Mach8's Comments (397)

“So the cop uses the guys face to smash a window and THE GUY is charged with two felonies? This is getting ridiculous. We are becoming a police state in the most literal sense.”

“"Government funding of basic research has been astonishingly productive. Over the past five decades it has led to the development of the Internet, lasers, global positioning satellites, magnetic resonance imaging, DNA sequencing, and hundreds of other technologies. Even when government was not the inventor, it was often the facilitator. One example: semiconductors. As a study by the Breakthrough Institute notes, after the microchip was invented in 1958 by an engineer at Texas Instruments, "the federal government bought virtually every microchip firms could produce...."

Yup, capitalism is great at commercializing stuff but not so great at actually INVENTING it anymore. Every time someone regales me with tales re: the strengths of capitalism, they grow oddly silent when I bring up the fact that almost every great technological stride of the last 60 years has come via government R&D and funding. The government is making more millionaires now than the so-called "free market."

So much for Adam Smith and the "Invisible Hand."”

“Everyone has a right to disagree with actual facts. Hey, few people like truth. But when you make up your own "facts" and call it "news," then there's a problem. When you remove the proof that you are making up the "news," then you are simply a propaganda outfit.”

“Chasing your own tail, KDog? Because your response was laughably circular.”

“Hah! Fanned.”

“So Fox "News" gets called out as a fraud news organization and then removes the PROOF. I can see it now...

Progressive: Fox "News" is a sham news organization.

Conservative: PROVE IT!

Progressive: Ummm.... ahhh....

When you can't win the game, change the rules. If Fox were indeed a REAL news organization, it would not have any problems with the clips remaining on YouTube. They are "news" after all, right?”

“How much of Goldman's profit is based on financing ventures that produce actual jobs, services and products? How much is produced simply from crafty mathematics? My guess is that far more profit is produced from the latter.”

“If those guys are caught ANYWHERE that recognizes an EU extradition treaty, they'll be spending 5 to 8 years curing Italian "sausages" in their bums. So I hope none of them is interested in visiting France, England or any other EU country.”

“What is Boehner's solution?”

“Still waiting for a solution from the right-wingers...”

“Yes, because everyone just has thousands of dollars in disposable income lying around...

Most people can't afford regular upfront costs for healthcare:

"Physician decisions drive the majority of expenditures in the US health care system. American health care costs will never be controlled until most physicians are no longer paid fees for specific services. The lure of economic incentives to provide unnecessary or unproven care, or even that known to be ineffective, drives many physicians to make the lucrative choice. Hospitals and especially academic medical centers are also motivated to profit from many expensive procedures. Alternative payment forms used in integrated multispecialty delivery systems such as those at Geisinger, Mayo, and Kaiser Permanente are far more efficient and effective.

Fee-for-service incentives are a key reason why at least 30% of the $2.5 trillion expended annually for American health care is unnecessary. Eliminating that waste could save $750 billion annually with no harm to patient outcomes."

http://www.thehealthcareblog.com/the_health_care_blog/2009/08/how-to-rein-in-medical-costs-right-now.html”

“Did your mother say something?”

“"As a savings vehicle, HSAs really only work best for people who can afford to pay current medical costs with other money, so that the HSA money can accumulate. And financial experts stress that since there's no guarantee that individuals won't need to tap the money sooner, rather than later, to pay for unforeseen medical costs, HSAs should be used in tandem with 401(k)s, IRAS and other forms of saving -- not replace them."

"Using an HSA as a retirement-savings vehicle is not for everyone, however. Critics say the accounts only provide a retirement benefit to those who are young, healthy and financially secure enough to pay for medical expenses on their own.

Keep in mind, an individual who opens an HSA must use its high-deductible plan as his or her principal health insurance. Typically, those plans only cover catastrophic events, such as hospital stays and surgery. "I wouldn't recommend that someone who has diabetes jump into HSAs" both from a health and retirement standpoint, unless you have plenty of discretionary income, says Tom Schneider, an independent financial adviser in Farmington, Conn. Frequent doctor visits and health-care expenses could easily eat up the money in the account, leaving little -- if anything -- to roll over from year to year. "You really should be healthy to take advantage of it," he says."

http://finance.yahoo.com/retirement/article/102589/Unhealthy-Strategy

As for the rest of your rant:

http://www.nccp.org/publications/pub_615.html”

“Here we go with the moving goal posts....

I like the way you guys can just rewrite history to suit you. Reagan was a massive failure who's policies sank the US into massive debt, and now he's a hero? Republicans aren't conservatives?

Pure hypocrisy.”

“Yes, because Republican leadership has been so effective:

http://www.eriposte.com/economy/other/demovsrep.htm

Dang socialists, with their gad-dum prosperity...”

“Funny you want to complain about "socialism" while expounding the virtues of another idealistic system. Ask yourself a question... why doesn't pure capitalism exist? After all, motivated self-interest in itself isn't supposed to be "bad" right?

The reason it doesn't exist is because greed doesn't work that way. Greed is the flaw that prevents pure capitalism from existing. Pure capitalism is about as naive an idea as communism. It will never truly exist on a macroeconomic scale.

But keep holding on to the dream.

As for the Fanny Mae/Freddie Mac thing, even die-hard right-wingers have given up on this myth:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late-2000s_recession

But why let facts stand in the way?”

“HSAs are more right-wing snake oil:

http://www.commonwealthfund.org/Content/Publications/Testimonies/2006/Sep/Health-Savings-Accounts-and-High-Deductible-Health-Plans--Why-They-Wont-Cure-What-Ails-U-S--Health-C.aspx

When are you going to learn?”

“What are you going to do, wait until the thread is dead like you normally do and then spam it?”

“"Simple numby, the Feds take money from the state population through taxes."

Dude, I asked you politely before to NOT claim that tax money belongs to the state. You right-wingers are always moving the goal post. Either the money belongs to the people or the states... you can't claim one or the other as it suits you...

Then again, you can. How convenient.”

“You're getting soft in your old age, floss... even YOU call it Faux. Pretty Freudian.”

“Who?”

“Considering Republicans have been running the show for decades, what is your point?”

“Still spamming unsupported nonsense Peleador?”

“You're so adorable...”

“To Ms. Brown,

Your argument was a False Equivalence fallacy: http://furrybrowndog.wordpress.com/2009/07/22/the-fallacy-of-false-equivalence/

But I guess being married to a Republican strategist doesn't make her credibility suspect...”