Kabuki, Deficits, health care, and other important matters.

Mail 795 Sunday, October 20, 2013

I’m still sort of recovering, so this will be Mail not View, and comments will be brief. Apologies.

This is the end of the Fall Pledge Drive. This site operates on the Public Radio model : it is free to all, but it remains open only if we get enough subscriptions to make it worth while to keep it open. http://www.jerrypournelle.com/paying.html Thanks to all the new subscribers during this drive. If you have not yet subscribed, this would be a great time to do it. http://www.jerrypournelle.com/paying.html And if you have not renewed in a while, now would be a good time to do that. I won’t be bugging you again for a couple of months. You can renew now while you are thinking about it. http://www.jerrypournelle.com/paying.html

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response to a letter from a “highly successful cardiologist

Dear Dr. Pournelle,

Referring to the article/letter from the “highly successful cardiologist” Mark, I would like to relate a (very) short story:

I was recently introduced to a man who was, at one time, a well-paid “roadie” for one of the very highly successful bands of the ‘60s-‘90s, who now holds a low-level job with no health benefits one step above a burger-flipper. He enjoyed himself in those years, led the “good life” and spent money like it was water with no thought for the “winter”.

He strongly reminds me of the story of the grasshopper and the ant: the one derived from Aesop’s Fables which underpins the Judeo-Christian ethic of hard work and individual responsibility which I heard as a child and not the “socially responsible” version of kindness and charity to which it had been altered in the early part of the 20th Century.

What right does he have to put his hand in my pocket, telling me at the same time, “You have the responsibility to look after my welfare” quoting the first paragraph of Article 1 Section 8 (obviously he misinterprets the word "welfare" in the context in which it was written). Where should it end? If I have to pay for his shelter, clothing, sustenance, ad inf, ad naus, at least I should be able to take him off as a dependent. Essentially, if he were a child, I would be “fostering” him and the government would be paying me.

Re: Tort Reform to reduce tort litigation and damages Medical malpractice litigation may be the threshing machine for quality of care.

I think this may be one of the primary reasons why people from all over the globe flock to the United States for medical care which, if not the finest in the world, is very close to it (and usually they pay out of their own pocket).

I find your correspondent’s logic to be both tortured and tortuous; very difficult for me to follow (asks me to assume facts not in evidence and compares apples to frankfurters).

Finally: “…we need to decide if EVERY person can have stents or artificial knees and how do we decide.” And who decides just who is the we who will decide: shades of Sarah Palin’s “Death Panels”.

Reading his letter I feel as though I’m living in one of the “who deserves to live beyond 18” SF novels from the ‘50s co-authored by Paul Krugman and Ezekiel Emanuel.

Gary D. Gross

The legal system is required to prevent incompetence and fraud, but the way it works now is to enrich lawyers at the expense of health care insurance. It needs reform. We have not discussed how.

And the question of subsidies to the undeserving poor has been important for a long time. Shaw tried to take it up in Pygmalion (My Fair Lady preserves a bit of this.) Alas, the discussion has run to ground.

Leave Palin out of it: is it not a valid question: How much is health care your responsibility and how much is your health care mine and that of my physician friend? Or your neighbor down the street? Who shall pay for your daughter’s maladies, and why?

American Exceptionalism and the Current Kerfuffle

Jerry,

Dr. Mark does describe well an attitude of what he calls "American Exceptional-ism."

"An attitude and culture of what’s loosely known as American Exceptional-ism. There is simply no other country on planet earth that can teach us anything. Our entire raison d’etre is to be the world’s beacon of shining success – in freedom, liberty, democracy – and really everything (but especially technology)."

" Health Care issues, government shut down, marvels, and other matters of interest."

<https://www.jerrypournelle.com/chaosmanor/?p=15732>

I have always thought the ideas and principles of American were exceptional, not necessarily things done in our history.

So " American Exceptional-ism" is not my bugaboo for opposition to the Affordable Health Care Act.

I have five reasons for my opposition– I could support whole heartedly approaches that might meet what President Obama wants to do.

1) If you want to change a system, a good practice is to change one small thing to improve it and add in more changes incrementally. If you can’t change the one small thing, how can you do anything else?

We still can’t get rid of bunny inspectors. So why in the world would any bigger change to the federal government work?

2) The Congress and the Executive branch are "goodied up" with all sort of special perks in health care. Pardon me, I have forgotten my place in the world.

3) I am taxed for not doing something. I am waiting patiently for being taxed for not eating my peas.

July 11, 2011 Press Conference by President Obama <http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/07/11/press-conference-president>

National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius <http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/11pdf/11-393c3a2.pdf>

4) I am fined for not participating in commerce. I am waiting patiently to be fined for not selling my peas.

317 U.S. 111, Wickard v. Filburn

<http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0317_0111_ZO.html>

5) Medical care is subject to economic forces. Obviously we cannot spend all the wealth of the US or the world to save a single person, nor can we say we will help no one with their medical expenses. Thus we are deciding on who gets what, at what cost, and who pays for it.

We are deciding on how to ration care–period. That is the dirty little secret. Not everyone can get the health care they would want.

Now the fabulously wealthy will get fabulous health care, So we are talking about the rest of us.

I am unalterably opposed in having a single payer system since then the single payer will be the only entity deciding on who is naughty or nice. I would rather have many providers to attempt to get good enough care at a good enough cost.

For the future I am very certain that medicine will become cheaper as AI (a la the Watson device & robotics) come into more play.

But for now, I am opposed mostly due to the shenanigans of the Congress and the Executive (both Democrats and Republicans) as they get the health care goodies and leave us to the AHC Act.

As Bill the Cat would say, "Pfft!"

Regards, Charles Adams, Bellevue, NE

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Just before the Kabuki ended:

Shutdown and Sequester, and Obamacare – long – sorry!

Jerry,

I take no joy in apparently being correct that this White House is actually willing to damage the country rather than give an inch on the massively mono-partisan Obamacare law.

(If anyone wants more damning evidence, consider the recent unsubtle efforts by members of the Administration, even the President himself, to talk the financial markets into panicking.)

(I note also the modern US left’s habitual "tell" of projection. Recent history shows again and again that whatever they loudly accuse conservatives of is a very good bet to emerge six months later as what the left was actually up to. Consider all the recent hyperbolic accusations of extortion, blackmail, hostage-taking, terrorism, and totally unreasonable refusal to execute a branch of government’s traditional obligations in that light, and much becomes clear.)

The majority of the House Republican caucus seems to have swung round to this view yesterday. Today’s House agenda is reported to be approving a Senate "compromise" bill said to consist mainly of reopening the government and extending the debt limit until early next year, in conjunction with negotiations aimed at reducing long-term deficits. The Sequester, at least for now, is said to remain in force.

In other words, kicking the can down the road a few months, combined with a likely continued impasse over future spending. Positions the Dems have taken in the last week show that their basic goals haven’t changed. They still want to raise taxes, remove the Sequester caps, and get on with spending our way into becoming the United States of Detroit.

They also feel massively burned by the Sequester; they’re determined not to fall for any such automatic spending limit again.

Current signs are the Senate compromise will pass, possibly with a fair number of House Republicans. (At least if Harry Reid can resist the urge to include any obvious poison pills.) House conservatives will likely be very, very unhappy about this, and I don’t blame them. (But given apparent Dem determination to take the country down rather than give an inch, this is unpleasant but probably necessary.)

At which point the fight will continue regardless, probably right through next fall’s election. Essentially, I expect from here on out we’ll see nothing but 2014 campaign; I would not bet anything important in the current legislative logjam breaking before then.

One remarkable thing about this exercise has been that, as long as there was even a remote chance of winning, the Republican House stayed united behind a strongly conservative position. The Tea Party wing now has power. Not enough yet to beat the combined White House, Senate, and conventional media, but real and growing power nevertheless.

To everyone who cares about not seeing this country bankrupted, I say:

Don’t get mad, get even. Forget the circular firing squads. Work to consolidate and increase the political power needed to actually fix things. IE, focus on winning back the public, then on winning back the Senate next fall.

Meanwhile, one obvious thing about this exercise is that Obamacare is now once again clearly hung around the necks of the Dems. They’ve nailed their sail to that mast. If it really is still a train wreck come November 2014, the public will know who was driving the train and who tried to stop it.

In that regard, some thoughts.

The current mess with Obamacare web signups will probably turn out to be secondary. (Indicative of the unwisdom of putting that big a slice of our economy under a federal bureaucracy, yes, but secondary.) They may have web signup mostly working in a few months, or those problems may drag on for years (as with many other major Federal software projects) but either way, there are two far bigger problems looming:

Cost, and access.

All due respect to your cardiologist correspondent, but I think he’s very wrong that there’s no serious cost-increase problem.

He may be looking at cost instances where the states involved had already imposed most of Obamacare’s expense-increasing requirements.

Hard to say.

Or, he may be making comparisons where the Obamacare version has drastically limited provider networks to keep monthly payments down.

Voters will NOT be happy if OCare routinely sends them fifty miles past the good hospital next door for treatment. Early reports are that there’s a lot of that going on.

I’ll give two like-to-like cost data points for now. There is the young fellow who blogged (on Daily Kos, of all places) about how Kaiser has just told him and his wife that their coverage cost is essentially doubling after 2013

(http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/361321/daily-kos-blogger-obamacare-will-double-my-premiums-avik-roy)

with the January 1st kick-in of Obamacare’s additional requirements.

His monthly premium is going from $150 to $284, his wife’s from $168 to $302. He was quite irate, threatened to drop coverage and not pay the federal fine.

Then there’s my own case. I expect I’m considerably more middle-aged than the Kos couple, but I live in a lower-regulation state. I’m marginally self-employed, barely get by (work just keeps on interfering with reading time…) and pay a major insurer for individual coverage.

My rate was just this month raised to $220 a month for a plan with a stiff deductible and co-pay, but very solid no-limit coverage once past the first eight thousand or so. IE, actual catastrophic insurance.

My insurer recently told me that my plan will go away after 2014 due to not meeting Obamacare mandates, but that they’ll be happy to then cover me under one of their new Obamacare-compliant plans. But, they won’t yet tell me what that will cost.

So, I went to ehealthinsurance.com and did a bit of looking around. The site still lets you specify a 2013 pre-OCare plan, or a 2014 OCare-compliant plan. I checked under 2013 for my age, gender, smoking status, and zipcode, and sure enough there was my current plan at $220.

Then I switched to 2014 OCare-compliant plans, all else the same, and the cheapest plan they had for me was their $441 "bronze" plan, with broadly similar deductible and co-pay. (I didn’t check to see whether it narrowed my provider networks.)

So I’ve already seen my pre-OCare plan increase for 2014, and the post-OCare 2014 equivalent is double that. God alone knows what that rate will be by 2015, after most of the young Kos-couple types have

(sensibly) bailed. My suspicion is that, unless I hit the lottery, I’m going to have to then seriously consider dropping coverage also. (Or spending a lot less time writing screeds… Nah.)

Taking a rough look at where the increase comes in, it looks like for me OCare’s new limit on middle-aged rates (3:1 max ratio over 21-year-old rates versus the customary ~5:1) is roughly a wash with its ban on charging more for gender (women incur on average roughly 50% more medical expense than men). So the bulk of the 100% increase seems to be coming with the whole bunch of things mandated by Obamacare that I made a considered decision NOT TO INSURE FOR back when I was shopping for insurance.

And please don’t tell me I should jump through hoops for the DHSS and IRS to perhaps get part of it back as a subsidy. Take on massively intrusive BS paperwork, yet still pay more to get less? Feh.

Multiply my extreme unhappiness by the millions of others getting similar news over the next year, plus the millions more being pushed down to less than thirty hours or put out of a job entirely, and it could be an interesting election.

If, that is, the farging Republicans can remember that they have a mission hugely more important than putting conservatives back in their place. Make Harry Reid the Senate Minority Leader again, and the odds go from 2:1 against us to 2:1 in our favor.

Optimistic? Me? Not very. But we’ll see.

Porkypine

And just after:

Jerry,

Well, the President has made his position clear this morning. Now that he’s faced House Republicans down by being more willing than them to take the nation to the brink of massive economic damage, he expects that precedent to hold for future disputes. "Responsible" Republicans are welcome to join in giving him what he wants in future; the rest can go hang.

Obviously he hopes to divide-and-rule the House Republicans at will now.

I think he’s doomed to disappointment. They will have to be more circumspect about using their negative powers over funding and the debt limit, yes. But anywhere the President wants concessions requiring positive approval from the House, he has a problem. Republican politicians and the Republican base are both now infuriated.

The House Republicans gave Boehner a standing ovation at the end of this. They lost, but they fought till it was hopeless, he held them together, and they seem to appreciate that.

I’ve also noted signs that the Senate Republican squish caucus, chronically prone to preening over cutting bad deals with the Dems in between sniping at fellow Republicans, are feeling heat from the base over their less-than-helpful role in the recent fight. Will they solidify now? Completely, no, but usefully, probably so.

Meanwhile, the Obamacare slow-motion trainwreck will continue. In particular, the effects on employment and the economy will get worse, with the connection ever more obvious between flat growth and the 0Care hiring freezes, layoffs, and 28-hour jobs.

Speaking of Zerocare, if anyone out there wants to get very very rich, figure out a plausibly legal way to sell affordable bare-bones catastrophic health insurance to Americans. The potential market size over the next couple years is millions, if not tens of millions.

That’ll pay for a few top-flight lawyers, not to mention all the doctors who’ll be ecstatic if someone can show them how to bail out of dealing with the ACA.

Porkypine

The result is that we will have a replay in January. I suspect the President will be told he was victorious and he should now hold out for new taxes. Whether the Republicans will submit to that is not entirely clear. I would hope now.

What we do not have is a sober discussion of the simple fact that the debt rises monotonically even if the deficit is lower this year than last. As the debt grow the cost of servicing the debt grows. The temptation is to solve that by running the printing presses. Other countries have tried this with predictable results.

If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.

You wrote, "continued rises [sic] in the deficit is a sure path to an eventual default"

As the link I gave you shows, the "deficit" has been cut each year since 2011 and is projected to decrease even more in the future. You call for a 1% cut in spending, but we are already cutting more than an additional 10% each and every year.

We are headed well in the right direction.

It seems you are making the common mistake of confusing the debt with the deficit, but people who would like to influence public opinion just look foolish when they make it.

J Stone

I may have mistyped deficit meaning debt but I am aware that the actual deficit is smaller this year than last. I also know that the debt has doubled in the past decade. Doubled: that is, in one decade, the US has acquired more debt than it did in the entire history of the Republic, wars and all, up to then. The fact that the deficit is still positive and must remain so – that’s why the deficit ceiling had to be raised in order to avoid default – is the important fact.

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Consultants – meh…

http://www.salon.com/2013/10/13/ted_talks_are_lying_to_you/?source=newsletter

Despite the apology for Jonah Lehrer (itself a comment on the author’s innate bias – and ironically the very thing he is railing against), this is an insightful article about group-think and perceived exceptionalism (e.g. superiority). What is left out is the fact that even ‘herd instinct’ provides observation opportunities for advancement breakthroughs. We just can’t be enamored of the majority ‘consensus’; there is no law that ‘consensus’ is correct.

"Every gawddammed Marine officer regardless of rank, training, education, experience or intelligence thinks himself a mucking’ tactical genius. Get the fuck out of my Command Center!" LtCol. David Couvillon, USMCR; 2002 29 Palms, CA on the occasion of an adjacent unit commander trying to countermand the actions of one of my subordinate units.

David Couvillon

Colonel, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve, Retired.; Former Governor of Wasit Province, Iraq; Righter of Wrongs; Wrong most of the time; Distinguished Expert, TV remote control; Chef de Hot Dog Excellance; Avoider of Yard Work

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The end of climate alarmism

I thought you might find this interesting.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/the-age-of-climate-alarmism-is-coming-to-an-end/article/2537417

Because so many powerful people have staked their reputation on climate alarmism, figure about 10 or 20 years before it completely disappears off the page and is retired quietly to the dustbin of discredited doomsday predictions, alongside Malthus, and ‘peak oil’.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

That is about how I read it. We don’t’ have decent models, and every now and then we discover that Nature has ways to change things in ways we never suspected.

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BTW, if any of your correspondents have any information on the failure of the obamacare launch from an architectural/design standpoint, I’d appreciate hearing more. My understanding is that the site was extremely heavy in terms of Javascripts and database, resulting in something that ran impossibly slowly when thousands of people hit the web site at once.

http://hotair.com/headlines/archives/2013/10/05/it-experts-on-healthcare-gov-websites-problems-the-site-basically-ddosd-itself/

The usual changing requirements and lack of QA didn’t help either.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/troubled-obamacare-website-wasnt-tested-until-a-week-before-launch/article/2537381

I’m interested in learning more not because I want to make fun of Democrat failures, but because I’m building a web app myself and I’d like to learn from other people’s mistakes. It’s so much cheaper than learning the lessons yourself!

Brian P

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Last flight of Grasshopper

Dr Pournelle

Perhaps that was the last flight of Grasshopper.

‘SpaceX isn’t planning to fly Grasshopper again, [Chief Operating Officer Gwynne] Shotwell said there were no plans to do anything else with it. “We’ll do like all SpaceX things: we’ll hold on to it,” she said. She added she almost regretted still having Grasshopper intact after its series of tests. “In some ways we’ve kind of failed on the Grasshopper program because we haven’t pushed it to its limit,” she said. “We haven’t broken it.”’

Live long and prosper

h lynn keith

Dear Dr. Pournelle:

I saw the Grasshopper flight. Very impressive and 21st-century.

But you wrote:

<<

… private enterprise is taking mankind to space. After all that’s how the airlines were built.

>>

That is a half-truth. The airlines have been subsidized by governments from their start unto the present day. Without this support, they would go out of business.

I predict the same for private spaceflight. It will be heavily subsidized and highly regulated.

And if you like the security theater at the airports, then you are going to love the spaceports!

– Nathaniel Hellerstein

paradoctor@aol.com

The airlines were more ‘subsidized’ by government during the creation of the airline industry through creating markets – Air Mail as an example, done by private carriers after experimenting with having the Army do it – and with labs and services like NACA Ames, wind tunnels, and the like. Since liberals have the great fear that somewhere, somehow, someone is doing something without permission and supervision from government, your prophecy is no surprise.

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Public Employee Unions, Pensions, Political Contributions and RICO

Jerry,

With stories about Public Employee Pension Reform appearing regularly in the Press, I got to thinking about the processes that were involved in creating Public Employee Pensions that are so unreasonably high when compared to the Pensions available to employees in the private sector.

It occurred to me that these processes met the definitions of Racketeering.

On one side you have the Public Employee Unions financed by dues from their members.

On the supposed other side you have the elected Officials granting these bloated pensions who owe their election to the funds provided by the Public Employees who benefit from these bloated Pensions.

Standing on the outside looking in are the Taxpayers whose pockets have been and are being picked by those who were elected to represent them.

Looks like a Racket to me.

Let the RICO suits begin!

Bob Holmes

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Why I Will Never, Ever, Go Back to the United States

John, Long time fan, first time writer.

When I first saw this title, I had no clue what the story would reveal.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/niels-gerson-lohman/us-border-crossing_b_4098130.html <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/niels-gerson-lohman/us-border-crossing_b_4098130.html>

WOW,

USA treats people like this! Guess since 9/11 we have lost more than peoples lives.

This is the type of story that deserves a lot of press coverage. Maybe you?

I have also just finished a "story" written in 1994!

As Jerry mentioned in his writing, it is no longer "Our Government", it is "the government"

And sent the author (80 Years old) the following:

2013/10/15 08:39

Dear Doctor Pournelle:

I am an old (72) fan of Byte and unfortunately my entire collection was donated to the garbage. Sure miss those days.

During my cleaning I found a book bought at Crown Bookstores for $3.99 on 6/18/1996 "Future Quartet".

I never read it but find that I can not put it down. The ‘Democracy in the year 2042" was unbelievable!

I believe that "story" should be mandatory reading for every living being on the planet! I have sent the amazon link to my mailing list. I wonder if there is any legal and ethical way to publish only that story in a manor(pun) that would allow more people to read and comment. It is the type of article that should be published in today’s online world.

jerryp@jerrypournelle.com

http://www.amazon.com/Future-Quartet-Earth-Four-Part-Invention/dp/0688131735/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1381845164&sr=8-1-fkmr1&keywords=Democracy+in+the+year+2042 <http://www.amazon.com/Future-Quartet-Earth-Four-Part-Invention/dp/0688131735/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1381845164&sr=8-1-fkmr1&keywords=Democracy+in+the+year+2042>

By the way, I have finally found a replacement for Jack Mabley -YOU!

And, I love your WLS 9-11 program!

B

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disturbing thoughts

I agree.

It does seem true that Social Security could be made sustainable without intolerable disruption, if we act soon. (Condition contrary to fact?) But will that be enough?

Although the deficit seems to be coming down rather well in the last few years, I remain concerned: the curve for the national debt looks too much like being asymptotic. Which can’t work. Even worse than a national budget aimed solely at entitlements and military expenditure, would be one that exists primarily to service debt.

I do remain concerned about health costs. Either we bring those down — somehow — or they break our economy.

Thank you again for your thoughtful insistence on maintaining a productive discussion —

Allan E. Johnson

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SUBJ: Gomer Gestapo now holds humor is a terrorist act

To no one’s surprise, the TSA has now descended to the traditional last refuge of schoolyard bullies and tinpot tyrants: Laugh and us and we’ll GET you! We’ll fix you good!

http://www.infowars.com/tsa-loudspeakers-threaten-travelers-with-arrest-for-joking-about-security/

Dear God, it like something out of a Bertold Brecht screenplay.

I’m tempted next time I fly to wear my sweatshirt with the TSA logo on the front and "All Hail The Mighty Gomer Gestapo" on the back. Just to hear the flunkies grit their teeth. I might miss a flight, but the lawsuit settlement would likely bring full satisfaction. Sorely tempted, I am.

Cordially,

John

I was brought up not to mention rope in the house of a man who has been hanged, and I would not think that bombs were a very good subject for humor in an airport. I have little respect for the TSA, but many of them mean well. Making mock of uniforms that guard you while you sleep is a bit of an overstatement when applied to the TSA, but I think I would not go so far as you in denigrating them. My solution to all this would be to abolish them in favor of a less pervasive bureaucracy and privatizing the service while increasing the number of armed air marshals, but I haven’t done an in depth study. I do know that many know how to bring down an airplane if they don’t mind being killed in the act, and it is very hard to prevent that with the present TSA methods.

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The Sounds of Silence

Dr Pournelle

For a time, I looked forward to the 2016 elections, because, I thought, the US would withdraw from Afghanistan in 2014, and we would witness the resurgence of the Taliban there in 2015. I thought the American electorate would blame the current administration for the catastrophe.

Then I thought, "Would the American electorate even know?"

So I cast around for an example and hit upon Iraq.

What has happened in Iraq since we left?

I find I do not know. ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox, NBC — none of them is reporting on Iraq. Iraq is not in the news. Is this a case of ‘No news is good news’? Maybe, but I have doubts.

Here are my predictions for 2015:

1. The Taliban will depose the Mayor of Kabul.

2. Afghanistan will revert to its ancient tribal ways.

3. Helmund Province will again become the world supplier of opium.

4. Americans will be ignorant of the above events.

Your thoughts?

Live long and prosper

h lynn keith

We should have left Afghanistan as soon as the Taliban was defeated, leaving Afghanistan to the Afghani. Our current policy ought to be to get out as soon as possible, but leaving behind the promise that we can and will come back if it is used as a lair from which to plot against the United States. We have lost nothing there, and we cannot impose a just or kind society or government. The one thing that united Afghani is the sight of armed foreigners on their soil. This has been true since Alexander the Great.

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Judge tells living man that he’s still legally dead |

Jerry

“Life can be tough, especially when a judge says you’re dead in the eyes of the law. That’s exactly what happened to Ohio resident Donald Eugene Miller Jr. on Monday when a judge upheld a 1994 court ruling declaring the 61-year-old legally dead.

“The Courier reports that 19 years ago, a court in Hancock County declared Miller legally dead eight years after he disappeared from his rental home. As a result, Miller has lost his Social Security number and his driver’s license. Judge Allan Davis called it a "strange, strange situation," but he also said the court cannot budge in its decision.”

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/judge-tells-living-man-that-he%E2%80%99s-still-legally-dead-201043615.html

The real reason for the ruling:

“His ex-wife, Robin Miller, asked for the initial death ruling so that Social Security death benefits could be paid to their two children. She reportedly declined to testify in court on Monday. … Robin Miller says she opposed overturning the death ruling, because she would then have to pay back the federal government for the benefits she received and does not have the financial means to do so. Donald Eugene Miller reportedly owed her $26,000 in child support at the time of his “death.”

It boils down to money, then. Of course.

Ed

It often boils down to money.

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GOP claims that Pay Our Military Act of 2013 pays death benefit

http://thisainthell.us/blog/?p=37909

"The Washington Times <http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/9/gop-says-pay-act-covers-military-death-benefits/> reports that members of Congress claim that their Pay Our Military Act of 2013 that they passed earlier this week does indeed cover payment of the death benefit for the military and that the Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel is the fellow withholding funds from bereaved families;"

Now since then the Fisher House, a charity I enthusiastically support and have done so for years, is going to pay the money and get reimbursed later. But it appears to laymen reading the wording of the law that these payments were in fact covered in the act passed shortly before shutdown.

I will point out that the president’s preferred USAF golf course is apparently still operating despite the shutdown, and state that contempt and hatred are not overly dramatic words to use in the circumstances.

I still remember the idiots in my unit, and there were a couple, who supported Obama for election and claimed he’d treat veterans and military much better than the evil Republicans. They still believe so. I don’t know what the weather is like on that planet, but I’m suspecting it is warmer than here.

Serving officer

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Health Care

I have a few comments about the Cardiologist.

———————–

One of the issues in medicine is that things simply cost more than they did and the care is much better than it was 30+ years ago when I started.

———————–

He is right on this. More expensive procedures to deal with conditions which had no cure exist now.

———————–

An attitude and culture of what’s loosely known as American Exceptional-ism. There is simply no other country on planet earth that can teach us anything.

———————–

Part of the problems we face now are due to us ‘learning’ from places like Europe. Some of these countries we ‘learned’ from are now facing bankruptcy and had to have bailouts by more prosperous countries.

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The fundamental mythos of American culture, is that no matter how poor or humble your birth, you can through grit, spunk and hard work become wealthy and prosperous.

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Mythos? I recall the story of the guy in Texas who wanted to open mine which would employ maybe 125 people. By the time he saw how much paperwork it would take and the time between the application and being able to open his business, he gave up. The admin costs were more than it was worth. How much of this was from what we have ‘learned’ as per the above?

A thought experiment –

Assume there are 60 people in Texas who have had the above experience?

Assume the same for each of 50 States?

Check my math, that works out to 37,500 jobs, right?

Not much out of 11 Million unemployed, unless you are one of those on the bench.

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At the core of all the anti-health care reforms is the single concept "why should I pay for the healthcare of those losers."

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Depends. Someone like me who is genetically inclined to High Blood Pressure and Elevated Cholesterol. Or my Mom, who was from a family who all had bouts with Cancer.

I say yes, help them out.

Someone like my Dad, who was a lifelong smoker even after warnings about that. Maybe not.

Where do you draw the line? How much of an unhealthy lifestyle is tolerable?

What about someone who follows all the Medical Recommendations and then it turns out Medical Science was wrong and screws him up?

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One really, really good thing we should be doing is looking at the 39 countries who DO have universal coverage and see how they do it. For example, the national health service in Great Britain has great public support, their costs are something like 8 times less and their life expectancy is better. What do they do that we don’t?

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I would like to know this, too. Do they turn away people, deny or have extraordinarily long waits for essential services?

Since there is much politics involved, who can you trust to tell the truth?

The last question is the best one: we try to find truth through rational discussion. Sometimes we succeed.

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The soft bigotry of unrealistically high expectations.

<http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-c1-cal-freshmen-20130816-dto,0,4673807.htmlstory>

Basically, this lad can’t write comprehensibly (which means that his reading skills are poor, as well). But at least he got an ‘A’ in ‘African American Studies’, so that he can return to a university environment which is obviously not appropriate for his level of actual education.

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Roland Dobbins

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