John Adams

What doctors do you think are going to do the work that adding several tens of millions to the public healthcare will require? I have the best healthcare plan money can buy (And it costs a lot of money)...and yet it still takes me weeks to get appointments with any specialist because doctors are so busy. My family doctor recently circulated a poll asking if patients would be willing to pay $3000/ year for unlimited visits if he no longer took healthcare plans. That becomes more appealing if this Bill passes.

The Bill will pass and be set up for 2013 implementation without specifics laid down on funding, or with funding to be determined based on some optimistic projection.

What SDS said. DC Tom practically gargled your man-juice when he said he was going to fly to Hemet and slap you. Have you ever seen him exercise such restraint? I think back to Melissa from Philly's threads regarding her kids--she got harsh criticism. You got what people feel is honesty. It's definitely possible that we're all wrong. WTF do we know about your situation besides a few paragraphs about your son over the years?

One of the good things about this community is also one of the troubling things. People can be civil but because we're not quite interacting with family/friends in the same way as we would in real life, you get a healthy dose of jerkiness and honesty. In this thread, you got a lot of candid opinions. I've been here in many incarnations since I heard about TBD from the old D&C board (circa 97...I remember the job I was at when I found Scott's haven). The ability to offer candid advice has not changed one bit. Would people be so brutally honest and succinct with you in person? Maybe not--but that's a good thing. SDS offered a point of view you must consider, that your son has passive-aggressively sabotaged himself in football (with the grades, not the injury) for a reason. Unless there were drugs or some extreme distraction involved that you haven't mentioned, he blew his grades up despite the fact that he knew it would tank his football career. There could be a million reasons for it--I would not want to speculate. But the point is, if he really wanted football deep down, he'd have done everything he could to make it. He didn't. Unearthing "why" he didn't will be an important thing for you to understand. Based on your posts on the subject, you don't know the reasons.

Having a top 10 safety is like having a top 10 longsnapper.

Atlas Shrugged movie comes out in 2011. Here's hoping they do a good job with it.

This is the biggest thing you have to help your son with. It would be easy to ease into a bitter depression that could screw up a whole life over this injury. That's no exaggeration. With the pain fresh, there's no way to avoid anger and bitterness. At some point, you can help him turn these lemons into lemonade. Even if he can still play football and the injury isn't severe, this is a good wake-up call. The future is on the phone and luckily, your 17 year old son can still do everything to set himself up well if he starts cranking on the classroom. ' And remember: Working hard in football won't contribute almost a single valuable thing to his future at this point.

This supports my new theory: The entire world would be watching AMERICAN Idol if it wasn't for the !@#$ing cigarettes.

If it's an MCL, your new job is to help your kid put football behind him. Based on what you said, he was going to barely make it in a college program before. Now he's a true long shot to make any college team. Since he has trouble with grades, it's time for him to ditch football and focus on what matters both in high school, college, and beyond. The last thing a poor student needs throughout college (unless he's a pro prospect which you've said your son is not) is a football distraction. Get him to start focusing on his real future, which is between his ears. That's easier said than done but parenting is hard. The last thing you want is for your kid to be bitter about a missed football career for the next 70 years.

Let me be clear: I am 100% against telling private businesses that they should/should not allow smokers. In today's environment, the market would happily dictate market winners and losers (or likely winners and winners) if restaurants designated themselves as smoking and non-smoking. Each would create a niche market. I would never frequent a smoking restaurant--others would never go to a non-smoking one. To this story though. There's a better justification than long-term health. How about short-term health concerns? It would make sense to me if the military required non-smoking because it contributes to poor physical fitness in a physically demanding job. If, for example, I owned a professional cycling team, I'd require that my cyclists didn't smoke. Doesn't it make sense that the military might do the same? Anyway, that would be a better justification for this but I stink the whole thing is dumb. I'd let soldiers smoke if they want to smoke, out of respect for what they are doing for the country.

I think even Bill in NYC will admit (as he did in his weekly Thoughts) that Peters did not have a great year. He had his moments of pure domination but he also had a lot of brainfarts that your best lineman shouldn't have. Maybe his contract status affected his play. Maybe missing camp did. Maybe he counted on Dockery to help more and he didn't. Whatever the reason, Peters did not have a great season. It may not have been as bad as some here think but it was also not great.

You are correct sir!

It's a huge concern. He's not athletic enough to play LT. But... Like you, I am oddly confident in Chambers for pass protection at LT. He did very well when Peters was holding out and in sub action (when PEters was being benched for punking out in a few games). Also, he won't have a useless POS blob next to him so that should help Walker focus more on the end rush. Still, it's the biggest concern for me this season. I am not convinced that he can pass protect or be a particularly effective run-blocker. I'm hopeful that the rest of the line is better and will make up for the LT deficiency.

Of course not you mutt.

They are on the metric system there.

Oh please. Who gives a sh--? It's just a funny pic, especially because of Sarkozy's expression.

See VABills--another Southern racist.

I like autobiographies but I tend to read ones about people who have done/accomplished/bore witness to something impressive. Pre-election Obama did none of these.

Good one VA. Keep up the misguided notion that the South is less racist than the North and add it to your list of things you're clueless about. Racism surely exists everywhere and it is much worse in the Southern states. I have still never seen the kinds of overt and accepted racism I see in the South. Most of my experiences are from Mississippi, Texas, and Louisiana.

Sarkozy's bemusement is top notch.

I'm shocked there aren't more pictures like this. http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Most-Recomme...8lY0GRSegCaK8MA

Steely, I know you're about 12 but Jesus !@#$ing Christ can you stop with your little ee cummings typeface fun? I generally at least skim your posts but I will not read that unreadable tripe.

Bingo. I would say also that I have no trouble supporting kids who are growing up in the other groups as well.

It's one thing to believe Jesus was real but Lucifer?

I don't pine away for homespun. I pine away for a smart outsider. I could live with Ron Paul despite some of his idiosyncracies. I could live with Steve Forbes. Bloomberg. And others. But please with Palin. Jesus H.