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The Stig

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Posts posted by The Stig

  1. you mean, ever?

    What a bunch of truants! :o

    Someone PM'd me asking to buy my Volvo today, and it got me wondering how you guys have been. I'm back in Vancouver the month of November, and it should definitely involve some cross-border cruising. And, in Kev's case, lots of groping. :lol:

  2. WE LIKE TO SUE.  Medical malpractice drives cost through the roof.  Looks up insurance costs in CA vs US. 

    This is true. Not being a legal expert, and maybe someone else can clarify this, but I believe there is either a guideline or a statute up here that limits the amount one can get for a personal injury suit against a doctor. It's meant to prevent those "I'm suing for $50 million because the doctor forgot to take out a stitch" kind of lawsuits. Hence, there aren't the huge money cases up here that there are south of the border. You guys sure are litigation happy~

  3. Also, Charles raises a very thought-provoking point about a person's responsibility for their own health.

    When you smoke, your odds of getting a smoking related illness are proportional to the duration and intensity of exposure. And when one of these pops up, be it emphysema, cancer, or something else, you can bet there's a significant dollar value associated with treatment, if it is in fact treatable. Yet smokers pay the same level of taxes as someone who doesn't smoke, despite being a much greater burden on the healthcare system due to an addiction that is (to some degree) perpetuated by their own volition. I always found that interesting.

  4. Charles, if what you're describing is an accurate reflection of the US system, then it is tantamount to universal healthcare. No one is denied publicly funded (in addition to private funded) essential treatment. This is the same as in Canada, except the scope of coverage is different, as is the absence of a private system (although this is rapidly changing, despite it being unconstitutional).

    Andrew, the thing is that if it doesn't come out of one pocket, it will come out of another. If the employers don't provide healthcare coverage to their employees, and it is instead left up to the state to provide that, then taxes will go up accordingly. In Canada, basic healthcare services are public, but private party insurance is also provided by some employers to cover additional costs such as dental work, medications, allied health practitioner vists, etc.

  5. I don't think Americans will be getting our drugs for too much longer. There have been a few recent and well-publicized reprimands for Canadian doctors signing prescriptions for American patients that they've never actually seen/examined. It's not considered appropriate standard of care. But everyone knew that was going to happen.

  6. Trust me Those are not frenches, People from Quebec drive Fast, no one from Quebec does under 120km/h or 80 mph (I don't know, I hate the non metric system) on the Highway.  The slow people with Quebec licence plates must be people who just started to live in Quebec.  :P

    That's true, they're crazy drivers over there.

  7. I think Canada is waiting for a missile defense system that actually does what it's supposed to. A 62.5% success rate isn't exactly anything to write home about. The money can and will be spend better elsewhere.

    The US should worry less about Canada and more about why the entire world seems intent on sending missiles its way.

  8. something that really bothers me about canada is the anti american things going around. I have a nice place in florida and love the states and maybe i dont agree with alot of bush policies but i do agree with some. And being canadian it seems the americans dont like me, and being canadian and conservative i get the same thing from the canadians, so where do i go?

    Russia! :P

  9. socialized health care may not be the answer, but what we have sure as hell isn't either. it is a system designed to enrich the rich and nothing else. the wife is a doctor, so trust me, I have a very intimate knowledge of how the hospitals and insurance companies work, not to mention drug and device companies. it is a filthy, slimy, racket.

    Couldn't agree more. Even up here, it's the same with respect to drug companies.

  10. The threat posed by Eric Rudolph to family planning doctors and their patients did not go un-noticed either. How many women didn't seek the medical attention they needed because they feared the harrasment of protesters and the threat of being blown up by a renegade lunatic?

    This is very true, both in America, Canada, and all over the world.

  11. You sure?

    American women fighting and dying in Iraq

    War brings increased participation not considered a decade ago

    BY MATT KELLEY

    Associated Press

    WASHINGTON--Female American troops in Iraq have killed Iraqis with bombs and bullets. They've won medals for valor and Purple Hearts for combat wounds. They've been captured as prisoners of war, killed by enemy fire and buried as heroes in Arlington National Cemetery.

    American women have participated more extensively in combat in Iraq than in any previous war in U.S. history. They've taken roles nearly inconceivable just a decade or two ago, flying fighter jets and attack helicopters, patrolling streets armed with machine guns and commanding units of mostly male soldiers. Seven have been killed in combat.

    Yet all this has gone largely without much comment in Washington, despite the attention given to rescued POW Jessica Lynch.

    Congress debated the issue of women in the military after the 1991 Gulf War, voting months later to loosen the 1948 ban on women in combat. The issue hasn't come up on Capitol Hill this year, however.

    "It doesn't seem to be a big deal," said retired Navy Capt. Lory Manning, who tracks military issues for the Women's Research and Education Institute.

    "We could not do what needs to be done over there without women. If there needs to be a body search of an Iraqi woman, there's no way an American male could do that."

    Military women in Iraq say they are doing their jobs just like their male colleagues. Sgt. Erin Edwards, 23, often travels in armed convoys as part of her work as an aide to a commander of the 4th Infantry Division in Tikrit.

    Edwards left her 3-year-old son and infant daughter with her in-laws to serve in Iraq because her husband serves in the Army in South Korea.

    "I would love to be at home with my kids, but I'm doing this for them. I wouldn't want to do anything else," Edwards said recently.

    Opponents of women in combat haven't resigned themselves to this turn of events. They're trying to pressure President Bush to reinstate restrictions on women serving in support units that travel close to the front lines, such as Lynch's 507th Maintenance Company, which was ambushed in Nasiriyah. That unit included the first American woman soldier killed in the Iraq war, Pfc. Lori Piestewa.

    Elaine Donnelly, an opponent of women in combat who is spearheading a petition drive on the issue, said it's important that women not be put in danger of being captured and raped. Medical records indicate Lynch was sodomized while in Iraqi captivity, but she has said she does not remember it.

    "If we are opposed to violence against women at the Air Force and other service academies, why all of a sudden if violence happens at the hands of the enemy, we say it doesn't matter?" said Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, which claims more than 20,000 signatures on the petition. "That's a step backward for civilization, not a step forward."

    Pentagon officials say they do not keep track of the number of women serving in Iraq. Overall, 15 percent of active-duty troops and 17 percent of National Guard and reserve forces are women.

    Acting on the 1991 law allowing greater roles for women, the Pentagon loosened restrictions on women's military service in 1994. The new rules allow women to become combat pilots and take other jobs that previously were off-limits.

    The military retained some restrictions: Army women still can't serve in front-line infantry, tank or artillery units, and Navy women can't serve on submarines or in the SEAL special forces units, for example.

    But the conflict in Iraq, in the manner of other modern wars, has blurred the line between combat and noncombat units.

    Women can serve as military police, which patrol Iraqi cities and often have been involved in fighting with Iraqi insurgents. Supply convoys and troop transports often include female soldiers and have been the targets of repeated attacks by anti-American forces.

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