Disqus - Latest Comments for steveegg

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Sun, 12 Jun 2022 15:32:09 -0000

The fact of the matter is neither party wants reform.

Re: $5 gas is largely Putin’s fault

steveegg — Sun, 12 Jun 2022 15:30:05 -0000

They misspelled "B-i-d-e-n".

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Fri, 10 Jun 2022 12:30:48 -0000

It never made it to the floor of either chamber of Congress (see the histories of H.R. 1776 and S.857 for the 109th Congress).

Re: That's just your opinion, man: Gannett to dump columns and scale back editorials

steveegg — Fri, 10 Jun 2022 12:20:00 -0000

So newspapers owned by Gannett Co. — publisher of USA Today and more than 250 dailies — have begun to radically shrink and reimagine their
editorial sections, publishing them on fewer days each week and dropping traditional features such as syndicated columns and editorial cartoons. Even political endorsements and letters to the editor are being scaled back.

The company has been pushing for the cutbacks for years, and they have become increasingly visible to readers since a committee of editors formally recommended them at a meeting in April. “Readers don’t want us to tell them what to think,” the editors, who come from Gannett newsrooms across the country, declared in an internal presentation. “They don’t believe we have the expertise to tell anyone what to think on most issues. They perceive us as having a biased agenda.”

What a load of duplicitous horse manure. The editors believe the readers want, nay, need to be told what to think; they just don't want competition from anybody else, be it columnists or readers.

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 21:13:33 -0000

Let's take the Medicare example. Clinton got rid of the FICA/SECA cap on Medicare's portion of those taxes (which funds Part A), and Obama/Pelosi added a surcharge on those making over $200,000 ($250,000 for married couples), and the health of Medicare Part A didn't improve one bit over the 1993 projections.

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 21:01:42 -0000

I don't remember the supposed Obama/Boehner deal because it is even less believable than the supposed Clinton/Gingrich deal in 1997 that was blown up because S(l)ick Willie could neither keep his pants zipped nor tell the truth...that only came out several years afterward. By the time Boehner was in a position to supposedly make that deal, the one person in DC that wanted to do something about Social Security no longer wanted to do anything about it (and he subsequently became an advocate for making it even more explicitly a welfare program).

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 20:54:00 -0000

Congratulations - you just killed what made Social Security popular among the upper 60% of the population.

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 20:27:52 -0000

You must have read the proposals where far more than 6.2% (with a matching 6.2% from the employer) of income above $130,000 is seized without adding to their benefits. Lots of luck with that.

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 20:03:46 -0000

As I said, THAT only extends the life of the trust fund a couple years...and destroys the concept that made Social Security popular among the middle-to-upper-middle class; that every dollar earned subject to the FICA/SECA tax would result in an increase (if more limited as the amount earned increased) in benefits.

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 20:01:14 -0000

Also, at the point FDR created it, half the population never collected a dime because they were dead before 65. Now, life expectancy is in the mid-70s.

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 19:58:44 -0000

Except it was the Republicans that killed the idea.

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 19:57:47 -0000

That only extends the life of the "trust" funds a couple years...if you don't include the additional income covered as part of the base for benefits.

Re: Social Security only has 13 years before it goes broke

steveegg — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 19:54:35 -0000

The "fix", such as it is, will be to make Social Security and Medicare Part A have the same senior secured creditor status Medicare Parts B and D have; that is, to give them priority for general revenue over all "discretionary" federal spending.

Let's ask Zimbabwe, the Weimar Republic, and Venezuela how that worked out.

Re: Insanity: At least one Dem on Jan. 6 committee reportedly wants to recommend abolishing the electoral college

steveegg — Mon, 06 Jun 2022 13:39:18 -0000

That faces the same basic problem the co-related attempt to abolish the 2nd Amendment does - the amendment drafting convention would have to control the membership of the ratifying conventions as there is no way 38 legislatures would, either directly or indirectly, agree to abolish the Electoral College. Before you say that they could easily do so, the 21st Amendment, which explicitly repealed the 18th, went the ratifying conventions route, and the various state legislatures controlled the membership of the ratifying conventions. Indeed, Arizona's legislature went so far as to deem themselves the ratifying convention for Arizona, and the Supreme Court declined to intervene when asked.

Re: If the libs want to get rid of the Second Amendment, here's what they'd have to do

steveegg — Fri, 03 Jun 2022 22:55:49 -0000

Congress, or the drafting convention, would have to control the membership of the ratifying conventions because there aren't going to be 38 legislatures that will either directly or indirectly ratify an amendment that nukes the 2nd Amendment. The problem for them is that an amendment, specifically the 21st, which explicitly repealed the 18th, has already gone the ratifying-convention route, and it was the various legislatures that controlled the membership of the ratifying conventions. Indeed, Arizona's legislature deemed itself the ratifying convention for Arizona, and SCOTUS declined to intervene when asked to.

Re: Seriously? Biden looks at releasing the last diesel reserves

steveegg — Wed, 01 Jun 2022 17:18:02 -0000

This is your periodic reminder that the Watermelon Economy requires a 90+% reduction in population to have even the slimmest of chances of working.

Re: Sec. Yellen: 'I was wrong' about inflation

steveegg — Tue, 31 May 2022 19:49:56 -0000

Two takeaways:

- For Biden, the buck stops anywhere but at his desk.
- Yellen admitted that it's always darkest just before it goes totally black, and that it's darkest.

Re: Erdogan: Still a hard nope on Sweden and Finland in NATO

steveegg — Tue, 31 May 2022 09:49:34 -0000

Let's ask the Orthodox churches what Turkey has done to them, both historically and under Erdogan.

Re: Erdogan: Still a hard nope on Sweden and Finland in NATO

steveegg — Tue, 31 May 2022 09:48:56 -0000

Time to reconstitute NATO without Turkey.

Re: Is the fifth COVID wave upon us?

steveegg — Thu, 26 May 2022 21:46:18 -0000

How the hell do you build a useful vaccine in 100 days if the virus is
spinning off dominant new subvariants every 60 days or so?

Given that the vaccines out there are still solely for Mk 1 Mod 0, what does it matter?

Re: "Incredible transition" update: Get ready for new gas-price records this weekend

steveegg — Thu, 26 May 2022 21:40:03 -0000

What's with the either/or?

Re: "Incredible transition" update: Get ready for new gas-price records this weekend

steveegg — Thu, 26 May 2022 21:39:12 -0000

Shorter Faisal - "GFY!"

Shorter Biden - "Thank you, sir. May I have another?"

Re: A whole age of warfare sank with the Moskva

steveegg — Sun, 22 May 2022 14:03:41 -0000

"A whole age of warfare sank with the Elia...er...Sheffi...er...Moskva"
- Idi...er...Elliot Ackerman

The closest the various iterations of that statement came to truth in the naval realm was when it was said about the Arizona. Its sinking, along with those of the rest of the Pacific Fleet, the Bismark, the Italian battleship fleet, the Yamato, et al, did herald the end of the age of the battleship...in favor of an even bigger platform.

As for the other "anti-"platforms - the Soviet Russians learned nothing from Afghanistan when it was the Stinger that neutered their helicopter force, and the Israelis have figured out how to neuter anti-tank missiles.

One more thing - a Switchblade can't take territory.

Re: Get ready for more blackouts because climate change

steveegg — Wed, 11 May 2022 10:23:14 -0000

This is your periodic reminder that the Watermelon Economy that is powered by "Green" Energy requires a 90%+ reduction in the population to have any chance of success (NARRATOR - The only success it had was completely depopulating the Earth).

Re: The overlooked reason Russia's invasion is floundering

steveegg — Tue, 10 May 2022 14:16:49 -0000

It's a feature...and a bug...of Communism.