Mathematical Proof: Single Payer = “Good”

There has been much debate in the last few months over the Health Care Bills in Congress.  Much of it, I’m afraid, has been more emotion and misconceptions than logic or truisms.  Few that have gotten through high school can dispute certain mathematical truths that were drilled into them ad nauseum.  One that we learn early on, is:

If A = B

and A = C,

Then B = C

Instead of ranting and raving illogically at various town hall meetings, let’s try using a little good old-fashioned logic (that we were all bored-to-death with in high school, but, let’s face it, can come in handy now and then).

Now consider the following statistics:

When asked in a new Harris Poll how strongly those polled support 14 different government services, five services receive strong, or a fair amount of support, from about three-fourths of all adults or more. The five most popular services are The National Parks Service (85% support), Crime-fighting and prevention services (77%) Medicare (76%), Social Security (76%), and Unemployment benefits (74%).

Medicare came in with a strong 76%, over 3 out of 4 people polled by Harris.  (REMINDER: Medicare is a “single payer” system, with the government as the payee).  I think it is safe to say that overall, Medicare is a success, and, if we can say that success is “good”,  it logically follows that:

Medicare (A) = Single-payer System (B)

Medicare (A) = “good” (C)

then, Single-Payer System (B) = “good” (C)

Now, that wasn’t so painful was it?

Most Americans Don’t Have “Health Insurance”

Today's crowded emergency room

At least 80% of Americans don’t really have any health care insurance.  This implies that,  given some unfortunate event, you will still have health care coverage.  What they do have,  those that are now fortunate enough to have a job, and less and less frequently, a job that also provides health insurance, is a “heath related benefit”.

According to Wikipedia, an “employee benefit” is defined as:

various non-wage compensations provided to employees in addition to their normal wages or salaries.   Where an employee exchanges (cash) wages for some other form of benefit, this is generally referred to as a ‘salary sacrifice’ arrangement.

The problem is, coverage is tied into whether or not you have such a job, and a job where your salary was negotiated to contain such a “benefit” (this is entirely up the the employer.  They are not mandated to provide you with a health care related benefit).

Many things can disrupt this tidy arrangement, such as:

Your company could drop its health plan. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the percentage of the population covered by employer-based health insurance has fallen every year since 2000, from 64.2% to 59.3%.

You could lose your job. I don’t think I need to tell anyone what the unemployment rate is these days.**

You could voluntarily leave your job, for example because you have to move to take care of an elderly relative.

You could get divorced from the spouse you depend on for health coverage.

… Continue Reading

Build your own home network, Part 2.

Netgear Gigabit Switch

In part two of this article I am going to be talking about each piece of networking equipment and how it interacts with the network and its importance.

The basic goal for any network is to create a reliable, fast and easy to maintain infrastructure. Our network had the following criteria:

All Television, Telephone, and Internet is to be powered by Time Warner Cable (TW).

• Telephone via TW VOIP, Using the 66 block all house phone jacks work.
• Television via TW Digital Cable, our house has two High Definition, and two Standard Definition TV’s.
• Internet via TW High Speed Internet, by setting up a simple network we can share this with our 6 computers and have network enabled backups.

In the last article we talked about our goals for the network and outlined the network map. … Continue Reading

Cash for Clunkers, a Flawed System.

The Car Allowance Rebate System is a US federal program that helps US citizens to purchase a new, more fuel efficient vehicle when trading in a less fuel efficient vehicle.

Thousands of Americans are rushing out and trading in their old cars to receive a $3500 or $4500 discount towards the purchase of select new cars. This may sound great at first but there are many hidden facts the majority of the population may not be aware of.

• The program is designed to get old cars up to 25 years old with under 18 MPG off the road and replace them with brand new cars that have a higher MPG rating.
• Depending on the age of the vehicle you will ether qualify for $3500 or $4500 off of the purchase price of the new car.
• The old car must have been owned, registered, and insured for the past year.
• The dealer is required to disable the old cars engine by draining the oil and replacing with a water and silica solution, permanently destroying the engine.
• The old car must the crushed and the engine and drivetrain cannot be sold for parts, this prevents the sale of the car in the United States and elsewhere as a vehicle.

Many of the cars being turned in as “Clunkers” to this program are still perfectly fine and are being turned in just so the owner can get a new car, but because the car is required to be destroyed hundreds maybe even thousands of cars are being destroyed. But is this really the best way to get people to buy new cars? Why go to the effort to destroy perfectly fine cars that may only be 4-5 years old.

Let’s say all the cars that went to the program that were newer then say 1998 were taken into a low income car program, helping get the “real clunkers” off the road.

It could work as follows:

• The total household income is less then a certain level.
• Each household would qualify for only one vehicle trade.
• The traded vehicle must need more then $500 in repairs to qualify.
• The car must be less then 35 years old, but mileage does not matter.
• The car must be owned for the last year but is not required to be registered or smogged.

… Continue Reading

Build your own home network, Part 1

In todays day in age almost everything we use is a small computer, and while devices are getting smallerand smaller every day they are also getting more complex and require all sorts of connections.

In this article i will talk about setting up a home network and centralizing the entire home telecommunications into one central location out of the way of normal life.

This article is based on my house and a few years ago I had spent 2 weeks completely rewiring all the telecommunications of the house and relocating it from outside the house to the utility room in our garage, this required installing over 1000 ft of Cat5e ethernet cable used for both Ethernet and Telephones and 500 ft of RG6 television cable. Each room received three Cat5e cables and two RG6 cables, this provided for 2 Ethernet, 2 Telephone and two Cable Television ports.

The reason I choose the utility closet to use for the telecommunications room was done after careful research and planning, the garage is on the lower level of the house and stays cool year round allowing the equipment to stay cool and not worry about overheating. The second reason for this was the ease of running wires to the attic, In this setup I have a 2.5“ bundle of wires running into the attic where it then is split to each room. Another advantage of having the networking equipment located out of the normal day to day area is the network becomes seamless and you don’t see networking cables and tv cables running all over the house, It gives the house a much nicer feel. … Continue Reading

Why “Trickle Down” Theory Doesn’t Work

The Republicans love their “trickle down” theory.  This theory, for the uninitiated, can be described as “terms of political rhetoric that refer to the policy of providing tax cuts or other benefits to businesses and rich individuals in the belief that this will indirectly benefit the broad population.”

Interesting idea, but why hasn’t it worked?  The answer is simple; Greed.    The majority of a corporations profits go to the top executives for allocation.  That part works fine.  But then, IT STAYS THERE!  NO WAY DOES IT “TRICKLE DOWN”!

It’s no secret about  the enormous salaries, bonus, and benefit packages received by the top guys and gals in major U.S. corporations.  Ex-Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina comes to mind.  She got a severance package worth about $21.4 million, but stood to get another $21 million after she was forced out by the company.  Nice pay for messing things up royally (consider the logic of such packages: the board hires a CEO, gives them an incredible golden parachute.  If they fail and are thrown out, they get rich.  If they succeed, they get rich.  What a Motivator!).

… Continue Reading

Repubs: Dump “Mr. Sunlamp”

Geez, I never thought I’d have to resort to being an “image consultant”, but the republicans are becoming soo retarded in that respect that I just have to jump in.  Take a look at the picture on the right.  You probably know that you’ve seen him somewhere.  You might think he’s one of those Wall Street guys, you know, the one that sold investors those flaky financial instruments that have brought down the worlds economy?  Or, you might think he’s top sales guy for a men’s hair cream, or perhaps some activity director from a Cancun resort.  Either way, your initial reaction to his looks is probably not a good one.   We collectively hate Wall Street right now, the wet hair look is way out of date, and none of us can afford a trip to Cancun anymore.  Also check out his suit.  What would you guess, a $5k “outift”.  Meanwhile we’re sewing patches on our jeans.

Introducing Republican Minority Leader John Boehner.  Now here’s an example of what NOT to look like in 21st century America.  You republican dudes would be way better off with some badly dressed geeky looking person as your spokesperson.

Sorry John, I’m not available right now to help you update your image.

By the way, when he speaks, he sounds as dumb as he looks.

Right Wingers: Lose Your Angry God

Christian Conservative Right, would you like to get back in the game? Maybe win a few elections? Have some significant influence over frail humans? Then you need to change your mindset. The recent presidential election shows us that most Americans are tired of fear, intimidation, and most of all, anger. We don’t want it anymore. It is destructive, and ultimately self-defeating. In other words, it is a waste of time, and time is what we are beginning to run out of.

… Continue Reading

Project Code Yellow: Paint and Body

So now that the Jeep is running and drivable we wanted to spruce the exterior up a bit.  We thought a nice change in color was in order,  and since we already have a white Jeep we decided to go with something a little more exotic, like, uh, yellow. After a bit of research we decided to get nasson paint since it is available at Carquest in any color combination.  After some debate, and much asking of opinions, we ended up with a yellow that was one shade lighter then the Nissan Xterra color.

The supplies needed for this was:

• One Gallon Paint
• One Gallon Primer
• Paint Activator
• Primer Catalyst
• Laqour Thinner
• Measuring Cups
• Stirrers
• Sand Paper Varied Grits 60 – 2000 Grit
• Polishing Compound
• Electric Buffer Polisher
• Spray Gun ($14 Harbor Freight)
• Air Compressor and Hoses
• Tack Cloth
• Bondo for smoothing body panels
• Resperstor masks!!! !! Very Important !!

The paint supplies cost us about $350.   This included everything but the aircompressor and air hoses. Everything else on the list had  to be purchased.

Once we had finished researching how to paint a vehicle and we had all the supplies,  it was time to start prepping the body of the Jeep.

First we had to remove all the trim and windows from the Jeep.  Most body shops just tape around all the trim but we wanted to take the time to do it the right way, which meant removing any windows that could end up with some paint mist on them.   Ditto with all the rest of the trim and door handles, resulting in only tape off three parts which ended up being just the door locks.

The Jeep had been repainted at one time in it’s sordid past,  using spray paint (rattle cans).  Because of this, the paint was chipping and flaking away, which meant we had to sand down past the spray paint and create a smooth clean surface at the original primer level. … Continue Reading

Project Code Yellow: Transmission Rebuild

When we got the Jeep the transmission was slipping badly and was not drivable, because of this we wanted to rebuild a transmission we had pulled from our 88 Jeep Cherokee. 

We started by removing the transmission from the Jeep and carefully examining all the components, we took a close look at the torque converter and quickly noticed that the oil bearing was stuck to the shaft. This would explain why the transmission was slipping, but since we had the Jeep apart we decided it was smarter to go ahead and put in a new torque converter and rebuild our spare transmission. 

The first step in the process is to source the parts, We have used Transmission Parts of Oxnard in the past and decided to stop by the shop to see what they had.  After a few minutes we where on our way with a new torque converter and all new seals and bushings for the transmission, the owner of the shop had a look at our clutch pack and we both agreed that it was unnecessary to replace them at this time because they had minimal wear. We also inspected the oil pump and sun gears for signs of wear but they all looked good with very minimal wear. 

Digging into a transmission may sound like a daunting task but it is really a strait forward repair and with a little patience anyone can do. We also recommend downloading the factory service manual for the transmission you are working on, this will have many detailed images and tips for working on your transmission. … Continue Reading