"Standstill crash"

On 2017-07-13 20:50, John B. wrote:
On Thu, 13 Jul 2017 07:25:31 -0700, Joerg
wrote:

On 2017-07-12 22:00, John B. wrote:
On Wed, 12 Jul 2017 10:19:46 -0700, Joerg
wrote:


[...]

However, the benefits are there regardless. For example, I had a liver
value (ALT) that was always too high. The doc said to reduce alcohol so
I went teetotaler for months to test that diagnosis. That did absolutely
nothing. Neither did the Atkins diet or any other I tried. In 2013 I
started riding again and pretty intensely. 4000mi/year isn't excessive
compared to others here and not even close to what I used to ride
decades ago but much of that is strenuous MTB trail riding. Sure enough
the ALT value dropped smack dab to the middle of the ideal range.

But an ATL measures damage to the liver. Not the effects of a diet.


Then why did it drop way down into the normal range? My only lifestyle
change was going from almost no exercise (other than walking a few miles
each day which isn't strenuous at all) to intense cycling.


I have no idea. But ATL tests primarily measure damage to the liver.
The main reasons seem to be:
Identify liver disease, especially cirrhosis and hepatitis caused by
alcohol, drugs, or viruses.
Help check for liver damage.
Find out whether jaundice was caused by a blood disorder or liver
disease.
Keep track of the effects of medicines that can damage the liver.


It can also indicate muscle inflammation and can read higher than normal
days after strenuous exercise. This makes my results even more weird
because while I properly fasted as usual before the test I kept my
normal cycling regimen. That includes long rides several times a week
and they have phases where I almost "redline" it unless a slower rider
accompanies.

https://fuelary.com/elevated-liver-enzymes/

[...]

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com/

On 2017-07-12 21:36, John B. wrote:
On Wed, 12 Jul 2017 15:01:40 -0500, AMuzi wrote:

On 7/12/2017 2:36 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Wednesday, July 12, 2017 at 10:26:16 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 7/12/2017 1:16 PM, AMuzi wrote:
On 7/12/2017 12:05 PM, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 7/12/2017 9:28 AM, AMuzi wrote:
On 7/11/2017 10:03 PM, John B. wrote:
On Tue, 11 Jul 2017 09:29:48 -0700, Joerg

wrote:

On 2017-07-10 22:15, John B. wrote:
On Mon, 10 Jul 2017 16:01:07 -0700, Joerg

wrote:

On 2017-07-10 15:46, Doug Landau wrote:
On Friday, July 7, 2017 at 8:53:43 AM UTC-7,
wrote:
On Friday, July 7, 2017 at 12:56:16 AM UTC-7, John
B. wrote:
On Thu, 6 Jul 2017 07:12:55 -0700 (PDT),
wrote:

On Wednesday, July 5, 2017 at 8:01:26 PM UTC-7,
John B. wrote:

Cops traditionally have had high retirement pay.
After 20 or more
years of very low pay and long hours. How else do
you entice anyone to
take a low salary, and harassment by the general
public, as a career?

You don't know what cops make these days do you?

Well, given that part time common labor gets $10 an
hour, in the
Sacramento area of California, how much do you have
to pay to hire
people who are willing to be called a pig everyday.

A cop in Sacramento makes about $28/hr and time and
a half for overtime and double time for more than 4
hours of overtime.

That is a lot of money in Sacramento when a nice
home cost less than $350,000. That means that less
than a quarter of your income goes to your housing.
That is entirely different from the San Francisco
bay area where 2/3rds of your income goes to housing.

http://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/24/twitt...ends-meet.html




Let's drill down to the details he

$3k/month rent is $36k/year. Wife and two kids means
he won't pay top
bracket even at $160k. He probably pays less than 25%
in federal taxes.
Let's say with state taxes it's 30%. That leaves $76k
after paying the
rent. That is a lot of money. What is this guy doing?

Of course, many people are of the firm belief that
they "need" two new
high-class cars every 2-3 years, a $50/mo cell plan
for every family
member, $100/mo cable TV with all the sports
offerings, $150/mo gym
membership, $8/day for the morning coffee shop (per
adult, of course),
$20 lunch, expensive school lunch for the kids, et
cetera, et cetera.
And then they wonder why they can't make ends meet.

Those people need a good dose of tutoring in financial
matters.

I find, what is apparently normal, family economics in
the U.S. as
almost unbelievable.


I could not agree more.


I live in a two story concrete house on a small lot in
N.E. quadrant
of Bangkok. Granted we built the place 35 years ago but
still we saved
money until we could pay cash, largely because in those
days nobody
was silly enough to loan money to either an unemployed
woman or a man
who worked outside the country.

Quite a few years ago I bought a hand phone and took
out the usual
post paid plan. Sometime later I bought my wife a hand
phone and just
put a plain old pre-paid SIM in it. Then I discovered
that it cost
more for my post paid plan then her prepaid plan so I
changed to
pre-paid. I usually buy a packet of 5, 200 baht, "top
up" cards for
1,000 baht and they usually last us at least a month.
So at current
exchange rates that is about $29/month for two phones.
(It would, of
course, be cheaper if my wife didn't talk so much :-)


Hah, beat you there. We pay $7/mo each for pre-paid cell
service. Even
at that rate we have both now piled up tens of hours of
talk time that
we'll likely never use up.

Looks like you and I have a very similar strategy when
it comes to
family finances, or finances in general. Unfortunately
people in
government are unable or unwilling to learn that.

[...]

In 1784 with the signing of the "Peace of Paris" the U.S.
formally
became a sovereign nation. Government revenue came
primarily from
customs duties, land sales, and taxes levied on goods
such as
distilled spirits, slaves, and tobacco.

Today, some 233 years later the primary (80%) source of
government
income is from individual income tax. The secondary (11%)
source is
from corporate income tax and the remainder from various
sources.

Which is so pernicious and has such devastating secondary
effects in a society that The Founders expressly wrote
that levies should only be laid in proportion to
population. (Art I sec 9) The first few attempts at an
income tax were held, rightly, to be unconstitutional.

With the emergence of the anti-alcohol movement, devious
minds realized that since the Federal government relied
heavily on alcohol taxes, prohibition would never fly and
so the income tax amendment preceded their true goal,
enforced temperance (which worked about as well as today's
drug laws).

And here we are. The tax code is voluminous, plus the
administrative rulings and a hundred years of case law, so
complex, contradictory and confounding that annual
inquiries of tax questions to IRS employees yield the
wrong answer most of the time. The end of Prohibition was
driven more by repulsion of its corrosive effects on
society through bribes, corruption and crime than by
actual dipsomania. Yet our tax code, every paragraph,
sentence and clause bought through one congressman or
another to the detriment of revenue, fairness and
efficiency, remains.

So the solution is... ??

Bright and workable proposals abound, as long as I've followed politics
and economics.

But no one in Congress will ever vote to remove the opportunity to shake
down one industry or taxpayer category or another as a perpetual source
of campaign funding (and unreported income as well).

As with all economic questions, the "bright and workable proposals" vary
all across the spectrum. They depend heavily on who is judging the
brightness.

But a bright and workable proposal that will never get enough votes to
pass is not a solution.

The 35th draft amendments will get enough votes, but by then, the bill will be reduced to a minor change to the tax code ensuring breaks for those who own three-leg Chihuahuas with flea problems. The powerful Chihuahua and flea shampoo lobbies will shout down anyone who votes against it. Do you hate Chihuahuas? http://images4.fanpop.com/image/phot...-1600-1200.jpg How could you?

A huge number of people will buy three-legged Chihuahuas to take the deduction. Turbo tax will have questions like "do you own a dog? What kind of dog do you own? Does your dog have fleas? How many legs does your dog have?" If you just have a normal pug or a Labrador, you'll get a pop-up box "I'm sorry, your dog does not qualify for the "Make America Great Again Tax Fairness and Canine Disability Act of 2018."

Yahoo News won't know what to do with it -- they'll want to hammer Trump for the obvious failure to make meaningful changes to the tax code but at the same time will not want to disrespect disabled Chihuahuas with fleas. Trump will want to declare victory but will worry about the clear Mexico connection and the absence of funding for a wall of any kind. Portland will have a Chihuahua Pride parade. http://tinyurl.com/yb9lzp47 Someone somewhere will block traffic. It will be great. Again.

-- Jay Beattie.



See what I mean? Clutter up the phrasing, make them run-on
sentences and add a few qualifying or disqualifying factors
and that would pass for an IRS form instruction page.

We are truly beyond parody now.

I'm not sure that "now" is applicable. I remember, probably 15 or more
years ago, our Comptroller spent a week filling out his tax return and
all the necessary forms. Granted he had a job, and he had investments,
and he had at least one rental property, but he was a CPA and he had
copies of the applicable tax codes. A week of work to figure out your
taxes?


It gets to be even more fun for people who have foreign assets or
accounts. They get to fill out two tax returns. One goes to one
department of the Treasury, the other to another. They could simply and
automatically forward the info but I guess in government that's asking
too much. You must report account balance and such but with different
(!) exchange rates. Nuts.

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com/

On Fri, 14 Jul 2017 11:46:17 -0700, Joerg
wrote:

On 2017-07-12 21:36, John B. wrote:
On Wed, 12 Jul 2017 15:01:40 -0500, AMuzi wrote:

On 7/12/2017 2:36 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Wednesday, July 12, 2017 at 10:26:16 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 7/12/2017 1:16 PM, AMuzi wrote:
On 7/12/2017 12:05 PM, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 7/12/2017 9:28 AM, AMuzi wrote:
On 7/11/2017 10:03 PM, John B. wrote:
On Tue, 11 Jul 2017 09:29:48 -0700, Joerg

wrote:

On 2017-07-10 22:15, John B. wrote:
On Mon, 10 Jul 2017 16:01:07 -0700, Joerg

wrote:

On 2017-07-10 15:46, Doug Landau wrote:
On Friday, July 7, 2017 at 8:53:43 AM UTC-7,
wrote:
On Friday, July 7, 2017 at 12:56:16 AM UTC-7, John
B. wrote:
On Thu, 6 Jul 2017 07:12:55 -0700 (PDT),
wrote:

On Wednesday, July 5, 2017 at 8:01:26 PM UTC-7,
John B. wrote:

Cops traditionally have had high retirement pay.
After 20 or more
years of very low pay and long hours. How else do
you entice anyone to
take a low salary, and harassment by the general
public, as a career?

You don't know what cops make these days do you?

Well, given that part time common labor gets $10 an
hour, in the
Sacramento area of California, how much do you have
to pay to hire
people who are willing to be called a pig everyday.

A cop in Sacramento makes about $28/hr and time and
a half for overtime and double time for more than 4
hours of overtime.

That is a lot of money in Sacramento when a nice
home cost less than $350,000. That means that less
than a quarter of your income goes to your housing.
That is entirely different from the San Francisco
bay area where 2/3rds of your income goes to housing.

http://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/24/twitt...ends-meet.html




Let's drill down to the details he

$3k/month rent is $36k/year. Wife and two kids means
he won't pay top
bracket even at $160k. He probably pays less than 25%
in federal taxes.
Let's say with state taxes it's 30%. That leaves $76k
after paying the
rent. That is a lot of money. What is this guy doing?

Of course, many people are of the firm belief that
they "need" two new
high-class cars every 2-3 years, a $50/mo cell plan
for every family
member, $100/mo cable TV with all the sports
offerings, $150/mo gym
membership, $8/day for the morning coffee shop (per
adult, of course),
$20 lunch, expensive school lunch for the kids, et
cetera, et cetera.
And then they wonder why they can't make ends meet.

Those people need a good dose of tutoring in financial
matters.

I find, what is apparently normal, family economics in
the U.S. as
almost unbelievable.


I could not agree more.


I live in a two story concrete house on a small lot in
N.E. quadrant
of Bangkok. Granted we built the place 35 years ago but
still we saved
money until we could pay cash, largely because in those
days nobody
was silly enough to loan money to either an unemployed
woman or a man
who worked outside the country.

Quite a few years ago I bought a hand phone and took
out the usual
post paid plan. Sometime later I bought my wife a hand
phone and just
put a plain old pre-paid SIM in it. Then I discovered
that it cost
more for my post paid plan then her prepaid plan so I
changed to
pre-paid. I usually buy a packet of 5, 200 baht, "top
up" cards for
1,000 baht and they usually last us at least a month.
So at current
exchange rates that is about $29/month for two phones.
(It would, of
course, be cheaper if my wife didn't talk so much :-)


Hah, beat you there. We pay $7/mo each for pre-paid cell
service. Even
at that rate we have both now piled up tens of hours of
talk time that
we'll likely never use up.

Looks like you and I have a very similar strategy when
it comes to
family finances, or finances in general. Unfortunately
people in
government are unable or unwilling to learn that.

[...]

In 1784 with the signing of the "Peace of Paris" the U.S.
formally
became a sovereign nation. Government revenue came
primarily from
customs duties, land sales, and taxes levied on goods
such as
distilled spirits, slaves, and tobacco.

Today, some 233 years later the primary (80%) source of
government
income is from individual income tax. The secondary (11%)
source is
from corporate income tax and the remainder from various
sources.

Which is so pernicious and has such devastating secondary
effects in a society that The Founders expressly wrote
that levies should only be laid in proportion to
population. (Art I sec 9) The first few attempts at an
income tax were held, rightly, to be unconstitutional.

With the emergence of the anti-alcohol movement, devious
minds realized that since the Federal government relied
heavily on alcohol taxes, prohibition would never fly and
so the income tax amendment preceded their true goal,
enforced temperance (which worked about as well as today's
drug laws).

And here we are. The tax code is voluminous, plus the
administrative rulings and a hundred years of case law, so
complex, contradictory and confounding that annual
inquiries of tax questions to IRS employees yield the
wrong answer most of the time. The end of Prohibition was
driven more by repulsion of its corrosive effects on
society through bribes, corruption and crime than by
actual dipsomania. Yet our tax code, every paragraph,
sentence and clause bought through one congressman or
another to the detriment of revenue, fairness and
efficiency, remains.

So the solution is... ??

Bright and workable proposals abound, as long as I've followed politics
and economics.

But no one in Congress will ever vote to remove the opportunity to shake
down one industry or taxpayer category or another as a perpetual source
of campaign funding (and unreported income as well).

As with all economic questions, the "bright and workable proposals" vary
all across the spectrum. They depend heavily on who is judging the
brightness.

But a bright and workable proposal that will never get enough votes to
pass is not a solution.

The 35th draft amendments will get enough votes, but by then, the bill will be reduced to a minor change to the tax code ensuring breaks for those who own three-leg Chihuahuas with flea problems. The powerful Chihuahua and flea shampoo lobbies will shout down anyone who votes against it. Do you hate Chihuahuas? http://images4.fanpop.com/image/phot...-1600-1200.jpg How could you?

A huge number of people will buy three-legged Chihuahuas to take the deduction. Turbo tax will have questions like "do you own a dog? What kind of dog do you own? Does your dog have fleas? How many legs does your dog have?" If you just have a normal pug or a Labrador, you'll get a pop-up box "I'm sorry, your dog does not qualify for the "Make America Great Again Tax Fairness and Canine Disability Act of 2018."

Yahoo News won't know what to do with it -- they'll want to hammer Trump for the obvious failure to make meaningful changes to the tax code but at the same time will not want to disrespect disabled Chihuahuas with fleas. Trump will want to declare victory but will worry about the clear Mexico connection and the absence of funding for a wall of any kind. Portland will have a Chihuahua Pride parade. http://tinyurl.com/yb9lzp47 Someone somewhere will block traffic. It will be great. Again.

-- Jay Beattie.



See what I mean? Clutter up the phrasing, make them run-on
sentences and add a few qualifying or disqualifying factors
and that would pass for an IRS form instruction page.

We are truly beyond parody now.

I'm not sure that "now" is applicable. I remember, probably 15 or more
years ago, our Comptroller spent a week filling out his tax return and
all the necessary forms. Granted he had a job, and he had investments,
and he had at least one rental property, but he was a CPA and he had
copies of the applicable tax codes. A week of work to figure out your
taxes?


It gets to be even more fun for people who have foreign assets or
accounts. They get to fill out two tax returns. One goes to one
department of the Treasury, the other to another. They could simply and
automatically forward the info but I guess in government that's asking
too much. You must report account balance and such but with different
(!) exchange rates. Nuts.

That may have been the case with our Comptroller as he was working in
a foreign company that paid local taxes on his behalf, I believe that
at least some of his interest earning bank accounts were in either
Hong Kong or Singapore, and he owned rental property in California and
traded on the New York stock exchange.

--
Cheers,

John B.