Increa Technology Blog

About 6 months ago, I put a vehicle into storage with my insurance company because I don’t drive it during the winter. With only comprehensive coverage in case a tree falls on it or a roof caves in, the cost went way down.

A month ago, I had a car go non-operational and it looked like a long fix. I put the car into storage coverage while it was not driven. A few days ago, I received the new declaration page of my policy and strangely, it still had medical coverage and liability coverage. What gives?

I called the company and started asking questions. Well, it turns out that “storage coverage” doesn’t mean “storage” any more. It means “lowered to state minimums”.

I pointed out that insurance is to cover against risk. If my car is not being drive, how can it cause any medical damage or liability? It is an inanimate object just sitting there. I asked what risk I am paying for.

The best answer they could come up with is “risk against the state sending you a notice of a fine”. Eeee gads. Even car insurance is going socialized. I don’t WANT to buy that coverage. I am your customer! The state has not sent me a fine at any previous time I’ve done this. Additionally, a state has no jurisdiction of the vehicle is not used on public roads. And believe me, a non-op vehicle is not be used on roads. Additionally, exactly how do they know if I do or do not have insurance coverage, anyhow? Are YOU telling them? Why are you sharing my private insurance records with the DMV as a part of day-to-day operations?

There can be no requirement to insure a vehicle that doesn’t even have a requirement to be licensed. This sounds like insurance company BS.

Well, I’ve wondered for a while. With the rationed health care, I’ve been wondering how much the government will spend to keep a person from dying. Let’s call it the “COLA-adjusted yearly value of avoiding death”. For fun, spell that out. The irony is deep. The Cost of LIVING adjusted value of avoiding DEATH.

For the first time I’ve seen the number published. Page 21 of September 21,2009 National Review. (Drum roll…) $45,000.00. Not bad, I guess. It could have been lower. Some people seem worth more than that, some less. Like A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor, where “all the children are above average”, I imagine most people are worth more than this average. Of course, I’m sort of on the high side.

In the pursuit of managing health, we’ve drifted to managing health care. And in the process, we’ve really become rather sick. Sick in heart and spirit. A key point surfaces on page 20 of the above article. It’s National health care. And so comparisons are done nationally. If we spend more money on Harriet in El Paso than Francine in McAllen, then we have to fix it. Why does this require a fix?

I’m a State’s-rights kind of guy. What’s wrong with different states being different? What’s wrong if different cities are different - cost more or less in any given way? It gives folks a chance to live where they want to. If you want subsidized life and that kind of lifestyle, go live in that state. If you want something else, live in a different state. Such is a character of life. Such is the character of freedom. Isn’t that what this country was founded on? Freedom, not sameness. Who said everybody has to be the same?

National health care plans require national comparisons. Why is this good? Show me what moral compass or religion advises adherents to compare themselves to everybody else and make sure they get as good. Actually, in this area I agree with Rush Limbaugh when he says a lot of leftish or socialist programs are not about making everybody feel equally good; it’s about making sure everybody hurts as bad.

Donnie’s been on the street since 2006 performing a 1.5 hour 1-man stage show titled “Show of Force”. His only props are a chair and a desk. I watched his performance a few nights ago. The talk-back session afterward was notably about the work, and not really about the content at all.

I can tell he really wants to argue and emote against war. He tries hard to imagine the reasons for war, but he just doesn’t quite make it. The arguments against war are deep and convicted. The discussion for it are shallow and hollow and trite ring of sound bites for anybody who’s been there.

His loud proclamations such as “Waring for peace is like fucking for chastity” were only meant to inflame and influence with nary a speck of intellectual capital. Reality in the world is that in many cases, a responder acts to deter aggressive atrocities and thus is the genesis of a war. An honest analogy would be “Waring for peace is like when a police officer stops a rape.” C’mon Donnie.. be honest with your audience. This passage is when you lost credibility for me.

I guess I came away with a question and an observation. After all the dichotomous fabrications were finished on stage, I wanted to say simply, “Okay. It’s bad. What’s the alternative?” I avoid people who only speak against something without providing a viable alternative. Thus is the mind of someone below the age of 35 which hasn’t been responsible to manage realities of conflict.

Secondly, in the staging and production, many particulars were intentionally avoided. Mather made this clear during the talk-back. No dates. No names. No events. Just conflict and war in general. However, when the ache and ugliness of war are in the particulars, it’s disingenuous to dodge them and speak only of generalities. The particulars ARE war. War is nothing else. If you don’t deal with specifics, you’re commenting on something other than war.

The choice to dodge particulars in the performance and discussion reminded me of a narrative from Francis Schaeffer (or was it Josh McDowell?), when he was smothered in discussions of fuzz-ball religions compared to Christianity. The way I remember it, he was confronted with a speaker who claimed all acts by mankind are good and should not evoke bad feelings. After repeated conversations with the speaker that wafted lofty in the generalities, but were devoid of bravery to handle the particulars of the life of mankind, he peacefully poured his cup of coffee over the head of the speaker. Of course the speaker justifiably gasped and was offended. And had nothing more to say in defense of his theories.

For years, our nation has been going into debt. It’s a parent’s way to be selfish and get what they want, at the expense of our children when they have to pay off the bill or suffer at the hands of foreign investors who then control our nation. BTW, already China is winning with economic might what they dare not win with military might.

I’ve noticed a new paradigm change since the current president came into office. He started the new paradigm by talking about jobs. Historically, people have claimed the program they do creates or looses so many jobs. Those have always been measurable numbers that can be checked. Now, the president has slipped in the phrase that he is saving jobs. In other words, if you ~didn’t~ have me as president, you would lose even more. And viola! This is a claim that can be compared to nothing to check it’s validity! Although there are job gain/loss numbers, there is no “saved jobs” number published by a government audit agency. It’s a figment of someone’s imagination based on crystal ball estimates of the future, and can be claimed to be anything.

Then today, I got an electric bill in the mail. And the new sneaky way of quoting un-checkable future numbers has been adopted. My bill ADDS a $2.50 “renewable energy development charge” and at the same time says “renewable energy will avoid $3.90 in coal costs” and cause me to “save $2.92 each month”. Eeee gads!!! So BILL me $2.50 more, and SAY it’s saving me $6.82. What a bunch of smoke and mirrors.

And when the rosy predictions don’t pan out, who remembers what was said? Can my children come back in time after our generation and hold them accountable? No. It’s the untraceable lie — or at least an untraceable fabrication or sloppiness. In any case, I don’t like this new paradigm of quoting future numbers with no way to be held accountable.

Hmm.. actually as I think about it, our children DO have a way of holding us accountable. New health care bills have this funny concept about mandatory briefing to the older folks about how to get ready to die because you’ve been cut off from health care. If you no longer help fund the nation, and you cost too much, then “Good-bye”, sorry to see you go! Did you have burial expense insurance?

I kept forgetting where WordPress and Tikiwiki store images. I realized the best place to put the information is inside the Blog, which is the environment I always need it

• For WordPress Blogs, images are stored (and need to be backed up from) blog-root/wp-content/uploads/{year}/{month}/
• For Tikiwiki Wikis, images are stored (and need to be backed up from) wiki-root/img/wiki_up/

One difference between a blog and a wiki is that the blog’s only organization is a is a chronological serial stream, allowing posts to “fall off” the bottom when they get too old. Yes, there is often some categorization or groups, but that is a minor character.

A wiki requires more intelligent hierarchical sort and keeps posts from aging. If you want to keep a time stamp on the material, you need to explicitly embed that into message content.

Turns out most of the material I write is not time dependent, even though it may be keyed by timed events. so I’m slowly transporting blog posts to my wiki. I may even create a wiki stub of sorted blog posts.

What do you think?

Moved to http://www.increa.com/tikiwiki/tiki-index.php?page=UsingCreditToFundYour401k