A Forum for Grinches and Ho-Ho-Hoes

[The Larry Davis Experience]

Originally posted by bilmore
Seems to me a slight rise in the max-wage number coupled with liberalization of 401k rules would fix things up very nicely, without screwing with the one governmental program that seems to have worked for so long. Anything new is going to have a ton of those pesky unintended consequences. (Or, as someone I admire phrased it, those things that we don't know yet that we don't know.)

I'm not too good with the lingo on this topic, but by "max wage number" I am assuming you mean the wage cutoff in each year after which you don't pay into SS. If that's the case I have two comments:

First, I would completely agree with this, and in fact tried to say something similar to to my somewhat inebriated father-in-law over the weekend. He wasn't having it; apparently the president's "SS is broke" mantra has taken hold with the older residents of southwest Florida, go figure. But I am undaunted.

Second, does anyone know of a site that crunches some numbers on what kind of savings could be achieved for increasing this number? And, more to the point, what is the reason for having this cutoff in the first place? If people aren't going to listen to the sage advice of the BRCs of the world when they support a means test for the benefits, I fail to see the logic behind a reverse means test on the cost.

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by The Larry Davis Experience
And, more to the point, what is the reason for having this cutoff in the first place? If people aren't going to listen to the sage advice of the BRCs of the world when they support a means test for the benefits, I fail to see the logic behind a reverse means test on the cost.

The max benefit is capped, so the "logic," so sayeth my father in law, is that your payments are capped, too. It is the false logic of the "I paid into the system so I am entitled to get benefits because it is my money" sham much of the public believes.

Actually, technically it isn't quite a false logic since, the way the law works now, your benefits are calculated based on the total income on which you've paid taxes; if the income on which you paid was uncapped the benefits would increase proportionally (and an even higher proportion of this welfare boondoggle would go to those with the most dosh). But it is still false logic in that it is idiotic to suppose that you could change one element of the law but not the other.

[Hank Chinaski]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...p/people_moore

So Yahoo runs a story about how drug companies are warning employees to look out for the man closest to Ty on the deep thinking spectrum, and in attached photos finally show the true Mikey.



Apparently the photo came from a story which quoted an oceanographer named Michael Moore, sloppy editing and all I guess.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by bilmore
This isn't about saving SS - it's simply a way to make government less meaningful.

Absolutely right . . . the support for privatization of SS accounts is at least as ideologically driven as Club suggests the opposition to be.

That's why many supporters of privatization are willing to "suspend their cognitive functions" (as Ty put it) to support the concept without even discussing in a meaningful way whether it is truly neccessary. how much it will cost, and how we'll pay for it. They just like the idea, 'cause individual choices and market forces are always better than any government program, don't you know.

Originally posted by bilmore
Having said that, I'm curious what new system is going to replace the safety net of SS for the twenty percent who lose their whole discretionary portion. We're obviously not going to let them starve, so are we simply making the investment portion risk-free?

Don't ask the President. I hear that's up to Congress.

S_A_M

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by bilmore
(Or, as someone I admire phrased it, those things that we don't know yet that we don't know.)

Yes, the unknown unknowns.

Why in the world do you still admire him? I can only see it based on intellect and chutzpah, because (it seems to me) the performance has been rather poor.

(Plus -- Having his condolence letters to the families of the dead signed by mechanical pen? Talk about a tin ear!)

S_A_M

edited to change "deaf" to "tin"

[bilmore]

Top Scientists Warn: Sea Gods Angry

Washington, DC - Pointing to the devastating weekend Indian Ocean tsunami that left over 24,000 dead, an international blue ribbon committee of climatologists and ecoscientists today issued a stark warning that man-made pollutants have increasingly "make water spirits angry."

The blunt conclusion prefaced a 2300 page meta-analysis of hundreds of scientific studies and computer models detailing links between human industrial activity and wrathful eco-deities. Entitled "Fire Bad: Fire Very Bad," the report warns that the planet faces additional catastrophies unless drastic regulatory action is taken to appease Earthen-furies.

"Unclean money devils anger sacred water spirit Tai-Waku," explained Martin Knudson of Scripps Oceanic Institute. "He now call angry to son the whale, 'make slap with anger-tails! Bring vengeance-surf to villagers!'"

While most empirical evidence supports the theory of wrathful whale-tail slappings, some scientists are exploring alternative hypotheses for the weekend tsunami. Ecobiologist Jane Geary of UC Santa Cruz points to mounting evidence that the ocean spirit-world may have been driven to gastrointestinal rage by gas-guzzling SUVs.

"Thunder-wagon make smoke cloud of greenhouse gas," explained Geary. "hungry Tai-Waku eat smoke from thunder-wagon, pass giant wind with mighty fury."

Peter Novak, chief science officer of the Sierra Club, dismissed Geary's "Divine Fart" theory, arguing it was more likely that SUVs had triggered the tsunami via a spirit underword sexual encounter.

"Wheels of thunder-wagons wake up Big Earth Spirit-Mother, make to crazy tingle in hairy child-place. She now go to water lair of Tai-Waku, make big angry love on tectonic plate," said Novak. "Big Earth Spirit-Mother say, 'if ocean rocking, don't come a-knocking.'"

Although they disagree on the precise causes of the wrathful spirit world, scientists were largely unanimous in recommending immediate global regulatory action. Remedial steps suggested in the report include ratification of the Kyoto treaty, elimination of automobiles, volcanic altars for virgin sacrifices, creation of a sustainable urine-based economy, and improved faculty dental benefits.

"If not act now, it too late," said report editor Paul Erlich of Stanford University.

Erlich, whose 1978 best seller "Ice Time Come Soon" is widely credited with saving millions of lives by warning of the massive age of glaciation that threatened Earth during the 1980s, said inaction might anger the spirit world further.

"Me not know when Tai-Waku make wrath again," said Erlich. "Me need more grant money."

http://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk...ws_briefs.html

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
(Plus -- Having his condolence letters to the families of the dead signed by mechanical pen? Talk about a tin ear!)

I'm sorry, but you leave me no choice:

"Since the attack of 9-11, we've won two wars, liberated millions of people from monstrous regimes, presided over one election in Afghanistan and are about to see elections in Iraq and among the Palestinian people. Focusing like a laser beam on the big picture, liberals are upset that, during this period, the secretary of defense used an autopen.

An autopen is a mechanical arm that actually holds a pen and is programmed to sign letters with a particular person's precise signature. Imagine a President Al Gore, with slightly more personality, signing all official government letters – that's an autopen. (You can relax now, there will be no more exercises imagining a President Al Gore.)

There are 300 million Americans who have a constitutional right – an actual right, not a phony one invented by Harry Blackmun – to write to government officials. Every government office you've ever heard of in Washington, D.C., uses autopens with abandon.

As president, Clinton sold burial plots in Arlington Cemetery and liberals shrugged it off. What really gets their goat is the autopen. Evidently, the important thing was that every one of those pardons Clinton sold for cash on his last day in office was signed by Bill Clinton personally.

It occurred to someone (who obviously has the best interests of America at heart!) that among the letters Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld sends out there must be condolence letters to the families of servicemen who died for their country. So liberals are in a lather that those letters were signed by autopen.

On the bright side, this is the first war America has been in where the number of casualties is small enough that it would even be theoretically possible for a Defense secretary to sign each condolence letter personally. When Democrats were running the Vietnam War, letters of condolence often began, "To whom it may concern" and were addressed to "occupant."

Most politicians were mum about Autopen-gate, inasmuch as they respond to letters from constituents with dying children in letters signed by autopen. Not Sen. Chuck Hagel, D-Neb. He criticized Rumsfeld for the autopen, saying: "My goodness, that's the least that we could expect out of the secretary of defense, is having some personal attention paid by him.""

http://anncoulter.org

[Not Bob]

Originally posted by bilmore
I'm sorry, but you leave me no choice:
Most politicians were mum about Autopen-gate, inasmuch as they respond to letters from constituents with dying children in letters signed by autopen. Not Sen. Chuck Hagel, D-Neb. He criticized Rumsfeld for the autopen, saying: "My goodness, that's the least that we could expect out of the secretary of defense, is having some personal attention paid by him.""

http://anncoulter.org

Hegel is a Republican, as I am sure Ms. Coulter knows. But the typo (coincidentally) helps her argument.

[Hank Chinaski]

I know we had an argument awhile ago about how it is/(is not) insensitive when a News story on a crashed plane in some Foreign country points out the number of dead Americans- "Plane Crashes Killing 250- 4 Americans Among Dead."

Both sides had valid points as I recall. But this morning NYT had the headline "40000 Killed By Tsunami- 8 Americans Among Dead."

Somehow, given the imbalance in the number of significant figures, pointing to the number of Americans seems horribly insenstive. No?

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
I know we had an argument awhile ago about how it is/(is not) insensitive when a News story on a crashed plane in some Foreign country points out the number of dead Americans- "Plane Crashes Killing 250- 4 Americans Among Dead."

Both sides had valid points as I recall. But this morning NYT had the headline "40000 Killed By Tsunami- 8 Americans Among Dead."

Somehow, given the imbalance in the number of significant figures, pointing to the number of Americans seems horribly insenstive. No?

2. I had trouble grasping the initial 11,000 number that was released two days ago. 44,000 dead is unfathomable to me, and I imagine the number will be worse as the week goes on. Yahoo's front page (44,000 dead, 11 Americans) is doing the same thing, and their focusing on an injured Czech supermodel seems a little gauche also.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Not Bob
Hegel is a Republican, as I am sure Ms. Coulter knows. But the typo (coincidentally) helps her argument.

No typo. That's her editorial comment on Hegal.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
I know we had an argument awhile ago about how it is/(is not) insensitive when a News story on a crashed plane in some Foreign country points out the number of dead Americans- "Plane Crashes Killing 250- 4 Americans Among Dead."

Both sides had valid points as I recall. But this morning NYT had the headline "40000 Killed By Tsunami- 8 Americans Among Dead."

Somehow, given the imbalance in the number of significant figures, pointing to the number of Americans seems horribly insenstive. No?

Even worse -- today's headlines (on Yahoo) report that a Czech supermodel was injured in the tsunami.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by bilmore
Top Scientists Warn: Sea Gods Angry

Wow, that's hilarious.

44,000 people dead and Bilmore's response is to post a right-wing Onion-clone attempting to trash the radical fringe of scientists who think that global warming and pollution are bad things (you know, the scientists who don't let the Bush Admin edit their drafts).

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by bilmore
No typo. That's her editorial comment on Hegal.

Ah. If someone says or does something stupid, he must be a Democrat.

And you wonder why your wife stopped fucking you during election season? Or are you hoping to bag Annie?

[dtb]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
Somehow, given the imbalance in the number of significant figures, pointing to the number of Americans seems horribly insenstive. No?

Yes.

What a horrific tragedy. 40,000 people killed -- who cares what nationality they were? It seems kind of silly to point out nationalities.