AKC

I drove back hame late last night through Castaic, and I can guarantee you that that whether it falls to the rule or exception side, there's a whole lot of exactly what I'm talking about going on there. I think the Cal rule on getting the kids under the plan only applies to companies with 200 or more employees- so yeah, if you're working for somebody big enough to have an ERISA exempted SFHP, the chances are you're in pretty good shape. But at the same time, there's a lot of people working for smaller employers- or themselves- who are using the public nut for their "coverage".

It doesn’t seem to me that it would be much of a surprise that the money spent on health care in nations who make it illegal for private citizens to purchase their own insurance is lower than money spent on health care in the country with the very best health care delivery system in the world and the freedom to buy what you want. For goodness sakes- we have the choice to buy a product that doesn’t require we wait 9 months for an MRI- of course many of us do that! And we spend a lot more to do it. It doesn’t seem like much of a stretch to turn down a plate of chinchilla when there’s a restaurant serving fresh Chilean seabass right down the street. I’m happy to entertain this conversation- and I know you agree we should take it to another forum. If you open something up I’d be happy to join an open-minded discussion about the differences between “us and them”- information is better than magic and I surely have much to learn about health care around the world. I am currently a believer that it’s the people with a boat in the driveway and DirecTV on all 3 LCDs in their house who still refuse to buy health insurance that play a big part in driving our costs up, with them ending up in the emergency room getting “free government healthcare” when the kid gets the flu- but I have not looked into research supporting that. On the Costa Rica thing- I bring that up because most discussions on health care lapse into some idiocy about all the “great healthcare systems” that include the buckets of free Bacitracin offered by banana republics as part of their study “ideal models”. I recognize you aren’t doing that here. Let me know where we’re going and I’ll get over there.

I've got a friend- she's a surfer and has never had any "interest" in buying her own healthcare. She spent a while in Costa Rica where they have "Universal Coverage". She's back in the states being treated in our Los Angeles County system because she isn't "covered", and the injuries she's being treated for were sustained while under the "universal coverage" of the Costa Rica health care system. She suffers permanent disabilities from their failed and wretched treatment of a relatively simple leg fracture. I've been to Costa too- and with any chance to avoid being caught dead through their unbelievably horrible system I can promise you I would never allow them to do even the most basic procedure on me. The "Universal Coverage" hoax that gets talked about in America requires that you ignore the best health care delivery system in the world- the one here in the United States- the destination for almost everyone with the means to seek the finest care. And the reason our delivery system is second to none, and continues to be the most innovative in the world, is because we haven't destroyed it with the "Universal Coverage" model that is killing people worldwide every day. There is nowhere in the world that more "uncovered" people receive more top quality care than in the United States. If you don't mind I'd like to hold onto the reality of the best healthcare in the world versus being duped into the false portrayals of the system killing the Canadian economy and killing off Cubans who require only basic services to be brought back to health.

What would ever make you think a grandfatherly group like the Pats* LB corps have been using HGH?

Are you talking about the actual 14,521 fans who suffered through the lean years wearing their colors nationally while the "real" Boston* fans were buying only Sox/Bruins/Celts jerseys and tickets, or the scumbags like Hollywood Donahoe who found himself a fan of their team somewhere around 2002?

I'm miffed by the lack of attention the offensive signal's tape emergence has spawned. Maybe I missed something along the way here- but early on didn't Goodell's "breadth of the violations" speech indicate that the league's position- based on his interview(s) of Rosie Ruiz, excuse me Bill Belichick*- was that the signal theft was limited to the defensive side of the ball?

NBC Sports calls new charges more serious than Spygate, warranting new penalties and fines.

Or (G)god forbid if the media and almost every casual fan of the game's obsession with QB is looney, and the QB is actually the 7th or 14th or maybe only 18th most important player on most NFL teams, do you have another scenario about what position the real fight for the success of the 2008 Bills might be built upon?

I'll bet I've seen him eat 150 pounds of fried chicken at a place called Angelo's in Houston. Earl's a great guy- and his freaking thighs are frightening. I spent about a year of my younger life (while Earl's career was coming to an end) declining his invitations to play handball. At the same time he accepted some of my invites to go drinking ;-)

;-)

I'm of the thinking that at least in Goodell's mind, he's stuck balancing the league damage to the effectiveness of any additional penalties to the Pats*, and by his measure any further action creates far more damage to the league than the effect it will have on cheating. I hate to agree with him, but it's a reasonable conclusion. If he speaks of the importance of Walsh now uncovering the Offensive signal taping and the further Pats* violations at other elements of the game, it becomes more and more clear that the Patriot's* cheating has probably been worth 2 scores per game to them. And with their cheating worth a minimum of 10 points per game on average, there is the inconvenient little fact that the Pats* don't win any of their Super Bowls, in fact they don't even play in any of those games, if they don't have that 2 score cushion. Goodell just can't find any way to effectively penalize the Patriots* without creating the bigger problem of being left with three unawarded Super Bowls.

The balance of teams in the AFC East should be invited to provide a spotter for all Pat's* practices during the 2008 and 2009 seasons to encourage Belichick* to end this heinous violation of league rules.

Intelligent people are always looking to learn. You on the other hand show an incredible resistance to it. Hang out with the tiny coterie of peanut-brains who are attracted to your mindless posts and continue to hide when you make an incredibly foolish prediction like your giant "WR bonanza" in the first round of the 2008 draft. 80% of the posters on this board are far more intelligent than you, and that fact alone makes your drivel tolerable from the sheer entertainment it offers. It makes your huge body of intellgence insults towards TSW posters that much more precious ;-)

I performed a study of the positional drafting of the past 5 seasons Super Bowl Teams versus the Bills in order to see if there were clear patterns that differentiated the Bills from the draft strategy's of the best teams. WRamius couldn't process the fact that the best teams place a much higher priority at the top of the draft on defensive players and specifically DL when compared to the Bills. This didn't fit all his pre-draft insistence on a WR at 11, which I tried to explain to him was not a good football move in the 2008 draft. Instead of considering the evidence done with a weighting for where the each position is actually taken (the only way to get information of value in assessing segments of the draft), WRamius somehow drifted off to making demands about the whole NFL or the Chiefs, etc. The Chiefs have been in the playoffs three times since the Bills have last appeared, but he somehow finds the need to positions them as some kind of bad example. I didn't include them in my study because I simply don't care what mistakes they do or don't make- I wanted to see how the Bills differ against the best teams in the league. My study shows that. If you recognized before the draft that there was overwhelming evidence that no WR was going to be taken in the top of the draft- at least not by any good football organization, you might further clarify that trend by looking at my study. On the other hand, if you cornered yourself like WRamius did before the draft on how great an idea a #11 WR would be, you have to try to find some innocuous way to cover up your embarrassment. I don't know whether you were screaming like he was for a #11 WR, but if you'd like to see some of the evidence showing the best teams shying away from WRs at the top, take a look at my study. If you got caught up in bad judgment like WRamius, maybe some foolishness like his rating the first 99 picks as pick of "great expected value" and pick 100 on of little or no value, mine won't be of any interest to you.

I sat through a full month of you whining about the Bills taking a WR at the 11 spot. I pointed out that only a bad team in the 2008 draft would take a WR that high, and you whinnied on about how the Bills had to draft a WR for need. Now you try to hide your inability to grasp how the better teams approach the draft with another "reach"- your nonsense about 2nd round WRs. But it just doesn't pass the stink test: On April 23rd you were still advocating wasting the 11 pick in the draft on a WR: "The Bills may have WRs rated higher than the "experts" do, and there might not be much to choose from when our 2nd round pick comes around. Picking someone at #11 when the dumbass "experts" say they shouldnt go until 17-18 isnt a "reach" WRamius The league drafted consistent with the good evidence I provided and not one team followed your naive insistence on wasting their first round pick on a WR. Some people might learn something after being so publicly proven wrong about the top of the draft, but your history of attacking other posters intelligence doesn't allow you to simply learn from your very public mistake- it forces you into an indefensible position. Now you bring in a nonsense "study" that is so flawed in it's methodology that it tells none of us anything- but it is consistent with your desire not to learn about the workings of the NFL but to simpy increase your post total with drivel and nonsense. I guess if you considered the fishing trip in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest a "good discussion" ;-)

I'm waiting for that long list of first-round WRs you insisted we'd see taken off the board in the 2008 draft- Feel free to go ahead and list them here for everyone's amusement!

What a load of drivel- two DBs drafted within 3 picks of each other and your "study" makes one as important as the first pick in the draft and the other inconsequential.

For anyone to accept your "methodology", they'd have to agree that Defensive Back DeCoud Thomas, drafted #98 at the end of the 3rd round, is "reasonably expected to be a significant contributor" to the Atlanta Falcons, whereas Defensive Back Tyvon Branch, drafted #100 at the top of the 4th round, is not expected to become any kind of contributor to the Raiders. Absolute nonsense.

Of course you're absolutely correct. The pick you make first on day one is the most critical to your team- A) It will cost you the most but offers the most likely opportunity for the greatest return. B) You remove a blue chip player who will otherwise benefit an opponent. Every ensuing pick of the day of course has value, but the more highly rated players taken in prior rounds diminish the overall impact of later picks from a strategic standpoint. Any analysis that requires a 3rd round corner to be considered of an equal impact as a 1st round corner simply fails even the most basic test of football logic.

That requires you believe Ashton Yobouty was as critical a decision for the team as Nate Clements- believe what you want; if you'd actually like to expand your understanding of the subject you should try this link- Well Researched Top Of The Draft Positional Study

With your unsupportable "average" requiring we consider the drafting of Ashton Yobouty be of the same impact as drafting Nate Clements. Try again- your hole keeps gettin' bigger! WRamius has made some argument that requires you accept the 94th pick in the draft having the same impact on any team that the 4th player taken, and it's sheer lunacy. His inability to recognize that teams making an investment in DBs with an 11 pick is going to have more impact on the team making the pick immediately and into the future versus a team making a DB selection at 84 is among the worst analysis made on TSW this year. Perhaps ever.

Excellent call. Showing WRamius attacking this study that uses a weighting by draft pick and position versus his idiotic "any DB taken in the first 3 rounds is of the same value" post offers a good contrast to how serious we should take people on this board when it comes to football issues. I'm still waiting for WRamius to provide us that list of all the 1st round WRs taken in the 2008 Draft!

What a total load of crap. You consider a CB taken with the 1st pick in the draft the same as a cornerback taken with the 90th pick. In your fantasy the Bills used 3 first round picks on DBs since 2001, including an 11th, 12th and 21st overall. Philly has used only one 1st rounder in that span, a #26, on a DB. Your argument ignores the value of the pick as it goes up the board. Philly HAS used three 1st rounders on DLinemen, but we all know what you think about drafting DLinemen in the first (Go WR! Go WR!)! You either don't understand the game of football in any meaningful way or you're full of crap- no one with a grasp of the game would try to suggest a third round corner is an any way the equal of a early 1st round corner like your poorly framed view insists.

Sounds good in a vacuum, but when you consider that he hasn't played at that level since the 2004 season, you might be wise to lower your expectations. I don't believe there's a player on the roster who will have a greater impact on our 2008 record than Stroud- if he defies all the odds by starting 12 or 13 games and playing at the level he did in 2004, we could be competitive in our division and take advantage of a weak schedule to at least be knocking on the door come the postseason. On the other hand, and if his last two season are any indication, he's likely to play in less than half our games and we'll be as bad against the run as we were last year, making us once again a below .500 football team.

"I wanted Sweed" WRamius, April 27, 2008, TSW