* to see Obama's positions and policies criticized from every possible angle. Both in formulation and in practice.
But let's stick with what Obama and others are actually intentionally saying (and will now be doing) - and not hearsay or misstatements. Let's concentrate on whether or not it will work, and why.
I would say, to really simplify it: it's not up to me to decide what's in your best interest. But is up to us as a majority, to decide what's in *all* of our best interest as a majority.
That decision may conflict with some people's moral views as individuals. And this form of decision-making must be given limits, or it won't be democracy, it'll be mob rule with no protection for those who aren't a majority.
Hence the complication of governing in practice...
"Paul Krugman is also a raving anti-Republican pundit..."
And? His facts are right. Maybe his knowledge causes him to be against Republican policies, because Republican policies really are bad.
Looking at the Clinton prosperity vs. Reagan, Bush 41 and Bush 43's recessions, makes a good case that GOP policies are bad for the overwhelming majority of Americans.
"...who has been predicting an economic disaster of every type since the day Bush took office."
And he's been right.
"And since even Clinton foresaw this mess developing while he was still in office, his predictive abilities are not all that amazing."
They don't have to be amazing. They're still better than every single conservative pundit of comparable stature, and most liberal, moderate and independent ones as awell.
As for the part you quote, yes, sure, that's what McCain's is *looking to attempt* to do. I can be "looking to attempt" to fly to the moon by shooting crystal meth. That still doesn't mean my plan will work. Neither would McCain's - for the clear, logical reasons I listed.
Finally, if you think that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are solely responsible for the mess we're in - and that the repeal of Glass-Steagal had nothing to do with it - then you are simply uninformed. Please, read about it.
1. Fannie and Freddie did not create the sub-prime market, essentially or otherwise. The sup-prime market was already 10% of auto loans and about 15% of mortgage funds, before Fannie Mae was encouraged to expand to low income borrowers.
...AND they are more likely to be repaid as all other subprime loans. Same report.
4. Most importantly, whether or not Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac constitute a "free market" or not - the problem remains the repealling of Glass-Steagal - an economic regulation that was designed to limit exactly this sort of damage, of people taking mortages en masse, wrapping them into packages, and selling all kinds of complicated financial-investing products based on those packages.
You can think of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as a house stuffed full of dollar bills, soaked in gasoline and about to be lit. That's bad enough - but there is a whole town of money-houses built around it. Glass-Steagal would have required a stone firewall around the F-Mae/F-Mac house. Without Glass-Steagal, everyone in town swoops in for the money, and when they set up a spark the everyone's money goes up in flames.
Well, everyone can't agree on everything. But we are one democratic republican nation, not 350 million different individual nations. This automatically means that someone's values will be forced on someone else.
I mean, it may be against my values to not be free to beat my wife, or to feed my kids without beating them first. or just to not fire my WWII artillery cannon straight up into the air from my yard. Those are extreme examples; sometimes perfectly justifiable values are also overruled by other ones. That's when controversy occurs.
I do think we actually aren't that far apart, in terms of what this country was founded on and for. I just think there's been a lot of smoke and misinformation thrown into the air, by many whose best interest is in having us divided rather than united. So I'm hopeful we can all move ahead, and solve many of the problems before us.
"Most of the mess with the current stock markets were caused by Congresses interference through the use of agencies like Freddie and Fannie and not through any sort of deregulation."
Absolutely not true. Not only did Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac have only 25% of the subprime mortgages that imploded - but more importantly, the mortgage collapse would never have spread out of the housing sector if it weren't for the repeal of one very specific piece of regulation:
Glass-Steagal. This is the regulation that came from the (hopefully only) Great Depression, that firewalled off mortage banking from investment banking. It was repealed in 1999. If it were still in place, the housing sector would have gone down, which would have been as bad as the Silverado collapse in the 80's - but wouldn't have been near as bad as what we have now.
And that's just one very specific example of how deregulation put us in these very, very dire current straits.
I agree that the government should be in the oversight business. And I definitely agree that regulation shouldn't be arbitrary. However - oversight requires regulation! You can't just tell someone to stop doing something, have no power over them, and hope for them to stop out of the kindness of their hearts. That doesn't work for muggers - why would it work for anyone else?
According to the free market model, wouldn't **employers** look for and getting the cheapest, best possible coverage?
From what I can see, that's what companies are currently doing. And they are getting cheaper deals for their employees than the employees could on their own - because they're buying in bulk.
The problem is, again, with insurance companies being able to inject cost into every part of the system - charging patients, hospitals, doctors AND support staff - while providing no actual services at all.
Perhaps we can use a different conception of insurance. Maybe this is due to BCBS's gov't-funded monopoly, as you describe; it seems more likely to be a lack of regulation to me. But I dont' need to quibble about the source, if we can have a solution. I just don't see McCain's plan as going anywhere near the root of the problem: insurance companies charging everyone while providing service to no one.
Personally I don't see why we need insurance at all. Why can't we all pay into a big pool, and then have costs paid out of it? That's basically what insurance companies do - they just pile on profits, blow millions in advertising, and deny coverage to people who need it while promising to cover people who don't need it.
I'll presume to speak for many on the Left here: because many to most on the Left don't think that fetuses are living human persons from the moment they're conceived. We think that a certain level of development has to occur before a fetus becomes a human person.
So it's a sadness to abort a fetus, because that *could be* a human person *someday* - but it's not murder, because it is not a person yet, now.
I personally am against abortion after the fetus' cerebral cortex is somewhat developed, because I think what separates humanity from all other Earth life is our brain, which gives us our mind.
That's my take on it.
But as for the morality of helping our fellow man, the thing is that, like many things, this is a good that's also in our best pragmatic interest. Like having good roads and impartial tax-paid police and fire protection, it's good for ALL of us.
I understand how taxes work. I don't think you understand what I'm criticizing.
I said $5000 in tax credit, and $12,000 in new taxes. Perhaps I should have said $12,000 in new taxable income, to be totally clear. So, I don't know what Times article you're referring to, but the one I found also said this:
"...[T]he people gaining insurance would be those who need it least: relatively healthy Americans with high incomes. Why? Because insurance companies want to cover only healthy people, and even among the healthy only those able to pay a lot in addition to their tax credit would be able to afford coverage (remember, itâ(TM)s a $5,000 credit, but the average family policy actually costs more than $12,000)."
"Meanwhile, the people losing insurance would be those who need it most: lower-income workers who wouldnâ(TM)t be able to afford individual insurance even with the tax credit, and Americans with health problems whom insurance companies wonâ(TM)t cover.
"...the McCain plan would also lead to a huge, expensive increase in bureaucracy: insurers selling individual health plans spend 29 percent of the premiums they receive on administration, largely because they employ so many people to screen applicants. This compares with costs of 12 percent for group plans and just 3 percent for Medicare.
In short, the McCain plan makes no sense at all, unless you have faith that the magic of the marketplace can solve all problems. "
That's Paul Krugman. Since he won a Nobel in economics, and more importantly (in my book) he successfully predicted our current mess before anyone else of prominence on the Right OR the Left, I consider him to be someone who knows what he's talking about.
And McCain's plan to remove state border restrictions is even worse. That means insurance companies won't have to insure based on area - now they can shop for the healthiest people in the country, compete for them, and leave all the people who really need coverage high and dry. Plus, now states won't be able to exert force on insurance companies - it'll have to be at the Federal level, if at all.
In other words, more deregulation, which worked just fine for the stock market, not.
Single payer systems also happen to be great in practice. That's the main reason why the residents of other nations live longer than us, with a higher quality of life.
I certainly don't think their system is rainbow and flowers. The problem is, theirs is at least flourescent light and a peanut-butter sandwich. Ours is a black bag over the head and a reach for our wallet.
Gather ten random citizens of the UK or Canada, and ask them if they'd prefer to have our healthcare system instead. I'd bring earplugs so you aren't physically hurt by the explosive volume of their shocked laughter. Our US insurance might not cover it.
Phone company costs are lower now because the monopoly of AT&T was broken up. That's not deregulation - that's actually full-on government intervention in destroying a monopoly.
And sure, I can see how being able to buy from an out-of-state provider is awesome. So if that's an example of deregulation, that's cool. That still doesn't mean that deregulation is great in general - because it isn't, as shown by the examples I cited.
I guess we're just going to have to disagree on McCain's taxing health benefits. I think it's a disproportionate tax on the working class - 'cause even Caddillac-and-caviar health insurance hits a ceiling quickly.
But even worse, McCain's plan isn't even addressing the central problem: insurance companies that are sucking so much money for providing NO service, that they are literally damaging our economy.
And yes, both unions and gov't employees think it's a bad idea. So do many other working people who's told about it. That's because it IS a bad idea.
There's a reason the people of other industrialized nations live longer and have better quality of living. Part of it is certainly their health care. I see no reason why we can't do things even better than them.
We absoltely have a private system in the US! Just because Blue Cross/ Blue Shield has some gov't money behind it, is not the problem. The problem is it still, like all the other companies, can charge almost anything they want, to patients, doctors AND hospitals - for NO actual service provided.
They are only middle men, but they are the single largest cost. This is *because* they are private - they exist only to make us much money as possible. That's not evil by itself - but it means that they will rape us to the limit we can pay for AND murder us by spreadsheet, if we get ill with something that they'd rather not cover.
Not true. Emergency room doesn't cover any sort of chronic illness, which is what really wipes out families. It doesn't even cover crippling injury that takes a long time to recover from. Hell, it doesn't even cover sick kids.
Plus to not pay ER coverage, you have to lie about your name or your address. I think a system that requires lying is not a system that works well.
Slashdot Mirror
Or some similar low-tech solution?
Oh - so it's only the Macbooks that lack firewire ports? That makes a bit more sense.
And not even that - I'd have to get an ExpressCard, as the Macbook Pro's ain't taking PCMCIA no more. It's been a while since I bought a new laptop...guess it's gonna be a while before I buy the next one.
Especially when they put out that early version of Windows NT, I think it was back in '96, that would randomly corrupt a file every time it rebooted, until it finally took out something and became a doorstop.
Yep, Vista can wait a while longer...the way Microsoft basically does beta testing on paying customers is frakking ridiculous.
Oh *that* sucks! I'm really glad now. I'd have to get a PCMCIA fireware card to even be able to edit video. Which is the whole reason why I got a Mac in the firstplace.
I don't think that's ever happened to me before.
What we need is a good monofilament. And a Ringworld.
Zeus is Lord! Read the Iliad.
I followed the link, and didn't find any info on that. Anybody know or have a guess?
So, I'll refrained from criticizing any conservative or GOP positions, and simply deal with what's incorrect.
1. NAFTA - that story you link to is incorrect. A couple of days after the article you cite, both the Obama campaign and - more importantly - the Canadian embassy itself declared that no such assurances were made. So either they're all lying, or the first article that you cite got it wrong.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/03/politics/main3898313.shtml
2. Obama's position on coal is: We will probably need some coal as a transition away from foreign oil. But coal also comes with environmental risks, so clean coal is better than dirty coal.
That's not shifting, that's reasonable. Sometimes reality is nuanced. That's addressing different circumstances in a complex world.
3. There was and is absolutely no change in Obama's tax plans, or anywhere near it. That link you cite is not even from Obama speaking. That's Biden making a gaffe-tastic misstatement in a speech. The Obama campaign restated it's policy after Biden's misstatement - it says that in the very same article you cite.
4. As for Biden's transcribed dialogue - it seems quite clear to me. It's just transcribed from live human speech. Biden's saying "When the US and France kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon, Barack and I wanted NATO forces moved in to fill the vacuum. Otherwise Hezbollah would walk back in."
So, in conclusion, I'd like to propose that, from this point forward, we criticize what people's actual articulated positions are, and see how their actions match up to those positions. Because, as an Obama supporter, I *want* to see Obama's positions and policies criticized from every possible angle. Both in formulation and in practice.
But let's stick with what Obama and others are actually intentionally saying (and will now be doing) - and not hearsay or misstatements. Let's concentrate on whether or not it will work, and why.
Sound good?
So we should skate out of Palin then too, by being sold into intergalactic bondage. Score!
This message below is empty, unless you have clearance - to nothing, because there are no plans, as previously discussed! Two lines, no talking!
"But is up to us as a majority, to decide what's in *all* of our best interest as a country."
That decision may conflict with some people's moral views as individuals. And this form of decision-making must be given limits, or it won't be democracy, it'll be mob rule with no protection for those who aren't a majority.
Hence the complication of governing in practice...
And? His facts are right. Maybe his knowledge causes him to be against Republican policies, because Republican policies really are bad.
Looking at the Clinton prosperity vs. Reagan, Bush 41 and Bush 43's recessions, makes a good case that GOP policies are bad for the overwhelming majority of Americans.
"...who has been predicting an economic disaster of every type since the day Bush took office."
And he's been right.
"And since even Clinton foresaw this mess developing while he was still in office, his predictive abilities are not all that amazing."
They don't have to be amazing. They're still better than every single conservative pundit of comparable stature, and most liberal, moderate and independent ones as awell.
As for the part you quote, yes, sure, that's what McCain's is *looking to attempt* to do. I can be "looking to attempt" to fly to the moon by shooting crystal meth. That still doesn't mean my plan will work. Neither would McCain's - for the clear, logical reasons I listed.
Finally, if you think that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are solely responsible for the mess we're in - and that the repeal of Glass-Steagal had nothing to do with it - then you are simply uninformed. Please, read about it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass-Steagal
1. Fannie and Freddie did not create the sub-prime market, essentially or otherwise. The sup-prime market was already 10% of auto loans and about 15% of mortgage funds, before Fannie Mae was encouraged to expand to low income borrowers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sub_prime_lending
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fannie_mae
2. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac control 42%, not 50%, according to the hardly-Left-wing Cato institure.
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=9557
3. More importantly, CRA loans only account for 23% of ALL loans, Fannie Mae or otherwise...
http://www.traigerlaw.com/publications/traiger_hinckley_llp_cra_foreclosure_study_1-7-08.pdf
...AND they are more likely to be repaid as all other subprime loans. Same report.
4. Most importantly, whether or not Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac constitute a "free market" or not - the problem remains the repealling of Glass-Steagal - an economic regulation that was designed to limit exactly this sort of damage, of people taking mortages en masse, wrapping them into packages, and selling all kinds of complicated financial-investing products based on those packages.
You can think of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as a house stuffed full of dollar bills, soaked in gasoline and about to be lit. That's bad enough - but there is a whole town of money-houses built around it. Glass-Steagal would have required a stone firewall around the F-Mae/F-Mac house. Without Glass-Steagal, everyone in town swoops in for the money, and when they set up a spark the everyone's money goes up in flames.
I mean, it may be against my values to not be free to beat my wife, or to feed my kids without beating them first. or just to not fire my WWII artillery cannon straight up into the air from my yard. Those are extreme examples; sometimes perfectly justifiable values are also overruled by other ones. That's when controversy occurs.
I do think we actually aren't that far apart, in terms of what this country was founded on and for. I just think there's been a lot of smoke and misinformation thrown into the air, by many whose best interest is in having us divided rather than united. So I'm hopeful we can all move ahead, and solve many of the problems before us.
Absolutely not true. Not only did Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac have only 25% of the subprime mortgages that imploded - but more importantly, the mortgage collapse would never have spread out of the housing sector if it weren't for the repeal of one very specific piece of regulation:
Glass-Steagal. This is the regulation that came from the (hopefully only) Great Depression, that firewalled off mortage banking from investment banking. It was repealed in 1999. If it were still in place, the housing sector would have gone down, which would have been as bad as the Silverado collapse in the 80's - but wouldn't have been near as bad as what we have now.
And that's just one very specific example of how deregulation put us in these very, very dire current straits.
I agree that the government should be in the oversight business. And I definitely agree that regulation shouldn't be arbitrary. However - oversight requires regulation! You can't just tell someone to stop doing something, have no power over them, and hope for them to stop out of the kindness of their hearts. That doesn't work for muggers - why would it work for anyone else?
From what I can see, that's what companies are currently doing. And they are getting cheaper deals for their employees than the employees could on their own - because they're buying in bulk.
The problem is, again, with insurance companies being able to inject cost into every part of the system - charging patients, hospitals, doctors AND support staff - while providing no actual services at all.
Perhaps we can use a different conception of insurance. Maybe this is due to BCBS's gov't-funded monopoly, as you describe; it seems more likely to be a lack of regulation to me. But I dont' need to quibble about the source, if we can have a solution. I just don't see McCain's plan as going anywhere near the root of the problem: insurance companies charging everyone while providing service to no one.
Personally I don't see why we need insurance at all. Why can't we all pay into a big pool, and then have costs paid out of it? That's basically what insurance companies do - they just pile on profits, blow millions in advertising, and deny coverage to people who need it while promising to cover people who don't need it.
So it's a sadness to abort a fetus, because that *could be* a human person *someday* - but it's not murder, because it is not a person yet, now.
I personally am against abortion after the fetus' cerebral cortex is somewhat developed, because I think what separates humanity from all other Earth life is our brain, which gives us our mind.
That's my take on it.
But as for the morality of helping our fellow man, the thing is that, like many things, this is a good that's also in our best pragmatic interest. Like having good roads and impartial tax-paid police and fire protection, it's good for ALL of us.
I said $5000 in tax credit, and $12,000 in new taxes. Perhaps I should have said $12,000 in new taxable income, to be totally clear. So, I don't know what Times article you're referring to, but the one I found also said this:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/06/opinion/06krugman.html?ref=opinion
That's Paul Krugman. Since he won a Nobel in economics, and more importantly (in my book) he successfully predicted our current mess before anyone else of prominence on the Right OR the Left, I consider him to be someone who knows what he's talking about.
And McCain's plan to remove state border restrictions is even worse. That means insurance companies won't have to insure based on area - now they can shop for the healthiest people in the country, compete for them, and leave all the people who really need coverage high and dry. Plus, now states won't be able to exert force on insurance companies - it'll have to be at the Federal level, if at all.
In other words, more deregulation, which worked just fine for the stock market, not.
For a realistic comparison of McCain and Obama's plans, go here: http://health-insurance-carriers.com/blog/health-care-john-mccain-vs-barack-obama/
Single payer systems also happen to be great in practice. That's the main reason why the residents of other nations live longer than us, with a higher quality of life.
I certainly don't think their system is rainbow and flowers. The problem is, theirs is at least flourescent light and a peanut-butter sandwich. Ours is a black bag over the head and a reach for our wallet.
Gather ten random citizens of the UK or Canada, and ask them if they'd prefer to have our healthcare system instead. I'd bring earplugs so you aren't physically hurt by the explosive volume of their shocked laughter. Our US insurance might not cover it.
And sure, I can see how being able to buy from an out-of-state provider is awesome. So if that's an example of deregulation, that's cool. That still doesn't mean that deregulation is great in general - because it isn't, as shown by the examples I cited.
I guess we're just going to have to disagree on McCain's taxing health benefits. I think it's a disproportionate tax on the working class - 'cause even Caddillac-and-caviar health insurance hits a ceiling quickly.
But even worse, McCain's plan isn't even addressing the central problem: insurance companies that are sucking so much money for providing NO service, that they are literally damaging our economy.
And yes, both unions and gov't employees think it's a bad idea. So do many other working people who's told about it. That's because it IS a bad idea.
There's a reason the people of other industrialized nations live longer and have better quality of living. Part of it is certainly their health care. I see no reason why we can't do things even better than them.
They are only middle men, but they are the single largest cost. This is *because* they are private - they exist only to make us much money as possible. That's not evil by itself - but it means that they will rape us to the limit we can pay for AND murder us by spreadsheet, if we get ill with something that they'd rather not cover.
Wasn't seeing my posts; perhaps it was some caching issue.
Plus to not pay ER coverage, you have to lie about your name or your address. I think a system that requires lying is not a system that works well.