The Ryan budget plan, Part II: Medicare
In his so-called “Path to Prosperity,” U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan pledges to “preserve America’s social contract with retired workers” by rescuing Medicare from collapse.
“Current retirees deserve the benefits around which they organized their lives,” the plan states. “Future generations deserve health and retirement security they can count on.”
Who's on Medicare? They are, and if you're lucky, you will be too someday. (AP photo)
There’s no question that Medicare is in real trouble. It is already placing enormous pressure on the federal budget, and once the Baby Boom generation begins to retire and claim their benefits, the stress will become untenable. Unfortunately, Ryan proposes to save Medicare by destroying it.
First, some basics. Under Ryan’s plan, Americans 55 and older will be guaranteed standard Medicare benefits. However, those who turn 65 after 2021 will be placed on an entirely different plan. They will in effect be given taxpayer-funded vouchers that they can use to purchase insurance from government-run exchanges, much like the much despised ObamaCare model.
However, those vouchers will not cover the entire cost of health insurance for those retirees. In fact, under the proposed formula, by 2021 those vouchers would probably cover roughly three-fourths of the cost of current Medicare coverage, and that percentage would decline in each succeeding year. Senior citizens would be forced to cover the difference out of their own pockets.
For some retirees, that would be manageable (the plan envisions unspecified higher subsidies for low-income retirees and those with more serious health problems.) But for others it would not, particularly as private and public pension plans falter and proposals are made to slash Social Security.
Ryan argues that the change from a government-managed plan to a voucher plan would actually drive down the cost of health insurance and make it more affordable for retirees. As the plan describes it, “50 million empowered seniors holding providers accountable in a true marketplace” will be more effective than the government in driving down health care and insurance costs.
“Putting patients in charge of how their health care dollars are spent will force providers to compete against each other on price and quality,” the plan argues. “That’s how markets work: The customer is the ultimate guarantor of value.”
There’s an idealism in that claim that is almost charming. The problem is, we have considerable data proving that such belief is nonsense. We know, for example, that since 1970, per capita costs for Medicare coverage have risen more slowly than per capita costs for private medical insurance. Ryan himself acknowledges that fact, complaining that Medicare pays hospitals and doctors less than private insurers while also claiming that “the open-ended, blank-check nature of the Medicare subsidy drives health-care inflation at an astonishing pace.”
When you make an apples-to-apples comparison in what are called common costs — defined as “benefits commonly covered by (both) Medicare and private health insurance” — the price-containment difference is even more stark. Since 1997, the per capita cost for such benefits provided by Medicare has risen at an average annual rate of 4.1 percent, compared to a rise of 6.6 percent among private insurers, a difference of more than 50 percent.
The truth is, individuals in the confusing, frightening and complicated health-care marketplace don’t have the information or analytical skills needed to drive a hard bargain with providers. That’s particularly true of an elderly demographic. If you doubt that, walk into a hospital and try to negotiate a better price for a knee replacement than Aetna or BlueCross has negotiated, using their experts and market power. You can’t do it.
These are not surprises. Nor are they design flaws. The Congressional Budget Office, in an analysis of the Medicare plan requested by Ryan, laid out its impacts in a letter last fall.
“Voucher recipients would probably have to purchase less extensive coverage or pay higher premiums than they would under current law, for two reasons. First, most of the savings for Medicare under the proposal stem from reducing the amounts that the federal government would pay for enrollees on a per capita basis, relative to the projections under current law. Second, future beneficiaries would probably face higher premiums in the private market for a package of benefits similar to that currently provided by Medicare.
For both Medicare and Medicaid, the budgetary effects would become larger over time because federal payments would tend to grow more slowly under the proposal than projected costs per enrollee under current law. Although the level of expected federal spending and the uncertainty surrounding that spending would decline, enrollees’ spending for health care and the uncertainty surrounding that spending would increase.”
Ryan bristles at the description of his approach as a voucher plan, preferring the term “premium support program,” but that’s what it is. But it’s a voucher plan. Through Medicare, this country has made a commitment to its senior citizens that they will not be denied needed medical care because they can’t afford it.
The Ryan approach to Medicare reform abandons that commitment. The best thing that can be said about it — and it’s a contribution not to be belittled — is that this proposal begins a much-needed conversation about how to tackle one of the most serious financial challenges facing us as a society.
That word, by the way, was not chosen lightly. How we treat our senior citizens is an issue for our society, not our government, to solve. It is a challenge to our values, our morals, our ethics and our humanity.
– Jay Bookman
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680 comments Add your comment
retiredds
April 5th, 2011
5:02 pm
Let’s see: Path to Prosperity, Contract with America, Weapons of Mass Destruction, No Child Left Behind, Death Panels. Seems the Repubs are very good and artful when coming up with names and slogans for their programs that never work.
Kamchak
April 5th, 2011
5:05 pm
Seems the Repubs are very good and artful when coming up with names and slogans for their programs that never work.
They have Frank Luntz on retainer.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
5:08 pm
Oooohhhh and even a link to a chart!
While I am for free, universal health care, I’m willing to forego it for all provided it’s there for the over 62 and under 18…anything else is just dickering, imho. And how to pay for it? A flat rate tax on all income, earned and unearned…
Del
April 5th, 2011
5:12 pm
Oh well, more subjective criticism minus alternative plans from the party of irresponsibility. So far…Ryan 2 and Jay goose egg.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
5:15 pm
Looks kinda good at first glance, but as you get to know it, makes you shudder.
I’ve dated women like that.
Anyhow, part of that cost-per-patient is based upon the ridiculously low rates Congress has been paying to health care providers. Who of the posters here would like such a system imposed upon their livelihood?
Rather amusing the comparisons to Obamacare. Maybe this’ll take the heat off Romney for a while?
Adam
April 5th, 2011
5:17 pm
Del: CBO is subjective but Heritage Foundation is not?
Dave R.
April 5th, 2011
5:17 pm
Ohhhh, another stunning Jay Bookman series on something he knows little about. Case in point: The FairTax.
If he shows as much intellectual honesty in this series as he showed in the FairTax series, we can simply ignore this one as well.
“Unfortunately, Ryan proposes to save Medicare by destroying it.”
And there’s your sign . . .
Dave R.
April 5th, 2011
5:18 pm
:Looks kinda good at first glance, but as you get to know it, makes you shudder.
I’ve dated women like that.”
Are you talking coyote arm, Paul?
Del
April 5th, 2011
5:19 pm
Looks like Ryan has the Democrats chasing their tales and soon they’ll be backing off like Iraqi tanks. Catch y’all later. maybe it will be The Ryan Budget Part III
Paul
April 5th, 2011
5:21 pm
Jay
similar to topic follow-up: KV Pharmaceutical Company cut the price of its Makena to $690 per shot, still resulting in thousands of dollars’ cost for the entire regimen. FDA then announced it would take no action against compound pharmacies who still made the drug and charged 15 bucks per dose.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
5:22 pm
Dave R
Never had the pleasure, thank heavens -
Del
April 5th, 2011
5:24 pm
Paul’s discovered that they all look good at closing time. ISFH…sorry just had to slip that one in. I’m out
jm
April 5th, 2011
5:24 pm
Gimme a R – R!
Gimme a Y – Y!
Gimme a A – A!
Gimme a N – N!
What does that spell? Cannon Fodder!
Dave R.
April 5th, 2011
5:26 pm
Time for the commute home. Not sure if I’ll be back on. The CBS Tuesday night lineup is just too good, especially if all new episodes.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
5:26 pm
Jay
And it seems Medicare will now pay for the prostate cancer drug Provenge to the tune of $93,000 per patient.
That buys another four months of life.
Sorry, but cost containment needs to take place within Medicare when fatal diseases are involved.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
5:27 pm
Yaaaaaaaaaaawn. More left wing nonsense about the GOP taking away health care for old people.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
5:27 pm
Dave R
Have a good one –
Better check my DVR.
jm
April 5th, 2011
5:29 pm
The laws of economics cannot be refuted Jay. We either have to tax everyone to death, or let people try to help themselves.
All this analysis is completely “ceteris paribus” too, such that it utterly fails to take into account human nature. All I know is the path we’re on is unsustainable. I look forward to “The Bookman Plan”. We can all be critics. What’s our solution to the plan that actually solves the problem? (rank amateur solutions that don’t meet basic economic tests don’t count)
I can look at this stuff in detail (and have to some extent). But I also no Ryan’s a good guy, not an a-hole, and if this is what it takes to keep america solvent and functional for the next generation, so be it.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
5:30 pm
PAUL
Death panels?
jm
April 5th, 2011
5:30 pm
My parents get my social security and medicare payment each month. They could take care of themselves as necessary. But no one turns down a government hand out. Which is why the must stop.
Your GOP Representative
April 5th, 2011
5:30 pm
How we treat our senior citizens is an issue for our society, not our government, to solve. It is a challenge to our values, our morals, our ethics and our humanity.
I’m sorry, next door neighbor’s momma, but I have to throw you under the bus. The people have spoken. They came to me in my dreams and said, “take me, no, take me.” How could I refuse. The savings will be well spent on tax cuts for Kochs though. They told me to tell you, “You’re Welcome.”
Jay
April 5th, 2011
5:31 pm
Paul, I agree on that prostate drug. Unfortunately, Ryan also takes a shot or two at “death panels” in his budget, although he doesn’t use the term.
Pablo
April 5th, 2011
5:33 pm
“Seems the Repubs are very good and artful when coming up with names and slogans for their programs that never work.”
How about “Hope You Can Believe In”? Seems to me that Democrats are not that far behind…
WOW
April 5th, 2011
5:34 pm
Congress makes first major dent in health care law
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/apr/5/congress-makes-first-major-dent-health-care-law/
Joe
April 5th, 2011
5:36 pm
“The best thing that can be said about it — and it’s a contribution not to be belittled — is that this proposal begins a much-needed conversation about how to tackle one of the most serious financial challenges facing us as a society.”
The most serious financial challenge facing us as a society is NOT the cost of Medicare. The cost of Medicare is a symptom.
The most serious financial challenge facing us as a society is the cost of health care. Cutting Medicare benefits will only shift the cost of health care from the public sector to the private sector. Either way, taxpayers are still screwed.
Health care in this country costs twice as much as in other industrialized countries. The solutions are out there. If only our political leaders would offer them, and when they do, if only the media would put these leaders on television too so Americans can hear about and consider such solutions.
Kamchak
April 5th, 2011
5:37 pm
The laws of economics cannot be refuted…
Funny.
That’s the same thing a high priest says about his god’s law.
Your GOP Representative
April 5th, 2011
5:38 pm
What we need to do is put all those Medicare recipients on private health insurance because they know how to keep profits up as long as the government stays out of the regulation business. For example, those stupid rules about insurance companies spending at least 80 percent of insurance premiums on the people paying the insurance premiums while CEOs and other executives struggle just to make ends meet is absurd. And that utterly foolish requirement that insurance companies cannot dump people at will doesn’t even deserve the time that I have already wasted on it. The nerve of that Obama fellow and those Democrats. Unleash Ryan. He’ll set things right.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
5:38 pm
OH UH SPEGETIOES!!!!!!!!!!
Voters still split on blame for possible shutdown
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/voters-still-split-on-blame-for-possible-shutdown/2011/04/04/AFMUiXdC_story.html
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
5:39 pm
Jay: “How we treat our senior citizens is an issue for our society, not our government”
But the modern right doesn’t believe in ’society’ (Thatcher). To the modern conservative movement (the one that’s in the driver’s seat of the GOP and in whose pocket Paul Ryan the mouse with clipboard and calculator sits) ’society’ is a myth, a ploy crafted by degenerates to sap the vitality of the nation. The nation exists, but not the society. (If you can’t waive a flag for it, it doesn’t exist.)
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
5:39 pm
I’d say a cursory read of Matthew 25 is in order for most of the society today. Whether we choose to do so or not, the Bible explains the reward/punishment for our actions towards those that need help the most. I’d rather err on the side of caution and aid those who need help as opposed to leaving them on their own. Seems as if those who say we are a “Christian Nation” sometimes forget the teachings of Christ.
Koch's Law of Money Rules
April 5th, 2011
5:41 pm
The laws of economics cannot be refuted…
Unless they’re related to the laws of physics and are used to support such absurd notions as man-made global warming. My money says otherwise.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
5:41 pm
For too long Washington has not been honest with the American people. Washington has been making empty promises to Americans from a government that is going broke. The nation’s fiscal trajectory is simply not sustainable. The debt is projected to grow to truly catastrophic levels in the new future, leading to an economic collapse and a diminished future. We don’t need clever politicians in Washington. We need real leadership and that is what we intend to provide. The president’s recent budget proposal that he gave is worse than just a commitment to the status quo. The president actually accelerates our descent into a debt crisis. He doubles the debt by the end of his first term and triples the debt by the end of his budget.
Let me ask anybody who is listening this, what if your congressman, your president saw it coming? What if they knew it was gonna happen, what if they knew why it was gonna happen, when it was gonna happen, what nature, and more importantly, what if they knew what could be done to prevent it from happening, and if they had time to prevent it, but they decided not to because it wasn’t good politics? What would you think of your president, your member of Congress? Well, gah, that is where we are right now. This is the most predictable economic crisis in our history, and what are we doing, playing politics?
- Paul Ryan
Face it Bookman, Obama is very very nervous right now.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
5:44 pm
josef nix – Jay
Rep Ryan came up with politically palatable terms for ‘Obamacare’ and ‘vouchers’ to sell it to the public.
I’m sure someone can come up with something to replace ‘death panels.’
How about “eternity-accelerating options”?
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
5:48 pm
PAUL
EOI! I kinda like that term…catchy.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
5:51 pm
SoCom
Hey! That stuff applies only on Sundays.
Doesn’t it?
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
5:51 pm
SoCo
I’m with you on that. But then, I’m not a Christian and am a bleeding heart liberal…
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
5:52 pm
Jay:
“How we treat our senior citizens is an issue for our society, not our government, to solve. It is a challenge to our values, our morals, our ethics and our humanity.”
I would add, how we treat our most vulnerable unborn citizens is an issue for our society, and our government, to solve. It is a challenge to our values, our morals, and ethics and our humnanity.
So fair we are doing very poorly.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
5:54 pm
Paul
I’m beginning to believe that, and only between the hours of 10am-1pm.
josef
Wasn’t Jesus Jewish?
Guess you don’t have to be Christian to follow common sense though.
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
5:55 pm
“I’d rather err on the side of caution and aid those who need help as opposed to leaving them on their own.’
Well go ahead, no one’s stopping you.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
5:58 pm
Cuddin JC should’ve stayed out of politics! Oh, wait a minute…he did…I think…oh, I don’t know.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:00 pm
ty
“Well go ahead, no one’s stopping you”
It shouldn’t stop anyone with a moral compass…
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
6:01 pm
Let’s correct that little bit for ty webb’s benefit:
We should say rather: I’d rather make damn certain that as a society we err on the side of caution and aid those who need help as opposed to leaving them on their own.
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
6:02 pm
josef,
well said…nor should it stop anyone regardless if the federal government does it or not either.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
6:03 pm
Whoa a two parter.
I know two seniors so I know what I am talking about.
But seriously, Seniors should be warned they are voting to take their own ss checks and health care if they vote gop.
Fear card.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:04 pm
ty
Trust me, I already do. I’m not waiting on anyone else to aid my personal salvation. I’ll die with a clean conscience.
Abe Froman
April 5th, 2011
6:06 pm
If their goal is to reduce medicare enrollment, then this plan is too complicated. Handing out 2 free cartons of cigarettes a month to seniors would so the same thing, and support a valuable constituency to boot.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:06 pm
josef
Read some interesting research a while ago in a book about ol’ Cuddin JC. We’ll have to discuss that sometime as part of it was based on linguistics.
jt
April 5th, 2011
6:06 pm
Jay claims–”f you doubt that, walk into a hospital and try to negotiate a better price for a knee replacement than Aetna or BlueCross has negotiated, using their experts and market power. You can’t do it.”
One needs to only escape an immoral and corrupt federal government and those coorps who it influences—————–
Knee Replacement Surgery & Cost in India, Costa Rica & Mexico
Package Cost: 6,000~12,500 US Dollars
The cost of a total knee replacement varies depending upon where it is performed. The average cost – total knee replacement in the United States is about $40,000. The average cost of total knee replacement in our network varies from $6000 to $ 13,000.
Example numbers are India: $ 6,000; Costa Rica $ 11,500; Mexico: $ 11,500.
These surgeries are performed by the best knee replacement doctors that have experience of several successful knee replacement procedures. Many of the doctors have worked in the USA or Europe.
Listen to Ron Paul, get the government OUT of the medical field..and we could have decent cheap service too.
http://www.medicaltourismco.com/orthopedic-joint-bone/knee-replacement-surgery-cost.php
Paul
April 5th, 2011
6:06 pm
josef nix – SoCom
’scuse me if I’ve told this before, but my dad enjoys relating the time his mother was talking about Jesus and my dad said, “you know Jesus was Jewish” to which my grandma replied most indignantly, ‘He was not!!! ”
‘course, we all know the Kinky Friedman song -
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:07 pm
SoCo
“I’m not waiting on anyone else to aid my personal salvation”
Race traitor!
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
6:07 pm
no thanks left wing management…you can keep the whole “society” spiel. I choose to take care of my own, when I can afford to, or have the time to. I don’t look to the government to do it. And by “own” I mean family, friends, neighborhood, city, state, and country. Individuals can do good work.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
6:08 pm
“to which my grandma replied most indignantly, ‘He was not!!! ””
And he wasn’t a Christian either
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
6:09 pm
You see, I’m the diametrical opposite to a conservative. I’m not happy in the knowledge that I’m free as a private individual to donate any wealth I might have accumulated to the needy, to charity, etc. I want to impose that view of the world on others and I won’t stop until I’ve done everything I can to do so. I’m perfectly happy to impose my morality on you, whether you like it or not. That’s what differentiates me most directly from your average so-called conservative.
godless heathen
April 5th, 2011
6:10 pm
Good news on the economic front in today’s paper: McDonalds to hire 5,000. TSA to hire 200. If you want a demeaning dead-end job, go with the latter.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:10 pm
SoCo
Sounds interesting…let’s…
PAUL
Sssshhhh…the Imam don’t much care for those of us who get uppity on THAT one!
godless heathen
April 5th, 2011
6:11 pm
There is no virtue in being generous with other people’s money.
BADA BING
April 5th, 2011
6:11 pm
Tuesday topics…..Kirstie Alley is dancing on DWTS. Earthquakes are occuring all over the globe……………………I’m just sayin’.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
6:11 pm
Scout,
It would help to not cut programs to feed the poor children that are born.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:12 pm
“The problem is, we have considerable data proving that such belief is nonsense. We know, for example, that since 1970, per capita costs for Medicare coverage have risen more slowly than per capita costs for private medical insurance.”
Sure it has………and it should when the gov’t slashes the reimbursements……who do you think is going to pay it……everybody else.
Take nursing homes for example…….each bed has a cost basis……when the gov’t pays under that cost, the private beds carry the difference. They are not 2 separate systems…..they are intertwined and the data doesn’t reflect that.
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
6:12 pm
“If you want a demeaning dead-end job, go with the latter.”
but you do get to grope people so “membership has it’s privileges”.
BADA BING
April 5th, 2011
6:13 pm
Micky D’s is hiring 50,000 people. A lotta people must want fries wid dat.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:14 pm
jt
I’ve tried to explain the medical tourism industry to others, but nobody believes me. I talk to people who travel for those purposes. Many of the doctors in those countries study here in the US on F1 and J1 visas. Some even do their residency here before returning home.
josef
And damned proud of it!!!
besides, somebody has to be the exception to the rule…
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
6:16 pm
md…you have misstated your case. In a nursing home, each bed has a sales price. The govt calculates a cost and profit for a negotiated sales price. The private insurance companies do the same. Those individuals who do not have the information and collective size pay a higher price which makes more money for the nursing home.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:16 pm
“I’d rather err on the side of caution and aid those who need help as opposed to leaving them on their own.’
Can I see some definitions of the operative word……”need”.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
6:16 pm
Bada Bing,
That guy trying to hold her up did not stand a chance.
heathen,
Go apply .
Paul
April 5th, 2011
6:16 pm
Doggone/GA
you auditioning for the EOI club or somethin’?
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
6:17 pm
You see, ty webb, my motto goes something like: what good is stinking old charity and voluntarism when we can bake it into the society as a whole?
It’s not “as an individual, I can make a difference”, but rather “as a society, we can effect the changes that are necessary” that should be our guiding principle.
It’s not good enough for me that I as an isolated individual am free to help the poor, etc. Like Jay said, the problem addresses us all as a society – a word the right hates – and as a collectiev – a word they hate even more. So it’s not good enough for me to know I’m free to help out poor people on a voluntary basis. I want it baked into the very fabric of our society.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:18 pm
SoCo
Medical tourism….got a friend down in Costa Rica who got in on the ground floor and is doing quite nicely…
And the exception to the rule…don’t you just love challenging the stereotypes? What tickles me is when somebody tells me or Unmentionable, “well, you’re different…” and actually think we’re supposed to take it as a compliment…
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:18 pm
There are death panels. They’re called health insurance companies.
As long as we have our system of health care set up by for-profit and private industries mostly, we aren’t going to see a reduction in cost, and we certainly won’t see an improvement in quality for the average person.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
6:18 pm
Paul,
Welll…somethin’ anyway!
Paul
April 5th, 2011
6:19 pm
Seems simple enough to say “hey Rep Ryan, take care of the old folks. Tell us how to do it, we’ll make it happen.’
Seniors shouldn’t be used as pawns on the political chessboard.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:19 pm
“I’m perfectly happy to impose my morality on you, whether you like it or not.”
Might want to start on those that choose not to participate in society……….
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:21 pm
left wing
Not all of the right and conservatives, but a goodly number have the same problem with “security” and “welfare.”
BADA BING
April 5th, 2011
6:21 pm
Kirstie ……soon to be appearing on ‘Forklifting With The Stars’.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:21 pm
“Those individuals who do not have the information and collective size pay a higher price which makes more money for the nursing home.”
Wrong……you may want to check the profit margins of some of those homes…….many are losing money because of the reimbursement rates………I stated it correctly…..cost basis per bed……there is an absolute minimum where losses occur if not covered.
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:21 pm
md: No one chooses not to participate in society. They are part of it, and participating, whether they want to or not.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
6:22 pm
Adam
Whenever I see a doctor or specialist, I ask the providers if they’d rather deal with the current system, or cut out insurance companies and deal with gov’t-run.
Without exception, they respond ‘the latter.”
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
6:22 pm
md: “Might want to start on those that choose not to participate in society……….”
Society is not a “choice”.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
6:22 pm
“Seniors shouldn’t be used as pawns on the political chessboard.”
They don’t donate much and have no lobbyists like the poor and middle class.
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:23 pm
Now, I’m actually a quite slender guy, but I take offense to the fat jokes. Can we stop talking about Kristie Alley this way? She has worked real hard to overcome her weight issues time and again, as have many other celebrities.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:24 pm
ADAM
“There are death panels. They’re called health insurance companies”
Yep.
PAUL
“Seniors shouldn’t be used as pawns on the political chessboard.”
Them and the children…anybody else is fair game…
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:24 pm
Paul: It would be a study worth publicizing to find out doctor and specialist opinion on the matter, as well as public opinion. Hopefully the “why” can also be clearly identified.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
6:24 pm
Adam – have pity, they really can’t help it. It’s reflexive.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:25 pm
“So it’s not good enough for me to know I’m free to help out poor people on a voluntary basis. I want it baked into the very fabric of our society.”
Many call it enabling………and what guarantees all will choose to participate in the collective vs allowing others to carry them??
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:25 pm
Doggone: I know most people have the capacity to watch it at least for a short time when it comes to stuff like that. It gives me hope, at least.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
6:25 pm
“Them and the children…anybody else is fair game”
I wouldn’t go that far. The mentally handicapped are not fair game either.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:27 pm
md
“Need” would be like the parents of a child born with a defect that requires long term medical care. Even when they have insurance, it’s usually not enough to help take care of bills. It’s hard to nail down a firm definition for “need” because people and situations are not all cookie-cutter in design. I just try to help those that are least able to help themselves.
My wife and I have provided meals for families that were down on their luck through local agencies. We’ve done Christmas (toys, clothes and food) for families through the same agency. I’ve helped with food drives, clothing drives and other things.
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
6:27 pm
ah yes…while we’re talking about words hated by one side or the other, don’t forget the left’s aversion to “personal responsibility”, “liberty”, “profit”, and “job”.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
6:27 pm
I bring chickens when I go to the doctor so we can barter.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:28 pm
BADA
You just plumb bad!
ADAM
Actually, I think Kristie might like that one…I hold her in the highest esteem for her sense of humor on the matter…she’s come up with some really good one-liners herself…
Society is a choice? Where do I check out?
md
April 5th, 2011
6:28 pm
“md: No one chooses not to participate in society. They are part of it, and participating, whether they want to or not.”
Our “society” set up an assistance program for all…..it is called “public education”……currently, 1/3 of folks CHOOSE not to participate in said program……………the problem compounds itself from there…..so again, how do you propose ALL choose to participate in “society”.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:29 pm
josef
If you’ve read The Hiram Key, you probably already know the theories tossed around in that book. Some were predicated on translating names using ancient Hebrew dialects.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
6:29 pm
“Whenever I see a doctor or specialist, I ask the providers if they’d rather deal with the current system, or cut out insurance companies and deal with gov’t-run.
Without exception, they respond ‘the latter.””
Whenever I do they say the former.
You should stop going to commie docs.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:30 pm
getalife
Unh-hunh…I know where you live…you got a prescription for them chickens!
Doggone
Yes. that, too.
jm
April 5th, 2011
6:30 pm
I wonder how many of these Jay is going to throw at Ryan.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:30 pm
Our “society” set up an assistance program for all…..it is called “public education”……currently, 1/3 of folks CHOOSE not to participate in said program
Imagine that even with 1/3 not participating, we’re still cutting funding. That 1/3 will probably end up being 1/2 sometime in the future unless we quit the bs and really dig deep to find out where we’re coming up short.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
6:31 pm
SoCo
I haven’t. I will. Sounds right up my alley.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
6:31 pm
And yet md you fail to post any evidence to support the claim that actual losses are occuring in private enterprise for some segment of nursing homes. But you are in fact acknowledging that under the Ryan plan, seniors currently covered by govt plan would have to pay more for services.
jm
April 5th, 2011
6:31 pm
Is Part 3 Medicaid?
Is Part 4 the interest component? That should be a good one. We have Trillions in debt, all on the short term borrowing credit card. If interest rates go up, interest expense takes over the national budget very quickly.
Hope you’ve got Part 4 on the docket too Jay.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:32 pm
soco,
Thanks for your definition….and I concur. And that is nothing short of what I expected to hear from you.
Personally,I think some here need to understand there is a difference between “can’t” and “won’t” when it comes to need.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
6:35 pm
Adam
What I’ve gleaned from them is frustration with insurance companies – not just that they all have different rules, but how arbitrary they can be when the person on the other end of the line says “approved’ or ‘not approved’ and how it seems to vary so much.
Granny Godzilla
April 5th, 2011
6:35 pm
Opening
Ok Ladies and gentlemen, and I use that term carefully, let’s talk.
It’s not just healthcare in America – it’s HEALTH – in America.
We are what we eat.
(I’m meat and potatoes, working on her salad and always have been)
@@
April 5th, 2011
6:35 pm
Unfortunately, Ryan proposes to save Medicare by destroying it.
Fear mongering, jay?
You underestimate seniors. They didn’t reach their ripe old ages without sheer determination. My sister-in-law who worked in a physician’s office said the only patients that made her cringe with fear, were the elders.
My Mom, on a VERY (small) monthly income wouldn’t be caught dead (no pun intended) without her supplemental policy. A friend of hers was sent home from hospice when her medicare ran out. “They won’t be shufflin’ me out” she says.
My brother and I reimburse the amount of her supplemental premium. She complains every time she sees where the money’s been deposited in her account, but we’re used to being reprimanded. We’ll survive.
She’s a feisty ol’ broad.
RW-(the original)
April 5th, 2011
6:36 pm
Off topic
Mick,
I tried to read the Stiglitz screed on class warfare but my eyes kept glazing over. I think the very same message he’s trying to put out has been done a million times in two sentence blog comments, but thanks for the link.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:36 pm
md
I firmly believe that you can not help someone who doesn’t want to help themself. No matter how much or how hard you try, you will not succeed if they don’t want the same.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
6:37 pm
Josef,
My cardiologist prescribed them and told me to try to catch them like in Rocky.
He just volunteered on a ship in undisclosed location to do surgery.
I asked him, what are you, some kind of liberal.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
6:37 pm
“…the left’s aversion to “personal responsibility”, “liberty”, “profit”, and “job”.”
No, they like “social justice, workers of the world unite, tax the rich,” etc.
If they had any integrity at all, they would chant “I’m a loser, pay me!”
md
April 5th, 2011
6:37 pm
“And yet md you fail to post any evidence to support the claim that actual losses are occuring in private enterprise for some segment of nursing homes. But you are in fact acknowledging that under the Ryan plan, seniors currently covered by govt plan would have to pay more for services.”
The evidence is in my head………been there, done that….take it however you choose…..
And I’m merely pointing out the data tries to separate the 2 systems, when one effects the other and visa versa.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
6:37 pm
md: “Our “society” set up an assistance program for all…..it is called “public education”……currently, 1/3 of folks CHOOSE not to participate in said program”
Society is not reducible to public education, or any other individual program.
Society is not equivalent to the totality of its institutions, or even of its people. It’s fundamentally a moral community.
Paul
April 5th, 2011
6:38 pm
@@
I’d have expected no less of you.
Well done.
godless heathen
April 5th, 2011
6:40 pm
“Kirstie Alley is dancing on DWTS. Earthquakes are occuring all over the globe”
Tsunami warnings went up when she fell down.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
6:40 pm
“The truth is, individuals in the confusing, frightening and complicated health-care marketplace don’t have the information or analytical skills needed to drive a hard bargain with providers. That’s particularly true of an elderly demographic. If you doubt that, walk into a hospital and try to negotiate a better price for a knee replacement than Aetna or BlueCross has negotiated, using their experts and market power. You can’t do it.”-Jay
Jay,
That’s not quite true Jay. People don’t shop because they’re lazy or as you said they may just be ignorant and not realize that docs and health care facilities can be negotioated with. I have a custome who works at an obgyn’s office and had to shop for her own services- her doc gave her a $300 a month voucher towards the cost of an insurance plan but she had to shop for it.
She purchased an HSA wich gives her a lower premium but she has to pay for a lot of things out of pocket. She called around and got an MRI for $300 with a well known MRI outpatient facility- normally a $700-$2000 procedure.
There are also doctors now that offer plans where you pay them directly like in the old days- this is a new and growing trend. Many of these plans have charges $50 flat fee monthly per family for doc visits with a $15 co-pay- unlimited visits per family member. Docs would much rather get paid directly by the patient then deal with claims paperwork.
And while you may not realize it Medicare does not pay 20% of part B expenses. Requiring seniors to now pick up an extra 5% is not asking a whole lot. That generation has accumulated more wealth than all the other generations. Its only reasonable that they should in fact pay for a little more of their health care. Anyone who has an understanding of basic demographics understands that the senior generation has far more wealth than the other generations- money and assets accumulated over a lifetime unless the govt took most of it from them.
BADA BING
April 5th, 2011
6:40 pm
Tuesday Topix 2……Pittsburg Police reported that prostitutes are accepting Gift Cards as payment for services rendered. Most popular card……Sluts R Us.
jconservative
April 5th, 2011
6:41 pm
Depending on whose numbers you believed, Obamacare gave the insurance industry a potential 15 to 30 million new customers. Ryan’s formula would give the insurance industry 50 to 60 million new customers.
In both cases the winners are the insurance companies.
The losers? The individual taxpayer, as always.
The real simple way to keep Medicare as a viable program is to tie the eligibility age to Social Security. It would require a bill of 58 words. It has been written dozens of times over the years but it never gets out of sub-committee.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:41 pm
“It’s fundamentally a moral community.”
With immoral components………….
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
6:42 pm
Ty Webb, Sinkwich: “the left’s aversion to “personal responsibility”, “liberty”, “profit”, and “job” ”
I like all those words. I just want to see them mean something other than a sloganizing, propaganda program put forward by those who have no interest in whether I am responsible, free, profitable, or have a job. Without social justice, all of those principles unravel.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
6:43 pm
md: “With immoral components………….”
Interesting comment. Care to elaborate? Are you saying that because society is not free of moral purity or perfection, a person cannot be forced to participate in it?
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:43 pm
I agree with SoCo on the matter of the public education system. However, society is not equal to public education system. Public education is a part of society, but not society itself. The 1/3 you refer to are still members of society. They do not have a choice in that. And I still don’t agree that all of them necessarily made that educational choice on their own.
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:44 pm
LWM: Well said. Especially Without social justice, all of those principles unravel.
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:44 pm
Nah, society isn’t a moral community. It’s just a community.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:44 pm
And for the record, I’m not opposed to a single payer type system…….this 3rd party crap needs to go. But I would prefer a 3rd party system such as a not for profit hospital vs the endless pit gov’t running the show.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:47 pm
There are also doctors now that offer plans where you pay them directly like in the old days- this is a new and growing trend. Many of these plans have charges $50 flat fee monthly per family for doc visits with a $15 co-pay- unlimited visits per family member. Docs would much rather get paid directly by the patient then deal with claims paperwork.
Sounds like cutting out the middle-man. It would be great to see even more jump on that bandwagon as I think it’s the middle-man, a.k.a. insurance companies, that are creating the massive price increases in the first place.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
6:48 pm
“society isn’t a moral community. It’s just a community”
I don’t agree. Any community has to have a morality. It might not be what you or I would agree is a morality, but it has to exist to even HAVE a community.
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
6:48 pm
Makes me glad I’m in the 55 and over crowd.
And on a related note………I’ve always wondered, who passed these “laws of economics”, I’m always hearing about?
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
6:48 pm
But I would prefer a 3rd party system such as a not for profit hospital vs the endless pit gov’t running the show.
Sounds like something I’ve stated here numerous times.
godless heathen
April 5th, 2011
6:48 pm
“Without exception, they respond ‘the latter.”
Sure they would, because they know the government throws away money hand over fist. When you take “for profit” for anyone except the providers out of the system, it will be a bonanza for two groups: providers and government employees.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:49 pm
“Are you saying that because society is not free of moral purity or perfection, a person cannot be forced to participate in it?”
How do you plan to force participation? There are many among us that choose not to be part of society……..the woods are full of them………other than the financial aspect, they can choose not to participate.
What you advocate sounds more like a ‘commune”……..and last I checked, it was voluntary and full of rules.
Sounds to me like you are advocating taking away the freedom of choice…………
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
6:50 pm
@@ at 6:35,
True enough. I like Jay put in typical liberal paternalistic fashion he himself said he doesn’t believe seniors can handle navigating the health system themselves. He has no clue how wrong he truly is. They are highly educated on their options and if not they will get themselves educated.
The only ones that don’t care are the ones on Medicaid- the really poor ones that are generally pretty ignorant. They are different in that they do want and need to be taken care of. And take care of them we do.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
6:50 pm
Obama is a colossal hypocrite.
Obama tells Congress to act like ‘grown ups’
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/395f0f8c-5fc1-11e0-a718-00144feab49a.html#axzz1IehpdthL
Paul
April 5th, 2011
6:51 pm
Hillbilly
“who passed these “laws of economics”, I’m always hearing about?”
Economists. Has to do with job security and nonaccountability.
Pleasant evening, all -
md
April 5th, 2011
6:52 pm
“insurance companies, that are creating the massive price increases in the first place.”
Exactly…….they don’t work for free………..
Adam
April 5th, 2011
6:52 pm
Doggone: That’s not to say there aren’t morals, but unless the community is very small it is unlikely those morals are shared by everyone in it.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
6:53 pm
You know this is all so very simple and the answer is right there before your eyes. If everyone was rich like me, we wouldn’t have any problem at all. Get it?
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
6:53 pm
“Without social justice, all of those principles unravel.”
Please define “social justice.” I think it’s a commie code phrase for Marxist policies.
Thanks.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
6:53 pm
md
Most of these left wing bloggers don’t understand basic economics.
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
6:53 pm
Hmmmm, I wonder how much an insurance policy for a 70 year old diabetic with failing kidneys and a heart attack in her past would cost.
Either these vouchers will cost us out the wazoo or people like that will be out of luck.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
6:54 pm
“other than the financial aspect”
In other words, they participate. Even minimal participation is participation
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
6:55 pm
I din’t see this posted. Sorry if I’m doing it again.
Bookman understands that there is a debt crisis.
If the Dems are so smart where is their plan? Where was their budget last year? FAIL.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xwv5EbxXSmE&feature=player_embedded
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
6:55 pm
WOW
April 5th, 2011
6:53 pm
md
Most of these left wing bloggers don’t understand basic economics.
There’s a lot more to economics than the basics brother and that’s what the conservatives don’t understand.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
6:56 pm
“Without social justice”
In other words, wealth envy. Black racist like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton preach social justice.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
6:56 pm
“Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) on Tuesday commended House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) budget, calling it “Serious & necessary.” ”
Good enough for me.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
6:56 pm
“Obama tells Congress to act like ‘grown ups’”
They need to.
He was aggravated today.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
6:56 pm
“There’s a lot more to economics than the basics brother and that’s what the conservatives don’t understand.”
Enlighten us all….brother.
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
6:57 pm
“Please define “social justice.” I think it’s a commie code phrase for Marxist policies.”
It’s one of the first terms all those “women’s studies” majors are taught to throw out at the drop of a dime.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
6:57 pm
Southern Comfort at 6:47,
That’s exactly what it is. People and docs are slowly cutting out the middle man- insurance companies. I own an insurance agency and I’m cool with that.
Insurance needs to be more about covering truly catastrophic events. Everyday routine health care at the micro level needs to go back to being between the doc and patient- without the government and insurance companies and the myriad paperwork and claims and bureaucracy that both entail.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
6:57 pm
“it is unlikely those morals are shared by everyone in it”
Anyone who doesn’t share won’t be a part of that community long. They’ll leave on their own account, or be pushed out.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
6:57 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
That’s because he knows he’s in deep doo doo.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
6:58 pm
“In other words, wealth envy. Black racist like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton preach social justice.”
BINGO.
In other words, equality of outcome.
md
April 5th, 2011
6:59 pm
“Hmmmm, I wonder how much an insurance policy for a 70 year old diabetic with failing kidneys and a heart attack in her past would cost. ”
Might want to remember that the new hc bill doesn’t allow for non coverage of preexisting conditions…..but, the plans are still nowhere near cheap………
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
7:00 pm
“Insurance needs to be more about covering truly catastrophic events. Everyday routine health care at the micro level needs to go back to being between the doc and patient- without the government and insurance companies and the myriad paperwork and claims and bureaucracy that both entail.”
Then who’s gonna pay for my little blue pills? The wife ain’t gonna like this.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:00 pm
Don’t Forget
April 5th, 2011
6:53 pm
Hmmmm, I wonder how much an insurance policy for a 70 year old diabetic with failing kidneys and a heart attack in her past would cost.
End stage renal disease(kidney failure) would be covered by Medicare because of its prohibitive costs and specialized care. That’s the way it works now.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:01 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
Michelle caught him smoking then kicked his azz.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
7:01 pm
Don’t forget: “Most of these left wing bloggers don’t understand basic economics.”
I don’t know, I get my economic theory from people like Adam Smith and Karl Marx, both of whom are essentially communists from the standpoint of the current American right. Anyway, I think I’m in pretty good company there. What about you?
Sinkwich: “Please define “social justice.” I think it’s a commie code phrase for Marxist policies.”
What’s a commie? To come back to Adam Smith, I think by that definition Adam Smith would be a commie, since his entire project was in an attempt to better create and distribute wealth for the general good, i.e. for social justice.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:01 pm
This is hilarious. This is the same moron who said that “we have to pass the health care bill to find out what’s in it.”
Pelosi: GOP Budget Will Deprive Seniors Of Meals
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/04/05/pelosi_gop_budget_will_deprive_seniors_of_meals.html
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
7:01 pm
I think the “shopping for medical care” argument has merits for things like routine check-ups, the flu and that sort of thing. It falls apart when you get into more complicated things. Who, realistically, is going to think about shopping around, when they’ve just been told they need chemo, or open heart surgery. At times like that, you’ve got all you can handle without worrying about business. In cases like that, time is of the essence and you don’t have the luxury of going doctor shopping. And realistically, how many people who haven’t been in that situation, can even name a place to go ask for a price.
That doesn’t even bring up accidents, when you go wherever the ambulance takes you.
Our medical care is as good as anybody’s but the business side of things is a mess. I think the growth in the number of “for profit” hospitals has a lot to do with that. At our own local “for profit” (the only hospital within 25 miles), they bought a new CAT Scan machine, a couple years ago. Well you can bet, if it takes X number of scans a month, to make the payments on that machine, they’re going to do X number of scans. Lots of those are probably paid for by insurance but it contributes to the high cost of health care.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:02 pm
Don’t forget,
Also under the proposed plan it kinda goes without saying that it would have to look like the original Medicare system whereby there is no underwriting- all are automatically accepted regardless of health condition- no cherry picking. Otherwise you would be able to disqualify dang near half or more of seniors.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:03 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
The White House laundry shrunk his Mom Jeans.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
7:04 pm
What we need is a system where Granny can either afford healthcare or not. If she can’t afford it, then she just flat-out needs to do without. And if the kids ain’t willing to pony up and pay the medical bills, then she just needs to die. NO MORE SOCIALISM!Survival of the fittest.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:04 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
UCONN won. That’s why he’s so upset!
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:04 pm
“to better create and distribute wealth for the general good, ”
Commie.
Yippee
April 5th, 2011
7:04 pm
And the liar speaks again.
Did you see this video?: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIA5aszzA18
harvey
April 5th, 2011
7:04 pm
You can tell you are not on Medicare. I am, but still pay more for my additional/supplemental insurance than I did when I was under 65. So, seniors still have to pay for supplements or, I assume, they depend on charity–medicaid. There is so much fraud in the whole system, including in the numbers of government personnel that run it, that if it were cleaned up we might really save. By the way, those seniors getting medicare now, in all likelihood, have always had a bigger work ethic than any of the kids coming along now.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:05 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
Shot an eleven on a Par 3.
Jackie
April 5th, 2011
7:05 pm
@WOW
Could you articulate your observations about the racist attitudes and actions of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton?
It appears that you have a problem with the minority community.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
7:06 pm
md
As you know, you and I sometimes differ on what is “can’t” and what is “won’t” but are in basic agreement. My question, though, is who sits on the “death panels” (for lack of a better phrase) making that decision?
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:06 pm
Hillbilly Deluxe,
You’re right about things like Chemotherapy and major medical events although today there is still some degree of shopping even in that regard. Some people choose to go to one of the nationally recognized American Cancer treatment centers such as at Duke Medical or UAB. I believe Emory’s cancer treatment center just attained status as a designated center.
I’m just talking about at the micro level getting govt and insurance companies out of the equation.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
7:06 pm
The Democrat response to Paul Ryan’s Budget is simply, do nothing except put on a red shirt and scream insults while calling them racist and crazy and don’t forget to watch Dancing With The Stars, The Emmys, The Grammys, The Oscars, The People’s Choice Awards, The SAG Awards, The Scream Awards, The Adult Video Awards and of course, last but not least, Chris Matthews.
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
7:07 pm
WOW
April 5th, 2011
6:56 pm
“There’s a lot more to economics than the basics brother and that’s what the conservatives don’t understand.”
Enlighten us all….brother.
I’ve tried in the past but it’s a waste of time. If you really want to know more about it than the high school Adam Smith version then take a course or do a little research and read some differing points of view.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:07 pm
Jackie,
Remember Jesse Jackson’s hymietown comment?
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:09 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
Someone asked him about his promise to close Gitmo.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:09 pm
“It appears that you have a problem with the minority community.”
No, I have a problem with racists morons who make a living off of race baiting, Jackie.
“Could you articulate your observations about the racist attitudes and actions of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton?”
Hymie town comes to mind. The Duke Lacrosse debacle comes to mind. Al Sharpton inciting riots in NY that killed a couple of people comes to mind.
md
April 5th, 2011
7:10 pm
“However, society is not equal to public education system. Public education is a part of society, but not society itself. The 1/3 you refer to are still members of society. They do not have a choice in that.”
But “society” designed the program for “all”, yet all do not participate in the program and therefore do not abide by the wishes of ’society”.
So…..they either don’t participate in ’society”, or how does society not fail if all are not following the rules set forth?
Where is that “force” component?
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:11 pm
“I’ve tried in the past but it’s a waste of time. If you really want to know more about it than the high school Adam Smith version then take a course or do a little research and read some differing points of view.”
In other words, you have no idea and divert attention to something that makes absolutely no sense.
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
7:11 pm
“It appears that you have a problem with the minority community.”
in the interest of “Blog Justice”, it appears he has a problem with Sharpton and Jackson, and rightfully so.
Tommy Maddox
April 5th, 2011
7:11 pm
Oh and Jessie’s ” I wanna cut his nuts out” tad on television.
Oh wait, the guy he was speaking of was only 1/2 white,
md
April 5th, 2011
7:11 pm
“NO MORE SOCIALISM!Survival of the fittest.”
Yeh yeh…..we know you all are pro-choice…….
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
7:12 pm
“how does society not fail if all are not following the rules set forth?”
Depends on the rules. The more flexible they are the more people can be in that society. The more rigid they are, the fewer people.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
7:12 pm
“It appears that you have a problem with the minority community.”
That stuff belongs in Cynthia Tuckers blogosphere.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:13 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
He bet on VCU.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
7:13 pm
Doom
No disagreement from me on that. I thought the whole purpose of insurance was for catastrophic incidents. I grew up without medical insurance (at least that’s what I was told at the time), but I was still able to get routine checkups and stuff. I never had any catastrophic things happen, such as broken bones or surgery.
“Without social justice”
In other words, wealth envy. Black racist like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton preach social justice.
MLK also preached social justice. I’m guessing he’s racist too….
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:14 pm
harvey,
The cost of supplements is going up although not at a crazy pace. Right now if you qualify for Medicare and Medicaid you get a plan in which you basically pay zero for anything medical. You could have a triple bypass 200k operation and pay not a dime.
If a senior can’t afford a supplement they can get a medicare advantage plan often at zero premium or at a very nominal premium like $40 a month. These plans are excellent with the only drawback being that they have network limitations as far as doc choice goes. They chiefly benefit low income people who don’t qualify for medicaid and middle class people who can’t afford a supplement.
Curiously enough the Obama administration wants to do away with Medicare Advantage which is very popular with lower income and middle class people. Why he would do this is a mindboggling mystery to me.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:15 pm
“MLK also preached social justice.”
He wasn’t a race baiting moron like Jesse and Al. He didn’t make a living off of suing companies and demonizing other people. He also didn’t go around saying he was going to cut the nuts off of people.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
7:16 pm
WTF?
“how does society not fail if all are not following the rules set forth?”
Depends on the rules. The more flexible they are the more people can be in that society. The more rigid they are, the fewer people.
Uhhhh No.
Rules are same for all or they don’t make squat for anyone.
As the great Warren Zevon would say:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5puAN1PGQw
md
April 5th, 2011
7:16 pm
“As you know, you and I sometimes differ on what is “can’t” and what is “won’t” but are in basic agreement. My question, though, is who sits on the “death panels” (for lack of a better phrase) making that decision?”
It should be our elected officials………and to me, assistance programs should be conditional and verifiable based on a step process.
If one is able to go to school, but chooses to drop out which makes matters worse for themselves and ’society”, no further assistance would be given without conditions to go back to step 1…in this case school. By allowing folks to go on to step 2, 3 4, etc without correcting the underlying problem does neither party any good.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:17 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
He figured out the world thinks he’s a wiener.
Jackie
April 5th, 2011
7:18 pm
@WOW
When you mention the “Hymie Town” remarks, could you say that you have never used a racial pejorative relative to others?
Secondly, the Duke LaCrosse incident had nothing to do with Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton. They were asked to come to Durham, NC to speak on behalf of the alleged victims, which turns out was a fraud. In that case, what did you think of Mr. Mike Nifong, the DA who used the incident to further his unsuccessful re-election, even though a majority of the people in the black and white community told him that the alleged victim had many issues and had perpetuated that fraud on others? Was Mr. Nifon a race-baiter?
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
7:18 pm
Sharpton and Jackson have a vested interest in their finding racism in a chocolate chip cookie. That doesn’t mean it isn’t an ongoing problem with us as it is in any multi-racial society. My problem is that all concerned are still trapped in a blac-white dichotomy.
As for the Hymietown comment. Yeah, it p*ssed me off. No big surprise, mind you. But then, on the other hand, it was kinda hard to get too worked up since that’s what I call it, too. It’s sorta like the infamous “n” word. Be careful when and where you use it.
Yippee
April 5th, 2011
7:18 pm
Democrats are like a jagged glass suppository-a real pain in the a$$. Most democrats in DC think their head is a suppository. I think I digressed. Back to the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIA5aszzA18
Adam
April 5th, 2011
7:19 pm
What the hell is with this obsession over who Obama picked for the Final Four. Who gives a sh*t?
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
7:19 pm
“I thought the whole purpose of insurance was for catastrophic incidents”
There is not “purpose” to insurance. It’s just legalized gambling. The insurance company (bettor 1) bets you X number of dollars a year that you won’t get seriously sick (or have an accident, or burn your house down, or whatever) and you (bettor 2) agrees.
If you don’t get sick (or etc) bettor 1 wins. If you do, and have to claim on your insurance you – as bettor 2 – wins.
And since the insurance company is, ultimately, taking the bigger risk, they set the “odds” (requirements to claim) as much in their favor as they can.
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
7:19 pm
So, Wow, what exactly do you want to know?
Jackie
April 5th, 2011
7:19 pm
@ty webb
How does anyone have a right to have issues with someone who advocates for minorities, all poor and women?
Did Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton exhibit racial hatred when they went to West Virginia and advocated for the poor in Appalachia?
md
April 5th, 2011
7:20 pm
“Rules are same for all or they don’t make squat for anyone.”
Hence the reason for numerous of our problems today………………ie immigration……2 sets of rules.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
7:21 pm
“Rules are same for all or they don’t make squat for anyone”
Sure they’re the same for all, but that doesn’t mean they have to be tightly rigid. “Your rights end where my nose begins” is a rule. It’s not a rigid one. It doesn’t define what you can or can’t do, it only defines that you must limit what you do to things that do not interfere with MY rights.
Jackie
April 5th, 2011
7:22 pm
@joseph nix
The black/white dichotomy is an issue that will not go away because it appears there are many who like sound bites to solve a festering problem.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
7:22 pm
Doggone/GA: “There is not “purpose” to insurance. It’s just legalized gambling”
The same can be said of capitalism itself. But it goes on. It doesn’t die. You bow before it.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:22 pm
Jackie,
Al Sharpton was initially out front on this Duke Lacrosse thing also. He had to quickly back down when it was becoming obvious the woman was fabricating the whole thing.
Al learned his lesson because he made his name with the Tawana Brawley fabrication of 5 ku klux klansmen raping her. That was the story that brought AL SHarpton on the national scene if you’ll remember. He was race baiting in the worst, most shameful way. Everyone knew that girl’s story was preposterous. He knew it. He just didn’t care because it was helping him make a national name for himself. How and why black people follow a man that led the charge on such an incendiary lie is beyond me.
Mary Elizabeth
April 5th, 2011
7:23 pm
Jay,
Thank you so very much for this article. I believe that you are right on the money (pun intended in every connotation – human and financial).
Here are my published words of a year ago:
“When we recognize that ‘no man is an island entire of itself,’ then we will understand the value of promoting the general welfare, through our government, as described in our nation’s Constitution.
“In this world view, America’s citizens would emerge less judgmental and more generous in spirit. As a nation, we would better be able to lead others in the practice of nonviolence. We would know the value of universal health care for all, as with education, instead of perceiving it only as a privilege for the financially well-endowed.”
(Please read Mick’s link yesterday which describes how the top 1 % of our nation have increased their wealth doublefold over the last decades, while the middle/working class has lost financial ground. I hope you will not only read it, but will place it on your Facebook page for others to read. It is really insightful:)
http://www.vanityfair.com/society/features/2011/05/top-one-percent-201105?currentPage=all
———————————————–
Now, I need to do something I was led to do by listening to God’s spirit in my willful soul. In yesterday’s storm, I realized fully that none of us knows the hour of our death. It could come at any
time.
I have often written in support of nonviolence – as my words, above, demonstrate. But how can I write in support of nonviolence, if I do not practice nonviolence myself in every context of my life? Verbal insults, even if one feels justified, are never really justified. They are actually small forms of violence toward others, unless done with good humor from both parties. (”An eye for an eye” means a loss for all.)
To HARRY CALLAHAN:
So, this evening, I must apologize to you, Harry, for the insulting words I have used toward you. Only God’s spirit in my heart could lead me to make this public apology. But I mean the apology sincerely. If I were to die tonight, I know that the Lord would be well pleased with my listening to His spirit and acting on it.
And, perhaps, my example, of trying to practice nonviolence in words, will mean more to others than my writings, anyway.
:
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
7:24 pm
Jackie,
two words…”tawana brawley”.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:24 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
His teleprompter demanded double pay, tenure, new work rules, 20 sick days a year, and overtime for more than two hours per week.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:25 pm
“When you mention the “Hymie Town” remarks, could you say that you have never used a racial pejorative relative to others?”
No.
“Secondly, the Duke LaCrosse incident had nothing to do with Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton.”
Interview with Bill O’Reilly about the Duke Lacrosse case from 2009.
REV. AL SHARPTON, CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST: I think that there are certainly a lot of racial factors. Whether it is directly in the case, we’ll see, because some reports said that there was racial language used. But I think that when you look at the racial atmosphere, when you look at the fact that there again were the allegations of racial statements, when you look at a lot of people feeling that they have been treated differently, where this girl has basically had a character charged in the media, there is a lot of racism that’s in the air.
SHARPTON: But I think that all of the facts that you have laid out the DA had — and I know this DA is probably not one that is crazy. He would not have proceeded if he did not feel that he could convict. So it tells me that all of what you said is either not true or he has convincing evidence that would certainly knock that out and no one is not letting him proceed.
Jesse Jackson article
Duke: Horror and Truth
By Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.
© Tribune Media Services
“Divorced Mother Of Two, Working Way Through College, Allegedly Raped, Abused By Gang.” Had the headline read that way, the fury would have been great. The facts that the police didn’t arrest anyone, that the gang was not talking, that it took two days for the police to search the scene of the crime would have added to the anger.
But that’s not how it was reported. Rather, it was reported that a black stripper was accusing members of the Duke lacrosse team of rape after she and another woman were hired to dance for them at a party. That method of reportage put race and class in the center of the story. Predictably, the right-wing media machine has kicked in, prompting mean-spirited attacks upon the accuser’s character. Rush Limbaugh called the two women strippers “hoes,” and later apologized saying “I regret you heard me say that.” And Michael Savage referred to the alleged victim as a “Durham dirt-bag” and “dirty, verminous black stripper”. And, it is in this tense atmosphere that the accuser flees from home to home, fearing for her safety. The players got lawyers immediately, who advised them to talk to no one. Duke University boosters hired big-time legal gunslinger Bob Bennett – who counts the Catholic Church as well as then-president Bill Clinton among his clients – to step in as spokesman for the newly-formed “Committee for Fairness to Duke Families”.
http://www.blacknews.com/pr/duke301.html
“Was Mr. Nifon a race-baiter?’
No, he was an idiot who who was disbarred for lying.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
7:26 pm
The Obama Weiner Dog… PERFECT !!
I should trademark it right now !!
Ya got ur hotdog with a logo of Barry’s face on a dachshund.
Or you could even make ballons that blow up into weiner dogs with his face on them !!
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:27 pm
Leftwingmanagement,
There’s no luck in me working 70-80 hours in the past so that now I can screw around and spend time blogging. The capitalistic system has raised more boats out of poverty than any other system. And the fact of the matter is that poor people in this country have more material wealth in the form of square living space, appliances and tvs, cars, internet access, indoor plumbing, clothing, access to health care, etc than 90% of the world’s populace. When my dad lived in Germany his middle class German landlord couldn’t afford a car as many average Germans couldn’t. But there are a lot of “poor” people here who have cars.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
7:27 pm
He wasn’t a race baiting moron like Jesse and Al. He didn’t make a living off of suing companies and demonizing other people. He also didn’t go around saying he was going to cut the nuts off of people.
I’m willing to bet that Whites in the 1960’s considered MLK to be the ultimate race baiter, but that point is moot. Neither Jesse nor Al make a living demonizing people. If that’s the case, then they are no different than Rush, as both Al and Rush have radio talk-shows that pay them to say the things they say. When you see Al or Jesse speaking, it’s usually because someone has asked them to do that. They don’t just go around looking for things to insert themselves into.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:28 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
Mary Elizabeth was blogging in his support.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:28 pm
“I’m willing to bet that Whites in the 1960’s”
Then get that flux capacitor ready and head back in time in your Delorean to find out.
md
April 5th, 2011
7:29 pm
“The capitalistic system has raised more boats out of poverty than any other system.”
One needs only to look at China for the truth about “systems/societies”……..the communal saved by capitalism………..
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
7:29 pm
Ahhhh… See Nifong was a republican and therefore could not possibly truly the problem…you have to find a way to blame others…thus the blame of Sharpton and Jackson.
Mongo
April 5th, 2011
7:30 pm
Didn’t like Ryan on the Office, don’t like him in DC. His ideas are even dumber in real life.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
7:30 pm
WOW: ““MLK also preached social justice. / He wasn’t a race baiting moron like Jesse and Al.”
He was only agitating for the overthrow of the entire social structure of the Jim Crow South. He was a bomb thrower — of the best sort.
md: “Hence the reason for numerous of our problems today………………ie immigration……2 sets of rules.”
You mean like the “2 sets of rules” that apply to Wall Street speculators mass-producing toxic financial products to bing down our economy, big banks forging mortgage documents, or oil company CEO’s cutting corners with oil rigs ready to blow sky high over the Gulf of Mexico. Total number convicted of wrong-doing in each of these cases (exluding Bernie Madoff in case of financial fraud): ZERO.
Now if you or I try perpetrating some garden variety act of fraud or malfeasance, how much leniency do you think we’ll get? ZERO
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
7:30 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAniDGqyy7I&feature=player_embedded
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:30 pm
“See Nifong was a republican”
Another ridiculous lie by Keep.
Mike Nifong
Political party Democratic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Nifong
Jackie
April 5th, 2011
7:31 pm
@Thulsa Doom
Al Sharpton WAS NOT the first one to come forth the Duke lacrosse story; it was others in Durham, NC who felt the DA was going to exploit this young woman for political purposes. Al Sharpton had his clocked cleaned on the Tawana Brawley story because he believed what the young woman kept repeating.
As for black people following Al Sharpton, wonder what you thought about black people who felt the need to follow Dr. King?; Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth?; Rev. C.T. Vivian?; the Manning, SC civil rights movement? Were all black people sufficiently duped by these “leaders?”
As an aside, if you followed the lead of Ronald Reagan, how does that make you feel since history has shown many of his unconstitutional and illegal actions?
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
7:31 pm
“They don’t just go around looking for things to insert themselves into.”
wait…that’s a joke right.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
7:32 pm
“Well, you’ll all be glad to know that I’ve solved my drinking problem. I joined Alcoholics Anonymous. Oh, I still drink, I just changed my name.”
“Yesterday, I went to the doctor and gave a urine sample. It had an olive in it!”
—Rodney Dangerfield
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:32 pm
“As an aside, if you followed the lead of Ronald Reagan, how does that make you feel since history has shown many of his unconstitutional and illegal actions?”
Oh goody, now Jackie is blaming Reagan. LOL
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
7:33 pm
I guess personal responsibility does not include keeping count so not to exceed their post limit.
Oh by the way, I can admit I was wrong about his party…..
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:33 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
He found that no one actually believes So Com’s contention that Al and Jessie aren’t race-baiting extortionists.
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
7:33 pm
Seriously, do ANY of you have an opinion on what the monthly premium would be for a 75 year old woman with hypertension and diabetes?
Moderate Line
April 5th, 2011
7:35 pm
Through Medicare, this country has made a commitment to its senior citizens that they will not be denied needed medical care because they can’t afford it.
The Ryan approach to Medicare reform abandons that commitment
++++
The county never made such a commitment if so the taxes would be there to pay for it. The program has been underfunded from inception.
All that being said I think Ryan’s solution is a gimmick. It’s about avoiding the consequences of angering current recipients at the expense of future recipients which means people paying medicare taxes now will pay more and receive less.
As bad as this solution is what have the Democrats come up with. Nothing. I don’t believe Ryan’s solution will pass but I believe this issue can not be put off much longer.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:35 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
Someone proved Keep is a liar.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:36 pm
jackie,
I didn’t say al sharpton was the first- merely that he was also out front at first. And if Al got his clock cleaned on tawana brawley then why and how does the black community look up to such a shameful man who helped perpetuate this fraud. If anything it made a hero of him.
Dr. King, Ralph Abernathy, Hosea WIlliams- all great man that I have no qualms with.
Reagan has nothing to do with this. You are really reaching with that one. And what and where are all of his “unconstitutional and Illegal” actions. Iran- contra- it was already shown he had no knowledge of this. SO of what do you speak?
md
April 5th, 2011
7:36 pm
“You mean like the “2 sets of rules” that apply to Wall Street speculators mass-producing toxic financial products to bing down our economy, big banks forging mortgage documents, or oil company CEO’s cutting corners with oil rigs ready to blow sky high over the Gulf of Mexico.”
Yes……..
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
7:36 pm
His party affiliation is irrelevant, Mike Nifong, was an opportunist politician who thought he’d found a hot ticket to election and didn’t give a damn about anything else. Fortunately, he got caught and disbarred. He should have spent a little time in the pen, too, in my opinion.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
7:36 pm
Sinkwich, it ws proved I made a mistake, do prove I lied. Perhaps I should say….why dont you know it was sarcasm? That seems to be the excuse used by others.
Jackie
April 5th, 2011
7:38 pm
@WOW
Oh goody, I am blaming YOU!!!!!
Did you ever notice how you try to change the subject when you have a difficult question to answer?
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
7:39 pm
Dear Don’t Forget,
The Death Panels would certainly see to her demise much sooner in order to avert huge medical bills adding up for the collective.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
7:39 pm
he online survey of 2,242 U.S. adults found an overwhelming majority (96%) of Americans “strongly” or “somewhat” favor Medicare, the medical assistance program for the elderly and disabled, while 91% say they support Medicaid, the program to assist people with very low incomes.
From the Wall Street Journal
This is just too perfect! First, the Republicans shoot themselves in the foot in Wisconsin. Now this. I love it! Good luck in 2012!
Jackie
April 5th, 2011
7:40 pm
@Thulsa
Again, you are trying to sweep everything into one arena when it suits your purposes, yet, you fail to acknowledge the fact that you may have followed Ronald Reagan down that path that put this country in the greatest constitutional crisis in modern history. Am I wrong?
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:40 pm
“Did you ever notice how you try to change the subject when you have a difficult question to answer?”
I answered your questions with facts about Jesse and Al, Jackie. Your nonsense is irrelevant.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
7:40 pm
Thulsa Doom: “The capitalistic system has raised more boats out of poverty than any other system.”
Before you get too carried away with your cheerleading about capitalism, let me remind you that capitalism has also ripped up and transformed traditional social institutions root and branch and wrought untold suffering on vast numbers of people. This was well expressed by Marx himself, who as much as anyone recognized the incredible power of capitalism and opportunities that it introduces into human history:
“The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It … has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous “cash payment” … for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation … Constant revolutionizing of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones … All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.”
md: “One needs only to look at China for the truth about “systems/societies”……..the communal saved by capitalism………..”
Are you sure about that? Are you sure it might not be the other way around? It’s not at all clear yet with China what exactly has been saved or what has done the saving.
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
7:41 pm
“Am I wrong?”
yes.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:41 pm
“he online survey of 2,242 U.S. adults found an overwhelming majority (96%) of Americans “strongly” or “somewhat” favor Medicare, the medical assistance program for the elderly and disabled, while 91% say they support Medicaid, the program to assist people with very low incomes.”
Good luck to those who will wake up one day to find that their precious government cheese is bankrupt.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
7:41 pm
ty
I was thinking that @ 7:24 myself…
Jackie
“The black/white dichotomy is an issue that will not go away because it appears there are many who like sound bites to solve a festering problem”
The point I am trying to make here is that the black-white dichotomy conveniently ignores brown, red and yellow. Take a look at the 20 poorest places in America as posted by SoCo earlier…what do you see?
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
7:42 pm
And if Al got his clock cleaned on tawana brawley then why and how does the black community look up to such a shameful man who helped perpetuate this fraud.
They look up to him for the same reason that you despise him. Different people have different perspectives, perceptions and opinions. Your opinion of him is yours, and nobody else has to agree with it or like it, just as you don’t have to agree with or like anyone else’s opinion.
md
April 5th, 2011
7:43 pm
“he online survey of 2,242 U.S. adults found an overwhelming majority (96%) of Americans “strongly” or “somewhat” favor Medicare, the medical assistance program for the elderly and disabled, while 91% say they support Medicaid, the program to assist people with very low incomes.”
And I favor getting a new Lamborghini…………
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
7:44 pm
Smeat, death panels?? Really?? lol
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
7:46 pm
“Good luck to those who will wake up one day to find that their precious government cheese is bankrupt.”
I wonder how many of those 90+% would be willing to pay slightly more than the current 1.45% (I know about the employer’s portion so you don’t have to bring it up) of the gross pay to keep Medicare going.
In fact:
Six In 10 Americans Support Opening Medicare as a “Public Option” to the Private Insurance Market; Public Willing To Pay Through Payroll Deductions
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
7:48 pm
“Your opinion of him is yours, and nobody else has to agree with it or like it, just as you don’t have to agree with or like anyone else’s opinion.”
here here Soco, but then again his opinion of sharpton does not reflect his opinion of the “minority community”, as “jackie” stated so race-baitingly well.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
7:49 pm
Soothsayer:
Anthony Wiener was right: if Obama had simply branded the health reform as “Medicare for EVERYONE”, a single-payer system could well have sailed right through with overwhelming public support.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
7:49 pm
“And I favor getting a new Lamborghini…”
This is just too perfect. The Republicans in total and complete Fustercluck mode. Playing to the extreme Right Tea Party nutcases while alienating themselves to those who really matter the “middle 50%” who are generally unaligned with any party.
Just wait. 2012 is going to be a landslide.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
7:49 pm
When you quote Marx you get
GONG, GONG, GONG, GONG, GONG !!!!!
Cuckoo, Cuckoo, Cuckoo !!
Dear blogger come out into the sunlight. It is the best disinfectant.
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
7:51 pm
If I remember correctly, Hosea Williams and Ralph Abernathy, among others, didn’t have a very high opinion of Jesse Jackson, either.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:51 pm
Southern Comfort,
I understand all that about different perceptions and whatnot.
I just don’t understand how an entire group of people can look up to and admire a buffoon who made his mark by perpetrating such a fraud as Tawana Brawley.
You can splain it till you’re blue in the face and it still aint gonna make a hill a beans worth of sense to me. MLK I understand- he was a truly great man. But Al Sharpton? Or Louis Farrakhan another race baiting hater?
md
April 5th, 2011
7:51 pm
“Are you sure about that? Are you sure it might not be the other way around? It’s not at all clear yet with China what exactly has been saved or what has done the saving.”
Please……….they were stuck in the mud for generations until they opened up the markets…….other way around?? Highly doubtful…….that system failed year over year.
“Chinese productivity increased at an annual rate of 3.9 percent during 1979-94, compared with 1.1 percent during 1953-78. By the early 1990s, productivity’s share of output growth exceeded 50 percent, while the share contributed by capital formation fell below 33 percent. Such explosive growth in productivity is remarkable–the U.S. productivity growth rate averaged 0.4 percent during 1960-89–and enviable, since productivity-led growth is more likely to be sustained. Analysis of the pre- and post-1978 periods indicates that the market-oriented reforms undertaken by China were critical in creating this productivity boom.”
ty webb
April 5th, 2011
7:51 pm
“Anthony Wiener was right: if Obama had simply branded the health reform as “Medicare for EVERYONE”, a single-payer system could well have sailed right through with overwhelming public support.”
sadly I agree, “society” is that dumb.
Adam
April 5th, 2011
7:52 pm
If you don’t like Marxism, then stop creating a pro-capitalist corporate welfare state, while cutting any and all funding for the middle class and the poor, raising their taxes while reducing taxes on the top 1%, etc. You’re headed straight for a Marxist revolution if you don’t at least TRY to care about someone other than the rich.
Adam
April 5th, 2011
7:53 pm
In short, if you hate Marx stop trying to make his predictions come true.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
7:53 pm
Yes, friends and neighbors, let’s throw Granny under the bus so we can afford Pentagon budgets that are approaching $1,500,000,000,000.00 ($1.5 trillion) a year. Yes, by God! NO SOCIALISM! At least not for Granny but yes, for the Military Industrial Complex.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
7:56 pm
That Weiner up there in New York. He’s awesome !!
Have you seen his logo?
http://www.weinerfacts.com/storage/layout/images/Header.jpg
WOW
April 5th, 2011
7:57 pm
“Anthony Wiener was right:”
Weiner wants a waiver for NYC from Obamacare. LOL
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
7:57 pm
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
7:51 pm
If I remember correctly, Hosea Williams and Ralph Abernathy, among others, didn’t have a very high opinion of Jesse Jackson, either.
Hillbilly,
I’ve read the same thing also. It seemed there was a rift when MLK died because of Jesse’s opportunism. He was nowhere near the scene but he showed up on national tv that night in a red stained shirt and claimed he held MLK as he died. Ticked off a lot of the veteran civil right’s leadership but it was kinda brushed under the rug in order to keep unity. But they knew then and there what an opportunist Jesse was. When you think about it that was a pretty despicable act.
Hosea Williams I read was ostracized a little bit later on because of embarrassing run ins with the law- all the DUIs. But I liked HOsea- he really was a true advocate and he had his annual Thanksgiving charity where he did raise a lot of money and feed a lot of people. He just had some alcohol issues is all.
Jackie
April 5th, 2011
7:57 pm
@WOW
Of course you would say “my nonsense is irrelevant” because the sophomoric hyperbole is ancedotal and without merit.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
7:57 pm
I just don’t understand how an entire group of people can look up to and admire a buffoon who made his mark by perpetrating such a fraud as Tawana Brawley.
Thinking along the same lines, I just don’t understand how an entire group of people can look up to and admire a jackass who made his mark by perpetrating such a fraud as claiming that government was the problem, yet people think he was the answer. People also laud that jackass as the epitome of conservatism, when he had some of the record highest tax increases for any president up until recent history. He also exploded the deficit and tacked on huge debt by his “tax cut” policies that have become a pseudo-religion now.
You can splain that to me until you’re blue in the face, but it still won’t make sense to me. That’s just how opinions work. You really don’t have to understand it. If you understand perceptions and whatnots, you also understand what you say you don’t. You just don’t want to acknowledge it.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:58 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
He learned that Soothsayer is an idiot.
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
7:59 pm
if Obama had simply branded the health reform as “Medicare for EVERYONE”, a single-payer system could well have sailed right through with overwhelming public support.
I think it would have had a lot more chance of popular acceptance than the program he got through. I said at the time, that I think his biggest mistake was not taking the lead and handing it off to Reid and Pelosi. I think there was a real chance to fix a lot of problems in the health care system but that it was squandered. It’ll probably be 20-30 years before that chance comes around again. I think the bill that passed should really have been titled the Health Insurance Company Relief Act. That’s who will benefit the most from it, in my opinion.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
7:59 pm
Hillbilly
Brother Hosea didn’t hold a LOT of people in very high esteem. I count myself one lucky SOB to have had the opportunity to chew the fat with him.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
7:59 pm
They’re here….
Whoopie !!
Democratic Socialists of America and Communist Party USA.
Not Troll …. hmmmm … KGB nah? … Soros Employee? YES !!!!!!
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
7:59 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
After a few beers Michelle wouldn’t dress up like Lady GaGa.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
8:00 pm
Smeat: “When you quote Marx you get GONG ”
You seem a little threatened!
Whatsa matter, somebody teach you Karl Marx was a bad guy?
C’mon, who taught you that?
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
8:02 pm
Marx and Communism are bad dude !!
It ain’t happening here comrade !
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:03 pm
Leftwingmanagement at 7:40,
Your quote of Karl Marx was um, uh, well what can I say about someone who quotes Marx as an authority? For the record what Marx saw as capitalism such as in Russia was not capitalism- it was serfdom. And the bottom line is that while capitalism has its excesses it is vastly and has always been vastly superior to communism and socialism.
If you don’t believe that then take a look at probably the 2 most lassiz faire economies in Asia- Singapore and or Hong Kong, and compare them with the most state controlled economy- North Korea. Are you starting to get the picture LWM?
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
8:04 pm
josef, Thulsa
Josef and I have had this discussion before but I think some of the leaders in the Movement, looked down on Hosea. He came from humble beginnings and a lot of them were upper class. I think that’s one reason Hosea and Lester Maddox got along. Both of them were trying to look out for the common people in their constituencies and they were both looked down on by the ruling elites, of their respective groups.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
8:04 pm
Karl Marx, interestingly enough, was born to a Jewish father. He later converted to Lutheranism. Karl Marx was German, not Russian, as many people might think. Karl Marx’ work received little attention until years after his death. Only in the late 19th century did his work become noticed and not until the Russian revolution did his name become a household word.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:05 pm
Left wing management,
Karl Marx was a great guy. The starving people of North Korea will tell you so.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
8:05 pm
LWM,
Is it just Marxism or Democratic Socialism or Communist Party USA?
WOW
April 5th, 2011
8:06 pm
“Whatsa matter, somebody teach you Karl Marx was a bad guy? ”
Communism killed over 40 million people in China over 20 million in the USSR. Yeah, he was a bad dude.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
8:07 pm
Hillbilly Deluxe: ” think there was a real chance to fix a lot of problems in the health care system but that it was squandered. It’ll probably be 20-30 years before that chance comes around again. I think the bill that passed should really have been titled the Health Insurance Company Relief Act. That’s who will benefit the most from it, in my opinion.”
Well said. And for that we can probably thank the team of Emanuel, Summers, and others (not sure about Axelrod). But end of the day, Obama himself holds the blame. He was never really committed to the so-called ‘public option’. Striking how a candidate who made such a point of doing bold things, wrapped in bold rhetoric, as a matter of course starts out by defining down what can be accomplished, thereby ceding the initiative to his opponents (who have no qualms about going for broke). Guess for him it really was just rhetoric.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:08 pm
Hillbilly Deluxe,
That’s a very true description of Hosea Williams. He wasn’t very articulate- not very educated. But the guy had a big heart and whether you agree or disagree with the man his heart was in the right place. He never became wealthy from his efforts- he wasn’t no limousine liberal- he just helped people.
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
8:08 pm
“He was aggravated today.”
Someone asked him how his foreign policy differed from GWB.
Starving North Korean
April 5th, 2011
8:09 pm
Me loves me some Karl Marx
Wealthy South Korean
April 5th, 2011
8:10 pm
Me loves me some capitalism.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
8:10 pm
Where is the Democrat plan to fix the Idiot Messiah’s spending problem and reform entitlements?
Billybob
April 5th, 2011
8:10 pm
LWM, 7:40
It was all about the messaging huh? and capitalism has wrought untold suffering on vast numbers of people? then a Marx quote? You are definitely a barrack hussein obama marxist sympathizer/supporter huh? A democrat right? Keep talking and exposing who is running the dem party so 2012 will be an even bigger election for conservatives……thank you for your service to the conservative ascendency…..
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
8:10 pm
WOW: “Communism killed over 40 million people in China over 20 million in the USSR. Yeah, he was a bad dude.”
Did communism kills those people?
More specifically, is it equivalent to say “communism killed X number of people in China, Russia” and “Hitler killed X number of people in the Holocaust”? It’s a serious question.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
8:10 pm
SoCo
A new one at St Elsewhere…
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
8:11 pm
“Communism killed over 40 million people in China over 20 million in the USSR. Yeah, he was a bad dude”
Communism didn’t kill anyone. PEOPLE killed them
WOW
April 5th, 2011
8:12 pm
“Did communism kills those people? ”
Yes, starving millions of people in the name of “equality” killed millions of people.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
8:12 pm
“Communism didn’t kill anyone. PEOPLE killed them’
Those PEOPLE were communists.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
8:12 pm
If you’re reading and postulating Marx don’t forget to share quotes from Mein Kampf .
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
8:13 pm
Thulsa
Actually, Hosea was a chemist. He held a master’s degree. So, he was educated and I never met him but I do know people that knew him and ever one of them says he was smart as a whip. He just didn’t let it change the person that he was. He stayed true to his roots.
DKW
April 5th, 2011
8:13 pm
At least rep. Ryan is willing to take on the issue. All the liberal democrats do is complain. I haven’t seen a plan by the democrats on fixing Medicare, Medicaid, and/or Social Security.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:14 pm
The offical tally
Hitler killed 6 million Jews
Stalin killed a minimum of 20 million of his own people but some experts believe the number to be closer to 30 million
Mao killed approximately 30 million in the great purges and some estimates say up to 40 million.
Get out your little red book Left wing management- Mao is the clear winner!
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
8:14 pm
Thulsa
I personally found Rev. Williams to be highly articulate and well read. He just didn’t feel obligated to put on airs.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
8:14 pm
Some are rather tolerant of Christianity…how many millions have been killed in the name of Christ
But who’s counting….not some we see
getalife
April 5th, 2011
8:14 pm
The President scolded the children today.
Loved it.
He has plenty of ammunition to attack the gop this cycle.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
8:15 pm
NAZI = National Socialist Workers Party
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
8:16 pm
“Those PEOPLE were communists”
You DO realize that by making that distinction you are blaming a philosophy, and ABSOLVING the people…don’t you?
F. Sinkwich
April 5th, 2011
8:16 pm
“Where is the Democrat plan to fix the Idiot Messiah’s spending problem and reform entitlements?”
No plan. Lefties just want to demonize those who want to solve the problem which satiates their ignorant and stupid constituency.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:16 pm
And who can forget Pol Pot’s year one pure communism experiment. Now Pol Pot was a piker in terms of pure numbers. He only killed 1 1/2 to 2 million of his own countrymen. But there were only 5 million of them at most to begin with. On a pure percentage basis of fellow countrymen killed Pol Pot wins in a landslide.
Anymore comments about how great communism is?
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
8:18 pm
how many millions have been killed in the name of Christ
Millions have been killed in the name of freedom, too. It doesn’t make freedom a bad thing.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
8:19 pm
Fish Sandwich:
“He learned that Soothsayer is an idiot.”
“Lefties just want to demonize those who want to solve the problem which satiates their ignorant and stupid constituency.”
No moderation, Jay?
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
8:20 pm
Thulsa Doom: “For the record what Marx saw as capitalism such as in Russia was not capitalism- it was serfdom. ”
That’s one of the reasons he was in Manchester, at the time a hothouse of industrialization. But you knew that, right?
“And the bottom line is that while capitalism has its excesses it is vastly and has always been vastly superior to communism and socialism.”
Capitalism is defined by its excesses which was precisely Marx’s breakthrough.
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
8:20 pm
The main market china opened up was it’s labor market. It’s the desire for cheap labor that has boosted their productivity but, unfortunately, not their quality. And don’t forget that the chinese government not only subsidizes it’s industries it also keeps it’s currency undervalued to maintain it’s competitive edge. A capitalist miracle??? Hardly.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
8:20 pm
“The President scolded the children today.”
LMAO — The weakling who couldn’t do ten push ups wagged his finger like a buffoon. Where’s his leadership?
“Uhhhhh….. You guys better work it out ! There’s no way I can go on the recond cuz I just announced my re-election campaign !” — BHO, April 5, 2011
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:21 pm
keep up the good fight,
Good point. How many people have the Christians killed? The crusades? A few hundred thousand I’m guessing. Maybe a million. I dunno. But was it 20 or 30 million overall? The Spanish Inquisition? Not sure. Thousands?
Native American populations-especially the ones conquered by Spanish conquistadores? Not sure. In the thousands but its important to remember many natives died from no resistance to European diseases- not from a pike.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:26 pm
Left wing management,
I certainly knew marx wasn’t in Russia. Personally I thought he was in Germany at the time of his writings but I didn’t really keep up with where he was and at what point. Say that reminds me where was good ole Fred Engels btw? Not that it really matters.
And yes- we all know that he theorized a revolution would occur in an industralized western European nation and certainly not in Russia. You’re not really telling us anything we don’t really know.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
8:26 pm
Question
Who posting here has read Marx or Mein Kampf?
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
8:27 pm
Smeat: “If you’re reading and postulating Marx don’t forget to share quotes from Mein Kampf .”
Why bother citing Mein Kampf when I’m interested in serious attempts to understand political economy? Marx is not so much the opposite of Mein Kampf as it is in a different universe. Mein Kampf is a distillation of racial and political paranoia, while Marx’s writings provide essential insight into and critique of the nature of capitalism.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
8:27 pm
You can’t beat him meat and you know it.
Just admit it.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
8:28 pm
Hillbilly
“Millions have been killed in the name of freedom, too. It doesn’t make freedom a bad thing.”
True.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:29 pm
Capitalism is defined by its excesses which was precisely Marx’s breakthrough- Leftwingmanagement
LWM,
I seriously doubt recognizing capitalism’s excesses was a breakthrough. Lots of historians, authors, philosphers, and economists recognized it. From Marx to John Steinbeck on the coast of California 8,000 miles away. Simply recognizing a self evident truth that many others also saw was not a breakthrough.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
8:29 pm
dommy…guns dont kill people, philosphical systems with guns kill people? so when in the count does it mean you are a bad “philosophy”? hundreds of thousands…well you can still be good…..millions, uh oh over the line. But let’s be clear, you can add a lot more to the count of the Church.
You confuse philosphical systems with bad leaders.
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
8:29 pm
Dear getalife,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GxNZ4FY_sY
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:35 pm
josef nix,
I have a degree in economics as well as in finance so yeah I’ve read Marx and the theory and practice of communism- still have the book. Marx is difficult machinery to read. Very boring also. But reading does make some people believe they somehow have a superior intellectual opinion.
For all his writings on the technical aspects of economy there is things Marx didn’t understand or didn’t care to understand- namely freedom,incentive, the human factor. And if you read Marx you quite clearly begin to understand why he doesn’t understand the human factor.
Mein kampf I would have no interest in reading.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
8:35 pm
Good fight
I beg to differ with you on the Church thingie…in a count of dead bodies, it’s staggering, to be sure, but not nearly what many would claim…Stalinist Soviet Union, Fascist Europe, and Maoist China are the top bananas there…
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
8:36 pm
Thulsa: “And yes- we all know that he theorized a revolution would occur in an industralized western European nation and certainly not in Russia. You’re not really telling us anything we don’t really know.”
It became one of the major points of debate – and fateful ones – in the whole evolution of the movement that took the name “marxism”. He and Engels were both in England because it was by far the most advanced industrial nation at that time, a perfect specimen for study of the effects of capitalism.
Btw, when I say capitalism is defined by excess, I mean that in a quite specific sense. Capitalism, according to Marx, introduces for the first time excess into the very heart of the social bond between human beings, setting those relations forever on a different track that will be forever defined by attempts to capture an ever more infinitesimal monetary excess (surplus value) from product exchange (which ends up turning everything into a product, take sex in pornography for example). So I was struck you used the word excesses, as that’s just the point of the Marxist critique.
But
getalife
April 5th, 2011
8:37 pm
Dear meat,
Meet the new band called the new Metallica:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94bGzWyHbu0
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
8:39 pm
josef…I am not arguing that perhaps christianity has killed less or more than a few governments….that will depend on how you attribute the count and what is included…..when does it cross the line in this absurd misguided discussion?
Adam
April 5th, 2011
8:40 pm
Did you know F. Sinkwich was struck by lightning 7 times? Once while he was making fun of Obama being aggravated…
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:41 pm
keep up the good fight,
I’ll politely refrain from the name calling and just address you by your handle,
No confusion here between philosophical systems and bad leaders. You simply brought up people killed in the name of Chrisianity and I simply did the count. I think most people recognize the difference between philosophical systems and bad leaders.
My point is that Christianity is a great philosophical system but obviously has had some very bad leaders- some really corrupt, horrible, and just plain bad popes and various church leaders.
With communism I feel its an inherently evil system period. That is evidenced that every communist system out there has ruled with an iron fist in a brutal fashion and no toleration of dissent. Didn’t matter the leader- the system is inherently anti-hummanity.
stands for decibels
April 5th, 2011
8:41 pm
Ryan bristles at the description of his approach as a voucher plan
There’s your opening, Democrats. You can kick ass, or be your usual go-along-to-get-along pussified selves. Your choice.
Del
April 5th, 2011
8:43 pm
Well I see Jay’s not moved on to The Ryan Budget Plan, Part III. The Federal government has no business in attempting to administer care for the poor and elderly in our society. Faith based care and community care is the best way to assist those less fortunate. I’ll bet if there was ever an unbiased detailed study of how charity works at the community level it would be proven that centralized programs filtering down from the federal levels of government bureaucracy has been ineffective in comparison to what could be done at the local level.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
8:43 pm
Thulsa
I will agree with you that reading Marx is a pain in the posterieur. It’s not so much what he said, to me, as it is the attempts to implement it. Personally, I think “Marxist” economics stinks on ice. His paradigm of class struggle does, though, have some validity and by that I am not speaking entirely of economic class, but any “class” into which we categorize humanity.
I would recommend that one and all read Mein Kampf. Like Marx it’s a muddled read, but it tells us here and now an awful lot of just how quickly we can fall prey to such and then come out later when the damage has been done claiming “we didn’t see it coming.”
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
8:44 pm
Thulsa: “For all his writings on the technical aspects of economy there is things Marx didn’t understand or didn’t care to understand- namely freedom,incentive, the human factor.”
Re: freedom. I think you’re buying into the propaganda of the defenders of capitalism here. See my post above on the way capital becomes a new actor in human history with explosive power, radically changing the nature of relations between people.
Thus he said: “Do not be deluded by the abstract word Freedom. Whose freedom? Not the freedom of one individual in relation to another, but freedom of Capital to crush the worker.”
“And if you read Marx you quite clearly begin to understand why he doesn’t understand the human factor.”
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
8:44 pm
Dear getalife — You obviously don’t know dog squeeze about Metallica.
I saw them in 1983 at in Hollywood.
GONG to you too:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxZ4Z6Zo3Fk
getalife
April 5th, 2011
8:45 pm
Those ki lling in the name of religion do not get virgins, they get to spend eternity with Stalin and H itler.
ODDOWL
April 5th, 2011
8:46 pm
That European style socialism is beginning to look better and better… Cradle to grave coverage… $35 dollars an hour average wage… Everything !!! Plus they pay about the same amount of taxes as we American idiots do. Stupid is as stupid do… Americans ===> STUPID
getalife
April 5th, 2011
8:47 pm
Meat,
Saw every tour in Atlanta.
My ex would camp out for tickets.
Front row baby.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
8:47 pm
Good fight
I know I can be accused of being picayunish when I say this, but be careful in your word choices. There is the Church and there is Christianity. In a serious discussion, that distinction should be made.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
8:49 pm
LWM,
You must be a student fascinated by the intellectual theory of communism. I was the same way in my younger days of reading about communism. I was of the intellectual vanity that if you only understand what Marx and us smart people are saying then we could make communism/socialism work. Then the idealism, the intellectualism and such gradually give way to seeing communism’s inherent failures- that it doesn’t work. And that it doesn’t work because it really doesn’t factor correctly for natural human behavior. You’ll begin to notice this more and more in the real world.
Another issue is that Marx thinks much more in macro terms and not micro but then you’ve probably already figured that one out.
The older you get you will grow out of your fascination with Marxism. Unless you’re just plain stubborn.
Chris Matthews
April 5th, 2011
8:52 pm
Obama will promise the believing idiots anything to get their vote! Obama loves America as much as OJ loved his wife!
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
8:52 pm
Don’t ever call me baby. Thank you.
I remember the KMET Mighty Metal Shop Show in the early eighties.
My friend is the guy who was Metallica’s monitor engineer on the first Kill ‘Em Tour.
Go drink more kool-aid….
Old, but not stupid
April 5th, 2011
8:53 pm
A Republican dealing with Medicare? Yeah, right! I’m living every day with the cost of the Catastrophic Medical Coverage Act of 1988, promoted as a “salvation” by St. Ronnie. Every day, another $142 flies out of my pocket, and it will continue to do so so long as my wife, a stroke victim, resides in a nursing home—the only place for a person completely paralyzed on the right side and reliant on a feeding tube for nourishment.
And this is a state nursing home, not one of those fancy “assisted living” places enjoyed by the wealthy. And my $142 is labeled a Medicare “co-pay.”
So every month, I write out a check for $4,245. I will continue to do so until my assets are utterly depleted and I qualify for Medicaid. I’m one of those people who pay a penalty for having worked, saved, and lived within my means. Had I done otherwise, the federal government and the state would pay every dollar for my wife’s care.
Thanks a lot, Ronnie, “compassionate” conservatives, and turncoat Democrats. Try Vaseline next time.
And if anybody is crazy enough to believe that Ryan is interested in anything other than enriching his insurance company paymasters, the ultimate beneficiaries of his “plan,” you need a nursing home much worse than the people currently residing there.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
8:53 pm
tweety,
Weak.
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
8:54 pm
Communism is a system that can’t work, in groups larger than just a handful, because it goes against basic human nature, in my opinion. Somebody is going to always figure out a way to get ahead, that’s just the nature of human beings.
North Korea, the USSR, China, etc, were/are totalitarian states. Communism was just a vehicle for them to implement totalitarianism (is that a word?).
No matter what form of government you have or what economic system, most of the power and most of the money is going to wind up in the hands of a few. That’s human nature, too. How that few treat the rest determines the success or eventual failure of the system.
For all it’s faults, and they are many, I still like our system best.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
8:54 pm
Doomy, name calling? Someone has a thin skin tonight……but I was not name calling.
Your feeling that communism is an “inherently bad system” does not prove that it is inherently bad, any more than having a king or queen is “inherently bad”. It has problems, but then again so does pure capitalism.
josef, you are correct that the Catholic Church in Rome after Martin Luther is different than Christianity….however I do think there have been abuses by both “systems”
Rachel Maddow
April 5th, 2011
8:55 pm
Where is Olbermann when America needs him most?
Jeff
April 5th, 2011
8:56 pm
So long as the government provides enough supplemental support so no senior citizen ever goes without coverage, due to money. It is hard to believe the insurance industry backs this plan, they make ever excuse right now not to cover people over 50 years of age.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
8:57 pm
Meat,
Don’t tell me what to say.
I have been to hundreds of concerts.
How many have you been to?
Del
April 5th, 2011
8:57 pm
josef, I once in Marines was offered and smoked a Picayune cigarette and about chocked. After that I could hardly stand C-ration smokes and to this day cigarette smoke makes me feel sick.Although, I do enjoy an occasional premium vintage cigar. Is that being “picayunish”?
Midori
April 5th, 2011
8:57 pm
can I say something here?
I turn 55 this year.
as some of you know, I am dealing with severe health issues.
I have macular degeneration in my right eye. the treatment calls for monthly injections in the eye.
i had my second injection Monday and was presented with my share of the bill: a whopping $800!!!
And I have Blue Cross upper tier insurance.
So in a nutshell – Ryan can go Cheney himself.
The GOP supporting his goofball proposals as well.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:00 pm
Let’s hope the elderly haven’t become such greedy maggots that they will fall for the usual Democrat lies and demogoguery.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
9:00 pm
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
8:43 pm
Thulsa
I will agree with you that reading Marx is a pain in the posterieur. It’s not so much what he said, to me, as it is the attempts to implement it. Personally, I think “Marxist” economics stinks on ice. His paradigm of class struggle does, though, have some validity and by that I am not speaking entirely of economic class, but any “class” into which we categorize humanity
Josef,
I would agree with all that- especially about his attempts to implement it. As for the paradigm of class struggle it really doesn’t apply so much today. Things are a lot different- more mobility in terms of human, physical, and financial capital.
Also if you review recent income dynamics studies you’ld be shocked about the level of both upward and downward income movement between the 5 income quintiles. In most studies there is only 1% of the population that stays in the bottom 20% income quintile permanently. And as for the wealthy? Turns out that unless you’re a doctor there’s not that many people who permanently stay in the top 20% income bracket.
The economy is dynamic and incomes rise and fall for the most part in a dynamic economy. And lastly, there is opportunity out there for anybody and everybody no matter what the naysayers on here always say.
19th century England and 21st century America are 2 totally different economic systems. Marx’s writings have no place here in America today.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:01 pm
well, maggots know all about maggots……..
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:02 pm
Midori: i had my second injection Monday and was presented with my share of the bill: a whopping $800!!!
And I have Blue Cross upper tier insurance.
———————
Who do you believe should be paying for your medical care? Did Blue Cross violate the terms of the contract you signed with them?
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:02 pm
sorry Barry – I don’t speak maggot-ese………..
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
9:04 pm
Midori
Sorry to hear that and don’t know what the total cost of your treatment would be (nor is it any of my business).
I do know that chemo treatments, as of right now, can run $10-20k a week, when you include the shots and transfusions, depending on how many the patient needs. It’s crazy.
Old, but not stupid
April 5th, 2011
9:04 pm
And I have Blue Cross upper tier insurance.
You will discover in time, Midori, that private insurance plans don’t cover a lot of things, including nursing home care. Your co-pay is just a sample of what awaits you as you grow even older. As one hospital person I respect put it, “The first instinct of insurance companies is to say no, then delay, then say no again.” You are dealing with a for-profit enterprise that has every reason to deny you as much in benefits as possible. And what is ludicrous is that there are dozens on this blog who applaud them for doing so and view single-payer insurance as socialism. Once those deluded souls start approaching old age or encounter a dire health condition, I suspect they will change their minds.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:05 pm
Pay your bills, Midori. Passing them off to your neighbors just shows what a greedy maggot you are.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
9:07 pm
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
8:54 pm
Doomy, name calling? Someone has a thin skin tonight……but I was not name calling.
Your feeling that communism is an “inherently bad system” does not prove that it is inherently bad, any more than having a king or queen is “inherently bad”. It has problems, but then again so does pure capitalism.
keep up the good fight,
You can keep up the name calling- doomy. Doesn’t bother me. Just lets me know how much I get under your skin and own you. That’s all.
So you still think communism is not an inherently bad system? It just has its problems just like capitalism? That is just a breathtakingly asinine statement that quite frankly I’m not sure if I should just give you yet another blog beatdown or feel sorry for you. I think I’ll just pity you for your complete lack of perspective.
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
9:07 pm
Yep, are D.I.’s called us maggost and a lot worse. Unbeknown to us they were probably trying to get us just a little psychologically used to it because later we sure saw enough of them crawling on the enemy as well as our friends.
You would have had to had been there maggotess.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:07 pm
Old,
I’m with you and am well aware of that.
These cretins are bleeding this country dry.
And what civilized society (other than us?) has “for profit” health care?
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
9:07 pm
Escuse me:”maggots”
getalife
April 5th, 2011
9:08 pm
Midori,
My bills are outrageous too .
How is it going?
Is the treatment helping?
stands for decibels
April 5th, 2011
9:08 pm
Pay your bills, Midori. Passing them off to your neighbors just shows what a greedy maggot you are
Here’s your competition, Democrats. If you can’t bloody their asses, you don’t deserve to be a national party.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:09 pm
as I stated, maggots know maggots.
very well, it appears.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
9:09 pm
L’il Barry
Have you absolutely no sense of compassion? And as for manners, were you raised by wolverines? In your case I DO hope you come down with some catastrophic illness, though not a terminal one, I would rather you suffer for quite a while. And I certainly hope I’m not in line behind YOU on judgment day…
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
9:10 pm
Del:
I tried to smoke them to to help stay awake on the lines at night. No “Red Bull” back then.
I finally switched to cigars. We would just hunker down in our hole or bunker to light them and then stick them through a hole in an empty C-rations meal box to hide the glow. Help with the little winged varmits too.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:10 pm
My vision is coming back slowly but surely Getalife. Thanks.
hopefully I won’t have to endure a full year of this, as he initially prescribed.
thanks Buddy
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
9:11 pm
midori
Sorry, I had to get that off my chest. You will be in my thoughts and prayers…
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:12 pm
Maggot is as maggot does. Maggots are parasites, just like Obama voters. Pay your bills, maggots.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:14 pm
thank you Josef.
Looks like someone’s Mom sorely shirked her responsibility.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:14 pm
If you have a problem with Ryan’s plan to pare back spending on entitlements, you just might be a maggot.
AmVet
April 5th, 2011
9:14 pm
Hi Midori,
Hang tough.
And ignore that trolling POS. Only a tiny handful here,lacking in testicular fortitude, don’t agree that he is a major league, Grade A, industrial strength sh*thead.
And ditto what josef said about the sleazebag…
Del
April 5th, 2011
9:15 pm
Midori, I’ll pray that your healed.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:15 pm
Thank you AmVet.
you’re such a good guy
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:16 pm
thanks Del.
Every time I see that doctor I have panic attacks.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
9:16 pm
Midori, I am sorry to learn of your health issues. It is a shame that so many lack compassion or that they wish to dismantle the safety net (as poor as it is) that does exist currently rather than fighting to improve the system. These are real problems for real people.
Doom..well if you object to a “y” so much i’ll try to remember your thin skin.
Mongo
April 5th, 2011
9:17 pm
Republicans love America…just like O.J. loved Nichol.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:17 pm
“Pay your bills, Midori. Passing them off to your neighbors just shows what a greedy maggot you are.”
Jay, no moderation? Are you awake?
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
9:18 pm
midori
I hope it was just shirking her responsibility. I’d hate to think she planned that. As you know, I’ve got my problems with abortion, but if we can make it retroactive, in LBB’s case, I’ll go for it on demand.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
9:19 pm
Midori,
That is great news and I am praying for ya
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:19 pm
Lil Barry: you make me sick. I wish I could get my hands on you right now!
Del
April 5th, 2011
9:20 pm
0311,. When you had smokers get under a poncho to puff after you’ve told them that smoking in the bush at night could very likely get them KIA from a sniper, many quit smoking on the spot.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:20 pm
LOL – Josef!!
I’ve never seen you this animated!!
However, he tries awfully hard to offend people, doesn’t he? or is he an it?
getalife
April 5th, 2011
9:20 pm
Take a hike lil bar.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:21 pm
Guess what LBB: I think Jay has taken the night off. However, I think we won’t be seeing you around here for a while. Maybe permanently!
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
9:22 pm
Geez, now we got two of ‘em.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
9:22 pm
Midori
I’ll add you to my prayers.
josef
I hope I’m behind LBB come judgement day. Maybe about 3-5 people back, but close enough to see the complete exchange. I don’t understand how people can be discompassionate.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:23 pm
HD: I think vuduchild is on our side.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:24 pm
thank you SoCo and Sooth
*hugs* to you both.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:25 pm
“When you had smokers get under a poncho to puff after you’ve told them that smoking in the bush at night could very likely get them KIA from a sniper, many quit smoking on the spot.”
No “three on a match.”
AmVet
April 5th, 2011
9:26 pm
For the (irredeemable?) Lil BB…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_ERGynR-CM
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:26 pm
Keep Up the Good Fight!: It is a shame that so many lack compassion or that they wish to dismantle the safety net
—————————
It’s not a safety net, it’s a hammock for the slothful looking to have their neighbors pay their bills for them. The country will be better off when all are expected to pull their weight again.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
9:28 pm
Chin up Midori,
I made it and so will you.
My doctors and hospitals are great.
The bills are not.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:28 pm
Lil Barry: enjoy your final hour(s) on this blog!
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
9:28 pm
I tried to find interview video and audio from Paul Ryan today as he spelled out his plan.
I searched and found, I think, his best defense.
Ahhh–Ughhh-You gotta play both clips on this link.
Even and most especially if you dismiss or despise the man.
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/paul-ryan-explains-economic-plan-to-glenn-as-govt-shutdown-looms/
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:28 pm
It’s a shame and a tragedy for our country that folks presented with a bill for services rendered think they’re being treated unfairly.
Del
April 5th, 2011
9:29 pm
Sooth,
Zippo lighters…everyone had one.
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
9:31 pm
I think Larry bailout could have been more compassionate regarding Midori’s situation.
But there are a lot of unfortunate stories like this and inevitably the cost of the service and who pays has to be raised? I feel bad for her situation but is Larry or everyone else responsible and liable for her copay? Should she herself not be liable for having to pay for the treatment or should the cost be passed onto everyone else because she is upset over the cost? I would assume that over a lifetime of working that she has set aside ample funds for events such as this.
These are some tough questions but pretty much everyone I know has a high deductible plan if they don’t have a group plan. I have a $2500 deductible plan myself with co-insurance. If something devastating like this happens to me I will have to pay out about 5k which sucks. But it is what it is and I’m sure eventually I’m going to have to fork out some big bucks.
Whether its Midori or the rest of us someone has to pay for this service. $800 for an outpatient procedure is indeed expensive but hopefully she has a $2500 or $5000 deductible to where the deductible will be met at some point and the insurance picks up.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
9:31 pm
We get it lil bar.
Get lost.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:31 pm
It’s an even bigger shame that bigoted, hateful, antisocial fools are allowed access to a monitor and keyboard in order to spout a bunch of assumed rhetoric about issues and situations they know ABSOLUTELY nothing about.
RW-(the original)
April 5th, 2011
9:32 pm
Midori,
Sorry to hear about the eye and the description of the treatment makes me cringe, but I also have a question. Didn’t you turn 55 last year?
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
9:32 pm
HD: I think vuduchild is on our side.
I’m not on anybody’s side who comes on here calling people names and insulting people.
stands for decibels
April 5th, 2011
9:33 pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy
stands for decibels
April 5th, 2011
9:34 pm
I’m not on anybody’s side who comes on here calling people names and insulting people.
Nor am I, but I think this “vudu” drive-by was damage control from some LBB sympathizer.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:34 pm
i fail to see where I’ve asked ANYONE to pay my medical bills.
If anything, the insurance company — which posted obscene profits last year (on the back of my and other policy holder’s premiums) should pay a larger portion of the bill.
And they should STOP denying payment for much needed treatment.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:35 pm
LOL — RW
you’re right!!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
I turn 56 this year!!
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:36 pm
You know, Del. I think Vietnam is where the great philosophical gulf really reached it’s zenith. Those who fought look upon us who had college deferments as traitors — especially those against the war. Contrary to what you might think, I admired those who fought in Vietnam. And, even though we lost in Vietnam, we basically defeated Communism. A lot of guys I knew in high school never came back from Vietnam. I can still see their faces as if it was yesterday. In many ways I feel guilt because they went and died and I went to college. But, that was 40+ years ago and I can’t change it now.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:37 pm
Midori: a bunch of assumed rhetoric about issues and situations they know ABSOLUTELY nothing about.
———————–
I work for a living, so yes, I do have to make some assumptions here.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:37 pm
see? I’m so traumatized from those shots, I forgot my age!!
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
9:37 pm
As y’all know, I’m opposed to banning up to and including the exile of my old nemesis, Andy, but in the case of LBB I’ll break with that and join the fatwa…
Oh, and midori…there are some things that just p*ss me off and get me “animated!”
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
9:37 pm
It’s a shame and a tragedy for our country that folks presented with a bill for services rendered think they’re being treated unfairly.
No, what’s a shame is that somebody can be a complete jackass with no compassion and say completely fu*ked up stuff continuously with no remorse. I’ll still pray that you don’t come down with something that knocks you flat on your ass.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:38 pm
Midori: And they should STOP denying payment for much needed treatment.
——————-
Why? Did you pay for coverage you didn’t get?
RW-(the original)
April 5th, 2011
9:38 pm
I turn 56 this year!!
If not I was going to ask where I go to get my free pass for this next birthday.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
9:39 pm
“And ignore that trolling POS. Only a tiny handful here,lacking in testicular fortitude, don’t agree that he is a major league, Grade A, industrial strength sh*thead.”
Man oh man, this is something else!
deegee
April 5th, 2011
9:39 pm
What company wants to underwrite health insurance for old people? Isn’t that a losing proposition right from the start? Does U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan think that old people are going to shop around for the best deal on a heart bypass or a hip replacement? Already they aren’t taking the medication they need because in some cases they can’t afford it. If Paul Ryan would have to take care of at least one parent or grandparent with dementia he would be singing a different tune.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:39 pm
and why do you ASSume I don’t work for a living?
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
9:40 pm
Did you pay for coverage you didn’t get?
A lot of people do. You don’t find it out until you start trying to collect.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:40 pm
see RW?
I need you around to keep me straight
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:40 pm
Lil Barry: the Sheriff gonna git you tomorrow. You in a heap o’ trouble. Been nice knowin’ ya!
Thulsa Doom
April 5th, 2011
9:40 pm
Midori,
Did they deny payment for the treatment? Or is it just not covered per your policy till you hit your deductible? There is a big difference. You also have several layers of appeals and recourse if you believe they should have paid.
The earnings that bcbs made last year have nothing to do with it and I’ld be willing to bet that their profit margins are dramatically lower than the average publicly traded company.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
9:40 pm
Josef,
He deserved it .
We know about Andy.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:41 pm
I don’t know what you do for a living. I only know what I do for a living. Work. And pay my bills.
AmVet
April 5th, 2011
9:41 pm
And right on Pavlovian command, here comes that 1st 9:39.
Hysterically predictable.
Birds of a feather…
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:42 pm
Sooth, go back to your truther fantasies…you’ll probably find them more, uh, gratifying!
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:42 pm
obviously, there’s an awful lot you don’t know.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
9:42 pm
midori
“I forgot my age”
I may need to get me some of them shots! Wait, I’ll just take the $800 and go down to the corner bar for a few shots to forget!
RW-(the original)
April 5th, 2011
9:43 pm
I need you around to keep me straight
Oh noooo, not the booty calls again
Then again…
Del
April 5th, 2011
9:43 pm
Sooth, I never thought that way…I enlisted in peace time marines and we all went into war time marines, never even thought about hating people who didn’t go and haven’t since.
surgio
April 5th, 2011
9:44 pm
Jesus said is “what you do unto the least of these, you do unto me.” Repubs don’t care about Jesus.
Midori
April 5th, 2011
9:44 pm
RW – You’re a nut!!
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 5th, 2011
9:44 pm
Sooth…. let’s be honest. Its never been nice to know that particular poster.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:44 pm
surgio, keep your religion off the blog, nutjob thumper.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
9:44 pm
“And right on Pavlovian command, here comes that 1st 9:39. ”
You are some piece of work, Vet. I can’t wait to read another one of your rants about how you are pure as snow.
“Birds of a feather…”
Vet, grow up.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
9:45 pm
SoCo
“I’ll still pray that you don’t come down with something that knocks you flat on your ass.”
My prayer cancels your prayer!!
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
9:45 pm
Already they aren’t taking the medication they need because in some cases they can’t afford it.
Daddy has a prescription that has been costing him $50 every time he re-orders. It’s set up where he orders through the mail, and if he gets it somewhere else, his part of the payment changes and the cost goes up greatly. He’s been taking this same thing for years. Anyhow, a few weeks ago, he got a notice that the prescription, is going to $160. This isn’t the first time something like this has happened either. So he’s got to either find another drug that’ll work, maybe, or just quit taking it.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:46 pm
I know it’s not Friday night. And I know this song was never a BIG hit. But I loved it from the minute I first heard it!
Smeat
April 5th, 2011
9:48 pm
Hilarious video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIA5aszzA18
Adam
April 5th, 2011
9:50 pm
Federal government has no business in attempting to administer care for the poor and elderly in our society.
Yes, yes it does.
Faith based care and community care is the best way to assist those less fortunate.
No, no it isn’t.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
9:53 pm
My prayer cancels your prayer!!
Nuh uhhh….. Remember my new status?? Minority-minority. I go to the front of the line now.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
9:54 pm
I think Lil Barry just likes running over here and throwing a turd in the salad bowl!
surgio
April 5th, 2011
9:55 pm
lil’,
jesus love you, everyone else thinks your a a-hole…
getalife
April 5th, 2011
9:55 pm
HD,
Have you tried Canadian pharmacies?
My drugs have gone up too.
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
9:57 pm
Del:
Yep ………… of course with all of the helicopters landing and taking off and mortar prep. fire is not like they didn’t know where we were…………….unless you were out on a sniping mission or recon.
Del
April 5th, 2011
9:57 pm
Adam, please common sense alone proves you wrong. How could a centralized government possibly be more effective in administering assistance at a local level in a country the size of America? They can’t even agree on a budget.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
9:58 pm
Hillbilly Deluxe: So he’s got to either find another drug that’ll work, maybe, or just quit taking it.
———————–
You would allow that to happen? Cruel.
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
9:59 pm
“Congress on Tuesday revoked the first significant parts of President Obama’s health care initiative when the Senate voted overwhelmingly to eliminate a burdensome tax paperwork requirement the law imposes on businesses.”
Redneck Convert (R--and proud of it)
April 5th, 2011
10:00 pm
Well, maybe Jesus wanted us to love everybody, but I’ll make an exception in Barry’s case. Like the Godfather says in that book, “Some people just beg to be killed. ‘Kill me, kill me,’ they say.” Anyhow, we don’t need him anyway. He can join Andy, Grand Forks, LA, and others that can watch but can’t talk.
Have a good night everybody.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
10:01 pm
HD
That’s completely f’ed up. It’s a shame when people are forced into a decision like that. However, other’s see it as the market at work. Sometimes I think the market needs to jerk off with a #30 sandpaper-lined glove, laced with razor wire, and lubricated with tabasco habenero hot sauce.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:01 pm
SoCo
Yeah, but don’t forget nepotism!
Surgio
I think even Cuddin JC might have a problem with loving LBB
Mark in mid-town
April 5th, 2011
10:02 pm
Jay writes “Unfortunately, Ryan proposes to save Medicare by destroying it.”
That’s kind of harsh. I’d like to think that Ryan’s plan is transform Medicare before it destroys us. And destroy us it will if it’s not converted into the type of program that Ryan is proposing. Is what Ryan is proposing a panacea? No. But it is an intellectually honest attempt to confront the 800 pound gorilla in the room, a gorilla that will soon grow to a few hundred tons if we refuse to confront reality.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:03 pm
SoCo
@ 10:01
Ouch!
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
10:03 pm
Scout: that was the onerous 1099 requirement. That required businesses that paid anyone $600 dollars or more for almost any reason to send that person a 1099. They’ve been trying to overturn that requirement for months. It should have never been there in the first place.
For the record, I’m not a big fan of the Healthcare Reform Bill. What many people don’t realize is that 99% of it was written verbatim by Anthem (parent of Blue Cross/Blue Shield). It is essentially a big giveaway to the insurance industry.
AmVet
April 5th, 2011
10:04 pm
surgio, classic!
And perfect…
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:05 pm
Y’all, we may be wrong. It may be LBB’s benefits have run out and he can’t afford his meds…
Del
April 5th, 2011
10:05 pm
josef, SoCo sure can be graphic. Double ouch!
Mr. Snarky
April 5th, 2011
10:06 pm
I’m sure the insurance companies are glad to have LBB around to stick up for them. They’re being victimized by the american people. All those annoying sick people filing claims and eating up their profits.
Actually he’ll probably change his tune once he has kids (assuming he can find a blind/deaf girl) and their kid gets denied coverage due to a prior condition…oh wait, healthcare reform fixed that. Nevermind…
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:06 pm
I think “Cuddin JC” might have a bigger problem with someone who allows a family member to suffer in order to save a measly $160 a month.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
10:06 pm
Yeah, but don’t forget nepotism!
You would have to pull that card, wouldn’t you?
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
10:07 pm
“Islamic hard-liners, some of them heavily suppressed under three decades of Hosni Mubarak’s regime, are enthusiastically diving into Egypt’s new freedoms, forming political parties to enter upcoming elections and raising alarm that they will try to lead the country into fundamentalist rule.
This would be just wonderful.
supertramp
April 5th, 2011
10:08 pm
Take a look at the gop field
the only one I got
Not much of a choice
Never seem to get a lot
Hillbilly Deluxe
April 5th, 2011
10:08 pm
LBB
I’ve flushed better than you, Dude. Nite all.
Del
April 5th, 2011
10:08 pm
0311, If you can smell them, they can smell you. Scent carried and could get you Coors most rickey tic.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:09 pm
I bet none of the GOP candidates would be proposing trillion dollar deficits.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:10 pm
Run away, HD, miserly coward.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
10:10 pm
Del
I’m pretty reasonable, but can be quite graphic when my feathers are ruffled. Stuff like what HD described really boils my blood. Nobody who’s worked their entire life and been productive in society should be treated like that later in life.
I think “Cuddin JC” might have a bigger problem with someone who allows a family member to suffer in order to save a measly $160 a month.
Like you really give a sh*t. You played your hand earlier with Midori. Don’t try to show some faux concern now. Can’t put the demons back once Pandora’s Box is opened.
Soothsayer
April 5th, 2011
10:10 pm
Well, friends, the old (smokefree) woodstove is, like the sirens on the shore, calling my name. I’m hoping this is the last time this season I have to fire it up. I wish everyone a good night.
“Call on me in your time of need and you will know that I am your God.”
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
10:11 pm
THIS IS GREAT !
“MIAMI — The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida has a message for women who want complete control over their reproductive health: Incorporate your uterus.
To help women who want to do this, the organization launched the website http://www.IncorporateMyUterus.com on Tuesday, which will issue a declaration of incorporation for women who would like one.
Head of ACLU of Florida Howard Simon says “The Florida Legislature – and extreme social conservatives across the country – are taking rules and regulation off of businesses and adding them to uteruses.”
Simon says that telling lawmakers that your body is a business “is really the best way to get them to leave it alone.”
O.K. YOU 18 YEAR OLD MEN OUT THERE !
Incorporate your body and don’t register for the draft. It’s YOUR body and no one has the right to take you away from loved ones for two years and send to someplace where other men will try to kill you.
Mr. Right
April 5th, 2011
10:12 pm
Wow !! There are some stupid people on here!!
AmVet
April 5th, 2011
10:13 pm
I’m with Hillbilly, the stench here is just too much tonight.
I’m out…
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
10:13 pm
Del:
The pop flares over our positions most of the night didn’t help either. We didn’t have night vision equipment except a starlight scope or two from the snipers.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:13 pm
SoCo, I’ve been playing the same hand all night. People should pay their bills rather than using the power of government to force their neighbors to do it for them. I’m shocked that someone would tell Daddy that they were just going to have to suffer cuz Junior won’t pony up the measly $160 a month for his meds. Shameful, and a sad reflection on the degraded state of our country thanks to the Democrat entitelement mentality.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:13 pm
lil bar will get sick one day.
Everybody does.
I think lil bar’s anger problem will make him sick soon.
Bad karma for lil bar.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
10:13 pm
“Every time I see that doctor I have panic attacks”
I’m coming to this late, Midori – I too will pray for your improvement to continue. As for you panic attacks, this won’t cure them…but it will help. When you begin to feel stressed, let your arms hang straight down, as relaxed as you can manage and spread your fingers as far apart as you can without straining. You will feel the tension flow down your arms and out your fingers.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:16 pm
LBB
If Surgio was as you put it “a nutjob thumper” he’d be upside yo pointy l’il haid ’bout now!
And Cuddin JC cares a lot more about that person and the “measly” $160 than he does yore tacky, nellie lil ass…
SoCo
Hey, you take what you’re dealt and play it!
Del
Don’t he just!
Adam
April 5th, 2011
10:17 pm
To equate our current nonsense with the budget to the overall ability of government to administer health care is a failure in logic. Also known as a logical fallacy. The two cannot be directly correlated. I wish logic was more common than your “common sense”
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
10:18 pm
LBB
I’ve been trying to avoid even addressing you because of the fu*ked up sh*t you say. You don’t know jack sh*t about Hillbilly’s nor his father’s situation. As you said earlier, all you know is that you work and pay your bills. Maybe you should focus on that and stay the hell out of everyone else’s bills. If you’re not contributing money to them, why in the fu*k do you care anyway? How do you know what HD is or is not going to do with his father’s medicine? You truly are a piece of work. I’ll pray twice as hard that you receive some personal salvation and you don’t have to endure anything like that. I honestly think you’d be one of those people who’d jump out of the Peachtree Westin if you lost all you had worked for.
Bless your soul, or whatever semblance of a soul that you possess.
G’nite all………….
Adam
April 5th, 2011
10:18 pm
It would also be a logical fallacy to assert government can’t administer health care properly THEREFORE faith based initiatives can. Just fyi.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:18 pm
Too bad HD doesn’t care. He’d apparently rather spend the $160 on himself.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 5th, 2011
10:19 pm
josef
I’ll find me a trump card that will best yours before too long…..
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
10:20 pm
Hawaii senator wonders what Obama’s concealing
‘Why would anyone spend millions not to make that information public?’
——————————————————————————–
Posted: April 05, 2011
8:33 pm Eastern
By Drew Zahn
© 2011 WorldNetDaily
State Sen. Sam Slom
“The lone Republican in the Hawaii State Senate was interviewed on the radio this morning, explaining that while he believes Barack Obama was born in the Aloha State, he questions what might be on the original, long-form birth certificate that would prompt the president to go to such lengths to conceal it.
“I’m not a ‘birther,’” Hawaii State Sen. Sam Slom told Jeff Katz of WXKS Radio in Boston, “and I followed this from the very beginning. At first I followed it with amusement, and then I got really concerned about it, because the question was if it was not just the birth certificate, but other records as well – school records, academic records, work records – why would anyone spend millions of dollars in legal fees, particularly someone in public office, particularly someone in the highest public office, to not make that information public?”
As WND has reported, besides Obama’s actual birth documentation, the president has refused to release his Punahou school records, Occidental College records, Columbia University records, Columbia thesis, Harvard Law School records, Harvard Law Review articles, scholarly articles from the University of Chicago, passport, medical records, files from his years as an Illinois state senator, Illinois State Bar Association records, baptism records and his adoption records.”
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:21 pm
Reminds me of the maggots who hire lawyers and accountants to transfer their sickly parents assets so they parents will qualify for taxpayer support for long term care, etc, just so the greedy SOBs can preserve their inheritance.
Del
April 5th, 2011
10:22 pm
I’m not really sure I dig what you’re putting down. Are you really telling me that I wasn’t sincere when I wished Midori well?
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:22 pm
LBB
You better be glad Hillbilly is a good Christian gentleman…I know you’re stupid as 16 trashcans, but a lot of Hillbillies I know would be tracking you down…
Yippee
April 5th, 2011
10:22 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIA5aszzA18
Del
April 5th, 2011
10:22 pm
My last was a question to SoCo.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:23 pm
blah blah. Empty, third-party threats, jonix.
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
10:24 pm
TROUBLE IN PARADISE:
STATES OF REBELLION
How legislators and governors nationwide are challenging a rogue president
——————————————————————————–
Posted: April 05, 2011
6:17 pm Eastern
“While millions of outraged Americans protest what they see as a lawless and power-mad Obama administration, many wonder how much clout individuals can really have in reining in a wildly out-of-control government.
But suppose, in addition to citizens with little power beyond their vote, those standing up to the federal government were named Virginia, Texas, Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, New Hampshire, Tennessee, Montana, Maine, South Dakota – and many more?
Incredibly, though under-reported by the establishment press, that’s exactly what is happening right now, as the April issue of Whistleblower documents in-depth, in “STATES OF REBELLION: How legislators and governors nationwide are openly challenging a rogue president.”
jms
April 5th, 2011
10:28 pm
Our out of control spending has to be curtailed. Paul Ryan is just the messenger that the party is over and it’s time to clean up. ABC news reported that even if Ryan’s $5 trillion in cuts over the next ten years are enacted, we won’t see a balanced budget for 30 years.
WOW
April 5th, 2011
10:29 pm
1811/1801 – 0311/0317
Obamacare will be overturned. It’s already happening and will continue. Left wingers can cry about it but it won’t change the fact that it’s gonna die a slow painful death.
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
10:30 pm
“even if Ryan’s $5 trillion in cuts over the next ten years are enacted, we won’t see a balanced budget for 30 years”
that’s exactly right…because unless you make truly DRASTIC cuts in our biggest expense – the DOD – you cannot even come close to paying down the debt by cuts alone. Can’t be done.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:31 pm
lil bar,
HD is good people.
I bet you don’t work or health insurance do you?.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:32 pm
LBB
No threats involved…I’m just enjoying my last few exchanges with you. You’ll be gone to well deserved oblivion by this time tomorrow…
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:33 pm
In English, please.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:34 pm
Josef,
I think he is on welfare and bitter about it.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:34 pm
getalife
“HD is good people”
Yep. The only person on here who has universal respect and admiration.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:35 pm
HD lets his Daddy suffer. Good people?
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:36 pm
lil bar,
Where do you work?
Del
April 5th, 2011
10:36 pm
One of the few things most agree with on here is that H.D. is good people.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:37 pm
Georgia, Texas, Norway, Malaysia, Brazil, India. Why?
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
10:37 pm
LBB: “If you have a problem with Ryan’s plan to pare back spending on entitlements, you just might be a maggot. … I’ve been playing the same hand all night. People should pay their bills rather than using the power of government to force their neighbors to do it for them.”
Oh you don’t know the half of it. As I said a few hours ago, it’s not enough for me that I make sure that I am paying taxes so that public services are available for people who need them. I’m coming for YOUR money too. I want YOU paying for those things too.
You see, Lil Barry, that’s one of the strokes of genius about this system. Every little bit put in by every one helps, even when you’re just a maggot. All the little maggots doing their little maggot part, making the maggot colony grow more prosperous. Probably makes you feel right at home, don’t it LBB?
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:37 pm
You don’t have a job do you lil bar and taking it out on good people.
TGT
April 5th, 2011
10:38 pm
How we treat our senior citizens is an issue for our society, not our government, to solve. It is a challenge to our values, our morals, our ethics and our humanity.
Ah yes, another liberal with moving sentimentalities concerning the weaker among us. And we’re supposed to take serious such sentiments from those who have aided and abetted in the deaths of tens of millions of the weakest and most innocent in our midst.
RW-(the original)
April 5th, 2011
10:39 pm
Del,
I think SoCo headed out, but in the comment you’re referencing I think you’re misreading his post. The first part is written to you then there is some quoted text in italics. The bottom of his comment is addressing the commenter he quoted and italicized.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:40 pm
See, that’s the scary part, LWM. Little maggots banding together and voting themselves a living paid for by the productive. Think that’s sustainable?
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:41 pm
getalife
I think he shares the basement with Andy at Andy’s mama’s place…bless her heart…
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:41 pm
Come on lil bar.
It is obvious you are on this blog all the time and you don’t have a job.
Times are tough but you don’t have to take it out on good people like HD and Midori.
Lets talk about it.
You seem desperate.
Do you need some help?.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:44 pm
I need some help with yardwork. Your competition will be the day laborers waiting on the corner.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:44 pm
LBB
Let’s see now. Maggots live in sh*t. You’re the productive paying for it. Okay. Sounds logical to me.
Del
April 5th, 2011
10:44 pm
RW, thank you for clarifying his post. I seldom get angry on this blog but I’m glad I misunderstood.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:46 pm
Strained, jonix.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:46 pm
lil bar,
If you can’t do yardwork then you must be sick and those bills hurt you .
It is okay. You can admit it.
Ask for help man.
Good people will help you.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:49 pm
LBB
Twasn’t I who came up with it…just following your own stream of semi-consciousness….
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
10:49 pm
“Let’s see now. Maggots live in sh*t.”
Personally, I think you’re being harsh on some useful creatures, however disgusting we might find them. At least they DO do something useful.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:50 pm
getalife: Good people will help you.
———————
That’s right, good people will help. Maggots and sloths will lobby their Democrat leaders to pass a law confiscating the property of others to buy votes by “helping”.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
10:51 pm
getalife
“Good people will help you.”
I guess I’m just not a good person…
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:52 pm
Yeah, you are very bitter and have major problems.
I will pray for you .
RW-(the original)
April 5th, 2011
10:52 pm
You’re welcome Del. It was an easy mistake to make since he didn’t address the person at the bottom, but once you track back the quote it makes more sense.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
10:53 pm
TGT: “Ah yes, another liberal with moving sentimentalities concerning the weaker among us”
What’s a ‘liberal’?
What’s helping the least among us got to do with being a ‘liberal’ (whatever that is) when 40 years ago any member of the Republican party would agree that it was an essential part of government?
And finally, what does helping the least have to do with sentimentalism or sentimentality? I can tell you that with me it’s not based in that, but rather on a self-interested desire to live in a society with some sort of equitable distribution of welfare combined with an outraged sense of justice when the powerful grow stupid and arrogant in their exercise of that power, failing to remember that they’re part of a society with others.
Was it ’sentimentality’ that motivated Saint Just and Robespierre to run heads through the guillotine? I’m really not sure it was, on balance, but more of an outraged sense of justice.
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
10:54 pm
Lil’ Barry Bailout
April 5th, 2011
10:37 pm
Georgia, Texas, Norway, Malaysia, Brazil, India. Why?
Just can’t hold a job huh?
getalife
April 5th, 2011
10:55 pm
Josef,
Not at all.
He pushes good people to their limit.
I don’t recall ever seen HD leave like that.
I doubt lil bar will be here tomorrow but I do think he needs financial help like many Americans.
Mick
April 5th, 2011
10:55 pm
I’ll testify to that, HD is certainly good people, as are many others….it’s somewhat comforting to know that not everybody here thinks the same, however those with bad manners stick out like a sore thumb. If I never came here I would have never believed the divide with civility – not politics…
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
10:56 pm
LBB: “See, that’s the scary part, LWM. Little maggots banding together and voting themselves a living paid for by the productive. Think that’s sustainable?”
It’s perfectly sustainable. Life on this level is capable of going on for eons, even with radiation pouring into the oceans from the afflicted plants.
Del
April 5th, 2011
10:57 pm
Taps…good night and silence about the decks.
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
10:58 pm
WOW :
I think what’s more disturbing is just how many states are in political war with the president. This is a precedent at least since the War Between the States. I don’t know all of the legal, nullification, political raminfications but something is really wrong when states from the North, South, East and West go after the President.
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 5th, 2011
10:59 pm
Del:
Firewatch ………. man your posts.
Mick
April 5th, 2011
11:00 pm
Midori – on top of everything else right now I couldn’t imagine being stuck with an $800 bill . Blue cross and the gang should be flying the skull and crossbones as they loot and plunder,,,it’s a shame..I hope this treatment helps you heal, good luck!!!
Doggone/GA
April 5th, 2011
11:00 pm
“It’s perfectly sustainable. Life on this level is capable of going on for eons”
With the population levels we have, and will have for the forseeable future, it’s actualy the ONLY truly sustainable society. It’s no longer possible for each and everyone of us to do everything for ourselves. That’s why we have businesses to do things for us, and money to pay them for doing it.
md
April 5th, 2011
11:01 pm
“ABC news reported that even if Ryan’s $5 trillion in cuts over the next ten years are enacted, we won’t see a balanced budget for 30 years.”
And that is the interesting part………we just had a huge financial crisis that most didn’t see coming…….and now when we see one coming……..we do nothing.
Mick
April 5th, 2011
11:02 pm
**something is really wrong when states from the North, South, East and West go after the President.**
Not really scout, as a matter of fact like the song says; ain’t that america?
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
11:04 pm
Mick
April 5th, 2011
11:00 pm
Midori – on top of everything else right now I couldn’t imagine being stuck with an $800 bill .
And the CEO of United Health made a hundred million dollars last year. He must be a BIG TIME producer.
getalife
April 5th, 2011
11:05 pm
Mick,
Politics as usual with a divided country as usual.
Vermont wanted to secede with w.
Nothing new.
Don't Forget
April 5th, 2011
11:06 pm
md, a few saw the last financial crisis coming but no one listened. Shoot it was predicted in congress as they were passing the repeal of glass steigal (sp?)
md
April 5th, 2011
11:11 pm
“I can tell you that with me it’s not based in that, but rather on a self-interested desire to live in a society with some sort of equitable distribution of welfare combined with an outraged sense of justice when the powerful grow stupid and arrogant in their exercise of that power, failing to remember that they’re part of a society with others. ”
Do you only see the problem on one end of the spectrum??
We have one of the largest prison populations in the world with an average cost of 30/40k per inmate……….and those making the choice to drop out of the assistance program called education cost the country about 300 billion annually………
One must look at both ends of the spectrum to see our problems……..it isn’t a right left situation…..or it is.
josef nix
April 5th, 2011
11:12 pm
all right…time to go read a bedtime story to a little feller here visiting and playing video games to his heart’s content…g’night
md
April 5th, 2011
11:13 pm
DF,
Well hang on tight, as we seem to be headed for the big one…………and the misfits are fighting over a few billion………basically a rounding error.
Blue Cross employee
April 5th, 2011
11:23 pm
The truth is LBB is right.
People have a responsibility to pay for their own health care and not burden total strangers with their health care costs. Midori has had all her life to save up money for emergencies and issue such as this. I have blue cross and I work for Blue Cross. I’ve never had a problem with them paying for my care or my kids so I question her story about blue cross not paying. She either bought a bare bones coverage plan or is not telling the truth.
And the truth is that everyone is sorry for her macular degeneration. But she has no right coming on here with the woe is me and complaining about her copays. To top it off she complains about Blue Cross’s obscene profits. Our company doesn’t make anywhere near the obscene profits she claims. And does she even know what our company pofits were last year? No. She doesn’t. She is just running her mouth.
I feel sorry for her medical condition and I hope all turns out well. I do not feel sorry for her mentality that its not fair for her to have to pay for her own care. Typical welfare entitlement mentality that too many of you people have regarding health care and many other issues.
LBB is right. And that is what really ticks you people off. I’m gong to bed. Gotta work for big blue in the morning and as I said she is either lying about Blue Cross not paying or Blue Cross is probably paying for a $4,000 monthly procedure and her copay is only $800. Either way this woman is not telling the full story.
Left wing management
April 5th, 2011
11:24 pm
md:
I do tend to focus on one side of the problem because it’s on that end of the spectrum where the problem is most acute. But I must say I don’t follow your examples on the prison population/education in the least. You’ll have to explain your point.
Lies and the liberal lie tellers
April 5th, 2011
11:33 pm
Don’t forget stated that united healthcare’s ceo made 200 million dollars. Hardly.The man who runs united which isures 77 million americans 1 of every 4 of us, made less than an average football or baseball player. And I would say his responsibilities are far more enormous.
UnitedHealth Group’s Stephen Hemsley – CEO Compensation
May 14, 2009 — 4:11pm ET | By Dan Bowman
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Stephen Hemsley
UnitedHealth Group
CEO compensation
UHG
Stephen Hemsley – UnitedHealth Group
Total Compensation: $3,241,042
Details: An $895 million class-action lawsuit over stock-option back dating aside, Hemsley still manages to make the cut for this list at No. 10. The UHG CEO’s base salary was $1.3 million in 2008, to go along with a non-equity incentive plan compensation worth just over $1.8 million and “other compensation” amounting to slightly more than $119,000.
Hemsley’s other compensation was a combination of the company matching his contributions under the 401(k) plan and the company matching contributions under his executive savings plan. According to the SEC, “in May 2006, the amount of Hemsley’s supplemental retirement benefit was frozen based on his current age and average base salary and converted into a lump sum of $10,703,229.” Because of this, “there was no increase in the benefit payable to Mr. Hemsley under his supplemental retirement benefit” in 2008.
Read more: UnitedHealth Group’s Stephen Hemsley – CEO Compensation – FierceHealthcare http://www.fiercehealthcare.com/story/unitedhealth-groups-stephen-hemsley-ceo-compensation/2009-05-14#ixzz1Ii5U3AI0
Subscribe: http://www.fiercehealthcare.com/signup?sourceform=Viral-Tynt-FierceHealthcare-FierceHealthcare
md
April 5th, 2011
11:39 pm
“But I must say I don’t follow your examples on the prison population/education in the least. You’ll have to explain your point.”
Stems from: “but rather on a self-interested desire to live in a society with some sort of equitable distribution of welfare combined with an outraged sense of justice when the powerful grow stupid and arrogant in their exercise of that power, failing to remember that they’re part of a society with others. ”
No society will ever be “equitable” without ALL buying into the concept………..rich and poor alike. For every power mongering rich person there is a “self centered” individual on the other end making choices not in the best interest of the “whole”.
We choose everything we do, including dropping out of school and making the choices to get oneself into prison………….
Jefferson
April 5th, 2011
11:43 pm
Ryan is acting stupid by such a proposal, only fools wish their life away. You GOP lovers ain’t going to make it like you think you will.
Get Real
April 6th, 2011
12:06 am
Well Jay, we are all still waiting on the democrats to grow some balls and take on entitlements but yet it hasn’t happened and it not going to happen because they are not anatomically correct, in other words “smooth as a Ken doll”
As predicted by Ryan, democrats and leftists such as yourself are going to attack his proposed reform, old people will be eating dog food, children will die…and on and on. That is why this problem has grown uncontrollably and unchecked for way too long.
If you oppose, then propose but we don’t hear “didily squat” from democrats and Obama’s budget for 2012 takes a complete pass on entitlement reform, what stellar leadership.
What makes the critique on Ryan’s budget even more ridiculous is a lot of Ryan’s budget proposals come right from the President’s own bipartisan debt commission….
Stand your ground
April 6th, 2011
12:34 am
Ryan stand your grand against the Democrat agenda to bankrupt the nation. Fend off these entitlement money grubbing pig at the public trough bloodsucking parasites. Cut their welfare, cut their food stamps, their gubment housing, slash it all. Stand with America against her parasites.
1811/1801 - 0311/0317
April 6th, 2011
12:41 am
France ? Did someone say France ?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYFxGPkPTyw
oldguy
April 6th, 2011
12:43 am
Give us a break Jay!
I am on Medicare and it will go broke (or break the budget) you make the choice! And your answer is………….?? We are waiting…….
Obozo Care??? That cuts 1/2 a Trillion dollars out of the current plan. We are still waiting for an explanation as to how that will “Improve” Senior health care!!!
Ryan says the proposed change is like Congress has currently (and I had as a Federal employee)(Yes, I confess, I was once a federal employee{oh the shame!!}). Unbelieveably I was actually able to pick a program that best met my needs and was (an am) quite happy with it (even though I am one of those senile senior citizens you don’t trust to make a choice).
I know you hate the idea of anyone but the Government making choices for us poor stupid citizens but “try it, Mickie likes it!”
TnGelding
April 6th, 2011
2:06 am
Can you imagine what the premium will be in 2022? But we senior citizens are going to have to pick up more of the tab one way or another.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
6:50 am
Wrong. Ryan’s plan changes nothing for you senior citizens. Are you willfully ignorant, or just being “uncivil”?
GOP Math
April 6th, 2011
7:09 am
Ryan’s plan has $40 trillion in spending over the next 10 years compared to $34.9 trillion in revenues.
So that’s what a Republican considers a “balanced budget.” What a loser.
Tom
April 6th, 2011
7:10 am
If one is looking for a plan to get rid of the elderly and vulnerable in our society, then Ryan’s plan would seem to be the one.
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:12 am
Ryan’s plan changes nothing for you senior citizens.
See also: GW Bush, at the end of his disastrous Social Security Piratization Tour, reduced to hissing “You’ll get your checks!”
Keep ‘em coming, LBB. This is very useful stuff.
GOP Math
April 6th, 2011
7:13 am
Ryan’s lame claim of a plan would cut 389 billion from Medicare. Isn’t Medicare for those people that we sometimes refer to as senior citizens. Why yes, I think they are. That Ryan is a real loser.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:14 am
Show us Ryan’s changes to current senior citizen benefits, stands.
Didn’t think so.
Normal
April 6th, 2011
7:15 am
Tom,
Ryan and the GOP need to make room for the New World Order…a wholly “Corporate Owned United Swesat Shop Of America…”
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:19 am
Switching gears for a moment for a bit of comic relief:
When has Gawker’s Nick Denton ever had anything in common with former first lady Barbara Bush? Or director Oliver Stone with Senator Lisa Murkowski?
The answer: When Sarah Palin has feuded with them.
Palin has monetized micro-blog bomb-throwing. She attacks people via her one-way Internet communication — the “lamestream” media reports it and she stays topical. It’s catnip. It’s a Real Housewives level of guilty pleasure voyeurism. She’s tapped into our love of shamelessness. The more we reward her with attention, the more she keeps giving … and giving.
To quantify this point, I’ve assembled a list of her media feuds since she was tapped to be veep. Call it a supplemental: A hyperlink to her hyper-sensitivity.
.
it’s an impressive, well documented list.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/04/the-sarah-palin-feud-watch/72133/
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:19 am
Show us Ryan’s changes to current senior citizen benefits
try grasping the actual point I had made, LBB.
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:20 am
Given that Ryan’s path to greater prosperity for the properous, aka the Road Kill Bill, is but another lame GOProposal and nothing that will ever become law, it is obvious that it has no impact on “current” senior citizens. Let’s keep it that way by ignoring Ryan’s piece of work.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:20 am
Ryan’s plan changes nothing for current senior citizens, or even for folks 54 and older. They get their parasite maintenance as it exists now. Those under 54 have fair warning that their neighbors won’t be picking up as much of their tab as before and can begin doing what they should have been doing all along–saving and planning for their own retirement.
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:22 am
Ryan’s plan changes nothing for current senior citizens, or even for folks 54 and older. They get their parasite maintenance as it exists now.
Thank you, LBB. do keep on referring to Medicare as “parasite maintenance.”
Dance for me, mofo. Dance!
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:24 am
“the truly eye-opening numbers in the 2010 Retirement Confidence Survey are the percentage of Americans with little or no savings set aside for retirement – 27 percent report having less than $1,000 in savings, 43 percent say they have less than $10,000 set aside, and more than half (54 percent) have less than $25,000 saved.”
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503983_162-20000180-503983.html
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:27 am
Yes, LBB–when you systematically depress wages and hollow out government services (and sell off the commons bit by bit), people don’t have much savings left as they enter their dotage.
I have been citing the appalling median net worth of Americans for well over a year now, right here, to make that very point.
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:28 am
see also:
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=547&Topic2id=49
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:28 am
Ryan’s plan would be to wait until 2013 to start affecting senior citizens on Medicare. So, they have a couple of years to plan and think about what they’re giving up so Ryan can cut taxes more on the wealthiest while also increasing DoD spending. Who says those Republicans don’t love their killing fields.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:31 am
How many people could be helped if your Idiot Messiah wasn’t giving corporate welfare to the following groups to help pay their retiree benefits?
United Auto Workers Retiree Medical Benefits Trust
$206,798,086
AT&T, Inc.
$140,022,949
Verizon Communications Inc.
$91,702,538
Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio
$70,557,764
Teacher Retirement System of Texas
$68,074,118
ken
April 6th, 2011
7:31 am
And your solution is
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:32 am
How many people could be helped if your Idiot Messiah didn’t allow GE to pay zero in taxes?
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:33 am
Ryan’s plan implements trillions of dollars in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid and food stamps and other domestic spending programs and yet it doesn’t even come close to eliminating the deficit. That’s Ryan’s idea of a plan — throw the poor and old under the bus and STILL NOT balance the damn budget. The GOP is a joke and a nasty one at that.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:34 am
stands for decibels: when you systematically depress wages and hollow out government services (and sell off the commons bit by bit), people don’t have much savings left
——————-
I think you’d agree that I’m not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I’ve got more in my checking account than most folks have saved for their entire retirement.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:35 am
Where is the Democrat plan, TaxPayer?
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:37 am
I see Lil BB is still trying to project his worshipping of an idiot on to others. Still lame, Lil BB.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:38 am
I see TaxPayer likes the Democrat plan (failure).
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:39 am
Oh, and LBB? I have, personally, taken every prudent step within my grasp to provide a nest egg for myself and my family for my own retirement. Withheld a good chunk of my income for tax-deferred investments; a good mix of some aggressive, some conservative funds. Did without all kinds of niceties I’ve seen in the hands of other folks in my socioeconomic group (your shiny new wheels every coupla-three yeas, your posh holidays, your latest wireless pocket doodads). I’ll continue doing so, and I’ll continue to be on track, theoretically at least, for a reasonably comfortable retirement.
And all of that is still at risk if rat[bleep]ers like Ryan, McConnel, & Böhner get to steer this ship. It is for you and yours, too, if you weren’t so blind.
But go ahead. Call me a parasite. Like FDR put it so eloquently:
“We will keep our sleeves rolled up.
“We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace–business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.
“They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.
“Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me–and I welcome their hatred.”
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:42 am
Glad to hear that, stands. Not sure how you think Ryan’s plan has any effect whatsoever on your savings, though. Fixing our spending problem and reforming entitlements, it seems to me, would be a good thing for the economy and for your investments.
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:43 am
I see TaxPayer likes the Democrat plan
I do believe I have stated several of my dislikes of Ryan’s plan to prosperity for the prosperous.
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:45 am
Not sure how you think Ryan’s plan has any effect whatsoever on your savings, though.
Providing me with vouchers instead of the single-payer plan we have in effect, and telling me “good luck gettin’ yourself private insurance, sucker” will quickly deplete those savings if my health turns out to be not in accordance with the tender mercies of the insurance industry.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:46 am
Ryan is a Republican, TP. Go ahead and comment on the Democrat plan that you so love–deficit spending and government dependence.
stands for decibels
April 6th, 2011
7:46 am
Anyway, I gots to go produce. Later, all.
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:47 am
Ryan’s plan would reduce the debt from 14 trillion to 13.9 trillion in ten years and not even eliminate the deficit. That’s what the GOP calls a plan. That’s all they offer after all their whining and moaning about how bad the debt and deficit are.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:47 am
stands, what is the Democrat plan for keeping the parasite maintenance programs afloat then? They’re going broke and are not sustainable. What’s the plan?
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:48 am
Ryan is a Republican
DUH!
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:48 am
The Democrat plan is to keep adding a trillion bucks a year to the deficit and do nothing to reform entitlements.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:50 am
CBO: Obama budget worse than projected on 10-year deficit
CBO estimates Obama’s plan would produce 10 years of deficits totaling $9.5 trillion
http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/budget/150737-cbo-obama-budget-worse-than-claimed-on-deficit
——————
Oopsies!
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
7:53 am
We recently had a poster who made claims regarding an economists take on a subject and then proceeded to scurry away from backing it up….
Well I would never to that…..So
Mark Thoma: Ryan’s Budget Plan Is Part Of GOP Strategy To Create Deficits And Use Them “As A Club Against Social Insurance Programs.” University of Oregon economics
Krugman: “The Republican Plan Is A Giant Game Of Bait-And-Switch, Dismantling A Key Piece Of The Social Safety Net In Favor Of A Privatized System.” New York Times columnist and Nobel Prize-winning economist
Baker: “Almost Everything In The Plan Has Been Tried And Failed.” Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research
IHS Global Insight Economist: “I’m Not Quite Sure What Assumption …
Would Deliver 2.8 Percent Unemployment.” Nigel Gault
And let us not forget that Messiah Ryan is part of how we got into this mess in the first place….supporting the Bush tax cuts in 2001, 2003 and during last years lame duck seesion….as well as being a supporter
of Medicare Part D
Thanks to our friends at Media Matters for America…..cause it sure does matter.
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:56 am
Ryan’s plan cuts trillions from Medicare, Medicaid and other domestic programs but only reduces the debt by 0.1 trillion. The GOP would have us believe that we should throw millions of poor and disabled and elderly under the bus in order to cut 0.1 trillion dollars from the debt in TEN years. What a plan, GOP style.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:56 am
Granny Godzilla
Mark Thoma: Ryan’s Budget Plan Is Part Of GOP Strategy To Create Deficits
——————-
News flash–your Idiot Messiah is the first person to hold the office to propose trillion-dollar deficits, so let’s not blame the GOP for “creating deficits”. The GOP is driving the effort to reduce them and have already passed billions in spending cuts since winning the House last November.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
7:57 am
TP, we have to reduce your Idiot Messiah’s trillion dollar deficits before we can start paying down the debt. You do understand that the deficit and the debt are two different things, right? Or did you go to public schools?
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:58 am
There goes Lil BB trying to project his idiot worshipping on others, AGAIN.
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
7:59 am
Ryan’s plan does not even eliminate the deficit and it cuts 0.1 trillion from the debt in TEN years. Great plan, GOP — NOT.
Corey
April 6th, 2011
8:00 am
Pablo, please don’t tell me that you cannot distinguish between a campaign slogan and a governing philosophy.
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:02 am
Lil Barry Bailout says “so let’s not blame the GOP for “creating deficits”.
why the hell not? there is no statute of limitations on driving the economy off into a ditch
Oh and the 1/2 of the 1/3 of Government that the GOP controls can pass anything they want…..but if it makes no sense, is unfair or actually a bad idea it’ll never get farther than Speaker Boehner’s out box.
John
April 6th, 2011
8:04 am
I say cut everything, including Medicare, Medicaid, Education and even the military if that’s what it takes to balance the budget. Where does it read in the Constitution that I’m obligate to care for anyone other than my family?
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:04 am
Why not? Because no GOP president ever proposed or presided over a trillion-dollar deficit.
Next question.
Normal
April 6th, 2011
8:06 am
LBB seems to forget that President Obama inherited a rather massive deficit…
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:06 am
your Idiot Messiah is the first person to hold the office to propose trillion-dollar deficits…
which would not have been required had your brush cutting faux cowboy champagne unit Messiah hadn’t created the first trillion dollar deficit…..
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:07 am
Normal: LBB seems to forget that President Obama inherited a rather massive deficit
———–
…and did nothing to fix it.
Lil' Barry's shadow
April 6th, 2011
8:08 am
Lil Barry is all hot air and a major train wreck in motion. Next question.
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:08 am
John
April 6th, 2011
8:04 am
I say cut everything, including Medicare, Medicaid, Education and even the military if that’s what it takes to balance the budget. Where does it read in the Constitution that I’m obligate to care for anyone other than my family?
Right smack tab on the top of page 1….it goes like this…..
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:08 am
Did you vote for Obozo to have him continue our President Bush’s policies? Tax cuts, for example?
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:10 am
Mr shadow
it not just hot air…..I distinctly smell sulphur….
Normal
April 6th, 2011
8:10 am
Go get him Granny G. That boy needs a spanking…just sayin’.
I think his mother didn’t teach him good manners. Either that, or he was abused as a boy by an uncle who was a Democrat…It’s got to be mental, somehow.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:10 am
“I think what’s more disturbing is just how many states are in political war with the president. This is a precedent at least since the War Between the States. I don’t know all of the legal, nullification, political raminfications but something is really wrong when states from the North, South, East and West go after the President.”
Yeah, which is why I laugh whenever Bookman writes about how easy Obama will have it in 2012.
Not sure how Obama will carry the swing states when all of the swing states turned red.
Peadawg
April 6th, 2011
8:11 am
“LBB seems to forget that President Obama inherited a rather massive deficit…”
And it seems that he’s continuing on by adding to it:
from http://usgovinfo.about.com/
“The CBO projected that Obama’s proposed budget would increase the national debt from $7.5 trillion – about 53 percent of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product – at the end of 2009 to $20.3 trillion – or 90 percent of the GDP – by the end of 2020.”
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:11 am
GG couldn’t answer John’s question…anyone else care to give it a try?
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:12 am
Lil’ Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:08 am
Did you vote for Obozo to have him continue our President Bush’s policies? Tax cuts, for example?
did you vote for George Bush twice to create a trillion dollar deficit and torture folks?
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:12 am
“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. ”
Granny obviously never took US History. Granny, the forefathers never intended the federal government to take care of it’s people by giving away other peoples money.
They escaped Europe for a reason.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:12 am
“did you vote for George Bush twice to create a trillion dollar deficit and torture folks?”
HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Granny, GITMO is still open for business. LOL
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:13 am
Lil’ Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:11 am
GG couldn’t answer John’s question…anyone else care to give it a try?
Lil Barry couldn’t understand the answer, anybody got hand puppets to try it in a more simplistic form?
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:14 am
Our President Bush’s measly $300 billion deficits look pretty tiny these days. Your Idiot Messiah presided over the first trillion dollar deficit and then more than doubled down on his failure by proposing a decade of them.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:14 am
“Where is the Democrat plan, TaxPayer?”
There isn’t one. They never proposed one back when they should have.
BLAME DIVERT BLAME is the Democrat mantra. No wonder they got their @sses kicked last November.
Peadawg
April 6th, 2011
8:14 am
Are we going to get a “The Ryan budget plan, Part III”??? Usually sequels are worse than the originals…but these are getter better and funnier each time.
BTW I love when Granny answers a question with a question. Too funny!!!!
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:14 am
“Lil Barry couldn’t understand the answer, anybody got hand puppets to try it in a more simplistic form?’
In other words, Granny has absolutely no idea what she’s writing.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:15 am
“BTW I love when Granny answers a question with a question. Too funny!!!!”
My favorite is when she she writes “bless your heart” after asked a simple question like “what is the Democrats plan?”
Mick
April 6th, 2011
8:15 am
wow@8:12
Err…wrong, it was religious intolerance..
Corey
April 6th, 2011
8:15 am
F. Sinkwich, Mr. Jackson and Mr. Sharpton are not elected officials; however, I do remember our current governor spewing the phrase “Ghetto Grandmothers.”
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:16 am
“Err…wrong, it was religious intolerance..”
That too. Kind of funny that you bring it up since left wingers think that our forefathers came here only to kill Indians and enslave black people.
Mick
April 6th, 2011
8:17 am
**Our President Bush’s measly $300 billion deficits look pretty tiny these days.**
Duh….your president bush kept two wars off the books, obama put them on the books, now you want to tag him for it?
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:17 am
“Err…wrong, it was religious intolerance..’
What did I type that was wrong, Mick?
Lil' Barry's shadow
April 6th, 2011
8:18 am
F. Sinkwich, Mr. Jackson and Mr. Sharpton are not elected officials; however, I do remember our current governor spewing the phrase “Ghetto Grandmothers.”
as well as Lil Barry saying that 60% of Black Women are sluts!
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:18 am
Bush’s $300 billion deficits
Look he made a funny!
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:18 am
“your president bush kept two wars off the books, obama put them on the books, now you want to tag him for it?’
So why are we still there, Mick? Why is GITMO still opened, Mick? Why did Obama extend the Bush tax cuts, Mick?
All these things you left wingers like to chide Bush over, Obama extended them.
Normal
April 6th, 2011
8:18 am
When one side is dedicated to making President Obama a one term President, nothing of substance will ever get done on the deficit or anything else. That is just one other thing the GOP will pay for after 2012…
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:19 am
“Look he made a funny!”
Look, Granny diverts attention!
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:19 am
“left wingers think that our forefathers came here only to kill Indians and enslave black people.”
is no lie too low for you?
Mick
April 6th, 2011
8:19 am
wow
**the forefathers never intended the federal government to take care of it’s people by giving away other peoples money.
They escaped Europe for a reason.**
Europe was not socialist at that time, mostly monarchs…
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:19 am
“is no lie too low for you?”
Hey look, Granny diverts AGAIN!!!!!!!!! LOL
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:20 am
“Europe was not socialist at that time, mostly monarchs…”
Never said they were, Mick. Your words, not mine.
Normal
April 6th, 2011
8:20 am
Mick,
Don’t confuse WOW…he sees Socialists behind every tree…
seabeau
April 6th, 2011
8:20 am
Like I’ve said before!! Stop ALL FOREIGN AID!,Cut 5% from each and every federal Dept./ program.for each of the next 5 years. Eliminate corperate welfare. Try THE FLAT TAX for 5 years! Do something!!!
Mick
April 6th, 2011
8:20 am
normal
http://www.salon.com/entertainment/comics/this_modern_world/2011/03/22/this_modern_world
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:21 am
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:19 am
“is no lie too low for you?”
Hey look, Granny diverts AGAIN!!!!!!!!! LOL
apparently not
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:21 am
“Don’t confuse WOW…he sees Socialists behind every tree…”
No, because the socialists want to take that tree and give all the leaves away that said tree produced.
Mick
April 6th, 2011
8:22 am
wow
Then what were you implying? It’s OK to admit a mistake, no one here is perfect…
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:22 am
“apparently not”
This is what I love about Granny. She never answers simple questions, can’t make a coherent statement and then diverts attention away from the fact that she can’t answer simple questions.
Bless yer heart!
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:22 am
13
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:23 am
“Then what were you implying? ”
I was implying what, Mick?
“It’s OK to admit a mistake, no one here is perfect…’
Glad to see you’re admitting your mistake.
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:24 am
14
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:24 am
“13 ”
We’re well over 500 comments, Granny. I’m free to type.
Bless your heart!
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:24 am
15
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:24 am
“14″
Hey look, Granny can count!
Bless your heart!
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:25 am
“15′
16, 17, 18, 19, 20……………..
Hey, can you count to 100?
Mick
April 6th, 2011
8:25 am
wow
Pathetic response, you step in it, then disavow. Why should anyone take you seriously?
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:25 am
Sorry Mick, but with our President Bush’s two wars included in the debt, it was never over a trillion dollars a year, like it is under the Obozo regime every year.
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:25 am
Wow….ok….if those are the rules….
And yes, my heart has been mightily blessed thank you.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:25 am
“Pathetic response, you step in it, then disavow. Why should anyone take you seriously?”
LOLOL!!!!!!! Poor mick, he actually thinks that I care about what he thinks of me.
Bless your heart!
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:26 am
“Wow….ok….if those are the rules….”
Ask Jay if you don’t believe me, Granny.
Big Red One
April 6th, 2011
8:27 am
Yes, Obama inherited a large deficit. How many people remember that the Dems had two years prior running the show in both chambers of Congress? Democrat liberals and the DNC main stream media won’t ever remind people of that fact. In just three years in office, Obama will be directly responsible for nearly $4.5 TRILLION dollars in deficit spending. No president in the history of the nation has come close to this level of economic malfeasance. Not Reagan, not HW Bush, not Shrub Bush. Those are the Cold Stone Creamery facts.
But what else is new in Democrat liberal land and the DNC media. These are the same people who won’t remind Americans that Democrats – in charge of both chambers of Congress all last year – failed to pass a budget for 2011. The Community Organizer was too busy playing golf and vacationing and hosting parties, so of course he didn’t say anything. Now of course, Republicans will be blamed if a budget doesn’t get passed – while trying to reel in out of control deficit spending.
See how that works? What was it Obama said? Oh yeah: you never get 100% of what you want. Yep you can say that again Barry. Especially now. So much for Republicans having to “ride in the back” these days while you Democrat liberals try and ram more legislation down America’s throats unwanted, huh? Oh, and defunding Obamacare is just a start.
That’s the change America voted for in the 2010 mid-terms.Like the RNC’s spoof video of Obama’s 2012 re-election announcement video on Youtube which currently has a 7:1 like vs. dislike ratio (and we all know who has given this video the thumbs down). Gottaluvit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIA5aszzA18&feature=player_embedded
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:28 am
Lil’ Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:25 am
Sorry Mick, but with our President Bush’s two wars included in the debt, it was never over a trillion dollars a year, like it is under the Obozo regime every year.
False
1.37 Trillion FY2009 that would be Mr. President Bush….
Mick
April 6th, 2011
8:28 am
Is it a coincidence that little barry morphs into wow, who then morphs into harry? All three stooges for the same cause…
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
8:29 am
So, how many jobs will Ryan’s proposed debt reduction of 0.1 trillion (14.0 trillion to 13.9 trillion) over ten years create. Will all of them be jobs operating the heavy machinery needed to throw that many poor and disabled and elderly under the GOP buses so the GOP can afford to give the wealthiest another tax cut without increasing the deficit much more. What a plan, Ryan. By the way, I don’t see a bunch of Republican presidential hopefuls jumping on that bandwagon. Could it have something to do with votes from those they plan to throw under the bus. Don’t worry. They’re with you. You got a mandate. Go for it.
getalife
April 6th, 2011
8:29 am
It is very obvious that wow and lil bar don’t have a job and very bitter about it.
They are screaming out for help so help if you can.
lil bar lost it last night .
josef nix
April 6th, 2011
8:30 am
I take it the Bruin is still hibernating…
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:30 am
Sorry, Granny, but Obozo presided over the 2009 budget year, and did nothing to rein in spending. Also recall who passed the 2009 budget–Democrat house, Democrat senate.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:30 am
“1.37 Trillion FY2009 that would be Mr. President Bush….”
Obama outspent W, Granny. Can’t wait for your bold type response!
Mick
April 6th, 2011
8:31 am
josef
Why should jay intercede? It is what it is….
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:31 am
“It is very obvious that wow and lil bar don’t have a job’
I love it when left wingers write about other people not having a job because they type on a blog yet those same people……….type on a blog.
Gotta love hypocrisy.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:31 am
TaxPayer: So, how many jobs will Ryan’s proposed debt reduction of 0.1 trillion (14.0 trillion to 13.9 trillion) over ten years create.
——————
We have to pass the bill to find out how many jobs are in it. Hee hee.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:32 am
Jobs are for chumps who can’t live off their savings.
Buzz G
April 6th, 2011
8:32 am
Bookman is an economic illiterate. There is no way we can pay for Medicare as it exists today. It is unsustainable. He seems to know this and acknowledge it and then forgets it. Why I read his nonsense is beyond me. I guess I need to know what goofy liberals think (or feel).
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:32 am
GO BAMA!!!!! No, not that Bama.
Alabama lawmakers approve immigration crackdown
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/alabama-lawmakers-approve-immigration-crackdown-20110405-184724-782.html
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:33 am
Lil’ Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:30 am
Sorry, Granny, but Obozo presided over the 2009 budget year, and did nothing to rein in spending. Also recall who passed the 2009 budget–Democrat house, Democrat senate.
Presided over? Look you made another funny!
Your slip is showing…..
Dave R.
April 6th, 2011
8:33 am
:When one side is dedicated to making President Obama a one term President, nothing of substance will ever get done on the deficit or anything else. ”
Really, Normal? And just WHERE is Hope & Punt’s plan to reduce the deficit? Where is the Democrat alternative to Ryan’s plan?
Short answer: There isn’t one. Your party is the leader in demogogery and whining, and nothing else.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:33 am
Lil’ Barry Bailout
I noticed you had the left wingers all pissed off last night!
GREAT JOB!!!!!!!!
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:34 am
“Presided over? Look you made another funny! ”
Look, Granny types another diversion! FUNNY!
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
8:34 am
We have to pass the bill to find out how many jobs are in it
Ryan’s maiden name must be Pelosi.
Get Real
April 6th, 2011
8:34 am
All the liberals are out again this morning Taxpayer, Normal, Stands for Decibels and of course Granny Goo Goo….more of the same liberal dribble
I am not going to blindly trust anyone or anything, other than my immediate family but Paul Ryan is a good guy and I believe has the best interest of the nation at heart. He will be completely open and transparent (what a concept) about his budget proposal and he has the guts to take on what everyone has avoided for over two decades.
Per my posting from late last night:
Well Jay, we are all still waiting on the democrats to grow some balls and take on entitlements but yet it hasn’t happened and it not going to happen because they are not anatomically correct, in other words “smooth as a Ken doll”
As predicted by Ryan, democrats and leftists such as yourself are going to attack his proposed reform, old people will be eating dog food, children will die…and on and on. That is why this problem has grown uncontrollably and unchecked for way too long.
If you oppose, then propose but we don’t hear “didily squat” from democrats and Obama’s budget for 2012 takes a complete pass on entitlement reform, what stellar leadership.
What makes the critique on Ryan’s budget even more ridiculous is a lot of Ryan’s budget proposals come right from the President’s own bipartisan debt commission….
md
April 6th, 2011
8:34 am
I see the folks are still arguing as to which spouse used the credit card more often………
Well folks…..the bill has arrived in the mail…….quit pointing fingers and pay the frigin bill.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:35 am
HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!
Cowardly, Stupid, and Tragically Wrong
The Obama administration’s appalling decision to give Khalid Sheikh Mohammed a military trial.
http://www.slate.com/id/2290359/
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:35 am
Yes, but my tweaking is a mere shadow of what you usually bring…”speed tweaking”
josef nix
April 6th, 2011
8:35 am
Mick
There’s a big difference, imho, between LBB and WOW…WOW is not souless…he may irritate a lot of folks, but he’s not just plain mean and hateful…
Jay
April 6th, 2011
8:36 am
So Wow, your purpose here is just to get people angry? You confirm the worst that your critics say about you.
Fresh sheets upstairs.
TaxPayer
April 6th, 2011
8:36 am
Lil’ Barry Bailout
I noticed you had the left wingers all pissed off last night!
GREAT JOB!!!!!!!!
You could always try posting equivalent comments to those of Lil BB’s on your own here. WOW us, won’t you.
AmVet
April 6th, 2011
8:36 am
Good morning all.
Good call, seabeau, though I would triple that figure for the Pentagon to 15%, which would amount to yearly savings of $21,000,000,000. Do so by ending both BushCorp wars, bring the troops home from virtually all of the over 100 countries they are currently stationed in and quit playing at being Christian Crusaders around the globe.
Even the beginnings of some tiny amount of Republican reasonableness is being borne out in this area. Finally.
BHO was smart to get NATO fully involved in North Africa. And the best move is that we lost zero American lives.
Southern Comfort (aka The Man)
April 6th, 2011
8:36 am
G’Morning all…
Del, if you read this, I saw your post last night, and the latter part of that post that you were referring to was not directed at you. I should have done more to point that part to the person who’s quote I was addressing. RW hit it dead on the head.
poison pen
April 6th, 2011
8:36 am
That word, by the way, was not chosen lightly. How we treat our senior citizens is an issue for our society, not our government, to solve. It is a challenge to our values, our morals, our ethics and our humanity.
– Jay Bookman
Wow, now it’s up to society to solve, unless of course it’s done by Obama, then it’s the Governments job.
Jay, the main reason so many people were against Obamacare is because of the way in which it was done, ( behind closed doors and only Dems in the room ) also signed without reading it.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
April 6th, 2011
8:37 am
Yes wow be proud of a poster who personally attacks a poster who indicates her own personal serious health issue and is called a maggot by your little hero……you are a real “man” taking glee in that attack. I’d tell you shame but you have none.
josef nix
April 6th, 2011
8:38 am
Mick
Why? If there was ever a cause for him to interceded, it’s that mean and unwarrented attack on one of the most decent people here. But I was referring to him being in hibernation due to the same topic..I’m not a regular on day crew, so I’m not sure when he throws down breakfast!
Granny Godzilla
April 6th, 2011
8:39 am
Get Real
Granny GooGoo?
Really?
WillieRae
April 6th, 2011
8:39 am
Obama has failed in so many ways, but most importantly he failed to lead. On the matter of an unsustainable federal debt and deficit, he has failed utterly to act or lead. In the end there will be competing visions of America. One will be a higher tax bigger government vision and the other will be a smaller government, more opportunity vision. One of those visions is on the table. The keeper of the other vison is filling out his NCAA brackets and playing golf.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:40 am
The Democrat party couldn’t even pass a budget last year. I guess we shouldn’t be surprised that they also have no plan for reforming Medicare.
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:41 am
Republicans are getting Obozo’s hybrid out of the ditch.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:41 am
“So Wow, your purpose here is just to get people angry? ”
Nope.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:43 am
“Yes wow be proud of a poster who personally attacks a poster who indicates her own personal serious health issue and is called a maggot by your little hero”
One problem, Skittles. You left out the part where Midori called Barry and others every name in the book. You also left out AmVets nasty response.
Keep up the good lies!!!!!
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:43 am
Sorry, jonix, but Midori was the first to label someone here a “maggot”
Techfan
April 6th, 2011
8:45 am
Contributions to Ryan:
Top 5 Industries, 2009-2010, Campaign Cmte
Industry Total Indivs PACs
Retired $344,200 $344,200 $0
Securities & Investment $221,850 $147,550 $74,300
Insurance $215,352 $46,845 $168,507
Health Professionals $201,123 $67,556 $133,567
Pharmaceuticals/Health Products $78,650 $4,650 $74,000
Common Sense
April 6th, 2011
8:45 am
You have two choices:
Cut the budget, reducing the tax burden being passed on to the future, allowing the country to return to a period of real growth, and then use those profits that YOU have earned to manage your expenses.
Or
Leave things as they are, bankrupt the nation, and have nothing left to provide those very services that you did not wan to pay for in the future, while the economic malaise continues to grip the nation.
WOW
April 6th, 2011
8:45 am
“And the best move is that we lost zero American lives.”
Yeah, but how many lives have been lost in Afghanistan since BO took over, Vet?
Vet? Where’d you go?
Get Real
April 6th, 2011
8:45 am
Really, yes…you are probably Pelosi as you make as much sense as she does. You are entitled to your opinion (which of course you do not need me to tell you that) but for the life of me I just cannot fathom the liberal mindset given where we are at the present time with $14 trillion in debt and liberals still support more deficit spending….it is absolutely incredible….we are headed towards a brick wall so let’s punch the accelerator….what kind of plan is that..
josef nix
April 6th, 2011
8:46 am
Li’l Barry
I wasn’t talking about midori…
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:47 am
Contributions to the Idiot Messiah:
1 Lawyers/Law Firms $43,154,642
2 Retired $42,892,978
3 Education $22,976,126
4 Misc Business $16,500,999
5 Securities & Investment $14,891,735
6 Health Professionals $11,746,631
Lil' Barry Bailout
April 6th, 2011
8:51 am
Oh hell, you must have got here late jonix!
physician
April 6th, 2011
8:56 am
Bookman, what’s your plan? You admit Medicare is bankrupting the country.
Logic 05
April 6th, 2011
8:57 am
So, Jay what is your plan?
What’s the Democratic plan?
That right … they don’t have one and neither do you…it just spend, spend, spend.
josef nix
April 6th, 2011
8:58 am
WOW
Yeah, but that attack on Hillbilly was, well, as Mick said, it was what it was…
L’il Barry
Like you, I was here all day and all night!
Bill Orvis White
April 6th, 2011
9:06 am
Jay,
I heard FOX News Business anchor Stuart Varney praise the Ryan Plan on the Sean Hannity radio program. Stuart is one of the most trusted business journalists in the entire world. If he said the Ryan Plan gets us on a path to prosperity, then it is trust.
In my humble opinion, the Ryan Plan doesn’t go far enough. The rightful Republicans just want to keep the older folks in their column by not touching their programs. Sorry folks, yeah, you paid into these dumb government programs, but y’all would be better off in private accounts instead of the big bumbling government managing your retirements. It’s time to make the tough choices, folks. We need to privatize Social Insecurity, Mediraid and Mediscare while cutting all programs below it including the ridiculous Planned Parenthood, school lunches and the (f)Arts.
Amen,
Bill
Left wing management
April 6th, 2011
9:14 am
md: “No society will ever be “equitable” without ALL buying into the concept………..rich and poor alike. For every power mongering rich person there is a “self centered” individual on the other end making choices not in the best interest of the “whole”.”
I’ll drop this off on my way upstairs.
I obviously fundamentally disagree with you and am astounded at your naivete in thinking that the capacity of the selfish people among the have-nots to do damage is the same or offsets that of the “For every power mongering rich person”. That’s simply not the case. The person with power and wealth has a far greater ability to do systemic damage, or at least, that’s what we’re seeing in our present time.
Plus, to lead the discussion in a direction I’m quite sure you won’t want to go in, it’s the powerful who effectively have ‘direct’ power over the levers of society, own them directly, etc. and therefore it is they who effectively shut out the less fortunate (behind their gates, their privileged communities, their institutions and positions of privilege), creating for all intents and purposes a double society where one part effectively lives outside the society altogether (this is the case in many slums around the world, incl. in the US). Therefore – and I know this will really get you going – the privileged who benefit from this bifurcation do in a very real sense deserve whatever they get for that when the disenfranchised on the lower rungs come roaring back with a vengeance.
dbm
April 6th, 2011
3:53 pm
Jay, why are all of “us” responsible for health care for all older people? Why view health care for older people as a aingle, massive, collectivized “problem”?
Mighty Righty
April 6th, 2011
8:28 pm
It’s amazing how little most of the commenter’s know about how Medicare works now. Neither Dr. visits, hospital care nor prescription drugs are 100% covered. For Dr. and Hospital care my wife and I pay about 25%. For drugs we pay approximately 50%. Most doctors will, as soon as they determine you are on Medicare, schedule you to see their PA. Doctors simply can’t afford to see Medicare patients. Obamacare stole 400 billion dollars from Medicare to make Obamacare seem like it saves money. In additon, they then counted the 400 billion dollars again as actual savings thereby counting the non existent 400 billion twice. The Damncrats then knowingly lied about the total cost of Obamacare which gave their brain dead stooges a selling point. Currently, the Damncrat liars are running TV ads claiming Republicans are out to destroy Medicare when in fact they are the only ones who have done any harm to the program. The prescription drug program, byare the way is a George Bush program. Medicare is a beneficial program for us seniors but it is a long way from perfect. Obamacare will be worse, not better and there will have to be changes made or the Dimcrats will destroy our economy and there won’t be anything at all for future seniors.
Viewpoints: Major News Organizations On Ryan Plan: Solution Or ‘Hypocrisy’? | | Debt Relief USADebt Relief USA
April 6th, 2011
11:55 pm
[...] The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: The Ryan Budget Plan, Part II: Medicare In his so-called “Path to Prosperity,” U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan pledges to “preserve America’s social contract with retired workers” by rescuing Medicare from collapse. … Unfortunately, Ryan proposes to save Medicare by destroying it. … Ryan argues that the change from a government-managed plan to a voucher plan would actually drive down the cost of health insurance and make it more affordable for retirees. … The problem is, we have considerable data proving that such belief is nonsense (Jay Bookman, 4/5). [...]
dbm
April 7th, 2011
12:40 pm
Sorry for the typo at 3:53. That should be “single”, not “aingle”.