Solution: raise taxes on “the rich” that, as a practical matter, will fund the government for less than half the time of Obama’s latest tax payer-funded $4 million Hawaiian vacation; continue spending and larding up the government dole by killing private sector industry; then pat yourselves on the back for reaching a compromise that you’ll pretend is balanced, when no spending is actually cut, and all you’ve succeeded in doing is slowing the recovery of the economy.
Still, insist what you’ve done is prudent and took a lot of hard work and sacrifice. Congratulate yourselves for your pluck, patience, and determination. Demonize those who resisted you — by resisting the status quo — and declare yourselves the adults in the room. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Politics 101: so easy even a politician can do it.
Then leave and have a drink, and perhaps a blow job or two. You’ve earned it. And besides, there’s a good chance you’ll be dead by the time you’ve destroyed your country, and man you obviously don’t believe in a Judgement Day.
that increase in workers on disability? the long term unemployed who finally said “f**k it”
Thus, they are now off the unemployment roles and make that tic in downward unemployment rate look like a trend for Obama’s “we are moving in the right direction” schtick.
Or they were told by their friendly local bread provider that, if they wanted to keep the money coming, they needed to apply for disability.
The proof they were disabled? Why, being unemployed for 99 weeks, of course.
It’s not so easy to be declared permanantly disabled.
It’s not so easy to be declared permanantly disabled
Something has changed to cause the spike. I don’t think its because jobs suddenly got less-safe.
I don’ think so, either. I’m questioning whether these people are on short term disability or permanant disability.
I was on disability once for a year, about 24 years ago and it wasn’t like you just waltzed or limped in and they said “Sure! Sign right here!” My doctor was the one who made the determination and it was only for one year. After one year elapsed, it was determined that I was no longer disabled and that was that.
This was in the Golden State, as well.
Think of it as the cancerous spirit of medicare and workers-comp fraud metastasizing
I’m not discounting that there is fraud involved.
What kind of disability are these people on? Is it medical? If so, there is a paper trail and a doctor could lose his license and go to jail. Is it Workman’s Comp? That is time limited.
I need more information.
Guy in Sweden gets “addiction to heavy metal music” declared a disability:
http://www.thelocal.se/7650/20070619
Employer accommodation, financial support, the whole deal.
I’m addicted to sloth. Where do I sign?
I used to be addicted to lust,
but it was too much work.
Yes, Spies, but that person is in Sweden which is not part of these United States or we’d have a lot more natural blondes and a better Olympic ski team.
I like cheese.
You’re right, Leigh. More concrete information would be very interesting. Hopefully someone goes after this.
We obviously need to spend more on OSHA.
On a serious note, leigh it has been reported for some time now that the Obama administration has been working behind the scenes to lessen the requirements for disability to try to cut into unemployment numbers.
Get a good lawyer, be persistent and patient and almost anybody can apparently do it.
I’m probably being unnecessarily skeptical about the requirements for one to sit on one’s ass and receive a check for doing so, BMoe. Quite frankly, nothing surprises me anymore with our current administration. Get everyone on the Dole and wham! we’re Greece in record time.
I’m hearing stress and psychological disorders from being unemployed. Of course, I have that from being employed.
Also I don’t know if they bother with the distinction between permanent and temporary these days. It is more like both at the same time, I think.
That doesn’t seem right. You can get hurt or really sick when you’re young and get better over time.
my guess is they released the reins on psychological issues. “I have a panic disorder” …. plus stuff like fibromyalgia ..
just a guess
Well, yeah, but why would you want too?
A Republican, in a wheelchair, entered a restaurant one afternoon and asked the waitress for a cup of coffee. The Republican looked across the restaurant and asked, “Is that Jesus sitting over there?”
The waitress nodded “yes,” so the Republican requested that she give Jesus a cup of coffee, on him.
The next patron to come in was a Libertarian, with a hunched back. He shuffled over to a booth, painfully sat down, and asked the waitress for a cup of hot tea. He also glanced across the restaurant and asked, “Is that Jesus, over there?”
The waitress nodded, so the Libertarian asked her to give Jesus a cup of hot tea, “My treat..”
The third patron to come into the restaurant was a Democrat on crutches. He hobbled over to a booth, sat down and hollered, “Hey there honey! How’s about getting me a cold mug of Miller Light?” He too looked across the restaurant and asked, “Isn’t that God’s boy over there?”
The waitress nodded, so the Democrat directed her to give Jesus a cold beer. “On my bill,” he said loudly.
As Jesus got up to leave, he passed by the Republican, touched him and said, “For your kindness, you are healed.” The Republican felt the strength come back into his legs, got up, and danced a jig out the door.
Jesus passed by the Libertarian, touched him and said, “For your kindness, you are healed.” The Libertarian felt his back straightening up and he raised his hands, praised the Lord, and did a series of back flips out the door.
Then, Jesus walked towards the Democrat, just smiling. The Democrat jumped up and yelled, “Don’t touch me …. I’m on disability.”
Heh. That’s a good one, BMoe.
My brother in California is on disability after being out of work for an extended period of time, and dealing with the disability red tape is giving him extra added stress with whipped cream and a cherry on top.
But then, he doesn’t have a corrupt doctor like the ones that handed out the phony sick-leave notes in Wisconsin last year when Walker was trying to get the unions under control.
Maybe that’s the trick, McGehee: being a union member and having access to crooked doctors.
BTW, his disability issue, diagnosed months ago, will require surgery.
In February.
I wish him well. He sounds like he can certainly use the disability dollars unlike people who claim thier kids are ADHD or some shit to get a check.
too funny
link
And if that teenager decides to binge drink on his weekends off, it’ll be his money he’s guzzling, not mom and dad’s.
perhaps nyt knows their “control” bubble is bursting
“a lucrative but risky decision for any 18-year-old to make, one that could foreclose on his future”
So in NYT-land you only get one chance to go to college? Dumbasses. I was in grad school with a woman who was in her seventies. Good scholar, too.
I think you’d be a much better student if you worked a few years before going to college. It may be that you’ll decide that college wouldn’t help you anyway, thus saving you a significant amount of money.
My dad was a 35 year old tradesman with a 8th grade education and five kids when he went university, and now he’s a retired middle school principle.
This is an excellent article:
link
The non-traditional (older) students are always better students. They are spending their own dough and have other responsibilities like a spouse and children and/or a job that the traditional students don’t have.
My most successful students were guys and girls who had done a hitch in the military and didn’t have to be told everything twice.
Same here, leigh. The older students were a joy, in general. They wanted to learn, they expected their money’s worth, and I did my best to give it to them.
They aren’t as easy to buffalo or bullshit, though, and some instructors (not me) have a problem with that.
What the NYT and several others are scared of is that more potential college athletes will realize that they’d be better off going pro right out of high-school. You can get a college degree with torn up knees; a pro football career not so much. Not only that, but an incoming freshman contemplating spending his hard-earned might have a problem taking mandatory diversity training with it. And fewer kickbacks from the student loan vultures. Quelle horreur!
Not to mention invalidating the entire premise of “Deadliest Catch”.
Because colleges won’t accept students who aren’t fresh out of high school! You have to be still a high school senior when you file your application! If you’ve ever put in an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay you are blacklisted for life!
Maybe we need to change the law!
I use exclamation points because there’s no sarcasm font!
My vote: Comic Sans.
…though the ‘style’ attribute gets filtered out, and you don’t actually get it.
But if you could!
It gets my vote too, but I’ve previously noticed the same phenomenon. Hence, exclamation points!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!