Good thing he likes golf a lot...
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Quote of the Day...
From Scott Adams, in today's Dilbert strip, said by Catbert (the evil HR Director).“Wrong” is one of those concepts that depends on witnesses.Sounds like a Congresscritter, doesn't it?
A Doctor's Take on the AMA's Endorsement of PelosiCare...
Dr. Joy Bliss, posting at Maggie's Farm:
You tell 'em, doc!
Time to get angry, folks...
The AMA backs the PelosiCare monstrosity? Fine.
1. The membership was never consulted.
2. I quit. And I will not be alone.
Time to get angry, folks...
Let Your Voice Be Heard...
One of the best messages I've read or heard on Obamacare.
Listen.
Write your Congresscritters.
Don't be afraid to show your frustration and anger.
Don't neglect to let them know that your vote, when they come up for re-election, depends on how they vote on this bill.
Jamul Casino Update...
All good news, if you oppose the Jamul Casino. From the latest Lakes Entertainment quarterly report:
Translated into plain English, the above essentially says that Lakes Entertainment is continuing to lose a significant amount of money on its investment in the Jamul Casino project. At some point, they'll say “enough is enough” and pull the plug on the whole thing...
Lakes Entertainment is the financial backer of the Jamul Casino project.The net unrealized gains in the third quarter of 2009 consisted of $0.7 million related to the project with the Jamul Indian Village ("Jamul Tribe") near San Diego, California and $0.2 million related to the project with the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma near Oklahoma City, Oklahoma due primarily to improvements in the credit markets. Lakes also recognized impairment losses of $0.6 million during the third quarter of 2009 due primarily to continued uncertainty surrounding the completion of the Jamul project. Unrealized gains in the prior year period related primarily to the notes receivable related to the Red Hawk Casino project due to the recognition of a gain associated with the continued progress toward a fourth quarter 2008 opening of the Red Hawk Casino, partially offset by unrealized losses associated with a decrease in probability of opening the casino project for the Jamul Tribe.
...The net unrealized gains in 2009 consisted of $2.8 million related to the project with the Jamul Indian Village and $0.4 million related to the project with the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma due primarily to improvements in the credit markets. Lakes also recognized an impairment on long-term assets in the amount of $2.9 million during the nine months ended September 27, 2009 due primarily to continued uncertainty surrounding the completion of the Jamul project. Unrealized gains in the prior year period related primarily to the notes receivable related to the Red Hawk Casino project with the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians near Sacramento, California due to the recognition of a gain associated with the continued progress toward a fourth quarter 2008 opening of the Red Hawk Casino, partially offset by unrealized losses associated with a decrease in probability of opening the casino project for the Jamul Tribe.
Translated into plain English, the above essentially says that Lakes Entertainment is continuing to lose a significant amount of money on its investment in the Jamul Casino project. At some point, they'll say “enough is enough” and pull the plug on the whole thing...
The Biggest Loser?
Michael Barone in the Wall Street Journal, making an interesting observation about yesterday's elections:
But you missed seeing the guy who may have been the biggest loser of all—a man who according to recently released White House logs has been a guest in the White House 22 times since Barack Obama became president, more than any other single individual.With all the healthcare bill noise I'd completely forgotten about the damned “card check” (aka “union takeover plan”) bill...
That man is Andy Stern, who has boasted that the Service Employees International Union, which he heads, ponied up something like $60 million for Barack Obama and other Democrats in the 2008 campaign cycle. Altogether, Mr. Stern and other labor union leaders reportedly gave Democrats some $400 million last year.
This was, to borrow a word from Mr. Obama, an audacious gamble. Unions these days represent only 8% of private-sector employees (and that's counting General Motors and Chrysler as private sector) and some unions went into debt to make these contributions. Public employee unions of course are financed by taxpayers, who pay the salaries from which dues are extracted, but even so their resources are ultimately limited.
What have the unions gotten in return? Some not insignificant things. The Obama administration bludgeoned General Motors and Chrysler bondholders, in what I called an episode of "gangster government," and effectively turned over the two auto companies to the United Auto Workers. The building trades got project labor agreements—i.e., plenty of dues money flowing to their coffers—in the $787 billion stimulus package.
A lot of that stimulus money went as well to state and local governments. The goal was to spare public employee union members from the vicissitudes of the recession to which the rest of us are subject—and to keep that dues money flowing in.
But the union leaders have been frustrated on their No. 1 goal, the card check bill that would effectively abolish the secret ballot in unionization elections. A couple of bulky guys in varsity jackets visit your home and, um, persuade you to sign a card, and later the union—with the help of a mandatory arbitration clause—impose contracts on employees and rake in the dues money.
Rationing Begins in the Healthcare Bill...
Does this sound like the hopey-changey stuff we were promised?
The reality is this: if all the people of this country were entitled (by law) to all healthcare services, there would be more demand for healthcare than there was supply. Nobody is proposing changing that by radically increasing supply (depending on whose estimate you believe, increasing supply to meet unconstrained demand would require somewhere between a 175% and a 450% increase in healthcare capacity, most of which would be unused most of the time). Human society has only ever come up with two fundamental ways to “manage” such a supply/demand mismatch.
One way is by government dictat, as socialized medicine would be. In that sort of a system, political bureaucrats use the criteria important to them (e.g., getting re-elected) to decide how much supply there should be, and then those same bureaucrats decide how to ration the limited supply to meet the much larger demand. That's Sarah Palin's death panels, the Senate bill's waiting period, etc., etc.
The other way is by market forces. The amount of supply is determined by our collective willingness to pay. What healthcare you have access to is determined by what you or your employer is willing to pay, which in turn depends on what kind of a job you have and how much society values your work. Thus as a software engineer, I probably have access to better healthcare than the guy sweeping out the offices at our local retail nursery. There may also be a “safety net” healthcare plan, as we have today in the U.S., that provides basic healthcare for everybody.
Both of these ways provide a way to allocate scarce healthcare resources to a much larger demand. I know which one I prefer. How about you?
You're afraid your cancer is back, and a health insurance company just turned you down.Socialist healthcare necessarily means rationed healthcare. This is such a simple and unassailable fact, but so many people don't understand it, or don't want to believe it.
Under the health care bills in Congress, you could apply for coverage through a new high-risk pool that President Barack Obama promises would immediately start serving patients with pre-existing medical problems.
Wait a second. Read the fine print. You may have to be uninsured for six months to qualify.
"If you are a cancer patient and have cancer now, you can't wait six months to go into a plan because your condition can go from bad to death," said Stephen Finan, a policy expert with the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network. He called the waiting period in the Senate bill "unacceptable."
Advocates for people with serious health problems, as well as some insurance experts, are raising questions about one of the most important upfront benefits in the Democratic health care legislation: a high-risk pool for the medically uninsurable.
The reality is this: if all the people of this country were entitled (by law) to all healthcare services, there would be more demand for healthcare than there was supply. Nobody is proposing changing that by radically increasing supply (depending on whose estimate you believe, increasing supply to meet unconstrained demand would require somewhere between a 175% and a 450% increase in healthcare capacity, most of which would be unused most of the time). Human society has only ever come up with two fundamental ways to “manage” such a supply/demand mismatch.
One way is by government dictat, as socialized medicine would be. In that sort of a system, political bureaucrats use the criteria important to them (e.g., getting re-elected) to decide how much supply there should be, and then those same bureaucrats decide how to ration the limited supply to meet the much larger demand. That's Sarah Palin's death panels, the Senate bill's waiting period, etc., etc.
The other way is by market forces. The amount of supply is determined by our collective willingness to pay. What healthcare you have access to is determined by what you or your employer is willing to pay, which in turn depends on what kind of a job you have and how much society values your work. Thus as a software engineer, I probably have access to better healthcare than the guy sweeping out the offices at our local retail nursery. There may also be a “safety net” healthcare plan, as we have today in the U.S., that provides basic healthcare for everybody.
Both of these ways provide a way to allocate scarce healthcare resources to a much larger demand. I know which one I prefer. How about you?