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Romney dodged the same question by time-traveling from Reagan’s era to JFK’s administration, when government spending was far lower than today. Sure it was—that was before the existence of Medicare and the EPA, to pick two examples.
In a sign of respect, Cain was pressed on how his national sales tax would raise the cost of milk, bread, and beer—three major food groups. He responded by saying this would be outweighed by slicing the payroll tax. When the candidates got to question each other, most of the queries were directed at Romney, but Cain ca...
There were no killer sound bites, and with Bloomberg TV lacking the reach of Fox, CNN, or MSNBC, the debate is unlikely to linger long in the public consciousness. But the takeaway is clear: Romney remains the man to beat, Perry is still slipping, and an African-American cancer survivor once dismissed as comic relief h...
Re: Blessed with our hospital, October 25 letter.
In 2011 I had surgery for a double hernia done by Dr Klaus Platt. Last Thursday I had another hernia procedure and was discharged home the following day.
After experiencing high pain I went to see a GP on Wednesday who immediately referred me to ED for an acute admission.
An assessment was made and I was told I would go in for surgery later that evening. This was cancelled at 10.30pm and rebooked for Thursday.
On Thursday morning a doctor said I could go home and wait for four to six weeks on painkillers to see if it would ease up: or have the surgery. My wife and I elected to have surgery.
At 2.30pm I was getting anxious as theatre time usually ends around 5pm.
I rang the house manager who came to see me. At this stage I was an emotional wreck. She contacted theatre and I arrived in the pre-op airlock just after 3.30pm.
At 4.10pm a theatre manager came to tell me: “You won’t like what I am going to say but we have cancelled your surgery.” Another higher priority operation took my place.
I was taken back to the ward shattered. I rang Jim Green and the duty manager, both were unavailable. What should I do? Enough was enough, I self-discharged.
This has been a week of living hell for my family and I. I have never been so humiliated, abused, and disrespected. I have gone without food, water, sleep, have high pain, and experienced episodic PTSD neurosis.
To the writer of the October 25 letter, my experiences as noted are considerably different. After 20 years as a chaplain in the public and private heathcare system in Oz and NZ, now a retiree, I am bewildered at what happened to me.
A bit faulty on the grammar there, Wally. I is the subject pronoun. When the pronoun is object or linked with a preposition, the correct pronoun is me. If the money for "Treaty settlements" had gone into health care, Wally might have got immediate treatment as happened to me in the past few weeks in China. In China, if...
I'm sorry, Father Te Ua, that your surgery was cancelled for that day. You and I will never know what exactly it was, this "Higher Priority Operation" . . . it may have been an emergency Caesarean delivery, saving the lives of a baby and mother, it may have been a perforated appendix, it could have been a traumatic inj...
When my own hernia surgery was delayed the second time, I was frustrated and disappointed, as I also experienced constant high pain. I had made arrangements, taken leave, and had to cancel it the following morning. That was a little embarrassing, the second time.
While it was time-consuming, spending two days in pre-op, tagged, marked and prepped, I didn't find the experience humiliating, abusive or disrespectful. Boring and tedious, but not distressing - such kind, polite staff.
I'm not sure how you come to feel you have been humiliated, abused, or disrespected, as I do not see how having a surgery delayed for another person's emergency procedure would do this.
I do hope you have your surgery this week, and the pain you are in is relieved.
Morgan Freeman has long been the unwilling subject of internet hoaxes, ranging from false quotes to death rumors, and now that the media is being targeted for the way the Newtown, Connecticut shootings were handled, he is now the talk of the web regarding a fake interview.
Freeman is “quoted” as saying the media is mostly to blame for copycat crimes, because of the way they publicize those who perpetrate such heinous acts, like the Newtown and Aurora, Colorado shootings.
The statement goes on to talk about the fact that the media overexposes the public to these people, which can lead to other disturbed individuals causing tragedies of their own in order to become famous rather than die as a “nobody”. Some might agree with that assessment, but Freeman’s rep says he never made those stat...
Industrial reliance on coal power is a growing obstacle to meeting Copenhagen targets.
Sunday marks the deadline for countries to submit their plans for carbon emission cuts, under last month's Copenhagen accord on global warming.
But reducing carbon emissions and keeping to the targets of the agreements will be difficult for many emerging nations.
In India, many factory workers heavily depend on coal power - which can be very environmentally harmful - to make ends meet.
Prerna Suri reports from Ferozabad, in north India, on the challenges the country faces in trying to reduce carbon emission while boosting industrial production and supporting livelihoods.
Above: Kate Edwards discusses the fallout of the #GamerGate campaign during the GamesBeat Summit.
The writer of this story has previously been a member of the IGDA. He no longer is. –Ed.
Click here for all of our GamesBeat Summit coverage.
SAUSALITO, Calif — The effects of Gamergate took center stage during the second day of the GamesBeat Summit. While portions of the vocal campaign have harassed and threatened a lot of game developers despite the larger campaign’s claims of being against unethical games journalism, International Game Developers Associat...
Sexism was the second (within the industry) and fourth (within the content) biggest issues in the most recent of the IGDA’s yearly polling of industry perception, making this more than just a liberal talking point. Working conditions was the top concern, and the perception of violence was third. Edwards cited unspecifi...
A “key to maturation” for the industry, according to Edwards, was the capability for content creators to speak out against industry trends or campaigns like Gamergate. The businesses that threatened to remove their services in the wake of Indiana’s original passing of their Religious Freedom Restoration Act earlier thi...
Edwards did reference Riot Games as an example of helping reduce harassment within their worldwide hit, League of Legends. The IGDA awarded the studio at March’s Game Developers Conference for its work in calling out abusive behavior in its multitplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game. Edwards praised Riot as “brillian...
Above: You can create any content you want, agreed Kate Edwards, but you are still subject to market forces.
When prompted with the idea of a developer that wants to create content to appease the adolescent male demographic, using sexualized depictions of women as a purposeful aesthetic decision, Edwards agreed that they should be allowed to do so. She then brought up the counterpoint that content creation does not exist in a...
A conversation then began between Edwards and Atari founder Nolan Bushnell in regard to the hiring of women in the industry. Bushnell noted that actually bringing women on game design teams was difficult, with some of his listings for programmers and the like getting a 100 percent male response. This brought up how to ...
“What we see is around junior high — without things to keep them engaged against social [gender] pressures, women lose interest,” Edwards said. “… That pipeline needs to be fixed. What we are trying to do right now is to build a great road map, with periods of retention and attraction for women in the industry.
But maintaining design interest in women is only one half of the human resources equation. Edwards, mentioning sociological surveys but not direct citing any specifically, described how the status quo manifests in terms of hiring managers. In the wake of industry discussions of diversity, Edwards described, there has b...
The belief that hiring diverse candidates would disrupt existing team cohesion is also, according to Edwards, disproved by a lot of anthropological studies. It has become the IGDA’s goal, in response to many of these trends, to double the amount of women and people of color within the industry in the next 10 years.
Albion are sweating on an injury to in-form Solly March.
The winger went off at the start of the second half with an ankle problem in last night's 3-1 home defeat by Burnley.
March sustained the injury during the first half when he looked a threat, twice forcing saves out of Tom Heaton and setting up a chance for Pascal Gross.
Manager chris Hughton said: "He's hurt his ankle. The physios did some work at half-time to see if he could run it off, but he wasn't able to. Hopefully it's not too bad.
"Solly's in good form at the moment. We hope it's not a bad one. He's in a very competitive squad and we want as many players fit as possible."
Albion are already missing Colombian winger Jose Izquierdo, out since December with a recurrence of knee trouble.
Two fathers-to-be have been taken hostage. Now they must face their greatest fear: being brainwashed into becoming an Embarrassing Dad. The horrors of appalling magic tricks, dodgy jumpers and the terrifying world of 'Dad Jokes' await.
After a trying year that saw most of her private client work dry up, Martin restructured her law practice to handle mostly government-related business because "that's the only work I'm getting."
Last week, her daughter, an attorney at a Wall Street law firm, called Martin in tears after her firm gutted its real-estate division, leaving many colleagues unemployed for the holidays. Martin's daughter was spared, but she won't be getting the bonus she received last year.
"She's just happy to still be working," Martin said.
In Los Angeles, California, Tanya Raimey, said she and her husband typically "break the bank" on Christmas gifts for her 18-year-old son, whose birthday is Christmas Eve. Last year, he got the latest iPod, skateboard, camera, X-Box, clothing and money, Raimey said.
"We're not going to do that this year. We just can't afford it. Things are different. Money's tight. This year he'll be lucky if we spend maybe $200 or $300," Raimey said.
An unemployed environmental scientist, Raimey, 45, said she's been getting a familiar response to her recent job queries.
"They call me back and they say, 'You really are what we want, but I wish you had called six or eight months ago when we had an opening. But the way the economy is now, we don't have anything.'"
Nearly 63 percent of consumers — 10 percentage points higher than in 2007 — said they were planning on spending less this holiday season than they did last year, according to a survey of 15,000 adults by Discover Financial Services. Eighty-two percent said the same thing in a survey by MyPoints Inc., an online marketin...
Less than 10 percent of consumers will spend more this season than last year, a Boston Consulting Group survey found.
"We may see an actual decline in holiday spending for the first time in many years," said Bill Hampel, chief economist at the Credit Union National Association.
Some 128 million people are likely to shop over Thanksgiving weekend, down from 135 million last year, according to a survey commissioned by the National Retail Federation.
"This is shaping up to be one of the most challenging holiday seasons in years and it's going to take more than the usual discounts and incentives from retailers to get consumers to spend more freely," said Lynn Franco, director of the consumer research center at The Conference Board, a business group.
The expected spending slowdown will begin with the Thanksgiving Day meal itself. The nation's 155 million households will spend $28.5 billion on Thanksgiving this year, mainly for food. That's down 3.4 percent from 2007, according to IBISWorld, a business research firm.
After growing steadily from 36 percent in 1980 to 43 percent in 2006, the share of Thanksgiving food budget spent on restaurant meals began to decline last Thanksgiving — when the current economic downturn first took hold.
That trend appears to be holding steady this year as preoccupation with Thanksgiving kept shoppers away from the nation's malls, where chain store sales dropped nearly 1 percent last week, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers.
"This past week consumers were more interested in getting ready for Thanksgiving rather than shopping for non-discretionary items," said Michael P. Niemira, chief economist at the council. "Ahead of Black Friday shopping, consumers are seemingly holding back waiting for those big discounts in the days following Thanksg...
However, a survey of 100 chief marketing officers some of the nation's largest retailers estimates that sales on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, will increase by only 1.2 percent this year, down from 8.3 percent last year, according to BDO Seidman, an accounting and consulting firm.
Things don't look much better for Cyber Monday — the first Monday after Thanksgiving when people return to work and often begin their online holiday shopping. Despite a flurry of steep price reductions, Cyber Monday sales are expected to increase by only 2.4 percent this year, after jumping 21 percent last year.
"While it is good to see growth, unfortunately this is down significantly from last year," said Ted Vaughan, a partner in the retail and consumer product practice at BDO Seidman.
With the average price of self-serve, unleaded gasoline at $1.91 a gallon, however store and mall officials are hoping some shoppers may be inclined to splurge due to pent-up demand.
"Shoppers who held off buying a DVD player or winter coat over the last few months will find that prices may literally be too good to pass up," said Tracy Mullin, president of the National Retail Federation.
A long-awaited storage bump could be just the excuse existing iPhone users will need to upgrade.
Apple will drop the 16GB base storage option for the iPhone 7, and introduce 32GB as the minimum storage option, claims IHS Technology analyst Kevin Wang (first spotted by 9to5Mac).
Wang expects RAM to remain at 2GB.
It makes sense for Apple to bump the base storage to 32GB. Not only have NAND prices fallen to such a point that bumping to 32GB won't hit Apple in the pocket too much, but it will also give users more space to download more apps and shoot more 4K video and Live Photos.
The biggest downside for Apple is that giving iPhone 7 owners 32GB for the base price - as opposed to selling them an upgrade for $100 - means that there will be less pressure on potential buyers to spend money on a higher model. This, in turn, could hit the iPhone's average selling price.
The maximum storage is expected to be 256GB.
Apart from more storage, analysts don't expect the iPhone 7 to differ all that much from the iPhone 6s. The case will be virtually identical - barring the redesigned antenna stripes and the removal of the headphone jack - and the larger Plus model is also said to feature dual cameras.
The government's latest decision to slap a road-use fee on vehicles while also increasing highway tolls has been panned by transport businesses for being "unreasonable" given the current economic situation.
A circular issued earlier this month requires automobiles to pay VND1.56-12.48 million (US$74.18-593.48) per year at local vehicle registries which are in charge of certifying roadworthiness. They can be paid annually or when obtaining the roadworthiness certificates at stipulated intervals of three to 30 months.
Earlier, at the end of last month, the Ministry of Transport's proposal to increase fees collected at tollbooths by up to 3.5 times until 2016 also got the green light.
The toll for cars with fewer than 12 seats will go up to VND35,000 ($1.66), and for trucks, to VND280,000 ($13.31).
Speaking to Vietweek, Tran Huy Hien, general secretary of the Vietnam Logistics Association, said once the new road-use fee is collected from January 1, transport companies would be paying double fees since their vehicles already pay a fee to use toll roads.
Tolls already account for 20 percent of transporters' costs, he said.
Besides bad infrastructure, a plethora of fees and taxes is making transport costs too high in Vietnam compared to other countries, he said.
In fact, the 15 different fees and taxes including the latest one in the country account for 50-60 percent of total logistics costs.
People would think that the government is trying to collect taxes from all sources to compensate for its "big budget losses," he said, warning this could wipe out businesses.
Bui Van Quan, chairman of the HCMC Transport Association, said that his association, as the representative of hundreds of businesses, has appealed against the new road-use fee to the government office and finance and transport ministries.
The association was also unhappy with several other provisions in the new circular.
For instance, it said, tractors and the semi-trailers and trailers they tow are all separately taxed though the latter two cannot operate on their own, and their cabs cannot function as a transport vehicle without them.
So it is impossible to separate tractors and their trailers and tax each of them, the association said in the appeal it filed on December 3.
It is also unreasonable that even when they are not in use due to reasons like natural disasters and business closure, automobiles are still subject to the fee, the association said.
This is against the government's own ordinance on fees and charges which defines fees as money that a person pays for services they use, it argued.
The government has decided that the road-use fees will be paid into a newly created road maintenance fund.
But Professor Nguyen Quang Toan of the University of Transport in Hanoi wondered if the fund would really help improve road maintenance.
The fee, even if it achieves the collection target, would only be able to meet 20-30 percent of the current requirement for fixing the country's bad roads, he said. Thousands of kilometers more, which are being used excessively, would soon wear down too, he said.
Nguyen Manh Hung, chairman of the Vietnam Automobile Transportation Association, agreed, saying there is almost no hope that the quality of roads would improve because of the new fee.
Critics also raised concerns about the transparency of the fund, saying it is imperative that more independent associations are represented on the fund's management council.
The fund will be managed by a council headed by the Minister of Transport. Its members will be drawn from the ministry, and will include the deputy minister and the road transport chief.
The only independent organization to be represented on it is the Vietnam Automobile Transportation Association.
In Vietnam there are around 35 million motorbikes and 1.5 million cars. The transport ministry has estimated that road-use fees of more than VND6.8 trillion ($323.37 million) will be collected every year from cars and VND2.4 trillion ($114.13 million) from motorbikes.
Motorbikes will have to pay VND50,000-150,000 a year.

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