AndyFromCB

As he should, as he should.

I'm hungover so I just woke up. Is everyone still with us, or has the Republic collapsed and everyone been hauled away to reeducation camps in Montana? Good morning to all ;-)

A client of mine bought the flight sim stuff for me as a gift. Been sitting here for a few weeks. Need to take it home or sell it on eBay. Not really my cup of tea. I've been so swamped that Ive been playing passenger for last 6 months other than Oshkosh. Decided to keep the bravo for hops between here and desmoines and kc and my personal trips and get flown in the TBM for flights over 200nm. One of these days I'll Have the time to go to simcom and actually get checked out in that thing.

This comrade doesn't like vodka straight, scotch/bourbon I can sip on by itself. No mixers here at the office (that's a lie, I know of one guy who works for me that keeps jim beam and coke in his desk drawer) and the ice machine is a pain in the ass to operate. Actually, other than Chopin, I've never been fond of vodka. More of a wino anyway, few cases UPS delivered I have not had a chance to take home yet.

Incorrect, tylenol and ethanol. Ibuprofen and booze go hand in hand. Tylenol doesn't really go with anything. That crap is bad for your liver.

Cheers ;-) From my office. I don't even hide it. Always on the window sill. Black box next to it is old school bar/mixing set. That's my idea of freedom.

I've never claimed to be anything else but an arrogant prick, and usually drunk between the hours of 5pm to 12am. However, you still have not answered my question. What do you get in the "reset" deal? What do I get?

What exactly do you think you stand to gain from the "reset"? Anything, or just principle? This is the part I don't understand. Inquiring minds want to know. What do you get? What do I get? You claim not to have far to fall, which I find hard to believe considering you own a house, an airplane and Porsche, but everyone's idea of "poverty" is different.

The primary agency for implementing the president’s new immigration executive order is the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). This agency is entirely self-funded through the fees it collects on various immigration applications. Congress does not appropriate funds for any of its operations, including the issuance of immigration status or work permits, with the exception of the ‘E-Verify’ program. Therefore, the appropriations process cannot be used to “defund” the agency. The agency has the ability to continue to collect and use fees to continue current operations, and to expand operations as under a new executive order, without needing legislative approval by the Appropriations Committee or the Congress, even under a continuing resolution or a government shutdown. User fees, brought to you by Ronald Reagan, who heavily advocated their implementation in order to shift tax burden onto the middle class. You reap what you sow

To paraphrase WC, tomorrow I will be sober, but you'll still be as dense as a rock It's called prosecutorial discretion, goes back to old english common law.

I'd stick to NFL...You know what they say, never believe anything a politician says until he or she officially deny it: "I'm not the emperor of the United States" I think was uttered sometimes in February, 2013. Very fitting, as every empire should have one. I mean, with "official" military presence in 63 countries, what are we but not an empire. Barry didn't start it, that ship has sailed long time ago. He's just putting on finishing touches.

Oh, insurance companies...One of my old customers, long since retired from business, got drunk once (well, more than once, for being 120lb on a good day, man could hold his liquor) and went on the record with newspaper reporter claiming that there was no such thing as a hail loss in excess of 15% when asked about his amazing year to year profitability. As you can imagine, the insurance department in TN (I think) had an issue with that comment. To add insult to injury, him and Hillary were great buddies going all the way back to Wellesley. Insurance companies are generally owned and run by some rather colorful characters lacking just a bit of character...

And you would have become one of the long term unemployed. Had it not been for a bailout, your employer would have gone tits up. What do you know about reinsurance and long term derivates that connect all insurance companies around the world together via a handful of reinsurers that would have all gone belly up if AIG was allowed to fail. Do you even have a faintest idea how all that works? Or do you just not care? I am serious here. Do you know how it works and what keeps you employed and do you just not care?

What about life long decisions of a 3 year old with leukemia? I mean, if the little shit would just worked a little bit harder and saved a little bit more. Or his/hers now 26 year old parents, fresh out of college, with good jobs but not lifetime of savings yet cause you know, they are 26 years old and not lucky enough to be equipped with trust fund. What do you tell them?

What do propose then? That someone who has had cancer in their 20's then should become uninsurable for the rest of their lives and then when they have another health problem, they should they eat shit and die? No, seriously, what is your proposal here. What about kids born with cystic fibrosis? Kill them at birth? I mean, can't abort them until then but what do you do with them afterwards? No sane insurance company would ever cover them. I sure as shit would not given a choice if that was my business. Do you have an answer other than status quo and/or tough luck, eat shit and die. We know exactly what it will cost: 3.8 trillion a year, same exact number as it costs today because everyone says "well, eat shit and die" but no one is actually willing to pull the trigger. Maybe health insurance is a flawed concept?

Almost, but no cigar, well, actually there was one ;-) Really, the anti-trust litigation spawned many, many companies much more innovative than Microsoft that would not be around if the browser monopoly held. As to somebody who then really fucked it up, the award has to go to GWB. I can only imagine the senile gentleman from Arizona and his IQ of 50 sidekick from Alaska trying to understand the intricacies of world's banking and insurance system. Read Henry Paulson's book to try to understand what it was like for him talking to Republicans. He, a lifelong Republican, could not understand how some members of Congress, including even Paul Ryan, could be so utterly uneducated and just simply stupid. Paulson and Geithner saved the economy from would have been a total meltdown of the banking and insurance systems worldwide. I understand his pain after spending some time on this board. Facts don't matter. Only ideology does. Paulson calls Barney Frank as "scary-smart, ready with a quip, and usually a pleasure to work with," praises Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and notes that then-Sen. Barack Obama was "always well informed, well briefed, and self-confident.". House Minority Leader John Boehner was ineffectual. John McCain comes off worst of all: impulsive, ill-informed and counterproductive. ​As to the balanced budget, what rarely gets the credit was elder Bush's and Clinton's tax increases. That's how you balance a budget.

I love the numbers in the article, I love how they pull them out of their ass too. Official price for spinal fusion $115,625. Actual average price paid $5,893 dollars. Actual profit on the $5,893 is about 15% for the hospital. Hospital performs 130 of them in a year for a profit of $115,625 dollars. Then, they perform one on an uninsured patient, call it charity care and subtract $115,625 in profits for the year claiming that they are barely breaking even. You do realize that's how list prices are set. I love how Dr. Mu's time is worth $117,000 an hour, too, even if under Medicare it would have only been $800.

Now since I'm kind of in the mood, let me explain how your friend makes $3 million a year, a practice quite common and quite annoying among surgeons: -Let's call him Dick, he belongs to one insurance network in town -His buddy, Harry, belongs to another insurance network in town Harry has a in network procedure scheduled, let's say a knee replacement, listed at $150,000, negotiated in network price that the insurance company will pay is $20,000. Harry calls Dick right before surgery, Dick comes over to "assist". He is not in network. He bills $90K for his services. Yes, the insurance company will pay. Next time around Dick calls Harry. On Sunday, Dick and Harry go golfing and laugh all the way to the bank. Want to bring costs down? Very simple. Let's copy the Japanese pricing schedule and force it on all US providers. An MRI in Japan is $160. Do you think they pay less for the machine? Do you think they pay their technicians or nurses less? Same MRI in US of A, about $2000.

Yes, that it precisely what I am saying. You throw your bullshit around, but I backup my numbers. Once again, all you guys do is demonstrate typical Pavlovian response when presented with facts: you ignore so that your view of "reality" remains unaffected. For once, admit you are wrong. As simple as that. Is there anything that could change your mind? Show me your numbers, not what you hear on Fox News. And let's be precise, I didn't say 99%, I said between 97.5% and 99%, depending on a year. During an average year, industry wide, there is only about 1000 (exact number is 1021 for last six years) "catastrophic" payouts, catastrophic meaning $1 million or more. 37% percent of these payouts belong to physicians who already had previous catastrophic claims. That alone should tell you something. Largest payout ever recorded for a single action was $31 million. Last six years saw 77,621 total paid claims, so on average 12,936 per year. So even if each and everyone of them was an even $1 million, the total would have been 12,936,833,333.33, so about only 12 billion out of 3.8 trillion industry. How is that for numbers. Refute them. Insurance industry is not a non for profit. We don't lose money year after year. We work on facts ;-) If your numbers were anywhere close to correct, we could balance the budget on the taxes paid by your invented attorneys and their profits alone. Math is hard, I get it. Prove my numbers wrong... Oh, and I checked, your neighbor is full of shit too, the highest premium paid in US of A ever for a single physician was $331,296.

I'm sure you've heard of national practitioner data bank. Basically, all settlements and awards, even confidential ones have to be reported within 30 days so that data can be aggregated and be available to industry. I hate to break it to you, but looking at the data summaries, it does not support your point of view. At most, total overall cost of malpractice in the worst years is 1.5 percent of overall healthcare spending. And I have yet, in my entire career in insurance, see a malpractice awards exceed the insurance liability carried by a doctor or hospital. It just doesn't happen. Show me one single case. You won't find it. 2012 Average Premium Paid, 7 years of now declining premiums. If your buddy is really paying 1/6 of his salary in medical malpractice, there is probably a reason for it. Works the same with gear ups... Obstetrics/gynecology: $43,400 Surgery: $30,000 Plastic surgery: $27,700 Urology: $23,500 Gastroenterology: $20,000 Cardiology: $19,400 Neurology/neurosurgery: $17,500 Emergency/acute care: $15,000 Hospitalists: $15,000 Ophthalmology: $12,300 Dermatology: $10,300 Pediatrics: $10,300 Psychiatry: $4,700

We will never balance the budget. At this point it's not possible to do. Feds biggest fear is not inflation but deflation. With inflation, the debt simply "disappears" and in order for it to disappear we have to continuously borrow more making the debt larger. Makes sense, doesn't it, but it's true. Deflation would make the entire system collapse and the Europeans are now starting to realize it as well and are saying fuck it to the whole austerity fiasco.

Not really if the money collected was spend supporting Taliban in Afghanistan and the Contra's and buying pie in the sky weapons systems. I don't especially like to agree with Scott, but SS always depends on future generations to pay the current tab as the money is simply spent the year it's received. I understand that an IOU is issued and that US government will never default on it (because we will never run out of ink, or actually, bits) but in order to keep inflation in check, the system heavily depends on more people paying into than withdrawing, so it is a very definition of a pyramid scheme...

Except that the walking corpse Reagan didn't shore anything up (as Gore Vidal once said, Reagan was a triumph of mortician's art). He simply lowered taxes for the wealthy and made middle class pickup the tab via SS taxes that were used to pay discretionary spending and then put the rest of the tab. I know most here don't understand compounding, but RR is the reason why we have a massive debt to begin with. So when Romney says that 47% don't pay taxes, he clearly misses the point that every working poor person already pays more as a percentage of their minimum wage check than Romney paid the year before he started running for president. His overall tax rate was 13%, mine was 41%. I know why my taxes are high and it's not because the poor are stealing from me ;-)

Anyways, if there is anything Obama is impeachable for, it's this. And it's much bigger than all the fake old scandals. I wonder how long before Holder starts his new cushy multimillion a year job with stock options. Obama, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan, etc, etc, etc. All owned by banks. http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-9-billion-witness-20141106

You're going to call me a bullshitter, ok, I'm going to call you a ignorant loudmouth who can't read: http://www2.illinois.gov/hfs/SiteCollectionDocuments/birthcenter_feeschedule.pdf Delivery services, $1,713.00, and yes, the hospital is still making money. Where is the 30K? As to your comment about malpractice, is the insurance rate was truly16%, then there would be at least 600 billion of premium floating around. Total insurance premium for all lines, I repeat all lines (excluding health), in US, was $1.1 trillion in 2012. That's a fact, that's a report on my desk. As to ACA, I'm sorry, nobody is forcing you into an exchange. Call a broker. My personal plan, purchased thru a broker, runs me $1400 a month, same as it always has. Still same plan, still from BCBS, still expensive as hell, still $1500 deductible, $3000 co-pay. ACA didn't change anything for self-employed who had adequate coverage prior to ACA. What you had was a substandard plan that would have put your potentially expensive medical event on tax payer's back once you run out of your $500K lifetime limit. Now you're paying the true cost of you being alive and not dumping most of your risk on the the government like you did previously. And clearly, even when presented with all the information needed to realize where to lay the blame, with the person standing right in front of you, you choose not to use that big organ between your earns, you chose to blame everyone but the surgeon who grosses $3 million a year. Well, now you know why your premiums are so expensive. He makes $3 million a year. Now you know why we think you're all so dumb. Well, because you are, because you can only connect two dots and never seethe big picture. And it drives us crazy. It's not a liberal vs conservative. It's stupid vs smart. I know why my premiums are expensive. It's because my surgeon neighbor two houses down has a Porsche 911 Turbo, actually, a 34 Porsche collection. Just for once admit, that you don't know the facts, you don't care about the facts and you just like to repeat Fox news drivel: