Originally Posted by Odin

I think everyone should get what I get...

-Can't afford it; eventually, the state of MN might not be able to afford YOU.

Originally Posted by Odin

I think everyone should get what I get. If that means those with higher incomes have to pay more taxes than so be it.

-How courageous, coming from the guy who thinks that he won't be paying the taxes...

Originally Posted by The Grey Badger

...No matter how good a job you can do, you still have to pass through a number of gatekeepers, all of whom are deeply, blindly committed to the rah-rah-team-player jolly-good-fellow model of a good employee. Starting with Human Resources and ending with the immediate supervisor who wants you all to walk with him or her in lockstep while putting on the ENTHUSIAM! And if you don't, your loyalty and commitment is suspect and you get the dreadful words on your performance review "Pat is not a team player."

-I've never seen it that way. Or rather, I do, but I look at the glass as half full, rather than half empty. "Not a Team Player" will always hold you back a little (ask Patton), but I've always found that skill and imagination make up for a lot, particulalry if people know that your intentions are honorable. In the end, people respect the guy who gets things done, even if they find him to be a bit "different".

Originally Posted by Odin

Because I haven't been able to finish college...

-You know, some people have been known to get a job without a Bachelor's Degree.

Originally Posted by Odin

...yet because tuition costs are so insane...

-See Above...

Originally Posted by Odin

...and I simply cannot handle working at a low-paying service industry "McJob"...

-You think you can't...

Originally Posted by Odin

I also have issues with bosses because I simply don't "get" how a supervisor wants his ass kissed until it's too late...

-Welcome to The World...

Originally Posted by Odin

I'll be honest, thinking I'm being helpful, and the supervisor will take it as a slight against his authority and position...

-Explain that you meant no offense (if they know that you're an "Aspie", they'll figure the rest out), apologize, and get over it.

Originally Posted by Odin

...And finally there is this BS "needs people skills" fad requirement even in jobs where it's not necessary...

-It's not a "fad". Unless you work in a cubby hole by yourself, you have to deal with people in the real world, and most of them are not obliged to love you or be your friend. Actually, even if you do work in a cubby hole, you still have to work with people. Again, you'll never be a salesman, but you can learn to work with people.

It might help if you didn't randomly accuse people of lying...

Going out on limb, I would bet that almost everyone reading this is a bit of a geek or a nerd (they are reading something called "The Fourth Turning Forums" for Christ's sake), and an "Aspie" is sort of a geek or nerd taken to the nth degree. But most of those people reading this have also managed to "get a job", which is the layman's way of saying "figure out how to produce goods and/or services for which other people are willing to compensate you."

I remember seeing "60 Minutes" several years ago, and the story was about a retarded guy who had worked his way up to shift supervisor at some fast food joint; I was more surprised that he was getting over $10.00/hour (I forget the exact amount, but remember it was over ten, and this was several years ago). The guy obviously wasn't that smart (he's retarded, Duh), and I don't think you'd say that his interpersonal skills were exactly at the presidential level, but there he was. After that, I really didn't see any reason that almost anyone can't earn at least $20,000/year if the have to (or want to).

Oh well.

Originally Posted by Odin

Most rich people are lazy trust fund kids that didn't do any real work in their lives, wile working class stiffs like my parents work their asses off and can't get ahead. Calling poor people lazy is BLAMING THE VICTIM, it is no different than telling rape victims it was their fault that hey got raped.

1) Most millionaires are self made (look it up, Odin);

2) This article makes a great point (it's a keeper):

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1238562901655&pagename=JPost%2FJPArt icle%2FPrinter

"The test can be summarized by a few questions: What is your attitude toward people who excel you in the creation of wealth or in other accomplishments? Do you aspire to their excellence or do you seethe at it? Do you admire and celebrate exceptional achievement or do you impugn it and seek to tear it down?"

"...Elementally, there are two different personality types here. Where you come down reveals a lot not just about your politics - though political views flow from it - but about the orientation of your soul."

---
Back to Playwrite:

I'd still love to know: When PW was supposedly visiting SE Asia, did he bother to check out the "Anti-War" movement's handiwork in the re-education camps, and in the killing fields? The answer seems to be NO...

Back to Haymarket':

I'd still love to know: Who paid Haymarket's Military Service Tax? Come on, I know you're retired, Haymarket. I'd think it'd be easy to go check out the old county draft records from 1971. You can look the guy up, and thank him for his inconvenience...

Originally Posted by haymarket martyr

WARNING: The poster known as jamesdglick has a history of engaging in fraud. He makes things up out of his own head and attempts to use these blatant lies to score points in his arguments. When you call him on it, he will only lie further. He has such a reputation for doing this that many people here are cowed into silence and will not acknowledge it or confront him on it.

Anyone who attempts to engage with glick will discover this and find out you have wasted your time and energy on an intellectual fraud of the worst sort.

-So cry many Boomers (self-professed Lefties, mostly) whenever they fail to explain their hypocritical self-justifications, their double-standards, and their double-think forays into evil. Perhaps their consciences bother them, perhaps not. Who knows.

This is why we need Single Payer:

"My sister just about died because she has no insurance."

She was released from her good job that had insurance last year a nursing home where she was social services director...after 30 years with the same company...the company sold and the new company downsized and kept the younger employee that didn't make as much in salary.


My sister lost her insurance and has been on unemployment since. She is 53 and in the town she lives in that nursing home was just about the only place for her to work. She is now working part time driving the SR. Bus, but it has no benefits.



Well, last week she had a major issue and turns out she has gallstones and her appendix is inflamed as well. She has no insurance so she just took tylenol to mask the pain...until she collapsed.

Now she had surgery and doesn't know how she will pay the bill. She was in the hospital longer than it should have been because she ignored the pain hoping it would go away since she can't pay for the hospital.

tell me how that is better than if she had had some kind of insurance she would have taken care of it as soon as she knew there was a problem. Her bill is quite a bit higher and will probably never be paid...

yea, that helps teh country right.

The Right-Libertarian answer for healthcare seems to be "Pray that you don't get sick and if you do get's sick it's all your fault so society has no duty to help you".

Originally Posted by jamesdglick

-I've never seen it that way. Or rather, I do, but I look at the glass as half full, rather than half empty. "Not a Team Player" will always hold you back a little (ask Patton), but I've always found that skill and imagination make up for a lot, particulalry if people know that your intentions are honorable. In the end, people respect the guy who gets things done, even if they find him to be a bit "different".

In a reasonable world that would be the case, but the world of corporate managerial fads and dumb*ss bean counters is not a reasonable world.

-You know, some people have been known to get a job without a Bachelor's Degree.

I am simply mentally incapable at working at most such low-income McJobs, I go into autistic meltdown from sensory overload.

-You think you can't...

No, I KNOW I can't, my psychiatrist knows I can't. I have to have a f*cking JOB COACH to help me with making food for kids at a preschool, James. It's not working that's the problem, it's the KIND of work. In an office or lab environment I would be perfectly fine and would not need assistance. Anything that is fast-paced and requires lots of multitasking is very difficult for me.

-Welcome to The World...

-Explain that you meant no offense (if they know that you're an "Aspie", they'll figure the rest out), apologize, and get over it.

Gee, maybe it would help if people quit assuming my issues are some moral fault like "laziness". And based on my experience most bosses are vindictive jerks that take things too personally.

-It's not a "fad". Unless you work in a cubby hole by yourself, you have to deal with people in the real world, and most of them are not obliged to love you or be your friend. Actually, even if you do work in a cubby hole, you still have to work with people. Again, you'll never be a salesman, but you can learn to work with people.

Sure, working with people is one thing, but it seems like that these corporate HR idiots expect computer programmers, IT guys, and lab technicians to be smooth-talking , charismatic charmers with "high Emotional Intelligence", it's completely moronic.

I remember seeing "60 Minutes" several years ago, and the story was about a retarded guy who had worked his way up to shift supervisor at some fast food joint; I was more surprised that he was getting over $10.00/hour (I forget the exact amount, but remember it was over ten, and this was several years ago). The guy obviously wasn't that smart (he's retarded, Duh), and I don't think you'd say that his interpersonal skills were exactly at the presidential level, but there he was. After that, I really didn't see any reason that almost anyone can't earn at least $20,000/year if the have to (or want to).

You don't have to be smart to have a decent paying McJob, you do have to be able to multitask and processes lot of incoming sensory data coming from many different directions at once, something I CANNOT DO, I mentally shut down.

Originally Posted by The Rani

Just keep in mind that your psychiatrist, and the entire medical profession, benefits from that "knowledge." And, no offense, but I use that word in quotations because I personally believe that it's B.S.

Learning anything always involves moving out of your comfort zone ... for everyone. Saying "I can't" is a certain path to failure.

Oh God, now you are giving me the same old "you are a lazy slacker who is making up excuses" BS that I was tormented with before I got diagnosed with Aspergers and left me with nasty depression, anxiety issues, and self-worth issues from internalizing the "lazy slacker" crap (hence my Enneagram type, it's like I'm fucking haunted by the shrill voice my super-ego, torturing me.) Pathetic. And you are a Psychiatrist?!?

Originally Posted by Odin

Oh God, now you are giving me the same old "you are a lazy slacker who is making up excuses" BS that I was tormented with before I got diagnosed with Aspergers and left me with nasty depression, anxiety issues, and self-worth issues from internalizing the "lazy slacker" crap (hence my Enneagram type, it's like I'm fucking haunted by the shrill voice my super-ego, torturing me.) Pathetic. And you are a Psychiatrist?!?

Sounds like you need to download some Anthony Robbins tapes.

Originally Posted by The Rani

Which psychiatrist do you think does a better job, one who pathologizes and validates your "laziness" (your word not mine) or one who pushes you to achieve more in your life?

That's my psychotherapist's job, not my psychiatrist's, and it involves dealing with my problems and going around them rather than denying them. And that still doesn't change the basic physiological facts of my sensory sensitivities, those can't be removed by therapy.

There's a whole other side of this issue which is not being addressed at all. That issue is the access issue. See, there are essentially three healthcare systems in America. At the top you have the kind of coverage that those who work or are covered by a government agency or a very large employer can get. If you get sick under that system you mostly have to worry only about your treatment and recovery. This is because your pool-the large institution-has enough clout to prevent what happens to you otherwise.
If you work for a small employer or else buy your own insurance, you are very likely to get good treatment when you first come into the healthcare system. But then, as you are in a small pool that the insurance corporations can run over with impunity, you are in time likely to have procedures denied or run into other problems created by your insurance company's persuit of profits.
And then of course there is the uninsured who too often only reciveve the most expensive kind of healthcare-in the emergency room after a given condition is too serious to to ignore and/or take over the counter medications for.

The quality of your healthcare in America isn't really a crap shoot, it's actually fairly predictable depending on whom your "daddy" is.

Originally Posted by herbal tee

There's a whole other side of this issue which is not being addressed at all. That issue is the access issue. See, there are essentially three healthcare systems in America. At the top you have the kind of coverage that those who work or are covered by a government agency or a very large employer can get. If you get sick under that system you mostly have to worry only about your treatment and recovery. This is because your pool-the large institution-has enough clout to prevent what happens to you otherwise.
If you work for a small employer or else buy your own insurance, you are very likely to get good treatment when you first come into the healthcare system. But then, as you are in a small pool that the insurance corporations can run over with impunity, you are in time likely to have procedures denied or run into other problems created by your insurance company's persuit of profits.
And then of course there is the uninsured who too often only reciveve the most expensive kind of healthcare-in the emergency room after a given condition is too serious to to ignore and/or take over the counter medications for.

The quality of your healthcare in America isn't really a crap shoot, it's actually fairly predictable depending on whom your "daddy" is.

T.R. Reid, who has lived everywhere and had medical where he's lived, wrote this for the WaPo.

Well if the Democratic leadership can't get around the Blue Dogs' fiscal conservatism, how about appealing to their moral conservatism?

Isn't it true that the province of Quebec does not pay for abortions in Canada's single-payer system? So why not allow states - or better yet, regional blocs of states - to opt out of including not only abortions, but things like RU 486, etc.?

You could carve up the country the way the breakup of AT&T did - and give each regional "payer" its own name; e.g., DixieCare.

And if that results in a domestic variant of "medical tourism," isn't that a de-facto economic stimulus package for the transportation and hospitality industries - a kind of "Cash For Clunkers" program for them?

Let's not have the Culture Wars kill this thing.

Originally Posted by '58 Flat

Well if the Democratic leadership can't get around the Blue Dogs' fiscal conservatism, how about appealing to their moral conservatism?

Isn't it true that the province of Quebec does not pay for abortions in Canada's single-payer system? So why not allow states - or better yet, regional blocs of states - to opt out of including not only abortions, but things like RU 486, etc.?

You could carve up the country the way the breakup of AT&T did - and give each regional "payer" its own name; e.g., DixieCare.

And if that results in a domestic variant of "medical tourism," isn't that a de-facto economic stimulus package for the transportation and hospitality industries - a kind of "Cash For Clunkers" program for them?

Let's not have the Culture Wars kill this thing.

I don't think women's rights should be sacrificed for political expediency.

Originally Posted by herbal tee

There's a whole other side of this issue which is not being addressed at all. That issue is the access issue. See, there are essentially three healthcare systems in America. At the top you have the kind of coverage that those who work or are covered by a government agency or a very large employer can get. If you get sick under that system you mostly have to worry only about your treatment and recovery. This is because your pool-the large institution-has enough clout to prevent what happens to you otherwise.
If you work for a small employer or else buy your own insurance, you are very likely to get good treatment when you first come into the healthcare system. But then, as you are in a small pool that the insurance corporations can run over with impunity, you are in time likely to have procedures denied or run into other problems created by your insurance company's persuit of profits.
And then of course there is the uninsured who too often only reciveve the most expensive kind of healthcare-in the emergency room after a given condition is too serious to to ignore and/or take over the counter medications for.

The quality of your healthcare in America isn't really a crap shoot, it's actually fairly predictable depending on whom your "daddy" is.

I agree with all of that. I think that's also why some people are afraid of universal health care. They think it means they will give up the better coverage they have from being rich and can't see that it's helping other people, human like them, who were born into less fortunate circumstances.
Right now heath care is a mess because people want it to stay that way, and those people have more political support than the uninsured, who can be easily labeled as lazy freeloaders.

Originally Posted by writerGrrl

I agree with all of that. I think that's also why some people are afraid of universal health care. They think it means they will give up the better coverage they have from being rich and can't see that it's helping other people, human like them, who were born into less fortunate circumstances.
Right now heath care is a mess because people want it to stay that way, and those people have more political support than the uninsured, who can be easily labeled as lazy freeloaders.

Some choose not to be insured even though their employers are paying half the deductible; mainly Xer's and Millenials are guilty of that. I don't believe a 1,00 page bill will change the system we currently have with our President making back-room deals with Big Pharma and Insurance Companies. I still think means testing and other eligibility measures to be put into place before any meaningful legislation be considered. As you may know, Medicare (Public Option for Seniors) will be insolvent in 2017. If you hear your representative hesitate if he/she would sign up for the Public Option, would you have the confidence in this reform as well?

Originally Posted by Odin

I am simply mentally incapable at working at most such low-income McJobs, I go into autistic meltdown from sensory overload... It's not working that's the problem, it's the KIND of work. In an office or lab environment I would be perfectly fine and would not need assistance. Anything that is fast-paced and requires lots of multitasking is very difficult for me...

-Have you tried janitor in an office after hours? Or a working in a library?

How many high-paying jobs do you think there are that aren't high paced, and which won't require you to multi-task?

Originally Posted by Odin

...now you [JDG & Rani] are giving me the same old "you are a lazy slacker who is making up excuses" BS...

-Well...

It is quite a coincidence that the only interpretation of Aspergers Syndrome which you are willing to accept, just happens to be the one which comes from a shrink who is happy to tell you that you can get a job, but only if it also just happens to be a high paying job.

Originally Posted by Ghost Echo

First, I have the personal suspicion that it's a thesis designed to justify the brand of Christianity that equates one's faith with one's materialism and power...

-Did you read the "Jerusalem Post" article on the "Israel Test"? It explains that the reason sore losers hate the Jews, is that they're envious of their success, and carries that over to people who hate anyone who is successful.

Originally Posted by Ghost Echo

Second, it assumes that all poor people believe in Zero-sum and all rich, successful people believe in ex-nihilo...

-No, it explains that those who hate the successful are envious of them; this includes some who are born poor, some who are born rich, and some of everyone born in between.

Originally Posted by Ghost Echo

The question shouldn't be in asking which philosophy you believe exist, but which one would you follow to become successful?

-Obviously, a person who is born poor and despises the path of wealth will probably be stuck where he is. A person who is born wealthy, and despises the path of wealth might get over and become Limousine Liberals and Chardonnay Socialists, or they could end up being a classic case of "shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations".

Originally Posted by Ghost Echo

As concerning the mentally challenged manager, I have to say that 20k really isn't that much...More likely he's getting assistance for being handicapped which is contributing to a greater income...

1) It was at least $20K/year (it was higher, but I forget the exact amount);

2) $20K was worth more "back then";

3) The "60 Minutes" story was of the "Inspirational Gimp of the Week" variety; I think he was independent, and living without welfare;

4) My current self-imposed budget is $1200/month.

Anyway, my point is that even HE could do it. If anyone remembers (or can find) the story, let us know.

---

Originally Posted by haymarket martyr

WARNING: The poster known as jamesdglick has a history of engaging in fraud. He makes things up out of his own head and attempts to use these blatant lies to score points in his arguments. When you call him on it, he will only lie further. He has such a reputation for doing this that many people here are cowed into silence and will not acknowledge it or confront him on it.

Anyone who attempts to engage with glick will discover this and find out you have wasted your time and energy on an intellectual fraud of the worst sort.

-So cry many Boomers (self-professed Lefties, mostly) whenever they fail to explain their hypocritical self-justifications, their double-standards, and their double-think forays into evil. Perhaps their consciences bother them, perhaps not. Who knows.

I'm not sure if it was my fortnight of sailing, but things seem to be looking a lot better than before I left. I'm in agreement with Klein -
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezr...are_refor.html

The State of Health-Care Reform
The research seems pretty convincing that impressive speeches don't do much to transform the dynamics of presidential approval. But then, tonight's speech doesn't need to do much. And it doesn't need to do much because health-care reform is in pretty good shape. Bills have now passed four of the five relevant committees. The outlier committee, the Senate Finance Committee, is circulating its outline and seems likely to pass a bill within the next week or so.

At that point, the bills will go to the floor of the House and Senate, where passage isn't certain but seems pretty likely. And once the bills pass the House and the Senate, final passage of the conference report (the merged bill) is a good bet. And the president's signature is then a sure thing.

That's the context for Obama's speech: It's sort of health-care reform's version of the State of the Union. And the State of the Process is strong: The legislative politics of health care are in considerably better shape than August would have suggested or the ongoing coverage has really articulated (in part because the Finance Committee was gummed up until this week).

Obama's job, then, isn't all that difficult: It's bringing public perceptions of the health reform process closer in line with the underlying reality. And that underlying reality is that the bills are fundamentally pretty similar, there's a fairly high level of consensus, and there are some crucial elements that need to be worked out over the next few weeks, and seem like they will be. The town halls made health-care reform seem chaotic and incomprehensible and disorderly, but at the moment, it's really anything but. In fact, it's closer to agreement than it ever has been before.

By Ezra Klein | September 9, 2009; 12:10 PM ET

Who also had this amusing take -

Nazi Health Care
Given the proliferation of mustachioed Obama signs in recent weeks, Michael Scott Moore thought it would be a good idea to take a closer look at health care under Hitler.

It's true the Nazis had health care. They inherited the tradition from Bismarck, who set up the first national health system in the world (after unifying Germany in 1871).

But there was a difference between Nazi health care and the systems under the German Empire and the Weimar Republic. Hitler rearranged the system under a strict regime of central government control, so all insurance-scheme managers reported straight to Berlin. ... After the war, East Germany became a stifled and shuttered Communist nation with a mediocre state-run medical system. "West Germany," meanwhile, according to an assessment of the German health system from the Library of Congress, "moved away from Hitler's central state direction and returned to decentralized administration and control. Social insurance and social protection programs under labor and management control, which were characteristic of the Weimar period, were restored."

In other words, the true anti-Nazi health-care system would put the insurance industry under the control of the AFL-CIO.

By Ezra Klein | September 9, 2009; 12:30 PM ET

Looks like the Grey Lady is giving a good cheer as well -

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/he...exprod=myyahoo

Despite Fears, Health Care Overhaul Is Moving Ahead

WASHINGTON — The conventional wisdom, here and around the country, is that the centerpiece of President Obama’s domestic agenda — remaking the health care system to cut costs and cover the uninsured — is on life support and that only a political miracle could revive it.

Here’s why the conventional wisdom might be wrong:

...

Krugman has a concern however -

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/

Why the public option matters
Most arguments against the public option are based either on deliberate misrepresentation of what that option would mean, or on remarkably thorough misunderstanding of the concept, which persists to a frustrating degree: I was really surprised to see Joe Klein worrying about the creation of a system in which doctors work directly for the government, British-style, when that has nothing whatsoever to do with the public option as proposed. (Forty years of Medicare haven’t turned the US into that kind of system — why would having a public plan change that?)

But what is one to make of the practical, political argument from the likes of Ezra Klein, who argue that any public plan actually included in legislation probably wouldn’t make that much difference, and that reform is worth having even without such a plan?

There are three reasons to be suspicious of that argument.

The first is that I suspect that Ezra and others understate the extent to which even a public plan with limited bargaining power will help hold down overall costs. Private insurers do pay providers more than Medicare does — but that’s only part of the reason Medicare has lower costs. There’s also the huge overhead of the private insurers, much of which involves marketing and attempts to cherry-pick clients — and even with community rating, some of that will still go on. A public plan would probably be able to attract clients with much less of that.

Second, a public plan would probably provide the only real competition in many markets.

Third — and this is where I am getting a very bad feeling about the idea of throwing in the towel on the public option — is the politics. Remember, to make reform work we have to have an individual mandate. And everything I see says that there will be a major backlash against the idea of forcing people to buy insurance from the existing companies. That backlash was part of what got Obama the nomination! Having the public option offers a defense against that backlash.

What worries me is not so much that the backlash would stop reform from passing, as that it would store up trouble for the not-too-distant future. Imagine that reform passes, but that premiums shoot up (or even keep rising at the rates of the past decade.) Then you could all too easily have many people blaming Obama et al for forcing them into this increasingly unaffordable system. A trigger might fix this — but the funny thing about such triggers is that they almost never get pulled.

This third item is the most interesting of his three reasons for 'why the public option.' It is the one that is going to swell in coverage and importance over the next few days.

However, from a 4T standpoint, it is not the most insightful observation in his piece; that would be this -

Let me add a sort of larger point: aside from the essentially circular political arguments — centrist Democrats insisting that the public option must be dropped to get the votes of centrist Democrats — the argument against the public option boils down to the fact that it’s bad because it is, horrors, a government program. And sooner or later Democrats have to take a stand against Reaganism — against the presumption that if the government does it, it’s bad.

- that is what this 4T is about - overturning the big myth of the 3T - as well as the Dems growing a pair.

going viral -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CO2S...layer_embedded

tracking every vote on every aspect

http://www.whorunsgov.com/Projects/Reform_Tracker

This will be good ammunition in Nov 2010 particularly in regard to who wanted MANDATED coverage WITHOUT a public option -- a Blue Dog killer.

Here we go!

WHAT???!!!!

$3800 FINE WITHOUT A PUBLIC OPTION????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


aaaggaggggggg!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.dailykostv.com/w/002112/

Senator Nelson says --

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BFm4O8uW0c

Hey Senator, I got your $3800 trigger right here buddy!

Tsk, tsk, now the Blue Dogs have really pissed us off -

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=2907

Employer Requirement in Baucus Health Package Would Have Unintended Effect of Discouraging Hiring of Low-Income and Minority Workers

While an employer responsibility requirement is an essential component of health care reform, a proposal included in the new health reform package that Senator Max Baucus unveiled this weekend would have serious consequences, particularly for low-income and minority workers and women.

Under the proposal, employers who do not offer health coverage would have to pay the full cost of the subsidies provided to employees who purchase coverage through the new health insurance exchange and qualify for a subsidy because their family income is below 300 percent of the poverty line. [1] But employers would not have to contribute to the health insurance costs of employees with higher family incomes. The new requirement would apply to firms with 50 or fewer employees.

Many employers that do offer coverage also would be subject to this requirement. Workers who would have to pay more than 13 percent of their income for their share of the premium costs under their employer’s plan, and who have family incomes below 300 percent of the poverty line, could receive a subsidy to purchase coverage through the exchange. Their employers, however, would then be billed for those subsidies.

As a result, firms that offer coverage generally would be worse off under this provision than under the “play-or-pay” provisions of the House health care bill or the bill that the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee has approved.

This is an archtype story - nearly kill the hero, take his livelhood away, steal all his material possession, BUT its not until you kidnap the girlfriend or shot the dog, that it becomes 'Bruce Lee Time.'

Originally Posted by playwrite

tracking every vote on every aspect

http://www.whorunsgov.com/Projects/Reform_Tracker

This will be good ammunition in Nov 2010 particularly in regard to who wanted MANDATED coverage WITHOUT a public option -- a Blue Dog killer.

Umm, how many are in Republican leaning Districts?..Let the slaughter commence in 2010.

Obama healthcare speech drinking game

The Rules: Select the adult beverage of your choice. Each point assinged is worth one drink. Drinks are defined as follows:
Liquor=1 point/ 1 shot

Beer and wine=1 point/ one swig or sip.

Words with point values:

Bipartisan=1 point
Compromise=1 point
"The good work of Congress/committees"=1 point

Public option=2 points (double shot)

Single Payer=3 points (triple shot)

Bottoms up!!!! : ;:

Originally Posted by herbal tee

Obama healthcare speech drinking game

The Rules: Select the adult beverage of your choice. Each point assinged is worth one drink. Drinks are defined as follows:
Liquor=1 point/ 1 shot

Beer and wine=1 point/ one swig or sip.

Words with point values:

Bipartisan=1 point
Compromise=1 point
"The good work of Congress/committees"=1 point

Public option=2 points (double shot)

Single Payer=3 points (triple shot)

Bottoms up!!!! : ;:

Now we are talking!!!

The most interesting thing is to what degree he mentions the "mandate" and if he ties the public option to making that $3600 mother go away. Its the one thing that will/is getting more press than his speech!

The number of Americans lacking health insurance rose during 2008: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32776829...th-health_care.