Taro T

Definitely not a flood insurance expert, but doesn't the fed underwrite all flood insurance and also mandates what coverage and premiums are required in high risk flood zones. So while there are private firms offering coverage, it isn't anywhere close to a free market. It sounds like the area was regraded from a low to moderate risk zone up to a high risk zone. Is it possible that the companies that insure in the low risk zones aren't set up to insure in the high risk ones? Either because they don't have enough reserves or realized that there is no way to make any money at the premiums they are allowed to charge or by some combination thereof. If you live in an area that has a 50% chance of flooding over a certain period of time, the insurer is going to get at least 50% of the value of the house/possessions over that time, or it is guaranteed to lose money.

I think we will have to, as neither will convince the other. Which is fine. I will agree that Jauron has a better staff of assistants this year than in the past, but I am not certain how much of that falls into the "blind squirrel / nut" category. When it comes time for a critical non-delegatable decision to be made, I haven't seen any improvements in what DJ is doing this year relative to years past. I think he comes up will reasonable game plans / strategies heading into games. I haven't seen any ability on his part to make changes to his philosophy / strategy on the fly, presumably due to his overly conservative nature which is exhibited in almost every major decision he has to make.

Yes, he did. Do you have anything else he's done better than in the past? I already agreed that getting rid of Shonert was a good thing. How in the world did it take DJ until after all of last year AND FIVE preseason games to figure that one out? The man appears to be unable to make a hard decision in anything resembling a reasonable time frame.

Really? What has HE done that you think was better than in the past? AVP seems to be calling plays much better than Shonert did; it'll be interesting to see if he still looks better when people start to learn his tendencies. I'll agree that getting rid of Shonert was a good move, I won't agree that making that move 10 days before the season was even remotely ideal. Dick still seems to go extremely conservative when the 4th quarter rolls around, and the team doesn't seem to adjust well after the half. I don't expect to see him gone until probably after next season, but I'd love to see him get canned at the bye week. As for the topic of this thread, I think the odds were greater that the team would get stuffed on 4th down than make it (I'd have expected ~40% chance of picking up the 1st), but I still would have preferred to see the Bills go for it there because they needed 2 scores (minimum) at that point and if they punted in a (realistic) best case scenario they'd have the ball back in the same spot 1-2 minutes later. Pick up the 1st down and maybe you get some momentum behind you. Punt it away and you are going for the slow death. Fail to pick up the 1st and it's a quick death, but at that point I'd have risked the 60% chance of the quick death for the near certainty that the punt would end with the same result.

Depends on the exchange rate and denomination.

Please do enlighten us as to WHY u [sic] exist.

It can't be a Democrat organization because it is a "government agency."

Roll Call: 1. Jay Rubeo 2. Rockpile (aka my twin) 3. Psycho Ward 86 4. R. Rich 5. Taro T Maybes: Just Jack hmmmmmmmmm's: taterhill

Of course the players will argue for all the additional money; and the owners will argue that they shouldn't get any of it. If 18 games becomes a reality, they'll split it somewhere in the middle. It wouldn't surprise me at all to see the players' %age of total revenues to increase 1-2% to compensate them for the additional wear and tear they'll take. And they currently get ~60% of the total revenues anyhow, so they WILL necessarily get paid more with more games even if their %age of the pie doesn't increase. I'd agree with you that ideally the focus SHOULD be on making the NFL a better product, but it hasn't been about that for at least 20 years.

Why do you assume the season still starts after Labor day and pushes farther into winter? Wouldn't it make more sense to move the start of the season up 2 weeks? Also, I would expect that the owners would do their homework before making a change to the schedule. I'd be surprised if the increase in net revenues to the owners was entirely eaten up by a (potential) increase in the players %age of total revenues. But if that is the case, (player salary increase eats up all the additional revenues) it's pretty simple; the schedule won't increase beyond 16 games.

From increased TV, advertising, and ticket revenues. 2 extra games -> larger TV contracts and more seats sold both of which increase the total amount of advertising during the season.

It will likely be cheaper (in direct costs) to the insured person on the government plan. It is not at all a given that the government plan will in fact be cheaper. It especially isn't a given that it will be cheaper when no one knows what exactly the government plan is going to be.

Well, you and the Dems pretty much are betting that the public will like it better by the time it gets passed. Because if they don't, '10 definitely becomes a single issue race, and '12 could very well be dominated by it as well. Aren't a lot of the provisions of "the plan" (no, what plan's on second, who's plan's on 1st, I don't know, 3rd base) supposed to kick in in '13. If they are, that could backfire on Obama if he's spending '11 & '12 trying to keep the Repubs from overturning his healthcare triumph of '09. The interesting question to me in the scenario where the public believes the healthcare reform got railroaded through becomes is the public frustrated enough w/ both parties that a 3rd (or even a 4th) party actually becomes viable. My gut feel is no, but I hope I'm wrong there.

Reason #2 being, Krugman is using them also. All I was suggesting was that the $300/$900 numbers would seem to be per year, not per month. At $300/month, that puts admin at $3,600 and (if Kelly's 20% figure is correct) full year cost for a single person at $18,000. Going w/ what would seem to be more realistic estimates for admin cost %ages would put that full year cost even higher. For my family last year, our insurance premiums were ~$2k. I'd be surprised if the company were eating upwards of $16k (probably closer to $60k in that case as it is a family plan). The plan's full cost is probably more like $4k, which w/ put administrative costs most likely into the $400-$800/year range. EDIT: And for the record, I agree that the comparison is an apples-to-kumquats comparison.

Don't know where those #'s come from, but for a Heritage Foundation / Paul Krugman biatchslap contest, the administrative #'s being bandied about for 2005 were $509/yr for Medicare and $453/yr for private health insurance. Those sound a bit closer to realistic as they put the costs of coverage for each more into the ~$10k/yr for Medicare and ~3k/yr for private insurance range. I doubt either is correct, but as mentioned they do seem more realistic.

Memory is a funny thing. After you posted, I started thinking that it was later that the Bills had the royalty issues. But according to Bills Daily, it was the off season prior to '94 that the song nearly changed.

According to the playlist for "Buffalo Bills - Ultimate Tailgate CD for Buffalo Fans" the "Buffalo Bills Shout (Part 1 & 2)" is performed by Buffalo Bills All Stars. Not sure when it was adopted, probably late '80's. It was definitely used by '91. ~'94 they considered going to a different version of "Shout" apparently to reduce royalty payments, but outcry from the fans got that plan nixed. Not sure if it was "official", but the team played "Talkin' Proud" in the early '80's.

Lori, It sounds like a really good idea to make this a series. It's interesting that you chose this book as your 1st one to review because my wife got me this one and Paul Wieland's "Then Perreault Said to Rico ..." for Christmas. (Apparently Triumph has a whole series of these books.) I liked the book, but was slightly disappointed in it because I read Wieland's book 1st. Gehman's book was good, but after having read the book by the guy who had been with his book's subject since day one, it was slightly disappointing. It just didn't seem to have as good of a flow. I'd definitely suggest reading them Gehman's book 1st and then Wieland's if anybody is thinking about checking them both out.

Back in the glory years, Sansone's on Westheimer was the place to watch the Bills. They had 2 huge TV's and a bunch of small ones. One of the big ones showed the Bills every game and the other showed the Eulers. They're still open, but I don't know if they still have the huge Bills contingent.

But if Tom wanted to vote in one of the polls, he could do it at least 3 different times w/ his 3 different logins. Yes we do. And they are so effective as a tool in keeping illegal aliens out of the country that my senior Senator has proposed switching to biometric data. Which no doubt, somebody would find a workaround for that as well. Are 72 hours enough time to fully understand the ramifications of how a bill maintaining sugar tariffs will impact another bill regarding celluosic ethanol production and existing petroleum production. Especially if the person reading the bill has no rudimentary knowledge of any of that? No, the poor have access to the internet as well. But how informed on an issue is an individual w/ a 10th grade education working 3 jobs and trying to raise a family going to be? They'd pretty much only know what they heard on the radio about a particular bill. How much of the nuts and bolts of a bill would they get from this format? I doubt they'd get much. Considering the fiascos that we've seen in Florida and Minnesota, I'd agree w/ you there. Who would set the limit and who would enforce it? The executive couldn't enforce it - separation of powers issues. It also would pretty much do away with all trade agreements, as I doubt they could be reduced to 2-3 page documents. While it is an interesting concept, and would like to read your additional thoughts on the matter; I see many difficult issues in attempting to implement such a system. And that's without even getting into how legislation is written, introduced, and debated to be put before a vote.

What mechanics are you proposing to ensure no one votes more often than once on a particular issue? What are your systems to make certain only legitimate citizens with full citizenship rights (ie felons and minors are out) vote? What system would you use to ensure that people that work odd hours or are out of the country get the same opportunity to vote as those with normal jobs have? What system would you use to ensure that the poor have the same access to the tools of voting as the rich? How do you propose the vote tallies be counted and how would they be disseminated? And far more importantly, what system do you propose to get 200MM or so people informed as to what is included in a 1,200 page spending bill? Not busting your chops. Just curious how you would propose to implement this idea.

I'd agree that, at least by the midpoint of the season, barring injuries, the middle of the line should be significantly improved. I expect that Walker/Butler will be better than what the Bills would have had with a disgruntled Peters and Walker, and that it'll be worse than what Peters/Walker could have been. As such, I expect this year's line as a whole to be better than last year's line. I'm looking forward to seeing what the RB's can do when they can actually make it to the line of scrimmage before the 1st contact on traps and draws.

The original MJ had to have had the best job going. Travel the world, drink beer, write about drinking beer, and talk about drinking beer. Sweet gig if you can get it.

I didn't even know he was sick. Saw him give a lecture / beer tasting at the Crown and Serpent in Houston. The guy knew his stuff.