laklak wrote:Meh, the Beginning of the End has been coming since the End of the Beginning. Obama was the Anti-Christ and would usher in FEMA camps and mandatory reeducation for all CIS white males. Bush was the reincarnation of Hitler until he re-reincarnated as Donald Trump. Slick Willy was going to end The Greatest Country On Earth in a shower of semen and local-yokel hucksterism. Reagan was going to open Soylent plants. Carter was going to give the country to the Iranians. Nixon was going to push the Big Red Button rather than resign.
I'm struggling to see what differences, if any, that a previous President's national policies had on my personal life other than the obvious tax rates, and even those differences were minimal. Under one guy I paid a grand or so more than under some other guy. I still bought and sold homes, cars, boats, etc, got married, got divorced, had kids. I never ended up in a bunker waiting for the radiation levels to fall. Never saw any Fascists or Communists, not even under the bed.
Actually, looking back, the only national policy that really affected me on a daily basis was Obamacare. My premiums went through the roof until I managed to get a subsidized policy, then they dropped through the floor. Oh yeah, there was the Vietnam War thingy back in the day, another Democratic Party fuck up.
Your mileage may vary, but Meh Again.
The mileage for many will vary
a lot!. And to tell the truth, I think you're missing a huge factor, you can't
know what things would be like if we'd had a different string of guys in office. How many get zero mileage because they're dead? In wars, because of poverty, health care, all kinds of things really, that would be very different with a different lot of leaders?
About your health care subsidy, is that the tax credit from Obama care? I am just about done with my 2nd year on that, and it disgusts me in numerous ways. First off is the insane, overly complicated way it's dealt with come tax day. You first have to estimate what you will make in the coming year, they base the monthly contribution to your insurance on that. In 2015, I made considerably less than my estimate, and I got a number of messages from some part of the bureaucracy telling me I was going to be penalized for the mis-estimate. It didn't matter to this person that I
underestimated, meaning I got less a tax credit than I should have, or that I can't estimate what my earnings will be because most of it is from farming, which ain't even close to a steady income. I kept repeating how insane it was what they were trying to do, and after a couple of weeks, some rational higher-up must have reviewed the case and they rescinded any threats of penalties etc.
And over the last 4 or so months, the IRS is trying to extort money from me. I get this letter from them saying I underpaid my taxes and owed them over $1200. The only info I got to try to defend myself was that their estimate of my income was double my figure, and that somehow it was due to how I handled the Obamacare tax credit. I say BS, show me where I made such a huge error, and they sent me the details. Turns out, on Form 8962, I accidently copied my AGI into both the box for me and the box on the same line that was for my dependents AGI. Now, I have had to fill out full 1040s since about 1970, I have never had dependents, they won't let me claim the cats, the bastards [that's for both the cats and the IRS], there wasn't a single mention of dependents anywhere but this one line on this one obscure form, they couldn't see this after multiple reviews of my return? I immediately sent them a letter explaining this and detailing the problem and a revised Form 8962, sent it certified. A month later, I get another letter and they're claiming I still owe and they're going to go after my state income tax refunds if I had one, I don't even have state taxes, and then my property, garnish wages, etc. I sent another letter saying that's all nonsense blah blah blah, and my attorneys frown on harassment and they're good frowners. A week or two later I get a letter saying they got the now over month old first of my explanations of the error, and that they need 45 days to respond.
Way TLDR, but that's as concise as I can make this deplorable hilarious situation. Except, on the actual medical end of things, I picked a certain policy/plan/company because this doctor was 'in network' and I wanted him to do my knee replacement. He's my mother's doctor/surgeon, and is one of the 'Spurs' doctors, the San Antonio basketball teams doctors. The whole clinic this is their big spiel, 'doctors to the Spurs'. When I finally went to start the process of getting a new knee, they take one look at my insurance card and see I'm in a subsidized plan and say we don't take your insurance! I go and recheck on the web, they are 'in network, I call Aetna, they say the list is up to date but maybe they just dropped out, they'll look into it and make sure they are taken off the list. They are never taken off the list, discussions with Aetna made it clear there is something fishy going on there, I can't figure out quite what. I suspect the clinic gets money for being in that network, even though they won't actually take any patients with that coverage, and Aetna is in on it too as they take a big cut. I didn't get anywhere talking to the people at healthcare.gov. All in all, Obamacare helps a lot of folk, but it's still a big payout to the insurance companies and doctors with little in the way of a real attempt to help the citizenry.
“When you're born into this world, you're given a ticket to the freak show. If you're born in America you get a front row seat.”
-George Carlin, who died 2008. Ha, now we have human centipedes running the place
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