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Will America recover?

Michael Knight

By Michael Knight
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Dolemite
Dolemite

I know that and since when would you ever care about the truth? Your little Obama is so precious. Oh fuck.

Equinox
Equinox

Is this the new "what will I tell my children" thread from the Shag?

Dertyberd
Dertyberd

Having lived in the EU for almost 5 years and running a small business and attempting to start others, I agree, it is harder to get rich.  America is still the place to hopefully get rich starting a s

Tennesseehorn

Tennesseehorn 101

Posted
Posted
9 hours ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

Good at projecting American democratic values across the globe and inspiring others to reject the evil of tyranny and oppression.  You want to know why our European allies loved him, that’s why.

 

More like apologizing for everything wrong in the world. 

How about that Arab Spring..................The red line in Syria...................Iran nuclear deal / cash payout.........................

Yeah BHO received the Nobel Peace Prize based on "potential" .  Boy that sure worked out great, ask the drone "dead".

 

 

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Stilicho

Stilicho 1397

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, Armybrat said:

This country doesn't need weaklings like Obama nor loose cannon blowhards like Trump.

What this country needs is another Teddy Roosevelt.

Never going to happen.  Conservatives lose their fucking minds at the very mention of progressive politics.  I can only imagine the hysteria that would ensue if progressives somehow managed to grab hold of substantial political power.  

And even if we got beyond that hurdle, which probably only occurs in some sort of "reverse-Rapture", the entrenched money in politics isn't going to let some pinko-commie left-wing Maoist spouting socialist try and run them out of the legislation game.

Unfortunately, we can't ctrl+alt+delete the dumbfuckery that pervades both the electorate and the elected. 

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Biff Tannen

Biff Tannen 45673

Posted
Posted

Bill Maher just quoted a poll that said 52% of republicans would support postponing the 2020 election if dotus proposed it.  Is that real?  

If that is true, holy living fuck.  That is something that would literally send me into the streets.  That is fucking full on dictator bullshit.

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Smax

Smax 3800

Posted
Posted
15 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

Bill Maher just quoted a poll that said 52% of republicans would support postponing the 2020 election if dotus proposed it.  Is that real?  

If that is true, holy living fuck.  That is something that would literally send me into the streets.  That is fucking full on dictator bullshit.

 

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Jack Burton

Jack Burton 35

Posted
Posted
57 minutes ago, Tennesseehorn said:

More like apologizing for everything wrong in the world. 

How about that Arab Spring..................The red line in Syria...................Iran nuclear deal / cash payout.........................

Yeah BHO received the Nobel Peace Prize based on "potential" .  Boy that sure worked out great, ask the drone "dead".

 

 

Quit yelling at the TV

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Jack Burton

Jack Burton 35

Posted
Posted
10 hours ago, deadshank said:

Good at what?

30 million more people had healthcare because of ACA. Pre-existing conditions were covered. Recognize that. 

Hell, Tomi Lauren stayed on her parents insurance til she was 26, and it's her sole job to bitch about him.

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Armybrat

Armybrat 40832

Posted
Posted
35 minutes ago, Jack Burton said:

30 million more people had healthcare because of ACA. Pre-existing conditions were covered. Recognize that. 

Hell, Tomi Lauren stayed on her parents insurance til she was 26, and it's her sole job to bitch about him.

Please continue believing that delusion if you like. The ACA is a failure.

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F250

F250 28767

Posted
Posted
4 hours ago, pyrohornIII said:

Ok, I am not really up on all this, and defer to your knowledge, 250.  But this seems to be in line with how the French viewed the Maginot Line before WW2.  Our navy won't help much if the telecommunications grid that supports it is shot to hell by a group of Russian or Chinese hackers.   

The threat of cyberwarfare is severely overblown but it makes for great headlines which in turn makes me money.

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GSU&UT

GSU&UT 1798

Posted
Posted (edited)
30 minutes ago, Armybrat said:

Please continue believing that delusion if you like. The ACA is a failure.

Yup, nothing like being denied for pre-existing conditions and having many fewer people on health insurance. I will keep saying it until we get a single payer system or I die, it's stunning how many Americans accept that our healthcare system should be ran by for-profit enterprise rather than joining every other first world industrialized nation and truly nationalizing our healthcare.

Of course, these same folks literally think government should be as small as possible because "fuck you I got mine and I want to be left alone and not think about the truly poor and weak being left to die."

Edited by GSU&UT
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deadshank

deadshank 24652

Posted
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Jack Burton said:

30 million more people had healthcare because of ACA. Pre-existing conditions were covered. Recognize that. 

Hell, Tomi Lauren stayed on her parents insurance til she was 26, and it's her sole job to bitch about him.

I got to keep my plan, until I didn't. And it was cheaper, like the cost of a cell phone bill, until it wasn't. 

Edited by deadshank
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Tennesseehorn

Tennesseehorn 101

Posted
Posted
4 minutes ago, GSU&UT said:

Yup, nothing like being denied for pre-existing conditions and having many fewer people on health insurance. I will keep saying it until we get a single payer system or I die, it's stunning how many Americans accept that our healthcare system should be ran by for-profit enterprise rather than joining every other first world industrialized nation and truly nationalizing our healthcare.

Of course, these same folks literally think government should be as small as possible because "fuck you I got mine and I want to be left alone and not think about the truly poor and weak being left to die."

The sad thing is that you actually believe that tripe you just typed.

 

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ScottishHorn

ScottishHorn 172

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, Biff Tannen said:

Bill Maher just quoted a poll that said 52% of republicans would support postponing the 2020 election if dotus proposed it.  Is that real?  

If that is true, holy living fuck.  That is something that would literally send me into the streets.  That is fucking full on dictator bullshit.

It's not going to happen so you dont need to get your blood pressure up

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Michael Knight

Michael Knight 12977

Posted
  • Author
Posted
29 minutes ago, Armybrat said:

Yeah, nothing like more cattle to follow your party line.

You're a stupid old man that believes the worst thing that ever happened to America was a black man being elected president and that the 2nd worst thing possible was a woman being elected. You believe this not because your outdated belief system led you to that conclusion but rather because someone else told you those things enough times that you accepted them without any thought.

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Tennesseehorn

Tennesseehorn 101

Posted
Posted
8 minutes ago, Michael Knight said:

You're a stupid old man that believes the worst thing that ever happened to America was a black man being elected president and that the 2nd worst thing possible was a woman being elected. You believe this not because your outdated belief system led you to that conclusion but rather because someone else told you those things enough times that you accepted them without any thought.

Hunter you need to keep off the sauce.  It's truly rotting your brain.

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David Dennison

David Dennison 18854

Posted
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Armybrat said:

Please continue believing that delusion if you like. The ACA is a failure.

It's better than the failure that it replaced and it established health care as a right. 

From a purely political standpoint, it's done exactly what it was designed to do.

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Incredulity

Incredulity 11664

Posted
Posted
47 minutes ago, GSU&UT said:

Yup, nothing like being denied for pre-existing conditions and having many fewer people on health insurance. I will keep saying it until we get a single payer system or I die, it's stunning how many Americans accept that our healthcare system should be ran by for-profit enterprise rather than joining every other first world industrialized nation and truly nationalizing our healthcare.

Of course, these same folks literally think government should be as small as possible because "fuck you I got mine and I want to be left alone and not think about the truly poor and weak being left to die."

Profit isn’t a dirty word.  It is exactly what would and historically did motivate the best and brightest to practice medicine and develop new treatments.

Government involvement(medicare and associated “cost controls”) are a big portion of the issue.  It is staggering anyone can think more government control of healthcare is the solution.

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David Dennison

David Dennison 18854

Posted
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Just now, Incredulity said:

Profit isn’t a dirty word.  It is exactly what would and historically did motivate the best and brightest to practice medicine and develop new treatments.

Government involvement(medicare and associated “cost controls”) are a big portion of the issue.  It is staggering anyone can think more government control of healthcare is the solution.

The research for most of those new treatments was heavily subsidized by government as were the loans that paid for many of the best and brightest to go to medical school.

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SKJ

SKJ 1311

Posted
Posted
23 minutes ago, Incredulity said:

Profit isn’t a dirty word.  It is exactly what would and historically did motivate the best and brightest to practice medicine and develop new treatments.

Government involvement(medicare and associated “cost controls”) are a big portion of the issue.  It is staggering anyone can think more government control of healthcare is the solution.

You do know about medical pricing, don't you?

cash prices vs insurance prices, right?

The whole profession is one big fucking price scam

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GSU&UT

GSU&UT 1798

Posted
Posted
23 minutes ago, David Dennison said:

The research for most of those new treatments was heavily subsidized by government as were the loans that paid for many of the best and brightest to go to medical school.

NIH grants are some of the most valuable government funds used, their budget should honestly be triple of what it is now.

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Anastasis

Anastasis 23469

Posted
Posted
Just now, SKJ said:

The margins for insurance companies to write down fake savings and steal money have gotten bigger and bigger. 

Among the healthcare sector, insurance companies operate at the lowest tier in terms of margin.

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Smax

Smax 3800

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, F250 said:

The threat of cyberwarfare is severely overblown but it makes for great headlines which in turn makes me money.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/china-hacked-a-navy-contractor-and-secured-a-trove-of-highly-sensitive-data-on-submarine-warfare/2018/06/08/6cc396fa-68e6-11e8-bea7-c8eb28bc52b1_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.dba6c9178d82

Chinese government hackers have compromised the computers of a Navy contractor, stealing massive amounts of highly sensitive data related to undersea warfare — including secret plans to develop a supersonic anti-ship missile for use on U.S. submarines by 2020, according to American officials. 

The breaches occurred in January and February, the officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation. The hackers targeted a contractor who works for the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, a military organization headquartered in Newport, R.I., that conducts research and development for submarines and underwater weaponry.

The officials did not identify the contractor.

Taken were 614 gigabytes of material relating to a closely held project known as Sea Dragon, as well as signals and sensor data, submarine radio room information relating to cryptographic systems, and the Navy submarine development unit’s electronic warfare library.

The Washington Post agreed to withhold certain details about the compromised missile project at the request of the Navy, which argued that their release could harm national security.

The data stolen was of a highly sensitive nature despite being housed on the contractor’s unclassified network. The officials said the material, when aggregated, could be considered classified, a fact that raises concerns about the Navy’s ability to oversee contractors tasked with developing ­cutting-edge weapons.

The breach is part of China’s long-running effort to blunt the U.S. advantage in military technology and become the preeminent power in East Asia. The news comes as the Trump administration is seeking to secure Beijing’s support in persuading North Korea to give up nuclear weapons, even as tensions persist between the United States and China over trade and defense matters.

The Navy is leading the investigation into the breach with the assistance of the FBI, officials said. The FBI declined to comment.

On Friday, the Pentagon inspector general’s office said that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis had asked it to review contractor cybersecurity issues arising from The Post’s story.

Cmdr. Bill Speaks, a Navy spokesman, said, “There are measures in place that require companies to notify the government when a ‘cyber incident’ has occurred that has actual or potential adverse effects on their networks that contain controlled unclassified information.”

Speaks said that “it would be inappropriate to discuss further details at this time.”

Altogether, details on hundreds of mechanical and software systems were compromised — a significant breach in a critical area of warfare that China has identified as a priority, both for building its own capabilities and challenging those of the United States.

“It’s very disturbing,” said former senator James M. Talent (R-Mo.), who is a member of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. “But it’s of a piece with what the Chinese have been doing. They are completely focused on getting advanced weapons technology through all kinds of means. That includes stealing secrets from our defense contractors.” Talent had no independent knowledge of the breach.

Undersea priority

The Sea Dragon project is an initiative of a special Pentagon office stood up in 2012 to adapt existing U.S. military technologies to new applications. The Defense Department, citing classification levels, has released little information about Sea Dragon other than to say that it will introduce a “disruptive offensive capability” by “integrating an existing weapon system with an existing Navy platform.” The Pentagon has requested or used more than $300 million for the project since late 2015 and has said it plans to start underwater testing by September.

Military experts fear that China has developed capabilities that could complicate the Navy’s ability to defend U.S. allies in Asia in the event of a conflict with China.

The Chinese are investing in a range of platforms, including ­quieter submarines armed with increasingly sophisticated weapons and new sensors, Adm. Philip S. Davidson said during his April nomination hearing to lead U.S. Indo-Pacific Command. And what they cannot develop on their own, they steal — often through cyberspace, he said.

“One of the main concerns that we have,” he told the Senate Armed Services Committee, “is ­cyber and penetration of the dot-com networks, exploiting technology from our defense contractors, in some instances.” 

In February, Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats testified that most of the detected Chinese cyber operations against U.S. industry focus on defense contractors or tech firms supporting government networks.

In recent years, the United States has been scrambling to develop new weapons or systems that can counter a Chinese naval buildup that has targeted perceived weaknesses in the U.S. fleet. Key to the American advantage in any faceoff with China on the high seas in Asia will be its submarine fleet.

“U.S. naval forces are going to have a really hard time operating in that area, except for submarines, because the Chinese don’t have a lot of anti-submarine warfare capability,” said Bryan Clark, a naval analyst at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. “The idea is that we are going to rely heavily on submarines in the early effort of any conflict with the Chinese.”

China has made closing the gap in undersea warfare one of its three top military priorities, and although the United States still leads the field, China is making a concerted effort to diminish U.S. superiority.

“So anything that degrades our comparative advantage in undersea warfare is of extreme significance if we ever had to execute our war plans for dealing with China,” said James Stavridis, dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and a retired admiral who served as supreme allied commander at NATO. 

The U.S. military let its anti-ship weaponry languish after the Cold War ended because with the Soviet Union’s collapse, the Navy no longer faced a peer competitor on the seas. But the rapid modernization and buildup of the Chinese navy in recent years, as well as Russia’s resurgent forces at sea, have prompted the Pentagon to renew heavy investment in technologies to sink enemy warships.

The introduction of a supersonic anti-ship missile on U.S. Navy submarines would make it more difficult for Chinese warships to maneuver. It also would augment a suite of other anti-ship weapons that the U.S. military has been developing in recent years. 

Ongoing breaches

For years, Chinese government hackers have siphoned information on the U.S. military, underscoring the challenge the Pentagon faces in safeguarding details of its technological advances. Over the years, the Chinese have snatched designs for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter; the advanced Patriot PAC-3 missile system; the Army system for shooting down ballistic missiles known as Terminal High Altitude Area Defense; and the Navy’s new Littoral Combat Ship, a small surface vessel designed for near-shore operations, according to previous reports prepared for the Pentagon.

In some cases, suspected Chinese breaches appear to have resulted in copycat technologies, such as the drones China has produced that mimic U.S. unmanned aircraft.

[Chinese cyberspies stole a long list of U.S. weapons designs]

Speaks, the Navy spokesman, said: “We treat the broader issue of cyber-intrusion against our contractors very seriously. If such an intrusion were to occur, the appropriate parties would be looking at the specific incident, taking measures to protect current information, and mitigating the impacts that might result from any information that might have been compromised.”

The Pentagon’s Damage Assessment Management Office has conducted an assessment of the damage, according to the U.S. officials. The Office of the Secretary of Defense declined to comment.

Theft of an electronic warfare library, Stavridis said, could give the Chinese “a reasonable idea of what level of knowledge we have about their specific [radar] platforms, electronically and potentially acoustically, and that deeply reduces our level of comfort if we were in a close undersea combat situation with China.”

Signals and sensor data is also valuable in that it presents China with the opportunity to “know when we would know at what distance we would be able to detect their submarines,” he said — again a key factor in undersea battles.

Investigators say the hack was carried out by the Chinese Ministry of State Security, a civilian spy agency responsible for counterintelligence, foreign intelligence and domestic political security. The hackers operated out of an MSS division in the province of Guangdong, which houses a major foreign hacking department.

Although the Chinese People’s Liberation Army is far better-known than the MSS when it comes to hacking, the latter’s personnel are more skilled and much better at hiding their tracks, said Peter Mattis, a former analyst in the CIA counterintelligence center. The MSS, he said, hacks for all forms of intelligence: foreign, military and commercial.

In September 2015, in a bid to avert economic sanctions, Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged to President Barack Obama that China would refrain from conducting commercial cyberespionage against the United States. Following the pact, China appeared to have curtailed much, although not all, of its hacking activity against U.S. firms, including by the People’s Liberation Army.

Both China and the United States consider spying on military technology to fall outside the pact. “The distinction we’ve always made is there’s a difference between conducting espionage in order to protect national security and conduct military operations, and the theft of intellectual property for the benefit of companies inside your country,” said Michael Daniel, the White House cybersecurity coordinator under Obama.

 

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SKJ

SKJ 1311

Posted
Posted
Just now, Anastasis said:

Among the healthcare sector, insurance companies operate at the lowest tier in terms of margin.

Eh... Not really if you include how they pad those numbers

They don't really pay a grand for an aspirin

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SKJ

SKJ 1311

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Posted

That's just the bullshit pricing book hospitals use.

It's a fucking price scam. They "charge' that upfront to show the insurance companies that they're getting a "discount"rate so that insurance companies can pay only 500 for the aspirin on their books. Meanwhile, the insurance company draws that amount out of their funds in payment, but then recovered the discount in their own books, passing the "savings" onto the premiums the customers pay, since there are "rules" as to how much they can collect.

The actual margin doesn't see the light of day.

It's a scam called "middling"

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Anastasis

Anastasis 23469

Posted
Posted
Just now, SKJ said:

That's just the bullshit pricing book hospitals use.

It's a fucking price scam. They "charge' that upfront to show the insurance companies that they're getting a "discount"rate so that insurance companies can pay only 500 for the aspirin on their books. Meanwhile, the insurance company draws that amount out of their funds in payment, but then recovered the discount in their own books, passing the "savings" onto the premiums the customers pay, since there are "rules" as to how much they can collect.

The actual margin doesn't see the light of day.

It's a scam called "middling"

Brought to you by the system created by CMS. 

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TreatyOak

TreatyOak 16313

Posted
Posted

It's sometimes hard for people to understand because we all read the daily bad news, but the power of the US remains at an almost unprecedented level. In 1910, 10% of the countries were democratic. Now, around 60% of the counties are. This reflects the popularity of the US form of governance. Until the Euros are willing to fund their own defense, they continue to remain at the mercy of the US to defend themselves. Russia? They're not even a 10-ten world economy. Yes, China is very powerful, but they have their own issues. With all of our faults, we are still the choice for worldwide investors and the soft power of the US exists on a mind-boggling level.

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David Dennison

David Dennison 18854

Posted
Posted
2 minutes ago, TreatyOak said:

It's sometimes hard for people to understand because we all read the daily bad news, but the power of the US remains at an almost unprecedented level. In 1910, 10% of the countries were democratic. Now, around 60% of the counties are. This reflects the popularity of the US form of governance. Until the Euros are willing to fund their own defense, they continue to remain at the mercy of the US to defend themselves. Russia? They're not even a 10-ten world economy. Yes, China is very powerful, but they have their own issues. With all of our faults, we are still the choice for worldwide investors and the soft power of the US exists on a mind-boggling level.

You might want to tell the president, because everything he does indicates that he doesn't believe any of that.

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SKJ

SKJ 1311

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Posted
40 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

Feels like word salad my man. 

How the living fuck does that sound like word salad?

Medicare/Medicaid/MCs= government insurance, which has price caps

Free market insurance does not have price caps.

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