The end is in sight

Rich the Newsgroup Wacko · May 1, 2009

On Thu, 30 Apr 2009 20:54:06 +0000, James Arthur wrote:

Rich the Newsgroup Wacko wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
Richard the Dreaded Libertarian wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
Eeyore wrote:
Didn't it introduce absurd requirements for boarding planes for one ?
Not that I'm aware. There were some silly changes made, but
separately AFAIK. They're more comical than inconvenient.
You sound like you _like_ being strip-searched.
I've heard this Brit is a tttteeeerrrrrrorrrrist:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1173577/The-bikini-shots-curvy-Kelly-Brook-diet.html

I volunteer to search her.

Too droopy for my taste. Human women shouldn't have udders.

Skinny smart women are my faves, but smart and sweet in
alternate packages shall be considered.

Mencken said "Marry for the conversation--it's the
only thing that lasts."

I once dated a girl who was mildly asymmetrical (which AIUI isn't all
that rare), so I got to take my pick. ;-)

Cheers!
Rich

Bob Eld · May 1, 2009

"Richard the Dreaded Libertarian" <freedom_guy@example.net> wrote in message
news

an.2009.05.01.20.10.36.67060@example.net..

snip....

I guess it's time for a little history lesson:

Instead of offering incentive payments to their employees, which would
essentially end up being confiscated by Da Gubmint, they offered medical
insurance (which wasn't taxed). IOW, employee-provided medical insurance
was self-defense against the income tax.

True but immaterial

Over the years, it evolved into an "entitlement".

Is that a bad word? It grew into a necssity

There was no control on the price of care - you'd just turn the bill over
to the insurance company, who'd rubber-stamp it and pay the bill, without
it affecting you at all.

Well that's Laissez-Faire, freemarket Capitalism where the robber barons fix
the prices and keep the gate. Whatever the market will bare!

So the medical industry came up with more and more expensive crap, a
billion tests for the sniffles and so on, and the insurance company
would pick up the tab and raise the cost to your employer.

Why not, they're robber barons with a license to steal. That's the way our
system works

Medicine became more complex as the science and technology developed. That
is not unique to the US.

This lack of Free Market medical care caused prices to skyrocket, since
nobody knew or cared how much it was actually cost them. "Oh, the
insurance will cover it!"

Pure republican-libertarian nonsense withour merit.

If, when Latisha took little Mobutu to the ER for a skinned knee or so,
If they billed her the three grand or so, she might be motivated to invest
in a first-aid kit and learn how to use it.

Racist!

As usual, the problem is socialism.

Thanks,
Rich

Socialism is not an evil it does some things very well and works for health
care for most of the developed world. The US pays more and gets less.

In the US our fire departments work on a "socialism" model. That is, they
are tax supported and come put out your fires on an as needed basis without
cost. You don't haggle with them, bargain with them, have some doofus claim
he can't put out this or that fire nor are they tied to your employment.
This model has served us very well for 250 years. Why should a sick person
be any different than a sick, on fire house?

Joel Koltner · May 1, 2009

"Richard the Dreaded Libertarian" <freedom_guy@example.net> wrote in message
news

an.2009.05.01.20.10.36.67060@example.net...

I guess it's time for a little history lesson:
....
There was no control on the price of care - you'd just turn the bill over
to the insurance company, who'd rubber-stamp it and pay the bill, without
it affecting you at all.
....
So the medical industry came up with more and more expensive crap, a
billion tests for the sniffles and so on, and the insurance company
would pick up the tab and raise the cost to your employer.
....
This lack of Free Market medical care caused prices to skyrocket, since
nobody knew or cared how much it was actually cost them. "Oh, the
insurance will cover it!"

There's something to your history lesson there, Rich, but it's really somewhat
more complex than that -- countries that have far more socialized medicine
than the U.S. does pay far less for some of the exact same
procedures/drugs/therapies/etc.

And it's not fair to say nobody knew or cared how much the health care costs
were -- certainly the employers footing the bill always did, and I'm sure they
cared greatly.

If, when Latisha took little Mobutu to the ER for a skinned knee or so,
If they billed her the three grand or so, she might be motivated to invest
in a first-aid kit and learn how to use it.

In a more sensible world, the triage nurse at the ER would tell Latisha,
"look, there doesn't appear to be any problem here -- you might go home, clean
it up and cover it with gauze, and it'll be fine; we'd do the same thing but
it's just going to cost you more money." In the real world, this doesn't
happen due to liability concerns -- if it turns out the nurse is wrong, and
Mobutu's knee gets infected and he eventually loses his leg, guess who's going
to have to pay millions of dollars? There's a non-negligible component of
U.S. health care that can be directly attributed to "defensive medicine" like
this.

---Joel

Jon Kirwan · May 1, 2009

On Fri, 01 May 2009 20:24:45 GMT, Richard the Dreaded Libertarian
<freedom_guy@example.net> wrote:

On Fri, 01 May 2009 09:18:35 +0100, Martin Brown wrote:
Richard the Dreaded Libertarian wrote:
On Wed, 29 Apr 2009 23:59:07 +0100, Eeyore wrote:
Richard the Dreaded Libertarian wrote:
On Wed, 29 Apr 2009 00:10:30 +0000, James Arthur wrote:
Might that help catch criminals and prevent crime?
The only thing the state can do is respond to crime scenes and clean
up the mess, and hope they'll catch the perp sometime.
CCTV in UK town centres has already shown that to be false. At last the
police here can and do now act proactively.

So, when you're being mugged, do you ask the mugger to wait a sec while
you call the cops? Or turn over your cash, while you're waiting for
somebody to observe the crime remotely and dispatch your "protector"?

It happens so rarely that I wouldn't know. Unless you are sure you can
win the advice is generally to give the attacker what they ask for.
Insurance can replace material goods - life is more important.

Yeah! Then when he's walking away, shoot him in the back! >;-

In most places in the US, that would be a serious crime. I don't want
those outside the US to imagine we consider that okay behavior. It's
not. (I think there are a couple of places where killing is
acceptable in protecting private property, but I hope that doesn't
include shooting them in the back -- I'm ignorant of the exact
details.)

However, if you were carrying a weapon they didn't detect during the
robbery, I suppose you might chase after them to get back what they
took, once you were on more balanced terms, knowing that if they did
escalate the threat and challenge you that you'd have a remedy. It's
possible the law may treat that situation as an acceptable approach.
Again, I'm ignorant of these details, though.

I'd rather be in a gunfight than a knife fight. Most people are a pretty
lousy shot.

Shooting in the back isn't a gunfight.

In the case of actual gunfights, it's better to simply avoid them. You
are pretty much always safer somewhere else.

Jon

Martin Brown · May 1, 2009

News123 wrote:

Martin Brown wrote:

The scan is marginally faster that traditional security measures, and
considerably more thorough. It sees everything in fact (though I am told
the computer blurs faces on the viewers screen).

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5g2FtU5NbFoqCYHY2j5RB4Mi2xUnQ

I just miss the point about blurring the face of a person:
Just imagine some persons seeing some really 'exciting' image with a
blurred face.

The guy or gal doing the watching doesn't get to see the person in real
life. And most people are not readily identified by their genitalia.
There may be a few notable exceptions among the porn stars, but I can't
imagine that they would be especially bothered by it.

They can just walk away from their screen, out to the check point and
'grin' directly in the real face of the person.

The monitor displays are deliberately out of range of the scanner (or so
they tell me). And the image is more like a cylindrical projection of
the body rather than a photograph. They are looking for hidden weapons
and bombs.

The setup is way more sophisticated than basic X-ray or metal detector
grids. I always test those to see how good they are (and the standard is
still pretty rubbish except in a few airports like Heathrow).

Either people have to accept being 'pseudo-naked' in front of the
security team or this new system shouldn't be installed
Blurring the face is 'just a joke'

I honestly don't care. I would prefer to have a security system that
worked. In the US it was almost trivial to defeat domestic airport
security prior to 9/11.

I'd be more interested about any health risks for frequent flyers.

Essentially none. The transmit levels are very low. The next generation
will be likely be using passive terahertz waves.

Regards,
Martin Brown

May 1, 2009

On Fri, 01 May 2009 19:55:57 GMT, Richard the Dreaded Libertarian
<freedom_guy@example.net> wrote:

On Fri, 01 May 2009 16:25:04 +1000, Bob Larter wrote:
James Arthur wrote:

Obama wants to go a-conquering in Afghanistan--I'm not sure why.

You don't want to go after Bin Laden, et al?

If we hadn't been mercilessly bullying the mideast for hundreds of
years, there wouldn't even have _been_ a Bin Laden.

Remember the Crusades?

And the Zionists didn't help much - bunch of ungrateful louts! We bothered
to rescue them from the death camps, and Palestine graciously offered up
a piece of their own terriory to give them a home, and the first thing the
child-mutilating bastards do is bite the hand that feeds them, attacking
their neighbors on the American taxpayers' dime.

Thanks,
Rich

Try pre crusades Spain and the Moores, Islamic terrorists, Europe did
not start the religious wars. For that matter the damn middle
easterners, south west asians invaded us and caused the colapse of
economies and religions before the birth of Jesu ben Mary.I won't go
into what happened when the followers of Jesu and his twelve thieves
moved in.

Kuurus

Jim Thompson · May 1, 2009

On Fri, 1 May 2009 13:34:37 -0700, "Bob Eld" <nsmontassoc@yahoo.com>
wrote:

[snip]

Socialism is not an evil it does some things very well and works for health
care for most of the developed world. The US pays more and gets less.

[snip]

Charlie E. · May 1, 2009

On Fri, 1 May 2009 13:43:39 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
<zapwireDASHgroups@yahoo.com> wrote:

"Richard the Dreaded Libertarian" <freedom_guy@example.net> wrote in message
newsan.2009.05.01.20.10.36.67060@example.net...
snip
If, when Latisha took little Mobutu to the ER for a skinned knee or so,
If they billed her the three grand or so, she might be motivated to invest
in a first-aid kit and learn how to use it.

In a more sensible world, the triage nurse at the ER would tell Latisha,
"look, there doesn't appear to be any problem here -- you might go home, clean
it up and cover it with gauze, and it'll be fine; we'd do the same thing but
it's just going to cost you more money." In the real world, this doesn't
happen due to liability concerns -- if it turns out the nurse is wrong, and
Mobutu's knee gets infected and he eventually loses his leg, guess who's going
to have to pay millions of dollars? There's a non-negligible component of
U.S. health care that can be directly attributed to "defensive medicine" like
this.

---Joel

This is all part of the "No Risk" society that we presently have.
There shoulld be no risk, no matter what behavior or action that you
perform, and if something bad SHOULD happen, then someone else is
obviously to blame, and should pay for it.

Rich smokes for 50 years, and suddenly has a stroke due to circulatory
failure. He sues the tobacco companies for them evilly inticing him
to smoke...

A guy breaks into your house, cuts himself on the window he broke to
get in, gets an infection, and sues you for the dangerous window glass
you have...

You keep your kids wrapped in a plastic bubble, but then they go to
college and party their minds out and get addicted. it is the
school's fault for not policing your child's behavior properly...

and on and on...

Charlie

Jim Thompson · May 1, 2009

On Fri, 01 May 2009 22:56:59 GMT, Charlie E. <edmondson@ieee.org>
wrote:

[snip]

This is all part of the "No Risk" society that we presently have.
There shoulld be no risk, no matter what behavior or action that you
perform, and if something bad SHOULD happen, then someone else is
obviously to blame, and should pay for it.

Rich smokes for 50 years, and suddenly has a stroke due to circulatory
failure. He sues the tobacco companies for them evilly inticing him
to smoke...

A guy breaks into your house, cuts himself on the window he broke to
get in, gets an infection, and sues you for the dangerous window glass
you have...

[snip]

Eeyore · May 1, 2009

Bob Larter wrote:

Eeyore wrote:
Bob Larter wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
Bob Larter wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
Eeyore wrote:
James Arthur wrote:

I favor Bastiat's formulation: if one man steals from another, even
though he uses the government to do it for him, it's still theft.
Who builds the roads and bridges etc in this world ?

Graham
There's a difference between a common good, and taking one man's
money to give to another.
When a government builds a road, it's taking the taxpayers' money &
giving to the guy who own the construction company. Either way,
somebody is having their money taken away from them & given to someone
else.
But one way a road was built, for all to use.
Absolutely. That's the upside to taxation. But either way, the money
ends up in the economy, benefiting someone.

Unless of course you pay foreigners to do the work.

Is that something that happens in America?

Well, there's plenty of Mexicans, no doubt sending a lot of their earning 'back
home'.

Electricite de France wants to build four new EPR 1.6GWe nuclear reactors in
the UK, to which end they bought the existing UK nuclear operator to get
access to existing licenced sites.

I doubt the UK has much in the way of capability any more to contribute much
to their construction.

Well, more fool the UK. It's not like they don't have their own experts.

Click to expand...

In days past you'd have contracted the likes of GEC ( a bit like GE but the
British version ) to do the job. It has literally ceased to exist, killed by
bankers' greed, an new idiot CEO and Thatcherist right wing thinking that denied
the value of the industrial sector. The UK is now officially a 'post-industrial
economy'. It shows. Only ~ 16% of GDP comes from manufacturing and it keeps
dropping.

Graham

Eeyore · May 1, 2009

Bob Eld wrote:

Capitalism is unstable and goes from one panic to the next when unregulated
and uncontrolled. A few dates: 1869, 1873, 1893, 1907, 1929. Then the
depression era regulations and controls followed by a long 50 year period of
relative stability. Then along came Reagan and deregulation and now the
panic of 2008. What, you can't understand history??

Yup, that's certainly its history. That's why regulation ( effective but
preferably with a light touch until things get out of hand when a slap is needed
) is essential.

Graham

Eeyore · May 1, 2009

Bob Eld wrote:

"Bob Larter" <bobbylarter@gmail.com> wrote in message
bill.sloman@ieee.org wrote:
On Apr 29, 12:43 am, James Arthur <bogusabd...@verizon.net> wrote:

"Progressive" Great Society programs drove the financial bubble,
which frankly pales compared to the Social Security and Medicare
fiascoes.

The US social security and medicare systems are fiascos - not because
the ideas are impracticable, since they work fine in other countries -
because American politicians don't understand the social contract
underlying the ideas, and won't implement them in a way that benefits
society as a whole.

Well said. That's exactly the problem. In the real world, it actually
costs more to make sure that the 'undeserving' are excluded than it does
to just pay out & accept that there's going to be some wastage. Per
capita, the USA spends more money on health care than countries with
free universal health care that excludes nobody. I suspect that the same
is also true of the Social Security system.

The US spends 14% of GDP on health care while most countries with universal
care spend about 10% of GNP. The US system is inefficient and very wasteful
plus insurance companies rake profit right off of the top without actually
doing any of the health care.

And the US system doesn't even cover the entire population at an adequate
level.

I want to see the Doctor, or he wants to refer me to a specialist ? It costs
only the price of getting there. Indeed, when my back was very bad some months
back they sent an ambulance to collect and return me to home from a CT scan
totally F.O.C.

Graham

Eeyore · May 1, 2009

"Charlie E." wrote:

Eeyore <rabbitsfriendsandrelations@hotmail.com> wrote:
James Arthur wrote:
Eeyore wrote:
Bob Larter wrote:

It will indeed. He's been left a heck of a mess to sort out.

Graham

Some, but not much different from what Bush inherited from Clinton.

I thought Clinton left the economy in decent shape.

Graham

Actually, the dot.com bubble was already breaking in 1999, which was
one of the reasons Bush was elected instead of Gore.

I hardly think you can blame the dot com bubble on Clinton. Rather on
stupid investors.

I saw once that the dot.com bubble burst could be traced to a single
transaction. A backbone company was going to expand service with a
huge purchase of equipment from L3, when their (government sponsored)
financing was pulled. This caused L3 to restate some expectations,
that dominoed throughout the industry to cause everyone to say "it is
now OVER" and plop! the bubble burst...

Can you elaborate ?

Graham

Eeyore · May 1, 2009

News123 wrote:

Martin Brown wrote:

The scan is marginally faster that traditional security measures, and
considerably more thorough. It sees everything in fact (though I am told
the computer blurs faces on the viewers screen).

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5g2FtU5NbFoqCYHY2j5RB4Mi2xUnQ

I just miss the point about blurring the face of a person:
Just imagine some persons seeing some really 'exciting' image with a
blurred face.

They can just walk away from their screen, out to the check point and
'grin' directly in the real face of the person.

Either people have to accept being 'pseudo-naked' in front of the
security team or this new system shouldn't be installed
Blurring the face is 'just a joke'

I'd be more interested about any health risks for frequent flyers.

You get a good dose of radiation at 38,000 ft anyway !

Graham

Eeyore · May 1, 2009