Sicko movie.

[MONOLITH]

but then you say your to ________ to do anything about it

Where did I say that?

why sit around and not do anything about it?

Who said I'm not doing anything about it?


Fighting against socialized medicine seems like a pretty good start.

Taking money away from the medical industry so that it hurts research and development certainly isn't the answer.

You want to preach to me to "do something", tell me, what exactly should I do?

[farmboy]

well here's my $.02.  Its easy enough to find a problem and complain about it.  Its a whole other thing to come up with a legitimate, practical solution to that problem that's not going to f*ck something else up and create a worse overall situation.  From what I've seen of Moore, he's great at the complaining, but I've not yet heard him come up with a feasible way to fix the stuff he's bitching about.  Even back to his first film ever, Roger and Me, he showed the horrible things GM's layoffs created, but he never said once what else the company could do to compete in a global automotive market.  IMO, if you've got a problem, your time is much better spent trying to right the problem than sitting around bitching.
/sidetrack

[DaSmerg]

I dunno Mono...I live in a country with socialized medicine and it's not quite the grim picture you paint.  It's not exactly a rosey picture here either with mis-spending and a decade and a half of cut backs.

Do I think that we'll see socialized medicaire in the U.S.?  Doubtful.  Too many people making too much money off of it.  The various lobby groups will ensure that debate/legislation goes nowhere.

Though I do think parts of the system could be socialized to pass on real savings to the end peeps.  Like I said, as far as I've seen from experts talk the last time this issue came up, there were some pretty nice savings by streamlining the whole administrative side and turing it over to public hands.

[MONOLITH]

there were some pretty nice savings by streamlining the whole administrative side and turing it over to public hands.

Turning it over to public hands being the opposite of socialized medicine, yes? Or am I interpreting that wrong?


Also, like I said in a previous post, you cannot compare another different country who already has a system in place, and has a different ethnic makeup and culture, to the United States. You cannot assume we will be as successful as Canada by suddenly switching to a different system. There are other issues/influences at work here.

[MONOLITH]

Even back to his first film ever, Roger and Me, he showed the horrible things GM's layoffs created,

I didn't even see the movie, but from that sentence, I can make some serious guesses at it's premise.


First off, If I personally create a business where there wasn't one before, and I provide you with a job where you didn't have one before, I should be praised and thanked for it. Every week that you recieve a paycheck to feed your family, and I struggled to find a way to make that happen, I should be given an award for it.


So, if things go badly for my business, and I get to a point where I can no longer provide that for you, why am I suddenly a villain?


And then go one step further into the TRUTH; that it's the people I struggled to feed that decided to unionize and turn against the hand that fed them and that decided to make all sorts of ridiculous demands that made employing them and meeting their demands simply impossible.

The unions put their own selves right out of jobs.


"The horrible things the GM layoffs created"?  No, The horrible things idiot employees who are given a free inch but insist on a mile, that's who created horrible things for themselves.

[farmboy]

"The horrible things the GM layoffs created"?  No, The horrible things idiot employees who are given a free inch but insist on a mile, that's who created horrible things for themselves.

yup, you nailed it.

[DaSmerg]

"The horrible things the GM layoffs created"?  No, The horrible things idiot employees who are given a free inch but insist on a mile, that's who created horrible things for themselves.

Riiight.  So I'm guessing you are likening yourself as an employer to Henry Ford's school of thought...that is...give a guy a job, let him get a family and a mortgage and then you have him by the balls for life?

I understand your point, in the general wide strokes that you paint it.  But anyone who has half a bit of knowledge of how the auto industry in your country, never mind mine, used to be run at the management <-> employee level wouldn't be sticking up so quickly for them and/or wondering why a union came about.

yup, you nailed it.

Seems Farmboy thinks this way too .

Back on sorta track, Roger and Me had to do with corporate responsibility.

So Mono, your company blossoms and your original plant becomes the lifeblood of a small town in Michigan.  More than 60% of the citizens of Monolithville, USA owe their living to your brain child.  And times get tough so you make a completely dollar and cents based decision to close down the Monolithville facility.  You don't think there is a level of responsibility you as an employer bear?  Because based on your last attempted point, your responsibility ends when you sign off on the pay cheques, and who ever works for you should be grateful at that ?

[MONOLITH]

Riiight.  So I'm guessing you are likening yourself as an employer to Henry Ford's school of thought...that is...give a guy a job, let him get a family and a mortgage and then you have him by the balls for life?

And you can verify that was his thought process?

 

But anyone who has half a bit of knowledge of how the auto industry in your country, never mind mine, used to be run

'Used to be' being the key words there.  Unions were formed in the days of sweat shops and employer abuses due to lack of protective labor laws. Now laws are in place to prevent employer abuse.

Now unions abuse the hands that feed them.

You don't think there is a level of responsibility you as an employer bear?

Responsibilty? Sure.  But define the parameters of that responsibility properly. Your idea of corporate responsibility is shackled punishment for creating jobs in the first place.  If I start a business, and I supply people with employment and incomes for as long and as well as I can, why am I supposed to be responsible for guaranteeing that's never supposed to end, or be punished if it does?  Especially when those very same employees ban together to work towards ways to bleed every penny they can from that business?.


Anytime you take a job, there is no guarantee it's for life. It's exactly why the government gives you the insurance called "Unemployment compensation".
Which by the way, the employer that provided the job for you in the first place has to pay. So not only do I provide you with a job, but I have to pay extra money just in case I lose my ability to give you that job. The employer gets punished right from Day 1.

[MONOLITH]

"The horrible things the GM layoffs created"?  No, The horrible things idiot employees who are given a free inch but insist on a mile, that's who created horrible things for themselves.

yup, you nailed it.

And just for the record, this morning when I typed that, I was actually thinking in general terms about about the struggle between employers and unions when I quoted that GM line. It made it sound like I was speaking specifically about that particular incident, and that really wasn't my intention.

[DaSmerg]

I think if you looked at some of the specifics that Roger & Me raised and it's time period, you'd have a different opinion.

The GM plant featured in the movie was the lifeblood of a small town.  It was a corporate decision in Detroit to close it down, purely driven by dollars and cents and the bare minimums were done for those who were to be displaced (that is...job centers set up for workers back during the late 80's recession when manufacturing jobs all over in a wide swath of sectors were dissappering).

One of the tag lines from the film was the concept that the GM plant had promoted within the community, a job with GM is a job for life, only to have GM turn around, close the plant and offer jobs to only a few white collar emplyees of all the affected employees.

The reality that more workers at the plant had killed themselves in the 6 months leading up to the plant closure than the previous combined operating history of the plant.

IMHO, what you lay out Mono is a plan to be "rich".  Lot's of folks in this world are "rich".  Wealth, on the other hand, is something comletely different and bears burdens of responsibility.

If you attract workers by telling them, 'hey, come work for me and you'll have a job for life'.  You build a buisness that an entire community forms around.  And then you make a monetary decision later to close that plant, you bear certain responsibilities.  Glaringly so when your soon to be former workers find it easier to off themselves rather than face the prospects of being unemployed in a time when manufacturing jobs are evaporating...meaning...your employees aren't going to be finding new jobs, they'll be finding themselves collecting food stamps.  Your board room decision was essential going to gut an entire community and put it into a welfare stasis.

To a seperate issue you raise...do/can auto unions serve a purpose in modern day economic life?  Depends.  The antaganistic relationship...be it management-union or union-management...serves no purpose but to raise costs and burden collective bargaining.  The modern approach of several auto makers...a hand-in-hand approach of both management and worker, can be relatively easily achieved.  Thinking about it another way, you can deal directly with an entire work force via a small group of representatives and share several burdens of responisibility for running a business on them.

You've basically said it yourself and I do agree with you/spent nearly 5 years of my life in that situation...if Ford or GM were to start up today, they more than likely would not be unionized.  I worked for the largest automotive parts manufacturer in the world and only a handful of it's plants/less than 2% of it's workforce was unionized.  Heck, I even served as a worker's rep.  Most anything that was reasonable was dealt with.

[MONOLITH]

IMHO, what you lay out Mono is a plan to be "rich".

Oh man.

Now C'mon Smerg. You and I typically manage to debate responsibility after some initial emotion.

That quote is pure crap.

First off.....  Nowhere in any post in here did I say something along those lines. You're trying to say that I was promoting the angle of "I have a right to use and dump you", and that's NOT what I said. That's the meaning you want to put there.

What I said is If I struggle to create jobs and provide for people, you cannot punish me for deciding to stop, or no longer being able to.

I said if I give you a job, you cannot punish me when I stop. I then said that the employer has to carry a lot of burdens to employ someone, that benefit only the employee, like Unemployment comp. insurance. I'm actually penalized for the possibility of 'un-employing' you, just for giving you the job in the first place.

Where you get "a plan to be rich" from, I don't know.

And let's not forget....the whole topic is BUSINESS. Business IS "dollars and cents" decisions. If I run two warehouses, and my business is in trouble, I might have to close one and lay off one factory, as opposed to trying to keep both open, failing, and ultimately having to close both and laying off EVERYONE.


Look, I own my own business right now. I employ myself and two others. I struggle like you have no idea. And my biggest concern every night when I go to bed is "How am I going to feed these three families next week".

We all have biases. I'm right leaning, your left leaning. No problem. But along with that comes your seemingly natural thought process of "Corporate equals Evil". You really think Henry Ford never worried about taking care of his people? You don't know.

And while I care about my employees, but I'm a small company, that doesn't automatically mean a big company doesn't care.


When I started my own company, one of the things I looked forward to, was actually being able to provide for others, and give something to the community. I envisioned it, I sacrificed to make it happen. But by your way of thinking, my employees should somehow be empowered to make their own decisions on what I'm somehow obligated to give them, AND, I should somehow be punished should I decide I no longer want to be in business.

How is that fair?  

Specifically to your points about GM;  

So a company promoted themselves with some 'job for life' slogan. Anyone with a complete functioning brain knows you don't base your life an that sort of thing. No one could stand behind such a statement.

And to blame and employer for someone committing suicide over a layoff is really ridiculous.

Is the whole thing a tragedy, that a town relied on one business and then fell apart when the business left? Sure it is. But anyone who relies solely on the stability of one businees to base their entire life on, has some responsibility of their own to bear.  Don't you know for your ownself that your own job right now might end tomorrow? Aren't you mentally prepared to have to look for a new job one day. I bet you are.

Will you kill yourself? No? Then what do you have that they didn't? Is that GM's fault?


Meh.  GRAW 2 SP demo is out, and I don't feel like spending a ton of time on this dead end debate. You're for the 'people power' no matter what, and I think I have a more realistic insight into the problems of employing people. This is largely a waste of time.

By the way, go try out the GRAW 2 demo if you haven't already. Hands down, the best GRAW yet.   Feels like Old Ghost Recon this time. Everything is spot on, from level design, to AI, to squad control. That's where I'll be for the next few weeks.  

Cheers Smerg. It's all good.  

[MindlessOath]

woah...
check out this story...
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Michael_Moore_shames_CNN_Blitzer_on_0709.html

its true the news not only cnn, but all the rest of the stations decide to spin or not tell people things they dont want to tell.  i have to find all my news from the internet and since i can look at many sources on the same subject to get a better truth on the subject.

but then again if he is slandering cnn for what he does in his movies thats bs also.

i dont know what can be done or how it can be done but i know something needs to be done and people need to stand up, we need to complain they need to offer something affordable and have less of these problems and corruption in the health care - you want a better life and so do others.

[MONOLITH]

There's been a whole lot of the far left fighting with the moderate left as of late. Even Cindy Sheehan wants to challenge Pelosi for her seat....lol.

Quite frankly, I like it.

It will force out some better truthfullness, or at the very least, expose some otherwise fudged truths. Hopefully.

[BOBK]

How about something like:

   Every time you use your VISA card, they put 5.00 in your Medical Savings Account

   Every time you shop at Best Buy, they put 5.00 in your Medical Savings Account

   And the Medical Savings Account gets 9% Interest

   Gas at the pump?...you guessed it...

Seriously though, I've seen first hand how many large Corporations seem so absolutely, unnecessarily top-heavy with management positions...and they are all in the wrong places.  Wipe out more than 50% of the over-head.  No more Deputy Director to the Assistant Floor Manager, which is the official title for the Assistant to the Head Janitor, who also has an assistant, and so on.  I've seen way too many big guys who only cared about making it to retirement, and in the mean time, everything goes to hell.  But what do they care?  And they get their million dollar retirement because they spent their entire career making damn sure they get it!

[MindlessOath]

some of those people really work for it. some of those people lie and cheat and steal to get there. you cant tell for sure so how do you fix that situation? i aggree that its a problem.

its like office space - "i work with people!!!!!!!!!!"

[Lazerblade]

Perhaps someone should look into how many people are employed unnecessarily by insurance groups or companies simply to sell insurance from their homes, which has an impact on coverage availability and cost- essentially feeding a family (or feeding off of families) for every 10 families insured.

Does a small-town insurance company really need 30 insurance reps for a population of 20,000, plus 2 local offices staffed with a minimum of 5 people? Especially when less than half the population can even afford insurance?

BTW, these examples and questions are in regards to secondary health insurance, not primary. Apparently primary has similar issues though since the coverage offered tends to leave the workforce with a high deductible and limited coverage.

[MindlessOath]

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/07/10/bush-on-health-care-its-all-your-fault/

bush said its all your fault.

[MONOLITH]

Mindless,

Did you even listen to his speech, or are just following what some other twit in that forum said?

I listened to the whole thing, please show me specifically where I as an American citizen are being blamed for any of what that poster claims.


I saw him explain why socialized medicine was bad, I saw him offer some alternative actions (federal malpractice insurance for doctors, the S chip, etc), and I see a lot of  bush hating  conspiracy loons putting words in his mouth.

What part did I miss?

[MindlessOath]

i just posted a link and the title of article.  nothing more. i thought that was funny too.  i understand why socialized medi isnt the right choice and that there are others out there and that something else can be made (tho i think if something else would be made someone would still revert to the old ways and get greedy).

i understand people are tying to make bush look stupid - he really is - but i know what internet media tries to do and skew whats really going on, no doubt about it.

but i think its your fault (not yours but in refrence to everyone in usa) because people are really un-educated - even myself (dont rub it in more) about whats out there and what we can do about it.  is that really our fault if no one is making it seen? its buisness's fault? are they blinding people for that great BUCK in the sky? so its everyones fault. whatever.

[BOBK]

I definitely feel that some of the problems are with the period of time that passed, after the Vietnam war, and the Hippie movement died down, and people started to realize again that they have to eek out a living, that a long drawn-out era of re-acquaintance with jobs and working took over...and since all of the hard earned information that had been gathered by the previous generation was wanning, these "old" pups became isolationists, and clicked with their "old" pals.  And the proper attitudes for success the "right way", i.e., ethics, honesty, etc., was not properly instilled in the rising order.  In its place, is an ever constant shifting of personnel, into more hours and over-time, and a greater division between the high and the low.

In the mean-time, we have had a technological boom, making newer technologies available to streamline the lower-workplace (loss of jobs), yet provided for the excuse of retaining and even growing an army of unnecessary executives.

And now, with the immigration situation being the next wave, to create even more distance between the old school, and the new, we can expect either more disconnect, or a movement sweeping across the United States that brings back certain values that actually help us to grow, instead of just providing the temporary illusion of growth.

We shouldn't be excusing some things because they "fill positions that nobody else we do", we should be wondering why those are the main jobs available?

If we all had a better chance of saving the money we make, at a decent interest rate, we could do a whole not more with what we have.  Instead, we need Insurance Companies.  Therefore, doctors need to begin charging more, etc., etc.
It wasn't all that long ago that we paid cash for doctor visits, and didn't go broke in the process, and, what do you know, docotrs were rich back then too....hmmmmm.