Month: October 2013

  • When I was still less than 40 years old!

    A blast from the past! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hijdHYgDmI Amazing to find a video of that place after all these (now 20) years. For years, my club’s space was the proud home of the House of Usher — “The Bay Area’s largest Gothic and Industrial Nightclub.” Is there anything that can’t be found on Youtube? (Of course, what…

  • I know! Let’s kill 65 million Americans!

    As a libertarian who happens to be a Republican (or might that be Republican who happens to be a libertarian?), I have long been sympathetic to the Tea Party principles, which are usually stated thusly: Fiscal Responsibility, Constitutionally Limited Government, and Free Markets Core agreement on the above can unite a broad coalition on the…

  • The Usual On The Healthcare Rollout

    I got the link from a comment on this piece.

  • Segregation now, segregation forever!

    The Ku Klux Klan would love this: …race concordance — defined as shared racial or ethnic identities between clinicians and patients — is related to patient reports of satisfaction, participatory decision making, timeliness of treatment, and trust in the health system. The above comes from a 2009 report by the Center for American Progress (CAP) which…

  • No Collapse at Facebook!

    Well, this is weird, I was trying to have a Facebook discussion on my own page, and the system will not allow me to say anything, so I thought I might as well put it here for lack of a better place. A friend asked this: As I understand it, thinking requires rationale whereas belief…

  • Hillary’s best friend?

    I’m a bit horrified to see a total political hack like former DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe poised to win election to the United States Senate Virginia Governorship, but I guess that’s just the way things have to be. Hillary is stumping for McAuliffe, and his (her) opponent Cuccinelli seems to be doing his level best to…

  • Thank you, U.S. legal “system”!

    While I always look for simple explanations of seemingly inexplicable problems, in the case of a recurrent problem I did just that, and it is beginning to appear that I was wrong. When I fill my gas tank, I have noticed that the little notches in the fuel pump handle that hold the lever in…

  • PV=nRT

    A beautiful explanation of the atmospheric system. And funny thing – you don’t need anything but classic physics/chemistry to understand it. Here is a starter: P is pressure. V is volume. If pressure goes up, volume must go down as long as all other things are kept equal (that is, the other side of the…

  • Plasticity of Reality

    Earlier I saw something on Facebook that made me say, “Damned if logic isn’t frustrating sometimes!” I found this especially puzzling because I happen to have a group of very puzzled dinosaurs (who call themselves the “TriLateralCeratopsian Commission”) and they have been puzzling over a puzzle for over a week now. They don’t know what…

  • Reducing The Cost Of Healthcare

    By reducing wear and tear on healthcare equipment: A joke? Nope. It is true. Ah. But surely it is only one hospital. Nope. Six. At least. Well. It could be worse. You could get your face eaten by mice. Musta been engineered by a 1984 fan. Well they should have done a root cause analysis.…

  • Closer to the Heart

    I haven’t done a music video here for a long time. This is an attempt to rectify that oversight. The song below “the Spirit of the Radio” describes my experience in the music business when I was the Chief Engineer at WTAO back in the mid 70s. Yeah. Salesmen. They ALWAYS brought coke. I never…

  • And exactly what does “voluntary” mean?

    An article warning of an Obamacare provision for “forced” home visits by government agents got me pretty worked up earlier. I was hoping it was untrue or exaggerated, so I Googled some of the claims made, and was hardly reassured. Snopes labels the report “FALSE,” and claimed that the home visits would be made by…

  • Government Is Wasting Your Time

    Yep. It is now official. Government is wasting your time. Insurance consultant Robert Laszewski, who has been working with health plans selling insurance on the exchanges, told The Washington Post this week that he wouldn’t even bother using the federal exchange system himself, and would advise others to avoid it. “People are just wasting their…

  • Lifestyle Wisdom from Great Men

    A sloppy desk and no exercise, Makes a man creative, powerful, and wise. No, Ben Franklin never said that, although John Adams was said to be shocked by Franklin’s failure to practice what he preached. While no one would argue that a sloppy desk alone will not lead to success, it is undeniable that a…

  • They can have my nuts when they pry them from…(Uh, never mind!)

    The war on peanuts has gone too far. It has now spread even to college football stadiums: When the Northwestern Wildcats face off against the Minnesota Golden Gophers at Ryan Field in Evanston on Saturday, something will be missing: peanuts. Northwestern University is hosting its first peanut-free football game to give fans with allergies a…

  • They will win

    There’s an election in New Jersey which as far as I’m concerned just plain sucks. The polls are closed. Much as I hate to say it, my opposition to socialist policies would have probably made me vote for Lonegan. (Not much of an endorsement, I know.) Anyway, as I tried to point out to a…

  • God hates flags?

    Anyone can fly any flag anywhere, right? Especially an unknown person in a crowd. I mean, when a Communist hammer and sickle flag was flown in front of the White House back when Obama was inaugurated, it didn’t cause all that much consternation. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7Sou5TQUZA That’s because as all of us reasonable people know, anyone can…

  • The Best Definition Of American Politics

    I frequently rant about American Politics. Especially about how there is little fundamental difference between the two parties. One talks liberty the other talks loot but both are power mad. I think I have come across the perfect definition of the two parties. Most “conservatives” don’t realize it, but they are just liberals and lefties…

  • How’s that “if you like your health insurance you can keep your health insurance” thingie workin’ out for ya?

    While I’ve been writing about this problem for some time, I was a bit taken aback to see it on the front page of today’s Sunday Detroit Free Press: 146,000 Michiganders – at least – face loss of cheap policies under new health care reform rules At least 146,000 Michiganders — and possibly thousands more —…

  • Decline And Fall

    In a post about John Bagot Glubb Charles Martel had this to say: The best way to describe Sir John Glubb is “Lawrence of Arabia — but smarter”. He goes on to quote Glubb at length from Glubb’s work “The Fate Of Empires”. I’ll just present the one of the really good parts: “An increase…