Revision alert: thanks to work by Jess McVay who caught one major mistake and provided feedback on two other issues (see comments). Responses: 1.  Jess you are correct about income tax revenues; I slipped a decimal point.  Revised calculations below this. 2.  I used the lower per capita health care cost intentionally because it was the only one that I found that removed administrative costs, and because it came with other stats calculated to the same benchmark.  I'm going to keep that in place, even though I agree with you that it is highly optimistic. 3.  I read your calculations vis a vis median income and total workers, but again I will keep mine in place for this study because mine produces a fairly optimistic result for funding, and I do not want to be accused of negativity. So:  to wit:  Delaware income tax returns in 2011 generated $962,000,000, not $9.62 Billion.  Those damn decimals are pesky things.  So let's see, that mea...

This may be one of the shortest debates over a bill in General Assembly history, since the sponsors and main advocates are all effectively admitting that it is fatally flawed. That wasn't so evident two days ago in the John Kowalko-Earl Jaques press release patting themselves on the back for having written a Single-payer health insurance bill for Delaware: John Kowalko here:  HB 392 will solve all of Delaware's health insurance problems.  Trust me, I've run all the numbers myself. State Representatives John Kowalko (25thDistrict) and Earl Jaques (27th District) announced they have filed HB 392, legislation that will provide Health Care coverage to all Delaware residents. The legislation will provide universal health care coverage access through a system that will reduce administrative costs by minimizing and centralizing the current system that requires multiple payment forms and consists of medical decisions being rendered by insurance company bureaucrats w...

The media black-out of third-party candidates seems to be ending . . . slowly. The "money quote" (but read the whole thing): At this juncture, neither the Romney campaign nor the Obama campaign has been willing to comment on Johnson and how he might impact the election. But underestimating that impact on what has proved to be a volatile electorate over the past two years could be a mistake.  

I can't make this stuff up. Kowalko and Jaques wrote this into the bill. Uh, wait a minute.  They didn't. They just cut-and-pasted it from the five-year-old failed bill that they didn't even write. Who wrote it?  Dr. Floyd McDowell--many years ago. And they haven't even updated it.

I'm John Kowalko, and I'm betting you won't go back to see this is exactly the same bill I introduced in 2007, long after Dr Floyd McDowell wrote the original plan. Don't believe me-- read the bill .  And when you do, take the time to compare it, line by line, with SB 177 from 2007 in order to look for any substantive differences.  (Good luck with that, by the way.) Here's, literally, the "money quote": (3) Private individual and employer health insurance payments and out-of-pocket health care expenses will be replaced in this single payer Delaware Health Security Act as follows: (A)    All employers shall pay a graduated payroll tax as follows: (i) 4 percent for employers with less than ten employees; (ii) 5 percent for employers with 10 to 24 employees; (iii) 7 percent for employers with 25 to 49 employees; and (iv) 9 percent for employers with 50 or more employees. This payroll tax may be shared by employers and employees. Singl...

The thing is, the thing that nobody seems to get, is that the Liberty movement really is full of people organizing from the mythical "grass roots," and they're not going to follow anybody's orders any more just because they're told to do so.

FLASHBACK : JUNE 15, 1992 In June 1992, just a few months before my 21st birthday, I flew home from Germany on my first leave after more than 18 grueling months serving as an enlisted soldier in the U.S. Army Infantry. After one long continuous grind from Ft. Benning, GA for Infantry and Airborne training to over a year with the 502nd Infantry, U.S. Army Berlin Brigade, including combat assignment on the northern Iraqi border in '91, I was ready for a break. The occasion was my brother Sandon's graduation from Archmere, but making sure to get the most out of a precious few weeks of stateside leave we caught three Grateful Dead concerts from June 14-20, two at Giants Stadium and the last at RFK Stadium in D.C. * *[The Grateful Dead played a different show every night, making up their setlist just before going on or playing whatever they felt like as the show unfolded. They gave 3000 performances in 30 years and not one is the same.] The second show of this little mi...