That's pretty much the definition of insurance. Yes, you pay more than you likely would have to, but you don't get catastrophicaly screwed if you are 'that guy'. When you write 'the rest of us', you are assuming that you are the heathly person, and not the one with the previously existing condition. You don't know that. It might be true right now, but that could change tomorrow, based on some test or event.

Further, your analysis assumese that the costs for a person without an existing condition just disappear. They don't. That person, who possibly can't get insurance, ends up in the hospital anyway, and then costs are shared by everybody else because your insurance pays for it in higher hospital costs. When you go to the hospital, it costs $100 rather than $50 because there is $50 added for uninsured people. It's even worse than that because it's a hidden cost. You don't know what percent of that $100 is cost of treatment and how much is overhead cost by uninsured. Better to have everybody covered, your insurance go up by a little and then the hospital costing $50.

Ah...so it would make sense not to get MMR, because not that many people have had it.
That logic doesn't really work. If you prevent something, so it doesn't happen, then would it have made sense for you not to have expended the effort to prevent it, because it would not have happened? No, you have to look at the costs and benefits, along with the probability, and then consider if everyone does the same thing.
Herd immunity only works if a sufficient amount of the herd has been innoculated.

A bunch of the government is long term or affects specific groups of people. Maybe you don't care that National Parks are closed, but I would think that eventually you would want to visit the Grand Canyon or the Smithsonian. If there was a hazardous chemical spill nearby, you'd want someone to investigate. You'd probably like basic cancer research to continue, and GPS satellites to continue to be launched.

No, the shutdown doesn't affect you right now and won't if they eventually start up again. But not having a federal government would affect you in the long run if it didn't restart.

Carlos Slim votes democrat? That would be a truly odd thing for him to do.

(Hint: Google Carlos Slim)

Doesn't look that way to me. Looks (to me) like House Republicans removed funding from one program and the Democratic Senate adding it back. It also looks like if the House voted on the Senate version it would actually pass, but the House speaker won't let it come to a vote.

Yes, spending bills must originate in the House. Then the Senate is expected to amend them and send them back. When they agree and pass both houses of Congress, it goes to the president.

Only Congress didn't, so the president didn't say one way or the other. In this case, it's one house of congress against the other, with the Republicans in control of the house and the Democrats in control of the Senate, and the House removing funding for an area and the Senate adding it back in.

Ok, that sounds like a great bi-partisan issues, so it should be trivial to get a bill that removes that tax and puts the tax someplace else (and doesn't do anything else, like repeal the entire ACA). Why do I think that I should not hold my breath while waiting for this to occur? And who do you think I'm going to blame for the lack of progress (hint: because some will oppose it because it is not a repeal, and won't support anything that will improve the act because they want it to fail)?

I have personally seen benefits already (22 year old son who can be on my insurance, sick aunt who can't be denied because of pre-existing conditions). So, it's better than the previous status quo. If they repeal it, the two people just mentioned are screwed. I imagine that the rollout today is going to be a huge CF, but the complaints that 'Obamacare has already failed' by Cruz and others is just crap.

The problem I see is that the people opposed to the law are not proposing anything. Literally, nothing other than getting rid of the ACA and going to status quo ante. At that point, there is zero incentive for them to propose an improvements or their own solution. Never mind that individual mandates were the original republican solution; once Obama ran with the idea, it suddenly becomes socialism / communism / fascism.

(Your 'unconstitutionality' swipe also brands you as a radical; it's been found constitutional, so suck it up and deal with it)

You have no idea what the value of your genes is. Nobody does. Any particular scale is wrong both because of bias and because it would be for 'now' rather than for the future. The whole point is that we don't know what's going to happen in 10 years, much less 50, so maybe you are the most valuable person in the world because your genes allow you to be the ideal person 50 years from now.

Yes, you, personally, are probably not it, but the person that is 'it' would probably be judged poorly now. Honestly, let's just keep the gene pool diverse and let things work themselves out as they do.

What? There are a number of robotic lawn mowers, and they work pretty well. The big problem right now is cost, on the order of $2k. The whole point is that they will get better over time and their cost will go down over time. It's the same with many currently manual jobs. Over the next 20 years, larger and larger segments of the job market will get replaced by robots, at least by reducing the number of people required. There are, of course, still farmers, just fewer. There will still be cooks and lawn mowers and dish washers and ditch diggers, just fewer of them.

The real 'problem', if it is one, is that the speed at which these changes are occuring is less than a human work lifetime, say between 20 and 70, so people that had jobs won't any more.

“Do you understand what I'm saying?" shouted Moist. "You can't just go around killing people!" "Why Not? You Do." The golem lowered his arm. "What?" snapped Moist. "I do not! Who told you that?" "I Worked It Out. You Have Killed Two Point Three Three Eight People," said the golem calmly. "I have never laid a finger on anyone in my life, Mr Pump. I may be–– all the things you know I am, but I am not a killer! I have never so much as drawn a sword!" "No, You Have Not. But You Have Stolen, Embezzled, Defrauded And Swindled Without Discrimination, Mr Lipvig. You Have Ruined Businesses And Destroyed Jobs. When Banks Fail, It Is Seldom Bankers Who Starve. Your Actions Have Taken Money From Those Who Had Little Enough To Begin With. In A Myriad Small Ways You Have Hastened The Deaths Of Many. You Do Not Know Them. You Did Not See Them Bleed. But You Snatched Bread From Their Mouths And Tore Clothes From Their Backs. For Sport, Mr Lipvig. For Sport. For The Joy Of The Game.” -- Going Postal, Terry Pratchett

In my reading, the subject-changing was being done by the person:

The computer is trying to engage in a conversation, and the person just throws out one-off questions. The key to a 'conversation' is a back and forth on the same subject, and keeping context during the conversation. You can't do that if the person doesnt' allow it through inane questions.

The only decent followup question was 'what is my name?' In the caze of IZAR, it answered correctly, showing that there is some sort of state in there.

As someone who used Sun Grid Engine, and then started using Oracle Grid Engine, this is not FUD. Oracle has changed the licensing to the point that I cannot use it any more. I cannot get it any more. And, worse, they have removed the old versions, so my clients can't get it any more either without going through Oracle licensing.

Well....if it is Lockheed IP / property, then it means that Lockheed bought it, in which case he's entitled to his 10%. If it's not Lockheed's property / IP, then he's ok. Which one is it?

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" -- Benjamin Franklin.

The people / companies / governments that are rapidly increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere are 'doing something' and they have not weighed the pros and cons carefully. Not producing CO2 is the default, it's been the case for human history; rapidly changing atmospheric composition is recent and people that want to do that, without weighing the pros and cons carefully, are the religious nuts.

Humans are changing the atmosphere, and that change is affecting the climate, the results have already not been good and are expected to become worse. That's the unintended consequence. At this point, I think the people that want to continue doing it are the ones that have to justify themselves, not the 'hysterical people' who want them to stop.