Another rainy weekend, another open thread.
Open Thread #58
This entry was written by Robert Koehler, posted on July 19, 2008 at 10:23 am, filed under Open Thread. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.
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For those who enjoy good television.
http://www.drhorrible.com/
Does anybody remember the Korean TV ad, from last year I think, which had a pretend car chase scene with a Korean man and Caucasian woman? They jump in the car, the woman yells “Go!”, they drive off, get chased by some bad guys, and then the ad ends with them braking just before driving off the cliff…
Anybody remember the name of the car and/or company? Thanks in advance.
I like the design Marmot, much better than the last one. Simple and clean, good stuff!
I particularly like the header. I might have mentioned it before, but have you considered an image rotator to show off a random bunch of your pics?
This week, I received an ‘Economic Stimulus’ payment of USD300 from the US government, and was able to cash it on the spot at KEB (as we’d set up a dollar-based account previously). Americans are required to file tax returns annually, which I’ve done, but due to a foreign-earned-income exclusion I’ve owed no taxes there for over twelve years. So, all in all, not a bad little gift from Uncle Sam.
The American economy is so bad, some people in Ohio who haven’t worked in 17 years are finding meat out of reach. Luckily, National Public Radio is on the case! Damn you, George Bush. This is all your fault.
The US is bankrupt and is facing an economic
and financial collapse. It’s coming, but they just want to keep on denying the inevitable, making things worse by the day.
Who’s going to bail out the US?
I believe the USFK is well on their way out of Korea. Not because of anti Americanism in Korea, but because the US can’t afford to keep its military in foreign soils due to lack of funds from their bankrupt economy.
It’s the biggest fiscal mismanagement of a country the world has ever known. And it will bring the superpower on its knees. Possibly in few years, the world may see a new world order. I’m not looking forward to that.
Brendon, I notice they have the bloated bellies that are symptomatic of starvation, just like the African kids we see on TV. It is shocking this could happen in the USA of 2008. The USGOV needs to at least double their $637 Social Security check and provide more food stamps for meat to lift them out of poverty.
Something dawned on me today. I was looking for a German restaurant in Los Angeles. I’m dating a girl who studied in Australia and she misses the Germantown there. There is only like one freak’in German restaurant in Los Angeles, a city of 8 million people. WTF???
You know what’s ironic? The U.S. census still allows people to put down their ethnic ancestry and everyone still fills it in… only 4% of the American population don’t fill out any ancestry and just put “American.” That means 96% of all Americans still put something down. Well the biggest ancestry identity in the U.S. is German at about 15%. In Los Angeles, I think this is even greater, like 18%… so that would be 1.4 million people of German ancestry, but not ONE freak’in German restaurant? Damn… you’d think America was populated by Italians, Chinese and Mexicans by judging on the availability of restaurants alone…
You German-Americans have no pride…
Gave it a little more thought…. WWI and WWII probably had something to do with making German Americans submerge their ethnicity and just try to blend in…
Well, at least hamburgers and hot dogs lived on! Daymn though… where can one get a decent Wiener Schnitzel, Bratwurst, Labskaus, Kartoffelsalat and some weissbier to wash it all down?
“There is only like one freak’in German restaurant in Los Angeles, a city of 8 million people. WTF???”
Only one if you don’t count all the hamburger joints and Der Wienerschnitzel stands.
@Wangkon:
You’re right. Most of us are completely assimilated and have no ethnic pride in Das Vaterland.
@Brendon:
Love this quote from the linked story:
“So they cut back on expensive items like meat, and they don’t buy extras like ice cream anymore. Instead, they eat a lot of starches like potatoes and noodles.”
What, no ice cream? How will those large and lovely ladies maintain their Rubenesque figures? A Chicago TV news broadcast aired a segment about supermarkets in Chicago that do roaring business starting at 12:01 AM on the first of each month because that’s when the next allotment of food stamps can be used. Large people pushed shopping carts loaded with pizzas, sodas, french fries, and other convenience items, which they paid for and loaded into their SUVs.
The $25 billion a year spent on food stamps is still probably less than the amount of overcharging on Medicare prescription drugs and an added layer of administrative expenses associated with government-subsidized private health insurance programs for Medicare recipients, all made possible by the 2003 Medicare bill, supported by every Republican senator but one and many Democrats and signed into law by Bush.
And let’s not forget that most of the processed items in those shopping carts contain wheat, soy, or corn products, all subsidized to the tune of $16 billion a year.
Government entitlement programs have both individual and corporate beneficiaries.
correction: which they “paid” for and loaded into their SUVs.
Pawi’s gone not a week and we’re making fun of fat people here?
You know what’s even more strange? The hot dog chain Wienerschnitzel doesn’t serve any Wiener Schnitzel!
Wiener Schnitzel is breaded, fried veal and I don’t know of any restaurants in Southern California that serve it. The closest thing to Wiener Schnitzel you can find in my neck of the woods is in a Korean Donkasu or Japanese Tonkatsu restaurant. Japanese Tonkatsu was inspired by Wiener Schnitzels and of course Donkasu is directly lifted from the Japanese version.
There used to be a restaurant at State College and Chapman that served excellent Wiener Schnitzel. It was just south of the southwest corner. The Chef’s name was, I think, Horst, who I used to work with at the Melody Inn a long time ago. I don’t know if it’s still there, though.
# 14,
I told ppl here that he’s everyone’s favorite strawman…
It’s nice to pound on the pinata… very stress reliving…
# 5,
Damn you gbnhj… people like Brendon and I don’t even freak’in qualify for a rebate check…
And you are not even going to use that check to “stimulate” the U.S. economy…
17- I’m not pounding on him, so much as lamenting that contrary to all reasonable expectations, his departure hasn’t necessarily raised standards at the Hole.
Actually, the part of the NPR story that caught my attention was not so much that those two disgusting lardasses were so fat, but that the mother dropped out of high school (later getting a GED), then the labor market after she got “depressed” 17 years ago, and those idiots at NPR thought they’d be sympathetic.
# 16,
All I get is this:
http://www.yelp.com/biz/old-wo.....on-beach-2
and this:
http://www.yelp.com/biz/red-li.....ery:german
There was a place called Lowenbrau Keller, but it closed and was turned into a trendy Hollywood bar and the other one, Sam’s Brauhaus, turned into a strip bar.
Schatzi in Santa Monica (the one that the Governator use to go to) closed down.
Talk about complete assimilation!
Pawi is gone? I must have missed that.
Oh yes, pawikirogi bid us all adieu last weekend, like a depressed teenager giving away his guitar and record collection before starting up the car in the garage. One can only hope…
We can make fun of the ladies for being heavy, but the link between poverty and obesity is clear. Poor people eat crappy food. May I recommend “Nickel and Dimed” by Barbara Ehrenreich.
Next month I’m off on my annual trip to my small country hometown in the Midwest. I’ve never second guessed my decision to bail after high school. Small town rural America (and much of the Midwest in general) died along with American manufacturing.
I sometimes wonder about some of the regulars here, such as “Lana”. Who is this peevish sourpuss obsessed with Koreans and Korea? Is it a female hispanic American that I keep thinking Lana is or am I way off? What relation would this person have to Korea, anyway?
19/slim - you can throw out the filthy garbage can but there’s still trash everywhere… so? If that’s all yo got to say, then it’s not much of a high-quality post, eh?
I’m headed out the door to see “Machine Girl” at the Pucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (PiFan)… campy campy. Anyone else patronizing the arts today?
Anybody remember the name of the car and/or company? Thanks in advance
It was the Kia Lotze.
Here’s the link;
http://blog.naver.com/stussy95.....&vid=0
There is only like one freakin’ German restaurant in Los Angeles, a city of 8 million people. WTF???
Seoul has a population of 10 million, and there’s only one German restaurant here.
I can’t believe there’s an “enlarge” link next to the picture on the NPR page.
I’m wondering what kind of space-time vortex these women live in that 7-8 bags of groceries between the two of them can make them two of the most horribly, floppy-bellied, adipose, obesely, rotundly, manage-to-attract-all-light-and-matter within-their-event-horizon (except jobs), butter-by-the-shovelful, sweating-in-January, wheezing-like-a-Mellencamp-accordion-solo, wipe-the-wrong-crack-after-shitting, FAT?
How is the HELL is that possible?
Seems to me that, while meat may be out of reach for the ladies in the Nunez family, not much else has been.
WangKon936, this American intends to use it to stimulate this American next holiday
BTW, according to this IRS webpage, ‘taxpayers must have a valid Social Security number, $3,000 of income and file a 2007 federal tax return’ in order to receive a payment. It’s true that some higher-income earners will be ineligible for this, but according to this page, ‘[t]he payment, including the basic amount and the amount for qualifying children, will be reduced by 5 percent of the amount of income in excess of $75,000 for individuals and $150,000 for those with a Married Filing Jointly filing status’. And, along with the foreign-earned-income exclusion, that’s a lot of earnings, so I guess I’ve got company.
if you’re an American citizen or else have a taxpayer ID, don’t you also qualify?
#27 mins0306:
thanks, would never have figured it out otherwise.
Hey, did you guys know that Medicare, which covers 8.3 million beneficiaries for general medical care, and 36 million old folks for prescription drugs (why don’t they shop at Wal-Mart, for the $4 generic prescriptions?), consumes US$425.5 billion of the Federal budget all by itself? I didn’t.
But then I started nosing around the Federal budget, and I learned that it’s true — and the Department of Health and Human Services, which operates Medicare, will gobble up a total of US$737 billion under that sumbitch George Bush’s FY2009 budget proposal — and that’s before the Democrats can socialize medicine!
Social Security? US$700 billion.
Fiscal Year 2009 will also see a 4% increase in the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the agency which brings gang violence to your community through Section 8 housing vouchers. US$39 billion is being wasted that way.
It’s not entirely clear, but it appears that across agencies the cost of the “War on Drugs” approaches US$50 billion, including about US$10 billion spent on Federal prisons.
Department of Agriculture? US$100 billion.
Department of Edumacation? US$59.2 billion.
The next time some lefty fool bleats on and on about the sums we spend on necessary defense of our nation, punch him in the mouth.
Are you letting Canada’s ambient anti-Americanism get to you, cm?
No, it isn’t. The US is unique in that it prints the currency that its debts are denominated in. Back in the ‘IMF crisis’, Korea really was broke, because it couldn’t pay its debts in won. The US doesn’t have that problem. The dollar is their currency, but it’s the rest of the world’s problem.
China - because the only way the CCP can stay in power is to continue to provide increasing economic opportunities to the Chinese people. That requires the American customer, and that requires supporting the US economy.
The Saudis - because it is only US power that keeps the house of Saud in power. They’ll spend anything needed to support the dollar.
Russia - because the first two will keep them in line, at least monetarily. All 3 have massive dollar holdings, none want massive devaluation. Any of them could dump dollars and start the downward cascade. None will. The current system benefits everyone, from those lardasses in Carr’s article to the Chinese peasant, to Wall Street bankers and everyone with a retirement plan.
I must be dense, Carr, sorry, but - what’s your point?
Draw your own conclusions. You don’t vote anyway. But American voters might find those numbers of interest. My recommendation would be to vote for whoever — other than Ron Paul — proposes to eliminate those departments and the War on Drugs. Voila! Massive budget surpluses. Otherwise, vote for McCain in preference to the Smart Guy, who promises massive expansions in the aforementioned departments which are already bankrupting the nation.
I would imagine that all of those sums have come about over the course of years of debate, negotiation and horse-trading. In all cases, probably much is wasted, and much is beneficial. That goes for the defense budget, too, every cent of which you seem to imply is necessary spending.
Maybe some of those programs could indeed be eliminated. But that would not stop the tendency of politicians to negotiate with each other. They will still dream up programs to move money around each other’s constituencies. Because that’s what they do. You support me to attract another billion in health dollars to my state, and I’ll support you to attract another billion in public housing in your state.
If in fact you really want a government that does nothing for its people other than protect them, then isn’t Ron Paul actually your guy? (Innocent question, I don’t know much about him.)
What strikes me as most important is to have someone in charge who understands how bureaucracies work, who can empathize with and therefore work with real people. Pre-election promises don’t count for as much as intelligence, and emotional intelligence. The pollsters and focus group organizers are in charge of the campaign. It’s after the election is over that we find out if ‘you American voters’ made the best choice. A real smart guy won’t bankrupt your country to buy votes. A real idiot might come close (oh, yeah, he already has…).
Your decision, I think it is clear now, should be made based on character and smarts.
I’ll take endless grief for this but:
There are a lot of very suspect things about 9/11.
In particular, the temperature of the basements. Thermite? The presence of Sulfur. Thermate? The alleged removal of explosives dogs from the tower in the week before 9/11. The alleged crews of unknown workers in large numbers pulling wire and putting in long hours. And, IMHO, the testimony of the senior database Admin. I’m an IT guy, and I can tell you we’re all honest and earnest. :p
http://video.google.com/videop.....5308136871
#38: We already skewered Cinemagauche thoroughly a while back, and now another Truther steps forward? Jesus Christ, I don’t have the energy. Besides, cold beer is waiting at the Hyatt.
So, let me get this straight: By your standard we should choose The One in preference to John McCain, who served 22 years with honest-to-goodness real people in the Navy — I might add, a bureaucracy if ever there was one — and 25 years in the House and Senate.
Why?
Obama hasn’t exactly distinguished himself thus far as any sort of reg’lar guy, nor does he have much experience in the world of work. How do you reconcile the aforementioned standard with your preference for The One?
Anyway, I doubt your assessment of Obama as a Smart Guy, even though he went to Harvard Law School. Even though he’s quite glib, Obama’s awful as a speaker once the TelePrompTer is unplugged; McCain’s difficulties start once it’s plugged in. Maverick’s problem is one of not being a performer, while Obama’s is that he is not much other than a performer.
Look its Korea as most beatuiful in the world. I should get a “HT” for this.
http://www.boston.com/travel/b.....ind_s.html
HAT TIP ME BABY! HAT TIP!
Also… in regard to Mr. Carr’s posts..
What is really sad is that with that 100 bill USDA budget they can’t mount a campaign to get better than they got in this absurd beef deal.
#39: I will NEVER come between you and cold beer.
Navy. Senate. Too limited. All American.
Some of those bureaucracies I was talking about (maybe organizations would have been a better word) include: OPEC, Wall Street, the SEC, Hezbollah, the Taliban, the UN, the IMF, various ‘Greens’, the Chinese Communist Party, an assortment of muslim brotherhoods, the EU, the Iraqi government, (yes, and the Pentagon), etc.
You know - the rest of the world. Not the just the organizations like the navy and the senate that the old generation of Americans used to think were the only bureaucracies that mattered on earth.
Riiiight. And, pray tell, apart from his sympathies for Hezbollah, what is The One’s experience with the laundry list of world “organizations” you’ve trundled out for us? Because I’d be more inclined to think Maverick has more experience with them as well.
You can tell it’s been raining by how many posts I”m putting up today.
Linkd , you think Obama is better than McCain in understanding the int’t organizations you mentioned?
“Any of them could dump dollars and start the downward cascade. None will. ”
Americans are in denial. Americans need to face the facts. Your country is broke. I don’t think it will be the Chinese, Russians or the Saudi’s will be the ones to start the stampede out of the US Treasury. I think it will be one of the smaller countries that will start the domino effect. And the US economic collapse will come up like a thief in the night. Get ready for some massive civil unrest from a country that has never experienced the kind of gut wrenching poverty that’s coming down the pipe. I hope I’m wrong, I really do, because the US economic collapse will collapse the world economy and everyone will suffer big time. Plus I don’t want the Chinese to fill the gap. But when you are continually being bombarded daily by such grave warnings from many economists like the link shown below.. if there’s smoke, there must be a fire somewhere. Talking about smoke, the US economic data is a smoke and mirror act. For instance, the official inflation rate in the US is 4%. But the actual inflation rate is 13%. The official unemployment rate is 5%. But the real unemployment rate is well over 13%. There are 9 million houses that have been foreclosed. In one to two years, they are estimating that number to go up to 20 million houses. What does that tell you about the health of the US banks?
Watch how the US government cooks the books here.
http://moneyandmarkets.stream5.....fault.aspx
Okay, this is a bit freakish: Angelica Hernandez’s right nipple is clearly visible in the NPR link (click enlarge).
Warning: this might be traumatizing to children, or to those attracted to persons who are height/weight proportional. Exercise discretion when viewing.
CM: spare me the night of horrors. ever heard of the depression?
That would be funny if it was not so wrong. One of these men has had an affirmative action free ride all his life, and I am not talking about Obama. McCain, with terrible grades in the naval academy (coming last or close to last), being shot down 4 times (a normal pilot would be retired if he destroyed that much equipment), promoted and coddled by his family who were big wigs in the navy, McCain has had his mouth in the public trough for years. He has always been in a government job and has never had any real life experience in any type of private sector job. By the way, his reputation of being a maverick is because he often votes with the democrats on things that mainstream republicans dislike, including masterminding some of the worst ones, like McCain-Finegold, McCain-Kennedy, and McCain-Liberman.
Just what America needs - a former homocide bomber geriatric manchurian candidate running for President Bush’s third term.
“CM: spare me the night of horrors. ever heard of the depression?”
Sure I did. But I stick with my comment
“Get ready for some massive civil unrest from a country that has never experienced the kind of gut wrenching poverty that’s coming down the pipe.”
Because it’s going to be far worse and it will make the Great Depression of the 1930’s look like prosperous times in comparison. All signs points to a run away inflationary stagflation coupled with rising oil prices and China’s reckless growth at all costs.
What is wrong with America is perfectly illustrated here. This is just one example of many banking failures that the US is facing.
http://www.reportonbusiness.co.....iness/home
Since it’s all going to hell, we might look for distraction. I commend Joss Whedon’s Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog to all Marmot’s Hole readers. Doogie Howser can sing.
Free to all through Sunday (in the States), $3.99 on the iTunes Music Store thereafter.
I did read that great book. In the US and some other developed countries, poverty is positively correlated with poverty, unlike less developed countries where the opposite is true. That fact alone reminds us that correlation is not causation.
One can eat reasonably healthy foods if one makes smart choices. If I had to live on $25 a week, I would eat the following:
1. six cans of collard and kale: $6.00
2. two heads of cabbage: $1.60
3. one bag of carrots: $1.00
4. one bag of onions: $2.00
5. 2 lbs. of beans: $2.00
6. 2 lb. of brown rice: $3.00
7. one carton of locally raised eggs: $2.80
8. 2 lb. bone-in chicken thighs: $3.00
So far that adds up to $22, the average amount of food stamp benefits per person.
Notice what’s missing: milk, cereal, bread, and pasta. All of these items do not deliver much nutritional bang for the buck. Non-starch veggies are always a good choice, eggs are the cheapest source of fat and protein, and chicken is not only cheap, but the bones can be used to make a flavorful broth.
I suspect the real reason why poverty is positively correlated with obesity in America is that a) healthy convenience foods priced out of range - a middle-class mom in a hurry can shell out $5.00 a pound for prepared foods at Wegman’s deli; and b) inability to access/understand alternative food choices to the standard USDA pyramid that is making us sick.
@ Slim:
I was not making fun of the women for being fat. I was pointing out that their physical size AND food choices belie their claims of hardship. For Pete’s sake, ice cream is not a necessity. You lived in China. You know what real poverty looks like. In America, the real hardship of poverty isn’t a lack of food but a lack of public safety - poor people are trapped in very dangerous neighborhoods with extremely unhealthy social environments.
And one more thing:
A big reason why Americans of all socio-economic classes like processed foods isn’t so much that they are cheaper but that they taste better owing to the addition of MSG-like additives, such as hydrolyzed yeast protein and autolyzed yeast extract. Just like MSG, these free amino acid derivatives add savoriness to all kinds of foods from spaghetti sauce to potato chips to packaged breakfast sausage.
A typical American would have a hard time living on the grocery list I listed in the previous comment because of the relative blandness. A poor Chinese, Indian, Indonesian, or Salvadoran would be thrilled to eat eggs and chicken every day.
Are you an egg?
http://sonofshenzhenzenhuahinh.....ls-to.html
Gotta drop a comment before reading ALL the drivel. How does Sontan Sally maintain HER zaftig(?) profile. I don’t think it’s the large quantities of Hanwoo sohgogi. Oily starches? How do low income people remain overweight? Cheapass empty calories. Ohio’s economy, as has the world’s, has been raped and neglected by those who won’t be affected by an economic collapse. Wealth is apolitical and amoral.
correction:
“…poverty is positively correlated with poverty..”
should read:
“…poverty is positively correlated with obesity…”
OK. I read the drivel.(Mid)Western fatties remain that way after income loss because of conditioning and what’s available at their current income level.The political divisiveness I attribute to everyone’s insane desire to suck up to what they believe will be the winning side. What I don’t get is no one’s ability to see wealth’s need for cheap labor, and the inevitable turn the US must take in this.(X - county’s) middle class will grow, and cheap labor will have to be found elsewhere.That’s a long term thing. For now, the stock market needs to be depressed so the wealthy can build more wealth from the cheap pickings. Nothing going on these days looks to me like moderate, pro middle class, slow and healthy growth.
Another tangent… I work for a bunch of ate up with the dumbass, ex-military,pro curfew, anti-drinking, control freaks.None of whom I would trust to run the country.I don’t believe that McCain’s experiences make him a better leader, just positioned such that he’s in a place to be groomed for conservative consumption, like Obama’s positioned for liberal consumption. In the end, wealth gets what it wants, more wealth, and maintenance of power.
@32
When I was studying for my Life/Accident/Health Insurance license, I was surprised to find that compared to ALL health insurance companies, Medicare is the most efficient. They spend less than 2% on administration or on anything other than actual care. That information was true in 2005, I’m not sure how accurate it would be now. AND, they require that the generic be bought unless there is no generic or unless your doctor specifies that they want the name brand.
Also, it’s helpful to remember that Medicare and Medicaid cover the people who cannot get insurance elsewhere either because they can’t afford it, they’re out of work, or because the insurance companies find them an “undesirable risk.” These are the most expensive people to insure. People with chronic conditions like asthma, cancer, DIABETES (which I’ve had since I was 4. I am ineligible for insurance anywhere despite total lack of complications because I am an “undesirable risk.” Even in Korea, I can only get the public health insurance.) as well as people who can’t afford to pay for it themselves.
I’m not trying to say that Medicare and Medicaid are perfect because there are definite ways that it could be improved, but they’re easy punching bags because they’re government sponsored. I know far too many people that this program has helped to throw it out with the bathwater of government.
I enjoyed the Dr. Horrible. Thanks #1 and #52 for the recommendation.
“The world is a mess and I just need to rule it”
Dr. Horrible
“The hammer is my penis”
Captain Hammer
Medicare and Medicaid is bankrupt, because people who quailfy for those services simply do not pay enough money to the government to provide those services and they use too much of those services. Money in <<< Money out.
How do you feel about a dude who intentionally overstays his hospital day at a county hospital, so he could get a wheelchair the next day on medicare, while he already has an electric one sitting at home, paid by medicare? People intentionally have medicare pay the bill. They could have bought a wheelchair on their own for $100. Instead, he incurs a cost of $2000 ish for staying overnight, and $100 or so for the wheelchair. He’s a taxpayer, who doesn’t pay enough taxes, but uses too much services. He’s not paying, what does he care? Lenin smiles.
Providers in rich hoods avoid it like the plague, because the govt artificially tries to save costs by directly underpaying the provider.
Save for providers who work for fixed salaries, no one works on medicaid and medicare alone. They’d never cover their overhead and supplies cost. They’d be out on the streets.
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/vid.....energy.cnn
either he missed college, or he was a liberal arts major. He can’t possibly coating silicon as if it was FREE, and that silicon prices will continually drop with increasing demand, can he? Also, case in point, he says straight out, that when the US pays for foreign energy,
they build sky scrapers,
we lose jobs.
This is not Xenophobic !?
All liberal leftists are bad at economics, dangerously populist, and appeals to liberal arts majors or straight out uneducated people, who have little understanding of economics and science. Or the science trained individual who missed a lesson in economics. There are, a ton of them, of course.
I’m all for renewable energy. Making all electricity from 100% renewable is science fiction. The real answer is in-between, and we need more nuclear reactors, for certain.
Electric car didn’t work out, did it? Hybrids have proven to be the market’s answer.
I will fight Big Oil.
-Babo Al.
or your named is WBuffett, you donate very little cash, and donate stocks, in your name, a poorly disguised perpetual monument to yourself, to glorify yourself to all humanity, in the future to come.
and we all know that has been done before.
WBuffett believes he should be taxed more and so should his collegues.
I always wondered how come he just doesn’t donate money to the govt yearly.
He never does that. He just makes these trusts, set aside with his stocks, in his name.
I would also like to recommend Dr. Horrible to everyone. It’s free until Sunday at midnight!
WangKon936,
18% German? They are GermanJews. Around UCLA, Westwood is Jew town. Made lots of money in Hollywood making movies. Tainted American public, according to the movie, the Birth of Republic.
Brendon Carr, the mr.Sensitivity, I would not judge those Ohians until I walk in their shoes for at least one year. People are too quick to judge. Condemning people who are different from you is a consistent trait of yours. Open your mind. Embrace humanity.
For those who worry about American economy: America can always sell Alaska to Japan. It will pay the debt many times over. Besides, within 10 years, Chino-Japanese war(WWIII) will start and the US will be big, big, big beneficiary of these two reasoning-challenged races go against each other. Two hump-back whales fighting to death.
Koreans are the shrimps between the two. And, they are clueless. Totally. Mental disease help them to survive.
Dokto is nothing. I am talking about the disappearance of a race.
There is an old Korean expression for haughty, naughty people like Brendon,니 똥 굵다. “Your dung is thick (due to eating a lot)”
In old Korea, majority of people were starving, literally.
Classic.
OK, I guess I’m not too drunk to come up with a reply. In honor of the grandiosity of alcohol, though, in the following, I shall take the extreme liberty of using ‘we’ to speak on behalf of the entire outside world.
WE WANT SOMEONE THAT CONVINCES US YOUR ERA OF FEAR IS BEHIND YOU. WE WANT YOU TO STOP BEING SCARED OF US. WE WANT YOU TO TALK TO US, FOR CHRIST’S SAKE, INSTEAD OF LECTURING US ABOUT HOW EVERY LEGAL PROCESS, EVERY POLICY, EVERY SYSTEM THAT AMERICA USES IS DE FACTO THE BEST BECAUSE IT’S AMERICAN.
WE WANT YOU TO TREAT US BETTER AT YOUR BORDERS.
WE WANT YOU TO RECOGNIZE THAT YOUR VAUNTED FINANCIAL SYSTEM JUST REALLY DROPPED THE BALL BIG-TIME IN THE LAST YEAR.
WE WANT YOU TO GIVE SOME OTHER COUNTRIES CREDIT FOR THE QUALITY OF LIFE THAT THEIR MIDDLE AND LOWER CLASSES ENJOY, RELATIVE TO THE UPPER CLASS.
WE WANT YOU TO TURN OFF CNN. YOU ARE THE COUNTRY THAT INVENTED THE TERM ‘PERCEPTION MANAGEMENT’, AND YET YOU FAIL TO SEE THAT YOUR NEVER ENDING ELECTIONS ARE NOTHING BUT THAT. YOU FOOL YOURSELVES INTO THINKING THAT YOU’RE “STAYING INFORMED”. NONSENSE. YOU KNOW WHAT WE ALL KNOW, HERE ON THE OUTSIDE, AND THAT IS THIS:
YOU HAVE A CANDIDATE OF FEAR. ONE THAT SAYS “WE ARE STILL AFRAID AND WE WILL MAINTAIN A WAR FOOTING AND TREAT THE REST OF THE WORLD WITH DISTRUST”. AND YOU HAVE SOMEONE WHO WILL HELP YOU FIND A HAPPIER WAY TO LIVE WITH THE REST OF THE WORLD.
I think the second one is the smart guy. But some people need 8 years for their idiot detectors to kick in. Some even longer than that, I guess…
Linkd is lit.
Sober up, Frenchie. You’re just jealous because of our freedom.
“linkd” is a dude who proofreads Korean companies’ English-language annual reports for a living, right?
Ask, and you shall receive.
it’s classic that he’s reverting to emotion, after being soundly out-reasoned by Mr. Carr.
The arrogance of these non-Americans.
cm, The united States is not on the verge of economic collapse. It goes through recessions periodically and recovers just fine. The U.S. will simply wait and see how its “allies” behave while it is attending recess.The United States would probably terminate this entire planet with nuclear extinction if it ever felt threatened to become anybody’s bitch.
#62
What about the costs of Canadian, British, and French universal healthcare? The reason why it costs so much in the US is that the US government has been in the pocket of those who profit from it for years.
And whether people hate the U.S. or not, the truth is that 90% of the posters here would not be alive today if the U.S. and it commonwealth allies had lost the war of the superpowers to Japan, Germany or Russia. I wonder how things would have turned out if His Majesty the Emperor of Japan had one…
I agree with this, except that this recession — unless we’re exceptionally lucky — looks to be profoundly wrenching. Like the early 1980s at least.
That will be okay with me, of course. I have a Ph.D. in Horribleness.
With respect to Medicare, the per-beneficiary cost is just about US$10,000 — except that the per-beneficiary cost is masked by the 35 million prescription-drug beneficiaries whose per-capita cost is lower. The ambulance-and-emergency-room commandos cost us a lot more per capita. I’d reckon those 8.3 million beneficiaries gobble up about US$20,000 per capita.
This works because the 180 million wage-earners in America don’t have to chip in US$20,000 a head — it only costs working people about US$1000 a year each to ferry those two grotesquely fat ladies to the emergency room in a taxpayer-furnished taxicab or ambulance to pick up their diabetes prescriptions.
How, exactly, is that supposed to work once the government extends Medicare to cover all Americans?
Brendon it would also help if many Americans learned not to rush to the emergency room every time they get a scratch or a cough.
Most Americans — i.e., the ones who work, and pay for their own medical care — already know not to go to the emergency room of a hospital except in an emergency. The Americans who get their medical care free, courtesy of the taxpayer, are incentivized the wrong way.
german food avail in Wisconsin, Illinois, and more than likely in Michigan.
Unavail in southern California.
Major casualty of white flight.
Ms Wie disqualified.
“She was like a little kid after you tell them there’s no Santa Claus,” Witters said.
Let’s send fan-mail to Michelle Wie. She’ll rise again like Park Chan Ho.
Park Chan Ho is never to be criticized.
He was the first. Besides, a lot of the Korean LPGA girls are not pretty, relative to Wie.
ER visit is very expensive. Most people duke it out, and wait for the office visit. These are people who care about their bank accounts, credits, etc.
The people who don’t pay anyway in the end, they go to the ER. That’s because the office won’t even see them.
That’s right. Most health care plans charge a hefty fee for emergency room visits that do not result in an overnight stay. Mine is $125. Every city has walk-in clinics. I use those when I can’t wait for an appointment. Medicaid pays for everything, but Medicare does not, so wouldn’t frivolous users have to pay something?
Not everyone who shows up at the emergency room with a scratch is a US citizen or even in the country legally. Hospitals bill working people without insurance but write off the expenses of the chronically unemployed or undocumented because they know they’ll never collect.
i’ve just been reading up on singapore’s medisave program. don’t know much about it, but there may be a model there for the US. the two axes of the american system that could use fixing are free service overuse and malpractice suits.
on another note, i’m working on a best practices aquistion/merger/licensing project for foreign companies (ostensibly in the food industry) setting up shop in russia. anyone (carr, sperwer, dogbert?)have experience with a company like that or know of anyone who has? any help greatly appreciated.
War of the superpowers? If you’re referring to WWII, the Soviet Union joined the Allies after Hitler broke the non-aggression pact with Stalin and invaded. I think most of us here would still be alive because most of us commenters are not Jewish, Gypsy, gay, or disabled.
‘Not everyone who shows up at the emergency room with a scratch is a US citizen or even in the country legally. Hospitals bill working people without insurance but write off the expenses of the chronically unemployed or undocumented because they know they’ll never collect.’
There is another group that is quiet but not small, and usually related in some way to the 20-and-out civil service crowd. They trade tidbits of the inner workings of government beaurocracy and aim to beat the system in anyway possible.
Boy, that was pretty good. Tone was a little over the top, but I still like it. I’ll try to lighten up on your upcoming election in the future, though.
user-81, I don’t know where the French flag comes from. I’m a Canadian WASP residing in Seoul. dogbert is basically correct. The bulk of my business comes from design companies who are contracted by chaebol to produce annual reports in both languages. Usually, the Korean text is produced first, and the translation of that is outsourced to me. I outsource the raw translation, and edit (or rewrite) that into the English text. (Then, usually, some semi-bilingual member of the client’s PR team hacks it up and sends it for printing without a final check from me). Move in $50K of FDI and “This could be YOU!”
I don’t care, Linkd. I’m still going to call you Frenchie.
About Medicare and Medicaid: I think it would be a more useful discussion if the two are separated.
From an outside perspective, the Obama/Mcain debate seems a no-brainer. I say that because in most other (smaller) democratic countries, people tend to elect leaders who are good statesmen and diplomats as well as for their economic and security credentials.
America, for whatever reason, doesn’t really factor in what the rest of the world thinks. One reason for this is that it’s big enough and strong enough to do what it wants, without needing to succour anyone (contrary to what smaller countries must do). Another reason is that America is only vaguely aware of the outside world. It just doesn’t factor in.
Ignorance also leads to fear. The US is one of the most fearsome, yet at the same time fearful, countries in the world. You only have to go back to how easily the Iraq invasion was sold to the population - by playing on absurd claims of threatening WMDs - to see that. Or to go back further to the way Reagan convinced Americans that the Sandistas importing a couple of thousand AK47s was a deadly threat to the most powerful country in the world. Absurd.
My point: Americans vote on security (ie, someone who talks tough) and economy. Relationships with the outside world don’t count. But they should.
Obama will fix America’s image in the world, and in doing so will give the states more leverage to do what it wants. Soft power. What’s the U.S going to do, post Iraq, when they’re faced with a real threat, something that needs a union of allies ala the Korean War? Or when it needs to pull out all its stops and convince other countries not to sell off its currency? Or in ahundred other possible scenarios where trust matters. Even the top dog needs friends.
The way I see it you’ve got a choice between a grizzled, ancient, belicose geriatric and a young, bright leader who seems clear and decisive. Why not give it a go and see what happens? The Republicans have royally fucked up your country, not just once but for two consecutive terms and you want them to have another go at it?
Unfortunately he’s not white, and his name sounds like Osama. I’m giving him 50/50.
I think you’ve hit a winner Marmot.
Campaign donors apparently give him much better odds than you as
OsamaObama is raking in much more than McSame. So far Obama’s shown a bit of Teflon, shaking off controversies from Rev. Wright to breaking his campaign pledge on public financing and even the flipflopping tag hasn’t stuck since McSame’s also changed positions on some key issues. Haven’t you noticed the resigned sense of gloom and doom among our liberal democrat haters? Absent a Swiftboat sequel, the election’s Obama’s to lose.Linkd, I wrote the annual report for Hyundai Motors in Seoul a few years back for a design company. I also designed it, since they didn’t seem to know how to design, which struck me as odd, since they were a design company. Had no idea what I was doing, but it turned out ok (I think).
“Unfortunately he’s not white, and his name sounds like Osama.”
Obama is half white and people are used to his surname now.
It’s the “Hussein” part that may get him in trouble.
That’s what they said about Hillary. Still, I hope you’re right. I think the world needs Obama (and I say that without cynicism).
My guess is that it will be alot closer than people think, and that when the election goes down to the wire it will get very grubby. What worries me is that the repubs managed to (quite easily) convince America that Saddam was tied up with 9/11, just by talking about the two things next to each as often as possible. I think there wil be lots of “tongue slips” and muslim innuendo and black social pariah gossip and all the rest of that sort of thing which will genuinely turn many voters off. Then again, maybe I’m just being too cynical after all…
Not sure who “they” is, but by the end of last year, Obama was bringing in substantially more than Clinton. Money attracts more money as donors want to bet on a winning horse. In fact, as I watched the media lovefest with Obama and the Democratic party elite lining up behind him, I got the feeling that the next president had already been chosen for us, and voting would just be a formality.
American independence movement was sparked by high taxes.
Americans don’t like paying taxes, period.
Bush delivered on security.
You may not like the rules, you may even credit sheer luck.
They didn’t vote on fear. They voted on results in security.
You also leave out religion in middle class America, in middle America.
I re-direct you to the map of voting results in 2000 and 2004 for that.
Significant difference from Europe, and the most likely distribution in 2008.
It will be enough to elect McCain, if he plays his cards right. That’s why Obama is acting like he goes to church. Any European candidate wouldn’t give a damn. But, it’s fake. He went on vacation in Easter. And denounced 2 of his pastors. No real Christian I know does that, even with good reasons. He’s playing his cards, too.
May the best candidate win.
Also, there is no way Obama is Muslim. A real Muslim will be significantly appalled at Obama’s core beliefs on social issues.
However, US Muslims are hypocrites on their ethics.
They will vote 99% for Obama.
They perceive that Bush has wronged them and their roots by the Iraq War, tight security on entry, and defending that nation in the west Arabian peninsula.
Obama is not Muslim nor Christian in reality. This will not matter crap in Europe. It matters in America.
Obama is best said to be what a real socialist lefty is.
Irreligious.
I’d almost like to see Obama win just to shut up white guilt shakedown artists like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton; emphasis on the word “almost.”
And you may say the world needs Obama, but what the world needs doesn’t factor into the election. But hey, if you feel like writing letters to some ignorant Yanks in Clark County, Ohio, I’m sure they’d appreciate your well-reasoned argument to vote for Obama because the world needs him. It really worked on ‘04.
May the govt collect taxes and make Kangnam a housing project for the poor.
Wait, that’s what America does.
So, how long do you figure it will take Fox News to admit that the US economy is in recession once Obama is elected? I call 24hours or less.
If the United States is on the verge of economic collapse then I must agree with Acrop7 and Brendon Carr, they entire world would fall first in it’s wake, including China. Anyone who disagrees with this truthfull logic better kill themselves now for they do not wish to face the reality. The United States is a country which realizes how important it is to look weak and be weak finacially when times are needed. The United States however is smart enough to know it is the only Nation on Earth as long as Earth exist’s to dominate space and surrounding planets. Anyone wh