On 12/27/09 2:28 PM, BAR wrote:
In ,
says...

On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 13:47:06 -0500, BAR wrote:

In ,
says...
I had health insurance that I paid for through my employer in the past. A
claim was denied that should have been covered. My employer tossed up
their hands as to say tough **** but I was locked in to paying premiums
until the first of the year. I quit the employment. They lost in the long
run, trust me.

The free market is a farce in the insurance market. They all work in
concert.


I love the simple-minded elegance of "get the government out and
everything will be ok." Yeah, right. Bend over. Farther.

"Free market" is as phony as "Work will set you free". Feel good BS.


Work has been very good to me so far.

Zooooooooooooooooooooom!

It really must suck to be you. Seeing the worst in everyone and
everything.


Your "so far" response was off the chart, bertie brain.

On 12/27/09 2:29 PM, wrote:
On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 13:20:33 -0500,
wrote:

The high school dropout who was making $60,000 on the line putting the
left front wheel on a Chevy is going to be in trouble, no matter what
we do.
Getting him a GED still won't get him UAW money.
That is the 60 year old "union bubble" that globalism popped.


Stop blaming the union for management's ill deeds. One immediate problem
with it is that it'll never happen. You're going to force people into the
school? Sure.



It's always so nice when those with some means want to crap on those
with no means. It's so...Republican.

A republican would want to keep paying $60,000 a year for a menial job
and charge $30,000 for the crappy car they build.(making a tidy profit
along the way).
Unfortunately that economic model has been crushed by a global
marketplace where the cost of labor is driven down by what the
customer wants to pay. If those hillbillies in Tennessee can build a
Honda for $20,000 that performs better than a Chevy, people buy it, no
matter what aging ex-football stars say.



If those hillbillies in japan can build that car for $20,000, it's
because they have a national health care system that spreads its cost
over the entire country, and not the manufacturer of that car.

I know many highly skilled construction workers whose straight rate is
$50 an hour. The morons who whine about this say construction workers
aren't worth $50 an hour times the usual 1800-hour work year for a total
of $90,000 a year. Of course, very, very few workers get 1800 hours a
year or even close to it. For full pension and welfare benefits, 1200
hours a year is considered a full work year. That's about $60,000, and
from that must be deducted health care and pension payments. There's a
lot of downtime in construction work.

On the other hand there are many crooks and near crooks on wall street
who make many times that $60,000 a year. Now there is a group that is
grossly overpaid.

wrote in message
...
The numbers you quoted don't match, and if it's off the 1040, then it's
speculation. Where did Buffett say this?


Line 37 is "after expenses" and most of the top 1% are in some kind of
business. They manage to live off of "expenses" and don't have to
report that as "income". I guess you have never filled out a schedule
C.

I guess you don't know much about me. In any case, the numbers you quoted
weren't substantiated.

Once I got off of a W-2 and started working on a 1099 I suddenly had
lots of deductions I couldn't take before.

If you have not heard Buffett's statement on taxes you haven't been
paying attention., Google it.

You posted it, thus it's up to you to justify it.



Can you cite the source for this?

Do you know a 20 something person who thinks health insurance is more
important than a nice car?

If you explain it to someone that age in a careful and complete way, then
yes she'll get it.

Have you actually tried to explain this to a young person?
Most are ****ed they have to pay into Medicare and SS.
If they don't get insurance at work, the idea of buying it is foreign
to them.

Yes. My niece gets it and she's 13.


Otherwise it is just a medical brokerage. Nobody wants to buy
insurance until they think their medical bills will be more than
their
premium.

Nobody wants to buy car ins., but we're generally required by law to
do
that.
... But they have convinced us driving a car is not a right, it is
just from the kindness of the government that we are allowed to drive.

Why do you think it's a right? Is it written into the Constitution? It's
a
privilege that needs to be earned.


What are you talking about, driving or health care. The Constitution
is silent on both of them.

Providing for the welfare of the general public is a basic goal of
government.

So is "the pursuit of happiness" (driving make me happy) but that is a
goal, not a protected right.

As long as that happiness doesn't intrude on others. And, yes, it's a goal.
A good one. One that makes sense morally and fiscally. Your happiness in
driving your car, isn't even close to the same thing.

.
on a policy of fiscal responsibility and that was a big
part of the "contract"
They may have bickered on TV but Clinton and Gingrich were actually a
very effective team. Neither would have succeeded without the other.

BS. Read up... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract_with_America

From your article
* require all laws that apply to the rest of the country also
apply to Congress;
* select a major, independent auditing firm to conduct a
comprehensive audit of Congress for waste, fraud or abuse;
* cut the number of House committees, and cut committee staff by
one-third;
* limit the terms of all committee chairs;
* ban the casting of proxy votes in committee;
* require committee meetings to be open to the public;
* require a three-fifths majority vote to pass a tax increase;
* and implement a zero base-line budgeting process for the annual
Federal Budget.

None of which was implemented.


It sounds like a formula for fiscal responsibility to me.

Sounds like a Republican agenda.


It wasn't that Perot was a serious candidate, it was the questions he
made everyone else answer.

No one answered anything. He was mostly ignored.

I guess you didn't watch the debates

Nothing came of anything he said. He was wrong on many things, and he faded
away as most kook should.


You notice that after that, the rules were changed to ensure another
outsider could never get a seat at the table.
If you are not anointed by the Remocrat/Depublican oligarchy, you
can't enter the debates

Ah, so it's back to conspiracy theories? Or, the more likely answer is
that
there hasn't been any viable third-party candidates.

They aren't viable because nobody actually gets to hear them. The
debates are completely off limits to anyone who wasn't propped up by
the party aparachicks

Ah... like Nader? I thought he decided the 2000 election.

These days there is very little difference between the Ds and Rs. All
you have to do is look at who gives them most of their money.
Elections come down to abortion and guns. Nobody talks about banks,
medical conglomerates or even the insurance companies in any real
sense. Just look at the bills they are hashing out in conference right
now. Wars keep on going on and rich people keep getting richer.

Except until the last election. Thus, the Republicans were mostly voted out.
Change is happening, albeit slowly and imperfectly, but it is happening.




It would be training for a job that can't be exported and it would
bend the health care cost curve. What else do you want?

The high school dropout who was making $60,000 on the line putting the
left front wheel on a Chevy is going to be in trouble, no matter what
we do.
Getting him a GED still won't get him UAW money.
That is the 60 year old "union bubble" that globalism popped.


Stop blaming the union for management's ill deeds. One immediate problem
with it is that it'll never happen. You're going to force people into the
school? Sure.

How was the runaway wage spiral management's problem. If there was a
problem, it was in not standing up to ridiculous demands ... but some
companies did.

If you don't know, I'm not going to be able to explain it to you in this
place. Look it up, do some independent reading on the subject.

They were Japanese and they built their factories in Tennessee where
the union did not operate behind the power of a government gun..(AKA a
"right to work state")
Ask yourself, who sold the most cars last year?

Cars are only one industry, but in any case, the Japanese economy is no
where near as stable or viable as the US economy.


I won't force people to go to school, the global economy will ... or
we will be paying them welfare until the government goes broke.

Well, hang on. Either it's the global economy or what? Our entire economy is
pretty much linked to the global economy. So, "paying them welfare"
(something we're not doing anyway), isn't outside the global econonmy.

--
Nom=de=Plume

On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 14:28:11 -0500, BAR wrote:

In article ,
says...

On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 13:47:06 -0500, BAR wrote:

In article ,
says...
I had health insurance that I paid for through my employer in the past. A
claim was denied that should have been covered. My employer tossed up
their hands as to say tough **** but I was locked in to paying premiums
until the first of the year. I quit the employment. They lost in the long
run, trust me.

The free market is a farce in the insurance market. They all work in
concert.


I love the simple-minded elegance of "get the government out and
everything will be ok." Yeah, right. Bend over. Farther.

"Free market" is as phony as "Work will set you free". Feel good BS.


Work has been very good to me so far.

Zooooooooooooooooooooom!

It really must suck to be you. Seeing the worst in everyone and
everything.

Not at all. I'm very happy and content over all. I've spent too much time
here today, but my wife has been off doing some other things and nothing
of value on TV, I have many of my projects caught up, come here to poke
some with a stick. I guess you're it.

wrote in message
...
On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 12:04:02 -0800, "nom=de=plume"
wrote:

If you have not heard Buffett's statement on taxes you haven't been
paying attention., Google it.

You posted it, thus it's up to you to justify it.



"Buffett says he pays 18 percent of his salary to the IRS while the
rest of his staff pays nearly twice that - 33 percent, a lopsided
equation that put Buffett in a Robin Hood frame of mind. "

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=3869458&page=1


Which has nothing to do with the figures you quoted...

--
Nom=de=Plume

wrote in message
...
On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 12:04:02 -0800, "nom=de=plume"
wrote:

If you explain it to someone that age in a careful and complete way,
then
yes she'll get it.

Have you actually tried to explain this to a young person?
Most are ****ed they have to pay into Medicare and SS.
If they don't get insurance at work, the idea of buying it is foreign
to them.

Yes. My niece gets it and she's 13.


Let's see if she still remembers at 25, although she won't really have
a choice..


Of course she will. Why wouldn't she if it's consistently reinforced.

--
Nom=de=Plume

wrote in message
...
On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 12:04:02 -0800, "nom=de=plume"
wrote:


What are you talking about, driving or health care. The Constitution
is silent on both of them.

Providing for the welfare of the general public is a basic goal of
government.

So is "the pursuit of happiness" (driving make me happy) but that is a
goal, not a protected right.

As long as that happiness doesn't intrude on others. And, yes, it's a
goal.
A good one. One that makes sense morally and fiscally. Your happiness in
driving your car, isn't even close to the same thing.

Why not? What if driving my car was a condition of my employment.

Which has little to do with "happiness" as described.

The point is you lefties are real quick to quibble about my right to
bear arms, parsing a comma in a passage that says "the right of the
people to keep and bear arms shall not be abridged" but you make up
rights that don't exist.

Give me a break. Suddenly, when you run out of logical argument, you claim
it's the lefties taking your guns. I guess you forgot about the recent
Supreme Court ruling.

It just says "Promote the general welfare", it says nothing about
"providing" it..

So, how is ignoring 40 million without healthcare promotion?

For that matter, "privacy" is not guaranteed either.
I suppose the founding fathers didn't foresee the internet and the
wire tap.

Sure... sounds like you're in favor of restricting women's rights. That's
the typical argument. Your right to have a gun is ok, but a woman's right to
have control over her own body isn't. Insurance covers Viagra.

--
Nom=de=Plume

wrote in message
...
On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 12:04:02 -0800, "nom=de=plume"
wrote:

It wasn't that Perot was a serious candidate, it was the questions he
made everyone else answer.

No one answered anything. He was mostly ignored.

I guess you didn't watch the debates

Nothing came of anything he said. He was wrong on many things, and he
faded
away as most kook should.

That kook did get people thinking about the deficit for a few years.
That is not a bad thing


That kook didn't do much for informed debate because he was a kook. Same
goes for Ron Paul.

--
Nom=de=Plume

wrote in message
...
On Sun, 27 Dec 2009 12:04:02 -0800, "nom=de=plume"
wrote:

They were Japanese and they built their factories in Tennessee where
the union did not operate behind the power of a government gun..(AKA a
"right to work state")
Ask yourself, who sold the most cars last year?

Cars are only one industry, but in any case, the Japanese economy is no
where near as stable or viable as the US economy.

The Japanese car business in the US is doing just fine tho and that
was my point. If you work for Honda or Toyota in Tennessee you are
still working. A UAW worker in the rust belt ... not so much.


So far...
http://www.marke****ch.com/story/toy...decades-report

--
Nom=de=Plume

"Canuck57" wrote in message
...
On 26/12/2009 12:47 PM, Bill McKee wrote:
"John wrote in message
news
On Fri, 25 Dec 2009 22:44:40 -0500, Gene
wrote:

On Fri, 25 Dec 2009 21:56:19 -0500, John
wrote:

However,
I believe you should have the choice.

What choice? Dying with dignity or being kept alive, with
extraordinary means, in a persistent vegetative state? Indefinitely?

And, there's always the chance
that the extra little amount of medical care would add another ten
fruitful years to your life.

I have absolutely no idea what you mean by this. Let's recap, per your
link:

".... has earned a reputation as a place where doctors will go to
virtually any length and expense to try to save a patient's life. "

This sounds great until you have to admit that an insurance policy
isn't an unlimited blank check. Sooner or later, whoever is "the deep
pockets" is going to start "rationing health care." But let's get real
and evaluate the next sentence.....

"If you come into this hospital, we're not going to let you die...."

Holy Crap, what incredible impertinence! That is just NOT their
decision. But wait, if you are in a persistent vegetative state, and
they keep your heart beating by extraordinary means..... uh..... you
haven't "died" yet..... right?

At least not until the money runs out and they have to start
rationing...... trust me.... there is NO FREE LUNCH.... and this has
NOTHING to do with humanitarian feelings toward you.... this is a
cold, hard, business decision.....

You missed this:

"Take the case of Salah Putrus, who at age 71 had a long history of
heart failure.

After repeated visits to his local hospital near Burbank, Calif., Mr.
Putrus was referred to U.C.L.A. this year to be evaluated for a heart
transplant.

Some other medical centers might have considered Mr. Putrus too old
for the surgery. But U.C.L.A.'s attitude was "let's see what we can do
for him," said his physician there, Dr. Tamara Horwich.

Indeed, Mr. Putrus recalled, Dr. Horwich and her colleagues "did every
test." They changed his medicines to reduce the amount of water he was
retaining. They even removed some teeth that could be a potential
source of infection.

His condition improved so much that more than six months later, Mr.
Putrus has remained out of the hospital and is no longer considered in
active need of a transplant. "
--

John H

"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the
gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery."

Churchill

Hell of a difference between 71 and 85 or 90 years old. A 94 year old
with
congestive heart failure and you are going to spend a 100k or so to
prolong
life a month?

So who gets to play god?

I am sure your health care would be cheaper if you were to sign a binding
orrevokable document that says you will never require an operation over
$100K and they are under no obligation to provided it. You cannot sue,
whine, bitch, contemplate or whatever when your term is up. This is
irrevocable in your lifetime.

Don't worry, Americans just subscribed to this. Read up on how government
saves on health care. Old farts looking for a free lunch, guess what, you
might find you are too old to qualify for the by-pass or whatever....

http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/Canada.pdf

A lot of truth under this title:

Rationing : “Everything is Free but Nothing is Readily Available” (Frogue
et al, 2001)



If you have the money, no problem with your family paying for extraordinary
means to keep you alive. Even in a vegetative state. But when it comes to
insurance, a 90 year old with a life expectancy of 6 months, who has no idea
of who he is or where he is, does not need the rest of us to supply him
extraordinary healthcare.