The Gaming Den

So since electrical power distribution is now a part of my job, I feel the need to drop this one in here: by connecting a large energy resevoir, or battery, into a power grid and then allowing points on the grid to either add or remove energy from said grid you create something which has proven to be used by human beings nearly 24/7/365 when their lives would end shortly after the grid fell. In fact, these are capable of being put in the hands of people who I barely trust to tie their own shoes at times, and they don't run into horrid blackouts because someone turned on (or off for that matter) the coffee pot.

Saying that a power grid cannot support parts of it supplying power that aren't the generator is not only blatently false, but also ignores actual design that has gone into electrical distribution systems.

Koumei wrote:*I don't mean that in the literal sense. I mean, I'm not sure where prostitutes fit in if we're talking communism. Ideas, Frank? PL?

Well my idea is that in the ideal communist utopia prostitutes are beautiful outgoing people persons funded by the government to actively seek out and have sex with people who need cheering up.

But as for ideas on that other thing, its called "nationalising" it can be done in a number of ways. I also favor the "fuck you" approach where the government just says "that's mine now bitch".

But lets be honest under the current environment a compulsory purchase under the most insanely generous and inflated prices would be whined about and fought tooth and nail for decades. The bastards would fight all the way to the bank where they would in the end still cash their massive compulsory purchase payments and live as billionaires forever. Whiny billionaires complaining endlessly about the nationalization of assets making them rich, and never mentioning the privatization and rape of those assets that made them already rich before that as well.

Nationalization is a real thing, it really happens, it really has benefits. We should do more of it.

Privatization is a con job, and it is DEAD. The public has had enough of it and knows its a massive fucking scam at their expense. To the point where now active privatization policy in Australia is a political death sentence. It killed the National party, it severely hurt the Liberal party, and it brought down at least one state Labor government.

Only an idiot would support Privatization now in the face of failed private roads, hospitals, telecoms, and electricity. Fortunately for us we have plenty of idiots. You get that when you have rich con men backing them with real money.

And yet, we let the bastards do it again and again, PL.

Yet the people who whine the loudest about the evils of corporations and government side with industry shills. Oh, and they're Republicans.

The average American just doesn't know this shit. Should, but doesn't. Where's that liberal media now?

-Crissa

The highest power draw being during time of peak solar production heavily depends on geography by the way. In England for example, peak draw is for the first couple of hours after the sun sets. Now because England will get its solar power from north africa where the sun sets later in winter (when there is peak draw in england), this might not be a huge problem.

Anyway, the grid is going to have to either have

A) Massive hydrogen production systems added for fuel, which can then be run overtime and burnt to store excess peak energy; or

B) Have a billion batteries hooked up to it

So you can certainly work out something. You might need to top up with nuclear or natural gas, but meh.

Gore Tells Global Warming Whopper

Oh, and that octopus has a lovely bunch of coconuts.

Data Vampire wrote:Gore Tells Global Warming Whopper

I don't get it. He said a scientist estimated that, when it was actually a ballpark figure thrown out (or "estimated") by a scientist. How is that a lie?

Furthermore, the actual statement just said that it could be ice free in 7 years. Not that it would be ice free year round starting 7 years from now. The August Arctic Ice is pretty close to nonexistent already.

How come global warming and evolution deniers get a free ride on actual lies as "opinions" and Al Gore gets attacked for lying just for cherry-picking an alarming sounding and true statement?

-Username17

Koumei wrote:See, there's a really simple answer, it's just that capitalist whores* don't like it: un-privatise them. I'm even for the governments just outright taking everything from the electricity, water, telephone and gas companies, at gunpoint, and saying "Yeah, well, suck my dick. You brought it on yourselves." But presumably a more realistic and reasonable scenario is they buy it back in a "Sale is mandatory. Decide on a deal with us by X or we're taking it for (small amount)." situation.

*I don't mean that in the literal sense. I mean, I'm not sure where prostitutes fit in if we're talking communism. Ideas, Frank? PL?

It's not just capitalist whores; people who don't think government can do an effective job with anything won't like it either. As for municipal power grids, I've gone on that roller coaster from LILCO(corporate) to LIPA (government) and then to National Grid USA under LIPA.

Given all that pain, agony, and misery (actually not related to the companies themselves just the stupidity of Albany in general) I would generally say that government owership of common utility distribution methods is a neither good nor a bad thing; contracting that out to others and keeping a good eye on the contractors tends to make it a generally good thing; at least so far.

FrankTrollman wrote:I don't get it. He said a scientist estimated that, when it was actually a ballpark figure thrown out (or "estimated") by a scientist. How is that a lie?

However, the climatologist whose work Mr Gore was relying upon dropped the former Vice-President in the water with an icy blast.

“It’s unclear to me how this figure was arrived at,” Dr Maslowski said. “I would never try to estimate likelihood at anything as exact as this.”

Mr Gore’s office later admitted that the 75 per cent figure was one used by Dr Maslowksi as a “ballpark figure” several years ago in a conversation with Mr Gore.

This is the typical liberal claptrap and it's so common by those bastards that you start to expect it as a matter of course. They point a finger at you and try to claim it's a gun that will go off unless you do something immediately. But it's only a finger.

Gore has pulled this shit before with Global Warming; based on his original dire warnings we are already DEAD now! Now he's trying the same shit again.

Obama just pulled the same thing yesterday with his health care policy.

He (Obama) pulled it eariler this year as well warning that unless the porkulus package was approved unemployment would rise to over 8%. (We did and now it's over 10%.)

This fucking "the sky is falling" parinoia, puting words in other people's mouths while those other people are actually present, only shows Gore for the lying politician that he is. An "inconvenient truth" if ever there was one.

Tzor wrote: Obama just pulled the same thing yesterday with his health care policy.

Our Healthcare policy already killed more than 2.7 million Americans. So you'll forgive me for not giving rightwing dismissals any credit at all.

The sky already fell. It killed the population of Chicago. I would like to do something before it kills that many people again. Since you know, it's not slowing down or anything.

-Username17

It appears that far from just a “'ballpark figure' several years ago in a conversation with Mr. Gore,” that Maslowski has indeed made this ice-free Arctic prediction much more formally and in model studies. Gore's version of events appears to be accurate, while Maslowski appears to be the one who has the explaining to do.

Link.

FrankTrollman wrote:

Tzor wrote: Obama just pulled the same thing yesterday with his health care policy.

Our Healthcare policy already killed more than 2.7 million Americans. So you'll forgive me for not giving rightwing dismissals any credit at all.

The sky already fell. It killed the population of Chicago. I would like to do something before it kills that many people again. Since you know, it's not slowing down or anything.

-Username17

You say that like the right wing cares. They've already demonstrated that a disaster can all but wipe a city off the map and they won't give two tugs about it.

Health Care or Climate Change would have to literally wipe out Chicago for them to notice, and even then you'd get a bunch of rural conservatives claiming the "city liberals" had it coming.

FrankTrollman wrote:Our Healthcare policy already killed more than 2.7 million Americans. So you'll forgive me for not giving rightwing dismissals any credit at all.

OMG, that is so funny. Did you really pull that number out your ass like that. And you accuse me of being the wacko. "2.7 million Americans" And they all died because "our" Healthcare policy killed them. I yield; you are the superior nut job.

Did Tzor just seriously deny that people die from lack of health care?

Seriously?

I think he's denying 2.7 million. Although, really, who can tell?

What part of basic reading 101 didn’t you understand?
It’s a specific number (not just 2 million, 2.7 million)
It’s saying that the Healthcare policy “killed” them.
(You know Col Mustard did it in the Conservatory with the Candlestick.)
It’s not saying that people die from lack of health care.
It has no support whatsoever.

You want to know how many people die due to a lack of insurance. Study links 45,000 U.S. deaths to lack of insurance

Another factor is that there are fewer places for the uninsured to get good care. Public hospitals and clinics are shuttering or scaling back across the country in cities like New Orleans, Detroit and others, he said.

Now, that’s a number, backed by a study, linked by a reference link to a news organization of … (disclaimer I work for that damn company so obviously I’m going to make them the greatest source of news since sliced bread).

Yes "We're losing more Americans every day because of inaction ... than drunk driving and homicide combined," and that’s important, but where the fuck one gets 2.7 million is something only a person more Gory than Gore can write and expect to get away with it.

aaaaand ignorelist

No, 2.7 million is not a random number. We lose 45 thousand people a year, over 123 people a day, because of lack of health insurance. Counting the state of our lack of a national health service starting in 1948 (when Truman failed to get one established because people like Tzor accused it of being a commie plot), That's two million, seven hundred and forty thousand people.

It's not a holocaust, but it is a fifth of a holocaust. And that makes it an atrocity that ranks on the big list of exciting atrocities. Worse than Pol Pot's Killing Fields, but not as bad as Churchill's Planned Starvations in India. You can make a compelling argument that the US was doing a lot of good stuff with the bad stuff so that it balances out or something. And you certainly wouldn't be on sane ground to call it as bad as the feats of villainy performed by Nazi Germany let alone the Supreme War Council of Nippon. But it's really bad, and you don't get to pretend to be the rational person responding to it with anti-Obama meme spam.

-Username17

Does the 45k/yr remain constant back through 1948 though? That seems unlikely.

I goggled the query "how many people die yearly due to lack of insurance" and just a couple years ago the estimates were in the 20k range. Back in 1993 a similar study was done that pegged the yearly rate at ~18k people/year, with people lacking insurance having a ~25% higher mortality rate (as opposed to the 40% found in the more recent study) as they used some different criteria.

I'm not saying Tzor isn't fundamentally insane on the issues of... well damn near everything. I do wonder how honestly we can track backwards that 45k/year number all the way to 1948.

I just downloaded and skimmed the study and it looks like the data used was from studies going back as far as 1986-2000. The 45k number comes from multiplying that 40% higher mortality rate of uninsured amongst those aged 18-64 against the number of fatalities in 2005 of ages 18-64 (which came out to be 44789).

So to get a proper number, rather than multiplying 45k/yr * yrs of having a divide between insured and uninsured, it would be more accurate to apply the mortality rate of uninsured versus total mortalities... though that almost certainly isn't a good figure either since it is dubious that the relationship of insurance and mortality has remained constant that far back.

So it is a fair bit more complicated, and that mortality hazard of being uninsured was not figured at all for people over the age of 64 or under the age of 18, where surely it plays a factor as well, likely an even greater factor since I suspect children and the elderly not seeking medical treatment when necessary is more dangerous than for non-geriatric adults to do so.

FrankTrollman wrote:No, 2.7 million is not a random number. We lose 45 thousand people a year, over 123 people a day, because of lack of health insurance. Counting the state of our lack of a national health service starting in 1948 (when Truman failed to get one established because people like Tzor accused it of being a commie plot), That's two million, seven hundred and forty thousand people.

Frank, that is the stupidest thing I have heard from you ever. No really Frank, this is stupid squared. The first is the notion that you can take the area of a curve “Part of the increased risk …” by taking the maximum height point of the curve and multiplying it by the length of the curve. That is so wrong it’s not even funny. The second thing is trying to pin this problem back to Truman.

I wonder if I can play the same game with tobacco. After all currently there are 440,000 deaths per year due to smoking. Now given that one data point there is no way I can even give you the total number of deaths due to smoking from a year you picked out of your fucking hat and never revealed.

In fact, how many uninsured die as a result of smoking (basically they are fucked no matter what they do) or who would have died anyway had they had insurance? My, this number is dropping by leaps and bounds.

You know, I really hate to break his fucking atheistic communist bubble and I’m going to hate myself in the morning but this limiting national health to Truman is just so wrong on so many levels. Truman Gets Credit (or Blame) for Current National Health Care Push “In fact, progressives have been agitating for national health care coverage for more than a century. The American Association of Labor Legislation began pushing for it as early as 1906 -- and even then was accused of being late to the game. Interestingly, the American Federation of Labor actually opposed this effort, out of fear that universal health coverage would undermine the importance of union membership.”

“In 1912, Theodore Roosevelt's Bull Moose Party platform called for "a system of social insurance adapted to American use." His cousin Franklin Roosevelt considered including national health insurance as part of the Social Security Act of 1935, but excluded it for fear it could doom the entire bill.”

Still, I deserve to end this on a happy note? Would you like some figgy pudding?

Yeah Frank how dare you make a ball park estimate. Those are totally lies when left wing people make them, even if they openly describe them as ball park estimates!

45000 people in the last year is different and perfectly fine Why I kill that many people on my daily commute to work. Just for fun. And everyone thinks that is fine!

Only it isn't actually 45,000 people last year. Its an annual figure derived from data gathered over a 8 year period. And it's data that is nearly ten years old so it is hardly a peak.

You can be assured a hell of a lot people than that died because of this last year.

But that's fine because you know, 45,000 easily avoidable deaths (that you could save money at the same time as avoiding!), give or take another 45,000. That's nothing. No one cares about that shit.

PhoneLobster wrote:Yeah Frank how dare you make a ball park estimate.

Yea I mean it's 45K/Year as a result of lack of insurance.
And it's 440K/Year as a result of smoking.
And it's 1,370K/Year as a result of abortions.

ANd please note I cided Frank for simply posting a number, out of the fucking blue, without giving a context over how it was derived. The fact that the derivation was shit to begin with onlyproved my point about how he was playing scare tactics with bogus numbers in order to ... well Al Gore the opposition.

(Do you realize that every day, 115K abortions take place around the world? That sort of makes that annual 45K per year seem small doesn't it? Or am I comparing apples and oranges ... oh wait, that was my point wasn't it?)

tzor wrote:And it's 1,370K/Year as a result of abortions.

Seriously, I never threaten people or tell them to kill themselves on the internet.

But kill yourself now Tzor.

You are an inhuman pro murder bastard indeed.

Abortions save lives. Not cause deaths.

You don't get to lie like that. You fucking drooling moronic stooge. Id on't care what IN-FUCKING-SANE shenanigans you are pulling for that figure if its counting every individual cell as a human life or if its not counting the lives saved by performing the procedure. ITS A FUCKING UTTERLY DESPICABLE LIE UNWORTHY OF THE LOWEST OF LIFE FORMS SO FUCKING BE A MAN AND KILL YOURSELF.

You should be a late term abortion right now. I'd vote that one in.

No, it's not constant. In 1948 we lost more Americans to lack of health insurance than in 1980, because of slow expansions of state healthcare. There was probably a low ebb in the 70s as the huge work they did to have community hospitals came to fruition with a new ethic in civil rights - you know, the civil right to be treated in a damn emergency hospital because you're hurt, not to be turned away for being the wrong race or religion.

Basically, it just means we traded around who was dying. And today instead of sick and old being the majority, it's middle income Americans, who are not really specifically any group or other than 'no insurance' and 'something bad happened to them.'

It was 45,000 a few years ago. 15,000 a decade years before that. But probably a 100,000 decades ago, when you count all the children and infants.

-Crissa

As PhoneLobster pointed out, 15 years ago the deaths per year was at least 45,000 because that was in the middle of the latest study. 15 years ago a study came out that said the deaths per year was at least 15,000, which in turn was based on older data and smaller sample sizes. Basically, every time they do a bigger study they come up with a bigger number. I'm sure if they counted all the dead, their "at least" number would be higher than what they have right now.

But in any case, there are 46 million uninsured Americans. At the beginning of the period when I am counting it as fair to start the death count (1948), there were a total of less than 60 million insured Americans out of a population of more than 146 million people. So I don't know where anyone gets off assuming the death tolls would be lower earlier in the century. The number of uninsured Americans was almost twice as large at the beginning as it is now.

2.7 million deaths is an incredibly conservative number. It's based on a large but still very conservative study, and extrapolates back in time to the period before medicare or Kaiser as if they were merely as bad as today, when we know they were worse! That's why I said "more than 2.7 million" because the actual number is probably 1-3 million more than 2.7 million. Which makes "more than 2.7 million" a rather defensible number, and people like Tzor into sick twisted monsters.

-Username17

tzor wrote: And it's 1,370K/Year as a result of abortions.

A quick Wiki gives less than that and its the all abortions figure. Unless you're against all abortions ever thats a dick move. If you are thats a different dick move.

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