John Oliver is Amazeballs! (Andy Zaltzman is in his shed)

I'm not hungry, but I'm still gonna have that bar of Snickers.

NSMike wrote:
Serengeti wrote:

Anytime someone prefaces a statement with "I'm not ______ but...", you can bet your ass they are exactly that.

Rezzy wrote:

I'm not sure, but I think you're wrong.

This is a lovely paradox.

Fear of outsiders just puts certain kind of people in a really irrational state. Here in Latvia many of those bemoaning the "swarm" of refugees (around 700 people? really, we have population of around 2 million, it's dubious we would be overwhelmed culturally), were the same people who were discussing where they would flee to if Russia decided to play out Crimea 2.0 here. The cognitive disconnect is just.. fookin' weird.
Also, latvian diaspora in US (refugees from the WWII time) sent some pretty strong anti-immigrant proclamations when gov here was discussing the procedure of how to deal with refugees. The hell, man, don't you remember how you yourself got to your current host country?

In the end, they have the wrong skin tone, that's all there is to it.

polypusher wrote:

It's also unnecessary to assume they're 'unskilled' Everyone needs out of a warzone, not just the untrained. There are language barriers and such but you're not dealing with millions of potential burger flippers.

If anything, considering how expensive it is seems to be to get through the smugglers, it seems like on average those who attempt getting to Europe might be those who are best off.

Which might be good for the countries who get those refugees. On the other hand it also adds the question if the refugees who need the help the most, are left behind in much worse conditions (not to forget mention the effect on the countries close to Syria etc. who at first receive most of the refugees, but then lose the most resourceful/educated ones to Europe or elsewhere).

I bet most studies showing positive net effects of refugees are talking about immigrants in general, which certainly isn't the same. On the other hand I bet most politicians and news medias greatly exaggerate the negative economical (and cultural for that matter) effects of the relatively small amount of refugees that has been at the center of discussions in recent weeks (EU has tried merely to agree on distributing 160.000 refugees...)

It is a difficult topic in any case. Can Europe take millions of refugees and immigrants? Easily. And Europe should. On the other side it is hard to ignore that there might be 10 or 100x times that number trying to immigrate. Cant really absorb 100s of millions. So no matter how much or little we open our borders, we still need to accept some and say no to others, which will always be difficult.
Europe needs to agree, as unlikely as it seems, to distribute refugees more effectively between the countries. It isn't exactly balanced right now IMAGE(http://static6.uk.businessinsider.com/image/55f1215bbd86ef19008b93fe-960/asylum.png) Admittedly GDP should be taken into account as well, that would reduce the differences a bit - well, except for UK I guess.
And the both Europe, and the rest of the richer countries need to help much more in the neighboring countries of Syria and elsewhere, where, if we should be honest, the real economic issues of mass immigration are to be found.

Gravey wrote:

"Human garbage" is quite the charge coming from a Pole who looks like he was old enough to experience WWII. That's something I won't understand about Europe.

Don't think it shows much else than Europe have our Donald Trumps as much as US have. Just the standard everywhere, regardless of history. Even worse, we have an increasing amount of them every day, considering how racist parties are growing and growing all over Europe.
The most negative impact of the immigration is unlikely to be economical or cultural... no, it will be the negative effect of racist left-wing parties growing even faster than ever before. Which obviously is scary as hell in a historic context.

farley3k wrote:
Chumpy_McChump wrote:

There is an obsession with "growth" of all sorts. Somewhere, civilization hit the mentality that equates more with better. I have the same confusion about "the economy"; I'm fascinated by the idea that all economies everywhere need to be constantly growing. Same with populations. Why can't anything be good enough?

I take it as proof we are just really animals and it is instinctual. All animal species expand until prevented by something (disease, predators, lack of resources, etc.) It is how life is wired I think in some fundamental way.

The only problem with this theory is that we have documented proof that humans are different. When countries pass a certain point of economic success, population growth rates begin to drop. Virtually every developed nation in the world has a population growth rate of 1% or less, and is in a state of birth rate decline. Half of the world's population now live in areas where the birth rate is lower than the replacement rate. Essentially people get rich, infant mortality goes down, women get empowered, and the species-survival instinct to have lots of babies goes away.

The fundamental obstacles to people getting enough food in the world today have nothing to do with the supply. We already produce enough food to feed 10 billion people, and we're developing the ecological skills to sustain that pretty much indefinitely. The reasons people aren't getting fed are political and cultural - backwards economic systems that prevent investment in agriculture and keep people poor. The roadmap for change is made obvious by countries like India, where following even a rocky and slow path of economic liberalization has resulted in massive economic growth, huge reductions in poverty levels, an exploding middle class - and unsurprisingly, a falling birth rate.

Mental Health

The most poignant part of that is the plea/demand to actually backup the rhetoric with support for mental health if you are going to use it as a scapegoat for gun violence.

I am 100% sure it was intentional to only use Republican politicians for the clips. I think it is fairly clear that it is the more conservative part of the political spectrum that halts reforms.

I think one of the gut wrenching things is, if proved true, that those mental health integration programs nearly paid for themselves. Surely it is far better than death or prison?
Greyhounding? Come on! What sort of asshole do you have to be?

fangblackbone wrote:

I think one of the gut wrenching things is, if proved true, that those mental health integration programs nearly paid for themselves.

Sure, but that doesn't pay the gun manufacturers or the politicians in their pocket. Won't someone think of the profiteers?

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/aMBTNi9.png)

North Dakota! Be Angry (please)

Did anyone else think of Metal Gear Solid during that section on memes and misattributed quotes?

Real Quotes

Here is the site mentioned above

http://www.definitelyrealquotes.com/

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/ol6FWL9.gif)

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/PLq45Y6.gif)

Pretty sure this one is real:
IMAGE(http://imageshack.com/a/img633/5344/618Fy4.png)

Just because it was true doesn't mean it was real.

IMAGE(http://mx1.politicususa.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Fake-quotes-2.jpg)

FCC cracking down on phone call rates charged for prisoners. This was covered a while back on the show, not sure how much impact Oliver's coverage had in getting this looked at, but cool to see regardless.

John Oliver: I'm not a journalist

“Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” is never far behind when it comes to satirizing the news. The show is in its second season and has renewed for two more. John Oliver joins “CBS This Morning" to discuss the "John Oliver effect" and why he doesn't consider himself to be a journalist.

Worth watching.

So...three more years without a real The Bugle episode?

Did the Bugle officially go on hiatus? I didn't bother listening to all of the non-real episodes that started showing up in the feed, so I don't know its current status.

gore wrote:

Did the Bugle officially go on hiatus? I didn't bother listening to all of the non-real episodes that started showing up in the feed, so I don't know its current status.

They said they'd shoot for one episode a month. That was back in July.

Medicaid Gap

I can't wait to see what he has to say about anonymous and the KKK outings...
Also Obama is pushing the "ban the box" initiative.

farley3k wrote:

Medicaid Gap

While I enjoyed this show, I'm very disappointed to see Oliver making the mythical "free federal money" argument - he's usually much sharper than that.

Aetius wrote:
farley3k wrote:

Medicaid Gap

While I enjoyed this show, I'm very disappointed to see Oliver making the mythical "free federal money" argument - he's usually much sharper than that.

My understanding of the Medicaid Expansion is that is exactly how it works, though. Obviously it's not free, it has to be funded from somewhere (federal taxes), but from the state's perspective, the federal government initially covers 100% of Medicaid costs, then 95% three years later, and 90% three years after that.

If you're a state government, that would seem like a fairly substantial savings for covering over half of your uninsured people. If a state were to cover them itself, it would be substantially more expensive. Of course what is actually happening is that the states that did not accept Medicaid expansion are just letting those people rot. So, in the end, everyone ends up paying for their care anyway, since they will get their care in hospital emergency rooms, and hospitals will have to charge everyone else more to make up for the costs.

Oh, and the citizens of those states that opted out of Medicaid Expansion are still paying for it anyway, since it is funded by their federal tax dollars. They are paying for benefits they are not receiving, *and* they will be paying for the uninsured with increased hospital costs.

Aetius wrote:
farley3k wrote:

Medicaid Gap

While I enjoyed this show, I'm very disappointed to see Oliver making the mythical "free federal money" argument - he's usually much sharper than that.

From what I heard, it was the "money you already paid to the Feds" argument. He even showed a clip of one governor saying he was bringing federal money back to his state.

(That was Kasich)

BadKen wrote:

My understanding of the Medicaid Expansion is that is exactly how it works, though. Obviously it's not free, it has to be funded from somewhere (federal taxes), but from the state's perspective, the federal government initially covers 100% of Medicaid costs, then 95% three years later, and 90% three years after that.

Yes, obviously it has to be funded from somewhere. Where does the federal government get its funding? From the taxpayers of the states. Financially, it doesn't matter at all that the Feds are funding it - the same people are still paying. That's why the "free federal money" argument is so preposterous. If anything, the federal funding is more expensive because it's created/borrowed money instead of straight tax receipts.

If you're a state government, that would seem like a fairly substantial savings for covering over half of your uninsured people. If a state were to cover them itself, it would be substantially more expensive.

It may seem that way, but you have to realize how fundamentally broken this assertion is - and it should be especially obvious in this case, where the state would be putting money straight into the exact same program the Feds are funding. The only difference between the two cases is that the State funding would come through state taxes, and the Federal funding would come through federal taxes.

Through this obvious and glaring mistake, Oliver manages to make the Republicans seem halfway reasonable when they talk about being fiscally responsible, which is just painful.

I guess for me it boils down to whether or not all poor Americans deserve health care. The Federal government has a bigger revenue pool to draw from, and is better able to redistribute funds to poorer states with tax bases that don't support health care for all their residents. States are not putting money into the "exact same program," because some states can't afford the level of benefits, or broader distribution of benefits that a nationwide Medicaid program can provide.

Ohio is not going to use their budget surplus to pay for health care for poor residents of cash-strapped Arizona.