The Republican creed in action:
Millions of people are waiting anxiously for the Supreme Court to decide the fate of President Obama’s health care law with a ruling this month on health insurance subsidies. But David M. King, a plaintiff in the case, is not among them.
Mr. King, 64, said recently that he was reasonably confident he would prevail in his challenge to the subsidies, a central element of the Affordable Care Act.
“We have a good chance of winning,” he said in an interview at his home here.
Mr. King and three other Virginia residents are challenging the payment of subsidies in states like Virginia that depend on the federal insurance marketplace. They contend that the 2010 health care law allows subsidies only in states that establish their own marketplaces.
But Mr. King said that he was not really worried about the outcome of the case, King v. Burwell, because as a Vietnam veteran, he has access to medical care through the Department of Veterans Affairs.
If he wins, Mr. King said, “the left will blow it out of proportion and claim that eight million people will lose their health insurance.” But he said lawyers had assured him that “things are in play to take care of the problem.”
So single payer socialized medicine is aok for this total asshole, but subsidized private insurance is atrocious. Got it.
Man, fuck this guy.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
But his lawyers assured him that the problem his lawsuit caused will totally be fixed, so it’s not his problem if they’re lying to him.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): There’s fixed and there’s “fixed.”
JPL
haha.. Thanks for the post. I said the same thing below but I added the guy admitted he does not have standing. He gets his health care through the V.A system.
dmsilev
So this guy is either dumber than a rock or is completely comfortable in telling lies. Or both.
And isn’t he admitting that he doesn’t have standing as an injured plaintiff?
bemused
They are basically little children believing whatever their team’s coaches tell them without any doubts entering their immature brains. I almost feel a bit sorry for them but they’ve had plenty of time to grow up.
22over7
I saw this earlier. Asshole.
NotMax
Does the VA provide empathy transplants?
Downpuppy
Mr. King’s lack of standing in this case should at least show up as a footnote.
Ben Cisco (onboard the Defiant)
Can’t add anything to that.
Archon
I assumed the “I got mine, F you” is pretty much the mindset of anyone that doesn’t believe in universal health insurance.
srv
Some veterans keep on serving after their service.
JPL
@dmsilev: Yes he doesn’t have standing. Unfortunately, we have a court that could give a crap about the rule of law. Scalia wrote a book on why context matters.
Richard Mayhew
My only quibble is the Republican creed is Fuck You, full stop
A guy
Stupid bitch pelosi should have read the law before it was passed. Perhaps the fact she wrote a law vulnerable would have been noticed
JPL
@Richard Mayhew: I hope you are prepared when the King ruling comes down. Although, I can’t imagine the court will overturn the law, if they do, we will need your analysis.
JPL
@A guy: You need to order Scalia’s book on reading the law on the whole. It’s on Amazon.
Baud
@JPL:
I think you meant to say stupid bitch Scalia.
Omnes Omnibus
@A guy: Have some god damned self-respect and put a bit of effort into these attempts. This one was just embarrassing.
Mike J
I’ve never understood his standing to sue. How is he being damaged by being eligible for a subsidy?
NobodySpecial
@JPL: I can give you the Reader’s Digest version: “You’re fucked.”
querlvox
IIRC, there are serious questions whether any of the plaintiffs – like this guy who isn’t affected by the ACA – actually have legal standing to have brought, and sustained, the suit.
Not that the courts bothered to ever considered that.
Germy Shoemangler
@querlvox:
Haven’t any of the less conservative justices noticed that?
Germy Shoemangler
don’t understand the logic
shell
What lawyers? The insurance fairies?
Dear God, that makes my blood boil. He has the nerve to say he’s not worried cause he’s got guaranteed government insurance. Does he even listen to himself?
Gotta go take my blood pressure medication
jl
@Germy Shoemangler: IIRC they did notice that, but so far, have not tried to throw the case out on that basis. My impression was that they figured the wingnuts will go out and find a few more sketchy ‘model plaintiffs’ the anonymous fab four will accept the case again, so might as well get it settled now. But IANAL.
JPL
@NobodySpecial: Personally not me. I wouldn’t have standing but that doesn’t seem to matter to this court.
Joel
@A guy: you should probably just stop posting. No, really!
SatanicPanic
Oh sure, some lawyers would be in the perfect position to know about “things in play” in Congress or whatever. A likely story.
Here’s a thought- if things are in play to fix the problem, why not let those things in play fix the problem, then you can spare yourself the lawsuit? Am I being too logical?
RSA
@Omnes Omnibus:
On the blog that DougJ calls home. What’s happening to this neighborhood?
WaterGirl
@Germy Shoemangler: There is no logic, only ideology.
SRW1
@A guy:
Ahhh, you seemed like such a nice guy.
Southern Beale
What. An. ASSHOLE
Amir Khalid
The nickname Obamacare was invented by his political enemies to associate him with a law they thought would fail. Seeing David King lament Obama’s “vanity” in using the name with justifiable pride is funny. I freue mich over his Schade.
JPL
@Amir Khalid: Everything is Obama’s fault.
Baud
@Southern Beale:
Not that I disagree, but Cole’s put up worse posts than this one.
Frankensteinbeck
@Richard Mayhew:
Yeah. It used to be I Got Mine, Fuck You. Since Obama’s election, it’s just Fuck You. They’ve realized they no longer rule the world, so they just want to burn it down. They do not care if they’re trapped in the fire.
srv
No more jumping the line for bombers:
WaterGirl
My go-to phrase in this situation would normally be “what a dick”. Fuck this guy. (Trying it on for size.) Fuck this guy. Fuck this guy.
I’m not sure the preceding “Man” is quite my style but “fuck this guy” is kind of growing on me.
Roger Moore
@NotMax:
Apparently not, since this guy is clearly a prime candidate.
satby
@WaterGirl: I liked it so much I shared it on FB, with my own “fuck this guy” too.
A guy
Be nice if everybody could just handle their own issues and not look for help beyond their own family. But no, most people are lazy. I understand that. Many people need genuine help, I’m willing to provide that. But far too many folks are just like my kids when I gave them a bit too much. They expect and want more.
Rome Again
@dmsilev:
My thought exactly. He has no standing? He’s admitting that the justice system can be rigged.
JPL
@A guy: wtf.. you should put whatever you are drinking because you are not making much sense. Do you really want to line folks up and say you lazy, you not. Are you Ben Carson who got help along the way but now thinks those who need help are undeserving?
Let’s just line up the folks and make judgments. Do we base that on appearance?
Turgidson
The left will blow it out of proportion by…accurately stating what is happening. Yep, this guy’s a loyal member of the GOP rank and file all right.
Bobby Thomson
@Germy Shoemangler: The DOJ opted not to push the standing issue because reasons. If there were ever a good candidate for a DIG, it’s this case.
Linnaeus
What a shitbird.
OzarkHillbilly
@A guy: It would be nice if unicorns farted gold laden rainbows but you know how selfish unicorns are, keeping all the gold to themselves.
Mark
Mr. King is probably eligible for VA care because his income falls under a certain level. As a veteran I too could get VA care if I didn’t make enough money and my employer didn’t offer health care benefits.
So he served in VietNam. So what.
Renie
@A guy: I don’t post much but had to just to add that you are definitely an a$$hole. Go troll somewhere else.
geg6
@OzarkHillbilly:
I truly love you, if only for this comment alone. You gave me my first genuine smile of a very stressful and all around bad day.
raven
I am very young for a Nam vet and I am 65 1/2. It’s possible that this dude is legit but I wonder. I also hope the fucker does have to rely on the fucking VA.
Kropadope
@A guy: It’s funny how there’s more pushback on programs like the ACA, which are designed to help working people, than there are on programs like Medicaid and welfare. Not to say that Medicaid and welfare recipients are undeserving, but the assholes don’t start bleating “socialism!!!” until you start trying to help people who work 40 hours a week and can scarcely afford to pay their bills, let alone get sick.
Betty Cracker
What a prick. Fuck him.
CONGRATULATIONS!
Wow.
What I’d like to say about this piece of human filth would get me banned for life from this site, so I won’t.
chopper
plus he’s just about at medicare age. so screw you youngsters and your 8-track tapes and your “need for healthcare”.
Major Major Major Major
Don’t feed untalented trolls, kids.
JPL
We live in strange times. You have the Governor of Florida who bilked the government out of millions and you have someone who is lazy and bilked the government out of a few thousand. The Governor of Florida is held in esteem but the poor is looked upon as lazy.
There might be a point because if the poor were not so lazy they would have bilked the government for millions and become Governor.
Davis X. Machina
You’re badmouthing a warrior, you know.
For shame!
Baud
Hopefully, one of the conservative justices will do the right thing (for the wrong reason) and wipe the smirk of this guy’s face.
chopper
@A guy:
exactly! right now i’m halfway through doing my own tonsillectomy in my kitchen. unfortunately my local shithead doctor doesn’t accept chickens as payment.
bemused
@JPL:
Your last sentence is brilliant.
Frankensteinbeck
@Kropadope:
What? What do you mean? Strangling Medicaid and attaching humiliating riders to it to shame the poor, and outright trying to destroy ‘welfare’, have been conservative rallying cries for decades. ‘Welfare queens’ came straight from Reagan, and it sure didn’t mean he wanted to expand the welfare system. Both systems have been under relentless attack since Obama’s presidency started, although it’s not all that visible since conservatives hated both anyway. Conservatives hate the poor. Hate them. And it’s no coincidence that they believe most of the poor are black. The ACA is new, it’s the most visible legacy of the first black president, and is generally known by that president’s name, Obamacare. Those things cover the extra froth in the lunatic rage.
Omnes Omnibus
@chopper: The clippers for dogs claws work really well for that.
Zinsky
Great post and great comments. As several have already noted, this doorknob has no legal standing and the case should be thrown out. On a different level of abstraction, I always want to ask people like this, who claim to be “patriots”, how America is a better or stronger country by denying affordable health care to a substantial number of their fellow Americans? The answer, of course, is they don’t really “love America”. They love the concept of America, but hate most of the people who actually live there.
raven
@Omnes Omnibus: Fucking P38 will do it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Zinsky:
I’ve felt that way on occasion.
Ruckus
@NotMax:
The VA does not provide empathy transplants. That would be a politically necessary operation and they only do medically needed operations. Besides if they had to do that their entire budget would be used up on that alone.
raven
raven
@Ruckus: Remember that starting in Nov, 1966 they started taking 100,000 troops that did not meet basic military requirements. There are plenty of Nam vets who were part of what was called “The Moron Corps”.
Ruckus
@SatanicPanic:
Yes you are being too logical. Besides you don’t think he has a dime in this do you? Those lawyers found a boob to lend his name and fucking stupidity to the case.
What I’d like to know is who is putting up the money? It ain’t free to get in front of the Supremes, someone is picking up the tab.
This fucking asshole is just the front man.
raven
El Caganer
@OzarkHillbilly: I thought they were sending it to a depository in Texas.
Ruckus
@raven:
I’d say this fucking asshole may be one of them. If not then he is still a FUCKING ASSHOLE.
raven
@Ruckus: 64 years old and he’s a part time limo driver.
MomSense
I find it difficult to even think about this case. It definitely has me spooked. At some point it just seems like the Republicans want to rub my nose in the fact that I cannot afford to insure myself and my kids and that somehow makes me unworthy.
Hopefully the Supremes will do the prudent thing and keep the subsidies in place but this whole situation just makes me want to cry. When your kid asks you what we will do if we lose the subsidies and you have put on your adult-don’t-worry-it-will-be -alright-face, it stops being just a point and mock exercise.
I had to try and explain to an 11 year old why they would want to do that. I didn’t have the right words because there are no right words. And even if the court decides wisely to uphold the subsidies, I’m really at the point where I resent this whole experience.
Kropadope
@Frankensteinbeck: Yes, while I suppose they’re definitely trying harder with the ACA, they have done some pretty harmful work with Medicaid and welfare and many other programs too. Still, they’re not trying to end any of the other programs, merely make them more difficult to cope with. I think they want to keep them around as a rallying cry.
bemused
@Zinsky:
Another question is how would it be better for them on a personal level. They whine about having to pay taxes for all those people but do they really believe they would be paying less in taxes? Doubtful. Same answer is that they hate most people
JPL
@MomSense: I’ve been fortunate to always have insurance because the companies that my ex worked for got big subsidies. In fact you could say they have been getting your subsidy all along.
It’s not you at all, it is who Congress think is worthy.
Baud
@MomSense:
You should. Even if it ends up OK, it’s an awful thing to do to people.
MomSense
@JPL:
Thanks. I’m just tired of it. It has been one thing after another since we passed the law.
raven
@MomSense: It ain’t gonna stop either. Buck up!
Ruckus
@MomSense:
Normal 11 yr old kids understand fantasy and comic books and that they are not real. Trying to explain that people who are several times their physical age and the concepts of those people being assholes is a lot more difficult. At some point I think you have to use my dad’s approach. He told me when I was about that age that some people are just fucking assholes. They like being that, some of them work on being bigger assholes as time goes on. It’s a tough thing to have to explain reality to an 11 yr old because you have to use adult language to get the point across. Good luck.
Baud
@raven:
Never has and never will.
Omnes Omnibus
@raven: FIDO
Shrillhouse
Huh?
I thought Obamacare WAS the problem. If the SC strikes it down, won’t all of its job-killing, and death panel-convening insanity end?
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@A guy:
My brother just died of cancer. He had three kids under 18. But I guess that if he didn’t want to die of cancer at 51, he should have planned better, amirite? After all, you were smart enough to not get cancer, so why doesn’t everyone else do what you did and decide not to get cancer?
JPL
@Omnes Omnibus: I guess I’m being naive because I think the approach should be what’s going on.
Gin & Tonic
@raven: Yeah, Rachel did one of her 20-minutes-to-wind-up-and-swing pieces on that.
I’m absolutely overjoyed that Trump is more or less in the race for now.
raven
@Gin & Tonic: She really diid wear it out didn’t she?
Omnes Omnibus
@JPL: Come again?
raven
@Omnes Omnibus: I missed that too.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic: @raven:
It’s really annoying, and I like her probably more than anybody on that network.
john fremont
@A guy: I know, wouldn’t it be cool if we had a health insurance system where Ya didn’t have to have your employer chip in and help pay your premiums. Wouldn’t it be better to start steering our health insurance system towards affordable health policies marketed to households? Imagine if we had legislation enacted that started us down the road to that!
raven
@Baud: yup
Valdivia
If he’s at the VA doesn’t he lack standing?
/Someone might have already answered this sorry for repetitiveness. Phone thread reading can be a challenge
J R in WV
@A guy: It is not Nancy Pelosi’s job to read the bill. The staff lawyers write the bills, the committee staff review the bill as written and write amendments to the bill. Congressional leaders stir up the membership to get them to vote for the bill as amended in the committees.
Your job is to go back to high school circa 1965 to retake civics, and to re-learn how government works, like I did 1965-68. Also, too, you job is to shut the fuck up until you learn how a republic works. There is a process, and it is complex. The leadership of the congress do not write the bills, nor do they read them cover to cover. They never have in our lifetimes.
The CEO of GM doesn’t write their annual report, he has staff for that, just like congressional leaders have staff for writing bills.
You, “A Guy”, are woefully ignorant, and should stop embarrassing yourself in front of your peers. Please Stop, before it is too late to recover your good standing in the community!
JPL
@Omnes Omnibus: I think it’s important to scream from the rooftop that citizens deserve the same tax breaks that companies do. I had to look up fido but I don’t think driving on is enough.
raven
@Valdivia: Only one person has to have standing is what I heard.
raven
@JPL: fuck it
Baud
@raven:
Yep.
raven
@J R in WV: dang
dopey-o
@A guy:
it’s long been obvious that you were a bad parent. stop taking it out on us.
Gin & Tonic
@J R in WV: before it is too late to recover your good standing in the community!
I think that ship sailed a long time ago.
Omnes Omnibus
@JPL: It doesn’t mean drive on by, it means keep working.
@Valdivia: Even if King doesn’t have standing, the other plaintiffs arguably do.
SiubhanDuinne
@Ruckus:
Exactly what I’ve been wondering all along, and more than ever now upon reading his IGMFY comments.
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne: There are lots of shady rich people who would fund this stuff. Could even include the Kochs.
Valdivia
@raven: That makes sense. How apt though that the case is named after the guy without standing. Sums the GOP perfectly.
Suzanne
Fuck this fucking fuck.
Speaking of healthcare, I WOULD SURE LIKE SOME RIGHT NOW. I went to the doctor yesterday and got a throat culture, and I called today to get the results, and they told me that they won’t know if I’ve got strep until Friday. Uh whaaaaaaaat? Meanwhile, I am coughing up a lung and I feel like my throat is in a vice and I sound awful.
Omnes Omnibus
@Suzanne: I thought I told you to feel better. Why won’t you do as you are told?
piratedan
what bothers me is how such a blatantly frivolous lawsuit even gets up to the supremes, why in the hell didn;t a lower court go tell these dipshits to pound sand?
MomSense
@raven:
You’re right of course.
Baud
@Suzanne:
That stinks. Feel better. Try not to design anything while you’re feeling under.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus: yes I had forgotten that the others might have standing. Though I remember someone else was iffy too.
piratedan
@Suzanne: bugs take time to grow in petri dishes , just the way that it is
MomSense
@Suzanne:
Sorry you feel rotten. Hope you feel much better soon.
MomSense
@Ruckus:
We talked about it and his take was that some people just don’t give a crap about anyone else which seems like a fair description to me.
dmsilev
@piratedan: The vast majority of lower courts did tell the plaintiffs to go piss up a rope. Unfortunately, there are enough conservative hacks sprinkled through the judiciary that (a) the plaintiffs were able to get at least a few appeals court judges to agree with them and (b) at least four Supremes were willing to hear the case.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@Suzanne:
Did they at least give you a prescription for a Z-pack or other antibiotic so you can fill it as soon as they know for sure, or do you have to go back for a second visit if it comes up positive?
Gin & Tonic
Rob Ford endorses The Donald: “They can laugh all they want but Mr. Trump is a very successful man and a very good candidate for president.”
I’m not going to be able to get enough of this.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: Two a Vietnam vets and likely eligible for VA benefits and the other two have some wobbliness on standing as well. I put the legalistic weasel word “arguably” intentionally.
SiubhanDuinne
@J R in WV:
[Snip]
Bravo! My only quibble is the “recover” and “good standing” stuff.
Tree With Water
“I got mine, fuck you”.
The GW Bush cabinet member who proudly coined the term Mayberry Machiaveli’s put the IGMFU philosophy into practice afterwards. He was asked if he feared retribution by his former colleagues for that bullseye characterization, and in a nutshell responded by stating he’d already made his mountain of money, and therefore they couldn’t touch him for it. You can look it up…
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
It could easily be the Kochs. Or Adelson. Or someone else we haven’t even thought of. And that’s kind of the point, isn’t it, about all this shady money?
opiejeanne
@raven: I knew one of those guys. A guy who painted our house in Riverside told me that when he went to Vietnam he was illiterate. I think he had dropped out of HS. One of his buddies in Vietnam taught him to read and he became an avid reader.
Another one that comes to mind was a neighbor for a couple of years and was a complete idiot. He did spend the war behind a typewriter, though, so I’m not sure he was one of the 100,000 even though the timing was right.
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
It’s everywhere. Nothing is what it seems, especially on the right.
Brachiator
Good, but sad article about how the public still doesn’t know what is at stake here and how the GOP is gearing up the fog machine to exploit this situation.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/06/16/morning-plum-the-gop-obamacare-fog-machine-gears-up/
Also interesting that the majority is in favor of health insurance subsidies.
SiubhanDuinne
@dmsilev:
I wonder, I wonder, oh how I wonder, which four Supremes those might have been.
Suzanne
@Omnes Omnibus: I do feel better, but that’s only because I felt even worse yesterday.
Seriously. Just fuck this fucking fuck.
I know I am sounding like the worst caricature of a liberal ever, but I know that some segment of people who join the military do so because they want to live their male fantasies of playing with guns for a job. They don’t do so for our freedom, or for honor, or for ‘Murika, or for the GI Bill, or for Tricare, they do so because they want to exert dominance over other people at the end of a weapon and get paid and praised for it. This is certainly not the majority of people in the military, but it is enough that I am often distrustful. As I am with cops. As a result, I do not participate in the veritable cock-sucking it sometimes feels like we are supposed to owe our military. And I say this as someone from a five-generation military family, though I never served myself. The military does not deserve better healthcare than anyone else.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus: that’s what I remembered. I guess the arguably worked for the Court.
Suzanne
@Mnemosyne (tablet): They said they’do call in a scrip if it comes up positive.
SiubhanDuinne
@Gin & Tonic:
OMG OMG OMG. I feel like Jon Stewart last night — “I’m in comedy hospice!”
piratedan
looks like Columbia defeated Brazil in the Copa
CONGRATULATIONS!
@MomSense: raven said it right – buck up because this won’t stop. Remember Roe v. Wade? Settled the abortion question for all time, right?
That’s what we’ll be dealing with for the rest of our lives with the ACA.
Don’t forget Social Security is over 80 years old and there are still people right now trying to repeal it wholly. We will never stop having to be vigilant. That’s the price of civilization.
Omnes Omnibus
Dear god, I just discovered I am at one remove from Nedra Pickler on FB.
Juju
@MomSense: I know exactly how you feel, except for the telling your children part. I too will lose my health insurance without the subsidy. I go back and forth on wether the SC will actually pull the plug on subsidies for states that don’t have an exchange. The decision could come tomorrow. I don’t know if I can take the anxiety.
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: The home of skullfucking a kitten? I think he’s safe, no?
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
Play your cards right, might even get you a front-pager gig.
Ruckus
@Suzanne:
I’ve tried to make the argument here that everyone deserves at least the VA level of healthcare. I had health care insurance till 10 yrs ago. After that I couldn’t afford (by a very large amount) insurance. In 12 I got accepted by the VA. It isn’t the best healthcare anywhere, but it is far better than what my last employer had and that was supposed to be Cadillac coverage. Must have been based on a mid 80’s Cimarron.
SiubhanDuinne
@Omnes Omnibus:
I didn’t know who that was, but I looked her up and it turns out she was born in Flint, Michigan EXACTLY three weeks before I moved to Flint, Michigan.
I just don’t know what to make of that.
Suzanne
@CONGRATULATIONS!: SAY IT SAY IT SAY IT. I like to speak ill of people, especially when they aren’t here to defend themselves. It’s what I do instead of play with guns.
boatboy_srq
Emphasis added.
Someone please explain how a single one of these a##h0les standing as plaintiffs (i.e. proxies for Reichwingnuts who don’t want no IslamoFascoSoshulism from that niCLANG) in this case has standing.
MomSense
@Juju:
I was geared up for Monday and now tomorrow may be the day. The anxiety is tough because we are so helpless to do anything about it. Normally when life is challenging I become very matter of fact, assess the situation, and take action. I honestly have no clue what to do in this case and I hate that feeling.
Let’s meet here tomorrow night hopefully to thank dog that this is behind us and everything is ok for now. Sending you a hug.
Lihtox
If I were this King fellow’s doctor, I think I’d start feeling a religious objection to treating him…
Suzanne
@Ruckus: Truth. I am just especially sick of this seemingly widespread cultural acceptance of the idea that the military is awesome and I owe anyone who ever served a debt of gratitude that I can never repay. Like, fuck that. I don’t owe them any more than anyone else who works hard, like a teacher or a construction worker or a doctor or a cashier at Walmart.
Omnes Omnibus
@boatboy_srq: Two of them have incomes low enough that the premiums of the benchmark plan arguably would make them exempt from the mandate. Due to the subsidies, the mandate applies to them and they being forced to either buy insurance of pay the penalty.
Juju
@MomSense: thanks for the hug. I send one back, and for your children as well.
Last year was the first time I had any health insurance in my adult life, even though it was a mostly useless policy. This year I qualified for a subsidy and have a much better policy. If things go the wrong way, I have lived without health insurance before, I can do it again, though I’d prefer not to live that way. You have children to worry about. It’s a bigger pickle for you. I bought a Powerball ticket tonight. If I win, we won’t need to worry. ?
Mike in NC
King is bankrolled by the Kochs. Read that in several places.
PurpleGirl
@Suzanne: Okay, they took a throat culture. Did they say if your throat was bright cherry red with white spots? Whenever I’ve had strep, my throat feels like sandpaper and I have trouble swallowing. I went through a period when I had strep every 6 to 8 weeks. I would go to the doctor for antibiotics because… cheery red throat with white spots. (Although she said if I kept getting strep, my tonsils were coming out; in your thirties that’s a major operation.) Luckily, I changed jobs and the strep cycle stopped.
I hope you feel better soon.
Matt McIrvin
@Kropadope:
That’s just because they already basically succeeded in killing welfare and Medicaid, or shrinking them so much as to be nearly irrelevant.
The ACA is just next.
Suzanne
@efgoldman: Sigh. Sadly, no. I actually am much more of a contextual designer, and have deep philosophical objection to the practice of the starchitects, including Gehry, who make these ridiculous things that look like alien spacecraft. I also specialize in healthcare architecture, so our buildings are much more restrained.
@PurpleGirl: They said my throat looks clear, and that it feels worse than it looks. But I’ve had strep before when it looks clear.
MomSense
@Juju: ?
fingers crossed!
@efgoldman:
I don’t see him working with the legislature to set up an exchange – even a work around exchange.
rikyrah
You are absolutely on point, Cole with the title of this post.
Valdivia
@Suzanne: Hope you feel better soon. My mom had something along the lines of what you describe for two weeks but she’s finally on the mend. I’m crossing my fingers you’ll beat it much quicker.
I have a deep love of architecture so I bow in your direction :)
Redshift
@J R in WV: Great rant, but one quibble:
Don’t buy into that particular bit of idiocy. Our dimwitted troll is just mindlessly repeating a stale falsehood that is (of course) still fervently believed inside the conservative bubble.
Conservatives insist (with high hilarity) that before the ACA was passed, Pelosi said “we have to pass the bill so we can read it”; i.e., ” we haven’t read the bill we’re voting on.”
In fact, she said “But we have to pass the bill so you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of controversy.” (Emphasis mine.) Really, there’s video and everything. She was just saying that soon the final bill passed, people could judge it on its merits, instead of the endless stream of BS scare stories. Perhaps overly optimistic about how many people would do that, but pretty uncontroversial. As usual, conservatives are smugly self-satisfied over a gotcha story that is entirely made up.
Ruckus
@Suzanne:
Hey I served and I feel the same way. Not that many people actually serve, even during Vietnam and the draft. And many of those, myself among them, joined the navy to get a better deal than was quite likely if drafted. I gave up 4 yrs up front, rather than the much riskier draft and 2 yrs. And the number of my fellow recruits that did the same was north of 80%. I still could have been sent to Vietnam, Higgs Bosons Mate joined and was.
I don’t and never did want to be on a pedestal for my service. Most of my friends never served and I don’t discredit them for that. Why should I give extra credit to those that did?
Now the VA, I earned that, by serving. It was in my contract that if I met certain guidelines, I’d have VA benefits. I didn’t use them for decades because I didn’t need them, but now I do. It’s the same as SS. I earned that by working for decades and paying into it. That some assholes want to take that away from me pisses me off. The vast majority of assholes who want to take away the VA never served, they are just cheap assholes who want to make others suffer. Fuck them.
PurpleGirl
@efgoldman: Would you believe that in front of me is a container of Wild Cherry ice?
seaboogie
I seem to remember fucking as a fairly pleasurable experience. If we are going to wish such a great quantity of fucking upon this guy, I think we need to qualify it more specifically – as in directionally (latitude, not longitude) and with all manner of oxidized farm implements. Maybe make him think a bit before he wants to sit down again.
Suzanne
@efgoldman: Everyone deserves that level of healthcare. I object to the notion put forth that members of the military deserve good healthcare because their job is more important than non-military jobs. No, it’s not more important. I do not believe that healthcare should only go to the winners in the free market. I do not believe that anyone’s pay check has anything to do with their value as a person.
Omnes Omnibus
@Ruckus: Co-sign from a few years later and a different branch of service. The fetishization of the military is flat out creepy. The “thank you for your service” from people who find out i had been in the military is either a pro forma recitation or an entire failure to understand that I was doing a job for which I was paid (in money and the promise of future benefits).
Suzanne
@Valdivia: Well, thank you. I work on hospitals and clinics and labs, etc, so not the kind of sexy projects you see on TV, but hopefully their communities like them and they permit state-of-the-art healthcare to take place.
Gin & Tonic
@Suzanne: I object to the notion put forth that members of the military deserve good healthcare because their job is more important than non-military jobs.
I think it’s not so much that their job is “more important”, it’s that you compensate the shitty pay, the lousy working conditions and the likelihood of being killed by providing them with better-than-average health care later.
Valdivia
@Suzanne: Oh I think every day architecture is beautiful too. I also like how the design is thought through with the purpose of the building in mind, some of the starchitects don’t think about that.
Ruckus
@seaboogie:
I believe that the term has always had two meanings. The first and foremost use is not that of the pleasant verb, but of a disreputable noun or adjective.
Suzanne
@Omnes Omnibus: One of my cousins was in the Air Force, but he worked his entire four years at a base in Phoenix. Literally never even left the country other than on vacation during his service. He told me that one day, he went to lunch when he was wearing his full uniform, and a random woman bought his lunch for him. I was so pissed. My cousin worked behind a desk and probably made twice as much as that woman, and he just wanted a free lunch. It was right after 9/11, so rah rah rah go team.
Suzanne
@Gin & Tonic: Have you seen the meme going around that has a photo of fast-food workers protesting for better pay juxtaposed with a photo of soldiers, and says something like “We get less than minimum wage, and you want $15 for putting a burger on a bun?”? The implication is definitely that their work is more important. And I hear some variation of that ALLLLLL the time. “We owe our troops more because they fight for our freedom!” “It’s wrong that they come back from war and aren’t treated better!” If we’re going to be all free-market about it, which is how every other class of employee is treated, then they deserve no more than they agree to. But there is always a moral appeal that the nature of the work, and its greater danger and value, means that we should feel a debt and that they have somehow more-than-earned their benefits, while the rest of us working people don’t deserve pay or benefits that good. Fuck that.
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman:
That was rather what I was saying. The fact that I was an officer is neither here nor there in the context of the kind of benefits we are talking about. Those benefits that occur in the future are merely forms of deferred pay that were earned during service. What was your dad’s gig as a warrant?
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: I was just north of there.
Suzanne
@efgoldman: Absolutely. And it is also being passed around by plenty of soldiers, who feel the need to sneer at those to whom they feel superior. The irony is that some of those soldiers probably joined the military because their only other job prospect was fast food.
Again, I’m not saying that members of the military don’t deserve good healthcare or livable wages. I just don’t think that they deserve livable wages while the rest of us deserve shit because we’re not willing and/or able to join the military. All workers deserve good healthcare and livable wages.
AxelFoley
@srv:
And you keep on being a fuckwad even after your sell by date expired.
Citizen Alan
@A guy:
It is so said to me to think that you have children,
brantl
That’s not exactly what they think, it’s actually I got mine fuck EVERYONE ELSE. Case in point, maybe this guy’s wife.
brantl
@A guy: I can understand that there is something seriously wrong with your kids (they were dealt a really shit deal on genetics AND environment, unless you’re divorced, with no visitation privileges), but frankly most people aren’t RICH, dumbass. 2/3 of all bankruptcies are now medical-bill based, dumbass. Clue up.
brantl
@J R in WV:
A guy is not one of our peers, for that to be true, we’d have to get lobotomies.
Howlin Wolfe
@A guy: Let me guess, Guy (is it pronounce “Ghee”? either way, it’s asshat nym) YANAL.
Spinoza Is My Co-pilot
I Got Mine, Fuck You and Devil Take the Hindmost. Absolute bedrock foundation of modern movement conservatism, full stop. Everything else in conservative ideology and policy is built on those deeply cynical and inhumane tenets.
Everything.