America - The Official Thread

[Keef]

I can't afford to buy a plan and I won't be able to for at least a couple years to come. I'm 25, unable to work full time because I'm in school, and will continue being a full time student for at least two years this fall. I'm already living on welfare because I wouldn't break even financially in my program of study unless I made about $600 a week, and that's a completely separate expense from school tuition or housing. I'm perfectly fine being without health insurance as I am right now. But my government is going to penalize me for doing that. I didn't vote for this crap so frankly all the other people of this country who thought it was a great idea can suuuuckkkkk ittttttt.

When you're unable to change the system by following the rules you have to say screw the system and find an uglier way of making it happen. There's a lot of people out there like me who are in the process of starting a productive life but keep being punished by the system. That's a really good way to convince good people to get creative.

EDIT: I completed the application and it didn't even offer me any plans at the end, I assume because I'm passed the deadline. It says I should be waiting on a call from Ohio Medicaid.

 

[FoolKiller]

I can't afford to buy a plan and I won't be able to for at least a couple years to come. I'm 25,

26 is the limit to be on your parents' plan.

I'm already living on welfare because I wouldn't break even financially in my program of study unless I made about $600 a week, and that's a completely separate expense from school tuition or housing. I'm perfectly fine being without health insurance as I am right now. But my government is going to penalize me for doing that. I didn't vote for this crap so frankly all the other people of this country who thought it was a great idea can suuuuckkkkk ittttttt.

It sounds to me like you would make plenty back in your tax return (you're welcome) and could afford for them to subtract $95.

When you're unable to change the system by following the rules you have to say screw the system and find an uglier way of making it happen.

Your way isn't uglier. Your way is giving silent consent to the system. Would you vote to remove the welfare system you are using?

There's a lot of people out there like me who are in the process of starting a productive life but keep being punished by the system. That's a really good way to convince good people to get creative.

And you convinced yourself there is no other way. That is what they want you to think. I don't know enough details of your life and studies to know what to tell you is a better way, or if there is one.

You really sound like you are admitting temporary defeat.

I don't mean to sound judgmental. It just happens when I am even working against my doctors' wishes to avoid using the system. If I listened to everyone around me I'd be spending my days, feet up, getting money from people like Danoff.

 

[Danoff]

If I listened to everyone around me I'd be spending my days, feet up, getting money from people like Danoff.

*Goes and looks up how much he shipped out in taxes this year*

 

[FoolKiller]

*Goes and looks up how much he shipped out in taxes this year*

It's not my fault.

 

[Keef]

26 is the limit to be on your parents' plan.

Mom is on Medicare or whatever they put disabled people on who can't work. I don't know if I can sign onto that but it would give me 2 months until I turn 26.

It sounds to me like you would make plenty back in your tax return (you're welcome) and could afford for them to subtract $95.

I probably would, but the smaller my tax return the less I can afford my flight training expenses. Pushing about $25,000 now, not qualified for financial aid because it's not factored into the school's certified cost of attendance (despite the fact that the training and licenses are part of a degree which is complete bull). So that's all out of pocket, scrounging from where I can. Luckily Sinclair was so cheap that I could use my leftover finaid to pay for flying but that still came up about $6,000 short over the past two+ years.

Would you vote to remove the welfare system you are using?

You know I would. It's a complicated issue but that's the way it should be.

I listened to everyone around me I'd be spending my days, feet up, getting money from people like Danoff.

Hopefully one day this awesome welfare money will allow me to be a well-paid and productive member of society, paying back what I took thanks to an elevated tax bracket that my parents never made it to. Maybe I'll write Danoff a thank you letter for helping me not get stuck in a machine shop for the rest of my life.

Honestly, I think the very first priority for welfare recipients should be students. At least they're trying to make something of themselves. Maybe I'm biased but if the system wants to keep kids without rich parents dumb and submissive then it should just be honest about it.

 

[Danoff]

There is often a stigma with libertarians that they can't use the things that they don't like and wouldn't vote for. People will tell me I'm not a libertarian if I send my kid to a public school or use a public road. I suppose I can't have a minimum wage job either. I suppose that since I don't think health insurance should be tax deductible, or that home mortgage interest should be tax deductible, I shouldn't take those deductions on my taxes.

I say forget that nonsense. That fact that the system is the way it is means that you can't have it the way it should be - an that means you just work within the system. I will say this though, I do not intend to keep social security checks. I'll pass every dollar of social security that I cash (and I will cash it, because that's definitely not staying with the government) to my kids. I honestly don't know how people who have provided for their retirement can sleep at night knowing that the SS checks they cash are coming right out of their kids' paychecks. You can give it back (by gifting it directly to your children), and you should.

 

[DK]

Well, this is awkward.

 

[FoolKiller]

There is often a stigma with libertarians that they can't use the things that they don't like and wouldn't vote for. People will tell me I'm not a libertarian if I send my kid to a public school or use a public road. I suppose I can't have a minimum wage job either. I suppose that since I don't think health insurance should be tax deductible, or that home mortgage interest should be tax deductible, I shouldn't take those deductions on my taxes.

I say forget that nonsense. That fact that the system is the way it is means that you can't have it the way it should be - an that means you just work within the system. I will say this though, I do not intend to keep social security checks. I'll pass every dollar of social security that I cash (and I will cash it, because that's definitely not staying with the government) to my kids. I honestly don't know how people who have provided for their retirement can sleep at night knowing that the SS checks they cash are coming right out of their kids' paychecks. You can give it back (by gifting it directly to your children), and you should.

I'm not meaning to call @Keef a hypocrite. I just want him to be sure all of his options are exhausted before being forced to use a system that takes from others.

I was unaware that there is no financial aid for his flying stuff. I'm still paying off my student loans, mainly on purpose. It's the only credit I have and so it keeps my credit score up. That's my example of a system I think is broken that I have to use just to be able to use it for what it's meant for later.

Well, this is awkward.

Eh, I don't know if it's as damning as the article makes it out to be. People invest in companies like Pfizer for retirement funds because they are a steady growth company. Pfizer is not best known for contraceptives, and I didn't know what they made outside of some of my medicines until I read this article, and I invest.

On top of that, they are likely using their bank as their 401(k) manager. I've never had a retirement fund run by my employer. If they didn't think about it the topic of companies that create contraceptive/abortion products likely never came up.

Basically, not enough info to judge and this columnist makes sure not to mention how the 401(k) works. Often an employee can redirect where their funds go. I wonder if this guy would be opposed to a company allowing employees to self-manage their retirement fund, even if their choices went against the company's moral positions. If Hobby Lobby locked them down to just what Hobby Lobby wants then he would have likely thrown that out as damning evidence too.

 

[Sanji Himura]

Supreme Court Could Outlaw Red Light Cameras

For any motorist, getting caught by one of those red light cameras is like opening your wallet for the police department for that particular city that you are visiting. However, if Howard Herships of Rancho Cordova, CA has his way, those cameras could be gone by the way of the dodo bird.

You see Herships has $980 in unpaid tickets thanks to California's system of Right Turn Red Light cameras (the cameras not only are supposed to catch red light runners, but they go the added step of making sure that you turn right on green.) After his appeal to the California Supreme Court went nowhere in December, he decided to take the matter to the US Supreme Court by filing a "writ of certiorari". A cert, for the legally impaired, is just a fancy legal term for a permission slip to bring a matter to the high court. Most of the time the court rejects these outright, but this one brings to the forefront an interesting Constitutional question:

The Fourteenth Amendment says you have the right to confront your accuser. But how can you do so if your accuser is a camera?

Hership notes that the case could be similar to a 2011 ruling where a DUI conviction was overturned when the lab where the Police conducted BAC tests sent a "surrogate" to testify in the man's DUI trial as the one who processed the test results. Not good enough, said the court in a 5-4 ruling in Bullcoming v. New Mexico. Essentially in that case, the court said that a human has to be pointing the finger.

 

[Keef]

I think something happened here in West Carrollton a while back because the speed and red light cameras don't seem to be working anymore. I think somebody filed a lawsuit locally, or they just got tired of people not paying up. I didn't pay one of them and after a while I stopped getting letters about it.

 

[BobK]

So if these things do get ruled unconstitutional, will everyone who paid a ticket based on these things be getting a refund, and the movind violation expunged from their records?

Somehow I don't think so.

 

[Pupik]

Well, this is awkward.

Oop$.

This gets my goat; while I'm not the staunchest proponent of the Affordable Care Act (yes, it's an act, but not affordable), the idea that a company can tell what people should not legally do with their earnings and benefits is absurd. If the company itself does not wish to engage in the sale of products and services in which it finds morally reprehensible, that's fine. But there's nothing saying I have to use any optional government service.

So which mask is Hobby Lobby wearing? The one which is just Anti-Obamacare, claiming religious freedom is beign squashed, or...that it doesn't trust its employees enough to make their own decisions.

The Fourteenth Amendment says you have the right to confront your accuser. But how can you do so if your accuser is a camera?

Conveniently, cameras are forbidden in many courtrooms.

 

[Danoff]

Oop$.

This gets my goat; while I'm not the staunchest proponent of the Affordable Care Act (yes, it's an act, but not affordable), the idea that a company can tell what people should not legally do with their earnings and benefits is absurd. If the company itself does not wish to engage in the sale of products and services in which it finds morally reprehensible, that's fine. But there's nothing saying I have to use any optional government service.

Huh? You totally lost me.

 

[Omnis]

Supreme Court Could Outlaw Red Light Cameras

For any motorist, getting caught by one of those red light cameras is like opening your wallet for the police department for that particular city that you are visiting. However, if Howard Herships of Rancho Cordova, CA has his way, those cameras could be gone by the way of the dodo bird.

You see Herships has $980 in unpaid tickets thanks to California's system of Right Turn Red Light cameras (the cameras not only are supposed to catch red light runners, but they go the added step of making sure that you turn right on green.) After his appeal to the California Supreme Court went nowhere in December, he decided to take the matter to the US Supreme Court by filing a "writ of certiorari". A cert, for the legally impaired, is just a fancy legal term for a permission slip to bring a matter to the high court. Most of the time the court rejects these outright, but this one brings to the forefront an interesting Constitutional question:

The Fourteenth Amendment says you have the right to confront your accuser. But how can you do so if your accuser is a camera?

Hership notes that the case could be similar to a 2011 ruling where a DUI conviction was overturned when the lab where the Police conducted BAC tests sent a "surrogate" to testify in the man's DUI trial as the one who processed the test results. Not good enough, said the court in a 5-4 ruling in Bullcoming v. New Mexico. Essentially in that case, the court said that a human has to be pointing the finger.

I'll leave this here: http://virginiacopblock.org/580/how-to-beat-a-photo-enforced-speeding-ticket-or-red-light-ticket/

Actually, our city doesn't even enforce red light camera (RLC) violations because the tickets actually bring in less money than it costs to enforce them. They would need to set up a separate magistrate because the RLC tickets completely gridlocked the courts here. So that means they just gave money away free and clear to the jerk company that built and set up all of those things on every intersection.

 

[nobuffalo]

@Danoff, can a libertarian vote for something that goes against their libertarian views because they are already in the system? For instance, if the ACA goes against the libertarian way but you can't afford health care because the system causes it to be unaffordable can you vote for the ACA?

Also, if you are willing to use some of the things provided by the system such as public school, public roads and deductibles on your taxes, why would you not use social security? What makes it any different? Will you only give to your kids what they have put in or will you give them all of it? If a portion of the money you receive from SS came from others will you give that back to them?

 

[Keef]

So if these things do get ruled unconstitutional, will everyone who paid a ticket based on these things be getting a refund, and the movind violation expunged from their records?

Somehow I don't think so.

Funny thing about red light and speed carmeras, at least here in Ohio: They aren't technically moving violations. There are no points placed on your license. This is even more support for the argument that the cameras have virtually nothing to do with enforcing law and everything to do with creating revenue.

And I highly doubt money would be paid back, especially considering that about half the fine money went straight to the camera manufacturers.

I feel like some sort of punishment should be placed on any government that used the systems without reviewing their constitutionality first. How would you go about punishing the government for doing something it wasn't supposed to do? Kicking the mayor and board members out in emergency elections? Cancelling retirements? Paying grievances to people who were fined via these systems? Paying everybody in the municipality because the purchase of such systems was done with taxpayer money?

 

[Danoff]

@Danoff, can a libertarian vote for something that goes against their libertarian views because they are already in the system? For instance, if the ACA goes against the libertarian way but you can't afford health care because the system causes it to be unaffordable can you vote for the ACA?

Also, if you are willing to use some of the things provided by the system such as public school, public roads and deductibles on your taxes, why would you not use social security? What makes it any different? Will you only give to your kids what they have put in or will you give them all of it? If a portion of the money you receive from SS came from others will you give that back to them?

All excellent questions. No you can't call yourself a libertarian and vote for things that fundamentally go against libertarianism.

What does it mean to "use" social security? Cash the check? If that's the definition, I would be "using" it like any of those other things. The difference with social security is that I can give that money back to the people it was taken from - the next generation. In reality, my SS check came from everyone or anyone who paid social security. I can consider it to have come from any single one of them, or a small portion of all of them. So giving the money back to anyone who paid in removes the exchange. Here's a scenario:

My wife and I cash out each $3,000 in social security checks during retirement (I'm thinking that sounds insanely high, but I looked it up on the SS website just now and that's what they claim). You have to pay tax on that, of course, so I'd have something more along the lines of a combined $4000/mo total to play with (post tax). That's a total of $48k per year (this still seems crazy high to me). You can gift a total of $28k (as a couple) per year to one person. So you can't give it all to one kid, but one kid could not be paying that much in SS anyway. The maximum outlay for SS in 2014 was 12.2% of your salary up to $117k/yr. So a kid could be paying a maximum of $14k/yr in social security tax. No wonder this system is so crazy broken, I'm supposed to work for 30 years paying in a $14k/yr and then retire for 30 years taking out at $36k/yr, how does that work?

So $28k/yr can be gifted but to offset the cost of SS you'd only need to give a maximum of $14k (less if your kid makes less). On the otherhand, if you're pulling in $48k/yr after tax, you're can afford to completely offset up to 3.5 kids. So if you have 3 kids or fewer who each make $117k, you can reimburse them their entire SS losses. If you have more than 3 kids you'd have to split it between them. If you have less than 3 kids the thing to do would be to cap it at their losses. If you want to give more to them that's fine of course, but it's not SS so it doesn't come from those earnings and it should be considered a separate gift.

Note: If your kids have spouses that work, you could consider offsetting them as well - but that seems like a recipe for anger and resentment and also the spouse's parents should do that.

 

[Adamgp]

Funny thing about red light and speed carmeras, at least here in Ohio: They aren't technically moving violations. There are no points placed on your license. This is even more support for the argument that the cameras have virtually nothing to do with enforcing law and everything to do with creating revenue.

Bingo.

My sister got one down in the city a while back. The ticket came in the mail from the Illinois Dept. of Revenue, not the Secretary of State.

I personally have been nabbed hundreds of times by the cameras but never received a ticket.

 

[FoolKiller]

the idea that a company can tell what people should not legally do with their earnings and benefits is absurd.

Um, huh? Hobby Lobby is saying that Hobby Lobby doesn't want to pay for Plan B (they have and still do cover other forms of birth control). Hobby Lobby is not saying employees cannot buy Plan B with their own money.

My issue would be that Plan B is now OTC. Insurance doesn't cover my Tylenol, Mucinex, Zyrtek, or Vitamin D pills. It also doesn't cover pseudophedrine, but I do have to ask for that, provide an ID, and register into a government database to get that. And now they are trying to make me get an Rx. But if you want Plan B, which alters hormones, just grab it and walk on out the door. Note: I'm not opposed to Plan B. I think Hobby Lobby is wrong in believing it is an abortion pill, but defend their right to believe a misconception and refuse to purchase it. I also wish we had consistency in how insurance and regulations worked. Either all OTC products get covered or none and all OTC products should be sold the same way.


WARNING: TANGENT BELOW!
Here is a bit of irony: The same a-holes that make me show photo ID and log my purchase in a government registry think that showing an ID to vote is racist. If an ID is burdensome to African Americans and showing an ID is supposed to prevent meth production, are they saying that mainly African Americans are making meth? I wonder what it says about alcohol purchasing.

 

[Pupik]

Huh? You totally lost me.

Basically, Hobby Lobby doesn't trust their employees to make their own "moral" decisions.

 

[Danoff]

Basically, Hobby Lobby doesn't trust their employees to make their own "moral" decisions.

How is that happening? All I see is the Hobby Lobby is making their own moral decision about what they want to provide to their employees as benefits. I don't see Hobby Lobby firing people for buying certain things - which is pretty much what would have to happen to make the above quote true. Maybe I missed a headline.

 

[FoolKiller]

Internet pro-tip: If you are a cop who doesn't want your name and face posted on the Internet complaining about you violating the 2nd Amendment, don't try to have a judge enforce the removal and banning of it through a restraining order. That just guarantees you make national news.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...put-a-video-of-me-online-im-a-police-officer/

As the ACLU of Missouri puts it, in its case page related to Klaffer v. Bledsoe (filed E.D. Mo. Feb. 25, 2014):

[Jordan] Klaffer is a gun owner who frequently fires his gun at objects on private property. On May 1, 2013, Jerry Bledsoe, a police officer, confronted Klaffer while responding to a noise complaint. Klaffer videotaped the interaction, where Bledsoe issued an ultimatum to Klaffer to surrender his guns or be arrested. Klaffer refused to give up his guns and was arrested for disturbing the peace.​

To express his opinion that Officer Bledsoe was using his position to harass him for exercising his Second Amendment rights, Klaffer posted recordings of the May 1 encounter on YouTube and Facebook. And, on Instagram, he posted a picture of Bledsoe alongside a photo of Saddam Hussein, with the caption “Striking Resemblance.”

Officer Bledsoe retaliated by obtaining a court order that prevented Mr. Klaffer from posting videos, pictures, and text data criticizing Officer Bledsoe on the Internet. “A government order prohibiting criticism of government is the worst kind of censorship,” explains Tony Rothert, legal director of the ACLU of Missouri.​

“Gun advocates who fear the government is infringing on the Second Amendment have every right to broadcast their beliefs,” says Jeffrey A. Mittman, the ACLU of Missouri’s executive director. “The ACLU will always push back against government censorship.”

You can read the ACLU complaint, the protection order — which was in effect for 12 days before being vacated — and Officer Bledsoe’s petition; you can also see the video embedded below.

The order that the Missouri court issued, and that the ACLU is now suing over, strikes me as outrageous. The relevant language read,

Respondent is further ordered to remove all videos, pictures, and text data showing Petitioner’s name and picture from the internet and respondent shall refrain from posting all such data in the future.
​

Such an order violates the First Amendment even if it referred to a private person, I think, and certainly when it bars the posting of the name of a police officer whom one is criticizing, and a video of the officer performing his duties. I’ve written in detail about such orders, and why they are unconstitutional, in my One-to-One Speech vs. One-to-Many Speech, Criminal Harassment Laws, and “Cyberstalking”; the article chronicles how harassment and stalking laws — which were designed to stop (among other things) unwanted speech to a person — are now being used to stop unwanted speech about a person. Yet so long as the speech about a person doesn’t consist of true threats or other unprotected forms of speech, it must remain constitutionally protected. This is just the latest such incident to hit the news; I wrote about several others in the article.

Video of the interaction is on You Tube as well, not posted by Klaffer.


I wonder if Officer Bledsoe will file restraining orders against WaPo and the ACLU too.

 

[Liquid]

Classic Streisand Effect.

 

[FoolKiller]

You know, I always thought I liked Rob Lowe.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/06/magazine/rob-lowe-on-the-problems-with-being-pretty.html?_r=0

So what do you believe?

My thing is personal freedoms, freedoms for the individual to love whom they want, do with what they want. In fact, I want the government out of almost everything.

And then there is this.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottgo...8-insurance-brokers-analysts-blame-obamacare/

Health insurance premiums are showing the sharpest increases perhaps ever according to a survey of brokers who sell coverage in the individual and small group market. Morgan Stanley’s healthcare analysts conducted the proprietary survey of 148 brokers. The April survey shows the largest acceleration in small and individual group rates in any of the 12 prior quarterly periods when it has been conducted.

The average increases are in excess of 11% in the small group market and 12% in the individual market. Some state show increases 10 to 50 times that amount. The analysts conclude that the “increases are largely due to changes under the ACA.”

The analysts conducting the survey attribute the rate increases largely to a combination of four factors set in motion by Obamacare: Commercial underwriting restrictions, the age bands that don’t allow insurers to vary premiums between young and old beneficiaries based on the actual costs of providing the coverage, the new excise taxes being levied on insurance plans, and new benefit designs.

The prior survey conducted in January also showed rates rising during the fall of 2013, but the new increases will come on top of those hikes and are even sharper. That prior survey of 131 brokers found that December 2013 rates were rising in excess of 6% in the small group market, and 9% in the individual market.

The hikes in the small group market, on average, have been largest for the Blues plans, which reported average rate increases of almost 16% year-over-year for renewing contracts. In the individual market, the publicly traded health plans had higher increases than the blues, at an average of more than 11%, and private and not-for-profit plans had the highest average increases overall at 13%.

For the individual insurance market (plans sold directly to consumers); among the ten states seeing some of the sharpest average increases are: Delaware at 100%, New Hampshire 90%, Indiana 54%, California 53%, Connecticut 45%, Michigan 36%, Florida 37%, Georgia 29%, Kentucky 29%, and Pennsylvania 28%.

Good thing we aren't forced to buy this stuff...oh wait.

 

[Slash]

 

[MHPALA]

Murica' : http://abcnews.go.com/US/babies-found-dead-utah-woman-arrested-murder-counts/story?id=23311067

 

[Omnis]

Someone wrote an article on the same kind of thing over which I expressed some feelings a while ago.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/04/the-culture-of-shut-up/360239/

It's like expressing an opinion is becoming character/reputation suicide.

 

[FoolKiller]

Someone wrote an article on the same kind of thing over which I expressed some feelings a while ago.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/04/the-culture-of-shut-up/360239/

It's like expressing an opinion is becoming character/reputation suicide.

It kind of makes me think of this.

 

[Sanji Himura]

Think that bankers are making millions of dollars? Think again. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average annual salary of a bank employee was $49,540 in 2012, not much higher than the national average annual across all occupations, $45,790.

However, there is one group in banking that stands out as highly paid - the Federal Bank Regulators. Before the Dodd-Frank Act, the average employee of a regulatory agency received 2.3 times the average compensation of a private banker, or $113,942. By 2013, this ratio actually increased to more than 2.7 times (or $133,758), and in some cases considerably more.

The average compensation at the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) exceeded $190,000 in 2012. The staff at the Federal Reserve is likely better compensated, but the Fed refuses to release employee salaries.

You might think that these high paying jobs require special skills. Not so. At the OCC, secretaries make on average $79,182 per year. Motor vehicle operators (limo drivers) at the FDIC earn $82,130. Human resources management trainees at the CFPB make an astonishing $110,759 a year.

Hat tip: Liberal Logic by way of The Wall Street Journal

 

[DK]

@Sanji Himura, I don't think that those protesting against bankers have the ordinary bank employee in their sights. Of the few I've talked to on the matter, their rage is reserved for those higher up the corporate ladder.

Anyway, this makes me glad Sarah Palin doesn't wield political office any more.