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http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D971964O1&show_article=1 WASHINGTON (AP) - Acting with lightning speed, the Democratic-led House has approved a bill to slap punishing taxes on big employee bonuses from firms bailed out by taxpayers. The vote was 328-93. Said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi: "We want our money back and we want our money back now for the taxpayers." Republicans called it a legally questionable ploy to paper over Obama administration missteps. ----------- Yes, Speaker Pelosi, I'd like my money back.

If you were contracted to receive a bonus by completing the project early without any stipulations regarding the safety of the final product, then you would deserve your money. It doesn't matter that you royally screwed the project up and flushed your company down the toilet. Contracts don't have to be "pay for good performance" -- if that's what the company and/or government wanted, they should have attached those stipulations to the money. I don't think it would have been a problem to ask AIG renegotiate its executive contracts before throwing more money at them. Furthermore, you assume that all the executives did a bad job and personally drove the company into the ground. The reality may be that some of those executives actually worked very hard and did a great job, and as such they feel no qualms about expecting their bonuses. Even more, is AIG completely to blame for it's own failure? Sure, they could have leveraged their equity more reasonably, but ultimately their business model was working great until the subprime disaster. Do you assign personal blame to the executives for this? Investment always involves a risk, and when a company is built on investments there is always a risk that circumstances beyond what the company can control will bring it down. AIG was not alone in missing the signs here. Just about everyone else did too. So just like your mutual fund manager still gets paid his commission regardless of how crappy your mutual fund is performing (it's the stock market, right?), AIG executives still expect their contracts to be honored regardless of how their investment decisions turn out.

The executives have every right to their bonus as guaranteed by their contractual agreement with AIG regardless of past, present, or future performance. If I were an AIG executive, I would fight tooth and nail for my bonus, as should anyone who thinks that a company should honor any of its contracts. Obama is just mouthing off. There is nothing he or congress can do about the fact that, in their short sighted rush to throw billions of taxpayer dollars at these failing giants, they neglected to add stipulations regarding the use of taxpayer money for company bonuses. Obama knows this. Congress knows this. Cuomo knows this. Naturally, they have to pay lip service to the taxpayer outrage. Maybe next time they'll be a little bit more responsible with my money. Better yet, maybe the taxpayers are outraged enough that there won't be a next time. In the wise words of Sen. Charles Schumer: "Why quibble over $200 million?"

You can always ask one of us to take a look at it anyways and provide your reasoning. We're pretty reasonable people

Indeed. It's 2-3x the average.

Good paper and good points. However, one can't make the assumption that a dollar saved by cutting promotions translates to a dollar that could be shifted to consumer savings or R&D. In other words, promotions isn't necessarily an expendable part of the process where dollars can simply be trimmed off and transferred to other places. It's an investment, just like R&D. Obviously if big pharma could increase their profits by trimming off promotional money they would have done it a long time ago. They've determined that a large promotional budget is just as essential to profitability as R&D. Once a drug gets to the market, it requires a huge amount of money to convince physicians and patients that the new expensive drug is better than the old cheap drug. With the exception of the telecommunications industry since the late 1990s, that percentage is higher than almost any other industry (according to this paper). Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged I agree that there are many areas for costs to go down. I just don't think that the government being involved in any way with the financial workings of a private company is the way to do it.

Pharma companies have to recoup R&D costs from someone. That isn't going to happen if people import drugs on the gray market.

Apparently the most pressing issue on the homepage of the democratic party is to kick dirt at Rush Limbaugh.

Unfortunately I don't know enough about the matter to have an opinion.

Because he's attracting way too much attention these days. Even the president has been getting in on the action. http://www.democrats.org/index.html Love him or hate him, he's laughing all the way to the bank.

He needs to spend more now to spend less in the long run, or something like that.

Arm-chair generals are generally hilarious when they analyze the technical aspects of what works and what doesn't in war, what should have been used and what shouldn't have in war, and of course, their expertise in analyzing alleged still photos and short videos of improper use of ordinances.

What a great game.

wut

ydoaPs, this is the ship you'll be on, correct?

What makes him any more of an expert than you? Microbiologists are not endocrinologists. Get your information from authoritative textbooks or qualified people.

Mokele has done an exellent job with your questions, just want to point out pheochromocytomas as an example of an endogenous 'overdose' of adrenaline.

Sure. I was always the skinny type when I was young, but I could eat with the best of them. Your genes ultimately control how your body handles the fat.

The angle of the spinous process varies based on the segment of the spine you're looking at. In the case of the cervical vertebra, they protrude at a higher angle from the vertebral body. If you take a look at the image below, in the left pane, you can see the spinous processes protruding posteriously (the patient's back, i.e. posterior, is on the right). What that means is that at least some element of extension would have to be in place for the spinous process to play a huge role. What you're more likely to see is either disarticulation of the superior and inferior facets of adjacent vertebra, or a fracture of the facets resulting in the same thing. Either way, the end result is that the spinal cord could either be compressed, twisted, or even severed by protruding bone fragments. If this occurs at a high enough level (and with enough cord compromise), it would result in quadripeligia and would likely paralyze the diaphgram, arresting respirations and resulting in death.

Good job YT! That's awesome

The solution is clear. Quit school, work, and your other interests.

Whatever the ideal solution may be, the first step in uncovering it is to convene a scientific panel of zombie experts to put out a consensus statement regarding the exact mechanism by which zombies are animated. We need qualified volunteers.

Interesting -- can you share some of your research with us?

Just don't use that as your password security question

This thread exists for the sole purpose of calling out those who need to change their avatar for various reasons. Dudde, my man, it's time. You've had that avatar for years.