I didn’t make it far.

Before I left I attempted to sign into my google account. I received an error relating to the lack of configured access points. I stopped and started the wireless data service but nothing would work. Luckily, I hadn’t left the parking lot so I went back inside to figure it out. Ten minutes later, with a brand new sim card installed I was once again on my way. I’ve never used an Android phone of any variety but this phone is slick as hell. I was on a HSPA “4G” network and downloads were blistering fast (compared to my old blackberry) and I was able to download apps in mere seconds. I’m still learning the UI so I’ve got a ways to go but this is a wicked fast phone. I’ve tested the camera and the photos turn out quite well. My knee jerk recommendation to is buy this phone if you’re in the market for a new android phone on AT&T and you want nothing to do with the forthcoming Motorola Atrix.

After a bit of messing with the phone I’ve found only a few issues and those are mostly interface issues. The phone is branded as a HTC Desire HD in most of the menus. It made me laugh the first time I saw it but its surely there. Most of those fields can be changed and it doesn’t hurt anything so it’s of no consequence. Changing the ringtones is a bit of a pain due to the way it’s branded by AT&T or by the way the OS is setup. If you go to the ringtones menu you’ll only get to pick from the presets or go the HTC site to find new ones. If you’ve got media files less than 300k on the SD card (8gb included with the phone) you can make those changes direct from the media folder. This phone is going to be around for the next two years so we’ll see how it fares.

There is no milk

I was amazed by the empty shelves. It’s as if they don’t expect to be able to leave their houses for weeks.

Snow is water...

While the temps are supposed to drop over the next few days I didn’t expect water to be in such short supply. Do pipes freeze this bad in this part of the country?

Chips are a survival item?

This aisle made me laugh – chips are a vital part of the diet of the local population. The only sections hit harder were the water, milk, and bread.

Lines? We know lines

For most people lines like this are normal at a Walmart . This place is an oddity because I’ve never seen lines like this. They had every single register open and the queue (good old British English) was quite deep.

Snow? Really?!?

I have a five hour class delay for this?

Just a little drift

Ok, there are drifts but this still isn’t that bad.

It's not that bad

A shot out of my front door. I didn’t venture farther because I didn’t want to put on shoes. I don’t think it’s any worse than what you can see out the door.

I think the response to this snow will be similar to the snowfall we faced two years ago in the Puget Sound. The city and county only had a few plows and we waited for days for the roads to be cleared. I’m sure that I’ll face a similar situation here. The difference is that there are no hills in this part of the country. The wind is moving briskly so there will be some drifts but I don’t think it will be anything to worry about.

A battle over who to blame for rising health-care costs is escalating, as groups seek to pin the problem on each other and say none of the health-care legislation under consideration does enough to solve it.U.S. spending on health care reached $2.5 trillion in 2009, according to federal estimates. It is expected to jump to $4.5 trillion in 10 years. Insurers contend that they must pass on ever-higher bills from hospitals and doctors. Hospitals say they are struggling with more uninsured patients, demands by doctors for top salaries, and underpayments from Medicare and Medicaid.

Nearly every mainstream analysis calls for medical costs to continue to climb over the next decade, outpacing the growth in the overall economy and certainly increasing faster than the average paycheck. Those higher costs will translate into higher premiums, which will mean fewer individuals and businesses will be able to afford insurance coverage. More of everyone’s dollar will go to health care, and government programs like Medicare and Medicaid will struggle to find the money to operate.

The health care that we are currently providing in Medicare and Medicaid doesn’t cover the actual providers costs. The cost of all health care is set to rise over the next 10-15 years. The 2nd and 3rd largest portions of the federal budget are Medicare and Medicaid.

Why haven’t we done anything about this emerging threat? Simply put, its a political landmine. Over the last few weeks both sides have argued in all channels and have said that they can’t agree with each other. Isn’t the job of the legislative branch to protect the best interests of the American people? Shouldn’t they put their political interests aside and do the right thing – cut spending where they can and improve service where it is failing?

The time line as I saw it went like this
1. The President put a mandate to congress to come up with a plan
2. Congress hemmed and hawed and didn’t come up with anything concrete (many points were made and argued but no progress was made)
3. Republicans complained that the President didn’t provide leadership on the issue
4. The President, in absence of a clear plan, provided his own take on the situation
5. The Republicans complained that they didn’t like it
6. A health care summit was chaired by the President to move the process forward but the issue remains unresolved
7. The Democrats do not want to commit to a plan for fear of political suicide – if it fails, they are out of jobs and the other side wins

Basically, if the plan or lack of plan fails the Republicans “absolve” themselves of blame. If they procrastinate long enough they can pin all of the blame on the other party.

Who suffers? Every single tax payer in America suffers.

Its a huge issue – most economists will agree that when ceilings and controls are put into place less of the service will become available and quality will decline (do a search on NYC rent controls).

There is a lot of “fat” in the system and some people are making money – people are allowed to make money in a Capitalist society. I’m against inefficiency and waste.

I want everyone to be able to afford basic health care.
I want providers to provide that health care without doing so at a loss.

If we can’t do that – maybe we should cut it out – all of it. Social security should go too. People depend on that stuff – it is their livelyhood – people will die without it or we can go broke trying to provide it.

There are hard choice to me made by Senators and Congressmen – now is the time to make them – before its too late.

Questions like these are why I love economics – huge, broad, expansive questions with long detailed answers – answers that we may not get correct. Sure, our policy makers are educated and their advisors often have PhD’s in their respective fields but the problem is simply massive. By the time we’ve collected and analyzed all of the data the situation will have surely changed.

Look at the weather, for example, how often have we been told that that the mean temperature on our planet is rising. How much bizarre weather have we all experienced in the past few years? Isn’t it strange that Seattle had its warmest and driest summer ever but is experiencing one of its coldest winters so far? Our climate, much like the economy, is a massive system with millions of variables. To think that we can figure out what is causing it and “solve” the problem completely is ridiculous. I think that we can find solutions that will improve our situation but I doubt we can “stop” the warming like we can stop our cars in front of a stop sign. It’s simply too big. If we ALL changed – today – forever – we could start a gradual change in both the economy and in our climate. Without everyone involved its simply going to take time.

Wait a minute? I remember a speech from our President shortly after he came into office saying that it would take some time for our economy to recover. Hmmm… good advisers? Wise choice of words? Absolutely! Recent indicators show that we are on our way out of this hole that we have dug – we’re not out of the woods yet but we’re headed into the right direction.

Just my two cents.