btq96r

  From the IRS website: The Affordable Care Act requires employers to report the cost of coverage under an employer-sponsored group health plan. Reporting the cost of health care coverage on the Form W-2 does not mean that the coverage is taxable. The value of the employer’s excludable contribution to health coverage continues to be excludable from an employee's income, and it is not taxable. This reporting is for informational purposes only and will provide employees useful and comparable consumer information on the cost of their health care coverage.

  It was Qatar that he moved to after they offered him a scholarship, not Yemen.

  I meant accomplish as in what does it materially do.  It's not raising money for a good cause like the Fisher House, and it's not trying to reach a goal like cleaning up the VA.  Veterans are being remembered plenty if people look around.  Go to a sporting event and there is always some "salute to service."  To me, it seems like it makes those doing it feel better than those it purports to help.  What does the green light do that a yellow ribbon, or a "support our vets" bumper sticker doesn't already do?  Does the hashtag upgrade it or something?  People are starting to confuse awareness campaigns with real action, and nothing is getting done.   As to the thread on reaching out...a place like TGO with real people offering someone to talk to can do more than half the country putting out a green light in support.   For me, the real way to remember veterans is to keep the pressure to reform the VA, and to make sure they aren't sent to fight in stupid wars like you and I were.

This is accomplishing what, exactly?

  You won't be able to view new plans until the "open enrollment" period begins.  That's supposed to be tomorrow, Nov. 1st, but let's face it, it will be closer to a week later when the site isn't a mess. Dec 15th is the last day to enroll for the policy to start on Jan. 1st, 2016.   The premium is going up on my current plan.  As a percentage it's 37%, but in actual numbers it's going from $141-193, so compared to others, it's lower.  I'll shop around for new plans, but since Tennessee didn't take the Medicare expansion, the options will be limited for my budget.   Right now since I'm single and relatively young, I have the "bronze" plan, which is basically emergency coverage, with me paying for office visits, medications, ect.  I'll see at tax time if I get any kind of credits, or what not.

Comes at a great time.  I have a lot going on this week and that extra hour will be a help. 

I guess the easiest way to explain it would be to say the Japanese decided to make a fancy alternative to the tube sock.

Let Primary Arms sell Geissele triggers for ~$200 again and I'll jump on it.  If it takes Christmas to bring about such a price, so be it.

  Cueto pitching all of game 2 was huge for KC.  The Mets have had their bullpen active both games, really two and a half if you look at how long game 1 went on, and that was in an AL park where they had the luxury of a DH.  Now that the series is back in NYC, the pitcher has to bat, and KC has a much fresher bullpen to facilitate pinch hitters after the 3rd inning or so.

Unfortouinetly, I had to work during the first two games, though I caught the 1st game in the 12th inning, or somewhere thereabouts.  I'll be able to watch games 3-5, if it goes to 6&7, I'm out of luck.   I love baseball.  Yes, the season needs to be shortened, yes, it's slow a lot of the time, but there is just something perfect about watching a game.  Even listening to it on the radio is enjoyable to me.

The A-10 is the girl in that scenario? 

  Yup 96R was a fun ride while it lasted.    They wanted us to stay in MI, and branch pretty much let us reclassify into any MI MOS we had the ASVAB scores for regardless of the In/Out call below if memory serves.  For any other MOS, there had to be an opening which varied for NCO ranks.  A lot of us took intel analyst, some took UAV, and some of those who had a secondary MOS went back to that, especially if they got out and went into the guard or reserves.

  Add me to that list.  I'll never turn away a veteran that needs to talk.       I hated it at the time, but the best thing that could ever happen to me was to be put on a battalion staff for my last few years in the Army, including my last deployment.   I enlisted into a high speed, low drag, closed to women, awesome MOS.  Had a blast doing it for six years in light infantry brigades, and wouldn't have changed a thing during that time.  But then the Army got rid of that MOS and I became an intel analyst, and moved to the intel section for an artillery battalion.  While I loved my old job, being able to carry a really heavy rucksack, camouflage ground surveillance sensors, and live in a hide sight aren't really transferable skills in a civilian market.  Being on battalion staff, all the work that came with that made me a very capable worker in white collar jobs, and gave me enough practical application to know what I needed to work on.   I left the Army in early 2009, when the economy was a mess.  I was able to get a very good job as a contractor because I was able to show the employer I was able to showcase the skills I had learned working on staff.  It also helped me get ready for college, and if all goes according to plan, I'll be graduating in December of next year.   Who knows what would have happened if I wasn't prepared to go out into the world after the Army. 

Two of my four deployments had a suicide in the unit, and in both cases, it was problems at home that weren’t necessarily exasperated by the deployment leading to the Soldier taking their own life.  I’ll concede the deployments might have prevented them from their situation getting better.   This Washington Post article, while a bit outdated, does show some good info about how combat service is not the driver of suicides in the military, and links to some in depth studies.   It also goes into how military suicides may outpace the civilian world, but not by as much as you think, and that they have gone up at the same times.  This is a society wide issue. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-suicide-in-the-military/2014/11/07/61ceb0aa-637b-11e4-836c-83bc4f26eb67_story.html   As to what causes it, best I can tell, it’s just life’s stressors adding up.  Some people can handle what life deals them, some cannot.  There is no set standard of what people “should” be able to take, as we are all the sum of our life and experiences, and everybody has their own breaking point, even if they don’t think they do.   Regarding your son, I do wonder why he told you he can’t tell you what he did, or even where he was on a deployment.  Something as simple as what base he was at, or what the summary of his duties were do not dwell into classified information.  As a rule of thumb, things like missions, equipment, and, information derived while over there are the verboten topics.  Anyone who deploys should be able to tell some tales of general life, the boredom and monotony, and stories something funny or dumb that they, or people in their unit did.

Should we all report her for violating GoFundMe's terms of service?  She is clearly "intentionally including factually incorrect information on their campaign."

Blocks 26 & 27 on the DD214 will tell you the details behind the discharge.  They are the separation and reentry codes, and if she is truly disabled, it will match up with what those codes mean.  They're very easy to look up.   That's if you can get a DD214 to look at.

  That speaks more to the stupidity of the general population than it does for the creativity of the troller.

This wasn't even creative trolling.

I've changed mailing addresses about five times since I left the Army.  So, if I was sent a letter, it's not likely to make it to me.  Anybody know if they have a website where I can enter my info and find out if I'm on the list?  I've been paying for credit monitoring through USAA for years now since I knew this was coming sooner or later.

My table just lifted up for no explainable reason when I saw this pic.

  It was your "no weeping" comment...the 1911 issue isn't even on the agenda for this at the WH.  If it was, they would have anti-gun surrogates like the Brady Campaign, or Everytown making noise about it on social media and in the press.

  The 1911 transfer isn't even a consideration in this bill for the White House.  This fight is over sequestration, and the Democrats are going to fight to make sure domestic spending gets a lift alongside defense.       If anyone is playing games with the defense budget, it's all the members of Congress (Democrat & Republican) who use it to send money to their districts (or state for Senators) in general for things DoD doesn't want.  It could be caped at $450 billion, with the force lean, mean, trained, and ready to roll if it wasn't for all the parochial interests cocking it up.

  Well, Republicans called his bluff, and found out he wasn't bluffing.  The funding for the defense department is good until early December along with the rest of the government, thanks to the continuing resolution passed a few weeks ago, so that gave him a lot of cover to do this and not have it become an operational impact across the force.  The only thing impacted are contracts that are on hold from being finalized until the money authorized to pay them.  Most, if not all of the current contracts should be covered under the CR.  I know mine was when I was working under a DoD or Army contract.   I'm thinking the White House really wants this settled on their terms outright, or they might use it as leverage when the talks on a new budget take place soon.  They give Republicans the money here in exchange for money somewhere else...that kind of deal.  After all these years, the President knows he can't go into the debt ceiling talks, and a budget negotiation after caving on this without getting something in return first.   The 1911 transfer to CMP is just caught up in the bigger fight.  But since it's not a money issue, it's more than likely to stay in the final bill no matter what deal is made, which it has to sometime.

  I'm usually somewhere just under 200GB per month, but I'm the only one in my house.  If you have kids who turn into zombies on YouTube or any other site on top of what you stream, it can get eaten up quick.   Try setting the video quality of whatever device you're streaming from at 720p instead of 1020p.  Not that much difference unless you want to watch a great movie or something else important enough.

  The bill was actually sent to the President earlier today (or yesterday since this post is after midnight) on the 20th.  The 7th was when the Senate approved the exact version the House did after the conference to hammer out the differences.   The presiding officers of each chamber had to certify the bill, then the House clerk  physically delivered the certified bill to the West Wing before the 10 day clock can start, bringing up that delay you mention. Here's a great link to understand the details behind the process.   The main cause for delay between the 7th and the 20th was as it usually is, a Congressional recess.  The other reason is grandstanding.  Republicans lined up to make press statements at a ceremony for the final certification (formally called enrollment), and wanted to make sure this wasn't in any other news cycle, hence the timing since nothing else big is going on this week.   After all the posturing, I may piss myself laughing if this ends up being eligible for a pocket veto.