iwishiwascool

Sidenote: In a choice between my TV and "This American Life" weekly radio show, TAL wins. Then again... I am white.

There was an episode of 'This American Life' on NPR about this exact topic. I recommend listening to it before you give it a shot. Act One. Needle in a Crapstack.

Must like: Yellow oak.

I feel like these are status symbols that translate to your self-perception of worth as a mechanic; A subtle nudge to your peers that says: hey, I'm better than you. Where I rock a Panerai watch or the wife sports the Epi Leather, we justify it to ourselves by saying "the quality is better" and some such nonsense, knowing a cardboard box or a swatch will serve nearly as well... all the while, deep down, knowing that we hope other people will notice and adjust their perception of us accordingly. That being said... win.

Right, I'm selling in a year or so. The kids on ColumbusUnderground seem to think it is now within code as it no longer disallows ladder balustrades.

with contemporary sympathies... You cannot do a railing like this: http://www.cablerail.com/pics/std_ov_3_lg.jpg and be within city code.

Universal remotes exist!? The ability to receive meta data from the source component is what those $60-$500 remotes lack. I can show you a panel that shows your itunes playlists with current album cover, thermostat, security cam, setting of every single light load, sprinkler system status, Entire movie collection arranged by DVD cover, ETeffingC. The point isn't that it can act as a Time Warner remote replacement. The point that it will be able to do all of the above for 10% of what I would sell my panel to you for.

Is buying a meal even necessary for a Reynoldsburg girl?

One of the things it is stirring up in my industry is the hyper-inflated price points of in wall touch panels. 5 years ago AMX and Crestron could justify 5-15k for a wall panel that controlled the lights, shades, A/V, etc. Now that the iPhone/iPad has more processing power, is more dynamic, and can still do everything the above panels do, moving these panels has become nearly impossible. Many of them have already developed iPhone application packages that allows us to create custom interfaces and the assumption is that the iPad will be no different. Chuck a few of the WiFi devices in custom wall docks around the house and you have 10 10" touch panels for the price of one a half-decade ago. Hand-held devices controlling your home is around the corner.

You see how speculative your pessimism is?

Of course not, but a federal mandate to own private insurance now somehow equals a socialized single payer system. So Kirk, is it the system that was enacted you fear... or what you think it will lead to. (i.e. a single payer system)

The debate isn't whether you or he will be impacted, but to what degree. In addition to his surgical duties, he is responsible for administrating the hospital to react and adjust to the changes. You don't think the administration board of a hospital might be impacted more than you?

The moral of the story is: Everything you do not agree with is not a "slippery slope" leading to the most hyperbolic extreme of what you (and the news sources that reinforce your preconceived notions) can fathom. "Write those letters now; call your friends and them to write them. If you don't, this program I promise you, will pass just as surely as the sun will come up tomorrow, and behind it will come other federal programs that will invade every area of freedom as we have known it in this country...And if you don't do this and if I don't do it, one of these days we are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children, what it once was like in America when men were free." That was in Ronald Regan in 1964. "Having given our pensioners their medical care in kind, why not food baskets, why not public housing accommodations, why not vacation resorts, why not a ration of cigarettes for those who smoke and of beer for those who drink." Goldwater in 65.

It's weird. I had a long conversation with a Pediatriac Surgeon and board member at Nationwide Children's earlier this week in his home. Though his life is far more impacted than that of a Chiropractor or even Resident Surgeon, his feelings on the matter were far less apocalyptic... he didn't even mention the chips that democrats were planning to implant in our brains that tell us when we can masturbate. He actually saw it as an opportunity to innovate, streamline, and improve patient care. He previewed for me the presentation he was giving to the board in the morning. I guess the difference between him and the complainers, is his ability to see a challenge and progress (How has Glen Beck Pavlov'd your reaction to that word) as an opportunity... You believe that if you subscribe to an idea you also subscribe to that ideas ideology and to every possible negative consequence that the ideology implies when you carry it to absurd extremes. You believe that if one believes in a minimum safety net for the nations neediest, one believes in totalitarian control. You believe that faith provides a moral compass for our nations foundation, If the left had a Glen Beck or Rush Limbaugh, they would insist this could only lead to totalitarian theocracy. *I lifted some of this language from JS's immitation of GB.

It has been shown (I can cite if you would like) that incremental changes cost dramatically more and have less overall impact. Let's talk about how incremental change would work. We all agree that pre-existing conditions, life-time caps, and dropping sick people need to be fixed. Let that be the goal. We decide to take the first incremental step and make the above practices illegal. The immediate ramification is that premium costs skyrocket as people wait to self-insure until after they are sick or need care... what's worse is that they drop insurance as soon as they are cured or healed. Insurance companies would literally go bankrupt. So now we've swung in a direction that unilaterally supports the people but screws the providers. So how do we make sure that people don't abuse the system? If having insurance is a necessity the problem is resolved. But now people who are too poor, unemployed, or retarded. Instead of emergency rooms writing off their massive losses year after year, these people are covered by a less costly government subsidy. Frankly, if we can pay farmers to not produce corn, we can cover a few folks who have genuine need. I don't think this bill is the answer, but I think it's a start. I think the next step is establishing cost controls and streamlining processes... including tort reform. I would tack on welfare reform to get the (small percentage) of abusers off the system and fucking dead for all I care. I hate social sponges as much as the tea party but I realize that they represent a relatively small fraction of the social safety net.

Anything can be repealed... with a 2/3 majority and a presidents signature. The same polls that showed the bill being unpopular also asked people about whether they support the individual components of the bill. Each of the issues were widely popular. It shows that a majority of people are confused by what the Bill really accomplishes. You can see evidence of this whenever you see someone refer to it as a "Takeover" or Socialism. Regulating a broken industry is far from a takeover. Even if we were debating a single payer system, we would still be a very far cry from a free market economy.

-Link me to a source stating that her "medicade is going up" -You massively misunderstand that the brunt of the cost of this bill is dedicated to those who cannot afford the mandate. -The CBO numbers that are being purported as massively overstating the long term savings of this bill say Tort reform would reduce costs by a small percent. So the CBO both over-estimates when it doesn't suite your narrative and under-estimates when it does. Tort reform needs to happen, but it is not the answer. -Tort reform and pre-existing condition clauses have no relation. How you suspect that tort reform resolves that is a massive cognitive jump that I can't seem to ride along with.

I'm interested in hearing your ballsy approach tomorrow.

Limited jurisdiction is defined under the establishment of the Judicial Branch and applies to Federal courts. All federal laws written and Supreme Court precedents are not unconstitutional.

Please elaborate on 3, 4, 5, & 7. 1 I wan't to opt out of building bridges and subsiding farmers. I'd like to risk it when driving my car and not buy auto insurance. We all buy things we don't want. 2 is debatable as the corporate bureaucracies are arguably worse than any government one might be. With 6 I'd argue that the cost control measures, while inadequate to the sum of everything that needs to be done, will not make the situation worse than it already is.

So is your solution to keep the system as is or do you support a different approach entirely?

Can I pre-empt links to 5th amendment's Takings Clause with the precedent set by Minimum Wage laws under the commerce clause. An individual mandate is not unconstitutional and the states challenging it are posturing.

I'M interested in some real dialogue, not rhetoric, about what specifically you oppose.

Are you and your tea party friends confused about the difference between a single payer system and what was passed?

While you're at it here is a non-wing nut equiped projector mount for $15