georgerussia

Who said that? What I heard is that the bill should slow down or temporary stop the healthcare cost _increase_. The average insurance premiums doubled during last ten years, meaning that private industry is not able (or does not want) to do that. You already have rationing of care - people kicked out of plans, insurance denies claims, and so on. What exactly is your concern? Who said that? This would mean existing insurance companies are run so badly that they cannot compete even with shitty, wasteful and poorly-run service provided by the government (as Republicans tell us, everything run by government runs shitty comparing to Private Industry, excluding AIG and GM). If service provided by UPS was worse and more expensive than the one provided by USPS, I wouldn't have no problem with them going out of business. What if it does? A new company would take their market share instead. Would it mean something dramatic to you? Only if you invested into the failed company. Probably exactly the same what was done after spending billions of dollars and a bunch of lives lost it was obvious there are no WMDs in Iraq. Likely, as they did it with Iraq. At least Republican money would be used for something useful for the citizens of America, not just for something harmful for others. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

This wasn't my statement either - I just agreed with the statement made by riddler. But indeed, any sane person reading the Bible would pretty much understand that it simply cannot be considered guidance in any reasonable way. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

No problem. For a $1,000 check you can get a blowjob from Maria (or Jesus, whoever you prefer) in Heaven. Larger contributions may also be discussed :) Please make check payable to "American Atheists" :) * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

The obvious problem here is that you cannot testify regarding encounters with your Lord - it may be Satan, Zeus or just a hallucination. When I went through a surgery and had general anesthesia, I've seen a lot of glitches myself when it was wearing off. Being a reasonable person, however, I do not trace it to Aliens, Gods or whatever else. Your testimony would be no different from those who tell us that yesterday aliens kidnapped them and had sex with them the whole night, or those who tell us that they cured cancer by drinking their urine. Those people typically believe that what they said really happened to them. Unfortunately it's only their beliefs, not facts, and any testimony regarding it would be easily disproved in cross-examination. I wonder if there is anyone here who feel hopeless, AND looks to find the solution in Jesus, AND is visiting SC instead of local church to find it? To me it looks like you're trying to operate way away from your target audience - you might get a better chance in your state office where people apply for unemployment benefits. This is correct. This is wrong - as long as: - Christians have the same right as everyone else, including people who are not Christians, and those who are not religious; - They restrict themselves in ways they spread "good news" - no, I do not want to see them every day coming to my house or sending me spam with their "good news", sorry. - They do not do it using public property or money; - Their "good news" do not call for action which would affect those who are not Christians (and here is where we typically have a major problem). Why would you need justification? * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Mimiboboka is the thing which created you, me and the whole world. Nobody ever seen him, but I have a paper which he inspired. It says "send a $100 check to George, and you will be rich in Heaven. Don't send it, and you will be sucking GWB cock in Hell for eternity". So if you consider it honesty, you'll see it yourself that there is the same amount of evidence regarding existence of Mimiboboka as regarding the existence of your Lord, so you should at least consider them both. I'd even say Mimiboboka should be considered the first, because he talked to me directly, not just to some ancient people you never heard of. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Collins gives a slightly better definition: "strong or unshakeable belief in something, esp without proof or evidence" This is not true, as such logic would assume I can come with any possible thought, and until it is proven to be false, it should be considered at the same trust level as any other theories. For example, there are "theories" that you can cure cancer by drinking urine, or that you can get rid of HIV by raping a virgin. None of those "theories" were proven false by scientific methods, i.e. via a proper double-blind study. Should we then consider them to be "possibly true" as well? If you think about it more, you'll admit that it is simply impossible to prove non-existence of something which does not exist. How would you prove that an invisible Bubba does not live in your bedroom, and is not having anal sex with you each time you're sleeping? You cannot prove that it is false, so it might be true, right? Then you'll immediately have a bunch of invisible creatures living in your room and doing weird things to you so large that you'd probably spend all the time thinking about them. Fortunately this is not the case, and no idea is even considered until there is at least some rationale behind it - preferably based on facts, or on proven theories. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

What I said which is wrong? Please quote me please, and explain why. So for you church is just a Jesus fan club to hang out there. Then do you agree that nobody needs church or ministries to be a good Christian and to be saved? Well, THIS is a typical example of faith. You made a thing up (that I think all Christians are dumb and wrong) and now believe in it so much that you keep repeating it despite the fact I just said that no, I do not think all of them are dumb. Some indeed are (like GWB), but not all. Nor they're all wrong - just misled, pretty much as my kids who believe that Santa is real, and can "prove" it by showing the gifts they found under the pine tree in the morning of Jan 1st. The problem is there are too many Christians who are trying to ram their faith down others throats - and they do it through local governments, by posting Christian scenes on public property, by doing "prayer meetings" in city halls involving government officials, and so on. Obviously their "efforts" should be countered. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

How can you have faith in the non-existence of something? Do you have faith in non-existence of Mimiboboka? * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

That's where it changes. Once the things are proven, you're no longer believe. You know. When you are trying to prove things, and have some knowledge about the topic, your beliefs are not groundless - even though they can still be invalid; Middle Ages alchemists believe they can turn Pb into Au as well, even though none of them succeed in it. Well, I do have evidence that there is air each time I'm in a freefall :) And the existence of some things could be proven by experiments, theories and formulas. Nothing, however, proves god existence. I do not know "most arguments", as there is only one: you're saying God (which?) exists? Prove it! Until you prove God exist, there is no reason to believe in it, and no reason to provide any arguments why don't you believe. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Some are, some aren't. Being a Christian is basically no different from being a sports team fan, with the only difference that a sport team is real :) Nobody so far has proven that at least one God exists (and I know a couple dozen gods; people say there are over 5000). This is called common sense. Why don't you believe in Poseydon, Athena, Beelzebub, Ra, Thor or Flying Spaghetti Monster, but believe in Jesus which has exactly the same amount of "evidence" it exists as all mentioned gods? So if they do, why would you need church then? Just go home and read the bible. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

This is not faith. This is common sense. X does not exist until someone proves the opposite. Neither have you. I bet you never even seen your God! * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

When I read the subject I thought about something like "hentai has been banned". It's always funny to hear that a real problem is with someone you never heard about. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Samuel Jackson. At lease, unlike most of (esp. female) actors he looks real, and not like a plastic doll. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Quote Now, how many people did I upset? Quote Probably nobody. As long as you keep your beliefs to yourself, and not trying to force others to follow them, you'll be fine. Your comment about the alleged purpose of the Christian faith to bring peace, however, indeed made me laugh. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Good point. They're actually more like some African/South America/Eastern Europe cops, which want people to learn the rules from them, so they can extort bribes (indulgences) for alleged violations. Obviously. The first question would be like "how THIS could be even considered a guidance? It looks like written by someone who took too much Prozac". * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Why didn't it? Would be fun to watch. But it wouldn't affect me anyway. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

This time it prevents marriage sanctity by forbidding divorce. Seems to be a joke - but it is still an initiative in circulation. Gonna be fun if it goes into the ballot. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

No, I want to see the full set of rules, as I might find rule #N unacceptable. Then it would make no sense to me to start at all. You probably didn't understand. I do not need your interpretation of what the rules are. You're just a gullible imperfect human which could be deceived or tricked, and therefore your interpretation may be wrong. Why would the rules set up by allegedly omnipotent and perfect God require human interpretation? Why couldn't your God do better job than DMV? * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

I'm afraid you missed the point. The purpose of both the Bible and the Driver Handbook is to inform the general population about what the rules are - not to enforce compliance. And from the Driver Handbook it's pretty obvious what the rules are, and those running red lights or driving drunk clearly understand that what they do is against the rules. From the Bible it's not clear what the exact rules are. This is the reason there are multiple different branches of Christianity, which interpret the Bible differently. All of them consider their own interpretation the only true one, which implicitly means that any other interpretation is false. If you look for example on Catholics and Jehova Witness, you'd find their interpretation of what IS the proper way to show your acceptance of Jesus as your Lord and Savior is very different among different Christians. Edit: according to World Christian Encyclopedia (chapter 1, "Global Overview", there are 33,820 distinct Christians denominations across the world. This is why I'm saying the Bible as a guidance is a complete piece of crap. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

And that's exactly why the Bible as a guidance is a complete piece of crap. Look on the Driver's Handbook, which was prepared by the least perfect form of already imperfect humans (i.e. government, who according to some people is inferior in managing things comparing to Private Industry). No parables, no bullshit, no kidding. And somehow everyone reading it gets pretty much the same message. Why a supposedly perfect God was not able to produce at least something like that as a guidance, is beyond my imagination. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Nichego udivitelnogo. Next time, please either use regular English, or you'll get a reply in Russian. What about "HSA plan"? Do you see the word "plan"? And please keep your advices to yourself. Now look on the context it was said on, and read again: What I consider "catastrophic policy" is a high-deductible insurance plan - and my considerations are based on facts. I even provided an example of such policy provided by the reputable insurer. Now let's see what you posted - and it's obvious you're in your main "answer avoidance" mode. You did not explain what does "catastrophic policy" mean to you. You did not back your thoughts by any facts. You did not provide any example of such policy. Nothing. I didn't say that you do. You're arguing with yourself. This is common misunderstanding that all you need is any high-deductible plan with certain deductibles. I suggest you read the IRS publication before confusing others. Important things you missed regarding HSA eligibility include: not having any other coverage for you besides high-deductible plan (including Medicare), and not being claimed as dependent on someone's last year tax return. Extremely important thing you missed about the plan is that the plan must not cover anything, besides some preventive care, until the deductible is met. This means a health insurance plan with 3,500 deductible, which covers office visits with $40 copay is NOT a HSA-eligible plan. Another important thing is that the maximum deductible cannot exceed 5,800/11,600 for the plan to be eligible for HSA. Also read the "Family plans that do not meet the high deductible rules". There are even more rules, but those seem to be the most misunderstood ones. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

I didn't understand anything you wrote there. If your "point" was that only a plan which requires you to open a HSA account is a HSA plan, then there are no HSA plans available now. It looks like you do not know the common terminology used by health insurers. They call "HSA plans" plans which are eligible for HSA. Because I do not know if this is a valid definition for the insurance policy, or something you just made up for argument's sake. That's why I asked several times, and yet again you ignored my request to provide a link to an existing policy, which as you said would be "a catastrophic coverage policy which won't meet the standards set by the bill". Of course the policy need to be from a reputable health insurer, and maternity may not be covered as we discussed that already. So far you did not provide any, which makes impression that either you're not really familiar with this kind of policies, or because such policy only exists in your imagination, and therefore the bill does not change anything at all. Because you must have a special HSA-eligible plan to be eligible to fund an HSA account pre-tax, and if you do not have such a plan, you cannot do it. Not every plan is eligible for HSA, only some high-deductible plans are which are commonly called (by the health insurers itself) "HSA plans". As a side note, an HSA-eligible plan does not require you to set up or fund the HSA account - it only gives you the right to do so. But it is up to you whether to do it. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

I do object, however, if they at the same time condemn such behavior in public, or even sponsor laws against it. Says a lot about integrity of one's character. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Your post, in turn, is a good example of politeness, wisdom and infinite truth! If you read the bill, then please when you talk about the bill, point to specific sections of it, so anyone can understand where you discuss proposed law, and not just speculating. This would also help to do a cross-check to make sure you did not misunderstood a specific section. It would be naive to expect everyone, including people on disability, and people who live on Social Security benefits or receiving welfare, to pay for it. So no, I do not expect everyone to pay for it, not should you if you live in real world. Facts about what? That I do not expect everyone to pay for it? What kind of facts you're looking for? So you WOULD rather address every problem we have now, from immigration to wars to shrinking Social Security to housing market to unemployment in the healthcare bill? Why the heck would you discuss IMMIGRATION issues in a HEALTHCARE bill? You really want to have one 200,000 pages "Save America!" bill which should take care of every problem around? This would be crazy. What you're saying seems to be a typical right-wing bullshit - "we should not fix healthcare until we fix all other issues" (most of which was introduced by Republicans, namely GWB). Of course, the same could be said about other issues - "we should not fix immigration until we fix healthcare" - and you're in a deadlock. You cannot fix everything at the same moment, and someone has to set priorities. Fortunately it's not GWB now who is setting them. You sound so arrogant that you didn't even see you're fighting against yourself! If USPS by law has so significant advantage over other companies (and it is pretty obvious that USPS can do most of what UPS/FedEx does), this pretty much proves the point that government-run entities do not push competing privately run entities out of business - assuming they are run properly, and not like AIG or GM. Just a few lines ago you asked for facts. Where are your facts? Your personal statements are not facts - obviously you didn't work in UPS top management, so your understanding of the business cannot be full. First. Just a matter of fact, I do not want you to pay for anything for me. I do not expect an apology for this misleading and arrogant statement, but I hope you at least would keep your tone down. Second, the proposed bill still gives you a choice - you can keep private insurance, or go for public option. You may claim that this choice is limited, but you cannot argue the fact that the bill still gives MORE choices to a person than you do! You are not the judge here, so please keep your conclusions to yourself and let others decide. The facts are that you did not provide any facts there, which could be verified using reasonable efforts. This would be true if there WAS supported documentation. So far I only seen your statement that "this is true", and the more I talk to you, the less I trust your statements. So until you show the actual facts and can back them up with the link to the independent source, everything you said is considered your opinion. This is extremely good example of politeness. At this point I'm ending my discussion with you, and not going to talk to you anymore. People like you WILL drive Republicans to non-existence - and this seems to be a good thing. At least there was no disagreement anymore that the way Amtrak ran before government takeover was not better than after takeover, and that Social Security is managed much better than some top private industry funds. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

Nobody. Note that this is not an insurance service, which requires risk calculation, adjustments, fraud checks and so on. This is basically prepaid service, which is not really different from getting a bunch of coupons for free oil charge/car wash. With a single case of fraud giving you $10 max (as you spend $10 on copay), I do not expect a lot of fraud either. If one is willing to commit fraud to make money, there are ways which pay much better than $10. Third party is not paying. Third party is distributing money you gave them. Like a prepaid VISA gift card - don't you care about the price when paying by a gift card? Some plans are, some are not. You can buy true health insurance - a plan which pays nothing at all until you got, like, $5K in claims in a year. Or you can buy a "health service" plan, which covers everything including massages, chiropractors, urinotherapy and other crap with $5 copay. You have a choice. * Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *