(Fool Me Twice, Shame on Me)
I live and breath to bust the chops of so called “professional journalists” when they’re caught not doing their job vetting sources and verifying the veracity of the stories which they deliver to their readers.
I am extremely agitated right now at the prospect of the government and the FEC making efforts to protect the rights of these “professional journalists” to publish any crap they see fit to publish while at the same time limiting my right to free speech in my blog when it comes to political issues. As I have said before, spending a few years getting an engineering degree doesn’t make me a rocket scientist any more than having a journalism degree makes everything that one of these morons writes happen to contain any truth.
Having said all of that, I regret to inform you that the mainstream media is at it again. It seems that ABC learned nothing from CBS’s and Dan Rather’s glorious adventure into the world of basing news stories on unverified anonymous documents.
This time the document in question is a supposed memo listing so called “Republican talking points” relating to the Terri Schiavo legislation enacted by the US Congress last Sunday evening. As usual, the guys over at Powerline are all over it, but I have to wade in myself because fighting and exposing media bias is my favorite topic in the whole wide world right now.
First question. How stupid do these “professional journalists” think that we are? Here is the full wording of the “Republican talking points memo” as reported on Monday after being “leaked’ by an anonymous source to the Rawstory web site and provided to ABC news:
Exclusive
GOP Talking Points on Terri Schiavo
Memo, Obtained by ABC News, Was Circulated Among Senate Republicans
March 21, 2005 — The following memo listing talking points on the Terri Schiavo case was circulated among Republican senators on the floor of the Senate.
This is an exact, full copy of the document obtained exclusively by ABC News and first reported Friday, March 18, 2005, by Linda Douglass on "World News Tonight with Peter Jennings."
S. 529, The Incapacitated Person's Legal Protection Act
Teri (sic) Schiavo is subject to an order that her feeding tubes will be disconnected on March 18, 2005 at 1p.m.
The Senate needs to act this week, before the Budget Act is pending business, or Terri's family will not have a remedy in federal court.
This is an important moral issue and the pro-life base will be excited that the Senate is debating this important issue.
This is a great political issue, because Senator Nelson of Florida has already refused to become a cosponsor and this is a tough issue for Democrats.
The bill is very limited and defines custody as "those parties authorized or directed by a court order to withdraw or withhold food, fluids, or medical treatment."
There is an exemption for a proceeding "which no party disputes, and the court finds, that the incapacitated person while having capacity, had executed a written advance directive valid under applicably law that clearly authorized the withholding or or (sic) withdrawl (sic) of food and fluids or medical treatment in the applicable circumstances."
Incapacitated persons are defined as those "presently incapable of making relevant decisions concerning the provision, withholding or withdrawl (sic) of food fluids or medical treatment under applicable state law."
This legislation ensures that individuals like Terri Schiavo are guaranteed the same legal protections as convicted murderers like Ted Bundy.
I don’t know about you, but I find many details of this memo to be troubling.
First of all, the “memo” is unsigned and written on plain paper without the US Senate letterhead. Why would that happen if it wasn’t fake? Can I draft up my own memo containing my own talking points and fax it up to the Senate and forward a copy to ABC News? Would the Senate be obligated to distribute it?
Then there is the little detail that the Senate bill number is wrong. It’s S.539, not S.529. The legislation was ultimately passed as S. 686. I know that the media has trouble being bothered with little things like DETAILS, but how the hell are we expected to believe that this piece of trash paper is authentic when something as important as the Senate Bill Number is WRONG? Sheeshhh!
Next, the idiot that wrote this “talking points memo” can’t spell worth a damn. Notice that the name of the woman, Terri Schiavo is misspelled “Teri.” In addition, everywhere the text contains the word (sic) there is another grammatical or spelling error like “withdrawl.” Something that has not been pointed out in other blogs that stands out to me is the grammatical error in the seventh paragraph where the phrase “valid under applicably law that…” Say what?
After lighting the fire under a minor uproar over the “Republican’s using Terri as a political football,” now ABC is backing off according to Powerline:
“the memo discussed a republican bill and was distributed to repulbican senators. That's what we reported. we are obviously not going to divulge our multiple sources. I appeciate your questions, but believe you are approaching this from the wrong end. We asked numerous sources - all confirmed that senators had received the memo in conjunction with one of the bills on the floor. For three days none of those sources has given us any reason to think there is more to the memo than a particularly naked expression of the politics of Shivo case.”
So what if multiple “sources” sent the same forged document to ABC. How much time did ABC spend looking into the details and verifying where the document came from?
I know that I might appear to be “picking nits” when it comes to bringing this whole issue up, but I continue to insist that we can’t believe a damn thing that is printed in the newspaper and broadcast on TV as long as crap like this is happening.
Please join me in demanding change.
Thursday, March 24, 2005
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Calling A Spade A Spade
Look at this story from the Associated Press:
Baghdad Shopkeepers Kill Three Militants
By TRACI CARL, Associated Press Writer
"BAGHDAD, Iraq - Shopkeepers and residents on one of Baghdad's main streets pulled out their own guns Tuesday and killed three insurgents when hooded men began shooting at passers-by, giving a rare victory to civilians increasingly frustrated by the violence bleeding Iraq."
Imagine that you are a reporter standing on the street in beautiful downtown Anywhere USA. Three men wearing hooded sweatshirts walk out on the street and start shooting at passers-by and another bystander getss out his .50 AE Desert Eagle Pistol and pulls a Clint Eastwood Dirty Harry maneuver on the “insurgents” sorry flea-bitten asses.
When you write your story for the local fish wrapper/birdcage liner newspaper full of wedding announcements and death notices, how the hell do you expect to get away calling these potential murderers “insurgents?”
Does America call Timothy McVey an “Insurgent.?” Does America accept that the “Native American” Neo-Nazi that killed his grandparents and shot up his high school this week can be defined as an “insurgent?”
I’m sorry, but I learned to spell and I own a dictionary and I’m really tired of the “media” redefining the meaning of words and using inaccurate wording to describe the actions of people committing crimes like MURDER and ASSAULT.
These idiots that call themselves journalists should all have their feeding and hydration tubes removed, and then be forced to take a nice warm Clorox enema in an effort to cleanse their minds and spirits.
Baghdad Shopkeepers Kill Three Militants
By TRACI CARL, Associated Press Writer
"BAGHDAD, Iraq - Shopkeepers and residents on one of Baghdad's main streets pulled out their own guns Tuesday and killed three insurgents when hooded men began shooting at passers-by, giving a rare victory to civilians increasingly frustrated by the violence bleeding Iraq."
Imagine that you are a reporter standing on the street in beautiful downtown Anywhere USA. Three men wearing hooded sweatshirts walk out on the street and start shooting at passers-by and another bystander getss out his .50 AE Desert Eagle Pistol and pulls a Clint Eastwood Dirty Harry maneuver on the “insurgents” sorry flea-bitten asses.
When you write your story for the local fish wrapper/birdcage liner newspaper full of wedding announcements and death notices, how the hell do you expect to get away calling these potential murderers “insurgents?”
Does America call Timothy McVey an “Insurgent.?” Does America accept that the “Native American” Neo-Nazi that killed his grandparents and shot up his high school this week can be defined as an “insurgent?”
I’m sorry, but I learned to spell and I own a dictionary and I’m really tired of the “media” redefining the meaning of words and using inaccurate wording to describe the actions of people committing crimes like MURDER and ASSAULT.
These idiots that call themselves journalists should all have their feeding and hydration tubes removed, and then be forced to take a nice warm Clorox enema in an effort to cleanse their minds and spirits.
A Moment of Silence For Terri Schiavo
I really don’t know what to say about the fiasco surrounding Terri Schiavo—thus my silence to date.
I smell a really stinky rat (her husband possibly?) or rats (the Florida court system possibly?) in the woodpile somewhere, but I can’t at this point discern enough detail to add substantially to the national dialogue.
Everyone seems to be forming their opinion on the issue on a pro-life/choice and Republican/Democrat basis. How the heck the issue of abortion came creeping into this situation is beyond my comprehension. Private family issues like the life or death of a disabled loved one should never be reduced to the level of personal political affiliation.
Our country was founded based on the concept of separation of powers and was endowed with a system of checks and balances. The executive and legislative branches of our government were always overtly political in their nature, but the judicial branch was in theory supposed to rise above political interests to interpret the US Constitution and the subsequent laws passed by the executive and legislative branch in a fair and evenhanded basis. I said “in theory” because I am afraid that our local, state, and federal judiciary train has jumped off of the tracks and the Terri Schiavo Fiasco is just the tip of the iceberg of a morass of unintended consequences that are going to arise as a result of the judicial failures of the past forty or fifty years. What a complete and total fatal train wreck we are witnessing in Florida.
I have a great deal of compassion for families that deal with the day-to-day realities of fellow family members suffering from the consequences of birth defects or health related disabilities. Regardless of whether a loved one cannot walk “normally”, talk “normally”, is blind, is hearing impaired (what we used to call blind, deaf, or “dumb”), or is severely mentally disabled in some other manner—the examples of love and caring exhibited by most humans far outweighs the abusive examples shown on television for the purposes of so-called “entertainment.”
Both sides of my family has been blessed with both good health and at least average intelligence, although some, like me, have squandered a great deal of our God given talent in search of things like the perfect beach, the perfect sunset, and the perfect Rum Cocktail. I admit, however, that I have a severe problem with the local court system, our national Congress, or the President (regardless of whether I voted for him or not) getting involved with life and death decisions regarding my family members.
You, too, should have a problem with this type of government intervention and intrusion.
While the judicial situation is of our own making, the influence on Terri’s medical treatment should give us all a vivid example of the total failure and uselessness of Government when it comes to helping us manage our day-to-day lives. We have let our government intrude incrementally into our business over the years, but the current fiasco provides proof that we absolutely cannot rely on government to make these decisions for us.
Fifteen years ago I wrote two very important documents. I drafted a Living Will and a Power of Attorney for Medical Care. Both documents are lost somewhere in the filing cabinets and Safe Deposit boxes of my past life, but I intend to remedy that situation IMMEDIATELY.
I’m afraid that it is really too late for Terri Schiavo to benefit from the public outcry on her behalf, but I suggest that Terri’s legacy should be that of influencing millions of Americans to spend the time to put their wishes regarding extraordinary healthcare decisions IN WRITING.
In addition, make sure that your immediate family members know what your wishes are and that legal copies of your documents are available for use by your healthcare facilities. This is often a problem because you can’t predict that you will be severely injured in an auto accident in a rental car in Chicago when you live in South Georgia. That’s why informing your family and properly preparing and registering your documents is so important.
Our Imperial State and Federal Governments will literally kill you with kindness and compassion. They take over a third of your money, but I say that you shouldn’t let them end up taking your life.
I smell a really stinky rat (her husband possibly?) or rats (the Florida court system possibly?) in the woodpile somewhere, but I can’t at this point discern enough detail to add substantially to the national dialogue.
Everyone seems to be forming their opinion on the issue on a pro-life/choice and Republican/Democrat basis. How the heck the issue of abortion came creeping into this situation is beyond my comprehension. Private family issues like the life or death of a disabled loved one should never be reduced to the level of personal political affiliation.
Our country was founded based on the concept of separation of powers and was endowed with a system of checks and balances. The executive and legislative branches of our government were always overtly political in their nature, but the judicial branch was in theory supposed to rise above political interests to interpret the US Constitution and the subsequent laws passed by the executive and legislative branch in a fair and evenhanded basis. I said “in theory” because I am afraid that our local, state, and federal judiciary train has jumped off of the tracks and the Terri Schiavo Fiasco is just the tip of the iceberg of a morass of unintended consequences that are going to arise as a result of the judicial failures of the past forty or fifty years. What a complete and total fatal train wreck we are witnessing in Florida.
I have a great deal of compassion for families that deal with the day-to-day realities of fellow family members suffering from the consequences of birth defects or health related disabilities. Regardless of whether a loved one cannot walk “normally”, talk “normally”, is blind, is hearing impaired (what we used to call blind, deaf, or “dumb”), or is severely mentally disabled in some other manner—the examples of love and caring exhibited by most humans far outweighs the abusive examples shown on television for the purposes of so-called “entertainment.”
Both sides of my family has been blessed with both good health and at least average intelligence, although some, like me, have squandered a great deal of our God given talent in search of things like the perfect beach, the perfect sunset, and the perfect Rum Cocktail. I admit, however, that I have a severe problem with the local court system, our national Congress, or the President (regardless of whether I voted for him or not) getting involved with life and death decisions regarding my family members.
You, too, should have a problem with this type of government intervention and intrusion.
While the judicial situation is of our own making, the influence on Terri’s medical treatment should give us all a vivid example of the total failure and uselessness of Government when it comes to helping us manage our day-to-day lives. We have let our government intrude incrementally into our business over the years, but the current fiasco provides proof that we absolutely cannot rely on government to make these decisions for us.
Fifteen years ago I wrote two very important documents. I drafted a Living Will and a Power of Attorney for Medical Care. Both documents are lost somewhere in the filing cabinets and Safe Deposit boxes of my past life, but I intend to remedy that situation IMMEDIATELY.
I’m afraid that it is really too late for Terri Schiavo to benefit from the public outcry on her behalf, but I suggest that Terri’s legacy should be that of influencing millions of Americans to spend the time to put their wishes regarding extraordinary healthcare decisions IN WRITING.
In addition, make sure that your immediate family members know what your wishes are and that legal copies of your documents are available for use by your healthcare facilities. This is often a problem because you can’t predict that you will be severely injured in an auto accident in a rental car in Chicago when you live in South Georgia. That’s why informing your family and properly preparing and registering your documents is so important.
Our Imperial State and Federal Governments will literally kill you with kindness and compassion. They take over a third of your money, but I say that you shouldn’t let them end up taking your life.
Tuesday, March 22, 2005
HillaryCare Preview--Part II
Back in October I wrote a posting called HillaryCare Preview about the flue vaccine shortage. What a bust that story really turned out to be. The medical officials and media managed to scare the heck out of a few gullible citizens, but by in large, other than revealing the fact that government meddling in the process had caused a supply shortage, and thanks to a relatively mild flue season, the final result was “much ado about nothing.”
Government involvement in healthcare at any level is historically a problem. Grand intentions and far reaching promises soon dissolve into a quagmire of expensive bureaucratic red tape, ultimately delivering more paperwork than doing any actual healing.
We have all heard about how wonderful things are in Europe and Canada with their Socialized medicine. You just walk into a clinic, get your healthcare “du jour,” and stroll out the door confident in the knowledge that the government is picking up your tab. But take a look at this story about Canadian healthcare.
“TORONTO - A letter from the Moncton Hospital to a New Brunswick heart patient in need of an electrocardiogram said the appointment would be in three months. It added: "If the person named on this computer-generated letter is deceased, please accept our sincere apologies."
The patient wasn't dead, according to the doctor who showed the letter to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. But there are many Canadians who claim the long wait for the test and the frigid formality of the letter are indicative of a health system badly in need of emergency care."
Can you imagine being in the position of needing something as simple as an EKG and having to wait three months to get it? I am certain that I could call a doctor right now and have one scheduled not later than this Friday. Yes it would cost me $500, but if I need it, I need it and our present healthcare system can supply it because there are probably twenty five EKG machines in every county of Georgia.
Americans who flock to Canada for cheap flu shots often come away impressed at the free and first-class medical care available to Canadians, rich or poor. But tell that to hospital administrators constantly having to cut staff for lack of funds, or to the mother whose teenager was advised she would have to wait up to three years for surgery to repair a torn knee ligament.”
"It's like somebody's telling you that you can buy this car, and you've paid for the car, but you can't have it right now," said Jane Pelton. Rather than leave daughter Emily in pain and a knee brace, the Ottawa family opted to pay $3,300 for arthroscopic surgery at a private clinic in Vancouver, with no help from the government.
My girl Pat tore a piece of cartilage in her left knee last October. Within three weeks she had the condition diagnosed with X-Rays and a MRI and had the outpatient surgery done at a local sports clinic. Total cost—about $5,000. Out of pocket expense—about $1000, and worth every damn cent. Of course, this didn’t include the $200 per month that she pays for private health insurance, for the past 22 years she has worked at her company, something that many Americans feel that they are entitled to at zero cost. That attitude really galls me.
You see, the problem is, there is no such thing as “zero cost” medical care. Somebody has to pay, even if the government gets in the middle and tells you that it is free. Look at the Canadians situation…
"The average Canadian family pays about 48 percent of its income in taxes each year, partly to fund the health care system. Rates vary from province to province, but Ontario, the most populous, spends roughly 40 percent of every tax dollar on health care, according to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
The system is going broke, says the federation, which campaigns for tax reform and private enterprise in health care.
It calculates that at present rates, Ontario will be spending 85 percent of its budget on health care by 2035. "We can't afford a state monopoly on health care anymore," says Tasha Kheiriddin, Ontario director of the federation. "We have to examine private alternatives as well."
Is this where you want to see us go here in the US? I damn sure don’t. And for those of you out there that are self-insured or are wealthy enough to think that you will just bypass the system, you can forget about it if Hillary gets her way. Imagine having the money to pay for your own healthcare, but the government making it illegal for you to pay the doctor outside the “government system?” That provision was buried in Hillary Clinton’s 1992 Universal Healthcare proposal. They wanted to put doctors in jail for accepting private funding, and cut off your ability to get treatment if you were caught going around the rules.
In 1984 Parliament passed the Canada Health Act, which affirmed the federal government's commitment to provide mostly free health care to all, including the 200,000 immigrants arriving each year. The system is called Medicare (no relation to Medicare in the United States).
Despite the financial burden, Canadians value their Medicare as a marker of egalitarianism and independent identity that sets their country apart from the United States, where some 45 million Americans lack health insurance.
Notice the emphasis on lacking “health insurance,” not lacking “health care.” So what is the big damn doodling deal here? I know that you might be getting tired of me using this statement, but looking at the Constitution of the United States, nowhere in it do I find the words “Life, Liberty, and free unlimited access to state of the art medical treatment.” It just isn’t there. And I seriously doubt the 45 million number. Who did that census? Probably the proponents of the “Universal Healthcare” idea.
I am so tired of hearing this refrain. The only healthcare crisis we have here in the US is the imaginary one created by the media and the Democrats. Yes costs are rising faster than inflation, but technology and new forms of treatment are advancing faster than inflation also. Today a bottle of 100 generic aspirin costs a buck and one half. Twenty-five years ago I bet it cost two or three dollars. Where is the crisis here? Can’t afford Tylenol or Advil? Buy Aspirin, you ungrateful moron.
"Canada does not have fully nationalized health care; its doctors are in private practice and send their bills to the government for reimbursement.
"That doctor doesn't have to worry about how you're going to pay the bill," said Deber. "He knows that his bill will be paid, so there's absolutely nothing to stop any doctor from treating anyone."
Deber acknowledges problems in the system, but believes most Canadians get the care they need. She said the federal government should attach more strings to its annual lump-sum allocations to the provinces so that tax dollars are better spent on preventive care and improvements in working conditions for health-care professionals...
Meanwhile, the average wait for surgical or specialist treatment is nearly 18 weeks, up from 9.3 weeks in 1993, according to the Fraser Institute, a right-wing public policy think tank in Vancouver. A Fraser study last year said the average wait for an orthopedic surgeon was more than nine months.
So if Pat and I lived in Canada, she would most likely still be limping around with a brace on her bad left knee. The lack of medical care would probably have severely limited her ability to make her weekly trips to Chicago and could have cost her her position with her company. A torn cartilage turns into unemployment, and on and on and on...
And in the time since she got her surgery done in November last year, how many Americans would have died waiting three months for an EKG?
Government involvement in healthcare at any level is historically a problem. Grand intentions and far reaching promises soon dissolve into a quagmire of expensive bureaucratic red tape, ultimately delivering more paperwork than doing any actual healing.
We have all heard about how wonderful things are in Europe and Canada with their Socialized medicine. You just walk into a clinic, get your healthcare “du jour,” and stroll out the door confident in the knowledge that the government is picking up your tab. But take a look at this story about Canadian healthcare.
“TORONTO - A letter from the Moncton Hospital to a New Brunswick heart patient in need of an electrocardiogram said the appointment would be in three months. It added: "If the person named on this computer-generated letter is deceased, please accept our sincere apologies."
The patient wasn't dead, according to the doctor who showed the letter to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. But there are many Canadians who claim the long wait for the test and the frigid formality of the letter are indicative of a health system badly in need of emergency care."
Can you imagine being in the position of needing something as simple as an EKG and having to wait three months to get it? I am certain that I could call a doctor right now and have one scheduled not later than this Friday. Yes it would cost me $500, but if I need it, I need it and our present healthcare system can supply it because there are probably twenty five EKG machines in every county of Georgia.
Americans who flock to Canada for cheap flu shots often come away impressed at the free and first-class medical care available to Canadians, rich or poor. But tell that to hospital administrators constantly having to cut staff for lack of funds, or to the mother whose teenager was advised she would have to wait up to three years for surgery to repair a torn knee ligament.”
"It's like somebody's telling you that you can buy this car, and you've paid for the car, but you can't have it right now," said Jane Pelton. Rather than leave daughter Emily in pain and a knee brace, the Ottawa family opted to pay $3,300 for arthroscopic surgery at a private clinic in Vancouver, with no help from the government.
My girl Pat tore a piece of cartilage in her left knee last October. Within three weeks she had the condition diagnosed with X-Rays and a MRI and had the outpatient surgery done at a local sports clinic. Total cost—about $5,000. Out of pocket expense—about $1000, and worth every damn cent. Of course, this didn’t include the $200 per month that she pays for private health insurance, for the past 22 years she has worked at her company, something that many Americans feel that they are entitled to at zero cost. That attitude really galls me.
You see, the problem is, there is no such thing as “zero cost” medical care. Somebody has to pay, even if the government gets in the middle and tells you that it is free. Look at the Canadians situation…
"The average Canadian family pays about 48 percent of its income in taxes each year, partly to fund the health care system. Rates vary from province to province, but Ontario, the most populous, spends roughly 40 percent of every tax dollar on health care, according to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
The system is going broke, says the federation, which campaigns for tax reform and private enterprise in health care.
It calculates that at present rates, Ontario will be spending 85 percent of its budget on health care by 2035. "We can't afford a state monopoly on health care anymore," says Tasha Kheiriddin, Ontario director of the federation. "We have to examine private alternatives as well."
Is this where you want to see us go here in the US? I damn sure don’t. And for those of you out there that are self-insured or are wealthy enough to think that you will just bypass the system, you can forget about it if Hillary gets her way. Imagine having the money to pay for your own healthcare, but the government making it illegal for you to pay the doctor outside the “government system?” That provision was buried in Hillary Clinton’s 1992 Universal Healthcare proposal. They wanted to put doctors in jail for accepting private funding, and cut off your ability to get treatment if you were caught going around the rules.
In 1984 Parliament passed the Canada Health Act, which affirmed the federal government's commitment to provide mostly free health care to all, including the 200,000 immigrants arriving each year. The system is called Medicare (no relation to Medicare in the United States).
Despite the financial burden, Canadians value their Medicare as a marker of egalitarianism and independent identity that sets their country apart from the United States, where some 45 million Americans lack health insurance.
Notice the emphasis on lacking “health insurance,” not lacking “health care.” So what is the big damn doodling deal here? I know that you might be getting tired of me using this statement, but looking at the Constitution of the United States, nowhere in it do I find the words “Life, Liberty, and free unlimited access to state of the art medical treatment.” It just isn’t there. And I seriously doubt the 45 million number. Who did that census? Probably the proponents of the “Universal Healthcare” idea.
I am so tired of hearing this refrain. The only healthcare crisis we have here in the US is the imaginary one created by the media and the Democrats. Yes costs are rising faster than inflation, but technology and new forms of treatment are advancing faster than inflation also. Today a bottle of 100 generic aspirin costs a buck and one half. Twenty-five years ago I bet it cost two or three dollars. Where is the crisis here? Can’t afford Tylenol or Advil? Buy Aspirin, you ungrateful moron.
"Canada does not have fully nationalized health care; its doctors are in private practice and send their bills to the government for reimbursement.
"That doctor doesn't have to worry about how you're going to pay the bill," said Deber. "He knows that his bill will be paid, so there's absolutely nothing to stop any doctor from treating anyone."
Deber acknowledges problems in the system, but believes most Canadians get the care they need. She said the federal government should attach more strings to its annual lump-sum allocations to the provinces so that tax dollars are better spent on preventive care and improvements in working conditions for health-care professionals...
Meanwhile, the average wait for surgical or specialist treatment is nearly 18 weeks, up from 9.3 weeks in 1993, according to the Fraser Institute, a right-wing public policy think tank in Vancouver. A Fraser study last year said the average wait for an orthopedic surgeon was more than nine months.
So if Pat and I lived in Canada, she would most likely still be limping around with a brace on her bad left knee. The lack of medical care would probably have severely limited her ability to make her weekly trips to Chicago and could have cost her her position with her company. A torn cartilage turns into unemployment, and on and on and on...
And in the time since she got her surgery done in November last year, how many Americans would have died waiting three months for an EKG?
I've Won The Lottery
(Fun with Internet Spammers)
I received this E-Mail Today:
FROM THE DESK OF BARRISTERS CHRIS CRUX KRUGER
PRIVATE BARRISTERS/SOLICITORS AND LEGAL ATTORNEY
GoodDay,
Your name and your e-mail address came up in a random draw conducted by
our law firm, Micheal Ben Law Chambers, My name is BARRISTER CHRIS
CRUX KRUGER esq. A personal attorney to our late client Mr. James Harrison
who worked for an oil firm. Mr. James Harrison a well known Philanthropist,
before he died, he made a Will in our law firm stating that $1.0M (one
million U.S. dollars only) should be donated to any Philanthropist of
our choice overseas.
We have made a random draw and your name and e-mail address was picked
as the beneficiary to this Will. I am particularly interested in
securing this money from the Bank, because they have issued a notice
instructing us to produce the beneficiary of this Will within two weeks
which happens to be you or else the money will be credited to the Government
treasury as per law here. It is my utmost desire to execute the Will of
our late client. You are required to contact me immediately to start
the process of transferring this money to any of your designated
official account. I urge you to contact me immediately for further details
bearing in mind that the Bank has given us a date limit. Please act
fast.
Contact me via my email address as follows:
Email: barristercrux3@ny.com
This is to assure you that this is risk free, but for the purposes of
confidentiality, further discussion on this matter shall be by phone.
You should therefore do well to send me your mobile number so that we
can discuss further on the intending transfer.
Congratulation,
Regards.
BARRISTER CHRIS CRUX KRUGER {Esq.}
Here is my response:
Dearest Barrister Chris Kruger,
I don’t know how to describe to you my excitement in receiving your recent correspondence. Not that I don’t in the same moment lament the demise of Mr. Harrison whom I never had the opportunity to meet, but your communications came at a most opportune time.
You see, my own dear Aunt Flussy, my only living relative, has been suffering from a terminal case of Gout in her big toe and has exhausted all of our financial resources in the past year, spending most of our money betting on NASCAR races and on the purchase of a new set of cosmetic implants for her pet pig, “Piggly Wiggly”.
When I told Aunt Flu about us winning your random drawing, she literally leapt off of the sofa bed in the living room of our trailer home, hobbled across the kitchen, and nearly knocked my deer head off the wall with her crutches in her excitement. Of course, she was sorta mad at first because she thought that calling us a philanthropist was an insult, but when I explained that the word didn’t involve drugs or bodily excretory functions, she was OK.
Aunty Flu has contacted her brother, Uncle Jerm, who is coming in on the bus tomorrow morning and will be bringing with him his prepaid cellphone that he is charging up with extra minutes at the local Seven-Eleven.
We will let you know the phone number as soon as he gets it turned back on and we look forward to helping you in this wonderful endeavor.
Oye Como Va, Senior.
Viagra Rodregez, III
I received this E-Mail Today:
FROM THE DESK OF BARRISTERS CHRIS CRUX KRUGER
PRIVATE BARRISTERS/SOLICITORS AND LEGAL ATTORNEY
GoodDay,
Your name and your e-mail address came up in a random draw conducted by
our law firm, Micheal Ben Law Chambers, My name is BARRISTER CHRIS
CRUX KRUGER esq. A personal attorney to our late client Mr. James Harrison
who worked for an oil firm. Mr. James Harrison a well known Philanthropist,
before he died, he made a Will in our law firm stating that $1.0M (one
million U.S. dollars only) should be donated to any Philanthropist of
our choice overseas.
We have made a random draw and your name and e-mail address was picked
as the beneficiary to this Will. I am particularly interested in
securing this money from the Bank, because they have issued a notice
instructing us to produce the beneficiary of this Will within two weeks
which happens to be you or else the money will be credited to the Government
treasury as per law here. It is my utmost desire to execute the Will of
our late client. You are required to contact me immediately to start
the process of transferring this money to any of your designated
official account. I urge you to contact me immediately for further details
bearing in mind that the Bank has given us a date limit. Please act
fast.
Contact me via my email address as follows:
Email: barristercrux3@ny.com
This is to assure you that this is risk free, but for the purposes of
confidentiality, further discussion on this matter shall be by phone.
You should therefore do well to send me your mobile number so that we
can discuss further on the intending transfer.
Congratulation,
Regards.
BARRISTER CHRIS CRUX KRUGER {Esq.}
Here is my response:
Dearest Barrister Chris Kruger,
I don’t know how to describe to you my excitement in receiving your recent correspondence. Not that I don’t in the same moment lament the demise of Mr. Harrison whom I never had the opportunity to meet, but your communications came at a most opportune time.
You see, my own dear Aunt Flussy, my only living relative, has been suffering from a terminal case of Gout in her big toe and has exhausted all of our financial resources in the past year, spending most of our money betting on NASCAR races and on the purchase of a new set of cosmetic implants for her pet pig, “Piggly Wiggly”.
When I told Aunt Flu about us winning your random drawing, she literally leapt off of the sofa bed in the living room of our trailer home, hobbled across the kitchen, and nearly knocked my deer head off the wall with her crutches in her excitement. Of course, she was sorta mad at first because she thought that calling us a philanthropist was an insult, but when I explained that the word didn’t involve drugs or bodily excretory functions, she was OK.
Aunty Flu has contacted her brother, Uncle Jerm, who is coming in on the bus tomorrow morning and will be bringing with him his prepaid cellphone that he is charging up with extra minutes at the local Seven-Eleven.
We will let you know the phone number as soon as he gets it turned back on and we look forward to helping you in this wonderful endeavor.
Oye Como Va, Senior.
Viagra Rodregez, III
Sunday, March 20, 2005
There's More To Life
(Than a 50’ Ethernet Cable)
Ahem....I have an announcement to make...
WE HAVE WIRELESS INTERNET ON ST. SIMONS ISLAND.
Our condo was built in the dark ages of TV and telecommunications in the early 1970’s. All of the old farts and miscellaneous geezers that have lived here before us were apparently happy with two TV’s and two telephones, because that’s how many connections to the outside world were included in the building when we moved in.
Since Pat’s office was in the other end of the building from the primary CATV jack in the master bedroom, we have spent a year living with a 50’ CAT5 cable connected to our cable modem and spanning through the living room and kitchen, across the sun porch, and into the second bedroom home office. The cable also presented a tripping hazard when we used Pat’s Dell notebook on the weekends in the living room and we’ve about wore the connectors on each end out plugging and unplugging endlessly over the past 12 months. I have become an expert at jumping rope using the cable as a rope.
I’ve been relegated to dragging around a 25’ phone line from the wall phone jack in the kitchen to my old Dell laptop on weekdays when Pat was working in town and dialing up at 45 Kbaud when she was out of town because I was too cheep and lazy to do anything like install a router/wireless network. I verged on having a nervous breakdown several times each week making the transition from 100 Mbaud to 45Kbaud. We considered using two Dixie cups and a really long string as an intercom, but I just couldn’t fathom one more wire in my life to stumble over.
The real reason for the delay in installing a wireless network was my concern about standards and desire to not compromise speed in the process. Why have a cable modem if your network and router cuts the speed by half to two-thirds? Why pay $300 for a network when a $30 cable provides a fast yet unelloquent solution? OK, OK, maybe I was just cheep.
Much of my trouble has been remedied this week with the installation of a Linksys WRT54GS 802.11g wireless router. I dumped the Voice Over IP idea for the time being when I found out I could add it in the future for free (they give away the hardware when you sign up for the service.) It only took me about four hours to get the hardware installed and figure out how to clone our MAC address. $130 with rebates—such a deal.
This stuff isn’t intuitive to a non-network geek like myself since the people that write the instructions seem to think everyone already knows the meaning of all of the acronyms and the cable company just throws a cable modem in your front door and runs for the hills. It didn’t help that the cable modem had been installed 365 days and several million-brain cells ago.
The real pain in the arse was the fact that Pat’s company Dell doesn’t have a CD drive because her old boss KEPT it when they fired him before she inherited the machine. Naturally you had to connect to the Internet through the cable modem and router to do the installation and the CD drive on my old Dell was of no use whatsoever. I was ready to throw both computers and the new hardware out in the parking lot about ten minutes after I started installation. I turned my attention to cooking dinner and after dining on Blue Cheese Stuffed Hamburgers and crispy homemade potato chips, I approached the project with renewed enthusiasm. I surfed over to the Linksys website and managed to find a copy of the installation software that I could download.
The router was up and running in about fifteen minutes after pulling the software off of the web. The wireless card in my notebook was another situation entirely. I got it installed easy enough with 128 bit WEP encryption, changed the network SSID, turned off the broadcast feature, sat back and...nothing. I could find the access point and I had a good signal, but the Internet was nowhere to be found. The Adelphia web site was of no help, but I found a really good article on the Linksys site about setting up multiple computers with an Adelphia cable modem. Once I found the article, it only took about another fifteen minutes before I had an Internet connection with no wires. I walked outside the front door and froze my butt off (it’s 45 degrees tonight) and checked my E-mail just for the heck of it.
In the words of Martin Luther King…free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, I’m free at last.
Ahem....I have an announcement to make...
WE HAVE WIRELESS INTERNET ON ST. SIMONS ISLAND.
Our condo was built in the dark ages of TV and telecommunications in the early 1970’s. All of the old farts and miscellaneous geezers that have lived here before us were apparently happy with two TV’s and two telephones, because that’s how many connections to the outside world were included in the building when we moved in.
Since Pat’s office was in the other end of the building from the primary CATV jack in the master bedroom, we have spent a year living with a 50’ CAT5 cable connected to our cable modem and spanning through the living room and kitchen, across the sun porch, and into the second bedroom home office. The cable also presented a tripping hazard when we used Pat’s Dell notebook on the weekends in the living room and we’ve about wore the connectors on each end out plugging and unplugging endlessly over the past 12 months. I have become an expert at jumping rope using the cable as a rope.
I’ve been relegated to dragging around a 25’ phone line from the wall phone jack in the kitchen to my old Dell laptop on weekdays when Pat was working in town and dialing up at 45 Kbaud when she was out of town because I was too cheep and lazy to do anything like install a router/wireless network. I verged on having a nervous breakdown several times each week making the transition from 100 Mbaud to 45Kbaud. We considered using two Dixie cups and a really long string as an intercom, but I just couldn’t fathom one more wire in my life to stumble over.
The real reason for the delay in installing a wireless network was my concern about standards and desire to not compromise speed in the process. Why have a cable modem if your network and router cuts the speed by half to two-thirds? Why pay $300 for a network when a $30 cable provides a fast yet unelloquent solution? OK, OK, maybe I was just cheep.
Much of my trouble has been remedied this week with the installation of a Linksys WRT54GS 802.11g wireless router. I dumped the Voice Over IP idea for the time being when I found out I could add it in the future for free (they give away the hardware when you sign up for the service.) It only took me about four hours to get the hardware installed and figure out how to clone our MAC address. $130 with rebates—such a deal.
This stuff isn’t intuitive to a non-network geek like myself since the people that write the instructions seem to think everyone already knows the meaning of all of the acronyms and the cable company just throws a cable modem in your front door and runs for the hills. It didn’t help that the cable modem had been installed 365 days and several million-brain cells ago.
The real pain in the arse was the fact that Pat’s company Dell doesn’t have a CD drive because her old boss KEPT it when they fired him before she inherited the machine. Naturally you had to connect to the Internet through the cable modem and router to do the installation and the CD drive on my old Dell was of no use whatsoever. I was ready to throw both computers and the new hardware out in the parking lot about ten minutes after I started installation. I turned my attention to cooking dinner and after dining on Blue Cheese Stuffed Hamburgers and crispy homemade potato chips, I approached the project with renewed enthusiasm. I surfed over to the Linksys website and managed to find a copy of the installation software that I could download.
The router was up and running in about fifteen minutes after pulling the software off of the web. The wireless card in my notebook was another situation entirely. I got it installed easy enough with 128 bit WEP encryption, changed the network SSID, turned off the broadcast feature, sat back and...nothing. I could find the access point and I had a good signal, but the Internet was nowhere to be found. The Adelphia web site was of no help, but I found a really good article on the Linksys site about setting up multiple computers with an Adelphia cable modem. Once I found the article, it only took about another fifteen minutes before I had an Internet connection with no wires. I walked outside the front door and froze my butt off (it’s 45 degrees tonight) and checked my E-mail just for the heck of it.
In the words of Martin Luther King…free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, I’m free at last.
