Republican Primary

[ishii]

Sadly, no.

For the lurkers: Had one hundred catholics in Washington voted for the pro-life gubernatorial candidate a few years ago, Washington state wouldn’t be a gay marriage state now. Dino Rossi would have vetoed it. Every vote counts - don’t let anyone tell you that it doesn’t matter who you vote for or that voting doesn’t make a difference - because it does. If you don’t believe me, come to Washington state and I’ll show you. We have a big election coming up in a few months and we need every vote we can get.

Ishii

 

[bbarrick8383]

For the lurkers: Had one hundred catholics in Washington voted for the pro-life gubernatorial candidate a few years ago, Washington state wouldn’t be a gay marriage state now. Dino Rossi would have vetoed it. Every vote counts - don’t let anyone tell you that it doesn’t matter who you vote for or that voting doesn’t make a difference - because it does. If you don’t believe me, come to Washington state and I’ll show you. We have a big election coming up in a few months and we need every vote we can get.

Ishii

State and local elections are an entirely different matter. Our current state rep won against the incumbent by just a handful of votes.

 

[LisaA]

For the lurkers: Had one hundred catholics in Washington voted for the pro-life gubernatorial candidate a few years ago, Washington state wouldn’t be a gay marriage state now. Dino Rossi would have vetoed it. Every vote counts - don’t let anyone tell you that it doesn’t matter who you vote for or that voting doesn’t make a difference - because it does. If you don’t believe me, come to Washington state and I’ll show you. We have a big election coming up in a few months and we need every vote we can get.

Ishii

Any way to get the dead people off the rolls? Dino Rossi would have won if not for all of the voter fraud in Washington. Not that we can talk with our mail ballots we have plenty of fraud as well

Lisa

 

[pnewton]

You are allowed a large range of thought as long as that thought doesnt lead you to vote for a pro-abortion canidate. .

While I agree with that, this is not technically true. One can not vote for a pro-abortion candidate in order to promote abortion. One can vote for one for proportionate reason, or if he not as pro-abortion as another candidate, but may be more electable. This second reason allowed Republicans to vote for McCain who was not as pro-abortion as Obama last time.

Personally, I vote for the most moral person and leave the results to God.

 

[JimG]

I’m not sure that anyone could predict what medical costs would be without the level of government intervention we have presently.

Part of the problem, too, is that almost nobody pays for his own medical care, but expects someone else to pay for it. I don’t know what it would cost without all of the hassle, but I do see Amish, who pay in greenbacks, negotiate costs well below “reasonable and necessary”. Why not? All the clerical staff has to do is put the money in the drawer and write up a receipt.

It also seems to me that the current emphasis on “preventive care,” or “well care,” is backward from an insurance standpoint. It would make more sense to pay the routine costs out of pocket and insure for the unexpected.

Insurance for a once a year office visit? That’s not the purpose of insurance. Why pay a large premium, even though it might be subsidized by an employer or the government, for routine care? That ‘s like insuring dinner. I’d rather insure for the unexpected rather than the predictable and expected.

 

[Raskolnikov]

For the lurkers: Had one hundred catholics in Washington voted for the pro-life gubernatorial candidate a few years ago, Washington state wouldn’t be a gay marriage state now. Dino Rossi would have vetoed it. Every vote counts - don’t let anyone tell you that it doesn’t matter who you vote for or that voting doesn’t make a difference - because it does. If you don’t believe me, come to Washington state and I’ll show you. We have a big election coming up in a few months and we need every vote we can get.

Ishii

I’ve never seen a state election in my state come close to anything like that. In fact I’m much more likely to be murdered in a given year than my vote effect the mayoral election in my city.

I know too many people who are jerks who think that because they vote a certain way they are good people, saving the world from itself one day a year. A persone who acts morally but “votes badly” is far far better in my opinion than a person who simply “votes well.” Of course, I don’t agree with some here about what choices are the good ones, and I find it impossible to view the voting booth, with the field as it stands, as such a crusade against evil, especially given the disgraceful nature of our electoral system, which guarantees every candidate is bough and paid for by someone other than the voters long before election day. More like Sysyphus trying to push his rock up a hill.

 

[pnewton]

For the lurkers: Had one hundred catholics in Washington voted for the pro-life gubernatorial candidate a few years ago, Washington state wouldn’t be a gay marriage state now. Dino Rossi would have vetoed it. Every vote counts - don’t let anyone tell you that it doesn’t matter who you vote for or that voting doesn’t make a difference - because it does.

It counts one seven millionth of one percent. That is not the same as zero.

 

[Raskolnikov]

It also seems to me that the current emphasis on “preventive care,” or “well care,” is backward from an insurance standpoint. It would make more sense to pay the routine costs out of pocket and insure for the unexpected.

Insurance for a once a year office visit? That’s not the purpose of insurance. Why pay a large premium, even though it might be subsidized by an employer or the government, for routine care? That ‘s like insuring dinner. I’d rather insure for the unexpected rather than the predictable and expected.

Probably true. Since the whole point of insurance is risk avoidance, it doesn’t make much sense to insure the predictable. One would think of course that insurance companies could reward customers for paying for their own annual physical, though they probably profit from getting to indure every facet of a customer’s healthcare, rather than just the surprise expenses.

 

[Raskolnikov]

It counts one seven millionth of one percent. That is not the same as zero.

Hmmmmmmm. The field I’mplanning on going into once I’ve completed my education involves a lot of statistics, and the statisticician in me sees 1/7,000,000, and says ‘0.’ I’ve assumed away a lot smaller numbers in statistics problems. Much smaller numbers.

I guess that’s why I’m not one of those people on MTV’s hip “Rock the Vote” commercials.

 

[ishii]

It counts one seven millionth of one percent. That is not the same as zero.

In washington state, a handful of votes gone the other way would have changed the election results. Or to put it another way, if a few cynics had actually voted instead of staying home because “their vote doesn’t matter/counts as .000000007%” then the election results would have been different. But my main point is to those who say “it doesn’t matter who we elect, nothing changes” I say, Dino Rossi would have vetoed the gay marriage bill that the Seattle archdiocese is currently fighting to repeal. It was signed by catholic governor Gregoire who “won” the election by a handful of votes.

Ishii

 

[pnewton]

In washington state, a handful of votes gone the other way would have changed the election results. Or to put it another way, if a few cynics had actually voted instead of staying home because “their vote doesn’t matter/counts as .000000007%” then the election results would have been different. But my main point is to those who say “it doesn’t matter who we elect, nothing changes” I say, Dino Rossi would have vetoed the gay marriage bill that the Seattle archdiocese is currently fighting to repeal. It was signed by catholic governor Gregoire who “won” the election by a handful of votes.

Ishii

I was giving an average. If we focus on the places where a few votes matter much more, then we have to acknowledge that likewise most places the vote matters nothing. The figure I gave is the average weight of a vote in a national election. That is the discussion here, you know, the president, elected nationally.

I would never say voting does not matter at all, and I never skip and election. I was just giving the math.

 

[LisaA]

It also seems to me that the current emphasis on “preventive care,” or “well care,” is backward from an insurance standpoint. It would make more sense to pay the routine costs out of pocket and insure for the unexpected.

Insurance for a once a year office visit? That’s not the purpose of insurance. Why pay a large premium, even though it might be subsidized by an employer or the government, for routine care? That ‘s like insuring dinner. I’d rather insure for the unexpected rather than the predictable and expected.

Jim you are exactly right and Ridgerunner’s post about healthcare finance was also spot on.

Insurance is for CATASTROPHES, not for everyday costs. This is like expecting auto insurance to cover oil changes. Unfortunately the healthcare model is a sort of hybrid product of insurance plus a prepaid expense plan.

Again this is the issue that demonstrates the inherent problems with mandates, all of them not just the recent HHS mandate which has moral implications, constitutional implications as well as being an idiotic idea in the first place.

What most people need is a high deductible policy that does not cover routine care, routine exams etc. What the Congress kept pointing to were the number of bankruptcies caused by a catastrophic and uninsured medical event. But what they DID was NOT focus on the outliers that could have easily been covered with a high risk government guarantied pool. Rather all this minutia, covering well woman care, covering this, covering that…no deductibles, no co pays. When you make something free people abuse it! You just have to wonder if all the brains were on park in Washington because nothing they did made any sense with respect to the issues of cost and access. They have made both WORSE.

Lisa

 

[ishii]

I’ve never seen a state election in my state come close to anything like that. In fact I’m much more likely to be murdered in a given year than my vote effect the mayoral election in my city.

It varies from state to state. Of course in big cities, the Democrat party has a monopoly on most mayorships - in spite of the dismal record of governance of those Democrat mayors. But I wasn’t talking about mayor races, I was talking about governor races or any other close race.

I know too many people who are jerks who think that because they vote a certain way they are good people, saving the world from itself one day a year. A persone who acts morally but “votes badly” is far far better in my opinion than a person who simply “votes well.”

I know some of those people too. Not sure why you bring up a false choice between the moral acting non-voter and the person who votes well once a year.

Of course, I don’t agree with some here about what choices are the good ones, and I find it impossible to view the voting booth, with the field as it stands, as such a crusade against evil, especially given the disgraceful nature of our electoral system, which guarantees every candidate is bough and paid for by someone other than the voters long before election day. More like Sysyphus trying to push his rock up a hill.

The field isn’t a crusade against evil, but a chance to avoid supporting evil. The GOP field might not be stellar, but they represent a chance to rebuke evil.

Ishii

 

[ProVobis]

Insurance for a once a year office visit? That’s not the purpose of insurance.

Precisely. What used to be dental insurance is now a dental plan. Insurance is as you say, for unexpected events. There should be no requirement for insurance to pay for routine office visits, like to get refills on your prescriptions.

 

[ishii]

I was giving an average. If we focus on the places where a few votes matter much more, then we have to acknowledge that likewise most places the vote matters nothing. The figure I gave is the average weight of a vote in a national election. That is the discussion here, you know, the president, elected nationally.

I would never say voting does not matter at all, and I never skip and election. I was just giving the math.

So how about that “national” election in 2000 when a few areas of Florida pretty much decided it? Seems to me that disproves your premise.

Ishii

 

[ProVobis]

It counts one seven millionth of one percent. That is not the same as zero.

It’s zero if the matter goes to the U.S. Supreme Court.

 

[Raskolnikov]

So how about that “national” election in 2000 when a few areas of Florida pretty much decided it? Seems to me that disproves your premise.

Ishii

And thank God we got George in that one. Otherwise we might’ve had a catastrophe…

 

[ishii]

Any way to get the dead people off the rolls? Dino Rossi would have won if not for all of the voter fraud in Washington. Not that we can talk with our mail ballots we have plenty of fraud as well

Lisa

I think the only way to win in Washington is to win convincingly enough that it would be too hard for the other guys to steal the election with endless recounts and “discoveries” of previously lost ballots. This happened in Seattle and it put Gregoire over the top after the **second **re-count. That is why its so important to vote and not give in to the cynics who say “your vote doesn’t matter, its already decided” etc. The closer the election, the easier it is for it to be stolen.

Ishii

 

[ishii]

And thank God we got George in that one. Otherwise we might’ve had a catastrophe…

You’re avoiding my point, which was that small numbers of votes can swing an election.

Ishii

 

[pnewton]

So how about that “national” election in 2000 when a few areas of Florida pretty much decided it? Seems to me that disproves your premise.

Ishii

Not for mathematicians. Again, if we focus on the votes that matter more, then we have to give a value of zero for those that end up mattering not at all. The percentage is an average, based on how many people vote in a national election. Smaller states will have a slightly greater percentage than larger states. I gave an average.

Now, that is four times I stated this was an average. Feel free to ignore that again.