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Health Care Debate #3: The math of the dependent in Politics JoeUser Forums

Today, there are roughly 300 million Americans. Roughly 260 million of them have insurance either through themselves, their employer, or through medicare or medicaid. In addition, there are 40 million people who don’t have health insurance. 10 million of them are people who are too rich for medicaid but are known as the working poor or are between jobs. The rest are either illegal aliens, people who make 3X the poverty wage, or qualify for help but haven’t filled out the paperwork or

Reply to Health Care Debate #2: Obamacare and the Family cottage in Politics Stardock Forums

You make purchasing decisions based on the opinions of employees of a company? Should I look and see where you work and make sure not to purchase anything from them because they employ such narrow minded people?

Health Care Debate #2: Obamacare and the Family cottage in Politics JoeUser Forums

I own a lake front cottage on a lake in Northern Michigan. It’s beautiful. One thing that is definitely in short supply is water front property. Another thing that has a very finite supply is health care. There are a finite number of doctors, nurses, and other health care providers. With my cottage, some people like me are able to afford a place on the lake. Let’s call them the insured (except in the real world most people are insured). Others, have to use public beaches. Let’s

Reply to Health Care Debate #1: Understanding Insurance in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]Do you have an issue with insurance companies being forced to provide coverage to people with pre-existing conditions if they get to choose what price it is at, or is it just if they are forced to provide coverage and have the price they charge capped (at an affordable level)?[/quote] A free person should be able to choose who they do business with. Period. If an insurance company doesn't want to do business with someone, they shouldn't have to. Those who disagree

Reply to Health care reform: The motives behind the opposing parties in Everything Else Stardock Forums

[quote]What I said. You have different values and beliefs than I do. And compassion, humanism and justice are apparently not among yours. Yours are apparently dignity, self-determination and wealth.[/quote] There is nothing compassionate about supporting taking other people's money to give to other people. Compassion would be YOU giving your own money to someone else voluntarily.

Reply to Health care reform: The motives behind the opposing parties in Everything Else JoeUser Forums

I trust free markets more than politicians.

Reply to So many reasons to be against government controlled health care… in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote]I cannot stress this point enough: your current health care system is inefficient and you spend a disproportionate amount of money on it for what you get. See <a href="http://graphs.gapminder.org/world/#$majorMode=chart$is;shi=t;ly=2003;lb=f;il=t;fs=11;al=100;stl=t;st=f;nsl=t;se=t$wst;tts=C$ts;sp=6;ti=2005$zpv;v=0$inc_x;mmid=XCOORDS;iid=phAwcNAVuyj3XYThRy0yJMA;by=ind$inc_y;mmid=YCOORDS;iid=phAwcNAVuyj2tPLxKvvnNPA;by=ind$inc_s;uniValue=8.21;iid=phAwcNAVuyj0XOoBL_n5tAQ;by=ind$inc_c;

Health Care Debate #1: Understanding Insurance in Politics JoeUser Forums

One of the things in these health care debates that has become clear is that people don’t know what insurance is. It seems obvious but apparently it isn’t obvious. When I hear people talk about “covering pre-existing conditions” I have to wonder if these people are looking for a re-branding of welfare or of insurance. Let’s walk through it from the beginning. Once upon a time, a group of people (typically farmers) got together and pulled their resources together that, if s

Reply to Brad’s Quickie Eval of Elemental Alpha 1 in Elemental Dev Journals JoeUser Forums

[quote]WHAT a deal! HEY, that reminds me, he never did send back my credit card. . .[/quote] Those boat payments don't take care of themselves you know... :)

Reply to What happens if global warming is wrong? in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote]You know, none of this really will change my belief on the enviroment; I'm still going to do everything I can to take care of it and lessen my impact. It's just what I feel is right.[/quote] Same here. My new house has geothermal heating, solar panels, and I use less than 2 gallons a gas a week. But there's a big difference between individuals voluntarily doing something and having men with guns force them to do something.

Reply to What happens if global warming is wrong? in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote] This tends to speak well to your posed question "what happens if global warming is wrong?" The title of the video is so hyperbolic it isn't even worth arguing about. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zORv8wwiadQ The arguments are sound and logical though.[/quote] Very week argument really. For starters, column A should both have economic depression (since the cost is there no ma

Reply to So many reasons to be against government controlled health care… in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]Also, as majority owner of your company, aren't you already paying a bundle for healthcare that could be coming directly to you in profits? It may be that you'd earn more if you were paying for healthcare through taxes rather than as a requirement of having employees.[/quote] Right now, I pay "a bundle" for health insurance for people who are actually producing something. With Obama's vision, I would pay a bigger "bundle" for them PLUS people who aren

Reply to So many reasons to be against government controlled health care… in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]Would you really support federally funded healthcare if it was combined with tax reform? I thought you had more arguments against it than who was paying for it.[/quote] I do have lots of other arguments. Try reading the article. :)

What happens if global warming is wrong? in Politics JoeUser Forums

I wrote this almost 3 years ago: https://forums.joeuser.com/144168/ “What happens if the earth starts cooling?” Of course, we have since found since then that yep, the earth’s mean temperature is starting to go down again despite all the claims of the global warming zealots who claimed it would be a steady rise. I wonder how long it will take for the whole “climate chang

So many reasons to be against government controlled health care… in Politics JoeUser Forums

The current system has its flaws but it does something profoundly right: Most people who have health insurance are paying for their own individual health insurance either directly or indirectly through their employer. They are paying into the system for what they get back. Obama supporters dream of a different system where taxes pay for health insurance instead. The problem with that is that nearly half the population pay no net federal income taxes. People get

Reply to This is an example of why Obama creeps me out in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]Yeah, it's the logo that creeps you out. I'm sure you'd LOVE Obama if it wasn't for that. At this point, it's really about finding reasons to justify your previously held opinions.[/quote] I didn't say I'd "love" or agree with Obama otherwise. I didn't love or agree with Bill Clinton (or Bush for that matter) on many issues. However, neither of them creeped me out. Obama is the only recent political figure I can think of that has tried to BRAND themselv

This is an example of why Obama creeps me out in Politics JoeUser Forums

Historically, not many political leaders have given themselves a logo. We all know of one famous German political leader who did so. [note to the severely humor impaired: this is tongue-i

The scary mob in Politics JoeUser Forums

http://thedanashow.wordpress.com/2009/08/06/meet-the-mob/ Clearly sent there by “big insurance companies”… [more]

The global warming ship continues to sink in Politics JoeUser Forums

One of the strangest things I run into with friends and family is the issue of global warming. At the risk of being bold, I tend to be the “go to” guy on answering technical questions with regards to science and technology by friends, neighbors, and family – except on global warming. That’s because I’m a global warming skeptic. That isn’t say that I don’t believe there is global warming or that I am certain humans aren’t the cause. It is

The basic problems with “universal” health care in Politics JoeUser Forums

Right now we have N people with insurance and Y doctors. Obama’s plan would be N+40 million with the same number of doctors. That doesn’t sound like a good deal to me. The counter argument is always that we’re already paying for those 40 million people. Well, if that is truly the case, then problem solved we don’t need to provide them with health insurance. But in reality, no, those 40 million uninsured don’t have even remotely the same access as those with

Weekend Demigod update in Demigod Journals JoeUser Forums

Greetings! So, what’s been happening in the world of Demigod this past week? Gas Powered Games has been working on the demo version of Demigod. There’s been a number of iterations to nail it down to be as small as possible a download while at the same time enough of a demo to give players a good idea of what the game is like. Meanwhile, we’ve all been working hard on some issues that I know only bug a minority of the community but bug me a great deal as being som

Healthcare by the numbers in Politics JoeUser Forums

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/07/07/state-run-health-care-by-the-numbers/ Great article. [more]

Reply to Various political observations recently in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]The true environmentalists practice what they preach. This is true for anything in life. However, you are painting with very broad brushstrokes here, stereotyping "environmental activists" as city-dwelling, prius driving folks who only want to feel good about themselves instead of enacting any changes.[/quote] I am stereotyping activist environmentalists who are different from general environmentalists. Activist environmentalists are the ones protestin

Future House: July 2009 in Building a home JoeUser Forums

Only 2 years away… It’s always only 2 years away… :) Back of future house taken from the woods. Had to combine a couple pictures toget

Reply to Various political observations recently in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]That is a little bit prejudiced insofar as you outright deny the usefulness of the breeding pattern of fruitflies in comparison for something that is useful in developing new materials and technology. Those are different fields of research and will have different usage later on anyway. I don't think that stating what sort of political belief a researcher has contributes anything meaningful in a debate unless you mean to say that liberal scientists "waste" their time with uselss stuff (