Mister P-Mosh

In Ireland we hear about the bad and the good, but the bad news always seems to have legs, and the good news is too often ignored.

In the US I never hear good news from the media about the Catholics or about any religions.

I'm sure you could search it out and something's been covered, but it's tucked away in the back storeroon closet or on Page eight under the "Slipand Fall" Lawyer's advert.

But let there be a problem, a complaint against "One Nation Under God" or "in God we trust" and it's front page eh?

It's funny, but I have Irish family in the U.S. that is scared of their small midwestern town because the local news makes it look very dangerous. This same person has been around me in places like Shankill Road, and in other areas previously bombed, without being concerned at all.

For those that don't know, on Shankill Road you see stuff like this all over the place:

Outside of a bunch of ranting nutjobs, nobody is really serious about it. I doubt that poll number is even accurate, but I also can see people voting for it as a joke just like voting for Kinky Friedman. The majority of those that really want to secede are the same nuts that live in cult compounds and listen to Rush Limbaugh all day. They sit around being angry over imagined offenses, fearful of imagined threats, and planning for impossible futures. If Texas tried to secede, even if the U.S. said no, we'd fail as a nation. How many of our jobs depend on other states? How much of our food is imported? We might stand half of a chance if we set up deals with other nations ahead of time, particularly Mexico since they sell us a lot of food, but I really don't think it would work.

The core problem here is that in Pat Robertson's mind, bad things can't happen to innocent people. It's like the only part of the bible he read is the part about Soddom and Gomorrah. This belief allows him a feeling of being in control of his life because if he doesn't sin and acts as Christian as he can, then he theoretically should be able to keep himself and his family safe from random disasters. It's a stupid idea, and exactly what TWI taught us as well, but that's why he says stupid crap like this.

While I agree with Tzaia that people with mental illness already can be drawn to cults like TWI, I do think that it's also true that they caused mental problems for many. If you are in an abusive situation of any kind, you are likely to develop mental illness. We were "trained" to be mentally ill. Speaking in tongues, hearing voices, paranoia about devil spirits, deferring to leaders over listening to our own common sense, etc. all caused those of us who were in TWI during LCM's reign to have issues. I personally have never gone to talk to any professional about it because I think I've not had problems like many folks, I am aware of how I'm "different" as a result of growing up in TWI. I missed out on some things growing up, went overboard on others, and it resulted in me being a person who, while easily popular, still doesn't really feel comfortable anywhere.

Well at least you did mention Jesus in your poem, although I don't know that naming a reindeer after him is exactly what all the angry people are looking for when they talk about the "war" on Christmas.

D'oh !

Those Fox kids are at it again

Technically, you could skew the results by looking at it this way:

Somewhat Likely

Very Likely

NOT (Very Likely), which could overlap with "Somewhat Likely" because it can be interpreted to be an option other than "Very Likely" and anything else. This doesn't fix the numbers to make them add up correctly, but I've been up late working on something very technical and my brain is just stuck in that mode.

Just curious. What is a creche?

I was wondering the same thing so I googled it. I've never heard it called that, usually just a nativity.

He really is a smooth M.F.<p><p>

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My wife and I got the H1N1 vaccine a couple of weeks ago now, but not my daughter. Once she has the vaccine we should be better covered, although my son is too young to get it.

Unfortunately, though, we're all sick with colds right now.

One error in your poll is that a few of the countries listed would classify as part of "America" and there's no option for U.S.A. so I selected other. Also, I'm mixed between primarily northern European with a few slivers of Native American ancestry, so I selected other for that as well.

BIRDPILOT TO BIRDJET...ATTACK FORMATION DELTA!

sky4it,

I appreciate your compliments and holding me in high regard in terms of my mental ability. That ability is a bit dulled at the moment due to sleep deprivation, so I won't respond in detail, although I have a lot of thoughts that I could respond and answer some of what you said about.

One thing I wanted to mention first, is that it is possible to believe in evolution, or any other scientific principle, and follow religious beliefs. In Judaism, for example, I don't think anyone believes that the story of creation was to be taken literally. It is only some Christians who believe the Earth and all life was created in six days a few thousand years ago. For example, some Christians believe that the Christian god created the Earth by creating the process of evolution, creating the big bang, creating the laws of physics, etc. and simply let everything fall into place.

Also, if anyone has an issue with you, it will be for things that seem patronizing. While to you it seems like you are praying for us to help us and because you want us to be saved and all that, from the outside it seems belittling. Imagine if a Catholic tells you that they are going to pray for you because as a protestant, you are a heretic. Then they say that while there are a few good protestants out there, the leaders of protestant movements and denominations were con men and pure evil looking to fool people away from the true path of Christianity. Or they say that most protestants are ignorant because they don't believe in saints, and that protestants are much more rude than Catholics.

It's a cliche, but keep in mind that "atheists" like myself don't have any lofty beliefs or ideas about religion. We simply have an absence of belief in what you believe in. You too are an atheist to many other religions. I imagine that you don't believe Buddha will give you good luck by putting a statue of him in your home. I imagine you don't put a mirror above the front door of your house to ward off evil spirits. I bet you also don't pray towards Mecca a few times a day in the name of Allah. You surely don't believe that the thunder is caused by Zeus rather than simple electrical charges in the clouds. Everyone is an atheist of some sort, and I think it would help believers of the various faiths to understand us on similar terms rather than trying to differentiate us from each other.

I've not been one to share much personal info here, but I can't help but brag. I am a father again, this time to a healthy baby boy. His "big" (she's only two) sister loves him, and everyone is home, happy, and adjusting.

While this does seem wrong on many levels, one of the lesser known ones is that the "black and tans" were an oppressive police force that the British sent to occupy Ireland.

So if you go over to Ireland and want to drink something like this, you may get kicked out of the place asking for a "black and tan". Instead, ask for a half and half.

like my login info? or that I'm trying to stop global warming by sending my friends a dancing flower with a smiley face?

Not just that. Here is a quote from a PC World article discussing Facebook's Beacon system:

Beacon will report back to Facebook on members' activities on third-party sites that participate in Beacon even if the users are logged off from Facebook and have declined having their activities broadcast to their Facebook friends.

...

"The first two cases involve the transmission of user data despite 'No thanks' having been selected on the opt-out dialog, and are causes for deep concern. They pale, however, in comparison to the third case, where Facebook was receiving data about my online habits while I was not logged in, and was doing so silently, without even alerting me to the cross-site communication," he wrote in the research note.

Of course, this is not the problem I was originally talking about, but it is one aspect. The original problem I mentioned is discussed in this Washington Post article:

Those mini-programs, called widgets or applications, allow users to personalize their pages and connect with friends and acquaintances. But they could pose privacy risks. Some security researchers warn that developers of the software have assembled too much information -- home town, schools attended, employment history -- and can use the data in ways that could harm or annoy users.

...

Even private profiles, in which personal details are available only to specific friends, reveal personal information, said Chris Soghoian, a cyber-security researcher at Indiana University. And they're allowing access to their friends' information -- even if their friends are not using the application. That's because MySpace and Facebook, the largest online social networks, let outside developers see a member's information when they add a program.

Unfortunately this exact scam happens a lot. It's been on the news and is very common. As far as security is concerned, Facebook is a huge mess. I recently found out that even if you try to protect your content there, if a friend of yours takes one of those idiotic quizzes, the programmers behind the quiz get to access a lot of YOUR personal information.

I agree. But, consider that it is currently illegal to discriminate against them in healthcare.

Before you suggest a "personal filter" keep in mind what I said before, I don't personally care. If they pay, I don't have a problem with them being insured. Healthcare is not the place to control immigration.

But until the text of the law is changed, it says what it says. Regardless of the White House statements.

Remember: the White House said no earmarks. Then he signed HR 1...which is nothing but earmarks. The White House said "no lobbyists." But they seem to have no problems signing waivers. And so on.

Personally, I oppose both the Republicans and Democrats on this. I think that if someone shows up at a hospital and is in desperate need of medical attention, they shouldn't have to show their papers or anything. Save their life, then figure out what to do. We all know that there is too much up-front paperwork involved in going to the emergency room. It would be nice if the life-saving portions happened first, and the paperwork (which should be minimized anyway) waits until the end.

dmiller,

The difference is that while CNN, etc. may not get things right 100% of the time, and they do focus too much on nonsense nobody should care about, they seem to make an attempt at being a news network. Fox News, on the other hand, focuses on being an entertainment network, and deliberately lies in an attempt to entertain their audience. That is why whenever a Republican does something illegal, Fox "accidentally" calls them Democrats. That is why people like Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly are on their network, rather than people reporting facts.

In fact, Fox won a lawsuit against two former employees over Fox's right to lie on the news. If you've not heard of Jane Akre and Steve Wilson, the Wikipedia article I linked to can get you started. Here's a quote from there:

In 1997, they were fired from the station after refusing to knowingly include false information in their report concerning the Monsanto Company's production of RBGH, a drug designed to make cows produce more milk. They successfully sued under Florida's whistle blower law and were awarded a US $425,000 settlement by jury decision. However, Fox appealed to an appellate court and won, after the court declared that the FCC policy against falsification that Fox violated was just a policy and not a "law, rule, or regulation", and so the whistle blower law did not apply.

The court agreed with WTVT's (Fox) argument "that the FCC's policy against the intentional falsification of the news -- which the FCC has called its "news distortion policy" -- does not qualify as the required "law, rule, or regulation" under section 448.102.[...] Because the FCC's news distortion policy is not a "law, rule, or regulation" under section 448.102, Akre has failed to state a claim under the whistle-blower's statute."[1]

So while any network could use this ruling as blanket amnesty to get away with lying, the fact is that Fox has been caught intentionally lying and got permission from the government to continue doing it. There is no reason anyone would trust what is reported on Fox. The integrity of CNN and the others are certainly up for debate too, but they haven't been as openly dishonest as Fox.

I was at work, and my coworker, who had a radio at his desk, told me something weird happened and there was an accidental plane crash in NYC. It was bad but didn't sound like terrorism. Then when the second plane hit, and the reports of the plane that hit the Pentagon and the one in Pennsylvania came in, everyone spent the rest of the day in shock. Actually the shock lasted for a few days at least, but it was difficult to work or do other somewhat meaningless things then.

A friend of mine had an interview in the WTC that day. She was running late because of an earlier hair appointment, so she was on the subway and managed to never make it to the WTC. A friend of hers and acquaintance of mine was less lucky. She survived, but had to spend some time in the hospital with burns and broken bones.

How about the Telegraph? That is a broadsheet, so it ought to satisfy even a news snob such as yourself.

I'm a news snob for taking you to task for posting an article from a tabloid? The Telegraph isn't much better, as they are a partisan paper in favor of the Tories. However, from the article you posted yourself, it said:

If a child was born between 22 and 23 weeks into pregnancy it should not be standard practice to offer medical intervention, which should only be given if parents requested it, and following a through discussion about the likely outcomes, the document said.

That says that if a baby is born prematurely and is dead, they won't try to resuscitate it without the parents asking for it. The medical industry has made advances to a point where they are able to save premature babies at younger ages. The recommendations given by the NHS to doctors will change over time as medical science advances. As far as the case you originally posted, it said that the mother asked the doctors to save her baby and they refused, despite the baby supposedly already breathing and everything. That goes completely against what this article in the conservative paper said. Which is it, is the NHS forcing doctors to murder living babies as you first claimed, or are they passing out recommendations that require the parents to ask for care if they are below 23 weeks of gestation? You can't have it both ways.

Or how about this, from the Times, another broadsheet (different topic, same NHS)

Patients are kicked out of emergency rooms in the U.K., according to conservatives? How is that factual? The Republicans did some research too, and found that Obama was really born in Kenya, that FDR magically caused the great depression before he ran for President, and that Obama brainwashes schoolchildren into becoming communists by telling them the importance of personal responsibility and staying in school.

Even if it were true, and it very well could be, we do exactly the same thing in our privatized system. I know it happens here in Conservative Texas as well as in "Liberal" California.

You can get mad all you want. Facts are facts. I hope the Telegraph is a good enough source to meet your high standards of journalism.

You are presenting misleading, biased information and calling it facts. Here are some facts for you to face:

According to the CIA factbook, here are a few of the more interesting life expectancy rankings by nation:

8 Canada

9 France

10 Sweden

32 Germany

36 UK

50 USA

Those socialized systems that people here seem to claim don't work do seem to support people living longer than here. But let's look at the beginning of life too. Since you are focusing on babies, let's talk about the infant mortality rate. In this one, the lower the rank the better, because the higher the number the more babies that die per 1,000.

180 United States

189 Canada

193 UK

210 Germany

217 France

222 Sweden

We were barely beat out by Cuba, who has less babies die per year in their totalitarian state than in our much greater nation. Of course, the only place we are #1 in when it comes to our health is in how much we pay. I would provide a direct link to it, but the World Health Organization statistics page is a bit tough to work with in that way, you'll have to go yourself and do a search under the Health System Resources category and select "Per capita total expenditure on health at average exchange rate" to see it for yourself. Of course, another interesting side effect of our privatized system is that healthcare costs are the #1 cause of bankruptcy in our country.

So the facts are, we have some of the worst health when it comes to industrialized (first world) nations, yet we pay more than anyone else on Earth. It's pretty clear that our system is broken, and the facts show that the systems you and others are so afraid of do work better, save more lives, and increase the overall quality of life that their people have. We as Americans deserve better, and are capable of much better than what we have now. Maybe you don't agree, but the facts are pretty clearly on my side here.

God first

hi geisha779 and Mister P-Mosh and markomalley and Bolshevik

i think we are will be sorry in the end

because we are powerless over this miss the government got us into

the government will go broke and there that you or me can do

love Roy

Roy,

I think your first mistake is viewing the government as being a separate entity from the people of this nation. They work for us, one way or another, and we need to enforce that. The second mistake is in assuming that the government is to blame for our economic problems. In reality, I do think that the government allowed it to happen and both parties share the responsibility to some degree, but the biggest problem are the huge corporations, specifically in the financial sector, that created huge risks with our money (as their customers), and ripped us off. I think the ultimate blame lies with the big corporations that seem to have more rights and more access to the government than us private citizens do.

From today's (9/8) UK Mail:

And, before anybody says anything, I realize that we are not in the UK and what is being proposed is not the NHS. However, when business rules are set up to control costs, they will make arbitrary decisions...if not an arbitrary decision like this one, some arbitrary decision that will upset somebody. Right now, there is a bogey man: the insurance companies. When the government-run "Health Benefits Advisory Committee" (HR 3200 Title 1 sec 123) makes its recommendation on coverages (sec 121), there may be some wailing and gnashing of teeth when the tough decisions have to be made.

Mark, you may not have knowledge of UK newspapers, but the Daily Mail is a UFO loving tabloid and has been sued numerous times for libel and such. They are on the same level as the National Enquirer. If I wanted to, I could also pull out some articles where they make Bush look like a total retard, but even my dislike of him doesn't make me believe what they say. The fact is, the article you posted probably isn't true, so I would not suggest using it as an example to make your point.

As far as the NHS making arbitrary decisions, they do not cut care for people to control costs. You may be able to find a case or two of malpractice, but you can't find any pattern or policy of them letting people die to cut costs.

In the U.S., however, many people do die to cut costs so the investors in the insurance companies can make a higher profit. Every insurance company out there has a whole department whose jobs are to find ways to drop people and refuse treatment, and as a result many Americans die or suffer horribly.

As far as what is in HR 3200 that you are throwing about as what appears to be a reference to Palin's "Death Panels", they will simply define what care is covered in general and what is not. This is the same type of thing that happens in any system including private companies. If you read the actual proposed bill, it states under the duties section:

1) RECOMMENDATIONS ON BENEFIT STANDARDS- The Health Benefits Advisory Committee shall recommend to the Secretary of Health and Human Services (in this subtitle referred to as the ‘Secretary’) benefit standards (as defined in paragraph (4)), and periodic updates to such standards. In developing such recommendations, the Committee shall take into account innovation in health care and consider how such standards could reduce health disparities.

I don't know about you, but I personally would like them to consider covering more treatments as time goes on and new discoveries are made. For example, within the next few years, we are likely to see cancer treatment options include nanobots with bee venom that are used to attack tumors. Insurance companies may not like that treatment when it's new and reject it, while it would become commonplace in Europe, Asia, etc. because of the costs associated with new technology.

From my perspective, I've seen the NHS work in the UK. I have family members alive because of it. They focus more on prevention than we do here, but when they need something, such as cancer treatment, they get it. Most people over there are happy with it and think it works great. You can quote from tabloids and right-wing scaremonger sites all you like, but the fact is, the NHS works mostly well. As a strong believer in how great this country is, I see no reason why our nation couldn't do as good as or exceed what the U.K. is capable of. There's simply no reason why we can't do it, unless we let greed, selfishness, or ignorance get in the way.

That isn't really fair or accurate. Those are medical guidelines and are not purely cost effective measures. There are other reasons they do not resuscitate a baby born before 22 weeks or give them intensive care treatment.

What happened was wrong. . . . but, that it is strictly a cost effective measure is a very big assumption. NHS spends a billion dollars a year on preemie care for 40,000 infants.

The guidelines were drawn up by a council on Bioethics. They are not compulsory. They are guidelines. The Doctors could and should have treated Jayden. It sounds like the hospital was wrong and are now passing the blame onto the NHS guidelines.

BTW I sat in a NICU for 3 months with a preemie.

My daughter was in NICU for a while too and when I read what Mark posted I got angry, until I clicked the link and saw he was using the British equivalent of the National Enquirer as a reference. The whole story was likely fabricated, and if not, it's likely that the baby was dead and there was nothing they could do. I seriously doubt any person who took the Hippocratic oath would simply allow a baby that had survived for a few hours to die.

I have a question for anyone here who is anti-choice here on abortions.

The normal procedure for an abortion is called a D&C (Dilation and Curettage). This procedure is done for other reasons, though. Unfortunately, in my wife's first pregnancy we suffered a miscarriage. As a result, the doctor had to perform this procedure. The procedure would have been the same had the baby been alive (as in an abortion), or dead (as in a miscarriage), so whether the doctors plan to perform abortions or not, they need to know this procedure if they are an OBGYN.

Now let's take it another step forward, what if a test is done, and they find that the baby will miscarry or will not live more than a few days at most because of some horrific, extremely painful disease? If, like me, you are not a fan of human suffering, you may want to abort a foetus with a condition like that before it ends up suffering too much. Would it be ok for a doctor to abort then? Should a mercy "abortion" like this be covered by insurance, whether private or government-run?

Let's look at it another way too. The "day after" pill is used to basically kill a fertilized egg. If you believe that it is a human being at conception, why not prohibit the sale of this pill? Of course, this is just a higher dose of other birth control hormones, so even they could be banned under the belief that it's a human being at fertilization. Would you ban birth control too?

The thing is, there is no neat answer to the questions surrounding abortion. Most of us, including us pro-choice folks, are not comfortable with late term abortions except in extreme circumstances. However, the further back you go, the more people go towards the "pro-choice" side. Rather than being a binary, "for or against abortion" debate, there are really a wide range of issues to discuss. However, politicians always use it to their advantage. The minute a politician wants to give free condoms or birth control to someone, he's labeled a "socialist eugenicist" or a "baby killer" by extremist anti-choice people. The problem is that the extremists are the ones controlling the debate on the abortion issue. In reality, most of us are both for and against it, depending on the time frame.

So the question is, what procedures, under what conditions, at what time, should be allowed? Should Catholic hospitals be required to provide emergency birth control to rape victims? Should religious hospitals be allowed to not have doctors on staff that can perform a D&C just in case they might accidentally perform an abortion? This isn't about the debate over who pays for the healthcare, this is about how care is regulated. Whether the government pays for it or we pay for it, these questions need answers.

Fox News has prove that Obama is playing a game

Fox News is a fascist entertainment network. They aren't news, they have no commitment to accuracy or honesty. They don't even try and openly lie in order to entertain. So don't take them too seriously. There are real things to disagree with Obama over, but I don't think dealing with Fox News really matters since they are not a legitimate news network.

I always got a kick out of this version: <p>

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVYCPf2i0Qg <br>

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I picked up a turtle off of a four lane road near the mall today. He was almost a certain turtle pancake. I'm keeping him in the bathtub. He seems to like strawberries. I haven't figured out what species he is yet . . .

The simple existence and activity of one species threatens others. That's the way it's always been. I don't see why those things shouldn't happen. Turtles have been around long before humans. I wouldn't be surprised if they outlast us. Not that I'd be around to be surprised.

That's a pretty ridiculous view of things. No other animals have ever caused such large numbers of mass extinctions that mankind has in recent decades. Doesn't the fact that there is a pile of plastic the size of our nation (minus Alaska, I assume) floating in the ocean bother you? Perhaps it would be good if we didn't need to make such a big mess?

The end game in all of this isn't just that a few turtles suffer and die. It's that quite a bit of life on this planet ends, including mankind, as a result of our own stupidity. It's much slower than the nuclear war that we thought would ensue with the U.S.S.R., but it's just as effective.