Sanford Shows its pimply ass again

Well, well, well. Looks like Sanford, NC made national news again. Classy place, Sanford. Lots of open ditches, sleazy hotels, and child prostitution.

Any comments, anon?

Open up and say ahhhh

The public option just a stepping stone to universal health care. The Dems aren't being honest about this, not that I think they can afford to be. If the public option ever passes (and it's not looking promising) then an emormous amount of health care related jobs will, in time, be permenantly eliminated. There's a reason why health care in the US is so expensive= bureaucracy, bureaucracy, bureaucracy.

Say I (like that unfortunate chap above) have a sore throat, so I go see my Primary physician, I use my flex spend card, so I can use my pre-tax dollars for health care costs. There's a positiion at my company that administers that through a 3rd party intermediary called Wageworks that has hundreds of employees.

There's an employee at my physician's office who's primary job function is to run my wageworks card for my ever increasing copay and then file my claim with Blue Cross Blue shield.

There is an employee at BCBS who intakes the claim, one that verifies coverage, one that confirms if the doctor is in network, one who reviews the claim and the coding to make sure all care is usual and customary, one who calls the providers and negotiates the rate that they will be paying, and one that actually issues payment to the doctor.

BCBS also has to support it's finance division, sales office, marketing, HR, Hippa compliance, coding experts, fraud investigators, legal departments, accounts payable, accounts receivable, etc. They employ tens of thousands of people in NC, and hundreds of thousands of people nationwide. And your health insurance premiums pay their salaries.

Is all of this bureaucracy really necessary for my doctor to prescribe me penecillin? Can you imagine how much paperwork would be involved if I had cancer?

Lets say I have a sore throat in England, or Canada, or Japan... I would go to the Dr. He would give me the same examination and write me the same prescription. His (or her, dang I'm sexist) salary is directly paid by the government. Simple, eh? No paperwork. No Byzantine coding or billing systems. Just You and Your Dr.
It sounds nice, doesn't it?

But it comes at the cost of millions of jobs, jobs that won't be replaced by government employment. Like many medical procedures, it's necessary but painful.

BACK FROM THE GRAVE!!!

Hello all! When I began this thang 6 months ago, I figured that I would be able to post a couple times a week and still have time for commute, work, studying, marriage, travelling, moving, booze, etc. But then life began getting in the way. My workload was piling up, my LSAT exam was looming, our honeymoon was approaching, we had to buy our first house, and my best drinking buddy stayed with us for a couple months. Suddenly, blogging time grew scarce. So I dropped it, thinking that it would fade into obscurity, or at least be deleted by Blogger.

But now that Fall has come around I seem to have more and more time on my hands. I've recently completed my LSAT (a respectable score), changed offices (so long Sanford, I'll miss you), bought a house (ok, a townhouse), and finished my Summer travels (Myrtle Beach, Wilmington, Asheville, and Greece), and my drinking buddy moved to NYC to attend Grad school (he's studying poetry, that pussy.) So I checked out my blog, and lo and behold some folks had actually read it and commented on my posts! So I'm bringin' it back! And it's gonna be badder than ever. Watchout!

Atlas shrugged... then dropped the ball.

No one can ever make you feel more embarrassed than an earlier vision of yourself. I’m sure Madonna wants to claw her eyes out when she sees Brittany Spears. Personally, I cringe when I see the following people: Ravers, punkers arguing if some obscure band has "sold out", acidheads, philosophy majors, and worst of all, Libertarians.

An impressionable young mind and a simple political theory were a dangerous combination for young Cyg.net. It was the "nanny state" that was preventing me from accomplishing great things instead of truancy, weed, and general laziness. Fortunately, my High school civics class forced me to study other political philosophies. I abandoned Libertarianism at the tender age of 17 and was able to avoid the horrible fate of the Randian.

One night my buddy Hoyt and I came to the conclusion that Libertarianism is really more of a personality type than a coherent political ideology. Today I would like to expand on this idea and present to you the life of a typical Ron Paulophile:


In utero: The Libertarian fetus refuses to feed off of the placenta leaving the brain's empathy lobe severely underdeveloped.

Infancy: No respectable Randian will suckle at any teat. He quickly begins nursing on coffee, Neal Bortz, and outrage.

Childhood: The Libertarian won't share his toys. 'Nuff said.

Adolescence: The Libertarian reads Ayn Rand for the first time. This causes him to immediately grow a greasy ponytail, start smoking, and wear ill fitting trench coats. Consequently, he fails to get laid.

College: The Libertarian is finally able to grow facial hair, which he will sport the rest of his life. He annoys everyone at the coffeehouse with caffeine-fueled debates with equally misguided 19 year-old "Communists". He fails to see the irony in asking his parents for more money.

Adulthood: The Libertarian quickly grows a beer gut, gets a dumb Loony Tunes tattoo to reflect his individuality, and buys an unnecessary security system to protect his filthy hovel. He starts a small business and blames its failure on government regulation and high taxes instead of his repulsive personality and gross incompetence. He marries a mild mannered woman who thinks she can tolerate his incessant ranting about "welfare queens" (she is wrong).

Middle Age: This phase of the Libertarian's life is defined by paranoia. He begins buying into every conspiracy theory on the Internet and perceives it as one Bilderbergilicious tapestry weaved by Jews (who are after his gold). His third mail order bride leaves him for someone, anyone who doesn't have an opinion about the flat tax. Overcome with xenophobia, he starts stockpiling weapons for the coming Apocalypse.

The Twilight Years: The Libertarian is sitting in his la-z-boy shaking his fist at the liberal Mainstream Media on basic cable. His breathing is assisted by a Medicare-subsidized oxygen tank for his emphysema. His only income is his monthly social security check because he lost his nest egg in the free market he thought he understood. He dies a hollow shell of a man, still bitter that a portion of his income contributed to your children's education.

Don't get me wrong, Libertarianism has some decent ideas. I believe that easing immigration restrictions, the separation of church and state, and being able to fuck whoever you want (however you want) are good things. I believe government waste, stupid wars (aka every war since WWII), and the prohibition of drugs are bad things. But be careful...If you are still a true believer into your 20s, forever will it dominate your destiny.

Sanford, NC: the Armpit of America

Sanford, NC: It's where I spend 45 hours of my waking life every week. A mere 45 minute commute from my home in Carrboro, Sanford is the location of my easy, thankless job. Google image search of "Sanford, NC" returns this gem:
That photo perfectly sums up this glorified trailer park of a town.

5 reasons to hate Sanford, NC:

1) Rednecks: Sanford is brimming with rednecks, and only rednecks. The black people are rednecks. The Mexicans people are rednecks. I haven't seen any other ethnicities, but if the Dali Lama relocated to Sanford I'm certain that he would join one of the local Pentecostal churches.

2) Bookstores: One of my favorite lunchtime activities in at other jobs was lounging at the local Barnes and Noble, sippin' on some green tea, and reading their wonderful selection of books in 45 minute increments. There are 3 bookstores in Sanford, two Christian bookstores and one Adult bookstore. Wanna guess which one I've visited?

3) Food: Sanford cuisine is staggeringly simple.... the drive thru next to my office serves fried baloney sandwiches. Americana and Soul food certainly have their place, but there are only so many baked spaghetti dinners I can stomach. That leaves fast food. Neither option is helping with my ample girth. 8 months ago a naive Dominican immigrant opened up a restaurant serving his native fare. Such spicy and flavorful chow was lost on the redneck palate and poor Juan's tables remained empty. I lunched there as often as possible, hoping that my bi-weekly meals of curried goat and morro would keep his doors open. Of course they didn't and currently the most exotic food in town is pizza.

4) Health Care: I'm guessing the Lee County Medical board won't admit you unless you check the "I'm a self-important asshole" box on your application. My Sanford healthcare providers make Dr. House look like Patch Adams. While I understand that living in this godforsaken town is enough to make anyone irritable, other doctors don't feel the need to prescribe gruff condescension for my strep throat. Penicillin will do.

5) Retards: I'm not sure why, but Sanford seems to be the mental retardation capital of NC. While I have no problem with the mentally enfeebled themselves (they're much nicer than normal people), I take issue with the thunderous groans emitting from the herd of retards sitting 2 tables over. I'm sorry for your wretched lot in life, but you're making my fried baloney sandwich even less appetizing. There's a van that sits in our office parking lot that has a Someone I love has Down Syndrome bumper sticker on it. I passed by it the other day and the bumper sticker had been removed. What did this retarded person do to make my co-worker stop loving him? Did he drink all the juice boxes?

In summation, Sanford = suck.

Bad Habits

The old saying holds true:


Let me count the ways...

1. …I use ellipses when I write…they reflect my lazy speech…and my lazy grammer...
2. My wife says that I sound like a sleazy game show host when I’m speaking with people I don’t know over the phone. Apparently my suppressed nervousness transforms me into Guy Smiley.
3. I sometimes take on another party’s accent during discussions. It’s involuntary, insulting, and embarrassing for all parties.
4. I smoke a tobacco pipe in the evening; It was my compromise with tobacco. I can smoke, but only in the home. You can’t pull off a tobacco pipe as a fashion accessory until you’re well into your 40s.
5. I love star gazing but know next to nothing about astronomy/physics/cosmology. It’s all about aesthetics...
6. I usually retire to bed with a glass of water, but never take the glass back to the kitchen in the morning. It's not unusual for 8 glasses to be crowded onto my bedside dresser.
7. I've still bite my nails and I'm lazy about discarding them. When my wife and I first began dating she was horrified to discover my "elephant graveyard" on the floorboard of my car.

I'm deeply flawed in other ways too... and so are you.

A cowardly new world...

I used to believe blogs were the ultimate expression of self indulgent egoism… then I came to realize what my friends already knew: I'm incredibly self absorbed that this would be a perfect vehicle to showcase it.

It also provides an exellent alternative to a journal. I love writing, but pen and paper pose significant challenges to me. There is a general consensus that I have the worst handwriting in the history of Western civilization (and probably Eastern civilization too.... Kanji are surely harder than cursive, something I never mastered). My clumsy block print is often mistaken for a 3rd grader. Grocery store clerks frequently ask “Is that yo’ real signature?” Sadly, it is.

I’m a political junkie and the '08 election I finally jumped head first into the blogosphere. But for some reason I tend to steer clear of serious ones that reflect my views ( Daily Kos, Huffington Post, TPM , etc.) in lieu of the irreverent ( Wonkette , Rumproast), the psychotic (Townhall , Hot Air), the bizarre (I Blame the Patriarchy ) and the retarded ( The Confulence , Puma PAC). I feel guilty giving those guys hits, but I get bored reading opinions I already agree with.

Another good thing about blogging: I can lie. I’m a lousy liar in person. I have several tells and they’re pretty obvious. I’m not so good with secrets, either.