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Comment Re:for profit healthcare needs to go and the docto (Score -1) 51

This is retarded.

1. It isn't for profit healthcare that is the problem, it's THIRD PARTY PAY.
2. I don't use third party pay, ever, for healthcare. I've been insured nonstop for over 30 years, and NEVER ONCE has my insurer paid my doctor.
3. Even when I've had emergencies, I still called around, negotiated a fair cash up front rate, paid cash up front, and billed it to my insurer. My cash up front rate was sometimes below any co-pay negotiated with my insurer, lol.

I just recently had some elective surgery that would have cost me about $2000 on my annual deductible, but I was able to cash pay a negotiated rate of $400 including a follow-up "free". I submitted the $400 to my insurer and they reimbursed me.

Third party insurance exists because YOU VOTERS demanded the HMO Act of the 1970s, which tied health care to employment, and then employers outsourced it to third parties.

Health care is remarkably cheap in the US (cash pay, negotiated) and I don't have to wait months to see a doctor when I call and say I am cash pay. They bump me up fast.

Comment Re:player expectations NEED to be distorted. (Score 1) 56

Other INDIE devs. Indie devs aren't charging $100 + loot boxes. Team Cherry are in the unique position of being like 3 guys whose previous game blew up and are basically guaranteed to sell 10M+ copies of the sequel. They can afford to spend 7 years on Silksong and then sell it for $20.

Other teams that aren't already set for life are worried because they will need to charge more for smaller, less polished games in order to afford to eat.

Comment Re:So shut them off? (Score 1) 35

What you'd need is a military operation (a war). There are many reasons not to do that.

And many to do. It'd be analogous to how, at one point, the British Empire was convinced by Christian militants to put its Navy in the service of ending chattel slavery, and then went and did exactly that.

Too bad they don't make Christian militants like they used to.

Comment Re:Somebody is totally ignorant of history [eyerol (Score 1) 215

Yes, but then the GOP implemented the southern strategy, and deliberately switched places with the Democrats, who were already beginning to support civil rights. Since then, republicans have consistently stoked racist fears among southern baptist conservatives. This is a dumb tired argument that assumes history stopped in 1968.

Comment Re:So many things that contribute to this (Score 1) 215

They have a choice without vouchers. The majority of people claiming a voucher were already sending their kids to private school.

Vouchers rarely cover the entire cost of a private school tuition. Poor people can't afford to avail themselves of the voucher. They amount to a tax break for people of means who were going to send their kid to private school anyway. They also suck money out of the public education system. The district still has to pay the fixed costs for facilities, staff, and services, regardless of how many families take money out of the system with vouchers. This leaves the more impoverished kids in underfunded schools with even less funding.

Comment Wrong Headline (Score 4, Insightful) 42

It should be "Court Tells Google to Continue Violations of User Privacy". If they made multiple billions and were fined $0.5b, and none of the executives went to jail, then there is no reason not to keep doing it. The fine needs to exceed the benefit derived from the infraction.

Comment Re:Access (Score 0) 102

Look at productivity vs wages since the mid 70s when digitization really started taking off. Rich people have derived virtually all the benefit. Yes, a handful of middle class knowledge workers have been created in IT, but compare that to the number of jobs that have been deskilled or eliminated.

Comment Re:Wow (Score 1) 201

Actual investments tend to increase in value because they are productive assets.

That's the ideal. Free-market idealists, such as Libertarians and Classic Liberals, believe that's all there is to it. Capitalists (not the same thing) see things differently. For them, investment is anything that increase their wealth, no matter what.

Hence, while productive assets are a type of investment, there are others. Rent extraction is one such. Forming cartels is another. Productive-asset-providers destruction is a fourth. Buying the best made-to-order laws from sovereign law-selling States in the free market of laws is a fifth. And so on, and so forth.

So! Housing is a rent-seeking investment type that, for maximum ROI, involves as operational costs primarily law-buying, and secondarily cartel-formation (enabled by the purchased laws). It transfers wealth up is an extremely profitable manner and, therefore, is an excellent opportunity for those operating at a scale they can in fact buy the necessary laws.

Comment Re:Bad recommendations (Score 1) 84

Honey is no better than sugar, what terrible advice

You definitely do not want to give it to children. Lots of hormones in bee puke.

It's not due to hormones. Honey can contain Clostridium bacteria spores, which if they become active in a child's gut, can give them botulism poisoning. It's realy only infants less than a year old though, or two years if you want to be really cautious.

Comment Re:Wow (Score 1) 201

As long as housing is an investment, they won't. The entire modern Western economy is built around the concept of "number go up". Investments are allowed downward moves only temporarily. After a while, number must go up no matter what, and if it doesn't naturally, the laws necessary for it to happen will be purchased as necessary.

Comment Re:Have yourself the economy you voted for (Score 1) 201

half the country didn't want this

Is that half country right now on the streets, participating in a general strike, paralyzing trade and traffic on most cities, and causing massive economic damage to the billionaires and their pocket politicians?

Or is the vast, vast, VAST majority of that half country passively allowing all of this to happen unchallenged, unwilling to dirty their hands in active subversive political action?

If the latter, well, inaction is a choice, and all choices have consequences. Hence, to all Americans who are day in, day out, choosing to do nothing, by all means, enjoy the fruits of those 226 -- and counting -- deliberate choices.

Comment Re:Wow (Score 1) 201

We could also put substantially higher taxes on homes purchased after the first that applies to both people and companies to prevent them from being used as investment opportunities.

The problem is boomers run most rich countries now, an unintended consequence of having population growth dropping below replacement level. They either are, or are becoming, the major political force most everywhere that matters, politicians almost invariably bowing to their will. And they want their retirement plans working as intended. So, no, housing isn't going to come down, or if it does, it's at best going to be temporary.

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