Hurlshort

I have a much higher expectation for the President than I do the media, though. Which might be unrealistic, but at least historically Presidents have attempted to come off as sincere. Trump seems to just be doubling down on falsehoods. He isn't building a house of cards, he's building a massive tower.

Sure, but Richard Garriott clearly wanted to keep making games and lost access to titles he was greatly attached to. The Doctors come across as hobbyists who just kind of struck gold and rode it out. They cashed out when they could and seem happy pursuing other interests. Honestly it seems like a pretty great deal for them. Not that I feel all that bad for Garriott, the guy built a castle with his gaming money.

But Origin was churning out average sequels, I don't remember a lot of new IP's.

Actually I kind of like the idea that a good studio is freed up to create new IP's while established franchises are continued on with a group that is still trying to earn their stripes. Particularly when the original trilogy was wrapped up pretty neatly (regardless of whether you liked it.) Obviously this is going to mean the franchise may take a nose dive, but it is also going to mean we get more new properties. The execution may be flawed, but the model seems very reasonable.

The Patriot Act was riding a wave of reaction from 9/11. The Health Care bill doesn't quite have that impetus behind it.

It's not necessarily racist to assume Islamic extremism may be involved when a terror attack happens, but the practice of NOT jumping to conclusions is sorely lacking in the world we live in, and worth practicing. I like how hard Sharp_one is trying though. He is committed at least.

same as Clintons Not sure how that excuses anything, since people were clamoring to throw Hillary in jail.

Well if you like the game, the DLC is solid. Although I think it is a better deal to just subscribe.

Every time the FBI director has to refer to a 'tweet', I fear we grow weaker as a nation.

That's what I used to think, but then I found out we are actually paying more than all of those countries in taxes towards healthcare costs.

No, they were well on their way with or without ACA. Also, in addition to all of our costs, estimates are about 25% of our federal taxes are going to healthcare programs. We pay like 5 times more than other countries, and I am pretty sure we aren't getting 5 times better healthcare for that.

Just to give a real world example from my perspective, I buy the best insurance I have available from my employer. The family plan deducts $693 dollars a month from my paycheck every month, and my school district kicks in an additional $2187 dollars every month to the insurance company. This plan gives us access to a pretty large network of providers. My family of four is pretty dang healthy. We are all active and we stick to a pretty good diet. My wife recently had her gall bladder out, which is a pretty standard procedure. I just received the breakdown in the mail, so lets go over it. The original charge from the hospital was $21,619. Now because the hospital is in our network, they work out a discount with the insurance company that shaves off $14,413. My insurance company paid $6,236 of that, and I am left with a $970 bill. So basically we give the insurance company nearly $3000 every month and we still get hit with a nearly $1000 bill when we have a fairly standard operation done. Imagine how crazy that bill is going to look when someone gets hospitalized for a period of time. And I say WHEN because the vast majority of us are going to end up needing this. Unless you get lucky and keel over without any warning signs, you are going to need some major medical care at some point in your life.

Well, costs have doubled since then, so I'd imagine that is a factor.

If you get bored of FFXV, pick up Horizon: Zero Dawn. It's good. I loved FFXV though, I still haven't finished it but my road trips with the boy band were super charming.

I'm completely over medical insurance as a thing. It is a failed experiment.

Just reached Meridian for the first time. It is pretty dang impressive. I also love shooting components off the robots. I was fighting a really big guy with some guards and I kept running for cover, popping up and aiming for these big missile launchers he had. It was super satisfying when I knocked them off.

To be fair, the Trump Budget Chief has done an absolute horrific job explaining any of that.

I've got a new episode up on Oskar Blues Brewing, enjoy!

That's exciting! How old is he? He is six. He did great, I had no reaon to worry. I have been taking him skating for weeks and he was hesitant to skate without me holding his hand, but once he got out with other kids he had no problem. He got off the ice with a big smile after a good hour of work. He also was following directions from the coaches, which is more than I can say for half the kids.

My son has his first hockey class today. I've been working with him on skating since the summer, so hopefully he is ready. I may be more nervous than him.

So we are cutting meals for the elderly and the free school lunch programs? The school lunch program is quite possibly the most important thing that some schools are doing. I've worked at a number of tough schools, and the fact that these kids can get a warm meal and some time away from tragic situations at home is invaluable. I'm confident that in California the state will pick up the slack, but I imagine all the states who already rely heavily on federal dollars to get by will be in trouble.

It's a good response, but it isn't an either or proposition. We can have diplomacy and military readiness.

I take it you trust the military generals to keep us out of war, instead?

It is hard to take the readiness argument at face value when we are cutting the State department budgets. If we are really worried about going to war with China and Russia, that would seem to be as important as military readiness.

You really think they will act on it? I am blaming him because he is in a position to act on it, and yet only seems to be throwing more money at the problem instead of actual reform. Those are taxpayer dollars being wasted. You seem mighty quick to assume they will do the right thing.