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Think of the ObamaCare reform debate now playing in the US Senate as the final gurglings of polity that knows it is whirling around the drain. They’re pretending to attempt to fix a racket that comprises eight percent of the American economy. Yikes! How did that happen? At the beginning of the 20th century it was one-quarter of one percent (.25 percent) of the economy.

The standard explanation is that, first, Medicare jacked up overall healthcare activity in the 1960s, hauling in a customer-base of old folks who previously received no special treatment and were, generally, less well than non-old folk. Secondarily, technological innovation opened up so many new methods of disease control for everybody, young and old, that we’re able to treat more sickness in more complicated ways — and that drove costs up way further.

The greater part of the story remains neatly concealed within the matrix of rackets erected around the money-flows since the big cost bump-up in the 1960s, and these involve insurance companies, Big Pharma, corporatized doctors’ practices, hospital monopolies, and, of course, politicians on-the-take dividing amongst each other a colossal pool of grift that exists mainly for one simple reason: the cost of everything is hidden from public view.

Nobody has any idea what anything costs. Certainly not the patients, sometimes called “customers” or “consumers” — but really hostages. If you go into the hospital for a stent in the left descending coronary artery, nobody will tell you what it costs, starting with the doctors who have performed the procedure a thousand times. They can’t even estimate the cost (or won’t), though they could probably give you a pretty good ballpark number for the cost-and-installation of a new fuel pump on their BMW-28i.

Charges for medical care are never discussed with the patient. Doctors especially pretend to regard such a proposition as beneath the dignity of their profession, rather like British aristocrats regarded all questions pertaining to money in the Downton Abby scheme of things — a filthy business better left to the servants, like disposing of the table-scraps. Of course the “servants” in the hospital scheme of things are a fantastic hierarchy of dangerously overfed clerks overwhelmed by the anomie of spending countless hours typing fictitious numbers into their work stations. A more pointless life can hardly be conceived. If you ask the ones who “interface” with you at the check-out counter how your bill was toted up exactly, you will receive nothing more than a pitiless stare of contempt — which is actually aimed inward at their own existential quandaries, a pathological dynamic that perhaps deserves attention from the research funding troughs.

The cost of everything medical is worked out in a private rain-dance between the aforementioned manifold concerned parties on the basis of what they think they can get away with in any particular case. In hospitals, this is enabled by the notorious ChargeMaster system which, to put it as simply as possible, allows hospitals to just make shit up.

Any bill in congress that affects to reform the gross financial malfeasance in healthcare ought to start with the absolute requirement to publicly post the cost of everything that doctors and hospitals do, and enable the “service providers” to get paid only those publicly posted costs — obviating the lucrative rain-dance for dividing up the ransoms paid by hostage-patients who come to the “providers,” after all, in extremis. Notice that this crucial feature of the crisis is missing not only from the political debate but also from the supposedly public-interest-minded pages of The New York Times and other organs of the news media. Perhaps this facet of the problem never entered the editors’ minds — in which case you really have to ask: how dumb are they?

(The funniest claim about ObamaCare in today’s New York Times is the statement that 20 million citizens got access to health care under the so-called Affordable Care Act. Really? You mean they got health insurance policies with $8000-deductables, when they don’t even have $500 in savings to pay for car repairs? What planet do The New York Times editorial writers live on?)

The corollary questions about deconstructing the insurance armature of the health care racket, and assigning its “duties” to a “single-payer” government agency is, of course, a higher level of debate. I’m not saying it would work, even if it was modeled on one of the systems currently working elsewhere, say in France. But Americans have acquired an allergy to even thinking about that, or at least they’ve been conditioned to imagine they’re allergic by self-interested politicians. So, the current product of debate in the US Senate is just a scheme for pretending to reapportion the colossal flow of grift among the grifters.

Spare yourself the angst of even worrying about the outcome of the current healthcare debate. It’s not going to get “fixed.” The medical system as we know it is going to blow up, and soon, just like the pension systems across the country, and the treasuries of the fifty states themselves, and the rest of the Potemkin US economy.


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369 Responses to “Rain Dance”

  1. seawolf77 June 23, 2017 at 9:19 am #

    Popped right after the JFK assassination. Hmmmm.

    • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 10:02 am #

      The AMA, having first taking the pattern from lawyers, then looked at the MIC arms development with cost over run pattern and decided to do that as well.

      • seawolf77 June 23, 2017 at 10:05 am #

        The military industrial complex and the medical industrial complex run this country. They both kill you with shots.

        • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 10:20 am #

          Which is why America has so many allies in the world nowadays.

      • windward June 23, 2017 at 12:02 pm #

        And how did the lawyers get rich? Self-regulation, taken to the ultimate power. Lawyers are in charge of the system we must use to prosecute them.

        Unlike everyone else in this land, lawyers have no predators. They are above the law. No wonder the doctors got jealous.

        • wolfbay June 23, 2017 at 2:38 pm #

          Here in Florida every profession except lawyers are regulated by the state.Lawyers are so “morally” superior they can be trusted to regulate themselves.

        • aibohphobia June 23, 2017 at 4:11 pm #

          The problem of ‘who watches the watchmen?’ has been with us from ancient times (‘Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?’).

          As Nicholas Taleb has pointed out, a model for the answer to it was provided in Solon’s Law– In that ancient time, if a building collapsed and killed your son, daughter, wife or husband, the contractor that built it would have his or her son, daughter, wife and/or husband put to death in the same proportion. This was not cruelty–Solon and his admin did not have lots of building inspectors and the like. So they put the builders on notice that the contractors would be perpetually responsible for deaths resulting from construction failure–A real incentive not to cut corners.

          In a similar manner, let any foreign troop deployment be led by the children of the politicians that propose it.

          Public disclosure of pricing and locking them into any health plan they mandate for the rest of us would probably go a long way in the correct direction…

    • Hands4u June 23, 2017 at 11:21 am #

      This is also when the Mental Health Asylums and State Hospitals began releasing more patients to the streets from the 60’s through the 70’s.

  2. DA June 23, 2017 at 9:23 am #

    Even before considering the rampant financial racketeering, we’re paying the costs of keeping an old-aged cohort alive that has no business living beyond 60 or so. All of that will likely end, for us plebes at least, within the lifetimes of those currently alive. Three generations and out will be the new mantra. Not that the younger generations are living all that well these days either.

    • Piper Michael June 23, 2017 at 9:59 am #

      Being 62, and having paid my taxes for 50 years(since I was old enough to reach the peddles on a farm tractor), I assure you… 60 and out means one thing, “You and who’s army mother fucker?”

      James is right, the System is FUBAR, this is what happens when money is injected into something… we’ve known this since Babylon. When I go to the doctor, I pay $83 a visit. Out of pocket. Fuck anybody who says I don’t have that right. Now. Being an old Vietnam vet, I have as much, or more right, than you, to say how long I want to stick around. But it appears Obamacare, after forcing me into the damn thing, and forcing me into the VA(what an abortion), then, just dropped me, kicked me out of the system.

      So they wanted me in the VA, I haven’t seen a doctor in 2 years. So what do I do? Return to the beginning of this post. I would rather pay for it myself, and get some relief than get next to nothing for nothing. When the bastards are done, it will be VA for all, and then, I assure you, regardless of your age, you will hate them with a passion as you begin to hear the dreaded word ‘treatment denied’.

      At that point, I predict James will be correct, as doctors, hospitals and insurance companies go up in flames. Literal, not figurative.

      • zizzybalooba June 23, 2017 at 3:16 pm #

        Piper, I think DA means those 60 and over who chose not to live healthy lives and over consume healthcare services. And I don’t put veterans in this cohort.

        • SunnyJohn45 June 24, 2017 at 6:10 am #

          Don’t presume to know what DA means. He may just be a dickhead.

          • DA June 24, 2017 at 3:42 pm #

            Ho-hum. I’m a dickhead that turns 60 later this year myself. Yes, Americans live TOO DAMN long, especially considering that humanity wants to have its cake and eat it too by continued high birth rates and ever increasing rates of consumption all along the way.

            And by the way, I’m retired military (25 years USAF), consume almost zero healthcare (in spite of rapidly degenerating health), exercise like an Olympic athlete, eat pretty damn well, and otherwise live a pretty much moderate life. I DO drink too much by my own defined standards (I’ve seen several doctors and counselors who don’t agree that my drinking is a problem, but rather, think I’m just a bit too idealistic!).

            All that said, what’s REALLY killing me, and what’s likely killing MOST of us (who are still working for a living, at least), is our soul-crushing corporate jobs, a large part of which the need for is due to, as Jim states above, the need for affordable healthcare.

            But as I’ve watched my own health and that of my peers peak and decline over the years, especially considering all the “artificial” medical advancements made throughout the 90’s, 00’s, and 10’s, I’ve concluded that the problem with medical care isn’t that we have too little, it’s that WE HAVE TOO MUCH! Or at least some people do.

            We’ve lost sight of living normal lives within normal lifespans, with all the trade-offs and travails that that sort of thinking entails, and replaced it all with a western corporate capitalist mindset that seeks to optimize and extend everything all along the way. With all too predictable results.

            Bottom line: The earth cannot continue to support out of control human based financial and/or actuarial exponential growth. PERIOD. If humans cannot or will not limit their numbers by other measures voluntarily (birth control, death my other natural measures during life, etc.), then death by whatever means for the weakest among the tribe – typically the elderly and the diseased – is simply INEVITABLE!

          • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 5:22 pm #

            “I’ve concluded that the problem with medical care isn’t that we have too little, it’s that WE HAVE TOO MUCH! Or at least some people do.

            “DA,
            No issues with your opinion of longevity…but who is to decide for those who wish not to shed their mortal coil? There must be a mechanism to determine the good of society…probably end up being some faceless airman buried in the basement of Base Ops, shuffling paper, checking names on paper, sorting according to some mysterious metric? Think of it, an E-2 manpower wonk, making that decision.

            Would a Dr. or a Judge do any better?

            Think …Mengele…or Freisler.

            The real problem is humanity…there are thousands that would take that job.

          • DA June 24, 2017 at 7:19 pm #

            elysianfield,

            There are no good answers to the problem that ails us, because the primary problem is simply that there are FAR TOO MANY OF US in the first place.

            How do we manage that primary conundrum? One again… For my part, I plan to “step off” fairly soon and leave the rest of you to ponder that fact for yourself. But who can say when each of us might go as well? Ours is not to question why… and all that.

    • michael June 25, 2017 at 6:27 pm #

      Not 60. Instead: retirement age. You are supposed to keel over on entry into retirement. It is the duty of each responsible citizen with the exception of our leaders who are indispensible.

  3. FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 9:40 am #

    we’re paying the costs of keeping an old-aged cohort alive that has no business living beyond 60 or so.

    Are you suggesting processing us for organs, or for soap, if no suitable organs to be harvested?

    • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 9:55 am #

      No one is going to harvest their joints.

      • FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 9:58 am #

        Soap, then? Or, perhaps, hair for mattresses?

    • FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 9:56 am #

      Older people are absolutely crucial to maintaining Nation’s long term memory.

      Yesterday I was talking to a couple of Russian kids in late 20s – they did not have any clue about the significance of June 22 for Russian history, but they have an adorable smart-phone skills and exact knowledge how to make money on the Internet selling drugs through anonymous web sites and system of GPS-coordinated hidden stashes.

      Process us, older people for soap through the system of voluntary/mandatory euthanasia and society will degenerate to a total chaos in one generation.

      • Piper Michael June 23, 2017 at 10:06 am #

        Still, I guarantee it will be a bloodbath. I’m a much better shot than most of these youngun’s, and have the training, age and discipline to aim and fire and maintain fire control during the heat of combat.
        That’s what it’ll be too. Because most of the children nowadays, as well stated above, have no skillsets in the real world, especially combat skills. They think it’ll be like a video game.
        Yeah, just like Nancy Pelosi, they’re legends in their own mind.

        • FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 10:11 am #

          By no means I was suggesting a shooting war with my kids/grandkids. Somehow, that idea just didn’t enter my mind.

          • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 10:21 am #

            What about nuclear war?

        • DA June 24, 2017 at 4:22 pm #

          To what end? To assert your human dominance for a few months/years more or less over those who will inevitably replace you anyway? Perhaps you weren’t schooled properly when you were young?

        • michael June 25, 2017 at 6:29 pm #

          You will face members of the security apparatus each of which will be granted generous extensions to their expiration date.

      • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 12:12 pm #

        Tontoenelvalle

        June 22, 1941 is a mournful date in the history of Russia, as well as the post-Soviet states of Ukraine and Belarus. On this day Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union. And the Great Patriotic War began.

        The Wehrmacht generals hoped for a blitzkrieg and reach the borders of Moscow in a few months after their victorious offensive was launched. Historians often ask whether the Soviet Union was ready for a war against Germany. Undoubtedly, the Soviet Union seriously prepared for it. However, Stalin feared that if the Soviet Union concentrated its forces along its border, this would provoke Germany, says fellow at the Institute of World History Natalya Lebedeva.
        “There was no necessity for provoking Germany, as it launched the offensive itself. The fear was a completely unjustified one. Stalin tried to blandish Hitler and hoped that his action would avert Germany’s offensive. The Soviet Union could not deploy its forces along the border in time, and as a result the enemy could reach the outskirts of Moscow, Lebedeva said.
        There are a lot of contradictions in reports linked to covering the developments linked to the beginning of the war and pre-war period. One of the key questions was the speculation that the Soviet Union allegedly was Nazi Germany’s ally. Reportedly, in August 1939, a Treaty of Non-aggression between Germany and the USSR was signed. Here is an opinion from historian, head of the Historical Memory Fund’s research program Vladimir Simindei.
        “There are no documents to prove that the USSR and Germany were allies. The existing documents regulate other spheres and are linked to issues of non-aggression, borders and trade. From the standpoint of documents that were signed, the USSR and Germany were not in a state of alliance. The rest is speculation by political writers who wished to distort history post factum to show Moscow as a capital that, besides Berlin, made the decision to unleash the Second World War,” Vladimir Simindei said.
        The attack on the Soviet Union was a treacherous one, but could it be regarded as an unexpected one? In fact, military surveillance provided evidence that Germany was preparing for launching an attack on the Soviet Union. Since the entire system of agreements was violated, it will be correct to use the word “treacherous”, although there was no unquestioning trust between Moscow and Berlin, Vladimir Simindei said.
        “Despite the fact that there were reports about the concentration of forces along the border, the Kremlin believed that the attack scheduled to be on June 22, would not occur. Perhaps, this was linked to strategic disinformation,” Simindei said.
        At present, a wave of falsification is spreading in the West, and it is aimed at putting the whole blame on Stalin for the Second World War because he allegedly planned an attack on Germany but Hitler surpassed him. Here is an opinion from Vladimir Simindei.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 1:55 pm #

          That’s just official history or “a lie agreed upon” as Napoleon said. In fact, Western Bankers financed the Communist Revolution. And since such people controlled America via their puppet politicians, America and Russia were allies at that point. Only after the War, when Stalin pushed Russian Nationalism before Global Revolution, did the relationship begin to sour.

          • seawolf77 June 24, 2017 at 8:54 am #

            Hitler did exactly what Napoleon did. Did he expect a different result?

          • robert magill June 24, 2017 at 9:38 am #

            Are you dismissing the invasion of Arkhangelsk and Vladivostok by United States and other troops from the democracies?

            http://robertmagill.wordpress.com

      • DA June 24, 2017 at 4:31 pm #

        Process us, older people for soap through the system of voluntary/mandatory euthanasia and society will degenerate to a total chaos in one generation.

        I guess you haven’t noticed that that’s happened already regardless?

    • DA June 24, 2017 at 4:40 pm #

      What I’m suggesting is simply that modern medical life extension processes (which are in fact, primarily merely revenue extension processes) are keeping FAR too many of us alive FAR beyond our natural “expiration dates,” and thus, making life on earth more unbearable for us all. This 50+ year old video sums it up better than I can explain:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4ga_M5Zdn4

      • sophia June 25, 2017 at 8:48 pm #

        I agree that we spend tons of money keeping very weak and ill old people alive, but at the same time 60 is really quite young. My cohorts and I are all between 60 and 70 and we all put in a lot of hard work outside and aren’t sick. Should someone of us have a little problem, I’d hope they can get some medical care.

    • SpeedyBB June 25, 2017 at 6:09 am #

      DA and you other gentlemen,

      I don’t know if anyone else remembers it but there was in fact a spirited discussion about the absurd extension of life for someone whose body shuts down, and it took place when ex-President Dwight D. Eisenhower lay dying (late 1960s).

      There was serious talk about whether it was morally correct to use an incredible amount of high-tech medical wizardry, and what this implies for society as a whole (and not just for the Rockefellers, Eisenhowers and DuPonts).

      Soon it became the norm to pile on everything available (or affordable) to keep bodies functioning, even when there was never any hope of the patient getting up, shaking the doctor’s hand and jogging home.

      This topic is, by the way, addressed very intelligently in this week’s excellent kevinmd.com blog.

  4. PeteAtomic June 23, 2017 at 9:40 am #

    It was always perplexing as a hospital worker to attempt to answer a patient’s question about costs. Nobody knew. Nobody knew who to even contact to start to explain potential costs for different exams or procedures.
    Muddling this even further is the ‘financial assistance’ patients can receive from hospital systems to help pay their bills. These are often based on income & can affect how middle and lower middle class people pay their bills. Hospitals might as well print out coupons or offer discounts. I don’t see much of a difference.

  5. Henry June 23, 2017 at 9:45 am #

    I have a relative I know that was charged 300$ for a “back-sponge”. It was literally a kitchen like sponge with a string through it to wrap around your back as you lie in the hospital bed. It’s beyond base.

    Also, part of the problem is the “training” doctors get. Go 8-12 years through medical school and you’ll will probably emerge with a sub conscious hatred of the human race. Imagine spending 8 years sleeping 3 hours a night, trying to beat every other student around you, working in inhuman florescent lighted rooms and being abused by asshole doctor overseers.

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    • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 9:53 am #

      Just pay attention to how society works ” …… and you’ll will probably emerge with a sub conscious hatred of the human race.”

      • michael June 25, 2017 at 6:42 pm #

        Why subconscious?

    • Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 1:58 pm #

      Exactly. They’ve been ruthlessly abused and thus feel they deserve the best of everything. The patients? Screw those assholes. They can’t even refrain from mocking patients as they work on them.

      As Michael Harrington said, Capitalism is the war of all against all.

      • DA June 24, 2017 at 4:53 pm #

        WAY too harsh vis-a-vis doctors, Janos. More the medical establishment in general there. But the Capitalism part you got EXACTLY right.

      • sophia June 25, 2017 at 8:52 pm #

        Oh, Janos, so you’re not a capitalist? What then?

    • SpeedyBB June 25, 2017 at 6:13 am #

      Again, this is a frequent topic in the kevinmd.com blog, along with doctor & medical student suicides.

  6. wet dog June 23, 2017 at 9:46 am #

    Was just visiting a backward, socialist country, New Zealand, and one of the questions I asked the downtrodden natives was: what are the chances of losing your home due to medical expenses? Or of declaring bankruptcy due to medical bills?

    And each of these half-dozen or so decrepit souls looked at me very queerly, as though I had spouted 2 heads, and said they had never heard of such a thing, and never thought of it.

    One middle-aged fellow I met has just been diagnosed with spinal cancer. He was immediately put to the head of the queue and was being given rushed treatment. His wife was worried for him, not about losing their paid off home. He didn’t worry about dying and leaving her destitute.

    Another older gent had been given numerous rides to a special medical center in Queenstown. This was 2 hours each way, and didn’t cost him a dime.

    A quick search showed this:

    Medical Bills Are the Biggest Cause of US Bankruptcies
    http://www.cnbc.com/id/100840148

    Another example? Look at Germany. Despite their debilitating, backward, commie-based free health care, they are the 4th (or 5th?) largest economy in the world. How could that ever work?

    • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 9:51 am #

      They haven’t paid their NATO bill?

      • Anon1970 June 23, 2017 at 11:15 am #

        NATO does not send out bills. But Germany spends a smaller percent of its GDP on its military than the US does. In 1990, near the high water mark for homicides in America’s big cities, I visited Germany for the first time and was amazed at how safe I felt in its cities.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 2:01 pm #

          You know it’s different now, right? Because of the Muslims? Have you heard? Or have you heard and not believed, because like, Muslims are good, not like those White Christians and shit.

          Why are Muslims good since all religions are bad? Why, because they’re not White! That’s the operative factor.

          • Anon1970 June 23, 2017 at 3:05 pm #

            Yes, I know that Berlin and other German cities are not as safe as they used to be. Western Europe needs to withdraw from the UN Refugee Convention of 1951 or watch its civilization go down in ruins. There is an endless supply of potential economic migrants from Africa and the Middle East.

      • Majella June 25, 2017 at 8:21 pm #

        Are you, in fact, Janos?

    • Quatermain June 23, 2017 at 10:13 am #

      Demographics…. And racial composition.

      • Anon1970 June 23, 2017 at 11:18 am #

        Chicago’s black neighborhood of Austin has a higher homicide rate than many of Central and South America’s most dangerous countries.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 2:03 pm #

          Parts of Stockholm are more dangerous than Somalia – because of the Somalis and other Muslims.

          • GreenAlba June 24, 2017 at 2:45 am #

            ‘Parts of Stockholm are more dangerous than Somalia – because of the Somalis and other Muslims.’

            Please don’t be completely ridiculous. You sound like the moron Trump. I live in the UK, where the idiot Trump said there were no-go areas. The man has an ignorance problem that stands on stilts even by the standards of the geographically challenged US population (apologies to those who do actually know where most countries are). There are no no-go areas in the UK, not a single one. And while we have had our share of terrorist attacks, they fade into insignificance compared to the number of people killed in car accidents in a month.
            Likewise, you are many times more likely to be shot accidentally by your own toddler in the US than by a terrorist. But if you live in a Middle Eastern country that had the misfortune to be invaded by the US and its allies (including the UK) on the basis of utter falsehoods, your innocent wedding guests are more likely to be killed by an American drone than anything at all is likely to happen to the average American.
            There’s a mosque at the end of my street and several Asian shops that I use on a regular basis. They do not worry me in the slightest. I’d be more scared of the alt-right in your own dear country.
            When I visited Syria in 2006 as a tourist, Damascus was the safest city I’ve ever been in. No drunk or drug-addled idiots likely to mug you. It’s not like that now, of course, since George W. Bush and Anthony Charles Lynton Blair decided to set about the wholesale destabilisation of the cradle of civilisation on the basis of utter nonsense.

          • Elrond Hubbard June 24, 2017 at 10:28 am #

            A bigot will believe what he feels like believing, period. That’s the definition of a bigot.

            Whereas people with respect for the truth will pay attention to all the facts, good and bad:

            Is Molenbeek really a no-go zone?

            http://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/molenbeek-belgium-no-go-zone

            “Belgium has produced more jihadi fighters, per capita, than any other western European nation and is estimated to have despatched around 520 recruits to the Islamic State cause in Syria. Even the idea of visiting the land that is home to the EU parliament is enough to inspire trepidation in some foreigners.

            “‘Go to Brussels?’ Donald Trump remarked on Fox News in January 2016. ‘I was there 20 years ago.’ Back then, Trump recalled, the Belgian capital was ‘so beautiful. Everything was beautiful.’ Now, he declared, ‘There is something going on and it’s not good. They [the Belgians] want sharia law. There is something bad going on.’ Travelling to Brussels, Trump asserted, requires you to rub shoulders with people who are ‘living in a hellhole’.

            “The president didn’t mention exactly what evidence had informed this judgement. The likelihood is that he’d been reading reports from the now world-famous quarter of Molenbeek-Saint-Jean in the centre of Brussels. …

            “If the casual barbarism inflicted on the Congo [e.g. under King Leopold II] is a source of residual shame, Belgium’s subsequent handling of immigration from north Africa has been hardly more distinguished. Certain streets adjoining Brussels’ Gare Du Nord (in Saint-Josse-Ten-Noode, the poorest commune in Belgium, close to Molenbeek-Saint-Jean but not part of it) exhibit a flagrant lawlessness that would alarm anybody. It’s here that Mehdi, a friend of a friend, takes me to meet some of his neighbours from Molenbeek. He leads me into a bar where every vice known to humanity is catered for. The only women present are Congolese and of a matronly build.

            “‘Who are they?’ I ask Mehdi.

            “‘The maquerelles [female pimps],’ he says. ‘They control the girls.’

            “(Younger black women are displayed in windows along the street.)

            “‘Who controls the pimps?’

            “‘Who do you think? The police.'”

          • Janos Skorenzy June 24, 2017 at 12:44 pm #

            Green (Red) Alba: You sound like one of those moron Civil Servants who turned White English girls away when they said they had been groomed and raped by Muslim men. Care to talk about Rotterham? Or Oxford? Or God knows how many other cities where this is happening? Even the BBC recently admitted it. It’s a national scandal but you’re playing dumb for your American audience here, confident they don’t know about it. Despicable.

          • Janos Skorenzy June 24, 2017 at 12:48 pm #

            Elrond admits there are problems, just not from Muslims or Blacks. It’s all White people’s fault. Once White are eliminated, the World will be a paradise just like Black Africa before the White invasion. Whites brought hunger, poverty, war, rape, slavery, and cannibalism to Africa.

            Too bad he’s not a BBC reporter: he would eat human brain if offered as one did recently. It’s alright as long as it’s not White!

          • Sean Coleman June 24, 2017 at 6:58 pm #

            Green Alba

            When you visited Damascus ten years ago did it occur to you why there were no menacing drug addicts or drunks around? Reading Peter Hitchens’s A Brief History of Crime I learnt that prison population of Britain was much smaller the Edwardian era and that many of those were serving short sentences for offences such as public drunkenness, swearing, sleeping rough and gambling in public. There was no drug problem them of course.

          • Anon1970 June 25, 2017 at 9:32 am #

            It seems to me that lately every “terrorist” incident in Europe is deemed important enough by American news media to report on. Almost all American homicides are ignored outside their local media market area. Even if American news media are not lying about the facts, I think they are guilty of distorting the news by ignoring incidents which they deem not to be politically correct to report on.

            On one day in February this year, Chicago recorded seven murders but I suspect that they weren’t covered by NPR or by the New York Times. The year to date body count in Chicago stood at 315 as of yesterday, very close to last year’s count for the same time period. My guess is that these figures are much higher than for the much larger City of London (UK) and its surrounding boroughs.

    • CirclesnCircles June 24, 2017 at 12:09 am #

      Wet dog – your stories about what you heard while in NZ are great. Good to hear people getting the help that they need with health problems.

      What I don’t understand is how so many Americans of mature ages buy so simply into the idea of – “gee, these other countries have it all figured out and have awesome healthcare at manageable national costs, why the heck can’t the USA just do that too?”

      Why do I never hear anyone say, “what are the downsides to those systems?” Here’s one:

      My New Zealand story from the mid-2000’s. Stayed at a small BnB and got into a long conversation with the owner. One of the stories she told me was this: About 35 years prior, her sister, hubby and 3 yr old son were in their backyard garden. The youngster was scurrying about, happened to trip and when he fell his face caught the raw, open edge of that short, coated-metal, green garden fencing. It jammed into this nose. They took him to their local doctor who fished-out what he could and then sent them on to the hospital for an x-ray because he wasn’t sure he had gotten it all. They go to the hospital, explain the situation, the Doc examines the kid and declares no x-ray is necessary. So, none was done.

      What happens? There STILL WAS a piece in there (it would have shown on x-ray because it was metal) and it eventually worked its way up his sinus and into his brain. Yes, he became permanently brain-damaged because the hospital preferred to save the cost of a fucking x-ray!! When she’s telling me this, the boy was almost 40 yrs old and still lived with his parents and always would because his brain is messed up.

      And there’s more dark side — right, wet dog….no chance of that couple going bankrupt BUT, they also got paid shit for what those fools did to their kid. You can’t sue, they have a Compensation Board who decides what damages will be and those parents were paid $100,000 total. Think about that! He has to spend a lifetime living under his parents care, can’t earn himself and that’s all they gave him. There’s a ‘healthcare utopia’ bubble burst.

      Another, not too pretty and very frequent scenario, is that in England, Ireland and Canada (no doubt other places too) if your health problem is not critical, you get put on a list for the MRI, sonogram, cataract removal, etc, that you need — for months out. You may have discomfort but, oh well, you have to wait. One situation I know about was a man in England who had to wait 9 months for the eye treatment he needed and when it came his time the disease had progressed past the point of the very procedure he was scheduled for!

      We have much work to do in the USA to get our healthcare and insurance thing figured out reasonably but boy, do I get tired of hearing the rosy stories about how socialized healthcare is so ultra wonderful. That dog won’t hunt.

      • wet dog June 24, 2017 at 1:43 am #

        Circle, you bring up good points. At this point, I don’t think there is any good solution. I was living in Germany when younger with my fiance, and her father was a baby doctor. She was telling me how aggravating the work was for him, because for the tiniest sniffle a Mom would bring the baby in, and he was always flooded with these small cases. And the paperwork was atrocious. He and his wife would spend weekends filling out all the insane forms.

        In reality, he told me he would have preferred being a gardener and to run a nursery, but he had a large family to raise.

        I don’t know what to say about the long wait times, and the poor boy who is brain damaged. It’s only going to get worse. Each country is effectively bankrupt, and it’s as if we’re all in slow motion waiting for the dominoes to crumble.

        I truly think we’re headed for a “bottleneck”, and we’re like Soviet Russia in 1938, not realizing that over the next 7 years they would lose 25 million people. It often feels that we are in a “Kobayashi Maru” situation, with no-winning strategy to avoid the horrors approaching.

        • CirclesnCircles June 24, 2017 at 1:06 pm #

          wet dog – let me add another piece to my NZ story that I think is VERY relevant. Whereas, socialized healthcare does solve some problems like people being able to see a Doc early in an illness because they don’t have to worry about paying for the appointment. It also can result in what you describe….people wasting alot of time and resources seeking medical help for simple issues.

          What’s worse, in my view, is the dumbing-down of the population regarding the VALUE of their health. I asked the NZ lady, “why didn’t your sister and her hubby say, ‘well, then we’ll pay for the x-ray?'” She shrugged rather sheepishly because she understood the validity of the question and replied, “they just didn’t think of that. It had always been that you trust the Doctors.” (Even though their primary Doc saw the injury first and it was he who understood the need for the x-ray). Those parents paid an enormous price for their simple obedience.

          Here’s another: a few years back, an Irish woman I know, who has lived in the USA for decades, told me about her niece in Ireland who was having alot of very uncomfortable abdominal cramping. Doc examines her and schedules a sonogram for 3 months out. The 21 yr old young lady kept complaining about the pain so my friend and her sister (the girls mother) split the $600 cost so she could jump the line and get the sonogram sooner. So much for “free” healthcare, right? But, get this…the girl didn’t really value her health with HER OWN money. However, she did value spending $150 per ticket for herself and her boyfriend to go to some big-name rock concert. My friend was pissed when she learned the girl had spent that kind of money on something inconsequential when her health needed tending to and she let other people pay for her test.

          Healthcare is certainly a sticky wicket, all around. But, we need full disclosure of the good, bad and ugly in any system being discussed or considered.

          • michael June 25, 2017 at 6:48 pm #

            Where I live obedience to perceived authority is unconditional and total.
            Thank God I lived in the US long enough to be disabused of this disease.

      • Jeremy June 24, 2017 at 10:03 am #

        “A late report by Swedish Police says the number of vulnerable zones in the country has jumped to 23. The areas often described in Swedish media as ‘no-go zones’ have sprung up across the country. The report says that the parallel social structure has emerged in those areas with police facing difficulties carrying out their duties there. ”

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNEZQTSJv4Y

  7. Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 9:49 am #

    Which is why health care outcomes are inversly related to health care costs.

    • seawolf77 June 23, 2017 at 9:58 am #

      Exactly. If doctors were paid to keep us healthy, instead of curing us after we’re sick, we’d all be better off. I can’t help but blame Jesus for this mess. If that idiot hadn’t cured the sick, we wouldn’t be in this mess.

      • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 10:09 am #

        That reminds me of the joke, three guys in a bar notice Jesus sitting alone, (edit for brevity) and buy him a drink. He heals two of them, and the third one says, “Don’t touch me, I’m on disability”.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 2:05 pm #

        Staying healthy is the individual’s responsibility. Just like defending yourself is as well. Stop trying to blame other people for your own mess.

        • ozone June 23, 2017 at 11:59 pm #

          Hooray for me and fuck you; a fine and necessary outlook in the coming fascist paradise.

          • Janos Skorenzy June 24, 2017 at 12:23 am #

            That just shows your ignorance. Fascists believe in National Health Care, but obviously taking care of oneself is part of that.

  8. MrTibbs June 23, 2017 at 10:04 am #

    Once again, JHK has written a narrative which perfectly depicts a day in the life of the future of members of the old republic!!!

    -T

    They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

  9. FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 10:05 am #

    Another example? Look at Germany. Despite their debilitating, backward, commie-based free health care, they are the 4th (or 5th?) largest economy in the world. How could that ever work?

    Germany is a very special case. The Adenauer miracle is based on the loot they collected during the occupation of Europe and never surrendered, except for a very small laughable percentage.

    For example, the entire amount of Jewish reparations could be covered by gold harvested by Nazis from the crowns of their relatives, incinerated in furnaces of Buchenwald and Dachau.

    • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 10:12 am #

      Did Marshall get a cut?

      • FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 10:16 am #

        If only he alone…

        Most of our current problems are due to the fact that Germany is VERY rich and united and sponsor the same Nazi ideology through their agents of influence, Hillary being a good example.

        • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 10:26 am #

          Not to mention Bill.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 2:09 pm #

          Hillary, who wanted to flood America with Hispanic and Muslim immigrants, is a Nazi?

          You are simply hopeless, an Agent of Chaos. As Confucius said, the first step in reform is “rectification of names” or returning words to their real meaning. This you will always utterly oppose since you can only operate in the dim world or half understood words which you can then twist to your own purpose.

    • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 12:23 pm #

      “the entire amount of Jewish reparations could be covered by gold harvested by Nazis from the crowns of their relatives, incinerated in furnaces of Buchenwald and Dachau”

      Finc,
      Bullshit…ski.

      • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 4:51 pm #

        Finc.
        Given the 6,000,000 loss figure…the average dental crown consists of 2grams of 12 carat gold…this equates to 1,000,000 ounces (troy) of pure gold if each victim had one filling/cap…and all were recovered (assuming no “butt-holing” by the Sondercommando) Assume each victim had 34 teeth (the average human has 32, but these victims are anointed of God) and further assume all teeth were filled, that provides for approx. 40 Billions of dollars at the above current rate of $1300 oz.

        In 1986, it was reported that Germany had paid a total of 120 Billions of RM to that date…and the payments continued to this day.

        • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 5:03 pm #

          Finc,
          Pardon my math error…. The 6,000,000 victim figure with one filling would provide for 1 million GRAMS of 24 ct gold…an error on my part of 16X. The current value today would equate to approx. 3 Billions of dollars.

    • michael June 25, 2017 at 6:50 pm #

      It does not work and your statements about Germany are rubbish.

  10. seawolf77 June 23, 2017 at 10:12 am #

    I recently brought my dog to the vet. His liver function was elevated by 20%. The vet recommended some pills that cost $76. I asked him what they were? He said something that helped the liver return to normal. I asked whether they were hormonal, steroidal, antibiotic … what? Finally he caved and told me it was milk thistle. That in a nutshell is the problem with medicine nowadays. The almighty belief that they can give you a pill that will fix it.

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    • CirclesnCircles June 24, 2017 at 12:22 am #

      Let’s be fair, tho…..pills can fix a great many things.

      Something you may know already but, in case not — many vet meds are exactly the same as the human meds for the condition being treated. Good that you asked for specifics b/c, often, if it is a human med you can ask for a prescription and then skip over to a pharmacy and get it filled for a tiny fraction of what the vet charges. I’ve done so many times. Vet may grumble slightly but, so what.

    • Jeremy June 24, 2017 at 10:05 am #

      Milk Thistle – it’s great for the day after a night of heavy drinking.

      • DA June 24, 2017 at 5:14 pm #

        LOL! Actually, it’s a great everyday tonic for the typical western diet. But be sure to take it with NAC – N-Acetyl-Cysteine – for best results.

    • sophia June 25, 2017 at 9:23 pm #

      Are you kidding? The problem with medicine is that they charge $76 for an herb. Veterinary medicine is getting more expensive too. You can buy milk thistle in the health food store for probably 12 bucks.

  11. JMR June 23, 2017 at 10:13 am #

    To put a fine point on it, here’s what happens when a state congress tries to make price transparency a thing. I get the complaints of the lawsuit, but obviously all these “associations” have no interest in working with the Ohio legislature to come up with some reasonable solution. They just want to block any price transparency at all.

    http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/ohio-hospitals-want-overturn-price-disclosure-law/PqWQ4QLlCh1E8aojbPHgmO/

  12. K-Dog June 23, 2017 at 10:22 am #

    Last October I slashed myself opening an X-acto type knife that had its plastic cap melted onto the knurling of the handle. Bad product packaging. I’ve mentioned it here. It had been bandaged for several hours before I showed it to Mrs. Dog who informed me that if I did not go to the hospital and have it checked out right away it was going to be no chasing any of the kitty for me. So I went.

    The midnight emergency room doc did a great job putting three stitches in my paw and sent me on my way. The bill was over $4000.00. Insurance rejected it since I did the slashing at work and I promptly opened an L&I claim as instructed. The threat of having to pay $4000.00 got me moving right away and it was not hard to do. I called hospital billing and let them know and I was told that it was all good!

    Now months later the claim closed for further billing and I get a bill for $630.00 dated on the last day L&I would actually pay on the claim.

    WTF!

    I call hospital billing and am told: Oh, it was an L&I claim we did not know. Do you have the claim number? I give them the number and call L&I.

    If the hospital did not know it was an L&I claim what happened to the other $3470.00 but never mind that. L&I let me know that billing me was illegal (as I had already figured out). How could it not be if the state was already picking up the tab! That double billing can of worms would wiggle so hard it would fall over right away and hop its way right across the floor.

    So I’m back to not worrying about the bill but had I been an anally responsible citizen, and perhaps also a bit stupid, I’d have paid the bill.

    If I had would this illegal mistake then have been discovered in audit and the money returned to me? I don’t think so. I suspect such mistakes return a tidy profit. Remember I was told ‘they’ did know it was an L&I claim after more than three quarters of the bill had already been paid by the state. A twist on ignorance is bliss I guess.

    So things go with this Pequod crew member. One racket after another until the white whale does us in.

    • K-Dog June 23, 2017 at 10:36 am #

      Oh, and I should have mentioned that the $630.00 bill was a ‘Final Notice’ practically dipped in red ink and the next step would have been to turn me over to collections.

      Nothing like a little intimidation to scare the ignorant into writing out a check.

      • Hands4u June 23, 2017 at 11:33 am #

        This is what happens to many of my disabled clients and families that don’t have the where-with-all/resiliency to stand up for themselves or question those in power. The medical industry makes a ton-of-mon through personal discrepancies or inconsistencies.

        • Hands4u June 23, 2017 at 11:33 am #

          “A fool with money is easily parted”

          • Petro June 24, 2017 at 8:43 am #

            Did you mean a rich fool is easily chopped into pieces? Or: “A fool AND HIS money are SOON parted”?

      • ZrCrypDiK June 24, 2017 at 12:02 am #

        Jim – NAILED IT!!!

        Capitalism is *THE* racket that requires exponential growth of profits, by any means necessary. This literally requires an increased consumption of EVERYTHING in sight – mineral resources, living resources, water, etc. Renewable resource management is relegated to the “external costs” trash bin. In fact, I’d argue all profits are simply exploited external costs – the depletion/pollution/destruction *ARE* the profits (eg – treating the symptoms more profitable than the ‘cure’). Exponential population growth isn’t helping here, either…

        Not the best source, but I saw a recent Judge Judy, where an “insured” woman went to the ER for rabies shots. There was no major investigation – this was a simple booster shot visit, with potential followups (if the dog that bit her didn’t have it’s vaccination). The initial visit ‘bill’ was $9,500, and the insurance company ‘payed’ (haha) $6,500. So, she ended up owing $3,000, for what amounts to $150 MAX worth of work… (I suspect ‘they’ colluded, and split the $3,000 – find it highly doubtful INS CO payed a dime to HOSP) FWIW, no followup rabies shots necessary – dog was up to snuff!

        Cost! That sounds like Max Keiser. Nothing anymore arrives at a price point, as you would expect from a supply/demand curve. Price is now established through derivative trickery – high volume, high frequency, naked shorting, FED RES money printing, etc… The “good ole daze” of market fundamentals are long since gone (no mo long term investing either).

        Usury loans owed by indentured debtors guarantee their compliance (to the State). They say only 50% of Americans have more than $500 in savings for an emergency – I suspect it’s much, much lower (18%?). Smoke and mirrors/divide and conquer – nothing goin’ on over *THERE* at the Oligarch Headquarters!!! But, one must ask – how will the ‘little peepz’ pay their bills, if they leave their loathsome jobs (HOSP clerk/etc)… Keeping them “under the heel” (ie – in extremis) is the entire gameplan, a necessary condition for profit.

        • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 12:29 pm #

          ZCD,

          Judge Judy does not in any way resemble reality. I was on the show…they pay all “contestants” to be there, the show pays any award…the maximum award is $5000.

          • ZrCrypDiK June 25, 2017 at 2:32 pm #

            How teh F* U find this poast?!? I thought I buried it soo deep, that NO 1 would evah find it…. Yeah not much credence for JJudy. I just thought it *IRONIC* ($3 grand split between HOSP/INS).

    • Yuri Sowryteski June 23, 2017 at 10:47 am #

      Several years ago my then wife PMO, and I went out to weed the blueberries, with a sickle. Sliced into the knuckle of my little finger. It was a Sunday, and I didn’t want to go to the hospital, so I made Yarrow tea, cleaned it out, closed it with a thin course paper strip dipped in the tea, and then immobilized the pinky and the next finger with a splint and some fresh drywall compound. Two days later it began to itch, and I removed the cast, thinking how stupid I would look explaining to a doctor how I got an infected cut, but it had closed up nicely. In fact it healed with a very faint scar, and while it was stiff for a year or so, the stiffness and the scar went away completely.

      Cost out of pocket: one third of a cup of drywall compound.

      • K-Dog June 23, 2017 at 4:11 pm #

        You were not threatened with loss of kitty and I did not think three stitches would run $4000.00. Getting the stitches was a good idea as the risk I’d open the wound working was high. I might have had to take time off work until the danger of opening the wound abated.

        Your situation was different and there is nothing wrong with saving money.

  13. Scott Kieser June 23, 2017 at 10:25 am #

    Hello:

    I have a minor arithmetic correction regarding the data shown in the chart at the top of comment. Health care is eight percent of the GDP, not one eighth. One eighth is 12.5%. In other words, one divided by eight equals 0.125 or eight percent.

    • James Howard Kunstler June 23, 2017 at 10:36 am #

      Yes, thanks… a foolish brain fart on my behalf. I fixed it. This is what comes of writing at 6 o’clock in the morning. — JHK

      • seawolf77 June 23, 2017 at 10:52 am #

        Actaully I think it is 1/6 or 16.5%.

      • Elrond Hubbard June 23, 2017 at 11:02 am #

        The World Bank has U.S. health care as share of GDP at 17.1% as of 2014, up from 13.1% in 1995. That’s over a sixth of the economy.

        http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.TOTL.ZS

        I wouldn’t worry about the discrepancy so much. The World Bank is likely lumping in things that Jim’s graph isn’t counting.

        Assuming the World Bank’s own data is apples to apples, the U.S. is much higher than the group of OECD countries (going from 9.2% to 12.3%). Plus, since the U.S. is part of OECD, the difference would be even bigger than if you compared U.S. only versus all other OECD except U.S. Any way you slice it, the U.S. is a huge outlier, in a bad way.

      • ZrCrypDiK June 25, 2017 at 2:45 pm #

        I just missed U/U just missed *ME* !

        They’ve been about 20% GDP for a couple decades (INS CO). Tat’s teh biiiig newz…

  14. Piper Michael June 23, 2017 at 10:26 am #

    Above, we see the ‘solution’ to the problem as killing old people.
    Obviously, a deranged ignorant lifeless and evil soul made this suggestion. We used to be about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and it was so, until when?
    Until the Money Changers took over the ‘issuing power’ of money.
    Governments, have always had the ability to ’emit bills of credit’, or, print money on their own without borrowing a damn dime. In the civil war, Lincoln had a problem, he had to fight a war, but the New York bankers were going to charge him 30+% interest… so he said “f you” and was counseled into emitting “Green backs”(yeah, that’s where the word came from because they were green on the back…)
    If the US government, and all the governments of the world got together, and said F you, to the International banking cartels, and arrested, them, or even, had public executions, then decided to issue their own currencies, without debt(like Lincoln did). I assure you, most of the worlds money problems would come a screeching, crashing halt.
    Of course, there would then be the problem of corruption writ large, but, what’s the difference between a fiat piece of paper, and a truly fiat piece of paper? Corruption centered around banks, or corruption that is responsible to the people, with a new amendment that says, two terms, in all public office, or civil service office, and you’re out. Then there would be no time for the poor bureaucrats and politicians to game the system.
    But, we would rather scapegoat old people, because we paid our taxes and are owed MY OWN GODDAMNED MONEY BACK!

    • pequiste June 23, 2017 at 8:14 pm #

      Cutting very close to the bone here Piper Michael.

      Remember what the Banksters had their agent tell Pres. John Fitzgerald Kennedy: ” Hey Johnny don’t fuck with the money!”

      He tried to and at a certain Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas one sunny November day he was “corrected.”

      Nothing personal you understand, just business.

  15. venuspluto67 June 23, 2017 at 10:26 am #

    Spare yourself the angst of even worrying about the outcome of the current healthcare debate. It’s not going to get “fixed.” The medical system as we know it is going to blow up, and soon, just like the pension systems across the country, and the treasuries of the fifty states themselves, and the rest of the Potemkin US economy.

    Yes, that’s exactly why I don’t take at all seriously any of the talking-points being spoon-fed by the codependent Kool-Aid drinkers of the Democratic Party. But what frosts me is that the disdain of the working class for the wolf-in-sheep’s-clothing that is Obamacare is why Trump won and why Republicans have been leaving the Democrats in the ditch for almost every election cycle since 2010. So what are the Republicans doing in response to this? Why, crafting a healthcare plan even meaner than Obamacare, of course!

    But I guess I knew there was going to be trouble when the movement to repeal Obamacare turned into this meme that we have to repeal and replace Obamacare. With a healthcare delivery system this fundamentally narcissistic and morally bankrupt, of course anything you do to tinker with it is just going to make things even worse!

    This is but one example of why from now on, I will never vote for another Democrat or Republican ever again, and anyone who would really has to have their heads stuck firmly in the sand.

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    • Hands4u June 23, 2017 at 11:38 am #

      Unfortunately while the Wizard(s) behind the curtain are trying to fix/cover-up/zip-up their foolishness that a multitude of people are falling into the major cracks where they may not be able to rise.

  16. Elrond Hubbard June 23, 2017 at 10:31 am #

    Accidents Of History Created U.S. Health System

    http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=114045132

    “If you want to understand how to fix today’s health insurance system, you’d be smart to look first at how it was born. How did Americans end up with a system in which employers pay for our health insurance? After all, they don’t pay for our groceries or our gas.

    “It turns out there never was any central logic at work. The evolution of the American health care system began in the 1920s, when choices boiled down to which crazy cure you preferred…

    “Before the birth of modern medicine, hospitals were poorhouses where the indigent went to die. Then came the advent of effective medicines, especially antibiotics, along with a revolution in medical schools…

    “Health care became much more effective, and much more expensive. Clean hospitals, educated doctors and real pharmacological research cost money. People proved willing to pay for care when they were really sick, but it wasn’t yet common to go for checkups or survivable illnesses.

    “By the late 1920s, hospitals noticed most of their beds were going empty every night. They wanted to get people who weren’t deathly ill to start coming in.”

    And it goes from there. Yes, it’s NPR, but hold your nose and check it out anyway. Unlike most other wealthy nations, the U.S. has been content to let this kind of thing grow and feed on itself, to the point where American health care is a bloated aneurysm of marketing B.S. sheathed behind opaque pricing.

  17. Walter B June 23, 2017 at 11:03 am #

    There can be little doubt Jim that the Health-Sham system must surely bloat to the point where it simply falls on it’s face and lies there until it dies and the entire economy croaks along with it. I once heard a medical provider commercial on 77 WABC radio that stated that “people will pay ANY price for one more minute of life, for one more hour, for one more day” as they extolled their abilities to deliver such pathetic returns on the massive expense that they charge. But yes, people will sell the souls of their own children (and their futures as well) to cheat death and that is why there will be no reprieve for the weary insurance payers. They WILL pay – any price until they can no longer pay at all, so screw ’em!

    My good friend who is an RN in the management of a “Health Care” provider pointed out a rather obvious reason why we are all doomed as far as this scam is concerned, and that is diabetes. A disease that once had a high mortality rate and shortened lifespans for its victims, it is now pretty much held in check by treatments and drugs. It is a very expensive condition to treat throughout the course of a lifetime and no one that has it is paying for the total of their own expenses, these are spread out over the entire paying pool. Diabetics are growing in number for many reasons including medical treatments and are producing more and more diabetics, all of whom require huge expenses to be shouldered on the backs of the rest of the payees. I may be derided as uncaring scum when I say that I do not feel that I have a social or a moral obligation to help pay the bill when the next 750 pound welfare diabetic has to have a hole cut in the wall of their 4th story tenement so they can be craned out to the street for the trip to the hospital, but I cannot see how I should be responsible for this expense. I also would have no regrets at all in denying Bradley Manning the sex change that I am sure we all paid for so that he did not have to serve his time in a male prison, even though I applaud his creativity. Making those who get less out of a system pay more and more every year in order to pay for those who take more and more is simply retarded, but then the system and the scum that run it are pretty retarded too aren’t they?

    • Beryl of Oyl June 23, 2017 at 11:58 am #

      I’ve noticed that among families on welfare, the kids are more likely to be diagnosed with various drugs to treat nebulous mental/behavioral conditions, and that many of these drugs have the side effect of ruining the metabolism and predisposing the child to diabetes.
      Also, the starchy crap labeled by the Big Food industry as meeting nutrition requirements plays a role, as poorer kids are more likely to eat two, and now even three meals a day, in school.
      This is another form of rent-seeking, these campaigns against “child hunger”.
      All kids get hungry.
      Black children in poor areas are more likely to get up off their butts and play outside than white kids, but is still see fat kids in that group.

    • beantownbill. June 23, 2017 at 11:58 am #

      I’m with ya, Walter.

    • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 12:50 pm #

      Walter,
      I think we all are in agreement regarding health issues that are brought on by choice of deleterious behavior…it rankles to pay.

      I see the beginning of our health care “nightmare” being the mid-60’s, when medical care for the poor became the responsibility of Uncle Sugar…deep pockets there for the divining…at any level, in every endeavor, whether it be section 8 housing, food stamps, education etc. Industries will expand and belly-up to the trough…a seemingly inexorable part of our system.

      I believe that medical care, on a basal level, should be considered a human right…but I have no idea how to provide for such…probably single-payer is the best of all bad paradigms.

      • Walter B June 24, 2017 at 5:28 pm #

        “Healthcare” might have a shot at working if people could choose what kinds of conditions they wanted to insure against such as heart attack, stroke, appendicitis and opt out of things they felt comfortable not insuring against such as HIV, Sickle Cell Anemia, and thereby reduce their premiums. As HC stands now those who pay cover not only ALL of the possibilities but all of the most expensive possibilities and things they will never even have to worry about in the first place. I for example would never subject myself to chemotherapy but would pursue natural and/or herbal remedies instead, and my family genetics has absolute NO history of cancer on any side so worrying about getting it is NOT even a minor concern in the first place. I would gladly refuse coverage for this particular malady. We have no choice because it is not about paying for what we might get but it is for paying what other, more healthcare intensive individuals may need, plus the salaries and profit margins for the executives, lawyers, and healthcare professionals that service the system. Your common Joe cannot even begin to conceive how ridiculously over expensive this all is and since he knows nothing of money, finance or how to handle such issues, he will simply pay, pay and then pay. They will never understand and the fear factor will drain them all of their very last cent or line of credit before they simply perish.

  18. seawolf77 June 23, 2017 at 11:07 am #

    When this all blows up, everything we believe in will be overturned. Religion, banks, government, medicine, sports, politics, education. Everything.

  19. SnowieGeorgie June 23, 2017 at 11:24 am #

    HOW TO CUT YOUR HEALTH CARE COSTS ?

    Stop smoking. Eat fewer processed high-salt foods. Exercise at least 3 times weekly. Drink less. Eat no junk food or high-sugar soda. Watch less TV. Eat more fresh vegetables and fresh fruit.

    Etc. If you preface the comment above with your having had the foresight to pick genetically superior parents, then you are halfway to the goal of cutting your health care costs dramatically.

    This is part and parcel of the idea that staying out of the hospital is one way to avoid getting sick — what with all of the medical errors and medical-personnel transmitted deadly infections.

    I am sympathetic to all that James and other commentators here have said here about the failures of the American “Health Care” system. I really am.

    It’s just that most of the really sickly people I have known follow none ( or almost none ) of the seven useful guidelines posted in the first paragraph above.

    Good health in many cases is just a lifestyle choice away.

    Those that get very bad diseases or conditions, no fault of their own ( e.g., MS or ALS some horrible cancer ) — in spite of living properly, you have my sympathy. We need good medical insurance for people who suffer from bad breaks.

    I am less sympathetic to people who get bad breaks after a lifetime of making horrible choices.

    That probably means I am a bad person. So it goes.

    SnowieGeorgie

    • Beryl of Oyl June 23, 2017 at 11:34 am #

      One of the younger people I know who believes she is getting something of value through Obamacare, even though she’s paying more and not less for her “pre-existing condition”, that condition is asthma, and she doesn’t care enough about her health to actually quit smoking. She believes she is deserving of a subsidy from the government for “access to health care” which she seems to believe she wouldn’t have otherwise.
      Anyone who can afford access to cigarettes can pay for one of those inhaler thingies.

      That’s one reason I believe no one should be using insurance for doctor visits. Insurance should be just that, insurance, against something catastrophic you couldn’t prevent. If people want to abuse their health, let them walk around feeling like crap, or pay for their doctor visits themselves.

      • My Point of View June 23, 2017 at 2:49 pm #

        Beryl, it seems this is the de facto, unstated GOP point in doing away with the ACA, i.e., “If people want to abuse their health, let them walk around feeling like crap, or pay for their doctor visits themselves.”

        This amounts to social darwinism, where the fittest survive to thrive and others enter into an also ran status to sink or swim on their own.

        In a way this has to happen. So many people abuse themselves with alcohol, tobacco, illegal drugs and lousy food that the health care costs as they grow older will be so astronomical that it’s simply not affordable. GOP’s unstated policy is that these self-abusers must fend for themselves, i.e., take care of yourself or die off, and many are.

      • CirclesnCircles June 24, 2017 at 7:05 pm #

        Beryl says, “That’s one reason I believe no one should be using insurance for doctor visits. Insurance should be just that, insurance, against something catastrophic you couldn’t prevent. If people want to abuse their health, let them walk around feeling like crap, or pay for their doctor visits themselves.”

        Agreed! See a couple of my posts above about some stories from socialized healthcare countries. I believe people need to be invested in and on the hook for at least part of their health outcomes. Otherwise, they turn in health morons.

      • sophia June 25, 2017 at 9:53 pm #

        Totally agree. Insurance causes more problems than it solves.

    • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 12:53 pm #

      Snowie

      “We need good medical insurance”

      NO, we need affordable medical care. Medical Insurance eventually precludes affordability.

  20. Beryl of Oyl June 23, 2017 at 11:25 am #

    The Republican side of the Uniparty will fight to take care of the rent-seekers, just as hard as the Democrat side.
    The difference comes down to Planned Parenthood, really.

    Keeping two sets of books is a crime in some rackets, just not in the “health care” racket.

    Michele Obama made her largest living in the “health care” racket, though not any sort of health care provider what soever, after her husband was elected to high office.
    Do you really think people like this want their concoction to fail and go to single-payer?

    I can’t persuade some people, even now, that paying hundreds of dollars per month to a middleman for “access”, and then paying more at point of service, is a worse deal than paying out of pocket.
    Younger Americans in particular, have a firm believe that human rights such as medical care should not be paid for, without the understanding that the humans providing the medical care must be paid, or what we have is slavery.
    This belief is especially ingrained in those with “pre-existing conditions”.
    I honestly believe that some of them wanted the public recognition of their victimhood status. One such young woman is now spending thousands per year in access to treatment, whereas the cost of treatment, actual medicine and doctor visits, previously, ran in the low hundreds.
    Bear in mind, a sizable number of young people are diagnosed with ADD or ADHD or whatever they call it these days. The clinical diagnosis is often made by lay people, who have an interest in making the diagnosis.
    The man who discovered the condition says the diagnosis is way, way overused, but the parents seem to love it.
    So we have generations labeled with bogus “pre-existing conditions”, as soon as they are out of nursery school.

    One foreign woman I know, told me that in her home country, you walk into a doctor’s office, you see the posted prices, and if you don’t like the price at one, you go to another.
    The industry in this country was starting to correct itself just slightly, as in New York City the walk-in doctor’s offices were beating the pants of the patient-unfriendly medical “groups”.
    Obamacare to the rescue, making it illegal not to have insurance, and no one forced to buy insurance is going to pay out of pocket, so that problem was fixed.
    We can’t have the patient in the driver’s seat like that.

    The actual medical care received under Obamacare has become worse, because the middlemen are fighting tooth and nail to keep people from getting anything but the cheapest drugs, whether they work for the patient or not, and the doctors’ offices are indifferent, because it’s more work for them to keep up with the paperwork for anyone who doesn’t fit one of the boxes.

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  21. KesaAnna June 23, 2017 at 11:26 am #

    Healthcare again ?

    * Groan ! *

    discussions on race, criminal justice , or even why I hate the United States, are more pleasant , more interesting , even more productive conversations.

    Healthcare discussions ALWAYS get around to a bunch of pointless and ludicrous gripping about poor lifestyle choices , and gratuitous indulgence in sadism .

    It is all pointless and ludicrous because, even if you don’t smoke, don’t drink, don’t screw, don’t cut corners on sleeping , don’t sleep too much , don’t drive fast , don’t insult the police , don’t eat meat , bread, or cheese, and exercise a lot —

    — News flash ; you still reach a point eventually where you can’t make your quota, so you cost other people money and aggravation, and then, of course, you die anyway.

    Also, just about everyone i have met who fit the above healthy lifestyle description is an asshole you wish would drop dead.

    • Beryl of Oyl June 23, 2017 at 11:40 am #

      I’m not against paying for old people (Medicare). The ones who abused their health tend to die earlier anyway.
      I want to get us away from the notion that “we” have a say in other people’s treatment, because society pays for it or something.
      Middleman Hillary/Romney/Obamacare is just protection for the rent-seekers, with blaming of the victims, actual sick people.
      Where I get irritated at the sick with poor lifestyle choices, is where they applaud making some young healthy schmuck pay through the nose for something he doesn’t want or need, because they think it nets them something.

    • beantownbill. June 23, 2017 at 11:54 am #

      Such discussions are not pointless and ludicrous. Who says anything about living forever? That’s another topic altogether. Nature didn’t design us to be immortal, but it also didn’t design us to be sickly, either. The causes of some diseases can be very subtle, but other serious medical conditions are caused by gross neglect of one’s health. Life is tough enough without having to pay a large percentage of my income and wealth because of stupid decisions made by the public at large.

    • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 12:40 pm #

      This is what old people have bitched about since the beginning.
      Falling apart and having to pay, in more ways than one, for bad decisions, bad genes, and bad luck. When they reach the drooling years part II, they’re too far gone to bitch, but too precious to let nature take its course. That being the upside.

  22. Anon1970 June 23, 2017 at 11:32 am #

    Neither the Senate nor the House bills to replace Obamacare are about making health care more cost effective in the US. They are about cutting government spending (to make more tax cuts available to high income Americans) and about reshuffling the deck chairs on the health care Titanic.

    Cutting funding to Planned Parenthood will mean more homicides and other shootings in the ghettos in about 15 years, not mention more requests for government welfare by baby mamas way before then.

    The state of the union is not strong and getting weaker by the day. Will Illinois soon become the first state in the country to default on its general obligation bonds since the Great Depression? It sure looks that way.

  23. FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 11:33 am #

    Doctors and medical insurers in America in my opinion is the most corrupt and parasitic part of the society whose compensation far exceeds their merits.

    • Beryl of Oyl June 23, 2017 at 11:45 am #

      The game they play is now much worse, after “reform”. Each side playing hot potato, who can get the most while giving away the least.

  24. vitaly2030 June 23, 2017 at 11:55 am #

    Kunstler Salty Meter: 6 out of 10 salt blocks.

  25. vitaly2030 June 23, 2017 at 11:58 am #

    Jim, I’m going to be offline for two weeks, but when I get back I’m going to measure you bi-weekly pissed off level with the Kunstler Salty Meter. Then graph the results for the year. Should be interesting.

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    • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 1:00 pm #

      I’m going to measure you bi-weekly pissed off level with the Kunstler Salty Meter. Then graph the results for the year.

      Vitaly,
      Sounds entirely subjective. Does pissing on your Salty Meter skewer the results? You need input from the readership.

  26. capt spaulding June 23, 2017 at 12:00 pm #

    The cost of healthcare is no different than any other area of the economy that can be influenced by corporations. The whole not so secret, is to buy the politicians. There’s no mystery to any of this stuff. As long as the sheeple allow themselves to be sheared, the shearing will continue. The amount of corruption affecting this country is staggering, and shows no sign of letting up. Something has to give.

  27. routersurfer June 23, 2017 at 12:02 pm #

    Damn you can write! Really enjoy your new book. Amazon review will be posted this weekend, after I finish. Thanks for not giving up or in Mr. Kunstler.

  28. beantownbill. June 23, 2017 at 12:17 pm #

    We can talk all we want about lifestyle choices, corruption, greed, rackets, etc. (Jim is so right), but the real point of this discussion is mathematical. Simply that healthcare costs have been increasing annually at 9% for a long time, while the economy has been expanding at what, 3-5%? I’ll leave you to figure out how the 2 sets of data points graph out over time, but basic intuition and logic can tell anyone that eventually healthcare expenditures will increase to 100% of income. Before that point, the system will collapse. How much time do we have left? I’d guess 3 or 4 years. Then, there’ll be reform automatically.

    • capt spaulding June 23, 2017 at 3:09 pm #

      Point well made, Bill. To expand on what you’ve said, how long will it be until the whole corrupt system collapses due to the abuses promulgated by the elite against the middle class, and how much time do we have left in that regard? I would be interested in your thoughts.

      • seawolf77 June 24, 2017 at 8:51 am #

        Which explains the draconian health care bill.

    • Sean Coleman June 24, 2017 at 7:12 pm #

      From the graph with the article the big increase in the rate of medical costs dates from the late 60s (quelle surprise) when, presumably,, the racket got going.

  29. shabbaranks June 23, 2017 at 12:20 pm #

    “Of course the “servants” in the hospital scheme of things are a fantastic hierarchy of dangerously overfed clerks overwhelmed by the anomie of spending countless hours typing fictitious numbers into their work stations. A more pointless life can hardly be conceived. If you ask the ones who “interface” with you at the check-out counter how your bill was toted up exactly, you will receive nothing more than a pitiless stare of contempt — which is actually aimed inward at their own existential quandaries, a pathological dynamic that perhaps deserves attention from the research funding troughs.”

    Jim, as a CPA, I must say that this is one of the most trenchant, relevant and damning criticisms of the practice of accounting I have ever read. It is spot on.

    PS – My sister is an MD. She has no clue what the cost of the services she provides, but she is aware of the dollar value of tests that she recommends. It is well over $1 million per year.

  30. bukowskisghost June 23, 2017 at 12:34 pm #

    I blame it all on the alien life species who designed us. Some jackass who was more concerned with his stock options approved our design with his signature and a ” good enough” mumbled under his breath.

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  31. 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 12:36 pm #

    This is a fairly simple racket. First people paid for medical bills out of pocket. That’s not profitable enough. Then employers and insurance companies helped pay. Employers know a racket when they see one and balked at insurers squeezing greater profits. Now, the government, the bottomless wallet/trough helps pay. Now money is extracted from everyone (employers shifted more of the burden) and all facets of society (individual, business, government) and most importantl of that mix is the goose that lays the golden egg AKA Uncle Samwell

    • capt spaulding June 23, 2017 at 3:17 pm #

      The system started during WWII. With a freeze on wages & just about everything else, companies didn’t have much to offer the workers. At the time people payed for healthcare out of their own pockets. In lieu of a wage increase, companies started to offer to pay for healthcare. After the war, it continued. Insurance companies saw this, and started to raise their prices. It was no problem at first, but eventually the costs became so high that the companies began to shift some of the cost to the workers. After that, the rest is history.

  32. Elrond Hubbard June 23, 2017 at 12:43 pm #

    Layoffs start next month at the Carrier plant Trump ‘saved’ last winter

    And the Ford Focus is moving to China rather than Mexico. Oops.

    https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/6/23/15860812/trump-carrier-jobs

    “The Carrier plant in Indianapolis that Donald Trump mentioned frequently on the campaign trail and famously returned to during the transition is preparing to lay off 600 manufacturing workers next month, according to CNBC’s Scott Cohn, who observes that the ‘deal’ Trump and then-Gov. Mike Pence struck to save the plant ‘is not living up to the hype.’

    “The production work is shutting down, not because there isn’t demand for the products but because the company has determined that it is more profitable to do the work in Mexico.

    “Per the terms of the deal, Carrier will continue to employ slightly more than 1,000 people at the location. But of those, only 700 are the manufacturing jobs the argument was about — ‘the rest are engineering and technical jobs that were never scheduled to be cut.’ In exchange, Carrier is getting $7 million in state incentives, which it is pairing with $9 million of its own money to make a $16 million investment in the facility. Trump characterized that investment as being about creating jobs, but ‘United Technologies CEO Greg Hayes told CNBC in December that the money would go toward more automation in the factory and ultimately would result in fewer jobs.'”

    Oh, well. Delusions can be fun while they last.

    • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 12:50 pm #

      How ignoble indeed. A last ditch attempt at keeping jobs for the working class/poor at the expense of corporate profits/earnings sheets.
      Not that anyone was expecting a point beyond gauche schadenfreude.

      • Elrond Hubbard June 23, 2017 at 3:19 pm #

        If I’m going to do cheap schadenfreude, it’ll be directed at a deserving target, not at workers who are getting screwed. (The Democrats will take care of that part.) My real point is to question the credulity of anyone who thinks Trump is liable to come through on any of his promises. The Carrier deal wasn’t a “last ditch” anything, it was a stunt. It made no more real difference than releasing a helium balloon — people oohed and ahhed for a moment, then moved on to the next thing, which is what Trump wanted.

        Who knows? Trump has over three years to go, and still might go on to deliver something more substantive. But he also made promises about things like health care — that it would be available, affordable, better than Obamacare, etc. Instead, Congress is getting ready to pass a bill that cuts back heavily on Medicaid while delivering a big tax break for the wealthy. People will end up with less access to health care, not more, and Trump shows no signs of doing anything about it.

        Credibility is wasted on Trump, because he squanders it on ego trips and unforced errors like pretending to have tapes of Comey and the like. All that little move managed to do was get him investigated by a special prosecutor, i.e. shooting himself in the foot. Trump is a crude conman, all ego and no chops. The only way to get anything out of him is to put relentless pressure on him until he caves — not act like he has your best interests at heart just because he insults the people you don’t like.

        • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 3:44 pm #

          People oohed? Are you certain it wasn’t the media and aligned politicians?
          Don’t conflate.
          False promises, publicity stunts, and change is a commin’ rhetoric is the politician tradecraft that, let me get this right, you’re only now surprised by?
          Rather sad.

  33. FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 12:46 pm #

    Trump fires from double Twitter Barrel

    This is another victory for me, or rather our victory with Trump, as I described this very important, crucial Trump victory more than a month ago, publishing this post where “predicted” the collapse of the American media that took place yesterday.

    http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/new-book-safe-happy-place/#comment-304121

    But this collapse began that Sunday when representatives of the White House did not come to Channel 5 after Chris Wallace warned them that during the first half of the program he would roast them with questions about the dismissal of the FBI director and Trump’s twit, calling on Comey to think about a possible existence of records of his conversations with him before he begins to leak information to the press.

    And in this post I wrote that the last statement is a worm on the hook thrown in front of the mouth of the collective Bastinda, with an invitation to demand these records ala the Nixon case. And it seems that this collective Bastinda, having lost her brain, swallowed hook, line and sinker.
    That Trump does not know about the Nixon affair and blurted it out by stupidity, which must be used quickly.
    It just does not occur to them that when they jump through all hoops and involve everyone in the case, Trump will simply say that he meant the illegal wiretapping of his office, which Comey refused to investigate and which he (Comey) most likely organized himself. And they will be forced to report this, despite a conspiracy of silence around the Tramp administration

    And yesterday Trump tweeted:

    “With all of the recently reported electronic surveillance, intercepts, unmasking and illegal leaking of information, I have no idea…..whether there are “tapes” or recordings of my conversations with James Comey, but I did not make, and do not have, any such recordings.”

    https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/877932956458795008

    https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/877932907137966080

    And this thing, which he stuck up the Clintonoid ass, is so big that it did not fit into one tweet and had to be split in two. It’s a pity that Trump does not have a blog – there it would fit perfectly into one post – well, he can’t go on CIA-managed Facebook, can he?

    And I will use my victory to inform you again that from the same logic follows what these two tweets confirm – Trump received from Putin a message (ultimatum), according to which after the shooting down of the Syrian plane the Russian military will no longer give him time to fight with Hillary.

    And from now on, he must either jail her or put her in the chair, or take full responsibility for her actions.

    And the fact that Trump tweeted these tweets just now says that he does not want to answer for her artistry either in this world or in the Better One.

    • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 12:53 pm #

      Tontoenelvalle

      Also, non germane as well

      Analysts told Izvestia that rising drug prices were putting pressure on regional governments.

      “In Russia, there is no general standard of care for cancer patients,” David Melik-Huseynov, Director of Russia’s Institute of Healthcare and Medical Management, said.

      “The same drugs are needed to treat cancer, regardless of where a patient lives. But everything depends on regional budgets,” he said.

      Certain regions boosted funding: noticeably in Sevastopol, where spending increased by 451 percent. The Republic of Buryatia also upped funds by 249.9 percent, while the Voronezh region increased their budget by 231.9 percent.

  34. FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 12:57 pm #

    The calm before the storm

    The fate of war and peace is now being decided in Washington, but if you go to the news line, then there is peace and quiet and just all-encompassing grace. Compared of course, to what was going on yesterday.

    And in this grace there happening a very quiet distancing of prominent, but sane figures of the Democratic Party, as well as related European figures from the Crusade against Trump, which was started by Hillary Clinton. And the most interesting is that if Trump is not a Russian spy, it does not mean that the Crusade against him is not really a Crusade against Russia.

    On Sunday, the New York Times tried to jump off this Titanic, and just now Bernie Sanders recognized Trump’s right to regard RussiaGate as a fiction. I would not be surprised if Dianne Feinstein already promised to get sick with the flu when(if) Hllary gets taken into custody.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/20/opinion/russia-investigation-trump.html?_r=0

    • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 1:03 pm #

      Tontoenelvalle
      Also, nothing to do with today’s topic

      Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and his Indian counterpart Arun Jaitley have signed a roadmap for the development of bilateral cooperation.
      “We are determined to go ahead with building up cooperation in order to enhance the combat readiness of both countries’ armed forces and to exchange experience in various defense-related matters,” Shoigu said at a meeting of the Russian-Indian inter-governmental commission for military-technical cooperation.
      He said that in accordance with the agreements the experts of the two countries drafted a roadmap for the development of military cooperation between Russia and India, which is to become the basic document in planning bilateral contacts.
      At the end of the session Shoigu and Jaitley signed a corresponding document.

      More:
      http://tass.com/defense/953030

  35. JohnAZ June 23, 2017 at 1:01 pm #

    Healthcare spending is just another economic bubble systematically being created by the government to spur the economy and create jobs. At this it has been very successful. The problem is that in a capitalistic system, the free issuance of government money also known as Medicare, Medicaid etc., causes the public to swarm over to healthcare related occupations with consequential inflation. The blood suckers of society love it,
    By the way, before Obamacare, hospitals wrote off the millions of people that used the ER for medical care and were unable to pay. So the hospitals spread the costs onto everyone else. With the corruption in the insurance industry, it was easy to hide all the graft that was occurring.. Obamacare enabled those millions to “pay” their bills with “cheap” insurance in the ER. So who pays the difference, the taxpayer. When Obamacare tries to hold down costs, inflationary forces in the industry blow up the system. One note, Obamacare supposedly subsidized the millions of people, why haven’t the hospital costs decreased?
    Single payer is inevitable! All the free market solutions will eventually fail as they do nothing to control the real problem, the healthcare industry’s inherent cost inflation.

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  36. pequiste June 23, 2017 at 1:03 pm #

    As long as it is “de rigeur” for the physicians in my neck o’ the woods to have their Jaguars and Bentleys with a 55 foot sportfish at the yacht club and a $ 2-3,000,000 McMansion, then the current “health care system” (Goddamn I detest that phrase) medical establishment will continue whether you, me or the Congress like it or not.

    That’s because kitchen surgeries and self-medicating are chancy activities at best for the average schmoe. So they – the medicine racketeers – have a nice solid monopoly on the gig. (Yuri Sowryteski, stated above, he used some drywall to fix a cut finger. That takes some real cojones – I salute you.)

    Additionally, medical doctors, lawyers, computer “scientists” (and of course, the money magicians of Wall Street) are our hierophants and constitute the priestly caste of our age.You will wait for your absolution and be required to pay for a large indulgence peasant. (My private jet costs are tax deductible and it is waiting to take me to my little island near Martinique for a well deserved vaycay).

    The heavens, however, tell us it is just about time for the Proctopalypse, the revealing of the end of the current health care system of things: where, by the way, we ALL take it up the butt (no lube either.)

    • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 1:07 pm #

      How much is a lawyer, computer scientist, financial planner worth to you?

      How about your health, your life?

      Ball’s in their court bro.
      MDeal with it.

  37. morosa109 June 23, 2017 at 1:18 pm #

    Don’t know how much health care costs? Ask an Amish person. They pay in cash.

  38. Boiledfrog June 23, 2017 at 2:01 pm #

    So if I build you a cabinet out of the wrong wood, I don’t get payed. If you have a brain tumor and the hospital first treats you for a broken neck. You end up paying for the broken neck and the brain tumor. They learned that from car mechanics.

    • capt spaulding June 23, 2017 at 3:20 pm #

      payed , correctly spelled “paid”.

  39. Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 2:30 pm #

    God: Where is your brother Abel?
    Cain: Am I my brother’s keeper?
    God: What have you done? Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground.

    Libertarians would say we are not our brother’s keeper, but shouldn’t kill him either. God would say that not only are we our brother’s keeper, but that by denying it, we will end up killing him one way or another. Just like the author I read who defended exporting food from Ireland during the famine. The Market must not be denied after all. Such idolatry is murderous. Attn Tibbs.

    • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 3:00 pm #

      Cain: God, drop the f*****g feigned outrage. If you genuinely cared, your omnipotentness would not have waited until now to have this important talk.

    • sophia June 25, 2017 at 10:19 pm #

      Janos, you are quite the softie!

  40. FincaInTheMountains June 23, 2017 at 2:31 pm #

    Trump never said “There are NO tapes” – he said “I (or my people) didn’t make them”

    And he’s 100% correct, since those are ILLEGAL tapes made by his opponents eavesdropping on the Oval Office which wound up in the custody of he Trump’s people after sudden firing of Comey while he was away from his office.

    Clintonoids got caught up in their own web of lies and intrigues!

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  41. My Point of View June 23, 2017 at 3:12 pm #

    One thing driving Medicare costs through the roof is that 1/3 of all Medicare spending is done in the LAST 3 WEEKS of our lives.

    Let that sink in a minute. We can use Medicare for 20 years, but 1/3 of all the money they’ll spend on me comes in the LAST 3 WEEKS?

    Those last 3 weeks are typically spent in a hospital with tubes up your nose, down your throat, in your stomach, and up your urethra.

    This grotesque sadistic abuse of the aged is what religionists running most of our hospitals call “care.” The crowd on this forum see it for what it is, greed to the max, extending massive suffering for profit all the while hiding behind a bible of some sort.

    I’ve seen family members go this way and believe me, it’s a huge relief when they finally pass away and are no longer suffering; and we no longer suffer at watching them die this way.

    As I age you can be sure I’ll end up living in a state that has a Death with Dignity aspect to its laws. If and when my body is rotting from the inside with some cancer, and there’s no hope left that I’ll recover and go dancing with Janet on Saturday night, then I want a fucking pill and a quick exit. TaTa, see you in hell buddy.

    I’ve been on Medicare a few years now, it is a blessing to have, but like Piper Michael said, we paid into it all our lives and we now expect some benefit back to us and not kick that money upstairs to the Koch Bros.

    I will NOT let the Catholic hospital system (or Lutheran, or Baptist, or insert name of phony belief system here), with its 600 major facilities, keep me alive for weeks on end so they can bilk Medicare for hundreds of thousands of dollars per week. I will NOT allow it, nor should anyone who’s paying attention. Like same sex marriage and legalization of marijuana, death with dignity is the next big piece of social progress where WE THE FUCKING PEOPLE take our lives back from BIG RELIGION, the ultimate racket of all rackets.

    Until JK takes on the king of rackets, we rely on George Carlin for the truth:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r-e2NDSTuE

    Have a blessed day. 🙂

    • capt spaulding June 23, 2017 at 3:21 pm #

      The king of rackets is congress.

      • My Point of View June 23, 2017 at 3:50 pm #

        Our GOP grovels at the feet of religionists, grand poobahs of the king of rackets. And it’s tax free to boot, talk about a racket.

      • JimInFlorida June 23, 2017 at 3:58 pm #

        And the king of rackets has an unholy relationship with the peddlers of the 501(c)3 religion. The two depend on each other.

    • snarkmatic9000 June 23, 2017 at 4:01 pm #

      Religion used to be the opiate of the people, but now we’ve got the real thing nicely juiced up with Fentanyl….not sure which is worse.

    • Hands4u June 23, 2017 at 4:40 pm #

      Insurance will not pay if you die of “old age” this is not considered a medical condition; it will pay for certain and particular conditions that also can bring about death that often coincide or occur with “old age”. These are billable.

      • Anon1970 June 25, 2017 at 10:18 am #

        Your life insurance policy will pay your heirs if you die of old age or at any other age.

    • baldi June 23, 2017 at 4:41 pm #

      Amen brother!

    • sophia June 25, 2017 at 10:27 pm #

      You are mistaken if you think hospitals are the major cause of this. The major cause is the families wanting everything done. Every hospital offers free living wills, and asks every patient upon admission if they want to have one drawn up.

  42. janet June 23, 2017 at 4:03 pm #

    Those last 3 weeks are typically spent in a hospital with tubes… –my point of view

    In your case, point of view, you have the right to refuse treatment. When a patient has been sufficiently informed about the treatment options offered by a physician, the patient has the right to accept or refuse treatment for two reasons:

    1. A patient has the freedom to decide what a physician or other health care professional will and won’t do.

    2. It is unethical to physically force or coerce a patient into a treatment against their will if they are of sound mind and are mentally capable of making an informed decision.

    If patient competency is questionable, the physician can give the information to a legally appointed guardian or a family member designated by the patient to make decisions for them.

    When the big D comes (terminal diagnosis), we have the right to decide whether or not to undergo a treatment that we know will clean out our savings or put us into a lifetime of debt.

    I agree with you about dancing, and death with dignity. Both the medical and religious priests need to respect one’s right to make an exit. Especially at end-of-life, which is why advance directives and DNRs are important: put DNR on your refrigerator in big letters (for the benefit of first responders) to avoid CPR. Buen viaje!

    • My Point of View June 23, 2017 at 4:45 pm #

      Exactly. But I want to do more than refuse treatment, I want a pill to take me all the way out and end any/all treatment, even palliative care in hospice. I don’t even want to reach the hospice stage, if I’m terminal and going downhill then I want to get off this train at MY convenience.

      I can do it with a handgun on the steps of a local church peddling that “live is precious” crap or I can do it with a pill.

      When a person at the end of life wants out, they want out, and no one should stop them. Doctors can explain the options, no one will be allowed to coerce the person, it should all be spelled out in advance and there shouldn’t be any discussion about it. When it’s time for me to go, then I want to go without anyone’s interference.

      In Colorado, which recently passed their own Death With Dignity law at a 70% approval rating, the Catholic Diocese of Denver spent a million dollars fighting the ballot initiative. Who the hell are they to try and write our laws for us? I want all religions, especially big religion, to get off our backs and out of our politics and government.

      If anyone’s “beliefs” rule out DWD, fine, that is their choice, they can suffer for weeks in a coma, moaning, groaning, rasping for breath.

      But dammit, I want MY choice for MY life and death, and I want it without the interference of any religion or politics.

      • malthuss June 23, 2017 at 9:33 pm #

        ‘try to write’, nimrod.

        Considering the late abortions and doctor assisted suicides, I am with the Church.

  43. baldi June 23, 2017 at 4:35 pm #

    …health insurance policies with $8000-deductables, when they don’t even have $500 in savings to pay for car repairs?”

    After 12 years without health insurance my husband and I finally got covered with the ACA. We are small, independent business/farm owners. Our ACA insurance has no deductible, low co-pays, dental, and vision coverage and is great. I don’t understand the hatred of the ACA. Before it came we couldn’t get insurance because we didn’t make enough money to buy it but we made “too much” to get it through social services (which would have been difficult for us to swallow anyway).

    • My Point of View June 23, 2017 at 4:48 pm #

      The bastards hate it because a BLACK man got it done. In GOP eyes and it’s base of haters anything a BLACK man does has to be stopped, burned, stomped, decapitated, raped, pillaged, shot, suffocated and stopped at all costs. Stopped at all costs even if it kills US as we don’t count to them, we aren’t billionaires and the other 1%ers who donate huge amounts to get laws passed that favor them.

      • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 6:04 pm #

        The black, in complexion only,man didn’t do anything but ran through a extremely flawed and failed vanity project.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 7:24 pm #

        Oh rubbish. He just signed what the insurance companies had written, with some additions and subtractions hammered out by the Party. I grant you he made some calls, but were they that hard? Considering that most of the Party worships him like you do?

        • malthuss June 23, 2017 at 9:37 pm #

          You tube, wolf children of eastern Europe,.

    • Hands4u June 23, 2017 at 4:56 pm #

      My wife family and I were the same due to under-employment and self employment. For us ACA was almost as good as what was offered by the state(MNSure) but now that I’m employed by a company again everything is more expensive. Personally I hope single payer is the best option. Those who can afford more, will, as they always have.

    • Anon1970 June 23, 2017 at 5:31 pm #

      ACA benefited some users and hurt others. That’s true for a lot of government programs when costs are factored in. More often than not, single people end up subsidizing married couples with children and a non-working spouse. This especially true for Social Security and related benefits.

  44. JimInFlorida June 23, 2017 at 4:51 pm #

    What JHK says about our current health care crisis is true but, he is forgetting the REAL paradigm shift that took place in 1973. That being the privatization of health care and turning it into a business. Before the HMO’s, medical care was a dividend of progress and regulated for the public benefit. Community hospitals and house call doctors were common. The docs went about to treat legitimate ailments. Not cater to bad lifestyle choices.

    Yes, there were large pharmaceutical companies like Parke Davis, Johnson & Johnson, Squibb, Lilly, Wyeth, etc. but, we regarded them as AMERICAN companies and their breakthroughs in medicine were something we all felt a part of. Their progress was our progress. And behind it all, the New Deal inculcated a feeling of trust in our institutions. The original Medicare and Medicaid programs were the fulfillment of that social contract.

    The HMO Act in 1973 changed the entire paradigm and destroyed the public trust in health care. The people’s connection to icons of national progress was severed. We were demoted to zombie consumers of a globalized commodity and made hostages to a payment racket that we have no control over. Our local doctors and neighborhood pharmacists were replaced by chain drugstores, cold impersonal hospitals, opaque pricing rackets, and slavery to the insurance racket

    The reason Medicare and Medicaid are still trusted is that they are relics of the pre-HMO era and are still structured to deliver health care from the funding they receive. They have that reassuring and responsible frumpiness and utter lack of marketing flim-flam. As public entities, their funding is NOT converted into profits for rent seekers, CEO’s, and political payola.

    Medicare For All restores health care to its rightful place as a PUBLIC BENEFIT and trusted institution. NOT as a business racket that sells health care while laundering billions in profits for shareholders and political payola.

    I’d like to see a CASH option along with Medicare For All.

    If the local population has an average income of $22,000/yr (common in Flori-Duh), then the prices should be adjusted to the ability of the locals to pay. A good start would be to price medical services to what was common in 1960 and then adjust for inflation.

    • My Point of View June 23, 2017 at 5:15 pm #

      Nixon is on tape discussing HMOs and how Kaiser can make more money by providing less care. The GOP did it to us. Again. And I voted twice for this guy. (smacks head)

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QkgUkM0o6Q

      • Anon1970 June 23, 2017 at 5:43 pm #

        On the other hand, the traditional fee for service model encourages unnecessary procedures and often leaves the patient with very high co-pays and deductibles. Doctors get little or nothing when they tell you that you DON’T need a procedure done. Some doctors are more ethical than others.

        These days, Nixon would never survive the Republican primaries. He signed an Executive Order related to Affirmative Action and signed into law bills creating the EPA and the Federal Clean Water program,

        • My Point of View June 23, 2017 at 5:53 pm #

          Agreed. Today’s GOP base would probably machine gun Reagan for restoring taxes after Art Laffer’s idiotic trickle down voodoo failed, just as it did again recently in Kansas.

  45. My Point of View June 23, 2017 at 5:39 pm #

    Our FAKE Democracy

    https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/23/opinion/our-fake-democracy.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-right-region&region=opinion-c-col-right-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-right-region&_r=0

    – the United States, once known for our American Dream, now has the lowest class mobility of any Western democracy,…

    – towering increases in health care and college costs … an unclimbable wall between low-income limbo and a chance at the middle class.

    – the biggest institutional lie of the moment is that we have a government of the people, responding to majority will.

    – the Senate, laughably mischaracterized as the world’s greatest deliberative body — is going against what most of the country wants.

    – We have a fake democracy, growing less responsive and less representative by the day.

    – The sunset of Obamacare is the dawn of death panels.

    – 75 million Americans depend on Medicaid. This bill will make their lives miserable and perilous in order to give the top 2% a tax cut.

    – symptoms of democratic collapse — from the opioid crises of people who long ago checked out of active citizenship to the stagnation of class mobility — cry for immediate action.

    – Less than a third of Americans support Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement.

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    • Anon1970 June 23, 2017 at 5:48 pm #

      A decade or so ago, every state that had a gay marriage amendment on the ballot (over 30 states) approved it. Many Americans have been voting against their economic interests and for their religious beliefs for two decades. Now they have to live with the consequences.

      • John Howard June 24, 2017 at 1:22 pm #

        Yeah, those amendments were orchestrated by the Koch Brothers to promote their libertarian state’s rights goals. They were just to take people’s money and waste their time while ensuring that gay marriage prevailed.

        • Anon1970 June 25, 2017 at 10:34 am #

          The Koch brothers were interested in small government and low taxes. I don’t know how much they cared about gay marriage, pro or con. But putting a marriage amendment on the ballot was good for bringing out more Republican leaning voters on election day.

    • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 6:02 pm #

      It’s a republic. It’s a representative government. The problem is democracy.

  46. tucsonspur June 23, 2017 at 6:45 pm #

    It’s obvious that medical care itself has become a mountain, a morass of maladies, infecting the nation’s people. A mephitic, medical matrix, sick within itself and making us sick, as we continue to truckle before the caduceus. WTF. I’m powerless before it. My mind wants to smash it, but my body needs it. I am truly held hostage.

    A century of great advances in medical treatment, diagnosis, devices, prognosis, and prevention has seemingly hypnotized the hostages, camouflaging their common sense and paradoxically making ever increasing medical costs appear to be as inevitable as the next sunrise.

    What to do? Order it up!

    http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/on-health-care-well-have-what-congress-is-having

    • pequiste June 23, 2017 at 8:31 pm #

      “…truckle before the caduceus.”

      Splendidly stated Tuc.

      I second the motion that we, the people, should have the very same medical care as our hirelings; the members of the U.S. Congress,

      • tucsonspur June 24, 2017 at 10:49 am #

        Merci beaucoup!

  47. San Jose June 23, 2017 at 7:03 pm #

    I have Anthem Blue Cross/California Covered (Obamacare) for health insurance. It might come in handy if I get hit by a bus. I think they use most of their money sending out heavy envelopes that explain how they aren’t covering any of our medical expenses in 15 different languages.

    Apparently, they have assigned me a “primary care physician”–I got a letter from them with the contact info–he/she (don’t know the sex because of the foreign name)–the doctor is in freakin’ OAKLAND!!. Oakland is a 45 mile/hour drive from my house in San Jose! WTF? Their are over 4 million people in the Bay Area and they assign me a doctor in crime-ridden Oakland. Ha, ha.

    The only doctor I see is a wonderful board-certified (in family practice and sports medicine) Jewish doctor who is the world’s greatest acupuncturist. He charges just $135 a visit (not covered by Obamacare). When I went in for a sinus infection, he treated me with needles and gave me a prescription for Zithromax– “If you aren’t feeling a whole lot better in 24 hours, get the prescription filled.” I didn’t even need the prescription.

    My daughter recently came home from college and we needed a second opinion on something recommended by the university doctor (whom she hated). I called one doctor and told them I wanted to pay cash. The office said that the visit would cost at least $281., but that they didn’t really know how much it would actually cost until the end of the appointment. Forget about it.

    I called another doctor, one that I had used 20 years ago, but don’t any longer because of insurance issues. The doctor called me back and we agreed that I could pay $200 cash for the appointment Good deal! Everyone is now happy and healthy.

    My policy (and it’s probably stupid) is don’t go to the doctor for anything that might hurt. Colonoscopy? No thank you. Mammogram–like getting my boobs squashed by a bus tire–did it twice in my life and I’m not doing it again–too painful.

    Jen in San Jose

    • tucsonspur June 23, 2017 at 7:31 pm #

      I have yet to try acupuncture. If it can cure sinus infections, I’ll have to give it a go. Wonders and mysteries of “medicine”.

    • Anon1970 June 25, 2017 at 10:53 am #

      There is a Kaiser medical facility in San Jose and I would suggest that you look into it. I learned the hard way that by the time a medical condition starts hurting, it may have already done a lot of damage inside your body.

  48. tucsonspur June 23, 2017 at 7:06 pm #

    Last night,Tucker Carlson talked about the Yulin dog meat festival taking place in China. Here, thousands of dogs are slaughtered, put on hooks, etc., then eaten. But first they must be tortured, to increase the benefits of the dog meat, libidinal or otherwise.

    Defenders spoke of “cultural relativism”, respecting different rituals among different people, saying that we’re really all the same.

    Tucker’s response was, “No we’re not. They torture and eat dogs, we let them sleep on the bed”.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 23, 2017 at 7:20 pm #

      Overheard in a Hare Krishna Temple. Young Chinese man tells a Hare Krishna that he has finally given up meat. Hare Krisna, with a Texas accent, “Congratulations, that’s not an easy thing for a Chinaman. There’s nothing a whore won’t do and nothing a Chinaman won’t eat.”

      • tucsonspur June 23, 2017 at 7:51 pm #

        From “Hombre”:

        Audra Favor: I can’t imagine eating a dog and not thinking anything of it.

        John Russell: You even been hungry, lady? Not just ready for supper. Hungry enough so that your belly swells?

        Audra Favor: I wouldn’t care how hungry I got. I know I wouldn’t eat one of those camp dogs.

        John Russell: You’d eat it. You’d fight for the bones, too.

        Audra Favor: Have you ever eaten a dog, Mr. Russell?

        John Russell: Eaten one and lived like one.

        Audra Favor: Dear me.

        Interesting? Yes No | Share this: Facebook | Twitter | Permalink

        • tucsonspur June 24, 2017 at 12:24 am #

          Oh, can the Chinaman use chopsticks?

          • Janos Skorenzy June 24, 2017 at 12:53 pm #

            Behold the Mighty Englishman,
            He rules the Hindoo small.
            It is because for he eats meat,
            That he is two cubits tall.

      • malthuss June 23, 2017 at 9:30 pm #

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibybvI19aOs

    • 100th Avatar June 23, 2017 at 7:36 pm #

      Barbarians let them sleep on the bed! Who cares to have an exposed furry *sshole lying on the pillow next to them? Well, besides Anderson Cooper?

    • Elrond Hubbard June 24, 2017 at 10:08 am #

      I’m glad to hear Fox News host Tucker Carlson recognizes torture as a bad thing when it’s being done to dogs.

      Does he consider it torture when the CIA does it to human beings? Not as far as I’ve heard.

      • tucsonspur June 24, 2017 at 10:56 am #

        No, not when it’s done to evil fucks who would use our heads as soccer balls.

        Anyway, some human beings are dogs. Or worse.

        • 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 2:12 pm #

          Shhh, this Man-et, or ManJanet willfully ignores reality. Renounces it. Violates it. All for provocation. Its entertainment is your reaction.

          Man is not merely a conduit of evil as evil only exists through man.
          It is beyond the boundaries of absurdity to compare the designs and motivations of man with an animal’s.

          Yet this is where he, Man-et, clumsily lays his bait. Swim by it, like a fish.

  49. dolph9 June 23, 2017 at 10:04 pm #

    I’m a physician, completed residency in 2008 just as the crisis was starting. I personally saw things deteriorate in just my 3 years of residency from 2005-2008.

    I can tell you that the health of the average middle aged American is often shockingly poor. The doctors just pass them through the system. Yes, the costs are high, but we have no other choice. It’s either that or face a lawsuit or complains because you didn’t do everything you should have. So it’s always more tests and procedures.

    By the way, most doctors aren’t rich. The rich are the hospital and insurance company execs. Those guys, they make millions finding ways to screw you out of more of your money.

    But, but…the Republicans are good, noble white men who want to save America! The Democrats want the blacks and terrorists to take over!

    • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 2:03 am #

      ….and for the Constitutionalists, it’s Indian Summer……
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8-O1O_gvfA&list=PLl55Zh3U2VW7YD-JKHT0vYIk1ZCrK7c4-&index=26

      -T

      They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

    • JimInFlorida June 24, 2017 at 9:49 am #

      Congrats dolph9 for your professional achievement.
      Condolences for becoming a doctor in this wretched age.

      The genesis of the crisis began back in 1973 with the HMO Act. I discussed this further up the page.

      As things are, “Medicare For All,” is the only hope. It’s initial funding must come from removing the FICA income tax ceiling. The ultimate goal is a 1% Wall Street Sales Tax, which levies a tax on all transfers of derivatives, securities, and other synthetic financial instruments. If Goldman-Sachs has supercomputers that can make thousands of flash trades a second, great! ONE PERCENT OFF THE TOP EVERY FUCKING TIME!

      Split up the revenue as 1/3 to the U.S. Treasury and 2/3 distributed among the States for their social service needs. The money collected is more than enough for the Feds to offer Medicare For All at $100/month and affordable deductibles.

      Given the mass insanity and anomie of ZOG Amerika, provisions will have to be set in stone to ensure that MFA will be used for preservation of health and treatment of sickness and injury. It will NOT be used for elective surgery, sex changing, or treat the aftermath of preventable problems i.e. the LGBTQ freaks.

    • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 3:47 pm #

      dolph,
      Can you explain to the readership the rationale behind the “boot camp” residency training and the concomitant sleep deprivation? How does it benefit?

    • DA June 24, 2017 at 4:11 pm #

      Thanks Dolph for revealing what the more perceptive among us already know. US healthcare is like everything else in corporate America these days: a million miles wide and a micron deep. Its all about the wealth transfer!

  50. GhostOfHam June 24, 2017 at 4:17 am #

    Walter Burien has shown pretty persuasively that the pension funds are NOT broken. The assertion that they are broken is a front for yet another vituperative fraud, probably the worst yet as it involves health care.

    The pension funds have yearly budgetary shortfalls, but it’s by choice and deception via accounting that the shortfalls are misrepresented to the tax payers as terminal bankruptcy. Instead, the budget is shorted and singled out for public news with the intention of diversion, and a subsequent raising of taxes; however, the taxes do not go to the budget — often that money has already been re-allocated to the funds before the taxes are even collected, and may even be the very reason the following year’s budget is in arrears.

    Burien and his videographer, Clint Richardson, have used the governments’ own Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports to show that there are trillions of dollars of just about every conceivable corporation invested into by the over 180,000 districted incorporations of government (governments of towns, cities, counties, parishes, states, and federal entities). When you study this information, you learn that governments are corporations, that there are enough investment returns in the investment funds to pay all taxes for years and years ahead, that the Federal Reserve IS audited EVERY year, that CALPERS owns billions of dollars of Chinese-based investments, that public school retirement funds are rich, and that most all of these funds hold a top-10 of the same companies in stock, that government stock ownership means that the corporations don’t control the government but, rather, the governments own the corporations via their influence and via stock ownership, particularly in corporate board voting power.

    Check out
    http://cafr1.com
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oym2CxMENt8&ab_channel=paulagloria

    And search, generally
    https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=clint+richardson+cafr1

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    • DA June 24, 2017 at 4:18 pm #

      GOH: Synopsis please, especially since your assertion flies in the face of pretty much everything else out there. Indeed, if pension funds are indicative of the larger market as a whole (which they should be, as they are inherently conservative), what you’re saying here simply makes no sense whatsover.

    • Anon1970 June 25, 2017 at 11:39 am #

      I used to analyze municipal CAFRs for a living before I retired years ago. My last big accomplishment was was to recommend that my bank-employer not issue a multi-million dollar letter of credit to the City of Vallejo. The City later went bankrupt. So did the City of Stockton and the City of San Bernardino and the City of Detroit. Unsustainable pension benefits to retired employees and future retirees were a factor in each case. Owing to poor demographics and varying amounts of corruption, these cities barely survived financially in good times and it was not a surprise that they failed during the Great Recession.

      Mr. Burien and the writer sound like anti-taxers to me. The reality is that many government bodies in the US have large unfunded pension liabilities. Many of these pension funds have assumed unrealistically high future returns (7%+ annually) in a world of very low Treasury bond yields. The State of Illinois has the worst record for unfunded pension liabilities of any of the 50 states and has the highest probability of defaulting on its general obligation bonds in the near term.

      • GhostOfHam June 26, 2017 at 11:08 am #

        We have taken your trust and misappropriated the funds or could not manage to wind them down an let you know about it, and we regret to inform you that your pensions will be severely mitigated or not be honored at all even though you may have been charged with the added tax burden over the many years you were believing, working, and paying into the plans, in order for us to keep them active even while they have proven to be “unsustainable.” We recognize that some of us have been acting with full knowledge that some of our procedures or policies are illegal, but perhaps you should not have expected so much from your managers or your plan.

        ***
        42 U.S. code Sec. 1981

        (a) Statement of equal rights
        ALL PERSONS WITHIN THE JURISDICTION OF THE UNITED STATES SHALL HAVE THE SAME RIGHT in every State and Territory TO make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, give evidence, and to the full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of persons and property as is enjoyed by white citizens, AND SHALL BE SUBJECT TO like punishment, pains, penalties, taxes, licenses, and EXACTIONS OF EVERY KIND, and to no other.
        (b) “Make and enforce contracts” defined
        For purposes of this section, the term “make and enforce contracts” includes the making, performance, modification, and termination of contracts, and the enjoyment of all benefits, privileges, terms, and conditions of the contractual relationship.
        (c) Protection against impairment
        The rights protected by this section are protected against impairment by nongovernmental discrimination and impairment under color of State law.
        (R.S. §?1977; Pub. L. 102–166, title I, §?101, Nov. 21, 1991, 105 Stat. 1071.)

        What is “exaction”?
        http://thelawdictionary.org/exaction/

  51. FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 5:49 am #

    Phew, looks like it might be MIG Alley 1952 all over again, this time over the deserts of Syria.

    I believe the first time around we won that fight. I wouldn’t be so certain about this time. ==brh

    In the early 1950’s, US President Truman was preparing a nuclear attack on the USSR, but the US did not have a lot of atomic bombs at that time, and it was necessary to expend them carefully. Therefore, no air armada was planned, and to ensure that the American bombers would reach the target they were to be accompanied by the fighters.

    The question of the ability of American fighters to protect American nuclear bombers from the Soviet fighters over the territory of the USSR (that is, the question of the nuclear bombings of Moscow and Leningrad) was determined by whose fighters were the first to overcome the speed of sound.

    To clarify this issue, the USSR and the USA then arranged a test site for their fighters in the North Korean skies, in the so-called MiG Alley, where they very quickly found out that MIG-15bis and F-86 Saber are very similar, not only externally, but also in aerodynamics, as well as tactical and technical characteristics.

    But both of them were unable to overcome the speed of sound in air combat due to a rather complex phenomenon called flutter.

    A characteristic feature of this phenomenon was the self-oscillation of the wing due to the “flow of the boundary layer and its separation” accompanied by a sharp blow along the sound front as the speed of the aircraft approached the speed of sound. As a result of these self-oscillations, the wing could come into resonance and simply tear itself away, and this danger imposed great restrictions on the maneuverability of the fighter and its speed.

    Until Russian scientist, Vladimir Struminsky, did not understand the essence of this phenomenon and proposed measures to prevent it.

    As a result, MIG-15 already in 1950 learned to overcome the speed of sound, that is, 3 years earlier than the American F-100 SuperSabre. As a result, MIG-15bis turned into MIG-17, and within 3 critical years the US atomic bomb was neutralized, but the Soviet atomic bombs acquired the geopolitical importance that Russian weapons reached again only now.

    • JimInFlorida June 24, 2017 at 9:55 am #

      I thought the MiG-19 was the first supersonic Soviet fighter.

      While the Soviets moved on to the more famous MiG-21, the Red Chinese loved the MiG-19 and kept building on, and refining, the design for decades afterwards.

  52. FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 6:32 am #

    It seems that after all, the S-300 brought down an American drone worth over $200 million

    Two nights ago, two S-300 missiles were launched from the Russian base in Tartus. Immediately Arab publications said that one of the missiles shot down an American strategic drone EQ-4 worth 200 million dollars.

    A few days ago in the area of Tabka a fighter F / A-18 “Hornet” shot down a Syrian airplane Su-22. This led to the fact that Russia withdrew from the agreement on the prevention of incidents in the sky over Syria, which immediately caused the American planes to sharply narrow the zone of their flights, and two days later this mysterious case occurred. What is there in common?

    The fact is that shot down / crashed drone was equipped with the Northport Grumman Battlefield Airborne Communications Node (BACN), which provides a link between the “good Syrian rebels” and the US Air Force. Thanks to this node, they can promptly request assistance from the US command and it is possible that this is what caused the Su-22 incident.

    And the incident with EQ-4 drone appears to be an asymmetric response for that Su-22.

    Both Russian and American defense establishments keep a tight lid on the incident.

    • JimInFlorida June 24, 2017 at 10:18 am #

      Glad to see the S-300 finally put into action and that it took down a very valuable target.

      That one action has now introduced significant risks into the Pentagon’s war calculations. They must also consider that the S-400 is also on site. The only uncertainty is Moscow’s dedication to meeting every increase of ZOG Imperial action in Syria.

      IMO, the only way to force a retreat by ZOG-NATO is if Russia stops the tit-for-tat and brings up an overwhelming response, have ample forces in place to deter imperial reaction, and leave the U.S no choice except to back down.

      The only way Russia and Iran can set up such a presence is to get Bashar Assad to sign a defense treaty that explicitly asks for Russian and Iranian assistance to regain his rightful control over all Syrian land. It must also clearly name Washington and its cronies as enemy belligerents and list their illegal attempts to overthrow a legitimate, and twice elected, regime.

      Tsar Vladimir will have the U.N behind him and Washington will be forced to back down and leave.

      • tucsonspur June 24, 2017 at 11:01 am #

        Interesting thought.

      • FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 11:59 am #

        The situation in Syria resembles Germany in 1945 – the fight is going who will control which occupational zone after the final defeat of ISIS, which is not far off.

        Everybody, including Americans, is trying to carve out bigger occupational zone for themselves, from where to influence very important ME politics.

        So far, US are losing out to Russia, Turkey and Iran.

      • thwack June 24, 2017 at 12:37 pm #

        I still think its a waste to use the S 300 to take out a drone.

        Drones are slow, unstealthy and unmanuverable. Once acquisition and tracking radars have done their job, an old SA 2 should be more than sufficient to take it out?

        They should save the S 300s for something with a pilot in it.

        Just sayin

        • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 3:53 pm #

          “They should save the S 300s for something with a pilot in it.”

          Like the modern day “red tails”?

          What a curious thing to say

          just opine’n

          • thwack June 24, 2017 at 4:23 pm #

            Are you following me?

            Go back to your bath house before I kick you down a flight of stairs

            fat boy.

          • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 4:55 pm #

            “Are you following me?”

            Mack Daddy,
            Unfortunately, the readership “follows” you all to well….

            just observin’

        • JimInFlorida June 24, 2017 at 10:34 pm #

          Maybe so thwack but, the political payoff justifies the overkill.

          The objective is to show willingness to use the system. The fact that a very valuable drone was shot down amplifies the message.

          I have a feeling that Bashar Assad may finally find his nuts and actually use his antiquated, but still deadly, S-200 and BUK systems against NATO violations of his airspace.

          I’m putting down a bet that the first manned fighter shot down by Syrian air defenses will be a Turkish F-4 and will be hit with a BUK missile.

  53. 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 9:24 am #

    Tontoenelvalle w/more Russian news nobody asked for

    We have repeatedly realized that all these preparations, which are now being fulfilled, when NATO’s infrastructure is approaching our common borders, when new units are sent there, under the slogan of permanent rotation, what means permanent deployment in all practical senses. We understand very well that pretexts used to justify such steps are far-fetched,” Lavrov said.
    “If there had not been the coup d’etat in Ukraine, after which we were forced to defend those people who refused to obey neo-Nazi perpetrators of the coup, then something else would have been invented,” he said.
    “NATO’s plans have never changed and with different intensity degree have been aimed at greedily acquiring geopolitical space, which they considered as unclaimed after the collapse of the Soviet Union,” Lavrov said
    Regrettably, this strategy prevailed over those who after the collapse of the Soviet Union called not to strengthen NATO and deepen division lines in Europe, but to draw up a joint approach under the auspices of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) or other universal organization, Lavrov said. “This approach should be based on ensuring equal and indivisible security for all countries of the North Atlantic region,” he said.
    The European politicians’ NATO-centric way of thinking cannot help build confidence and strengthen good-neighborly relations, he went on.

    • FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 9:33 am #

      It is nice to have a personal troll assigned to me. Keep it up.

      http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/126927141/72290702

      • 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 9:38 am #

        It’s nice that a blog-troll thinks it’s nice tone trolled.

        Tontoenelvalle

        The catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Yemen caused by the indiscriminate bombing by Saudi Arabian forces using weapons supplied by its Western masters has just worsened: the cholera epidemic has surpassed one hundred thousand cases, affecting mostly children and the elderly.

        As of June 7 2017, there have been 101.820 suspected cases of cholera, occasioning 791 deaths, the most vulnerable being children under fifteen years of age (46 per cent of cases) and the over-60s (33%).

        Cholera hotspots

        The head of the World Health Organization’s office in Yemen, Dr. Nevio Zagaria, is focusing on the so-called cholera hotspots, namely the areas with the highest number of cases. In declarations to the website WHO, he stated “These cholera ‘hot spots’ are the source of much of the country’s cholera transmission. Stamp out cholera in these places and we can slow the spread of the disease and save lives. At the same time, we’re continuing to support early and proper treatment for the sick and conducting prevention activities across the country.”

        • nsa June 24, 2017 at 9:43 am #

          Zio Bio Warfare……….

  54. wm5135 June 24, 2017 at 9:42 am #

    Your mileage may vary:
    The ACA was a comprehensive assessment test to determine the depth of ignorance and lack of intellect of the citizens of the United States.

    First – a plan crafted by a conservative think tank was introduced into the body politic as a progressive plan to improve health care in the United States. The plan was no more than a path to opening a direct line between the insurance and health care industries and the national treasury.

    Second – the lobbying arms of the above mentioned industries crafted the talking points: lukewarm support, openly bigoted negative rhetoric and fairy tale advantages for the legislative and media cons to spread like bovine pasture enrichment.

    Third – pass legislation that included a mandate to limit personal responsibility and the ability to husband one’s finances based on the individuals personal goals. This same legislation gave access to health insurance, as Mr. Kunstler has noted, and not much health care.

    Fourth – test the citizens ability to understand the nature of the legislation with the proctors of the examination spewing non stop industry supplied talking points during the examination. Make the test long and arduous, about seven years.

    Fifth – Score the results of the test and analyze the outcome. With the results and analysis in hand understand that a flat slick smooth river rock is sharper than the United States citizenry.

    Sixth -Heat up a poker to white hot. Let industry craft new legislation work out the payoffs in secrecy and install new limits on the citizens responsibilities and rights.

    Seventh – Smile broadly and whisper “Bend Over”.

    • nsa June 24, 2017 at 9:57 am #

      Average American female weighed 170 lbs as of 2016…..more than the average American male weighed in 1960. Have another Haagen-Daz, girls.

  55. 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 9:51 am #

    The healthcare system is called a market.
    Like all US “markets” it’s mostly rigged and non-.transparent.
    You don’t get prices, and you’re not allowed to shop.

    Hospitals chains, insurance companies, physician groups, due to lack of oversight and regulations are literally permitted to charge whatever they WANT.

    Lobbyists, with something like 97% of all lobbyists representing the wealthiest 8% and their corporations keep it that way.

    You have a government where graft (outright buying of politicians)
    kickbacks (campaign donations, trips, dinners, gifts) and influence (they suggest, write and corral votes for the laws they introduce) IS the order of the day. It operates out in the open in broad daylight. Thus is the beauty of American corruption: it’s all on the table and in the light for everyone to see. Thing is, you’re all too powerless to really do anything about it.

    Support this blog on PatreonSupport this blog on Substack
    Support this blog via Patreon or Substack
    • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 9:59 am #

      In the old republic, members are made by the effective use of influence peddling, bribery, extortion, kickbacks, racketeering, treason, and sedition, and enjoy calling for blood in the streets in the last desperate attempt to maintain power.

      Y = career politicians x career lawyers x globalist mainstream media x career unelected Deep State bureaucrats x Hollywood elites x unprosecuted corruption

      “God integrates empirically.”
      – Albert Einstein.

      Y = old republic NETWORK globalism = THE SWAMP.

      In the New Republic, members enjoy resuming the restoration of the Constitutional republic from JFK’s point of interruption, can see for miles and miles, and enjoy Liberty in building out properties and the local means of production, with the capability to sow, nurture, grow, harvest, store, cook, engineer, design, program, automate, construct, process, raise, teach, counsel, hunt, defend, provide, debate, organize, compose, worship, dance, laugh, love, celebrate, and sustain.

      We are the sheepdogs.
      And we are old fashioned and sentimental.
      And we belong to the longest serving Civil Rights organization in the Republic.
      And we don’t require others for border protection or building bridges.
      And members are made by undying love, devotion, and loyalty to the Constitution.
      And we are happy to participate in the proper pursuit and offering of due process under the Constitution to the NETWORK globalist class charlatans who sold out the old republic in their lust for power and the love of money.
      And we are ready for what’s next.

      -T

      They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

  56. wm5135 June 24, 2017 at 10:49 am #

    Mr. Tibbs – “And we are ready for what’s next.”

    The excessive hubris of an egocentric sphincter. Or perhaps those of you in the New Republic have a glowing orb of your own.

    • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 11:22 am #

      LOL.

      The glowing orb is the lamp of lady Liberty, augmented by Justice, and propagated by Truth.

      YOU are well defined by Ben Franklin: “Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain. And most fools do.”

      WE are well defined by Theodore Roosevelt: “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

      -T

      They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

      • 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 1:31 pm #

        This quote is incredibly prescient and wise.
        This place, right here, is full of keyboard strokin’ critics. Veritable do-nothings.

        Do-nothings kvetch and lament. Ostensibly, about the actions of others, but truly, and deep down inside, it’s about their own inabilities and inadequacies. Their cowardice in the face of a doer, even a doer buffoon, or worse, a doer crone with a sense of gender based entitlement.

        • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 2:54 pm #

          Yes.

          ……and furthermore, it is futile to lament the failings of the multitude of imperfect social, political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, academic, medical and philosophic systems and the attendant power structures, unless one has prescribed and is living in a successful system to share with others.

          The New Republic has such an offering.

          Participation is entirely voluntary.

          Sent From The New Republic.
          https://www.dropbox.com/s/nv8sko6hpqm6tir/New%20Republic%20rev123.pdf?dl=0

          -T

          They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

          • DA June 24, 2017 at 4:02 pm #

            Fucking blah, blag, blah! TR was a child of privilege, who (credit where credit is due), at least made the most of it. But to imply that every Tom, Dick, and Mary in the modern world should just suck it up and make the world over in their vision is beyond simplistic, beyond stupid, and veering into propaganda land.

            ~D

            They Call Me A Lot of Things, but I At Least Choose Which One’s I Answer To

          • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 6:18 pm #

            Simplistic……

            Just like the Bill of Rights, The Lord’s Prayer, and Liberty, Justice, Kindness, Truth, and Beauty.

            “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” -Albert Einstein.

            Y = career politicians x career lobbyists x globalist mainstream media x career unelected Deep State bureaucrats x Hollywood elites x unprosecuted corruption

            “God integrates empirically.”
            – Albert Einstein.

            Y = old republic NETWORK globalism = THE SWAMP.

            -T

            They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

          • 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 11:05 pm #

            Child of privilege? Well, what does that mean, exactly? It means he had even MORE of a reason to do NOTHING. To rest and collect. To live off his name and his patrimony. Nah, nah he didn’t, he’s a DOER. He didn’t need anything, but he risked everything. That’s a man. A reloaded blue-blooded American. They don’t make them anymore, or do they?

  57. FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 11:02 am #

    I thought the MiG-19 was the first supersonic Soviet fighter == JIF

    Where have you gotten your info from? Wikipedia?

    I got mine from a phys-tech guy who worked for Struminsky, who actually was the biggest asshole the guy has ever met in his life.

    The first supersonic flight was accomplished on modified MIG-15, 3 crucial years before Americans did it.

    • DA June 24, 2017 at 4:03 pm #

      You so proud and so sm-a-a-a-a-a-rt!

    • JimInFlorida June 24, 2017 at 10:46 pm #

      Maybe so on a modified MiG-15 but, the first OPERATIONAL fighter that could sustain supersonic flight was the MiG-19. I thought my comment was obvious on that point.

      Did the Soviets create a chest-beating Hollywood-style movie about their version of The Right Stuff? If so, where is it? How can Moscow remain silent about breaking the sound barrier; 3 years before the Bell X-1?

      The whole point of being first is lost if you keep it a secret!

  58. volodya June 24, 2017 at 11:13 am #

    There’s an article on zerohedge that classifies strands of Democrats.

    We used to have the FDR Democrat. Now it’s the Davos Democrat, the Wall Street Democrat, the Hollywood Democrat, the Silicon Valley Democrat, the Military-Industrial-Complex Democrat.

    And, by my sights, those Democrats neck-deep in the Brazilianization of American politics, the Dirty Dog Democrat, as personified by Bill and Hillary, grifters and takers without peer, well, except maybe for Obama, he of the 400G speaking fee. A good pay-day for not incarcerating Wall Street, don’t you think? And there’s a lot more to come. To the megabuck players, 400Gs is bus fare.

    Matt Taibbi came over to the Garden of Truth and Enlightenment. He sez what a lot of us have been saying, that American politics has no “center”, that there’s just a handful of billionaires, the Oligarchic Donor Class, you know, those guys that buy and sell American politicians like cattle, Democrat and Republican alike. Welcome, welcome, welcome, a thousand welcomes. Matt, you’re one of the good guys now.

    So, if you’re looking for an explanation for what ails America, especially the medical care racket, look to that fact. Why is a single payer system off the table? Why do simple medical procedures become the slayer of sanity and destroyer of households?

    It’s simple, the system was set up to benefit that handful of people that own senators and congressmen. Lobbyists wrote Obamacare. Was Jeb in the pocket of drug makers? Let’s don’t be ridiculous, of course he was, they all are.

    The thing to remember is that the billionaires only want capitalism, red in tooth and claw, if they’re the apex predator. Free markets? Are you kidding, there’s money at stake.

    No, rather it’s the rigged market, the can’t lose bet. That’s where politicians come in. They pass laws, and presto, corruption, what corruption? Abuse? There’s no abuse. It’s all legal, it sez so right here.

    • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 11:31 am #

      …..thank you for a perfect depiction of that which imperils the old republic, all by NETWORK globalist design.

      In the New Republic, we got Back to the Garden.
      https://www.dropbox.com/s/5h3r0b6gndumhy0/Back to the garden.pdf?dl=0

      -T

      They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

  59. janet June 24, 2017 at 11:34 am #

    All Americans should have the same health care plan that representatives in Congress have. If it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for us.

    • DA June 24, 2017 at 6:15 pm #

      My aren’t YOU the quiet bot bitch when people have more interesting things to say? Hint, hint.

  60. communitymotive June 24, 2017 at 12:18 pm #

    Collusion at the top, competition at the bottom. Same playbook foe each of the complexes. It is the profit motive unchecked by the community motive. Your mother said you can’t take other peoples’ stuff (shalt not steal). Maintaining the system has overhead costs, tribute, which must be paid. Creating dependency, a mental environment where the simple heuristic is a Brand that is palliative. In these very large systems, harm to an ndividual is statistically insignificant. Harm has to reach great numbers to be acknowledged. Even then it can be fought by legal means. Still statistically small, the news of it will not excite those without that problem, but facing others. The sameness of the problems is hard to see, confusion between protection rackets is maintained. Professional courtesy? As the resource base continued to shrink, it takes more debt to consume further into the future. Shrinking to fit resources is the economic path the world is on. Wars for control will only make it worse.

    Support this blog on PatreonSupport this blog on Substack
    Support this blog via Patreon or Substack
    • DA June 24, 2017 at 3:55 pm #

      You’ve summed it up very well. Anything to add?

  61. wm5135 June 24, 2017 at 12:22 pm #

    Mr. Tibbs,
    With tears as big as horse turds in my eyes I restate what I said about you after you had been here a week.
    “You are as full of shit as a Christmas Turkey”.
    After about 500 million years the first unicellular organisms arose here on our planet. To the best of my knowledge nothing has stood the test of time but the will to life that is the essence of our home.

    From Dune:
    Many have tried.
    Many have tried and failed?
    Many have tried and died.

    ” I have three treasures which I hold and keep,
    The first is mercy, the second is economy,
    The third is daring not to be ahead of others.
    From mercy comes courage; from economy comes generosity;
    From humility comes leadership. ……

    Mercy brings victory in battle and strength in defense.
    It is the means by which heaven saves and guards” Lao Tzu

    The moment your New Republic springs into being entropy will be localized and it’s being and demise created in that instant.

    “Therefore the stiff and unbending is the disciple of death.
    The gentle and yielding is the disciple of life” Lao Tzu

    Make some attempt to know yourself before you seek to define me.

    • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 12:31 pm #

      …..”For the taking of offense is what rests in the bosom of the stupid ones.” -Solomon.

      Sent from the New Republic.
      https://www.dropbox.com/s/nv8sko6hpqm6tir/New%20Republic%20rev123.pdf?dl=0

      -T

      They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 24, 2017 at 1:09 pm #

      People in the New Republic all want to be the Billionaires they pretend to criticize but secretly worship. Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged” is the scripture of these kind of people.

      Free Enterprise is just Corporate Capitalism in its early stages. Until you can see the Oak in the acorn who haven’t attain full knowledge. Btw, I’m fine and more than fine with Free Enterprise. You just have to cut the forest back now and then – keep trees from growing everywhere. I mean these people want to open hot dog stands on top of the Great Pyramid. Money is their god and thus they are not trustworthy.

      Capitalism seems healthier than it is because its earlier stages are fairly benign. And historically, it was able to flourish in a society that still was healthy because of Christianity and the Christian ethos. But absent that, it will go downhill very quickly now, the complete commitment to money making an overt madness. To sum up: it is not something that can stand by itself. It needs to be regulated by the Church, or by Shariah, or by an Inner Government Council as in Japan, etc. From the Vedic pov, merchants are the second lowest class, controlled by rajas and tamas or passion and ignorance. They can’t be expected to rule and should not be allowed to dictate to the higher castes.

      • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 1:27 pm #

        I’m enjoying the dialogue while laying in a hammock adjacent to the brick patio by the herb garden on a cleared 3 acre garden and cabin plot carved within a plot of a wooded 55 acres within the beautiful Piedmont region of the colony of North Carolina within the Constitutional Republic of the United States of America; all of which gainfully acquired, developed, maintained, sustained, and defended through the sweat of my brow, and individual empowerment endowed by the very same Creator that gave Life and Liberty.

        The only “business” enumerated by the Constitution is the “Free Press”.

        The rights of the individual are preserved and well defended, in the New Republic. The quest for “billionairehood” is of no value.

        The failings of imperfect social, political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious and philosophic systems and the attendant power structures make for interesting musings.

        However, truth stands on it’s own.

        “Give a man a fish, and feed for a day. Teach him to fish, and feed for a lifetime.”

        Sent From The New Republic.
        https://www.dropbox.com/s/nv8sko6hpqm6tir/New%20Republic%20rev123.pdf?dl=0

        • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 4:10 pm #

          “The failings of imperfect social, political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious and philosophic systems and the attendant power structures make for interesting musings.”

          Yes, interesting, but little more than mental self-abuse. On the death of the Old Republic, and before the Birth of the New, tribulations will be visited upon us, and yes, you…you will survive the SHTF no better than us…better than some, worse than others.

          “light a fire for a man, and he can be warm for a day. Set him on fire, and he will be warm for the rest of his life….”

          Why do you quote the Constitution? It has no meaning to those fine Mandingo warriors, and others, who will covet what you own. What you cannot defend, you cannot own…and you and your group of patriots will not be able to defend anything for long….Sorry.

          • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 5:00 pm #

            Speak for yourself, as it is clearly evident the bell is tolling FOR YOU.

            -T

            They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

          • DA June 24, 2017 at 8:13 pm #

            You have to forgive Tibbs. He’s still harboring the illusion that he’s going to live forever and that his alleged monetary wealth is going to save him. They call him many things, but wise is not necessarily one of them.

            ~D

            Doesn’t matter what you call me, I know my name.

          • MrTibbs June 25, 2017 at 1:02 am #

            “Wealth is the ability to fully experience life.” – Henry David Thoreau.

            In the New Republic, members enjoy resuming the restoration of the Constitutional republic from JFK’s point of interruption, can see for miles and miles, and enjoy Liberty in building out properties and the local means of production, with the capability to sow, nurture, grow, harvest, store, cook, engineer, design, program, automate, construct, process, raise, teach, counsel, hunt, defend, provide, debate, organize, compose, worship, dance, laugh, love, celebrate, and sustain.

            Illumination is the underlying theme.

            -T

      • Janos Skorenzy June 24, 2017 at 1:27 pm #

        Tamas/Ignorance – Sudras or manual laborers

        Rajas/Passion – Vaisyas or merchants

        Ksyatrias or warriors and adminstrators

        Sattwa/Goodness – Brahmins or Priests and Intellectuals

        The middle two castes each partake of two of the three qualities. Vaisyas, passion and ignorance and Ksyartrias, passion and goodness.

        Krishna says in Bhagavad Gita, “These are not arbitrary social designations but rather they were created by Me.” Thus each man must find his place, with the help of the wise. Caste often follows birth but not always. Thus King Louie like to fix clocks (Sudra) while France was going down the toilet. And Trump was born as a Vaisya but is obviously a Ksyartria.

        • thwack June 24, 2017 at 4:15 pm #

          Where do I belong in this line up?

          • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 8:07 pm #

            Mack Daddy,
            Remember the old blues rift;

            If you white, you all right,

            If you brown, stick around,

            But if you black,

            Uh, uh buddy,

            get back, get back get back…step aside!

            Just rememberin’

          • Janos Skorenzy June 24, 2017 at 8:59 pm #

            Either a Sudra or a very degraded Brahimin.

      • 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 11:10 pm #

        Janos iis a Christian nutter. He is afraid of the man that can abide without the infection. Lawd help him.

  62. thwack June 24, 2017 at 12:29 pm #

    Jordan Peterson goes full afterburner on 21st century conservatism:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nyw4rTywyY0&t=2s

  63. MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 12:35 pm #

    To all my friends traveling to Charlotte to see Chicago perform tonite, please absorb the creative spirit, energy, leadership and compositions of founder Terry Kath.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uAUoz7jimg
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKvNoC0SRoY
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pizRRft3_8Y

    Kath was born to Raymond Elmer “Ray” (1912-2003) and Evelyn Meline Haugen Kath (1916-1982) on January 31, 1946, in Chicago, Illinois. He was raised in the Norwood Park neighborhood of Chicago. He attended Taft High School and DePaul University. He was of German, English, and Scandinavian descent. He acquired a guitar and amplifier when he was in the ninth grade, and his early influences included The Ventures, Johnny Smith, Dick Dale, and Howard Roberts. He was later influenced by George Benson, Kenny Burrell, Mike Bloomfield, Eric Clapton, and Jimi Hendrix.
    Unlike several other Chicago members who received formal music training, Kath was mostly self-taught and enjoyed jamming.[In a 1971 interview for Guitar Player, he said he had tried professional lessons but abandoned them, adding “All I wanted to do was play those rock and roll chords.” His father wanted him to have a steady career, but he decided he would prefer a career in music.

    Sent From the New Republic.
    https://www.dropbox.com/s/nv8sko6hpqm6tir/New%20Republic%20rev123.pdf?dl=0

    • 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 1:46 pm #

      Hola Festival Asheville is where it’s at esta noche

      • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 6:34 pm #

        Hola!!

        ¡disfrutar del día!

        -T

    • thwack June 24, 2017 at 1:53 pm #

      Kath was mostly self-taught and enjoyed jamming

      ****************

      Are there any good non Chicago recordings of him out there?

      Im curious as to what he sounded like/did before/without Chicago?

      • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 2:40 pm #

        thwack, I located this early performance with Chicago in 1969 at the age of 23 on a French TV show:
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRKV5rkC6io

        I would like to see earlier performances as well…..

        -T

        • thwack June 24, 2017 at 4:10 pm #

          No good.

          Looks like a synched performance to the studio recording?

          BTW, my bucket list is composed almost entirely of guitar riffs and various solos.

          If I slow down Kath’s solo on “25 or 6 to 4” I can almost get all the way through it bouncing off the guard rails; until the wah-wah comes in.

          Im chopping away at the Allman Bros “Ramblin man” solo (the 1st one)

          I can get through the whole thing if I slow it down 10%

          It was really difficult getting used to sliding between hammer ons and pull offs like they do so effortlessly.

          In other words (whomever that guitarist is?) could get 5 notes out of a single pluck.

          Having the right tone helps but it still ain’t easy.

          • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 6:24 pm #

            thwack, those are awesome, epic guitarists with every bit of genius and mastery as the classical composers and musicians of the Renaissance.

            …….you might say they serve as sources of creative inspiration to members of the New Republic, ala Renaissance II.

            -T

          • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 8:17 pm #

            “thwack, those are awesome, epic guitarists with every bit of genius and mastery as the classical composers and musicians of the Renaissance.”

            Yeah, and “graphic novels” also on equal footing.

            Did you see the latest Aquaman.? The epic battle with the villain was a thinly-veiled quest for beatification and grace in humanitiy’s continuing struggle against the antichrist…or something….

            Talk to me about Sam Hopkins….

            Will Lightnin’ even be allowed in the New Republic?

          • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 9:30 pm #

            The one and only Lightnin’ Hopkins:
            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightnin%27_Hopkins

            Genius.

            All who share love of Liberty, Justice, Kindness, Truth, Beauty, and Constitution are at home, in the New Republic.

            -T

    • DA June 24, 2017 at 6:58 pm #

      I was all set to pick a fight with you about this Tibbs, but about this we can agree: Terry Kath and Chicago FUCKING ROCKED! I wish I’d followed them closer when I was young now (once upon a time I dreamed (foolishly) of making a living as a trumpet player), but such are the foolish dreams of youth. For what it’s worth, I think that’s where I went wrong too by taking professional lessons. I was all technique, and pretty much zero musicality. Sigh… Ain’t we all?

  64. FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 1:00 pm #

    Her Turn

    Senate announces probe of Loretta Lynch behavior in 2016 election.

    http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/jun/23/senate-announced-probe-loretta-lynch-behavior-2016/

    Clintons next.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 24, 2017 at 1:10 pm #

      Ridiculous pageantry. They aren’t going to do anything to these people. They know too much and would bring down the system if brought down.

      • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 1:40 pm #

        “Ridiculous pageantry.”

        Yes!

        “They know too much and would bring down the system if brought down.”

        No.

        “They” are the Deep State racketeers, AND THEY ARE BEING BROUGHT DOWN, like parasites being evicted from the host.

        And the host (Constitutional Republic) is gaining in strength, as represented by the already emerged New Republic.

        The insurgency began; participation is entirely voluntary.

        -T

        They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

        • 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 2:15 pm #

          That’s TheTruth Dfoxx!

      • FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 1:45 pm #

        They became too dangerous for the survival of the entire elite by fanning nuclear war with Russia in the interests of German and Saudis Nazis.

        Putin already said that the luxury western fallout shelters are on the target list.

        They got to go.

        • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 4:40 pm #

          Summary of U.S. Concurrent Operations.

          1. The prompt freezing of U.S. Treasury funds approved by Congress and scheduled to be dispersed to Deep State intelligence agencies, world wide.

          2. The prompt redirect of U.S. Treasury funds to domestic infrastructure and park build outs, accelerated trade construction apprenticeships programs, and accelerated team building in successful concurrent private-civic construction partnerships and expanded supply chains.

          3. The prompt redirect of U.S. Treasury funds directly to vetted financially imperiled pensioners who are at risk of immediate hardship with loss of promised and earned benefit. States that fail to deliver on promised obligations enter into prompt arbitration and restructuring of finances and fiscal governance.

          4. The prompt thanking of tactically selected Deep State careerists for their years of service and dismissal with benefits.

          5. The prompt acceleration of promotion of selected Deep State individuals committed to the restoration of the Constitutional Republic, starting with the proper restoration of the 4th Amendment and oversight of the peaceful reduction of agency non-Constitutional power and budget.

          6. The prompt ICE vetting of immigrants and visitors, with admittance granted only to those who have the knowledge and strength to contribute to the preservation and adherence to the Constitution and the love of the Republic.

          7. The prompt initiation and offering of Constitutional due process to Deep State generals, beginning with Comey and advancing to Lynch, thereby peacefully and progressively neutralizing top rank leadership.

          8. The prompt redirect of funds to educate students in the motives that created the Republic, the principles, rights, and responsibilities therein, the educating of the mind to think (and how to fish: concurrent pathways identified in early development: vocational, agriculture, technical, construction, trade, professional, defense, arts and entertainment, in all devleopment of collaboration and team skills), the acknowledged challenges facing the Republic, proper representation of positive influences/figures achieving within arts and entertainment, political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, academic, defense, and philosophic regions, and the attendant negative influences/figures. Taught through the lens of reinforcing the principles and foundation that serves as the basis of the Constitution and the civics surrounding the strengthening of the Republic, with Liberty, Justice, Kindness, Truth, and Beauty clearly defined and developed.

          -T

          They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

        • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 5:16 pm #

          Alex and I agree.
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxRV8x5fU-s

          -T

          They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

        • JimInFlorida June 24, 2017 at 10:57 pm #

          HA!!!! if that’s the case, then Tsar Vladimir Putin’s web crawlers have been reading MY COMMENTS!!!!

          CFN isn’t the only place I’ve elaborated on my proven, trademarked, 100% money-back, guarantee on how to deter WW3.

          For YEARS I’ve put out the answer and Tsar Vladimir finally got it!

  65. John Howard June 24, 2017 at 1:27 pm #

    I bet those of you saying people should just live healthier lifestyles also think males should be allowed to gestate a baby. Am I wrong? Who here thinks we should let males gestate babies?

    Support this blog on PatreonSupport this blog on Substack
    Support this blog via Patreon or Substack
    • DA June 24, 2017 at 3:53 pm #

      Where would they carry them? In their ball sack? Wouldn’t THAT be a sight?

    • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 4:15 pm #

      “Who here thinks we should let males gestate babies?”

      John,
      With respect;

      Who here really gives a damn?

      Just a curious scientific/medical spectacle of no real concern.

      • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 4:17 pm #

        Just like Michael Jackson making himself “white”…discounting the shame of the culture that drove him to hate his own skin, just a medical anomaly

        • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 4:22 pm #

          DA

          Google “ectopic pregnancy”.

          Probably the large intestine….

          • DA June 24, 2017 at 5:17 pm #

            Oh my fucking Christ!

          • DA June 24, 2017 at 6:18 pm #

            Gives new meaning to the term “shit-bird!”

          • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 8:21 pm #

            DA,
            Yes, and gives truth to the term derisively applied to birth…to “shit one out”…not my choice of terms.

          • John Howard June 24, 2017 at 9:53 pm #

            They’d transplant a uterus first, like they have already done in women.

            So who here thinks we should let transgender women attempt pregnancy??

        • thwack June 24, 2017 at 9:53 pm #

          Just like Michael Jackson making himself “white”…discounting the shame of the culture that drove him to hate his own skin, just a medical anomaly

          *****************

          Thats what I thought at first too.

          But after a while I began to consider his plastic surgery festival was more in response to sex, in contrast to race?

          Let me explain:

          It is my opinion that Michael Jackson, as the youngest and cutest Jackson was disturbed at puberty by the prospect of becoming masculine; i.e a black man, with all the baggage that comes with that identity in a white supremacist culture.

          Therefore, all his surgery was really an attempt to feminize himself in order to stay closer to the “little cute talented, non threatening black boy” that everybody found so adorable.

          As a black male, its completely understandable because I remember how things changed for me around the age of 13. Your budding sexuality (whether you have any or not) is seen as a threat; not only by white people, but even your own father, as was the case with me.

          I think Michael Jackson was able to sucessfully be very sexual precisely because he did it at the same time he feminized himself by adopting soft mannerism, and neotonous behaviors…

          Making himself look white was more a side effect than a feature.

          It is my opinion that if you make music with black people, you can’t really find fault with the concept of African people?; their features, their mannerism, their ethos…

          Our musical ability may be the only good thing about us?

          therefore, given Michael Jackson’s experience making music with black people, I gotta suspect his “transformation” was not a straight rejection of being a black person;

          but was instead a fucked up response to the white supremacist system he existed in.

          Just sayin

          PS– I value my hearing more than my sight; because my hearing is always on.

          When blind people die, how can they be sure they are dead?

          Maybe they are having a dream that they died?

          • JimInFlorida June 24, 2017 at 11:03 pm #

            From the Khandogya Upanishad, 4th Khanda, verse 2,

            “Therefore he who has crossed that ocean, if blind, ceases to be blind; if wounded, ceases to be wounded; if afflicted, ceases to be afflicted. Therefore when that ocean has been crossed, night becomes day indeed, for the world of Brahman is lighted up once for all ”

            Om

          • elysianfield June 25, 2017 at 12:28 am #

            Thwack,
            Interesting to speculate upon his pathology, but a sad comment on humanity any way you cut it. It makes me…uneasy…embarrassed for his actions, and more so for his motivations. It reminds me of my puberty…what young teen does not wish he were other than what he/she is? Youthful angst writ large.

      • John Howard June 24, 2017 at 10:02 pm #

        Well, surely the posters here complaining about people eating too much sugar and needing unnecessary health care don’t want to pay for males trying to gestate a baby.

        • elysianfield June 25, 2017 at 12:34 am #

          “don’t want to pay for males trying to gestate a baby.”

          John,
          You will achieve consensus on that point. Michael Jackson may have had the right to “pass for white” by any medical means, but he didn’t ask the Government to pay for those procedures. Had he done so, He then would have progressed from a curiosity to an outrage….

          • John Howard June 25, 2017 at 9:26 pm #

            As if changing his complexion compares to gestating a freaking baby!

            Even if a transgender woman pays for getting pregnant with own money, it still is huge burden on hospitals and health insurance to cover the pregnancy and child birth and new natal care, and then probably lifelong health problems and lawsuits.

            Why the fuck shouldn’t we just ban male pregnancy, you idiots!!!!

          • elysianfield June 26, 2017 at 11:18 am #

            “Why the fuck shouldn’t we just ban male pregnancy, you idiots!!!!”

            John,
            Yes, why don’t we have another useless law piled onto the tens of thousands we already suffer under…it is a non-issue, and does not require the time and consideration of our legislature, who are busy, as we speak, in it’s quest to completely circumscribe our lives.

            Idiots, indeed….

    • sophia June 25, 2017 at 11:36 pm #

      I absolutely think people should live healthier lifestyles and that at least 75% of the people admitted to a hospital are there due to their own stupidity and carelessness, and I don’t know what that has to do with the current gender hysteria.

  66. pequiste June 24, 2017 at 4:18 pm #

    I find it Ironic that so many of those who chose the calling of physician; practitioners of the healing arts; dedicated to the alleviation of pain and suffering, helping the injured, sick and wounded and above all looking to make a killing.

    Dr. Lexus to the CFN stat:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ip-lm3YQZuw

    “Don’t worry scro’…”

  67. janet June 24, 2017 at 5:18 pm #

    Who here thinks we should let males gestate babies? –john howard

    I only approve of males gestating babies if they also have the right to contraception and the right to abortion. Males have the right to control their bodies.

    • thwack June 24, 2017 at 6:10 pm #

      Except when its times to send them off to war?

      You’re a woman so you already know this; how convenient of you to leave it out.

      • DA June 24, 2017 at 6:21 pm #

        You’re a woman so you already know this; how convenient of you to leave it out.

        Evidence please! The only thing we “know” for sure about “janet” is that it signs on with that handle.

        • JimInFlorida June 24, 2017 at 11:08 pm #

          DA……! . janet’s very style of writing totally gives her away as a batshit-crazy tenured Jewish professor of Women’s Studies.

          The only thing we don’t know is in which Ivy League hellhole she teaches. Bryn Mawr? Mount Holyoke? UC Davis? She hasn’t tipped her hand yet.

      • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 8:24 pm #

        Thwack,
        Well said….

    • DA June 24, 2017 at 7:45 pm #

      Approval? Who’s asking?

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPZUgfOqAdg

      • John Howard June 24, 2017 at 10:07 pm #

        We aren’t going to let men gestate babies. Any one that attempted it would be fined and jailed and doctors would lose their license. No one will break the law, no doctor would put a person in harms way. It will never be an option.

        • elysianfield June 25, 2017 at 12:42 am #

          John,
          Why not allow a procedure such as this as a medical proof of concept? It might prove medically valuable to be able to grow organs without fear of eventual rejection by the host’s body.

          Of course, there may be moral/religious/ethical objections….

          • John Howard June 25, 2017 at 9:31 pm #

            Because allowing males to gestate babies is stupid! It doesn’t benefit me at all, and it wouldn’t benefit anybody. Why not ban it??.?

        • Janos Skorenzy June 25, 2017 at 5:31 pm #

          Men can’t gestate babies. This reminds me of a Feminist who was up in arms that more girls hadn’t been abused by Catholic Priests.

          • John Howard June 25, 2017 at 9:32 pm #

            Men could try to gestate babies. Stop being ignorant.

    • John Howard June 24, 2017 at 9:54 pm #

      Of course males would also have the right to abort if they had one in their body. Stupid concern.

  68. FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 7:20 pm #

    Better late than never!

    Finca, May 15, 2017 at 12:04 pm


    It just does not occur to them that when they jump through all hoops and involve everyone in the case, Trump will simply say that he meant the illegal wiretapping of his office, which Comey refused to investigate and which he (Comey) most likely organized himself.

    http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/new-book-safe-happy-place/#comment-304121

    CNN’s Smerconish, June 24, 2017


    Did we all misread critical Tweet about taping of President Trump?
    Everybody assumes that in the Tweet rump was suggesting that he had taped their conversation, and he was threatening Comey that he might release them.

    I have a different interpretation: maybe President Trump wasn’t threatening to release tapes, he was saying “Hey, Jim Comey, you better not have taped me”

    http://edition.cnn.com/videos/tv/2017/06/24/comment-did-we-miss-trumps-real-point.cnn

  69. FincaInTheMountains June 24, 2017 at 7:59 pm #

    If Smerconish, the big juicy CNN rat is jumping the Hillary’s ship, the Witch is finished!

    Ding Dong the Witch is Dead!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5ayK694PZI

  70. janet June 24, 2017 at 8:36 pm #

    “…not like those White Christians and shit.” –janos

    janos, white Christians are responsible for the mess we are in. Here are the honest truths that rural Christian white Americans don’t want to accept; until they accept these truths, nothing is going to change:

    Their economic situation is largely the result of voting for supply-side economic policies that have been the largest redistribution of wealth from the bottom/middle to the top in U.S. history. Trump is continuing this massive redistribution of wealth from the poor to the 1%.

    Immigrants haven’t taken their jobs. If all immigrants, legal or otherwise, were removed from the U.S., our economy would come to a screeching halt and food prices would soar.

    Immigrants are not responsible for companies moving their plants overseas. The almost exclusively white business owners are responsible, because they care more about their shareholders (who are also mostly white) than about American workers.

    No one is coming for their guns. All that has been proposed during the entire Obama administration is having better background checks.

    Gay people getting married is not a threat to their freedom to believe in whatever white god they want to. No one is going to make their church marry gays, have a gay pastor or accept gays for membership.

    Women having access to birth control doesn’t affect their lives either, especially women they complain about being teenage single mothers.

    Blacks are not “lazy moochers living off their hard-earned tax dollars” any more than many of their fellow rural neighbors. People in need are people in need. People who can’t find jobs because of their circumstances, a changing economy or outsourcing overseas belong to all races.

    They get a tremendous amount of help from the government they complain does nothing for them. From the roads and utility grids they use to farm subsidies, crop insurance and commodities protections, they benefit greatly from government assistance. The Farm Bill is one of the largest financial expenditures by the U.S. government. Without government assistance, their lives would be considerably worse.

    They get the largest share of Food Stamps, Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security.

    They complain about globalization, yet line up like everyone else to get the latest Apple products. They have no problem buying foreign-made guns, scopes and hunting equipment. They don’t think twice about driving trucks whose engines were made in Canada, tires made in Japan, radios made in Korea, and computer parts made in Malaysia.

    They use illicit drugs as much as any other group. But when other people do it is a “moral failing” and they should be severely punished, legally. When they do it, it is a “health crisis” that needs sympathy and attention.

    When jobs dry up for whatever reason, they refuse to relocate but lecture the poor in places like Flint for staying in failing towns.

    They are quick to judge minorities for being “welfare moochers,” but don’t think twice about cashing their welfare checks every month.

    They complain about coastal liberals, but taxes from California and New York cover their farm subsidies, help maintain their highways and keep the hospitals in their sparsely populated rural areas open for business.

    They complain about “the little man being run out of business,” and then turn around and shop at big-box stores.

    They make sure outsiders are not welcome, deny businesses permits to build, then complain about businesses, plants opening up in less rural areas.

    Government has not done enough to help them in many cases, but their local and state governments are almost completely Republican and so are their representatives and senators. Instead of holding them accountable, they vote them into office over and over and over again.

    All the economic policies and ideas that could help rural America belong to the Democratic Party: raising the minimum wage, strengthening unions, spending on infrastructure, renewable energy growth, slowing down the damage done by climate change, and healthcare reform. All of these and more would really help a lot of rural white Christian Americans.

    Support this blog on PatreonSupport this blog on Substack
    Support this blog via Patreon or Substack
    • elysianfield June 24, 2017 at 8:51 pm #

      Well ladies and germs;

      The movie of the week, the new movie presented each Saturday on HBO, is…The Birth of a Nation … the remake. I haven’t seen it yet, but I am in the mood for a good documentary. I hope the good guys win….

      • MrTibbs June 24, 2017 at 9:43 pm #

        Greater than 3/5.
        1. Holy Spirit.
        2. Ninja Juicer.
        3. Smoothies with Whey Protein, Vitamins, Strawberries, Bananas, Kale, Spinach and MINT.
        4. High Lean Protein/Low Fat.
        5. Honey.
        6. Exercise.
        7. Fellowship.
        8. Prayer/Meditation.
        9. Gardening.
        10. Sunshine.
        11. Surf.
        12. Extra Vitamin D and B12.
        13. Herbs.
        14. Beer.
        15. Maker’s Mark.
        16. Classic Rock.
        17. Classic Jazz.
        18. Country.
        19. Classical.
        20. Travel.
        21. Exploration.
        22. Debate.
        23. Challenge.
        24. Peace.
        25. Solitude.
        26. Growth.
        27. Forgiveness.
        28. Harvest.
        29. Culture.
        30. Heritage.
        31. Liberty.
        32. Justice.
        33. Constitution.
        34. Kindness.
        35. Truth.
        36. Beauty.

        -T

        • ZrCrypDiK June 25, 2017 at 2:56 pm #

          WUT DO *tey* call U?!? Oh yeah, tibbs(SOKER!)…

        • Janos Skorenzy June 25, 2017 at 5:37 pm #

          No Blacks.

    • My Point of View June 25, 2017 at 12:12 am #

      In other words those white evangelicals are the world’s biggest hypocrites. About 40 years ago I sat in a Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) church where almost monthly we got the sermon on why we Baptists were the ONLY ones getting into heaven. What a crock. I haven’t been back in 40+ years and don’t plan to ever go back to any church. The SBC was always the mother church of the KKK and not a lot has changed in their attitudes; in their eyes it’s always the OTHER person/race/nationality who is the problem.

      When it comes to mooching, the rural crowd is about 8% on disability versus about 4% for city dwellers. When rural types can find a job they weasel their way onto disability.

      Obama was spot on when he characterized them as backward types clinging to their guns and bibles; they thrive on anger and fear so the GOP shovels their execrable load down their willing throats 24/7/365.

      • My Point of View June 25, 2017 at 12:14 am #

        spell check strikes again

        correction follows:
        When rural types CAN’T find a job they weasel their way onto disability.

      • MrTibbs June 25, 2017 at 12:42 am #

        Illumination is the underlying theme.

        -T

        They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 25, 2017 at 5:42 pm #

        But you will become a Muslim when that scimitar is put to your scrawny neck.

        Not that you care, but the 2nd Amendment recognizes (not decrees) our Right to bear arms. In other words, if the 2nd Amendment or Bill of Right was repealed, we would still have the Right because it is granted by God, not man. Man does well to cling to his rights or rates as our Southern Brothers say – and to Holy Writ as well.

        The SBC has fallen to the Darkness btw. You’d fit right in now.

  71. janet June 24, 2017 at 10:35 pm #

    Expats who have moved to Mexico say doctors are more helpful and enjoyable to visit than in the US and the expats are amazed how affordable healthcare is in Mexico. About one million Americans have moved to live in Mexico.

    One expat said: “It’s cheap. It’s very patient-oriented. It’s like my father practiced in Illinois about 50 years ago, without all the paperwork.”

    • janet June 24, 2017 at 11:02 pm #

      Dr. Santiago Hernandez is a successful primary care doctor who attends to nearly 1,000 expat patients.

      “I am the medical director and primary care physician and have a dedicated network of medical specialists in my referral network,“ Dr. Hernandez said. “Most of them are board certified in the United States. For example, the ear, nose and throat (ENT) physician was trained at Harvard and the neurosurgeon has had fellowships at the University of Washington.”

      Dr. Hernandez said one of the healthcare differences between the U.S. and Mexico is that primary care doctor referrals are not necessary in Mexico, although he has adopted the U.S. practice of vetting specialists and including them in his referral network.

      “In Mexico,” he said, “you can find your own healthcare specialist without a referral from your primary doctor. You can also get testing done on your own. If you woke up with a headache and felt you needed an MRI, you could get one without a doctor’s order. That can be a very expensive way to manage your healthcare. We follow the same standards of care and diagnostic and treatment steps as the U.S. About 90 percent of my patients are expats, primarily from the U.S. and Canada.”

  72. 100th Avatar June 24, 2017 at 11:16 pm #

    Dear host,

    Nothings getting fixed.
    The fix is in.

    So:

    You know when you’re right
    So right [x2]
    You write what you say [x2]

  73. nsa June 25, 2017 at 1:11 am #

    The 8% of GDP offered in the essay’s chart is misleading, as it refers only to GOVERNMENT SPENDING ON HEALTHCARE. Other entities also spend….corporations, small businesses, private individuals, insurance companies, etc. Overall healthcare (sickcare?) spending is generally accepted as close to 20% of GDP…probably 25% if you include all the less accepted quackeries: chiropractic, acupuncture, homeopathy, vitamins, supplements, weight loss, etc. And probably closer to 33% if you include dentistry and veterinary spending.
    Pardon if someone has pointed this out already.

  74. pembina June 25, 2017 at 5:16 am #

    Hi Jim! Thank you for you essays and the four novels about a world made by hand.

    It would be great to hear you interview Prof. Steve Keen of Kingston University in the UK, who sheds useful light on capitalism. He is an economist, and seeks to reform that profession from the inside. His language retains some of that awkwardness. A specific language example is his use of “debt” and “credit” (some smart on-line commentators complain that they didn’t “get” this). Keen uses “debt” for the total sum of borrowed money (a “stock”) and “credit” for the annual change in debt (a “flow”; in mathematics the time derivative—rate of change—of debt). Please do not let his language put you off.

    What is excellent about Steve Keen:
    1. He ridicules some of the statements of Paul Krugman. This was probably a failed attempt to get the attention of main stream economists. On a personal note, I really enjoyed this attack.
    2. He wrote a satire which was booted from the Forbes web site, that mocked the ideas of the Harvard-MIT axis in economics, specifically Larry Summers et al.
    3. Keen actually understands that energy is key in the long term. He has a way to insert raw materials/energy into the mathematical models of the economy. Nonetheless, he still struggles mightily to actually explain this to sympathetic interviewers.
    4. His latest book (somewhat like your boldness) names a half-dozen countries in imminent danger of a great financial crises—totally about 1/3 of the world economy. Their crises will probably happen serially, not all at once. Maybe (just maybe) the world’s governments will have learned that they can actually print money during great contractions as long as they give it to ordinary people (the immediate inflation risk is zero because money is being destroyed faster than any government can probably create it).

    What is weak/hard-to-like in Steve Keen’s work?
    1. He cannot time the crises. He is well aware that Australia (his home country) dodged the 2007-2008 crisis by doubling down on debt creation/property value inflation. Keen believes that Australia has just postponed the crisis, but to when? BTW, no one else seems to be able to time the crises. The person closest to good timing might be Prof. Sornette (Zurich, with a physics/engineering background). A Hawaii PhD thesis offers qualified support for Prof. Sornette’s technique.
    2. Steve Keen spends a lot of time on his mathematical/computer models in many on-line lectures (most available on you-tube). These may be critical to somehow influencing academic economists, and I find them interesting. My guess is that most readers do not get much from them. Moreover, they are “models”, a kind of useful tale that illustrates the inherent instability of capitalism. These models are far from giving a basis for investment decisions.

    I offer one final personal note. I am now retired and amazed myself with a recent emotional change. Until recently, the excesses and absurdities of capitalism used to give me stress that was viscerally emotional. As a scientist I was offended by “something for nothing” aspects and profoundly uncomfortable with markets. Now I expect markets to overdo good/useful/money-making ideas (e.g., sub-prime lending to buy cars necessary to get to work in the absurd America that we have built). I no longer feel alarm. Odd, indeed, but very a welcome change.

    With best regards!

  75. FincaInTheMountains June 25, 2017 at 5:34 am #

    CFN isn’t the only place I’ve elaborated on my proven, trademarked, 100% money-back, guarantee on how to deter WW3. == JIF

    It saddens me to see Jim that you fail to see the difference between un-christian assassination attack and a legitimate self-defence.

    Besides, it is time to remind the Western Elite that they bear responsibility not only before their pocketbooks, but before their fellow citizens and their Nation as well.

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    • JimInFlorida June 25, 2017 at 9:18 am #

      Well Finca, I do understand your appeal to a higher morality with regards to geopolitics.

      The “Christianity” you appeal to is an imposter. It is that modernist chimera known as Jewdeo-Xtianity (J-X) which would would have killed Western civilization many centuries ago had it been in place.

      It is VERY CHRISTIAN to spare billions of souls in danger by destroying the few who are willing to sacrifice them on the altar of their agenda.

      Russia’s defense must necessarily go beyond its borders and let the NATO plutocrats know that they will personally pay for WW3 with their lives.

  76. pembina June 25, 2017 at 5:53 am #

    Hi Jim! I suggest possibly interviewing some vegan-promoting physicians. If some large fraction of Americans reduce their intake of animal products (meat, fish, eggs, dairy) to under 10% by calories, the reduced disease rates will save billions of dollars with sustained vigor into old age. Among “near-vegans” we should expect 90% fewer cases of Type II diabetes, similar reductions in cases of high blood pressure/stroke, similar reductions (maybe even reversals) of atherosclerosis/heart disease and perhaps 50-70% reduction in cancers.There are many good vegan-physicians to interview:
    1. Dr. Joel Fuhrman of New Jersey, drfuhrman.com The web site is not free; the advice (paid for) is individualized. Dr. Fuhrman is my guess as the “best” of the second-generation practitioners. For some of his patients he has learned that he must allow up to 10% animal intake by calories. He is more “fat friendly”—depending on the person, between 15 and 30% fat by calories but from unroasted nuts and seeds (not processed oils).
    2. Dr. Michael Greger, nutritionfacts.org. His web site is free and a wealth of information. Dr. Greger was raised as a Midwestern Jew next to a pork processing facility; his humor reflects his history! His rhetorical flourishes may grate after awhile (I have watched over one hundred of his videos) because he repeats them frequently. Nonetheless, he is a close tie to being “best” among second generation practitioners.
    3. Dr. Neal Barnard, pcrm.org (Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, founding member). This guy gives the most polished of presentations. I have never heard him say anything that didn’t bear scrutiny with success. The nuanced use of precise language with popular audiences is impressive. His one rhetorical flourish: in every talk that I’ve watched he mentions that he grew up in Fargo, North Dakota, on a meat and potato diet. He is truly dedicated to reforming clinical practice, one physician at a time.
    4. Other choices: Esselstyn, Ornish, McDougal, Klaper (whom I consulted by phone—I was referred to him by Dr. Greger’s web site), etc. Klaper mentions in a recent you-tube interview that Kaiser Permanente’s upper management now realizes that moving their client base toward near-vegan diets is the best thing that they can do to promote health, vigor, and lower costs.
    5. Albert Lea, Minnesota, has had a Blue Zone project for about 10 years, with good success. Iowa has now enrolled 15 cities/towns in Blue Zone projects. Hawaii’s HMSA (the local equivalent of Blue Cross/Blue Shield) has enrolled 5 communities in Blue Zone projects. The Blue Zone project is multi-modal: not just diet changes, but strengthening community ties.

    As a mathematician, my main “concern” is this: can the forces resisting entropy (such as above) expand super-exponentially fast to outweigh the all too evident decay that surrounds us!

    • AKlein June 25, 2017 at 7:00 am #

      Ah, yes! Your post, Pembina, reminds me of the old saying that it is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness! Several years ago I switched to a “near Vegan” lifestyle augmented by a vigorous exercise program. Result? I have never been more healthy. Looking for others (i.e. doctors, practitioners) to care for one’s health is a certain way to become sorely disappointed. Sure, go to practitioners for guidance, but we should not expect anyone to care more for our health than we do ourselves. Effective health care requires the active participation of the person him/herself. One more thing. All of us are going to die of something eventually.

  77. Pucker June 25, 2017 at 7:53 am #

    Medicine in Europe in the year 1805 before the discovery of fossil fuels:

    “The skills of surgeons varied according to their experience and training, but all were hampered by the poor state of medical knowledge at that time. Most diseases were thought to originate from a single cause, usually evil-smelling vapours termed miasmas, although some religious surgeons thought that disease was caused by sin, and doctors had no idea why some medicines apparently worked while others did not. In reality, many medical treatments did no good at all (and, if the patient was fortunate, they did no harm either). Many patients recovered, not because they had been treated by a doctor, but because their own immune system eventually overcame the problem; in some cases faith in the doctor’s skills may in itself have had a beneficial psychological effect.”

  78. Pucker June 25, 2017 at 7:58 am #

    “Speed was the key to a successful amputation. Opium could be given to dull the pain afterwards but, without anaesthetic, if the operation went on too long, the overwhelming pain sent the patient into deep shock, which usually proved fatal. This restriction applied not just at sea, but to all surgeons at that time, and the most successful surgeons were the fastest ones. Robert Liston, Professor of Surgery at University College Hospital, London, had the reputation of being the fastest in England, and gamblers would often bet on the speed of an operation, many of which were performed publicly. A balance had to be struck, however, since greater speed tended to be achieved at the expense of accuracy. Even Liston on one occasion, eager to beat his personal best performance while amputating a leg, is said to have cut off one of the patient’s testicles and two of his assistant’s fingers at the same time.”

  79. Pucker June 25, 2017 at 8:05 am #

    “”A ‘vision of hell’ was a recurring phrase in the writings of those who witnessed the cockpit of a battleship during a battle. It was hot and airless, with every surface -walls, floor and the deck above -trembling from the recoil of the guns. In this gloomy confined space, reeking with the stench of blood and mangled flesh, from the shadows of which came the screams and moans of the wounded and dying, the little light shed by flickering candles and lanterns was focused on the surgeon. Often described as looking more like a butcher than a medical man, covered with blood and working as fast as possible to hack off mangled limbs, which were unceremoniously thrown in a tub prior to being heaved overboard, the sweating surgeon worked up to and beyond the point of exhaustion.”

  80. MrTibbs June 25, 2017 at 8:22 am #

    GAME THEORY.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_theory

    Illumination is the underlying theme.

    “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.”
    – Albert Einstein.

    Y = career politicians x career lobbyists x globalist mainstream media x career unelected Deep State bureaucrats x Hollywood elites x unprosecuted corruption

    “God integrates empirically.”
    – Albert Einstein.

    Y = old republic NETWORK globalism = THE SWAMP.

    -T

    They Call Me Mr. Tibbs.

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  81. FincaInTheMountains June 25, 2017 at 9:13 am #

    Agony

    What I began to write about a week ago this Sunday became obvious. Namely:

    Some Democrats say there is no obsession with inveterate clintonites on the idea of linking Russia and Trump with a story about the non-admission of Hillary to the red button
    http://nypost.com/2017/06/24/democrats-warn-party-to-move-on-from-russia-obsession/

    The House Oversight Committee under leadership of Trey Gowdy will not pursue investigation of Trump and Russia
    http://theweek.com/speedreads/708011/house-oversight-committee-not-pursue-investigation-trump-russia

    However, when dealing with Hillary even the stake through the heart does not guarantee anything, and losing the hope to attain success with the help of intrigues, she can go to such extremes that only Kalibrs will calibrate her.

    http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fu-PbzIruyA/VhWuLi4g_GI/AAAAAAAAHQk/k49wGVNk_D0/s1600/klub%2Bmissile.jpg

    • FincaInTheMountains June 25, 2017 at 12:09 pm #

      Looking through Sunday’s political programs:

      And again I was right – the Clintonoids are squealing about the tapes of Trump’s conversations with Comey as stuck pigs, apparently this arrangement was completely unexpected for them and the trap for Clintonoids was even more effective than I thought.

      The law on anti-Russian sanctions would not pass.

  82. wm5135 June 25, 2017 at 11:56 am #

    J. Robert Oppenheimer

    “The peoples of this world must unite or they will perish.”

    Twhack

    Mr. John Hurt – Mississippi John Hurt -Kindness personified.
    Richland Woman Blues
    My Creole Bell

    Yes sir, Dickey Betts has crafted some of the most memorable melodies for the guitar of our time.

    • elysianfield June 25, 2017 at 7:22 pm #

      Wm,

      And what do you think of John Fahey? His work might come close to your earlier description of the “Chicago” virtuoso.

  83. janet June 25, 2017 at 4:31 pm #

    CHICAGO (The Borowitz Report)—In an appearance at the University of Chicago on Monday, former President Barack Obama unloaded a relentless barrage of complete sentences in what was widely seen as a brutal attack on his successor, Donald Trump.

    Appearing at his first public event since leaving office, Obama fired off a punishing fusillade of grammatically correct sentences, the likes of which the American people have not heard from the White House since he departed.

    “He totally restricted his speech to complete sentences,” Tracy Klugian, a student at the event, said. “It was the most vicious takedown of Trump I’d ever seen.”

    “About five or six sentences in, I noticed that all of his sentences had both nouns and verbs in them,” Carol Foyler, another student, said. “I couldn’t believe he was going after Trump like that.”

    Obama’s blistering deployment of complete sentences clearly got under the skin of their intended target, who, moments after the event, responded with an angry tweet: “Obama bad (or sick) guy. Failing. Sad!” –Andy Borowitz

  84. Janos Skorenzy June 25, 2017 at 5:24 pm #

    https://www.prisonplanet.com/european-union-admits-most-migrants-are-not-actually-refugees.html

    All a Big Lie, just like the Russian Collusion scam. They want to make Whites a minority in their own lands, and ultimately to breed us out of existence. Google the Kalergi Plan.

    • FincaInTheMountains June 25, 2017 at 5:58 pm #

      Felicidades, Janos, for discovering America.

      Merkel is openly building up an European Invasion Army with weak “refugee” cover, which could only fool HuffPost readers.

      Big question, whom she’s planning to invade?

      • pequiste June 25, 2017 at 6:48 pm #

        France.

        It’s always France first and foremost in the mind of the German. Something about that Teutonic obsessive-compulsive personality that compels it.

        They’ll Just dust off the venerable Von Schlieffen Plan. Third time is bound to be a charm.

        As a bonus the Yzlamik jihadi forces of the New Caliphate want a second crack at France. The memory of Tours and Charles Martel burns their collective asses more than the hot sands of the Sahara and Arabia combined

        They will get it this time from both inside and out.

        • elysianfield June 25, 2017 at 7:23 pm #

          “Third time is bound to be a charm.”

          How could it be more “charming” than the success in 1940?

          • pequiste June 25, 2017 at 8:06 pm #

            The Deutsches Islamisches Reich under Fuhrer Merkel will get to keep it – the Neuer französischer islamischer Staat – that’s how.

  85. Janos Skorenzy June 25, 2017 at 6:37 pm #

    Secession: Yes, Marc Thiessen, A Divorce Would Be Great

    AEI’s Mark Thiessen, a former Bush speechwriter, surely feels chesty and responsible calling for American togetherness:

    America is on its way to divorce court: Marc A. Thiessen, PennLive.com, June 23, 2017

    Problem is, we’re beyond the point of patching the marriage up.

    Because it’s ceased being a voluntary association, as most marriages are.

    It never really was all that romantic to begin with: whites ventured forth, and killed off Indians to forge a home, leaving a few stragglers on reservations. Blacks were dragged here from West Africa. The differences were, and remain, irreconcilable.

    But immigration explosions pushed the situation to the breaking point.

    It is difficult to imagine how the multiracial morass we now find ourselves in can be sustained. Whites will either find themselves in unbearable Brazil/South Africa-type scenarios, or move toward some kind of political/cultural/geographic self-determination.

    I prefer the latter.

    The problem with “let’s all come together” exhortations is that they’re faux statesmanship. They completely ignore the very real differences that *actually* divide us. It’s like penning up a giraffe and a hippo and being shocked to discover they aren’t mating.

    I don’t want unity with Muslims. I want them to leave. I don’t want to share the road with drunk driving illegals from Mexico. I want them deported.

    I want to raise my children in a country where they aren’t forced to stand and apologize for their “white privilege” in school.

    The true statesman will acknowledge all this, and work toward the divorce we all so desperately need. Divorce isn’t actually such a bad comparison: it’s a legal remedy that recognizes that the sacred bond of marriage can get so screwed up that it needs to be dissolved. It divvies up property peacefully, and lets the spouses part without killing each other.

    The Declaration of Independence, after all, was a complaint for divorce.

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    • elysianfield June 25, 2017 at 7:25 pm #

      “The Declaration of Independence, after all, was a complaint for divorce”

      Yes Janos…we got the gold mine, England got the shaft….

    • thwack June 25, 2017 at 7:54 pm #

      I want to raise my children in a country where they aren’t forced to stand and apologize for their “white privilege” in school.

      *********************

      Why don’t YOU move to an all white country like Latvia, Lithuania, or Poland…?

      Whats the matter?

      are you afraid you are not white enough?

      • Billy Hill June 25, 2017 at 9:12 pm #

        This is not progress.

  86. BackRowHeckler June 25, 2017 at 7:37 pm #

    well, state and national economies may be ready to blow up, as Jim says, but its the summer season, and Deep State elites are living large out on the Vineyard, flying in from DC, Manhattan and SF. In fact here’s a message from Thaddeus Braithwaite III, Princeton Grad, frequent guest on PBS news and Charlie Rose, and a State Dept. spokesmen: “You knuckle draggers and mouthbreathers who cast your vote for Donald Trump, enjoy your 4th of July holiday. Whilst you cave dwellers are waving your flag, (we piss on your patriotism) shooting off fireworks, fixing your pickup trucks and cleaning your guns, we’ll be picking a new president. What, you thought your vote mattered you stupid sonsabitches? What are you cooking on that grill, hotdogs and hamburgers? Too bad, because us elites on the vineyard are having Kobe beef and lobster, which is what we’ll be dining on while we destroy the president. You morons are so goddam naïve and stupid you thought the country belonged to you. I’ve got news for you, it belongs to us, and at this moment I’m overlooking a harbor full of 80ft yachts, on this sunny afternoon hobnobbing with some of most powerful people in the world who’ll back me up back me up on that. I’m Thaddeus Braithwaite III on Martha’s Vineyard, Deep State Elitist; who are you pissant?

    brh

    • janet June 25, 2017 at 11:10 pm #

      “who are you pissant?” –brh

      Who, me? I’m just a barefoot housewife cooking in the kitchen… while all you men folk talk about important stuff like economic collapse.

      Little Jane

      • BackRowHeckler June 25, 2017 at 11:17 pm #

        Little Jane

        I thought you were kicked out.

        What did you have to do to get back in?

        brh

    • elysianfield June 26, 2017 at 11:24 am #

      Thaddeus,
      You are correct on all points…and we are wasting out time cleaning and oiling our guns…they will just get dirty again….

  87. Pucker June 25, 2017 at 11:57 pm #

    They seem to be on some kind of weird drug?

    “Donald Trump will tout surging U.S. exports of oil and natural gas during a week of events aimed at highlighting the country’s growing energy dominance.

    The president also plans to emphasize that after decades of relying on foreign energy supplies, the U.S. is on the brink of becoming a net exporter of oil, gas, coal and other energy resources.

    As with previous White House policy-themed weeks, such as a recent one focusing on infrastructure, the framing is designed to draw attention to Trump’s domestic priorities and away from more politically treacherous matters such as multiple investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election.”

  88. janet June 26, 2017 at 2:24 am #

    “not a dime’s worth of difference… blah blah blah.”

    Republicans exempt their own insurance from their latest health care proposal

    Republican legislators want to keep popular Obamacare provisions for themselves and their staff.

    The amendment offered by Rep. Tom MacArthur (R-NJ) would exempt health insurance plans held by legislators and their staff from key Obamacare repeal plans.

    Obamacare requires all members of Congress and their staff to purchase coverage through the health law’s marketplace, just like Obamacare enrollees. The politics of that plank were simple enough, meant to demonstrate that if the coverage in this law were good enough for Americans, it should be good enough for their representatives in Washington.

    House Republicans appear to have included a provision that exempts members of Congress and their staff from their latest health care plan.

    The new Republican amendment, introduced Tuesday night, would allow states to waive out of Obamacare’s ban on preexisting conditions. This means that insurers could once again, under certain circumstances, charge sick people higher premiums than healthy people.

  89. dcp5979 June 26, 2017 at 9:22 am #

    Excellent synopsis, sir! I absolutely concur. I worked for a while with the Obamacare implementation, and sadly, despite everyone’s best intentions, none of these schemes do anything to address the core problem. The system is a snakepit and as you already pointed out, it is domed to fail. I wish we could all have the same zeal for understanding things as we seem to have for “fixing” them.

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