If you were wondering what rhymes with “fact-duckers.”
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OrmayberomneyDOEScare.
Who knows?
Just last Sunday, Mitt Romney was touting the benefits of Universal Emergency Room Healthcare. Yesterday, he apparently decided that sounded too crass, not to mention thoroughly ineffective. Via Risking Conservative Ire, Romney Touts Romneycare | TPM2012.
“[D]on’t forget — I got everybody in my state insured,” Romney told NBC. “One hundred percent of the kids in our state had health insurance. I don’t think there’s anything that shows more empathy and care about the people of this country than that kind of record.”
In other words, “message: I care,” . . . every third day until November 6.
Big Day for the 88 Honda
I’ve previously posted about
I’ve previously posted about the car that has transported me around most of my adult life. We hit a big milestone yesterday — just north of Colorado Springs in the pouring rain. I’m enough of a nerd that I pulled off I-25 at the 99,998 mile mark and drove a couple of miles along this quiet road so I could pull over and get the above photo.
Romneydoesntcare
I’m sure this has been covered more thoroughly, eloquently, and learnedly elsewhere, but how the hell can Romney say this with a straight face:
In the 60 Minutes interview, Romney protested the idea that government doesn’t already provide health care to the uninsured: “Well, we do provide care for people who don’t have insurance,” he said. “If someone has a heart attack, they don’t sit in their apartment and die. We pick them up in an ambulance, and take them to the hospital, and give them care. And different states have different ways of providing for that care.”
So no mammograms, but once the cancer has metastasized to your lungs and you stop breathing, an ambulance will take you to the emergency room.
No dialysis, but when your kidneys fail, an ambulance will take you to the emergency room.
No annual physical, but when you have a heart attack, the ambulance is ready!
This isn’t about those grabby poor people Romney has clearly written off. It’s about people who are too rich for Medicaid but too poor to buy their own health insurance. And THAT category includes many hourly workers, independent contractors, and people who are starting their own businesses. Future job creators rather than current job destroyers.
And how on earth is his plan pro-life? Seriously — you can defend this approach on doctrinaire libertarian grounds, but how can you square it with the position that life is sacred and that the government has a legitimate role in protecting it?
Legal Reasoning: Multi-Use Technology
Because Carrie and I figured the rest of you were curious to know what happens when two high-powered civil rights attorneys use their finely-tuned analytical powers on important non-legal questions:*
Carrie: where do children learn to put catsup on their eggs
Amy: um, by osmosis by hanging around uncle tim?
Amy: it’s disgusting, but it’s one of those great marital compromises . . .
Carrie: lol
Amy: for me it violates a sacred boundary: between Breakfast Food and Not Breakfast Food
Amy: now, you can eat Breakfast Food any time of the day
Carrie: snort
Carrie: i do put salsa on hashbrowns
Amy: but you cannot mix Breakfast Food with Not Breakfast Food
Carrie: so having leftover chinese food for breakfast is fine
Carrie: just not if you add a bowl of cereal?
Amy: yes
Amy: for example, steak and eggs: wrong
Carrie: i agree
Amy: and scrambled eggs for dinner, also ok
Amy: but scrambled eggs on pizza: no
Carrie: i agree
Amy: ketchup is a Not Breakfast Food item
Amy: putting it on eggs: wrong
Carrie: although we sometimes do have leftover donuts as dessert
Amy: hmmm
Carrie: but the dinner food is finished
Amy: right!
Amy: i think perhaps i need to refine the rule to say: within any one course
Carrie: plates cleared etc
Amy: exactly
Amy: you would not have, say, donuts covered with enchilada sauce
Carrie: lol
Carrie: because sometimes leftover donuts are not stale for dessert, but leaving for breakfast….
Amy: excellent point!
Amy: and i have no problem with cold leftovers for breakfast: pizza; chinese; etc
Carrie: right
Amy: i bet people wonder how high-powered civil rights lawyers use their finely-tuned analytical powers on important non-legal questions…
Amy: IOW, can I blog this?
Carrie: snort
Carrie: yes
Carrie: non-leftover, non breakfast foods not acceptable for breakfast
Carrie: unless it is a breakfast burrito
Carrie: which has bacon or sausage
Amy: wow – the breakfast burrito is right on the line
Amy: yes you have to police it, though, to be sure it doesn’t have Not Breakfast Foods in it, like taco sauce
Carrie: if bacon or sausage, it is breakfast
Amy: yes
Carrie: or chorizo
Amy: if taco sauce + eggs: wrong
Carrie: hence, mcdonalds breakie burrito, wrong on many levels
Amy: what does it have?
Carrie: im not sure, but it comes with taco sauce
Amy: blech
Amy: wrong
Carrie: plus from mcdonalds, wrong
Amy: indeed
Amy: but notice that we’ve isolated the actual tortilla itself as something that adeptly spans Breakfast Food and Not Breakfast Food
Amy: hmmm
Amy: further research may be required.
Carrie: i think many bread items can be multipurpose
Carrie: e.g. must be because I don’t go to the bread store often enough
Amy: that’s true
Amy: and rice porridge for breakie
Carrie: true
Amy: another starch that crosses boundaries
Carrie: but eggs with rice, wrong
Amy: agreed
* Lightly edited for order because, as I’m sure it will shock you to learn, Carrie and I constantly text over each other.
Mutt Mitt
Hey! I didn’t invent the product or the packaging — I just added my 8th grade sense of humor. And a product endorsement: nothing beats the Mitt for scooping poop!
Yes, I put the poop scoop bag bag on the scanner. Yes I did.
Garage Triage
* Includes car, bike, snow blower, tools (actually used), tools (aspirational), and the complete Fair Employment Practices Cases, Vols. I – 1997, complete with Post-It annotations by Peter C. Robertson.
Coolest.Brief.Ever.
This brief writer was given five pages to express a series of complex antitrust arguments. Result: a format I want with all my heart and soul to use in my next brief. As you can see from the ECF header, this was filed with the court. I don’t understand the antitrust or economic theory, but check out the last panel for an excellent punchline.
Damn! I wish I could draw! Perhaps my next brief could start with the Cute Puppies’ Guide to Title III of the ADA.
8 stages of settling on the eve of trial*
- Drinking.
- Sleeping.
- People Magazine.
- Long leisurely walk with dogs and camera.
- Shoveling archeological layers of binders and papers off the desk.**
- Freaking out at all the tasks in other cases you’ve ignored for the past month.
- More sleep.
- Fired up and ready to litigate!
**********
* WordPress always suggests tags for each post. For this post, it suggests, among others, the tags “Chad Ochocinco” and “Little Richard.” Not sure how that algorithm works!
** Hey, Tim, remember that tax document you asked about on April 14. Um.
Nerd gear: dogs and photography
I’ve been trying to figure out how to combine photography practice with dog walks. Before today, it has consisted of:
Come.
Come.
Seriously.. come. Here. No, over here.
Sit.
Sit.
Good dogs!
[Put leashes on ground.]
Stay.
Staystaystaystay.
No! Sit. Staaaaaaay.
Good dogs!
[Compose. Focus.]
Click!
[Pick up leashes.]
Let’s go!
Rinse. Repeat.
Until now! I solved the problem with some gen-u-ine nerd gear: a web belt and a large clip.
Now that is some seriously crappy photographic composition. But you can see my nerd-gear dog-walking photo-practice hack. And my ca. 1972 tennis racket. Both the belt and the clip were available on amazon.com, with the interesting side effect that ordering the belt — which has oddly knife-shaped pouches that will be perfect for dog treats — put me in interesting company.
Guess the pouches weren’t specifically designed for dog treats. Anyway, all in the service of my continuing efforts to learn how to use my Nifty Fifty.
Thought Snax 
