Chapter 3, Page 61

Was thinking of uploading both pages at once but I just can’t sit on pages after they’re done, so here we are, haha. Last page of the chapter up tomorrow.
Also, I retconn’d the color on the previous page, since everyone missed there was a thing in the water XD Red makes more sense anyways so here we are.

I’m going to be adding a new wallpaper this weekend to the Patreon to commemorate finally giving birth to this chapter, that’ll be up for all wallpaper-access tiers. After this end of the chapter I’m hopping back to TM updates and also posting the interlude.

Political stuff below the break!


Some suggestions for American readers who crave better representation in this post-Obama Presidency:
Foster Campbell is running for a Democratic senate seat, you can donate to help win another seat for Democrats in 2017.
make a quick call (or fax) to request a bipartisan review of Trump’s financial conflicts of interest
– continue to call your representatives to voice your opinion on issues you disagree with in these first few weeks. It’s easy and you can get a step-by-step here.

So far most of the critical voices I’ve heard are saying “why bother? stop whining just accept this is the way it is.” The way I see it is that there is very little for anyone to lose by making a small effort every day, and a lot to gain to make sure we don’t head down a path we can’t return from. I’d rather overreact and learn how to be involved in my political process than under-react and regret that I didn’t do more to help my neighbors after it is too late.

Thanks for reading and see you tomorrow.

60 Comments

  • Lost Yooper

    Bex must smell / taste a lot better than Mike does! Also – the return of LEVi?

    • Pumpkin_Cake

      I don’t think so. LEVi had squarish speech bubbles with clipped corners. Round bubbles says to me that it’s somebody organic.

      • Lost Yooper

        That’s true… Maybe its some weird LEVi / Kallakore mash up like in “The Fly” Since there were two bodies in the mirror it created a Wollaria / Robot hybrid.

    • Fat chances it’s LEVi, but there also was “weaker version” in cave during the quake.

  • Spark

    A s s i m i l a t e

  • Patrick

    Buried him deep.

  • Pumpkin_Cake

    Ribbonfish says you shouldn’t walk around covered in blood. It only wants to help her look her best!

  • Minutiae

    Oooh

    Oh my. I’m dying. tomorrow? ???

    • shingworks

      If I’m done tonight I’ll put it up tonight :p

      • Retterhardt

        :O

      • grahamf

        youcandoityoucandoityoucandoityoucandoityoucandoit

  • …Mike gets a pass because he has a symbiote ?

    • Or maybe, they were attracted to the blood on her spacesuit, and released once the “water” had taken it off.

  • Adriano

    Wait, there was something in the water other than Michael?

    • Rana

      If you look at her foot in panel 1, you can see that the pink stuff is in strands and is pulling her in.

  • Lo

    Mike found fish!! MARTIAN FISH!

  • max

    Am I the only one who thinks Bex is so nice? I woulda been so mad at Mike the moment I saw him but she was so relieved to see him and is trying to help him out right now.

    • Spark

      I feel like having only one other person stuck underground with you on a hostile planet will do wonders for your ability to forgive said person.

    • Asterai

      I have no quarrel with Bex. You are not alone.

    • Lilian

      Bex has been a very kind person.

  • David

    Maybe Mr. Tentacle just wanted a hug…

  • Whachamacallit

    I’m actually wondering if Mike is screaming for the fish to attack him again… I think that may be too dark of a thought though.

    • shingworks

      lol, like this

      • arteopteryx

        HOLY HECK!! That’s exactly the scene I was thinking of before I clicked the link! Hahahaha!

        “Heeeere FISHY FISHY FISHY!!”
        Mike: *annoyed face* “what.”

  • Bradford

    Martian Bio-AI = super racist

    Bold choice Der

    • shingworks

      You know me, always pushing that envelope

  • Shakespizza

    No one likes Bexy, not even martian fauna.

  • datguy

    Ima have to step in here in and stand up for the Republican party. Having declared being in defense of an opposition I now have to waste time to add credibility to myself and defend myself personally. If you want you can skip this next paragraph to opt for actual defenses.

    I have always been a Democrat and voted thusly in a Republican-dominated state that has only FOUR times ever since the states statehood voted Democratic. I am an educated post-college youth who has grown up with minorities and had to defend a interracial relationship I had(black vs white) to a racist mother. The main racial issues where I live specifically are discrimination/racism on both sides dealing with Native Americans vs non Native Americans. The college I went to had a high male to female ratio and contained some pretty vocal gay men and I mainly collaborated with minority students from other countries (Pakistan, Turkey, Nepal, to name a few.) We talked a lot about their views on our country and their fears as well as their country. My friend from Pakistan expressed fear of returning to his country because of the violence and refrained from any research that might make him look “terrorist-y.”

    You can try and label the Republican party some unfair majority of “uneducated privileged white racist sexist males” due to a policy of social conservatism that seems to imply discrimination and hatred. And you could easily confirmation bias yourself as such. The Republican party actually has *huge* divides on issues like legal recognition of same-sex marriages. But this isn’t the full picture or why Trump won the election. The two party system, the electoral college, and the vast disconnect between rural working class voters and educated college youths/big cities caused Trump to get elected. The last one, working class voters, is imo the biggest reason.

    It wasn’t racism, gender, gender preference, or ethnicity that caused the election to turn out this way (even if it played some tiny role for some voters). This election didn’t bring in any large sway from any specific group (ethnic, gender, or otherwise) except small city/rural city voters from the past elections. Having said that, Trump actually GAINED support of minorities (at least 5% across the board compared to Romney) while Hillary lost support compared to Obama. Hillary didn’t even win over white women despite the assumed “gender card” and Trumps constant backlash from his discriminatory rhetoric.

    Now is where the real fear starts. The rural/working class in America. This is a huge thing and the working class was neglected in this election by the Democrats. The power of the working class should never be underestimated. The oppression and neglect of the working class in Germany caused Hitlers with his National Socialist German Workers’ Party to rise to power when he gave them a reason for their struggle. Trump appealed to the working class and promised to fix their struggles and told them they mattered. Validated them. Obama appealed to them as-well (in a better way but he failed his promises because of a Republican-locked congress) but Hillary did not even try to appeal to them. The working class contains tons of minorities who despite Trumps comments against them still voted for him. It isn’t because they want to engage in discrimination, and hate ect., it is because the working class feels like their needs are not being met. As much as any humanist hates to admit, ‘human rights, race, sexism, and climate change’ are a luxury for a country to have. These views of equality and global change develop once a certain level of needs are met. And don’t just label the working class as greedy (they aren’t rich) or bigots. Calling them as such just causes them to buckle down and engage in more in-group vs out-group dynamics. That doesn’t solve any problems. Don’t believe that half the United States wants racism, hate, and pain to exist. They just want to matter and to be safe in their families and communities. To have job security and a stronger country. To have financial stability and independence. Those peoples needs are not met and they feel neglected and they look for something to blame. Trump (not the Republican party) manipulated them by addressing their fears and give them faces. Examples in the following form: Problem (attribution). Stagnant Government and neglect (Hillary), Job loss (“Illegal, murderous, rapist” Mexicans, immigration, too strict government over regulation), Terrorism (“bad radical” Muslims and immigration, “weak generals”), Socialism and healthcare (Stealing *our* hard earned money-Democrats), “bad trade deals” (Democrats/Clintons even though it started with Republicans), national deficit (Democratic party even though it is both), corruption (“system is rigged” – Hillary/Bought politicians), gun control (right to hunt and self empowerment-Democrats), ect.**

    The candidate-elect, not the Republican party, preyed on the fears of the working class. By itself the working class isn’t inherently discriminatory and is actually built out of a diversity of people. So is the Republican party. A large portion of Republicans spoke out against his degrading and discriminatory comments. Trumps fear mongering and popularity caused by the free publicity of his “entertaining-ness” caused him to win the primaries in a two-party dominated system. This insured that unless a party member gave up their entire party affiliation, core values, and beliefs they’d be stuck with him. This race came down the lesser of two evils for most people. The one who won was the one who appealed to a diverse neglected majority made of minorities and majorities.

    The only thing we can do now as a nation is work together with each other. The nation has been working since it’s founding centuries ago to better ourselves and our people (and the world). We as a people chose this route of the belief that we are all created equal and no singular event will completely undo all that we’ve fought for since our creation. There will be tests and backlashes and progress.

    *The only thing we can do now as a nation is work together with each other.* To make sure we keep working on equal treatment, respect, rights and global issues while reaching out to the rural voters and the working class and addressing their issues. Their issues *do* matter even though they seem irrelevant and we label them as some unfair majority of “uneducated privileged white sexist males.” They are not and neither is the Republican party. We should look to the specifics of the individual members positions and not vote along party lines. This election demonstrates the horrors of the two party system. There are LGBDQ+ in the Republican party. There are races and racists and just about any other belief or being in BOTH PARTIES. They are not all ignorant or bigoted. Pick the person not the party. The party vs party dynamics are causing apathy and discrimination to the opposing party and that is causing a lot of problems. “You are just a sore loser.” “You are just a racist/homophobe/ect.” When neither are true. Just need to remind each other to not vote on fear, but to vote on policies. Not party lines. To actually look up a persons stances and personality before voting. We can still voice ourselves and our fears and ask for protection in those fears being realized among both parties.

    Our country is beautiful not because of the injustices that have occurred in the past (and present) but that in the face of each step backwards or stumble we are still walking forwards.

    A Ref cause I had it on hand:
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/11/11/trump-got-more-votes-from-people-of-color-than-romney-did-heres-the-data/

    **Forgive the mess in this listing
    ***I know I didn’t cover all issues but I just wanted to make some points.
    ****Also get rid of the electoral college.

    • datguy

      Why is there no edit button?
      I has gramma and speln errorfs and sentences I wish to restructure.

      • datguy

        Also also, I didn’t make it clear that I’m not trying to defend Trump but the Republican party and the working class with the large post. I think they still need a representative that aligns with their values but doesn’t have his disgusting attitude to speak for them.

        • shingworks

          Yeah, I think both Repubs and Dems would like a representative like that.

          • Lilian

            This election was a seething hot mess of stupid. Even the Libertarian Party couldn’t manage to nominate a decent candidate.

          • ProphetZarquon

            @Lilian
            Agreed.

    • shingworks

      Thanks for your thoughts! I don’t have a problem with Repubs (nor do I think I’ve ever said anything like that), my concern right now is preventing any harm this new president will bring to people who are already vulnerable. I’d venture to guess most people who are worried are worried about Trump and his unchecked appointments right now.

      As an aside though, I don’t really know what to think about people who have definitive answers about anything regarding race/ gender etc. It’s a little weird trying to be fair to your stance while you tell me that I’m completely off the mark, and that it’s actually this other factor that we should be looking at. It’s a little arrogant and ignores complexities. Pretty sure a ton of things are responsible for our current situation, and that’s fine, just gotta keep chipping away at things that are threats, or solvable, right now.

      And as a further aside, I’ll fix your typos~ except for the humorous ones

      • datguy

        Thanks for reading my wall of text! Hopefully it wasn’t too painful. Thanks for also fixing my typos and I guess my Hitlers will have to remain plural into der Fütur.

        I’ll have to admit, I’d be ignorant if I claimed I had definitive answers about those social issues. Each person views and handles problems differently and those problems come at them in different ways.
        This was my attempt at cobbling together a few of the different views of people I have had interactions with in my Republican dominated community and Democratically-ish leaning college (mainly comprised of out-of-staters). I wanted to draw attention to this perspective and add some validity to it and hopefully it provided some value. Although, it doesn’t really help actively solve our current situation.

        I also wanted to draw attention to party lines and say people among both lines can share the same beliefs and values and that the party lines are somewhat arbitrary and we shouldn’t dismiss or ignore one another based on them This should be common sense but people act otherwise.

        On a side note I really do appreciate the links you provided to our representatives. I was aware of being able to call Congressmen about issues but not of these sneaky secret call surveys that actually impact policy??? Thank you so much for informing me among others.

        I hope we can all help see each other to a better tomorrow.

    • Lilian

      Thanks for taking the time to articulate your thoughts. This election has had me thinking a lot of thoughts.

      Shing, I’ve noticed you have a smart audience. People on your threads write well and express themselves well, regardless of opinion or political leaning. Way to appeal to thoughtful people!

      • shingworks

        Yes, definitely… it’s been sort of an effort this last week trying to maintain a somewhat neutral space, but it’s been worth it just to hear thoughts from different readers. Lots of perspectives, which is always a valuable thing.

        • Herp McDerp

          And the frustrating thing is that events will prove all of us wrong regarding one thing or another that right now we’re absolutely certain about.

        • Lilian

          I appreciate your attempts to maintain said space.

          On the aside, your comics are wonderful pieces of storytelling!

    • MikeLinPA

      Thank you for sharing your thoughts.

      Trump hijacked the Rep. party because the RNC is a corrupt failing mess. Trump’s campaign was a circus and Trump is the ringleader, and sadly, was still the best man put forward by that side. The Dem. party still lost because the DNC is also a corrupt failing mess that marginalized a good man and backed the single most hated woman in the country hoping to ride her coat tails back to power. Clinton’s campaign was a murder-suicide, (for the second time.) Even if Hillary had won by a hair instead of losing by a hair, it would have still been 8 more years of partisan gridlock in Washington.

      Instead of electing the most hated woman in the country to be the most ineffective president possible, we elected a bad caricature of Lex Luthor! (Only he isn’t as smart as Luthor, nor as charismatic, and he has a silly comb-over. Part of me actually wants him and the Reps on the hill to do the most damage possible in 8 years so we can hit bottom already and get around to the rebuilding part. Rebuilding would be nice.

      I don’t like Hilary Clinton. She always annoyed me. She’s easy to hate. I don’t believe a single accusation the Reps hurled at her, and I still don’t like her. I think she was capable of doing a competent job, (not that the hill would have let her.) She changed her positions on topics all the time to be popular. That is a politician. That is pretty much what we all hate about politicians.

      In my lifetime I have seen Republican candidates yell “Fiscal Responsibility” and empty the treasury into the pockets of their cronies. They yell “Save the unborn” and empty the treasury. They yell “Defend the country” and empty the treasury. They yell “smaller government”, create more government, and of course, empty the treasury. They yell “We Are Conservative” and conserve nothing, waste everything, and empty the treasury. They yell “Tax Cuts (For the wealthy and big business)” and the treasury empties itself. They yell “Freedom And Liberty” while gerrymandering and making it harder for poor people to vote. They wrap themselves in the flag and clutch the bible while not doing what would be right by either, and empty the treasury. So what does the DNC counter with? Hillary-Fucking-Clinton, the poster child for being a hated politician! I feel like puking.

  • Vert

    I wonder if Bex is now INFECTED with lovable MarsFungus! …nah, that can’t be the first time she’s fallen in the water. Must be the system reclaiming Kalla’s blood for memory reintegration.

    Also, for some reason my brain misinterpreted the lettering on her suit in the last panel as FML, and it made me laugh.

    • Asterai

      I dunno. Whether this is her first time in the water or not, it seems pretty inevitable that she’ll wind up with some passengers.

  • questioner

    Aww Bex, they just want to give you a thighfriend too….all astronauts must be properly equipped for a Martian expedition after all.

  • Lar

    My brain interpreted the letters on her shoulder as FML and I was like “That makes sense.”

  • basaway

    when will these poor guys get a break!! :(

  • Vert

    Wait, am I crazy or was that tentacle green yesterday?

    • Vert

      I guess I should read the page notes, huh. Oops.

  • Squirrelmaster

    I suppose I can keep doing updates on the political theater for a while, until Trump actually takes office and we can all see clearly for ourselves what will and won’t happen.

    John Stewart has weighed in with some good points on the current goings on and why Trump won: https://youtu.be/mUkv_jPgTeg

    Take his suggestion to heart and go read about Nixon and especially LBJ. Though I’m not understanding the new line that’s being passed around about not draining the swamp yet. Trump hasn’t taken office yet and won’t until Jan 20. Obviously he’s not doing anything official in government yet.

    Other than meeting with world leaders. Obama didn’t meet with anyone until Jan 8th after he won. Trump has already met with 26 world leaders at last count.

    Kayne West apparently stopped his concert to give a 40 minute speech on why he would have voted for Trump, if he had voted. Clips are all over YT: https://youtu.be/tA0PURaILF0

    The Anti Defamation League has backed off of its claim that Breitbart is the “premier site of the alt-right”, but is still claiming that alt-right is code for racism or whatever. Not true, but anyway. They also put a footnote at the bottom of their article claiming that Steven Bannon is an antisemite that “While there is a long fact pattern of evidence that Breitbart served as a platform for a wide range of bigotry” (false) “and there is some controversy related to statements from Mr. Bannon’s divorce proceedings in 2007, we are not aware of any anti-Semitic statements made by Bannon himself. In fact, Jewish employees of Breitbart have challenged the characterization of him and defended him from charges of anti-Semitism. Some have pointed out that Breitbart Jerusalem was launched during his tenure.” http://www.adl.org/sp/stephen-bannon-backgrounder/bannon-backgrounder.html

    You might follow the links to the articles referenced and read them for yourself. Note that several are written by Milo, who is gay (and a fabulous troll who write eye catching clickbait headlines in an ongoing attempt to get people to think for themselves and discuss sometimes difficult topics), and the others are pretty well sourced.

    I mean I follow one link to a muslim rape culture article that’s supposed to be all racist and horrible and it has source links in it back to Reuters and the BBC. Just because facts are unpleasant doesn’t make them racist or bigoted.

    As the rest of the people Trump has appointed, I haven’t been keeping up with all the accusations as it’s just too much. But they’re attacking every single person he adds to his cabinet as he adds them, and at some point you have to ask yourself, “All of them? Really? And not until they were added?”

    • MikeLinPA

      “they’re attacking every single person he adds to his cabinet … All of them?”

      Isn’t that exactly what the Republicans have been doing all along? What appointments have they happily accepted during the Clinton or Obama administrations? They refused to even hold discussions on his final supreme court nomination.

  • The “neural sea” is taking back the blood…

  • Seriously about the political stuff? As a libertarian, I get very tired of little to no representation. I wasn’t convinced that Hillary or Trump were good candidates, and frankly, I can’t see that there was all that much difference between them, if you look seriously at what they both “promised” during their campaigns.

    You want a better democracy? End the Duopoly. End the ‘winner takes all’ aspect of American politics. Many countries, especially in Europe, have proportional representation.

    Most importantly, stop relying on government to solve all aspects of society’s problems. Not everything is political, and a government with no limits is necessarily tyrannical.

    Of course, I have little hope that people will do these things, or even learn anything valuable from this election, but maybe some of you will get it.

    Now, let’s get back to the comic.

    • shingworks

      Well, also that it’s much easier to say all of these things than actually implement them. People don’t know how to compromise anymore, and the ones who do are seen as weaker or not reliable leaders, so… yeah. Honestly it seems from the past few weeks that a very vocal group of people actually love having someone loud to tell them what to do, and are getting that, at least they’re happy I guess.

      • I realize that what I ‘suggested’ is very difficult to implement. But it all starts with the individual’s attitude and what they expect from government. The more we want from government, the more control we’re giving them over our lives. I realize that many people don’t agree with this, but it seems to me that the purpose of government is to protect individual rights, and thats’ pretty much all it should do. How much security can you actually have if your rights are not protected?

        The reason that Trump is so scary is because the power of the President’s office is scary. Many people liked Obama, but in fact, Obama violated Americans’ rights, as did Bush before him, etc. The lesson to be learned from this election is the extreme importance of individual rights and limited government. If you can rely on government to actually protect your rights and not violate them, then it matters much less who actually wins the election.

        And in actual fact, I imagine Trump will find that once he’s in office, much of what he wants to do will either be rejected by Congress or overturned by the Supreme Court. At least, I hope there’s still some substantial limits in our system of checks and balances.

        • shingworks

          IDK, I’d also argue the government should be involved with stuff that makes our lives easier that aren’t strictly rights (things like… access to clean water, power, healthy food, etc). I know that food specifically has been a subject of contention before, but I was reading about countries that have a higher tax or limit access to certain foods, and their country’s population has a lower rate of diseases that in the US are crippling our healthcare system… what do you think about stuff like that? Or do you not think that right to healthcare is a thing government should be involved in either? (my tone is not snarky btw, just asking)

          • There’s a tension between positive rights and negative rights. Should people be free to act, or should people get free stuff? The short answer is that nothing is free; government cannot provide food, education, healthcare, etc. without taking it from other people, either by making people pay for it through taxation or by restricting the rights of action of the providers. Unfortunately, such coercive activity has unintended consequences that tend to create new problems or subvert the intended purpose of the government’s laws. The market works towards best satisfying the consumers, and government laws and regulations tend to prevent the market from doing its best; it discourages market incentives to produce goods and services and to increase productivity. So you have good private education for the wealthy and not-so-good public education for the rest of us. Second rate health care for everybody, etc. My electricity and natural gas are provided by government-granted monopolies, but while there is a commission that oversees them and controls their rates, it in no way guarantees that I have electricity and natural gas. All the monopoly does is ensure that I have little or no alternatives to what government has made available for me, and forcibly limits the competition.

            An example of unintended consequences:
            The U.S. has tariffs on any cane sugar imported into the U.S. This ensures that U.S. sugar companies can charge more for their sugar than if they faced unrestricted competition, and thus all food products that use cane sugar are more expensive. You might say that’s good, as it limits sugar consumption, but in fact, it does no such thing. Many foods that are not overtly sweet have sugar added to them (check the ingredients labels), and many people crave their sweets enough that they will sacrifice healthier options to have them. Thus, instead of lowering sugar consumption, it simply makes people pay more for their bad choices, leaving them less money for other things.

            Furthermore, the U.S. subsidizes (I.e. taxpayers pay it) corn production, primarily to use for ethanol fuel and for animal, feed. The result is that corn is cheaper than market prices (not counting the taxes paid to support it), and this is a big reason that corn syrup is used to replace more expensive cane sugar in many products. So Americans get to pay for a sugar replacement and still get plenty of sugar in their diet! Can anybody seriously argue that sugar tariffs and corn subsidies are making Americans healthier?

            Reason.com has done a few articles on soda taxes, another policy that some might think are a good idea, and shown that all they do is raise more money for the government without doing anything to reduce obesity. I can look up the links for you if you’re interested in those.

            You said that it was because of the ACA that you have health insurance. But this is much like breaking a person’s leg and then giving them a crutch, because what you don’t see are all the government interventions into health care that took place long before the ACA ever came into existence, interventions that made health care less accessible and more expensive for Americans. Everything from medical licensing and the FDA to hospital certificates of need, ambulance monopolies, and government policy involving taxation of benefits (this goes back to WWII) and how they dealt with HMO’s. All of these things have made health care more expensive and less accessible, instead of less expensive and more accessible.

            The ACA is an omnibus law that covers many things, but among its other actions, it turns people into criminals for not buying health insurance, and really, it truly undermines and subverts health insurance industry and even the concept of “insurance” which many people apparently don’t understand. Instead of being true insurance, health insurance in America is simply another way to pay for and redistribute health care, but at an inflated cost. You may have health insurance, but how much health care will you actually get when you need it, and how good will its quality be? The ACA also has the inadvertent(?) effect of limiting your health care choices. What doctor can you see, what procedures you can get, etc.

            In short, if we truly want to help people, we need to respect their rights of action and let them have more choices and opportunities to help themselves, or receive voluntary help (charity) instead of having government provide “solutions” that restrict our choices and opportunities for improvement and advancement.

            Meh, I’ve probably gone on too long, but I’ll be glad to clarify anything if i can.

          • shingworks

            Thanks for the examples! You’ve given me some interesting things to think about…

            For healthcare though, and even for the above, I agree with you. But the practical solutions aren’t there. I guess this is the problem I have in general with third party voters. I completely understand the idea of needing to undo these harmful policies produced by entrenched powers who only want to maintain strangleholds, but at the same time, you can’t undo them without asking the marginalized to shoulder the burden. I am afraid to discuss this with the third-party voters I know personally, because they get extremely vitriolic or defensive about being told that to remove those policies will kill people. Before the ACA I just didn’t go to the doctor. I have some bad health problems now because of untreated problems from that time period. After it’s taken away, I can imagine that people who require specific and expensive care will die. It’s not fair to them to say “well the system is broken, you dying is the lesser of two evils if it prevents people from paying more down the line,” isn’t it? It’s clearly not their fault that their options were limited, nor should they have to pay with health or life or whatever, like some sacrificial lamb… I just can’t justify that to myself, but I know people have different priorities. I guess I’d rather have less money or spend less in general than ask someone else to take a bullet for me, though I know not everyone feels that way.

          • It’s these kind of responses that make me think that either I didn’t explain myself very well, or else we’re thinking along entirely different lines.

            I don’t want people to needlessly suffer and die. That’s why I’m opposed to the government intervention and things like the ACA. Keeping the ACA *is* asking for people to take the bullet, for a variety of reasons that I’ve suggested or implied above.

            It’s not just about saving money; it’s about wealth and having the resources to provide the goods and services that people need when they need them. Wealth isn’t just mansions and swimming pools and sports cars; it’s all available goods and services. As I said, marketplace incentives encourages people to provide more goods and services, and increased productivity, which makes more people wealthier, i.e. more people able to command resources when they need them.

            An air conditioner, for example, is of great value to a person when the weather’s 100+ degrees outside, and may well save them from heat stroke and heat exhaustion. But it’s no good if the person can’t afford the air conditioner or the energy necessary to run it.

            Government intervention not only disrupts the economic incentives of production, but also makes us less wealthy, and thus, less able to command the resources we need. This is as true of health care as of any other good or service. The ACA is not only unsustainable in its present form, but it will have increasingly disastrous results for American health care the longer it continues. More people will needlessly suffer and die, maybe even you, down the road.

            It is a harsh economic reality that we will only have as much health care as can be paid for, regardless of who pays for it or how. And government’s intervention will slow down or even prevent the increased production of health care services by disrupting the economic incentives. This will mean, for example, the slower development of new medicines and medical procedures. At best, we might hope for a flourishing grey or black market for health care.

            But we don’t have to settle for that if we understand the economics of production and wealth, and how we will be better off without extensive government intervention than with it.

            Maybe I can’t explain it to you very well, but please don’t doubt my intentions. I certainly believe that you mean well, even though I think you are mistakenly advocating a dangerous policy.

          • shingworks

            Thanks for clarifying… I’m actually not arguing for the ACA as it is now, I would prefer that it continue to be worked on rather be scrapped or stuck in some weird limbo. There are other countries with government-run healthcare where everyone has their needs met: Taiwan, for example, has free healthcare for all citizens. But I know that we’ll probably never see anything like that in our lifetimes.

            I get all your points by the way, I guess I am a little bit out there with my personal beliefs and habits, I’m a bit more on the “move to the woods and never interact with society again” end of the spectrum. I’d only trust governments or corporations if they were required to live by the same standards they are willing to impart on everyone else, which isn’t going to happen. I suppose then I agree with your original point about the duopoly, since they’re pretty much different faces of the same coin, but I’d rather push to modify a broken system than abandon them with immediate catastrophic consequences.

    • MikeLinPA

      Of course you are right, so it will never happen here.

  • No One

    She won’t get eaten, she is a main character. I’m not liking her as much as in the beginning of the series, but Michael has grown on me.

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