lookin

I was initially disappointed in the bill as it stopped short of a single-payer model. My hope was that they'd do something simple like gradually extend Medicare to more of the population until, after a decade or two, everyone would be covered. When they didn't do that, I lost interest. However, as I learn more, especially about the insurance exchanges and the possibility of increased government involvement if private insurers decide not to offer any acceptable plans, I think it may be possible that we could move gradually toward a single-payer option. Hard to say where it will lead. Especially hard to predict is what will happen if the Supreme Court decides that the government cannot mandate that everyone either buy insurance or pay a penalty. I don't think the Court is expected to strike down all the provisions of the AHA, so much of it will be left in place. If they decide to strike down the universal coverage part of the Act, it will cause problems for the insurance companies who were counting on thirty percent more customers. That means they will probably price their offerings higher, and I think that means there will be more of an opening for a government plan. It seems to me that another benefit of moving toward a single-payer system like Medicare is that employers could eventually get out of the healthcare business, and that should make them more competitive with other countries which have adopted government-run systems. Hard to see how this will all play out but, if I had to guess where things will end up ten years from now, I'd put my money on a greater role for the Federal government than we have today. I'm not sure my reasoning is valid, and would love to hear what others think.

Not till now. Funny!

These would come in handy in my social life as well.

Dark humor. I wonder, gcursor, if you are a fan of Edward Gorey, as I am. From the Gashlycrumb Tinies:

Jimmy Carter has always been the proudest vote I've ever cast. To this day, the man walks his talk.

AdamSmith invites RA1 for an evening spin through West Hollywood. Before long they spot a couple of twinks looking for some company.

You'd think they'd have the good sense to keep such incendiary programming out of drive-time hours.

What about poppers? Or prescription drugs? Or the giddiness that comes from just being high on life? If I understand correctly, the laws being considered would work to determine why a driver was unsafe, and then only after the fact. Tests to determine levels of alcohol in the blood are usually made only after a driver has caused an accident or has been observed driving erratically. And it sounds like tests for THC or prescription drugs or other chemicals that could cause impairment would also be made only after an impaired driver has taken to the road. And what if a driver has an impairment that does not have a measurable blood-based component? What if he has unusually slow reflexes related to age or some other factor? What if he forgets his glasses, or has just had his eyes dilated by his ophthalmologist? What if he's zoned out on a drug for which we don't yet have a test? There are probably millions of such folks on the road as we speak, and we'll hear about them only after they've crashed or been spotted zigzagging by the police. The ignition-interlock that some convicted drunk drivers are required to install and blow into before the car will start has the advantage of preventing an impaired driver from getting on the road, and it seems that a similar principle could be applied to prevent a driver who is impaired for any reason from starting the car in the first place. Perhaps the solution would be to define the basic criteria that indicate a driver - any driver - is safe to be behind the wheel and to use technology to determine if he meets those requirements before the car starts. While the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration should probably be the ones to develop these requirements, I'll throw out a couple off the top of my head: response time and peripheral vision. The enabling technology might be as simple as projecting a half-inch symbol on a random spot on the far side of the windshield and requiring the driver to step on the brake and push a button on the steering wheel within two-tenths of a second. After repeating the process with a symbol on a random section of the rear window, the ignition would be unlocked and the car could be started. I'm sure there's plenty wrong with the criteria and the examples I've used, but there should be some experts out there who could come up with better ones, and require that they be implemented on all new cars. The critical component would be performance-related tests given to every driver before the car starts. I can hear the squeals coming from at least three directions: The car manufacturers would holler just as they did after seat belts were proposed and for all the same reasons. Is that a good enough reason to keep doing what we're doing, and just try to find more and better blood tests? Prescription drug users would point to the legality of their drugs and their right to drive whether or not they're impaired. Is that a good enough reason to let them loose in the neighborhood? Some may worry that a stoner still has good enough vision and fast enough reaction time to pass the objective tests and get the car started. Is that a good enough reason to keep him off the road even if he's still a safe driver by objective standards? Discuss, if you like.

Happy Birthday, CharliePS! I always enjoy checking the Famous Birthdays to see who shares a natal anniversary with those I admire. With the possible exceptions of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and Neville Chamberlain, you are easily the most famous person on today's list. Queen Latifah might also have made the cut, though I'm sure you have better legs. ( PS: I tried posting this on the other site, where's there's already a very active thread going on, but wasn't able to log in for some reason. )

Tomcal waits to see if Lucky will invite him up to take a few pictures

At last! Let's hope they (and we) follow through in dismantling this unchecked assault on our democratic values. Even the name gives me the willies. Who should ever be given the right to label some citizens "patriots" and exclude others at will. The problem with a word like "patriot" is that it has no objective meaning, and is far too subjective as a basis for enacting legislation. As far as I can tell, the only way such an act could ever have got through a thinking Congress is that Congress was not thinking in the aftermath of 9/11. The government was caught with its pants down and was determined to never again be in a position to be blamed for the series of failures that led to three thousand civilian deaths at the hands of amateurs. The easy solution was a new piece of legislation, rather than fixing the problems and failures that let the terrorists get through in the first place. No one wanted to say that "We screwed up, the legislation we have is plenty good enough to prevent this in the future, and we need to do a better job of working with what we have." Like TampaYankee, I believe that Cheney was the force behind getting this unjustifiable legislation passed. But the majority of Congress and the President went along with it ten years ago, just as they go along with it today. I believe that the average citizen is used to thinking that the government knows what it's doing and that our democracy hasn't really been hurt by this legislation. But it has, not only because of the specific laws that have sprung from it, but by the attitude it has fostered that the government can do any damned thing it pleases just by invoking the bogeyman of terrorism. Thank Heaven for the ACLU and for Congressmen like Ron Wyden and Mark Udall. I think it will take decades to undo this legislation and the attitudes it has fostered. It will also take involvement from ordinary citizens, beginning with a clear statement that we do not want a government with unlimited power. I thought we had made this clear a couple centuries ago, but apparently it's time for a reminder. /rant

Actually, he didn't. But Eric Wagner and Sharon Ma did. Here's how. Fun post. Thanks!

OMG! When he said he was going after some fresh pussy, I just assumed . . .

Though still in love with Oz, Buster senses the honeymoon may soon be over.

OK, I'll bite. 2802, including the sacks and the riddler himself. Although, as I prefer to think of only animate things as actually going somewhere, I'd sooner stick with 2753. Whichever, if each of them would make a post under my name, I'd be $500 richer.

. . . . . . . . gcursor for President! . . . . . . . . You can't vote. . . . . . . . . Hell I can't! My tombstone's been registered in Jefferson County since 1973. . . . . . . . . Hey, who's stepping on my shroud? . . . . . . . . Somebody's got their finger in my eye! . . . . . . . . At least you have an eye. Anyone try the brains over at the Underground Cafe?? . . . . Too much sauce. . . . . . . . . I heard they use frozen. . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . That's offal!

What a Merry Band of MER-cenaries we have spawned! I usually post here to get away from it all. Except for one of my early ones, I don't think any of my threads ever get more than a hundred views. If I post in somebody else's thread, it usually meets an untimely end. As soon as I hit the 'Post' button, that thread goes quiet as a mime's tomb. So, for me, it's wonderful just to come here, post away for a few laughs and then find the tranquility and peace that comes with knowing nobody really gives a shit.

I tried it with a Hollywood area code. After three rings I heard "Bieber residence". I could swear it was Lucky's voice.

Lucky in Phoenix

I'm with you, EXPAT. If you watched the STUXNET piece on 60 Minutes last night, it's clear that there are a whole lot of smart folks out there prowling the 'cloud' almost at will. It's not a question of whether any of my internet stuff gets seen by the world, but when. What comfort I feel comes from having so little to hide.

I'm pretty sure it's a cover of an old Jimmy Durante tune.

I'm outside posting this as we speak. Although, in fairness, I'm under the redwoods in Northern California and not astride the Great Sphinx of Giza. My old laptop was so slow, with the hard drive thrashing slowly and continually, that I seriously considered a solid state hard-drive for my new laptop. Figured I'd wait until the prices came down. In the meantime, I put in 8gb of RAM for less than a hundred bucks and, huzzah!, the thrashing stopped completely, and I rarely, if ever, experience a slowdown. Talking computers, of course. Other areas of my life have slowed down considerably, and I'm definitely open to any drive improvements you may suggest.

OZ, not sure if you're aware that you can plug a 27" monitor, or a large TV, into your MacBook Pro. The new MacBooks can even send video and audio to a flat screen TV using an HDMI adapter and cable. Seems like this would be a bit easier and less risky than schlepping your desktop around, although you seem to have had no problems so far. Personally, I'd be lost if I went to Rio while my computer went to Riyadh . FourAces, glad you like your laptop so far! One thing I've noticed, for Macs anyway, is that notebook hard drives are about 25% slower than desktop hard drives. Not usually an issue except when you're short of memory and the laptop uses the hard drive for virtual memory and keeps swapping data back and forth. Then things can get a bit sluggish. The fix is to bump up the RAM, which is pretty cheap and easy to do yourself. Of course, you were probably smart enough to buy your laptop with lots of RAM. I skimped, since Apple charges an arm and a leg for extra memory, but I maxed it out myself with third-party memory in less than a half-hour. Quite zippy now. And congrats on getting up and running so quickly!

Mine definitely isn't a smart phone, though I try not to talk down to it.

I've used a laptop at home for the last five years. I have WiFi so I can use it everywhere: desk, kitchen, living room, bedroom and outdoors. It's probably a little too handy, but it would be an adjustment going back to a single location. And when I travel, it comes with. Haven't missed the larger screen and in fact replaced my 15" laptop last year with a 13" this year. If I really needed a larger screen, I could buy one and plug in the laptop. I did get a mouse for it though, as the trackpad is a pain for long periods. I also like that I can plug it into my TV and show videos and photos to friends on a larger screen. And it streams my music to the stereo over WiFi. A lot depends on what you use your computer for, and your patterns may change after you've had your laptop for a while. If you find you really miss having a desktop, you can always plug everything into your laptop and pretend it's a desktop, no?