We're due some storms the next two nights. It is that time of year. March is typically our wettest month. We've had about 12.5" so far in 2023 here on the mountain.

Time to get lettuce planted. Still have a couple of cabbages and some collards growing. Always something, but that's good...otherwise it would be pretty boring.

Well, take care and thanks for the OT!

but I cannot resist jumping in to answer easy questions:

What knot? Morning - Midshipman's knot; Evening - Double Carrick Bend.

be well and have a good one

At what point does a hired protector of the city or country become the jailer?

I believe we have passed that point just about everywhere. One great big honeytrap. (fixed this on edit) This AM I was reading a piece on the abc snooze site (I most definitely will NOT link to that article):

Slovakia basks under NATO umbrella, sends Ukraine old arms

LEST, Slovakia -- Former Soviet satellite Slovakia has been a NATO member since 2004, but the reality of belonging to the world’s biggest military alliance really kicked in after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a year ago.
...
“We remember well what it was like to have occupiers on our territory,” he added, referring to the 1968 Soviet-led military invasion of former Czechoslovakia — from which Slovakia split peacefully in 1993, four years after the communist regime fell.

The country of 5.4 million hosts a battlegroup with troops from the United States, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Slovenia and the Czech Republic, as NATO moved to reassure members on its eastern flank worried about a potential Russian threat.
...
Similar units have been created in Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. They complement another four deployed in 2017 in the three Baltic states and Poland, to expand NATO's presence from the Baltic to the Black Sea.

There is some pushback, very small, not very likely. My point is.... to me it looks like this country is more subjugated now that when it was part of the ussr. Invited invasion and occupation and most likely funding it with loans from the IMF (welcome to the debtor nation club). Hmm, sounds a lot like some of our cities.

A secondary observation... when I was looking at the article I noticed the name of the "leader". Why are so many of these nations headed up by a particular visage? Using a variation of the diversity card in their "democracy" poker game?

they get nuttier.
Bill Gates, Genius of Nothing, is promoting a sky darkening plan with the UN.
Sounds quite unhelpful.
https://igorchudov.substack.com/p/the-un-discusses-darkening-the-skies?u...

Having been assured that sulfur dioxide was bad for us, we spent billions of dollars eliminating it from coal and oil-burning emissions and building sulfur-capture technology.

Now, it turns out that sulfur dioxide is good for us, and we need to spend even more untold billions to inject it into the atmosphere.

Does this sound stupid to you?

I am sure, however, that investors will earn quite a bit of money from “sulfur dioxide atmospheric injections” right after making billions on “eliminating sulfur dioxide emissions” from coal-burning plants.

'Potentially deadly' copay accumulator policy remains legal in Utah

This is sickening

Medications for people with chronic illness are lifesaving, said Keri King, the mother of Taylor King, who has cystic fibrosis.

But with high deductibles and even higher prescription drug costs, many chronic illness patients would be unable to afford the medication they need to live without copay assistance, Keri King said. Copay assistance, she said, helps make life somewhat more affordable and gives chronic illness patients, like Taylor, the means to fulfill their dreams.

Copay assistance is when nonprofits or medical companies pay a portion, if not all, of a deductible or out-of-pocket maximum on an insurance plan for a chronic illness patient.

In recent years, some insurance companies have implemented a policy known as a copay accumulator. It prevents patients from receiving help from nonprofits or medical companies. Those funds no longer go toward a patient's deductible or out-of-pocket maximum.

On Tuesday, the final day of committee hearings for the Utah Legislature, SB184, a bill that would eliminate copay accumulator policies, was held in the House Business and Labor Committee. It will not reach the House floor for consideration this year. It passed in the Senate earlier 21-2.

In the House committee hearing, Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, the bill's sponsor, explained what the legislation would do.

"If there is a benefit that is paid into a health care system on behalf of a patient, the patient should get credit for that benefit," he said. According to the bill text, the policy would not apply to self-funded plans.

Bramble said insurance companies are "double dipping," getting money from vulnerable patients and the organizations who are trying to help those experiencing chronic illness.

The bill, he has said, would end a loophole and help patients pay for expensive drugs.

Several community members spoke in favor of the bill at the committee hearing, including a pharmacist, patients and parents of patients.

But Stephen Foxley, of Regents BlueCross BlueShield of Utah, voiced concerns, as did other insurance companies. Insurance prices, he said, could rise if the policy passes.

If there is a cheaper substitute for medication, Foxley said, insurance companies should cover those rather than a more expensive option.

Of course, he said, there are exceptions where less expensive substitutes may have different effects on a patient. Foxley cited Washington state's bill, SB5610, which passed into law in 2022, as an example of legislation that considers those exceptions.

Bramble said the legislation is designed to allow substitutions. It allows insurance companies the flexibility to "set their benefits the way they choose."

Anyone who thinks that government shutdown the country and passed illegal rules in order to keep us safe needs to rethink that. If they had our health in mind we would long ago gotten MFA type healthcare and doctors would be talking about healthy lifestyle choices instead of pushing for rotten big pharma products. This would have happened during the worst epidemic in our lifetime….

Unless we get money out of politics we will continue to have a government that is captured by every evil industry it’s supposed to be regulating. No 3rd party should ever have been allowed to get between a patent and their doctor.

The epa is telling people in Ohio that the air and water are safe while they hadn’t tested to see if it was and they are now letting a company with ties to the rail owners test things. Agent orange, the air at ground zero, the water in Flint…