tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post2968092493244927913..comments2024-03-28T06:32:24.557-04:00Comments on The Elephant Bar: Deuce ☂http://www.blogger.com/profile/13472858446242700869noreply@blogger.comBlogger122125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-61227613403219372692013-04-16T11:11:41.216-04:002013-04-16T11:11:41.216-04:00I'd like to thank you for the efforts you'...I'd like to thank you for the efforts you've put in penning this blog.<br /><br />I really hope tο cheсk out the same high-graԁe blog pοsts from you latег <br />on аs wеll. In truth, your crеаtive <br />writing abilities has inspirеd me to gеt my own blog now ;) <a href="http://wiki.cas.badpointer.net/User:VirgieGat" rel="nofollow">simply click the next document</a>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-26416917616067477832013-02-25T00:00:45.755-05:002013-02-25T00:00:45.755-05:00I have study much concerning without charge bloggi...I have study much concerning without charge blogging web pages, but I have no clear idea about that, can any one advise <br />me which one is finest in favor of free blogging and site-building?<br /><br /><br />Also visit my weblog <a href="http://217.172.183.33/pg/profile/RicardoSt" rel="nofollow">217.172.183.33</a>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-39073127734254479262013-02-24T21:30:55.107-05:002013-02-24T21:30:55.107-05:00Hey very nice blog!! Man .. Beautiful .. Amazing ....Hey very nice blog!! Man .. Beautiful .. Amazing .<br /><br />. I will bookmark your blog and take the feeds also..<br /><br />.<br /><br />Feel free to surf to my homepage <a href="http://social.2dtg.com.br/index.php?do=/blog/32972/making-use-of-coupons-to-save-money/" rel="nofollow">social.2dtg.com.br</a><br /><i>Also see my site</i> - <b><a href="http://video.afrivideo.net/read_blog/16725/describe-the-different-attributes-of-world-wide-web" rel="nofollow">afrivideo.net</a></b>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-18691495234464279352013-01-16T11:23:55.256-05:002013-01-16T11:23:55.256-05:00If some one wishes to be updated with newest techn...If some one wishes to be updated with newest technologies after that he must be pay a visit this <br />web site and be up to date daily.<br /><i>Have a look at my web-site</i> : <b><a href="http://member.realiser.org/html/pg/profile/MaribelMun" rel="nofollow">free advice to get my ex back</a></b>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-13469786922672291542012-07-01T11:30:03.522-04:002012-07-01T11:30:03.522-04:00Had just one more justice joined the Kennedy Four’...<i>Had just one more justice joined the Kennedy Four’s opinion, Medicare would have likely shut down. Approximately 100 million Medicare claims are processed each month using a formula that was altered by the Affordable Care Act. If the entire law were tossed, new rates could not be calculated under the old, pre-ACA formula until after a rulemaking process that can take months to complete. The result would be that Medicare would not be able to pay doctors for what could be many months, and because Medicare’s computers are not equipped to handle this kind of backlog, Medicare’s systems would likely crash.</i>Max (short for Maxine)http://url.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-31343338100596977442012-07-01T11:16:26.576-04:002012-07-01T11:16:26.576-04:00There was a time when justices appointed by Democr...<i>There was a time when justices appointed by Democrats and Republicans intermingled in their judicial decisions. Ideological lines were murkier, and it was harder to predict who would fall where in a split decision. The last two justices who retired, David Souter and John Paul Stevens, were both Republican appointees who usually voted with the court's liberals.</i><br /><br /><i>Since they left, the court has settled into a partisan pattern of 5 to 4.</i><br /><br /><i>That was troubling to Chief Justice John Roberts. When he took office in 2005, he said it was bad for the court and bad for the country when the justices issue high-profile decisions on 5-4 partisan grounds.</i>Max (short for Maxine)http://url.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-19068471864854958972012-07-01T10:54:08.931-04:002012-07-01T10:54:08.931-04:00Careful - don't want to start rumors.
It'...Careful - don't want to start rumors.<br /><br />It's like one of those DirectTV commercials:<br /><br />Don't wake up with your own wiki page on [How High Heels Compromised Justice Roberts and Collapsed Western Civilization (with new Hush-Hush Closet Interviews Guaranteeing Full Disclosure from Scalia, Thomas, Kennedy, and Alito.)]<br /><br />...<br /><br /><i>Conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh did not mince words: "Our freedom and choice just met its death panel: the Supreme Court."</i><br /><br />Rush is just grouchy because he's gonna have to go on a diet and give up the pills.Max (short for Maxine)http://url.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-84468057310043201482012-07-01T08:25:33.332-04:002012-07-01T08:25:33.332-04:00Meanwhile, here’s how Romney put it in a July 30, ...<i>Meanwhile, here’s how Romney put it in a July 30, 2009, op-ed in USA Today in which he’s telling Obama that insuring everyone doesn’t have to cost gajillions of dollars: <b>“Using tax penalties, as we did,</b> or tax credits, as others have proposed, encourages ‘free riders’ to take responsibility for themselves rather than pass their medical costs on to others.” </i>Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-2965029266551833092012-07-01T08:10:41.706-04:002012-07-01T08:10:41.706-04:00For comparison, Solyndra was gearing up to produce...For comparison, Solyndra was gearing up to produce their panels for <b>$6.00/Watt</b>, a price that would have been "competitive" 5 years ago.Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-88341668384701672132012-07-01T08:07:20.116-04:002012-07-01T08:07:20.116-04:00First Solar, the company with the incredibly low p...First Solar, the company with the incredibly low price panel price of $0.74/Watt went over the Germany and got their ass handed to them by a couple of German Companies that came in at <b>$0.60/Watt</b>.<br /><br />That is just freakin' incredible. I now believe that we'll see a "utility-sized" system go in, somewhere, probably Germany, in the next 5 years for $1.00/Watt for Total Installed Costs.Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-47477301235575505552012-07-01T07:58:56.518-04:002012-07-01T07:58:56.518-04:00Which, again, means absolutely nothing, of course....Which, again, means absolutely nothing, of course. If I really was in the insurance business, I might have been the dumbest asshole to ever pull on a pair of cole haans, and discover later that his socks don't match.<br /><br />It Is the intertubes, bro.Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-16645598511245891012012-07-01T07:47:38.725-04:002012-07-01T07:47:38.725-04:00Although, I did retire from the Insurance Bidness,...Although, I did retire from the Insurance Bidness, Not the Mortgage Business.Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-33113806732078218302012-07-01T07:45:47.904-04:002012-07-01T07:45:47.904-04:00And, THAT, Ash, IS a Valid Point.And, THAT, Ash, IS a Valid Point.Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-40313308683133662282012-07-01T07:41:06.169-04:002012-07-01T07:41:06.169-04:00Rufus was dead wrong about the mortgage crisis why...Rufus was dead wrong about the mortgage crisis why should we trust hid judgment about...Ashhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16688752302081088907noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-17536852262428125792012-07-01T07:39:38.943-04:002012-07-01T07:39:38.943-04:00They, also, tend to be the same crowd that gets on...They, also, tend to be the same crowd that gets on Fox News, and CNBC, and rants on about Ethanol being a boondoggle (even though it now comprises 10% of our gasoline, and lowers our cost of transportation,) and about how Solar, and Wind don't work, in spite of California getting 18% of its electricity from Renewables, yesterday, and close to 30% if you consider Hydro.<br /><br />It's just "old school thinking" I know, to "consider the source," but, sometimes, that's all we really have to go on.Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-24322812944895417252012-07-01T07:31:59.216-04:002012-07-01T07:31:59.216-04:00The thing is, Q, the same guys that were telling u...The thing is, Q, the same guys that were telling us that Romneycare was going to be an unmitigated disaster for Massachusetts are the ones that are now telling us that Obamacare is the "End of America as we know it."<br /><br />They were dead wrong about Romneycare, so why should I trust their judgement about its kissing cousin, Obamacare?Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-23429781539641308022012-07-01T07:28:37.825-04:002012-07-01T07:28:37.825-04:00backwards, and in high heels
:)
I like that<i>backwards, and in high heels</i><br /><br />:)<br /><br />I like thatRufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-74810981699414279012012-07-01T06:43:08.732-04:002012-07-01T06:43:08.732-04:00The fact that Roberts had to squirm like Houdini t...<i>The fact that Roberts had to squirm like Houdini to reach middle ground (in the second part of his ruling, he held that the mandate to buy insurance is not a tax, but by the third section he announced that it is) only enhanced the bravura of the feat. As the saying goes, it’s one thing to dance like Fred Astaire, but Ginger Rogers did it backwards in high heels. Philosophical purity is easy — the blogosphere is lousy with it — while pragmatic solutions to difficult problems are as rare these days as virgins on Jersey Shore.</i><br /><br />...<br /><br /><i>It’s hard to believe, but generations of Americans considered compromise an admirable quality. Schoolteachers taught their students about the Great Compromise that produced the Constitution and the Missouri Compromise that — for a time — held it together. Now the word connotes something bad. A leaky gasket has been “compromised,” and cheating spouses are caught in “compromising” positions. What Roberts managed to do with Obamacare vindicated the virtue of compromise in an era of Occupiers, Tea Partyers and litmus-testing special interests.</i><br /><br /><i>He didn’t seek some nonexistent middle ground halfway between irreconcilable poles. He didn’t listen to one side saying no and the other saying yes and write an opinion saying maybe, or blend black and white to make gray. He found a means of giving both sides just enough of what they wanted that he was able to avert a crisis. In the superheated conflict mill that is American politics these days, it’s good to have someone in a position of authority willing to try.</i><br /><br />...<br /><br /><i>And ultimately, even though his compromise left the enormous mechanism of health care reform lumbering onward to horrify his friends on the right, Roberts brought the court down squarely on the side of one of the most basic conservative principles of all: that big decisions in the U.S. should be made not by judges or bureaucrats but by voters. They’ll have their say in November. “The Framers created a Federal Government of limited powers, and assigned to this Court the duty of enforcing those limits. The Court does so today,” he wrote at the end of his 59-page decision. “But the Court does not express any opinion on the wisdom of the Affordable Care Act. Under the Constitution, that judgment is reserved to the people …</i><br /><br /><a href="http://swampland.time.com/2012/06/29/roberts-rules-what-the-health-care-decision-means-for-the-country/?iid=sl-main-lede%3Fxid%3Drss-topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+time%2Ftopstories+%28TIME%3A+Top+Stories%29" rel="nofollow">LINK</a>Max (short for Maxine)http://url.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-1448091353454877272012-07-01T01:47:08.490-04:002012-07-01T01:47:08.490-04:00All I read in your screed was a lot of opinions, s...<i>All I read in your screed was a lot of opinions, sprinkled with might be's, could be's, and oughta be's, Q. Except for one thing that I will address.</i><br /><br />Screed? I thought my response was pretty civil with the possible exception of my gratuitous remark about the Dems wet dreams being incapsulated in the ACA. The comments were at least civil on a Quirkster scale.<br /><br />But to clarify, are you saying I made up the numbers I was talking about? I could always provide you with some links if you would like; however, I realize that would probably be a waste of time since they don't agree with your preconceptions.<br /><br />But it's really not necessary. Take a look at the quote that I initially responded to and then also at your request that I expand on that response. <br /><br /><i>And, if Obamacare is such an expensive proposition, why is it affecting Massachusetts' budget by only about 1%?</i><br /><br />In my initial response, I was taking your words literally (something objected to by some of the more 'artistic' here). Obviously, a rhetorical question but one that implies that as far as costs are concerned Obamacare somehow has a direct effect on recent MA healthcare budget performance. The other alternative (the only one I can see) is your post was phrased sloppily and that what you were implying was that if MA is doing a good job controlling costs under Romneycare, why shouldn't we expect the same for the US under Obamacare?<br /><br />Regardless of which way your post was supposed to read, I think my expanded post answered it. However, the detail I provided was tangential to the real point, that being that your comment was wrong in it's totality and in it's parts.<br /><br /><b>"If Obamacare is such an expensive proposition..."</b> <br /><br />If it is expensive? Of course it is expensive, or at least, it would appear so to anyone who reads a newspaper or a blog. When you start calculating costs in trillions, that is expensive even for D.C.<br /><br /><br /><b>"...why is it affecting Massachusetts' budget by only about 1%?"</b><br /><br />You are implying some kind of direct relationship between Obamacare and MA's healthcare budget performance, or you are implying that we can reasonably expect that the performance MA has achieved under Romneycare can be replicated for the US under Obamacare. <br /><br />The former implication is obviously false since Obamacare hasn't been fully implemented yet. The latter is unlikely for all the reasons I laid out in my extended post. There are too many differences between the two programs in size, demographics, and circumstances to use one as a proxy for the other, at least not on a cost basis.<br /><br />.Quirkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00272168240606512672noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-69236827941444179742012-07-01T01:24:47.074-04:002012-07-01T01:24:47.074-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.Quirkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00272168240606512672noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-7706862336003699482012-06-30T23:35:07.217-04:002012-06-30T23:35:07.217-04:00.
Jeez, Bob, now you are even quoting Larry Kudlo....<br /><br />Jeez, Bob, now you are even quoting Larry Kudlow?<br /><br />Have you no shame?<br /><br />.Quirkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00272168240606512672noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-64765547383835594452012-06-30T23:32:27.291-04:002012-06-30T23:32:27.291-04:00.
I used to like Mark Steyn and agree with many o....<br /><br />I used to like Mark Steyn and agree with many of his views. But lately I've noticed he is moving more and more into the 'dick' category, joining those kool-aid drinkers of the right who currently occupy the space.<br /><br />.Quirkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00272168240606512672noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-51805098984066414712012-06-30T23:26:56.778-04:002012-06-30T23:26:56.778-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.Quirkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00272168240606512672noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-90256762298991533382012-06-30T22:21:12.867-04:002012-06-30T22:21:12.867-04:00Oh, horsehockey. My Doctor works for the Gummint,...Oh, horsehockey. My Doctor works for the Gummint, and he works his ass off for me, and I like him just fine. I'm going to bed.<br /><br />It passed, it's constitutional, and it's the law. Get used to it.Rufus IIhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05297231055991566183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21297199.post-23897338368041135092012-06-30T22:03:55.321-04:002012-06-30T22:03:55.321-04:00http://www.nationalreview.com/blogs/print/304442
...http://www.nationalreview.com/blogs/print/304442<br /><br /><i>So be it. It’s down to the people now — as it should be. But, meanwhile, a little less deference to judges wouldn’t go amiss. The U.S. Supreme Court is starting to look like Britain’s National Health Service — you wait two years to get in, and then they tell you there’s nothing wrong. And you can’t get a second opinion.</i><br /><br />Mark Steyn<br /><br />Rufus you've blogged all day and said nothing of much importance yet, side stepping the issue of the interference of the government in one's personal affairs, which is the heart of the question. Which of course you must avoid, since all this goes to the center of the patient/doc relationship.<br /><br />bAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com