Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Now they're trying to steal your healthcare as well--what a Bummer.
I don't think traditional Medicare (I'm on traditional Medicare) is in any immediate danger. Do you (IIRC - you're on Medicare too)? Best I can tell - many liberals don't even want to implement more means testing (guess many of those union retired people have really cushy pensions). Wouldn't support more means testing (I usually don't vote against my own self-interests) - but wouldn't jump up and down and throw a hissy fit if it happened. Because it's rational IMO - at least for people in my generation who only paid a small amount of money into the Medicare portion of our FICA that doesn't support what we're expected to get from the system. Still - I wait and watch and read. Because anything can change on a dime. FWIW - government can change my health insurance coverage - but not necessarily my health care. As long as I'm willing and able to pay for provider X - and the government doesn't push provider X out of business and provider X is willing to take me as a patient. Robyn
When I was in Viet Nam, we had several Vietnamese workers in our camp working in our mess tent and doing general clean up. I was amazed to see one young woman take a tin plate and heap it about eight inches high with all sorts of food. I sat down with her and asked her in my broken Vietnamese why she ate so much. She told me in her broken English, that she had six brothers and sisters along with her mother and father, and she gave all of her money to them to purchase food, while she ate one meal a day -- at our camp. And she said she ate better than anyone else in her family.
Reckon you're talking about someone who weighed at best 100 pounds soaking wet, When someone weighs 300+ pounds - it's a totally different issue IMO. Robyn
Reckon you're talking about someone who weighed at best 100 pounds soaking wet, When someone weighs 300+ pounds - it's a totally different issue IMO. Robyn
I suppose so. Obama should appoint you the Fat Czar and require everyone to report to you to determine whether they deserve health care!! So very Christian of you. And you completely skipped over the skinny kid my cousin helped by buying him a loaf of bread--and you've ignored posts that point out that the healthy foods recommended by "nutritionists" to control weight (as opposed to your "don't eat so much philosophy), are not so easily available to the poor. A better solution would be to cut the pay of CEOs in half and double the pay of everyone at the bottom. Since CEOs of the Fortune 500 make on average 354 times that of the average American worker. Healthy foods could possibly come into the sight of the average American forced to eat starchy foods high in carbohydrates because nutritional foods cost so much more. Oracle's Larry Ellison was top-earning CEO with $96.1 million, compared to the average worker's pay of $34,645 last year. Chief executives of the nation's largest companies earned an average of $12.3 million in total pay last year -- 354 times more than a typical American worker--- CEOs earn 354 times more than average worker - Apr. 15, 2013
i heard it all on Hannity tonight. what a mess. i was trying to find something positive in ACA, but all the info points to bad things across the board.
Well, sir, any credibility you (disappeared long ago upthread for me) - up to this point - just evaporated. Clearly, you don't know what you don't know if you think Hannity even comes close to truthtelling. Sad.
Last edited by Ariadne22; 10-30-2013 at 02:37 PM..
Well, sir, any credibility you (disappeared long ago upthread for me) - up to this point - just evaporated. Clearly, you don't know what you don't know if you think Hannity even comes close to truthtelling. Sad.
It's really sad to think people really think of Fox News as a legitimate news source.
Even Tabloid papers have more truth to them than Fox Entertainment does. But gullible people gravitate to fear and hate mongering, and have made a lot of entertainers on Fox, very wealthy people. They also use the "God" approach to try and convince you they are really good people trying to spread the truth to all who listen.
My advise to poster of this comment. If you want more unbiased truthful news, try watching PBS News on your TV. They will present both sides and discuss issues in a much more honest way. They won't be quite so entertaining, and they won't get you so excited, but you'll be better informed.
I suppose so. Obama should appoint you the Fat Czar and require everyone to report to you to determine whether they deserve health care!! So very Christian of you. And you completely skipped over the skinny kid my cousin helped by buying him a loaf of bread--and you've ignored posts that point out that the healthy foods recommended by "nutritionists" to control weight (as opposed to your "don't eat so much philosophy), are not so easily available to the poor. A better solution would be to cut the pay of CEOs in half and double the pay of everyone at the bottom. Since CEOs of the Fortune 500 make on average 354 times that of the average American worker. Healthy foods could possibly come into the sight of the average American forced to eat starchy foods high in carbohydrates because nutritional foods cost so much more. Oracle's Larry Ellison was top-earning CEO with $96.1 million, compared to the average worker's pay of $34,645 last year. Chief executives of the nation's largest companies earned an average of $12.3 million in total pay last year -- 354 times more than a typical American worker--- CEOs earn 354 times more than average worker - Apr. 15, 2013
Hate to break it to you - but my husband and I love carbs - especially pasta. We eat it probably 4 times a week for dinner - in small portions. I can cook up about 2 dozen delicious pasta meals for about a buck or two a serving. Takes me more time and costs me more than going to some fast food joint. But I know how to cook and enjoy cooking. And I - like most older people concerned about BP - don't need the mega-doses of salt that often appear in fast food places.
Now - I have to admit - I am retired - and have some time on my hands to do this stuff (and didn't have that time when I was working 50-60 hours a week). And perhaps some working mothers with kids don't have the time either. But a % of these mothers aren't working. They're on welfare. So perhaps they could learn a life skill - like cooking. Is that too much to ask?
I do like eating fruit for lunch - but it's pretty much a seasonal delicacy thing. Fruit is expensive and lousy out of season where I live (it's good and kind of reasonably priced in season). And fruit season is pretty much over now . So you know what we like to eat for lunch during the winter - hot cereal - especially oatmeal. Cheap and healthy - even if you add a little dried fruit and a bit of brown sugar and some milk on the top.
FWIW - I would take your "food challenge" any day. I don't have to eat cheap - but I know how to buy food and cook. And could live totally cheap in terms of food if I had to.
BTW - you can rail against high CEO salaries. But - even if you succeeded in your endeavor to knock them down - it wouldn't do anything to reduce obesity rates in the US. I sure didn't blame Larry Ellison because I was 25 pounds overweight last year - and think that if I cut his compensation by 50% - it would turn me into a sylph. I kind of had to handle things on my own. And have lost 15 pounds (only 10 to go - and they will be very hard to lose). It would have been nice to have a personal chef to help me (I know people who have personal chefs - but I can't afford a personal chef - so I just manage things on on my own).
I'm not saying any of this is easy. It is for sure easier to have a cheap but gross meal (both in terms of calories and salt and similar) than it is to make a decent meal at home. But - for people who have the time to do it - whether it's a retired person like me - or a non-working mother - it's worth it IMO. Robyn
Hate to break it to you - but my husband and I love carbs - especially pasta. We eat it probably 4 times a week for dinner - in small portions. I can cook up about 2 dozen delicious pasta meals for about a buck or two a serving. Takes me more time and costs me more than going to some fast food joint. But I know how to cook and enjoy cooking. And I - like most older people concerned about BP - don't need the mega-doses of salt that often appear in fast food places.
Now - I have to admit - I am retired - and have some time on my hands to do this stuff (and didn't have that time when I was working 50-60 hours a week). And perhaps some working mothers with kids don't have the time either. But a % of these mothers aren't working. They're on welfare. So perhaps they could learn a life skill - like cooking. Is that too much to ask?
I do like eating fruit for lunch - but it's pretty much a seasonal delicacy thing. Fruit is expensive and lousy out of season where I live (it's good and kind of reasonably priced in season). And fruit season is pretty much over now . So you know what we like to eat for lunch during the winter - hot cereal - especially oatmeal. Cheap and healthy - even if you add a little dried fruit and a bit of brown sugar and some milk on the top.
FWIW - I would take your "food challenge" any day. I don't have to eat cheap - but I know how to buy food and cook. And could live totally cheap in terms of food if I had to.
BTW - you can rail against high CEO salaries. But - even if you succeeded in your endeavor to knock them down - it wouldn't do anything to reduce obesity rates in the US. I sure didn't blame Larry Ellison because I was 25 pounds overweight last year - and think that if I cut his compensation by 50% - it would turn me into a sylph. I kind of had to handle things on my own. And have lost 15 pounds (only 10 to go - and they will be very hard to lose). It would have been nice to have a personal chef to help me (I know people who have personal chefs - but I can't afford a personal chef - so I just manage things on on my own).
I'm not saying any of this is easy. It is for sure easier to have a cheap but gross meal (both in terms of calories and salt and similar) than it is to make a decent meal at home. But - for people who have the time to do it - whether it's a retired person like me - or a non-working mother - it's worth it IMO. Robyn
Smart, educated people know better. Not so smart, uneducated people, not so much. Even so, despite your 4 pasta meal dinner claims, poor people most likely have way too much starch in every meal, and very little fruit, except in the summer like you. Your diet can be varied. There diet leaves less choice.
And no one would argue with you that they make poor choices, and if they ate more healthy foods they would be slimmer. And though I could not provide accurate numbers, I would say there are far more poor working people then welfare queens (and usually not desk jobs) who come home exhausted, and don't have the energy to spend an hour or more trying to figure how to prepare healthy meals on a budget.
They gravitate to quick and inexpensive as a rule. Cooking even a roasted chicken takes too much time when you have young hungry mouths to feed, dishes to do, baths, homework, laundry, etc. And yes, their environment. They eat what they see others eat. The southern culture as an example has grown up on a lot of fried foods. Hard to break that cycle. They even fry their vegetables (which are delicious by the way - love fried okra and eggplant)
Smart, educated people know better. Not so smart, uneducated people, not so much. Even so, despite your 4 pasta meal dinner claims, poor people most likely have way too much starch in every meal, and very little fruit, except in the summer like you. Your diet can be varied. There diet leaves less choice.
And no one would argue with you that they make poor choices, and if they ate more healthy foods they would be slimmer. And though I could not provide accurate numbers, I would say there are far more poor working people then welfare queens (and usually not desk jobs) who come home exhausted, and don't have the energy to spend an hour or more trying to figure how to prepare healthy meals on a budget.
They gravitate to quick and inexpensive as a rule. Cooking even a roasted chicken takes too much time when you have young hungry mouths to feed, dishes to do, baths, homework, laundry, etc. And yes, their environment. They eat what they see others eat. The southern culture as an example has grown up on a lot of fried foods. Hard to break that cycle. They even fry their vegetables (which are delicious by the way - love fried okra and eggplant)
I live in the part of Florida that's in the "south". Savannah - Charleston - etc. - are reasonably close by. So I'm familiar with southern/new southern cuisine. Learned how to cook some of it after we moved here. We do the traditional hoppin' John - collards and corn bread on New Year's Day .
I don't see too many fried veggies (okra is an exception - have never seen eggplant). But just about every veggie dish incorporates some kind of pork (ham hock - fat back - etc.). Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. The pork adds a nice flavor. OTOH - the pork salts the dish too - to a more than sufficient extent IMO (and too much IMO if you don't par boil something like fat back to get rid of some of the salt). But then - most recipes and many cooks here add even *more* salt. For example - Bill Neal's recipe for collards calls for a ham hock - *and* 4 tablespoons of bacon fat - *and* 1 1/2 teaspoons of salt. Talk about OD'ing on salt . I call this addiction to over-salting the "southern disease". And I think it's very bad in terms of its health consequences - especially when it comes to high BP. Note that Bill Neal was a chef in North Carolina who is widely considered to be one of the "fathers" of New Southern Cuisine. He broke a lot of new ground - but didn't do anything about the salt.
I don't disagree with you about the time/knowledge thing. Because I didn't have the time to learn when I was younger and working either. One thing I always thought would be nice is to bring back "home ec" in schools. "Shop" too. Add some money management courses as well. IOW - teach kids some basic life skills. Most shouldn't be going to college from an academic POV - and we should prepare them for the real world. Better to produce a high school graduate who can be an A/C tech and cook himself a decent dinner than an unemployed high school dropout whose idea of dinner is KFC. FWIW - I thought Michelle Obama had a good idea when it came to having kids eat healthier. But the execution of the idea has left a lot to be desired - it just hasn't "clicked". Laura Bush's reading initiative kind of fizzled too. Perhaps these are the kinds of thing that have to start at the bottom - local communities - instead of being imposed from the top? Or maybe you need to have a popular TV show to push them (along the lines of Oprah Winfrey's "Book Club")?
I would also like to see food retailers reaching out more - not only in poor communities - but everywhere. To teach people how to eat decent food at reasonable prices. For example - I can buy a whole 3 pound roast chicken at Costco for $5 - much cheaper and easier than doing it from scratch (and they're better than what I could prepare myself). I assume places like Sam's/Walmart/BJ's/etc. have similar offerings. Frozen vegetables are pretty cheap - pretty good - and very easy to make (and they're even cheaper on BOGOs at Publix than they are at Costco). But they continue to disappear from my local markets (I guess because people don't buy them). Chicken + veggies = a meal. And - if you want a starch - you can pop a potato in the oven and bake it.
I honestly despair when I see how kids eat today. We're probably well into our second generation of people who only know how to eat chicken nuggets and pizza and don't know what a radish is. Makes me want to tear my hair out. Doctors can only do so much after the fact - when someone is sick. We can make their lives easier - and our health care system will work better - if we all use our common sense when it comes to eating. Robyn
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.