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The victims can recover more funds in civil court. That's how this works. If the government takes it all then there is nothing to recover.
They don't even have to, that'd be the restitution part.
I just think that if you're going to have a victim's compensation fund in the first place, don't make it look like a joke by fining people such a tiny amount of money in its name.
FYI, the fund has $12 billion in it, and is mostly funded by the deposit of federal fines / penalties, forfeited bonds, etc. The $1,100 contribution isn't needed, is a drop in the bucket, and does nothing but to make the program seem silly.
We have the US government saying that it's going to start invalidating the otherwise valid patents of pharmaceutical companies unless they agree to sell their products to Medicare at below-market prices (which is also extortion, and probably also restraint of trade.)
Tangentially related, but I wonder how come pharmaceutical companies seem to be the only industry where economies of scale and longtime production don't relate to cheaper production costs. I realize they have to pay for research and development of new drugs, but then the incredibly high price of new drugs is supposed to be about paying back the R&D money. F-35s are getting cheaper to produce with each plane made, but insulin has increased ~400% in the last 10-15 years.
Or why drugs are priced to the moon, then they give consumer a rebate, so it ends up costing them nothing?
This scenario I'm familiar with since my girlfriend was diagnosed with RA last year. The retail cost is something like $4500 per dose of Humira, which she has one every other week (she just recently switched to a new medicine). So my health insurance brings down the cost of the drug to $1600 per dose. But then, Humira gives her a chargeback card that lowers the price of the drug to $5 per dose. Which for all intents and purposes is basically free.
The retail cost is something like $4500 per dose of Humira, which she has one every other week (she just recently switched to a new medicine). So my health insurance brings down the cost of the drug to $1600 per dose. But then, Humira gives her a chargeback card that lowers the price of the drug to $5 per dose. Which for all intents and purposes is basically free.
Shenanigans such as this are really at the root of all that is wrong with the economics of modern healthcare in the US. And they are the direct result of involving health insurance companies in everyday, routine health care.
Health insurance used to be like auto insurance. It was there to pay for costs related to things like accidents or severe illness, but had no involvement in routine health-maintenance or the treatment of chronic conditions.
Today, I get asked for my insurance card when I go to CVS to get a routine flu shot. That's like taking may car to Jiffy Lube for an oil change, and expecting Geico to pay for it.
AOC recently posted a "Green New Deal" FAQ on her blog. (The one which is part of her official US House uh Representin' website.)
The post has since been removed, however I have found copies of it archived at two separate, reputable sites. One is NPR, the other is Cordillera Communications (via AWS). Here are the archived copies of AOC's Green New Deal FAQ:
I direct your attention to Page 1, the last bullet point under "The Green New Deal resolution a 10-year plan..."
Yes, the one which says "Build on FDR’s second bill of rights by guaranteeing (... ) Economic security for all who are unable or unwilling to work."
Say WHAT? This lady wants to run up the largest debt in the history of mankind, in part to guarantee economic security for people who are UNWILLING to work?!
I'm... I don't have the right words to describe what I'm right now.
As if he wasn't already in enough **** due to the whole "I was sleeping with a Russian spy and feeding her information" thing, poor ole' longtime GOP campaign manager and political consultant Paul Erickson just got himself incited on 11 counts of money-laundering and fraud. And not the vague, "no victim, no crime" kind. Seems that over the period of 1996 - 2018 (you know, while he was already earning millions from the republican party), Erickson made a hobby out of actively defrauding individuals of millions of dollars by convincing them to invest in fictitious businesses enterprises.
I honestly didn't think anyone was dumb enough to attempt Ponzi schemes any more. Turns out I was wrong.
Plot twist: Erickson is an undercover Democrat. Clearly.
I direct your attention to Page 1, the last bullet point under "The Green New Deal resolution a 10-year plan..."
Yes, the one which says "Build on FDR’s second bill of rights by guaranteeing (... ) Economic security for all who are unable or unwilling to work."
Say WHAT? This lady wants to run up the largest debt in the history of mankind, in part to guarantee economic security for people who are UNWILLING to work?!
I'm... I don't have the right words to describe what I'm right now.
Joe, she's only the beginning... a "test case" if you will. Bernie has to stay within the framework to be an effective politician... AOC likely will never accomplish anything beneficial for her state or district ever, and that's not her apponited task. Her job is to take all the heat, and be so far "off the deep end" that every other Democrat seems like a fair-case moderate trying really hard to meet in the middle. Her win may have been a surprise to the DNC, but their large think-tank staffs went to work instantly to figure out how to best use her. They're crushing it as far as I can see.
But like I said, she's only the beginning. We'll have a few more just like her get elected in the coming election cycles, and as those few more slide the bar futher left, their message becomes less and less crazy, especially to the masses of offended-victim-culture children currently in the public education system. You think we have a problem with millenials having no drive, just wait until millions of kids who are now in elementary school that are cultured with "economic security for those unwilling to work" become adults and start voting.
This is why I now refuse to vote Democrat. In the past, I've gotten behind a few blue-dogs who didn't want to take my guns and didn't let a lot of religious baggage influence their decisions... but not anymore. The party has swung so hard left, so fast, that there aren't any more moderates left. Maybe this is by design, or maybe it's the logical destiny of the 2-party system.
And the future doesn't hold many bright spots for Republicans... between trying to end the electoral college, giving felons back federal voting rights, and granting citizenship to the masses of illegals... the country is poised to make a dramatic shift blue in the coming decades.
If Democrats ever take both houses and the Presidency again, which could be as early as 2020, I don't see them losing it for decades.
But like I said, she's only the beginning. We'll have a few more just like her get elected in the coming election cycles, and as those few more slide the bar futher left, their message becomes less and less crazy, especially to the masses of offended-victim-culture children currently in the public education system. You think we have a problem with millenials having no drive, just wait until millions of kids who are now in elementary school that are cultured with "economic security for those unwilling to work" become adults and start voting.
This is why I now refuse to vote Democrat. In the past, I've gotten behind a few blue-dogs who didn't want to take my guns and didn't let a lot of religious baggage influence their decisions... but not anymore. The party has swung so hard left, so fast, that there aren't any more moderates left. Maybe this is by design, or maybe it's the logical destiny of the 2-party system.
I agree that this is the logical destiny of having a two-party system. I've made that very observation in the past. Over the last century, not only have the expressed values of the "Republican" and "Democratic" parties flipped, but they have also been shifting gradually towards the extreme ends of their spectrum. This process seemed to have accelerated over the past few decades, aided by a growing "if you are not 100% with us, then you must be 100% against us" mentality.
And yes, I also agree that this trend is likely to continue, and that as the democrats increasingly promise unrealistic, utopian outcomes (eg: free everything), they will continue to gain popular support from the... I was going to say uneducated, but that's actually wrong. The unwise and un-thinking. People who just want easy answers and aren't sufficiently motivated to analyze them. You know, people like Braineack who mindlessly re-post every meme that seems to support their preconceptions without bothering to fact-check.
And that actually scares me.
As a matter of historical precedent, the US has been, for the past 250 years or so, the place to which people who were fleeing tyranny went. There is no non-tyrannical, first-world country on earth large enough to absorb a mass exodus of American expats who are tired of their own government.
Australia, maybe... But every living non-human thing there wants to kill you. Including the flora.
My grandparents fled a corrupt and tyrannical government in Spain, and landed in Cuba. My parents fled a corrupt and tyrannical government in Cuba, and landed in the US. I would REALLY prefer not to continue this cycle.
Last edited by Joe Perez; 02-07-2019 at 08:20 PM.
Reason: gremmar
Funny you mention Australia... current exchange rate is $1.00USD to $1.44AUD
Non-Resident Tax Rates 2018 - 2019 $AUD
Taxable incomeTax on this income
$0 - $90,000 32.5c for each $1
$90,001 - $180,000 $29,250 plus 37c for each $1 over $90,000
$180,001 and over $62,550 plus 45c for every $1 over $180,000
I'm not a tax expert, but this looks pretty damned close to base US rates (except for the $.45 over $180k, that's gotta hurt). OTOH, I don't know if there are state taxes. I think they throw on an additional 2% for everybody to fund universal healthcare. I just read that the average bloke spends $1100yr on car insurance, and that property taxes aren't bad... they do have essentially a property sales tax of 5% whenever a property is transferred, but looks like an "annual property tax" is minimal ($1300yr/average).
Overall, doesn't look all that much more/less than the US with some differences.
A couple of other bullet points from the new green deal pointed out by the local news reader last night were the banning of air travel and internal combustion engines. We are supposed to use high speed trains instead of airplanes and electric vehicles in place of our existing automobiles.
Thank you, Joe, for posting the links to the document. I've read it in its entirety and my first impression is that the writing style is very juvenile. The word choice, ideological platitudes, lack of substance, and sentence structure would cause me to believe this was composed by a consortium of 4th and 5th graders assigned to a junior Model United Nations committee. There are starry-eyed hopes and dreams void of specifics for implementation or milestones for goal achievement. It is as if stating it will make it so. Where specifics do exist, they are frightening in implications.
Any reasonably educated adult would know that formal government proposals do not call for terms like "farting cows" and would choose more advanced terminology. Sophomoric generalized references to "Billionaires and companies" appeared several times making me wonder if the writer thought that Bill Gates, Dunkin Donuts, and the local tire shop up the street were a problem and would be responsible for the rebuilding of America's infrastructure. There were also a few grammatical errors that were indicative of the poor quality of public education in our dear country.
The sheer ignorance of unintended consequences is another indicator of the naivete of the author. Or perhaps I read it through my own biased lens without seeing their truth. They really don't mind if millions of Americans die in pursuit of their proposed Utopia. It is all for the good of our future, comrade.
I'm fairly certain as towards the writing style, that half of people in government these days struggle to get much past a 2nd grade writing/speaking level.
As for the content, of course a bunch of it is off the deep end. Showing your *** seems to be the only way to get anyone talking about anything these days. Which, is disgusting in itself. Sigh.
Newly elected Democrat Senator Krysten Sinema (AZ) told to "Watch your ***" by Nevada Senator Jacky Rosen for applauding Trump at SOTU Tuesday night (9 secs long). She wasn't dressed in the women's KKK uniform of the day for that night also.
^ And that pretty much sums it up. "Don't be seen approving of the enemy, because they are ultimate evil and must be opposed. Never mind what's best for the country, you have a career to worry about."
On a lighter note, y'all down in Virginia are gonna find yourselves in this situation if things continue they way they are:
At last check, 100% of your elected, statewide officials are now mired in some form of controversy based on something which they said or did years ago, which the enlightened find to be offensive.
02-07-2019, 02:51 PM
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