I have accomplished nothing. Perhaps I should run for Congress.

I sat in a meeting for an hour listening to a gentleman try to explain what the folks who wrote probably don't understand.  It was exactly how I imagine a Congressional subcommittee meeting to be like.   

The group health care plans--you know the ones that the president assured everyone were not going to change if health care was reformed--well, guess what?  (And I bet you won't even need a second guess!) Yep, changing in January.

At every company I have ever worked for, I had the option of deciding on an individual basis not only what insurance/retirement plans I wanted, but also which I wanted tax sheltered.  That choice will no longer belong to me.  It's all or none.  Plus, the new "savings plans" purportedly created to allow the employee to put money away to pay for things like day care and medicines are not only going to cost a fee each month but are going to require so much pre-planning and submission of paperwork as to be no savings at all.

Hell, we can make more money, we can't make time.

The man's solution, too, to the "use it or lose it" dilemma (translation: if you don't use all the money you set aside for health care during the plan year) was the go see the doctor.  Yep, just schedule an appointment for the heck of it! Take a day off (-$250) from work, and just go see your physician so you don't lose that money that you had deducted all year into your flexible spending account  (that was yours to being with) and that you paid a montly fee to save.

Plus, only large chain pharmacies will take the credit card the money is being deposited on because those are the onles who can afford the new software required to administer the program. So, Joe the small-town pharmacist, you are S.O.L.

Frankly, I needed a pill after listening to all this crap.

Please go votes these loons who don't have anything better to do than come up with more bureaucratic bullshit out of office in November.  I, for one, am more motivated than ever....So I guess the hour wasn't a total waste after all.

Shepard Smith is a rebel in the truest sense of the word.

FOX News anchor Shepard Smith took a stand tonight against most Mississippians of his and older generations when he affirmed the newly adopted University of Mississippi mascot, the Rebel Black Bear.  The Black Bear, indigenous to Mississippi, was chosen by a yes-vote of 62 percent of Ole Miss faculty, staff and students.

The Ole Miss alum announced the mascot change on his Studio B program Thursday night and didn't leave up for debate what he thought about the change.  He essentially told his viewers, many of whom wanted to save the traditional Colonel Reb, to get over it already--"It not about you. It's about the kids."  And he said, "I like it," adding that the cartoon mascot was cute, and black bears are tough.  (Tough enough to make mincemeat of elephants Sunday, he added, referring to the game against Alabama's Crimson Tide).

Col. Reb wasn't the first mascot to be fired from Ole Miss.  In fact, his tenure started in 1979 after his predecessor, the Confederate flag, was deemed too racist for the relatively newly-integrated university.  Col. Reb, an old white Dixiecrat-looking fellow, seemed a more race neutral choice for the times.  Well, change has come again, and it stings a little now for some of us, myself included.  Not because of racism for most, but because of nostalgia.  Col. Reb is the mascot I remember from my youth.  In fact, Col. Reb is still the mascot for the high school I attended, and the news from Oxford makes me realize it's just a matter of time before Harrison Central is forced to confront this symbol of continued racism to some.  And honestly, I do understand it.  It's easy for me to say, "It's just a cartoon mascot; it's not real. Get over it."

In reality our strongest convictions are often born of intangible ideals.  And real crimes.  To continue to deny Col. Reb's time has past would make me as guilty of those who refuse to see.

Thanks, Shepard, for being a rebel and speaking up for what's right.

http://www.thetowntalk.com/article/20101014/NEWS01/101014012/-1/rss