kapkomet

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 5, 2010 -> 07:23 AM) Bob Jones University 4th grade science textbook. Coming soon to a Texas Public School near you. Oh bulls***.

QUOTE (Rex Kicka** @ Jul 5, 2010 -> 03:51 PM) You should tell that to my uncle in France who has spent the last 15 years in and out of the hospital with one nearly critical ailment after the other. If he were here, he'd be better. Oh wait, he'd be dead, because he would never get seen, pre-existing conditions, no insurance, etc. ... ... ... because you know, it's Amerikkka, home of the suckiest health system on earth ™.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 4, 2010 -> 07:02 AM) Really? They just let you die? Why didn't you tell me this months ago! Before I went to Germany, got sick, and DIED! We're all going to die anyway, right?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 3, 2010 -> 10:32 PM) True. We could try the British/French/German/Swiss/anyone else's method of a government run plan. Because that's SOOOOOOOO successful to any kind of agressive treatment plans. They just let you die, so that helps their stats.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jul 3, 2010 -> 08:42 AM) I was told multiple times that six weeks was enough time for Bush to cause a recession on his own... Hell, according to some around here, it only took six hours.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 2, 2010 -> 10:15 PM) At least IMO, if a person screwed up badly enough, the statute of limitations doesn't end. Feel free to keep blaming Reagan/Bush/Clinton for the whole Afghanistan mess, for example. You just don't get to use an infinite statute of limitations for a Dem and a 3 month one for a Republican. Most conservatives here do call out Republicans when they mess up. That pretty much makes that a moot point

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 2, 2010 -> 09:00 PM) Kap tells me that the way to lower health care costs is for me to be able to shop around for all of those. But you're not able. If you were, then you would save on health care.

It's a steady rain - and a break for about 20-30 minutes, then another hard rain after that. But with the sun going down, it might dry out a bit.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Jul 1, 2010 -> 04:09 PM) How many of those are Kap? Good question. I can't spend a lot of time right now but I will read that really closely and come up with one for me.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 1, 2010 -> 08:24 AM) I never knew that Obama appointed Paulson. Impressive, this man's time travel skills. Once again, you're back to the GWB hate. You can't help yourself. Nevermind the whole house of cards that was constructed during the Clinton years. There's plenty of "blame" for all involved... but not Mr. Teflon... "he will prevent it from ever happening again" - which is a LIE, a bald faced lie. But it sets up the strawman hate arguement he has to bring up to get ANYTHING done.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 1, 2010 -> 08:57 AM) McClatchey on the Jones Act topic Okay, then why are companies specifically asking to waive the requirement told "we'll get back to you"... so they can say they haven't been asked? This is an outright lie. There's too many people that's been asking for it to be temporarily waived.

There's a Sonic every mile or so here. It's ridiculous, although I love me some cherry cokes. I think their burgers are nasty.

QUOTE (Tex @ Jul 1, 2010 -> 09:02 AM) Tell me how your insurance company's requirement for profits helps your health care? Do you understand what insurance is (or, what it's supposed to be?) Tell me what any risk based anything "for profits" helps anything, anywhere? That's pretty much the lib mindset now.

QUOTE (Tex @ Jun 30, 2010 -> 08:44 AM) Well I am sitting at home, 80 miles or so inland. I am reminded the story of the chicken and the pig at a bacon and eggs breakfast. The chicken is involved, but the pig is committed. Hanging around as a tourist while friends boarded up their businesses and homes seemed wrong. Plus there was a bunch of stuff we could do back here. Hopefully Alex will keep hooking west and make landfall about 120 miles south of the island. Which is exactly what is happening, except the tornados that have spun up.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Jun 30, 2010 -> 03:09 PM) My daughter lives in San Antonio and whenever I visit I am blown away by the number of fast food restaurants in that town. It's insane. I think that's everywhere now.

QUOTE (Tex @ Jun 30, 2010 -> 09:22 AM) Not exactly, but you are close. They prescribe the minimum that will be covered. And it is embarrassing how political ideology drove the committee. When, 10 years ago when the last set of books were written? 20 years ago? Now? The answer is yes to all, unfortunately.

QUOTE (Tex @ Jun 30, 2010 -> 09:14 AM) So no one has figured out how your insurance company's requirement to produce a profit results in better health care for you? I wasn't able to figure that out either. Currently insurance companies control what your Doctor, hospital, etc are being paid. Do you believe if your insurance negotiates lower reimbursment rates (increasing their profits) it will cause you to receive better or worse care? If Humana (to pick on one) pays a Doctor $25 per office visit, do you think he's thinking, hey if I offer superior services they will increase what I am getting paid? Or is he thinking, I'm only getting $25 for this patient, but $32 for that one, if I spend less time with the $25 patient I can increase my profitability? After all, profits drive innovation and better care. That's not how it works, but ok.

Barack Obama was/is in charge of the bailout. Don'tcha know, by passing this financial reform, "this will never happen again" ... why don't those evil motherf***ers across the aisle agree with me, myself and I?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 29, 2010 -> 08:30 AM) Serious, non-ranting question in reply...can you back up the statement that "Schools have gotten worse"? I've gotten the impression from my readings that the U.S. education system has, at least going back to the 60's, ranked consistently at the middle or bottom of the pack of developed countries, but that it has sorta just stayed there in that area. It's produced good schools where property tax returns are high and crappy schools where they're low, with the occasional outlier, and every education innovation from New Math to Charter Schools has been a bandaid to cover that up. Can you correct my impression and argue to me that the trend line is not flat but is instead down? The divide of the "who has" and "who hasn't" is much, much worse now then it used to be. And, the teaching to testing and not to real learning is a humongous problem. I'd argue that it's one of the major downfalls of our society... because one generation to the next seem to lose all ability to think critically. IMO, our society has been torn from within - the 8 minute show - commercial - 8 minute show - commercial - 30 second soundbyte - 30 second soundbyte - commercial - 5 minute show is a huge cause of it. Hardly anyone I know can think past 10 minutes on anything anymore.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jun 29, 2010 -> 08:47 AM) The problem is, for me, is that there is no fair value pricing available. When you go to a car dealership, you see the price of the car. When you get your oil changed, you see the price of the oil change. This applies to ANYTHING but the health care industry. There are no prices, as they're all arbitrary. Need a knee surgery -- tell you what, we'll perform the surgery and THEN we will tell you how much it costs. This way you can't go compare pricing elsewhere. And if we happen to charge 30x times more than a friend of yours paid, we will simply say the surgery took longer for X, Y and Z, three things your friend didn't have to deal with -- and you wouldn't know one way or another, because there were 8 people roaming around the entire time doing god knows what. If they truly wanted to make things cheaper, they'd change this, so instead they "reformed the health INSURANCE industry", which accomplishes almost nothing in regard to the CORE problem, and that is simply -- nobody knows what ANYTHING in the medical services industry costs, and therefore cannot shop around for non ER care where you SHOULD have such a choice. QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 29, 2010 -> 09:33 AM) Great point, agree 100% LMAO. Look at post #1 in the health care thread. I said almost exactly that. That's a majority of the problem but not all of it.

Cute puppy. What kind?

QUOTE (KipWellsFan @ Jun 28, 2010 -> 09:33 PM) After reading dozens of Kap's points I certainly understand your feelings but I guess I disagree with the premise. Polls seem to show that more Americans are conservative than ever before. The Supreme Court is probably more conservative than it has been in decades. TV News media and radio news media is absolutely dominated by the right. And it basically took 8 years of a completely irresponsible White House to put Obama in charge. Now, it's looking likely that Republicans will make gains again in the House and Senate, so I'd relax a little. And please stop trying to judge how a person views their own personal liberties. Government isn't the only thing that can oppress. You can say that with a straight face? And if more Americans are "conservative" than ever before... then surely you can understand that health care, cap and tax, stimulus (aka, the black hole of Democrat coffers), TARP, immigration, etc. are NOT what "more Americans" want. And yes, that goes back to the last president, who I have several issues with on these issues.

QUOTE (KipWellsFan @ Jun 28, 2010 -> 09:49 PM) Ummm, I'm not sure what words you're trying to put in my mouth, but I believe programs cuts combined with moderate tax increases will be necessary to bring some semblance of sanity back to American public finances. It's not really an ideological argument. Fine. Cut health care before it starts.

QUOTE (G&T @ Jun 28, 2010 -> 08:47 PM) Federal law trumps state law. However the federal government cannot enact laws upon the state except pursuant to the interstate commerce clause. I guess I'm getting hung up on the word "trump". I don't see it that way - because state laws can supercede federal law, as long as it passes constutitional merits.

QUOTE (KipWellsFan @ Jun 28, 2010 -> 09:42 PM) I don't think Obama was talking about a VAT. Of course it's probably a good idea, but whatever... It's always a great idea to create the biggest entitlement program in the history of the planet, and then tax the f*** out of everyone to pay for it. If Europe is discovering after 50 years that it doesn't work (i.e. they have to kill entitlements and now the people are getting uber pissed off because their nanny government can't take care of them anymore... waaaah waaaaah), what the hell makes you think that it will work here? Answer: it can't... but you'll not really understand that.