When “Affordable” ain’t

Before Obamacare became law, my employer offered three plans: HMO, PPO and High Deductible Health Plan (HDHP). I opted for PPO, which had a combined deductible/copay/coinsurance of $1000/year per person.

The year the act became law, HMO and PPO options were taken off the table, and we were offered the option of HDHP, which had a combined deductible/copay/coinsurance of $5000/year per person. They took great care in repeatedly telling us that this decision had nothing to do with Obamacare, but was to do with “the higher costs of health insurance”, while ignoring the fact that the single biggest changes in the the cost of healthcare was the increased costs to health Insurance mandated by the new law.

“Pull the other one, it’s got bells on it”.

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My lady has multiple allergies and several other health issues, which require several expensive (up to $300/month *each*) drugs. Before Obamacare, I had to find $1000/year to pay for these. At about the cost of a high-end cellphone plan, this was annoying, but bearable. Under HDHP, however, I paid the first $2500 of all medical costs – which we usually burned through by March – and then 20% of all subsequent costs until we had spent another $2500, which happened around September. For the last three months of the year, however, all health costs were covered at 100%.

This led to an interesting interlude a few years ago: I was picking up her drugs and when the pharmacist told me that there was no charge, the fellow behind me said “Free drugs? How do I get some of that?“. I riposted with: “Easy. Just spend five thousand dollars“, to which he replied “Forget I asked.”.

So for me, Obamacare translates directly to a four-thousand-dollar-per-year pay cut – and that’s just for her; if I get sick, that’s another five grand I’ll have to find. this is why I flatly refuse to refer to it as the “Affordable Care Act.” I think it’s the height of understatement to say that I’m not a fan.

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Obamacare is not all bad news; two good things came out of it were The removal of coverage limits was a good thing, and Health Insurance companies could now no longer deny coverage on the basis of Pre-existing conditions. However, both of these changes increased the exposure of Insurance Companies, and those costs were passed on to the Customer – Mr. and Mrs. You-and-me. But the biggest insult about Obamacare was the ridiculous Supreme Court decision that effectively made purchasing healthcare mandatory; a mandate that has since been overturned by Executive Order, and rightly so, in my opinion.

The Healthcare system in the USA used to be a perfect example of capitalism in action; It takes about a million dollars and twelve years to train a doctor – about the same as a fighter pilot. Unlike the Air Force, however, the Physicians train themselves at their own expense, so it makes sense that they should set the value of their services. As an aside, this is tempered by the fact that the AMA and licensing authorities effectively conspire to restrict the supply of doctors, which keeps prices high. This seems to be working; there are, for example, plenty of unemployed attorneys, but the unemployment rate of qualified and licensed physicians is effectively zero, and an M.D. is often perceived, rightly or wrongly, as a license to print money.

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The problem with Obamacare is that it attempts to mix the worst of Capitalist and Socialized systems while getting the best of neither, and ends up being less than the less than the sum of its parts. The young were forced to pay for coverage that they did not want, in order to subsidize the unemployed, the itinerant, and the poor. The quasi-free-market Health Exchanges, while a good idea in theory, have not worked out well in practice; prices have spiraled in recent years, and many insurance providers have left the business or gone out of business.

I, for one, would like to see Obamacare repealed. But it will not be until something better is offered. And by “better”, I mean that “nobody loses any coverage that they currently have”, that simply won’t happen. This is in accordance with Prang’s Law of Freebies, which goes as follows:

“Once someone has gotten used to free stuff, they will never voluntarily give it up, and will fight tooth-and-nail to keep it“

Ten things that you didn’t know about Roe v Wade

Source: Pixabay

1. “Jane Roe” was no angel: The woman in the case, Norma Corvey, had been in and out of prison and had already had two children before she was twenty. She was, in her own words “unemployable and depressed”, and when she got pregnant for the third time, she didn’t want the child.
2. By hook or by crook: At the time, the law in Texas prohibited abortions. She was advised by friends to file a false rape accusation, which she did. The accusation was (rightly) dismissed because she didn’t report the rape to the police at the time. When that didn’t work, she tried to get an illegal abortion, only to find that the clinics near her had been closed down by law enforcement. In desperation, she found a pair of female lawyers who took the case all the way to the Supreme Court.
3. The case was moot: Norma never had an abortion.The child who triggered the case was put up for adoption.
4. Roe v Wade was never about “Women’s rights”: The case was heard by the Supreme Court as a privacy issue, not as an abortion issue. The case was fought primarily as a right for physicians to practice medicine freely and with a minimum of federal oversight
5. The right to life is important: In its ruling, The Supreme Court found that the state’s duty to protect life outweighed the mother’s privacy rights at the point where the fetus was viable. In the 70s, viability was about six months. Today it is abut four. When artificial womb technology becomes available, that will effectively drop to zero, at which point viability will, at least theoretically, trump abortion.
6. The case was not fought on the morality of abortion: One of the arguments was whether consent to sex equaled consent to parenthood. The court rightly found no such equality.
7. The trimester model: A woman had the right to an abortion during the first trimester. During the third Trimester, the fetus was viable, and abortion would therefore be murder. the “trimester model” was dismantled in subsequent Supreme Court cases.
8. It is Constitutional. Sort of…: In its majority finding, The Court deemed abortion a fundamental right under the United States Constitution… even though there is nothing in the constitution that deals directly with the matter. Legitimizing abortion is “a matter of privacy” is a joke, as it does not supersede the “right to life” enshrined in the Declaration of Independence.
9. Roe V Wade is a bad law: Since the case was settled, many Supreme Court justices have said that Roe v Wade was a bad decision. A prime example was none other than Ruth Bader Ginsberg https://www.law.uchicago.edu/news/justice-ruth-bader-ginsburg-offers-critique-roe-v-wade-during-law-school-visit
   Jane Roe is anti-abortion:
10. Roe Repented: Norma Corvey subsequently regretted her actions and the landmark case which bears her name. She went on to become a pro-life advocate. Before she died, she created a website called www.endroe.org.

Six of the best

Six Quick and Easy Reforms to Lower the Cost of Healthcare

1. Make all medically-necessary health expenses fully tax-deductible: Abolish the 10% AGI requirement. Do away with Health Tax Shelters such as FSAs and HSAs. Who loses: the Government and the banks. Who wins: Everybody else.
2. Get rid of “sweetheart deals” that benefit only Insurance companies: All this “in-network” and “out of network” rubbish need to stop. Once upon a time, insured people paid full price so that the uninsured could get healthcare at zero or low cost. Then the Insurance Companies made a grab for the money that was left on the table. Providers were offered lower, fixed rates with insurance companies. Insurance companies need to pay the same as everybody else. Who loses: Insurance companies. Who wins: Everybody else.
3. Allow providers to negotiate discounts: Under current Medicare Law, it is illegal for a Provider to offer you a discount. Who loses: The Government and Insurance companies. Who wins: Everybody else.
4. Require Insurance companies to settle bills immediately: Medical care is the only area where you have no idea what it will cost you until you get a bill, weeks, often months, later. When you go to the pharmacy, you know how much your drugs will cost before you leave. A similar system needs to be implemented for medical care. Who loses: Insurance companies Who wins: Everybody else.
5. Menu Pricing: Customers have a right to know the cost wherever possible, and shop around if necessary. Who loses: Doctors. Who wins: Everybody else.
6. Discourage frivolous malpractice lawsuits. The way things stand, Doctors have to pay thousands of dollars a month. That pushes up the cost for everyone. Who loses: Lawyers and folks who want to sue for malpractice. Who wins: Everybody else.

SSA? SOL!

Or: When Security Isn’t.

I recently got an email from the good folks at the Social Security Administration (SSA). They have added a feature that requires you to type in a Security code that they text to your phone every time you want to log in to your “My Social Security” account.

On the face of it, this sounds like a good thing. But it isn’t. Let me count the ways…

1. Texts are inherently insecure. They can be read by your network operator and phone provider. Due to the sheer number of texts passing through the system, this is not such a problem when a one-off secret is transmitted via text (say to validate a new device), but requiring this every time you want to log in is ridiculous.
2. Not everyone has free texts. In order to keep my unlimited data plan (Thanks Verizon!) I have to pay for every text I send or receive. As a result I have texts disabled and use data-based chat apps (like Signal and Threema) to text with friends and family. This means that I cannot use any text-based system.
3. It’s a cheap solution. Texting codes is not security done right, it is security done cheap. There are better ways to do this; one is to use a code generator like Google Authenticator. Another is to use a hardware token like a Yubikey.
4. You have no choice: “If you do not have a text-enabled cell phone or you do not wish to provide your cell phone number, you will not be able to access your my Social Security account.” Translation: Do it our way or leave. Email or voice notification would work fine… but they aren’t offered.

Only the Government could get away with something like this; any private organization that had such a “my-way-or-the-highway” attitude would soon find themselves shuttered. Some other options would be a good idea. Even the option to eschew two-factor authentication entirely is a valid choice if the user is advised of the risks.

Where’s the “Give-me-my-money-back” button?

Brexit Day

Why Britain should leave, why they probably won’t, and why it doesn’t matter.

When I were a wee lad, way back in 1973, Britain joined what was then called “The Common Market”. Over the years, it became the European Economic Community (“EEC”) and later the European Union (“EU”)

Today, Britain votes on whether we should leave.

Why Britain should leave.

I no longer live in the UK. I left in 1994, so I will not be voting. But if I was, my vote would be a firm unequivocal “NO”. Here’s why:

• The EU is no longer an alliance of equals. It was actually founded in 1957. Britain was the 9th nation to join; when Britain joined in 1973, it consisted of France, West Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Ireland and Denmark. Twice, in 1963 and again in 1967, Britain tried to join. Both times, the application was vetoed by Charles De Gaulle (now there’s gratitude for you). At this point in time (mid-2016), the European Union (“EU”) is composed of twenty-eight members, including Slovenia, Slovakia, Romania, Latvia, Lithuania, and Greece. A union of equals results in an equal sharing of blessings and resources. An unequal union results in the net transfer of resources from the richer nations to the poorer ones.
• It Costs Britain. Britain pays over three hundred million pounds (about half a billion dollars) a week. Other figures say this is 250M a week, due to “rebates” won by Margaret Thatcher. Either way, with or without rebates, it’s bloody huge.
• Sovereignty? What Sovereignty? In the 1970s, Britain fought to defend her fishing grounds in the North Sea. Europe has taken those from her. British fishermen are told to stay in port while other members overfish those grounds into oblivion.
• Britain is not Europe: The British are an insular people. They are not “European”. They have more in common with countries like Canada, Australia, New Zealand and even the United States.
• The game is rigged: Britain joined late, and as a result, “…we were entering a club whose rules were set long before we joined, without our involvement, and not necessarily in our favour. The terms of British membership were particularly poor.” (Source)
• Immigration: Every time a new member joins the EU, its poorest citizens head west. Germany sends them on to France. France sends them on to England — and Britain cannot refuse them entry. And once they arrive, they are quick to maximize the opportunities afforded by a socialist system — at the taxpayer’s expense.
• We’re already half-way there: In spite of Euro entreaties, Britain has successfully fought to keep their national currency (the pound Sterling) and their admittedly-archaic system of weights and measures (also, ironically, call the pound). And the sky has not fallen in.

Why they probably won’t

• Fear-mongering: There is a lot of FUD being spread in the news about how the economy will collapse if Britain leaves — and there are plenty of people who are gullible enough to believe it.
• Entrenched Interests. There are literally thousands of well-paid Government jobs that will disappear if Britain leaves the EU. One can hardly expect those folks to enthusiastically vote to leave – after all, it is impossible to make someone believe something if their paycheck depends on them not believing it.
• Britain has changed: The British people I left behind more than twenty years ago were a bloody-minded, stubborn, independent bunch. With the large number of immigrant Europeans, “timid” Indians, and an increasingly Socialist younger generation, I’m not sure that the country has a whole has the testicular fortitude to leave.
• It’s never been done. Even if Britain votes to leave, there is no guarantee as to how they would do it or whether they could. No country has ever successfully left the EU. There is a good chance that both the British and European Governments will do their best to disregard the clearly-stated will of the people.
• Logistics: The day that Britain leaves the EU, millions of European Citizens living and working in the UK will suddenly be “strangers in a strange land”. And what will happen if they have children who are born in the UK? That mess will take years to fix. When all is said and done, leaving the EU will look more like an amputation than a divorce.

Why it doesn’t matter

• Brussels marches on: Unless Britain gets mean, the European Government will probably simply ignore Britain’s entreaties to leave, or spin it out for years.
• Europe won’t listen: Ireland voted against the Nice Treaty in 2001. Europe demanded that they voted again (in 2008) and again (in 2012) before they finally gave the “right” answer.
• The damage is already done. Even if Britain votes to leave, even if the British Government goes to bat for the country against their own interest (dubious), and even if the European Government allows them to leave (unlikely), they are still bound by too many one-sided treaties and trade agreements for it to make any real difference.

My personal opinion is that they should never have joined in the first place.

The Smell of Desperation

I recently had occasion to rent a car at a nearby car rental establishment. I noticed something in a corner of the contract that I had never seen before:

When I asked about this, I was told that this was new; they were instructed that if the customer had recently arrived by plane, they would have to charge them an airport tax, as if they had rented the car at the airport location. Since it is the state, not the rental company, that profits from these taxes, we can safely assume that this was the Government’s doing.

The logic behind this “new tax” is tenuous indeed. I had always thought that Airport taxes were charged at airport locations, and whether or not you just got off a plane was irrelevant. Apparently I was mistaken. So by this logic, if I drive to the airport and rent a car there, I should not have to pay airport taxes, since I did not just get off a plane. Somehow, I doubt that I would get out of paying that tax.

You can almost smell the State’s desperation to find some new untapped stream of revenue. I can just imagine some bright spark in Frankfort probably said something like “Hey, sometimes people fly in and rent cars elsewhere to get out of paying airport tax! We need to do something about this!“. Oh no you don’t: Last time I looked, tax avoidance was not the same as tax evasion, and it was completely legal.

So this is not an extension of an existing tax, this is a new tax – and one that the prospective purchaser can avoid paying by simply initialing “True“.

Given that this it a tax that can be easily avoided by lying, I wonder how much additional revenue it will generate?

Affordable?

Where ObamaCare went wrong.

The Affordable Care Act — or ObamaCare, as I prefer to call it, giving credit where credit is due — is a wonderful panoply of the entertaining, the frustrating and annoying to me.

• Entertaining, as it is quite amusing watching a bunch of politicians trying to implement socialized medicine and ending up with a curious hodge-podge of Marxism, Capitalism and Corporatism.
• Frustrating, because I have personally experienced the costs of a piece of legislation that was so complicated that we had to pass it to find out what was in it (thanks Nancy!).
• Annoying because I work — indirectly — in the Healthcare industry, and have seen and have had to deal with the direct knock-on effects and consequences that have resulted from the introduction of this legislation.

What they did:

• Insurance for everybody! At some point somebody decided that Health Insurance was a fundamental Human Right, and that we should all have Health Insurance. Pity the 90% of the people on this planet have never heard this.
• That’s an order! The Supreme Court has bought into this flummery to the degree that they ruled that it was a crime to refuse Health Insurance if it was offered to you.
• Expand Medicaid! Free coverage for the poor! Sounds good, but who’s going to pay for this? More on that later.
• Abolish Pre-existing conditions: Depending on who you ask, this was either one of the few good things that came out of the Affordable Care Act or an affront to Free-Market Capitalism. Until now, insurance companies could refuse to insure you if you had a pre-existing condition.
• Abolish annual and lifetime caps. Nobody wants unlimited liability and exposure, and Insurance Companies are no exception. A Heart Transplant costs millions… and nobody wants to pay for that.

Unintended Consequences:

• The words: “If you like your health care plan, you can keep it” will go down in history as one of the great presidential lies of all times, along with “Read my lips, no more taxes“, “I am not a crook“, and “I did not have sex with that woman“.
• The first consequence of Obamacare was that premiums went up significantly. So much so that my employers dropped the HMO and PPO options that they had been offering, leaving only the High-Deductible Health Plan (HDHP) — the cheapest option for them, and the most expensive for those of us who are not young and healthy. The good news is that I now pay about 20% less for health insurance. The bad news is that I am on the hook for the first $10,000 of expenses, Since I have a dependent who has severe allergies and Asthma, I am about $6000 a year worse off than before. Thanks for the pay cut, your Obama-ness.
• Only the largest groups get a good deal: My employers are not a large company, so they get a crappy deal from the Insurance Companies. Big organizations like Federal and State Government, Home Depot and Wal-Mart can use their size to get a better deal.
• Doctors don’t get paid. Under HMO/PPO, the patient pays a Co-Pay. Under HDHP, the entire bill goes to the insurance company where it is “adjusted” and then gets passed on to the customer… who ignores it for several months. Medical bills are now at the back of the line to get paid after just about everything else.
• Insurance companies won’t to answer the phone: “All of our agents are busy at the moment”, “call volume is exceptionally high at the moment”, and “We can’t come to the phone right now” all mean the same thing WE DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH EMPLOYEES.When even your local pharmacist is getting having their time wasted by the IVR run-around, something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

What they should have done:

• Removed or phased out the incentive that enabled employers to offer Health Insurance.
• Added tax breaks for individuals who purchase private health insurance. or added the incentive to private buyers.
• Favorable tax treatment to Health Care Professionals who provide free services.
• Made *all* medical expenses tax-deductible, and abolish that stupid AGI requirement.
• Removed all sweetheart in-network deals for Insurance companies – the original idea behind the HMO was that the insurance companies paid top dollar so that the uninsured could get free or low-cost treatment. This lasted until the Insurance companies realized that there was money left on the table that they could grab.
• Broken the AMA-induced doctor shortage by introducing government-backed training for doctors and/or allowing Nurse Practitioners and Midwives to practice medicine in limited situations without a Doctor present.
• Introduced menu pricing or allowed patients to negotiate prices directly, with governmental oversight in place when this is not possible.
• Reduced our reliance on Employer-provided Health Insurance: Employer Health Insurance first became popular during the Carter years; with a wage freeze in place, employers scrambled for a way to keep their best employees, and this was one of the “perks” that they came up with. There is no definitive reason why Health insurance has to be the province of employers!
• Divided healthcare into acute care (private) and chronic care (public) components, let the private sector handle the former and the Government handle the latter.
• Prohibited conflict-of-interest situations like Insurance companies involving themselves in providing (cheap) medical care.
• Required that Insurance Companies answered the phone. Not sure if there is any practical way to do this.

Of course, none of these things were going to happen, since they all result in a cost to the Government, the Health Insurance companies, or the Doctors.

And we can’t have that now, can we?

SCOTUS Screws Up

This is a long-overdue post, but I didn’t want to expound on this subject without giving it some serious thought, as it is a highly controversial subject.

The Supreme Court has ruled that Gay Marriage is now legal in every state of the Union.

Short answer: This is wrong on so many levels.

Longer answer:

• There is nothing in the Constitution that suggests that Gay Marriage is a constitutional right. You do not have the *right* to marry anyone.
• There is nothing in the Constitution that gives any of the three branches of the Federal Government any power over marriage.
• Marriage has always been a free exercise of religion — an area where the Federal Government is explicitly ordered to keep out.
• Since the Federal Government has no explicit constitutional mandate to police marriage, this responsibility clearly falls to the States, which is where it was before five Supreme Court Judges (including, unsurprisingly, all three women on the court) decided to usurp that power.

Women on top

This ruling is a logical and expected consequence of giving women the vote. That sounds like a horrible, sexist thing to say, but it is nonetheless true. Two-thirds of the six men on the Supreme Court voted against this measure; had the court been all-male, the measure would have been soundly defeated 6-3. But there were also three women on the court, and that made all the difference.

This is hardly surprising; women in general overwhelmingly vote for progressive/liberal/democratic causes and candidates; they also tend to vote for legislation and social programs that benefit them at the expense of others (such as affirmative action, free birth control and other female-only benefits), as opposed to the population in general. They also, as a rule, tend to prioritize feelings over unpleasant truths. It comes as no surprise, then, that all three women on the court voted in favor of recognizing Gay Marriage, and that was enough to squeak out a 5 to 4 victory — the narrowest possible.

It’s not over till it’s over

I have noticed that whenever Liberals win a victory over the Conservatives — such as in this situation — the former instruct the latter in no uncertain terms to sit down and shut up, as the question has been settled for all time. But when the latter takes place — such as California’s Proposition 8, where the majority of Californians voted against gay marriage, or the Hobby Lobby Abortifactants ruling — the result is cry of the losers is invariably a rallying battle-cry of “This is not over! We shall fight on until victory is ours!”

Well folks, this is not over. And there will be consequences.

With Marriage comes Divorce

Yes, Gay marriage is now legal in all fifty states, for good or ill. I suspect that there will be quite a lot of ill. For one thing, when you get marriage, you also get divorce. And given that gay men are generally more promiscuous than straight men, I suspect that we will be seeing a lot of those. With Divorce comes property and custody battles; with the added wrinkle that identifying the “mother” or the “father” is impossible in this case, which will make the jobs of the family courts far more difficult than the current “man-bad-woman-good” model currently allows. Still, given that gays are generally more affluent than straights, the divorce lawyers must be rubbing their hands together in delightful anticipation of the windfall that is to come.

The Beatings will continue until morale improves

With marriage also comes a higher level of domestic violence, and studies have shown that lifetime Domestic Violence statistics among homosexuals is significantly higher than among heterosexuals (7.1% for men, 20% for women). Gay men report 21% Domestic Violence, Lesbians report an incredible 35% — and that was before they were allowed to marry. Given that Domestic Violence is less prevalent outside of marriage on the premise that either partner can walk away at any time, one can only assume that once marriage enters the picture, things will get worse.

Unholy Matrimony

While it is true that Homosexuals now have the right to marry, it has not yet been decided whether they can force a given minister, church or denomination to marry them. And if the primary goal of gay marriage proponents is social acceptance, that is going to be a major sticking point. The US Constitution States that “Congress shall make no law regarding the establishment of religion and the free exercise thereof“. If marriage within the church is an exercise of religion (Hint: it is), this means that Congress cannot compel a church to marry anybody.

In the real world, ministers can, and do, refuse to marry heterosexual couples — for a variety of reasons — every doo-dah-ding-dong-day. And many will flatly refuse to marry homosexuals, claiming (rightly) that the Bible does not have a single positive thing to say about homosexuality. That is their prerogative — both legally and morally.

And even those churches that choose to marry homosexuals (Which is the bride? Which is the groom?) may find their pews emptying as folks leave in disgust — particularly the older ones, whose tithes and offerings keep the doors open and the preacher in paid employment. Hopefully the happy couple have enough rich friends who will step in and take up the slack.

Disagreement is not Homophobia

There are some who will read this and label me as some sort of bible-thumping homophobe. You are welcome to your opinion, as I am welcome to mine. We can agree to disagree. But you understand this: disagreement is not hatred or fear. To my gay readers out there, live your lives as you see fit; the Constitution guarantees you the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Do what you want to do with whom you want to do it, as long as nobody gets hurt it is no concern of mine. If you need specific legal rights — survivorship, beneficiary, custody, etc — you can have them in a Civil Union. I have no problem with that.

But when you mess with Marriage, you mess with God. And He has an annoying habit of having the last word.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

End Paternity Fraud

It is estimated that as many as two million men in this nation are unwittingly raising another man’s child. What’s worse, if the mother can keep that fact under wraps for three years, her husband will be on the hook for child support for somebody else’s child — even if she leaves him and moves in with the child’s biological father.

Don’t expect any sympathy form the courts; they are not interested in justice. When faced with a situation like this, they will think of the child first, the mother second, and throw the man — any man — under the bus. If the real father cannot be found — or chooses not to be identified — the poor schlub who married her will be required to pay the bill, whether he is the father or not. And if he can’t pay, perhaps because he can’t find work or has lost his job, the court will guestimate what his income should be, calculate child support accordingly, and put him in jail if he cannot pay it.

As it happens, paternity fraud is not a crime in any state of the union. And if a man suspects paternity fraud by his cheating wife, she can refuse to divulge the true identity of the father of her child that he is expected to support, and there is no way he can force the issue without her permission. How can it be that an unemployed father can be compelled to pay child support, but the mother can refuse to provide proof of paternity in support of that same child support?

It gets worse: in France, paternity testing is banned. Apparently the courts don’t even care whether or not you are the father – all they care about is whether you can pay.

This needs to change.

The first thing that must be done is to establish paternity at birth. It’s not hard; just make paternity testing a compulsory requirement before the father’s name goes on the birth certificate — and if the child isn’t his, there should be legal remedies available, up to and including termination of the marriage in his favor. If hospitals can routinely perform circumcisions on newborn baby boys, a simple blood test should not be an issue.

Naturally, women will kick and scream at this one. Expect active hostility from the distaff side of the aisle; like moderate Muslims who feign outrage against terrorism while covertly admiring jihadists, women will agree that paternity fraud is wrong, while fighting to keep things just the way they are; they currently benefit from the current “Mama’s-baby-Papa’s-maybe” system, and want the legal protection that they currently enjoy against any indiscretion that they may commit in future to to continue. Apparently their loyalty to “team woman” can trump even sacred vows made before witnesses. And then they will doubtless complain about how men don’t want to marry.

There is a reason that all major world religions rail against adultery, even while Hollywood is busily glorifying it in any way that they can. But every man has a right to know that the children that he is sacrificing his blood and treasure for are actually his, and not the product of an indiscretion – and if they aren’t, he deserves to know that his wife is the dictionary definition of a lying slut.

The second change that is required is that paternity should be proved in all child-support cases. No man should never have to pay child support for another man’s child. No paternity test? No dollars.

The second change that is required is an end to no-fault divorce where children are concerned. It is wrong for a man to walk out on his wife and children. Deadbeat dads are a definite problem. But more and more women are abandoning their marriages, then plundering their joint assets in the name of “fairness”. When a marriage breaks up and children are involved, somebody’s got some ‘splaining to do.

In conclusion, in future elections, make candidates aware if this issue and as what they intend to do about it. Ask incumbents what they have done about it. And vote accordingly.

Going back to the well

Saw this story a few weeks ago.

TL: DR: Back in the nineties, a two people made a baby. He was unemployed and she divorced him in short order. No child support was awarded because he had no money.

Fast-forward twenty years, and he is a multimillionaire… and she suddenly wants £2 Million for child support.

This is not exactly news: She tried this before and was shot in flames down a few years ago, but she’s obviously not letting that slow her down.

At this point, she has only received permission to apply for child support, so there is not much of a story here. But the fact that she has even received permission to take this matter to court is alarming.

There is a tendency in divorce family courts to put women and children first, mostly at the expense of men. This made sense when women could not vote, own property, divorce their husbands without cause or survive and thrive after divorce. But those are no longer problems, yet we still expect men to live up to their side of an ancient bargain that no longer exists.

But women who walk out on their husbands have already made that decision. They have chosen freedom over marital obligation.

If a woman decides to blow up her marriage and walk out on her husband, that is her choice. But that choice came with consequences.When she left him she knew that life would be hard, and she knew that he would not be able to help her. For her to then change her mind yet again and claim child support because he has money is effectively saying:”I don’t want you, but I sure would like some of your money“.

A wife takes a man for better or for worse. A mistress takes a man for better.

It sounds to me like she is trying to get the best of both worlds.