2rd

each time, I read this as "trud" :o

coincidence ?

turd

this is what I meant :((

Demon isn't invited!

These are just the first eight. Total spots are 32.

Dem0n confirmed :>

1nd

3th

D O O M S D 4 Y
O
O
M
S
D
4
Y

That is reall cool that he is going. South America represent

Is that the same guy who looks like Steve Seagal?

ROFL

http://www.esreality.com/post/2518891/dreamha...pid2519615

no_il just no

haha as pet mentions thats no_il, yet doomsday looks similar to him.

lol you dumpcakes, that's plazma, not no_il

:x

:D kek

what in the f**k, I had that exact same shirt years ago :O

i'm really interested to see how he compares to NA and EU skill level

My guess is we can expect him to be around the same level as players around 200 elo lower, compared to eu/us.
At least that was my impression from the oceania players when they traveled for events.

edit: Which will still place him high enough for interesting games :)

200 elo is quite low ;)

200 elo lower, meaning 2400 = 2200

I read this after I woke up...

One always reads to his best abilities while still asleep

wise words

nooooooice

He has a dentist appointment

?

That's why he won't play at QCon.

I see.

I read this news post with ddk's voice in my head and it totally sounded right.

Ddk placed himself into my mind when I wrote this.

.

that just conjured up a wretched image in my mind, thank you

S T R E N G T H
T
R
E
N
G
T
H

why no Fatal1ty

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA *choke* HA HA

*choke*

leave dahang out of this

you should write comments more often D:

You can say what you want, but he always shows up at the event just to show his face and say hi, and always supports the pre-Quakecon tournaments.

I know he does, I've seen the photos :p even more reason to invite him to play.

Not to brag, but I owned him in poker last year. #swagyolo

were you eating gamer food at the time? dopping called it

Yeah, get lucky.

8)

stop focusing on fat's big blind

Agreed!

`always`
http://i.imgur.com/EGOyYq7.jpg

FailFish

Noice.

rapha is love
rapha is life

E P I C
P
I
C

C

C

C

C

O

O

O

O

O

O

O

M

L

L

L

B

L

L

L

O

E

R

fail lol

What a conspiracy?

I scrolled down with such excitement, such joy, thinking this would be the most epic C O O L L E R I've ever seen.. but allas, esr still needs to grow.

;)

Esr can't even count to 10.

^ you all disappoint me

Ppppppffffffftttttttt

B

I believe zero4 has 3 titles as well, according to wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QuakeCon#2000

2000
2001
2003

Edit: combo-breaker !

Moron.

I love doing stuff like this.

you in danger, mate

whatcha gunna do? Insult me?

There's a monty python reference there somewhere.

Seems you are right!

Its co-co-co-combo-bracker

pls delete this comment so you dont break the combo

I've deleted 3 of those but he kept re-posting...

lol

R

A

P

P

P

GANGSTA

YOYO SHIT NIGGA YOYO C'MON YO

u wot m8?

RIP in pieces ((

Y A Y 0
A
Y
0

YA

strong lineup

those australian and south african pussies better show up

"The first eight invited players are:", proceeds to list 4 players.

sorry, just thought it was a bit funny

And then proceed to list another 4 (totaling it to 8)

Get Av3k out of retirement

No! Winning the Faceit Legends Cup was the best final for him.

Evil, tox, Cypher

1st 2nd 3rd

this how it should be

define "should"

verb (3rd sing. should)
1: Used to indicate obligation, duty, or correctness, typically when criticizing someone’s actions: he should have been careful I think we should trust our people more you shouldn’t have gone

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/should

define "or"

OR
Referring to someone as a whore but without actually saying the word "whore".
That girl is such an or.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=OR

define "Reply to #79"

getting deep right there

Turing test failed.

No double elimination so results gonna be very dependant on brackets.

DOOMSD4Y!!!!

yayo!

Evil to win..... \o/

Yeah, come to the Dark Side \o/

Fraze???

huge train

dude, where's rapha? there is no train without rapha.

paris dallas express train, why would rapha board that

good point

As a hobby?

http://www.esreality.com/post/2516949/all-aboard/

Here you go. I made it, last year, but at least this way Rapha has his own fucking train, unlike the plebs in the pic above.

>:(

when u see it

u'll shit brix

Fazz spotted.

lmao

haha awesome thx

.

;)
[img1=left]

Fazz spotted !

>implying spartie n fazz @ quakecon? are you alexey A from moscow region in disguise?

spartie is going with the ctf team, no?

and you never know with fazz

ahhh damn I completely forgot he's with exp :D

wait what, fazz? he said on stream that he's not going, he changed his mind?

He just fits in every picture.

zliveFazz

Nevermind what redjuice said. It's just that Fazz has attained the glorious status of Esr meme.

I see dem0ns everywhere

There are no brakes on the rape Quake train.

Quake train in action :

The south american boys will be the surprise of this tournament

plural? Anyways, I hope you're right.

Evil is going to win quakecon, no doubt.

He is raped by cypher 2 times in a raw. But ye, he's gonna win qqcon for sure Kappa

pro gamers are always at their best just after their peak

ps adem ilu

Raped in a raw, I see what you did there

lucky typo :b

totally slipped on the "o" and pressed "a" instead, across the entire keyboard, nice :D

Depends on the keyboard layout.

Rapists normally use sexual protection, but Cypher is on a whole another league, he does it RAW!

Strenx is a disappointment because there's no way he could get into proper shape inside 6 weeks.

Evil isnt in shape either, he was in incredible, rapha thrashing shape a month or so ago though. DDK/zoot commented that he peaked a month ago and cypher is on the rise, I don't think its a sine wave, I think its just hard to maintain the kind of practice pattern and drive required to sustain that. Hopefully this changes before the tournament.

I only hope cypher stays on form and evil is at his best, only then will we see whose decisions are better. I also hope South America sends their best and makes a deep run into the tourney. That's all I ask.

Trivia: A cypher vs rapha finals has yet to be seen at Quakecon. Will it happen this year?

2008: cypher vs zero4
2009: rapha vs spartie
2010: cypher vs cooller
2011: rapha vs strenx
2012: cypher vs dahang
2013: rapha vs evil

Rapha and cypher both won all their finals, so it's 3-3. Would be epic to see them both in the finals this year!!

wow didn't realize the range of challengers had been that diverse over the years, rapha, cypher always in final, but the opponent has been different every year. tox this year? :P

What about
2014 : cypher vs evil in donut's land?

http://www.esreality.com/post/2610994/re-quak...pid2610994

I see your logic, it will be Doomsd4y vs Dem0n for sure

So cypher and rapha take turns and always play against someone new in the final.

2014 final cypher vs. tox confirmed.

or cypher vs ins

Ins vs CMSS

tox > ins

Let's guess how many Euros miss their flights!

would be totally satisfied if it were an 8 player tourney with this line up.

Qcon to be awesome!

Grand final between Cypher and Rapha, DM6 Deciding map, calling it now!

french idiot

sounds great

rofl @ polish shitlords

schizm is the better troll

youre awful at quake and have a shitty sense of humor your opinion is invalid

You like men!!! Fgejwhw.

lets play tummy stix

E R
R

who the heck is doomsday, time for another B1chito repeat ?

For what ive heard (i got a good argentinian buddy from q3) all the southamerican scene bashed b1chito at that time because he was barely a top player and didnt stand a chance in the tournament. But this time is different, Doomsday is best argentinian dueller and probably best player of southamerica after nhd.

How good will he perform? only time will tell, could be either a Fraze or a Phantom. :>

from what I've seen more like ph4ntom, but who cares, it's cool that he shows up regardless

Not sure if 2nd in southamerica, etjx from chile for example comes to mind, but surely hes a top player from this region so will be a good representative.

Bichito isnt that bad, but he was totally unprofessional. Prefered to party instead of practicing the days before, was unable to warmup in the event, etc.

yes, doomsdays is the best next to nhd, he is really skilled, lacks a little of aim but great strat

what is this nonsense, no dkt? ....









:<?

still time to donate!

Muhaha.

has to work

Quakecon stacked already. Anyone know what shape Dahang is in?

He's shaped like buzz lightyear.

J\k, he's in dahang-shape. He is around the 4th best around. He Will hang around with the top top plrs, maybe upset rapha but eventally lose to Cypher or Evil. ggnore

He can beat evil and strex no problem at the shape he is at this moment. Tho he will need to play a super game to beat Cypher or a lan-raffer, otherwise he stand no chance. :>

its a save bet to say hes in beat-strenx-shape imo

more like strenx is in beaten-by-dahang-shape

evil to win Quakecon 2014

Wololo Wololo

Cypher to win Quakecon 2014

the argentinian boys have low profile, but they will be the surprise of the tournament.

And Doomsd4y is not another bich1to.
Bich1to never defeat doomsd4y, he is the top player of Argentina, and one of the top in this region.
but he has a low profile, he never was in the forums talking shit about "i am the number one of south america"

hi Doomsday :D

Bich1to had traveled to USA just to go on vacation and to party on the beach

but Doomsd4y and c0d47 they were training for months and traveling only to pursue their dream of playing QuakeCon, and concentrate all their energies on it

So did bitchito, training initial spawns and stuff for months, but he said otherwise because he's egocentric as fuck.

Might check his profile if you want.

lol he raged vs me on thunderstruck

this guy bichito is an asswhole

Asswhore?

buttslut

needs griffin and dkt.

Griffin the rocket lord, I would like to see that guy playing again!

"Who will take it all the way this year? Will the Europeans prove the strongest, or will the Americans defend their crown? or will Cypher piss all over everyone?"

I choose Cypher :)

i choose piss

yes, yes, but I choose danger.

Gogo Tox!

Rooting for my alltimes favourite gamer!

btw what happened with av3k??He expressed desire to play at qcon?

Afaik he changed his mind, didn't want to start another donation thing.

He said he was considering it, never comfirmed.

Only if id werent a bunch incompetent morons the would have QL 2.0 ready by now coupled with a huge PR campaing.

And little success.

It would be cool if whole picture was made in paint with spray tool.

Do you have it in high resolution (wallpaper size) ?

No. I just goofed around in PS With a small format to begin with.

I can't promise anything as the picture of Doom was a bit small in the first place. But I could try and vectorize the picture in Illustrator. It will lose some of the detail tho.

How big do you want it?

:)

How big do you want it?

How big can you give it? ;)

I tried making it BIG, But it just looked awful. If Anyones interested I can upload it. But I'm away on vacation and left the PSD file at home so it won't happen before Quakecon is over (21st of july earliest).

But like I said, It looks terrible :/

You missed the obvious euphemism...

But feel free to upload your big image ^^

Yes
and
no


:(

preparing buckets

and douchebags

PHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTTPHHSTT

WHERE IS MY INVITE?????

toilet paper was finished at id software, so they used it.. sorry for you :(

what about nhd aka nohead aka Flesh1?

"in high-definition"

too dangerous to use wallhack in a lan

i don't know why he doesn't appear in tournaments, i lost to him in 2007 in the ESWC Brazil qualifier, he was the best player and still he lost to his brother "klz" in order to send his brother to France. He is very skilled, for me the best south american player no doubt.

ah btw, his clan is the E clan, means experience, this is the clan that Reef played for.

1- 5 month's child,
2- a lot of work (28yo as engineer at Petrobras),
3- not enough money,
4- no mate to practice at SA,
5- holidays already dated to december.

6- no head

.

LONG LIVE QUAKE <3 I SO CANT WAIT TO SEE ALL THOSE FACES AGAIN, FUCKING LEGENDS

nowadays they turned into myths, legends long gone

GO D O O M S D 4 Y GO

where to?

Victory!

Dallas!

let's a go!

let's a go!

where is emocrates? is he still alive? :)

lol @ all these 3rd world cry babies!!

Country: United States of America

Good thing you live in a first world country that provides its citizens with fundamental services such as health care and paid maternity leave.

http://img.pandawhale.com/45066-sad-bald-eagle-BlGw.jpeg

It's called freedom you fuckin fascist

if i was a mod here youd be banned for that shit. its not even remotely funny

thats the ol' german fascist spirit we all know and love

and you too

AND THE JEWS!!!!!!!!!!

The wonderful healthcare systems that peddles dangerous drugs for Big Pharma

I'd rather have the standard of living of an average American than the generous health care I get from the Polish government for 40 euros (or about 80 euros in PPP for easy reference).

why not have both hehehehehehe

I guess you were never forced to pay 15k $ bill for ER that your insurence made sure not to cover. lucky boy.

But it's fine, you can live like a slave to pay the bills for the rest of your life.

While you are entitled to your opinion, and I'm sure you can see that there are several arguments against it (including the fact that health care is especially important for those with wealth below average, whose very existence is in danger when they can't afford medical bills), you are forgetting the bigger picture.

It's not about comparing different countries. It's about realizing that the USA, despite its enormous wealth and power, chooses not to adequatly care about the health of its citizens.

sure, objectively thats my opinion too. in the long run they will see a positive output. but this "freedom & choose" mentality is american and its hard to understand for non americans on a argumentative level.

imo it's hard to ACCEPT the denial of human compassion, sharing medical expenses through taxes wouldn't make people go bankrupt: I recall Bill Gates - american and liberal - saying he liked the idea of public health care (healthy pepole = productive).
unfortunately, besides argumentations, the real way to see if a health scheme fits for someone, is just to be taken ill.
in my case, i found myself asking a health insurance about 20k$: i must say i had much better days, even if the claimed prize was quite low.

While I can't comment on the other arguments which to you justify the state-run health care, the one you have presented is refuted by a healthy dose of common sense and the observation of the public's daily choices.

First of all, I think you'll agree that food is even more important (in general, more precisely it's the case that people choose between increments of both on the margin, which is my second point) than health care, yet it is blatantly clear that freer markets have succeeded in providing even the lower class with a variety of foods unattainable to the wealthy of yore, and the instances of mass starvation in recent history are isolated to areas of little economic freedom and disregard for property rights. If then, we have witnessed such great progress in feeding the population, there is good reason to expect the same to be accomplished in health care, at least with respect to routine and straightforward medical procedures paid out-of-pocket which wouldn't require the involvement of insurance.

In fact, this type of medical practice is flourishing now in the US when ObamaCare regulations require coverage for many procedures which a great deal of population find unnecessary and, because of the higher premiums stemming from those additions, decide to opt out from the health insurance market.

Second of all, as usual with discussions of economic matters among laymen, the focus is mistakenly on what is seen, with complete disregard of that which is unseen. One would have to be pretty wicked to answer in the negative to a following question: wouldn't it be better if we had more health care? Even hardcore anarcho-libertarians such as myself, who'd gladly do away with everything the government provides and replace the services desired by consumers through voluntary means, think more health care would be good, given that we suffer from health-related maladies.

However, the correct question to ask is: wouldn't it be better if we had more healthcare, but less of everything that the increase in health care denies resources from? In plain English, if we had to train more doctors, nurses and other medical staff members and use more steel, sillicon, and electicity to produce the medical equipment, would the decrease in the number of shop assistants, teachers, fire fighters and computer programmers and a smaller supply of computers, selphones, pizzas etc. be justified by the benefit we derive from better and more accessible health care?

Such answers are provided daily, albeit at an individual level, by consumers who spend a certain amount of their money on health care and other necessities, and part of what is left on, for example, sending Quake players halfway across the world to attend a LAN. The latter expense is totaly superfluous to our existence, yet it provides more utility at the margin rather than buying out a more comprehensive health-care plan, as evidenced by the sheer fact of such an expense.

I am aware of the specific nature of the health-care industry in the US. I would argue that the negative outcomes that are at this point known worldwide are a result of state policies dating back to the 1940s and that it is anything but a free market nowadays. But this response has already turned out to be much longer than I intended, so I'll instead direct you to the most succinct text on the subject I know and if you have some questions, I'll try to answer to the best of my knowledge. http://mises.org/daily/3643

The search engine at the Mises Institute is a goldmine and you'll find much more there. I hope you don't have the knee-jerk reaction to "free market gospel" that I've encountered way too often ;) Just because the website is openly dedicated to libertarianism/classical liberalism, it doesn't mean there's no sound economic analysis there.

Hitler was an australian too, right? love those 'solutions' on that von mises site. basically lets all just kill off right now all handicaps as they are economically not viable. This cult of power is all cool if you are a lucky boy that was born into family that lets you study economics, and never experienced bad luck in a form of let's say idiot trashing you in his bmw m3. but not everyone is like you, you know. some people have less luck it does not mean they dont deserve to be here. Sure im with you when it comes to limiting the number of humans dwelling this lovely planet. But doing this in this fashion is so 1939. Tasteless. soo lets move back to the article.
Wasn't #1 done already with CRAs and subprime mortgage crisis? Riight. and then you want a stupid consumer you formatted be smarter than a panel of doctors in searching the right medical treatment. Trial - error in this field luckily for him will end rather sooner than later.
+ for australian's solution for overpopulation
just hahaha #2. i believe that costly drugs are result of your type of people fighting for 'property rights' - meaning copyrights. You cannot just produce cheaper substitute, as the formula is patented and you lack permision to do that. But yeah, just spin that and give even more power to pharmaceutical tycoons. So that they can basically rush into producing new drugs, with no control - meaning that you as a patient will learn of all the wonderful side-effects years later. why not. it hinders the progress. maybe god wants us to be mutants? those regulations are there for a reason, if you believe you are smarter than a doctor in this field, well you are being factitious. You know that your family will pay for a proper medic who will prescribe proper treatment. Whereas those poor? well they can just go ef themselves. Guinea pigs that they are.
+ for australian's solution for overpopulation
#3 this screams nietzsche
funny that example given are 'athletes', manipulating much? ofc noone wants to be in group with those rich jackoffs who earn soo much yet pay same while receiving more. UNFAIR! but i would switch athletes not even with 'future handicaps (accidents)' - you cannot insure yourself from prior events. but lets switch it with manual workers. I know you eggheads are inventing robots and such. but we dont live in those times yet. physical labourers will suffer on HP department more than you sitting on your chair whinning on the depression, anxieties and diabetes. But ye, fuck 'em even more, not only they will earn less for objectively more strenuous work, but they will 'pay the iron prize' later. true 'losers' And by pay i mean pay $$,$$$ straight to the deregulated doctors. cause "Uninsurable risks would lose coverage". Who would insure a dude lifting some heavy sh1t from back injuries? same with all those people doing landscaping. oh well, f00k teh poor. should have work at the desk, cause we now have robots to do all that manual stuff, you know?
+ for australian's solution for overpopulation
#4 subsidies create unhealthy? oh i though that accidents and diseases do? this one is so obvious, evil and full of shit. i mean commenting on "we would strengthen the will to live healthy lives and to work for a living" is a waste of time.as you get that 'all who are against our ideas are slackers' insult and ridiculous claim that diseases and accidents are controlled (done by a healthy lucky boy) in ONE sentence. INCREDIBLE.
this one could only be done by oblivious lucky boys, its not that i wish now that those who '+1' it would get into some terrible accident and be 'moochers' to the rest of their lives, but i do. Yes i do, you zombies.
+ for australian's solution for overpopulation
But this response has already turned out to be much longer than I intended, so I will omit the parts written by gienek, as they are even funnier. Good luck, boy.

sorry, i feel the urge to brainfart !

Maybe I didn't get your concept, but I think your can't compare the (in)efficiency of medical research and food industry: skillset is different, procedure engineerization is more expensive and verification takes much more time. Also, the typical american engineered food is OGM bullcrap and may be the reason for one being ill.
Moreover, biggest medical fundings come from private foundations or industries, which invest their assets on high-profit markets (antidepressants, stimulants more than chemo treatments for terminally ill people). That's why some medical branches are more developed than others.
Anyway, the point is a lot of people couldn't afford medical expenses, while, as you said, it's really hard to starve. That's why society should intervene at helping unhealthy people to live as healthy people does thanks to their luck.
That said, i think it's ok to place side by side private and (almost) free public healthcare: i am happy to pay 50EUR for faster routine blood tests, but someone may not be able to pay when he really need them.

Second of all, regarding healthcare service as privation of other services, I think that illness is an unpredictable damocle's sword. Irrespectively of the efficiency of a treatment which could save your life, the right of being cured shall be set forth no matter what.
Sure you can gamble with luck, but I ask myself if it's funny for a surgeon not to attack again a finger because the insurance won't cover the expenses, or that a high-risk client is dumped by his insurance. And that can happen just because someone is born under a bad sign.
Is that a society which grants equal opportunities to everyone?

WHen you face health issues, it's the moment you get the importance of health. In fact, perceived value is *perceived through the subjectivity of oneself's sight and situation. That's why I enjoy donating to help a bit the QL scene, I am not a jobless, old man about to pay for an expensive treatment.

Regarding your link, i would like you to comment it on its 4 points:
1) how can you deregulate a such important market? It's too delicate with respect to speculations, wouldn't it worsen problem as drug trials, barkers preparing toxic drugs, corruption of not-well-defined volunteer control agencies?

2) FDA, that is certifications may seem useless, but if an hairdryer is half the price of competitors but there's a moderate risk of being electrocuted, would you buy it? please don't answer you are bald :D
I know privatization may bring advantages, but:
- a deregulation doesn't only imply price reductions (i think about dentist fees in my country, the status quo on drug patents, or how generic-equivalent drugs are much harder to be found than famous and expensive brands)
- when you deal with one of more person's lives, you have to take in account human greed. that's the same reason why i am against nuclear energy.

3) Profit is the only goal of insurers, so genuine insurance risk would mean anything than a morally fair and equal treatment. I.e. if DNA tests show A is likely to develop huntington corea and B is not, i know which one would have a better premium.

4) "subsidies create more of whatever is being subsidized."
Yes, life is addictive.
On a serious note, the lack of subsidies strenghtens will to live. Yes, when? Mostly when you are already in trouble. Again, until someone hasn't the correct perception of how precious health is, he won't strenghten the will to live healthy. such good habits come with education and experience.
Also, i can't see how you can strengthen the will to work (for paying your treatments) if your medical condition doesn't allow it. Damn, point 4 is SPARTA!

OK, brace yourself because it’s gonna be a long reply ;)

sorry, i feel the urge to brainfart !

Maybe I didn't get your concept, but I think your can't compare the (in)efficiency of medical research and food industry: skillset is different, procedure engineerization is more expensive and verification takes much more time. Also, the typical american engineered food is OGM bullcrap and may be the reason for one being ill.

Well, there’s a vast number of industries with many distinctive things about them. To be precise, there are no clear boundaries between industries but, for the sake of argument, let’s assume there are. You have examples of private solutions working well with cases as diverse as computer science, food, entertainment, transport, etc. Yet, it’d be absurd to claim that the above would function better if there were a large entity financed from tax receipts or with a special tax incentive (which is currently the case in the US and will be for the foreseeable future) next to the fully private ones. We can clearly see the fallacy in that reasoning with respect to shipping companies or car insurance (the type of insurance that people are incomparably more pleased with than with health insurance). What is more, the factors you have mentioned are highly industry-specific and we can think of branches of immense complexity and risk, in which the private sphere is making great strides in, e.g. space tourism or even laser optics, to hit closer to home when discussing health care.

As far as food quality in the US is concerned, it’s a fairly understandable consequence of government policy: massive per-acre subsidies (for example corn subsidies have made high fructose corn syrup a staple in American diets) artificially favour centralization of the industry and less competition. Another consequence of creating big businesses through redistribution and regulation is that a big interest group all of a sudden emerges which has the means and incentives to influence governmental agencies and perpetuate the status quo, i.e. affect research and simply bribe USDA when it prepares it’s food pyramid or similar concepts. I’m not saying they should be broken up but at least if the regulations recommending their products (fatphobia, which now after 30-40 years of research is gradually being put to rest, peddled by the state solidified all companies which rested on sugar-based food items and drove more business interest in that direction), often bogus compliance barriers and a complicated tax code were reduced/abolished, economies of scale would return to a more sensible level and current smaller food producers (which would be more inclined to offer more natural products because they do not have the access to labs which make your food look or smell nicer) would regain the chance to compete on a level playing field. Moreover, new ones would spring up and that would necessarily drive down the prices of healthy foods making them more accessible not only for the wealthy (as is the case currently) but also for people with lower-to-moderate wealth.

Just because I’m recommending the abolition of state certification agencies, it doesn’t mean that consumers would be blind in their choice of products. I think the need for having some certification is strong enough to make it profitable for such companies to emerge and that is in fact the case. We can conceivably expect that food companies themselves would strive for some sort of verification to gain competitive advantage. This isn’t set in stone, but what is, is that it would be infinitely more difficult to bribe a private customer protection company, whose economic livelihood would depend on certifying good/safe products and warn against the deficient ones because of competitors waiting to capture its market share, as opposed to an agency which has no competitor, gets its funds from taxes and the biggest blow that can be dealt to it in case of a blunder in its operations is some of its employees being fired and replaced by another ones (presumably approved by the big businesses that captured the entire body in the first place).

Moreover, biggest medical fundings come from private foundations or industries, which invest their assets on high-profit markets (antidepressants, stimulants more than chemo treatments for terminally ill people). That's why some medical branches are more developed than others.

The question to ask oneself is why are these markets more profitable (I can’t be sure that they are but let’s run with it)? Are you convinced that there are no recommendations from the FDA that favour one medical solution over another and restrict access to competition in it? Profitability means the spread between revenues and costs. If one business venture continuously offers a 10% rate of return and another a measly 5%, why aren’t companies flocking to the former and bidding up the input prices to gain a 9% return, then an 8% and so on? I think you are taking a lot of things for granted in this part.

Anyway, the point is a lot of people couldn't afford medical expenses, while, as you said, it's really hard to starve. That's why society should intervene at helping unhealthy people to live as healthy people does thanks to their luck.
That said, i think it's ok to place side by side private and (almost) free public healthcare: i am happy to pay 50EUR for faster routine blood tests, but someone may not be able to pay when he really need them.

I certainly sympathize with you on that one. We are after all living in a world of scarcity and there is no way for everyone to satisfy all their needs. However, we cannot achieve a perfect solution, so let’s think of a system which deals with a problem to the biggest extent, while accepting the fact that there will be people who at this point of economic development will be denied a high cost innovative treatment even if the health care industry (be it private charity of government) had ten times as many resources as today. I’d rather that weren’t the case but sadly it is. If we accept that, we can move on and be sure that both of us want to find an effective solution and not just enjoy seeing poor people die of a terminal disease.

What a free market in health care would presumably entail is a certain batch of medical care being financed out-of-pocket. That means a continuous search between quality and cost on the part of the consumer (I hope you don’t think I’m an evil soulless person for calling a medical patient a consumer, as some Nobel laureates do). I think I’m right in assuming that you agree with me that this part of medical care would behave similarly and have a similar success as the food or smartphone industry. Sure, a rich guy has better care than the poor guy but it’s not the case that the poor guy has no means to afford cough medicine or a simple blood test now and then.

A more nuanced approach needs to be used in the insurance market, but we still have the phenomenon of car insurance as a lending hand. It too entails a large one-time expenditure in case of a rare occurrence and is based on pooling risk of people who will never experience that occurrence and those who will. But no one in this group knows in advance if he’ll “win or lose the lottery” and therefore is better off paying regular premiums and not needing the insurance pay-out rather than being caught off guard with no insurance. This is again subject to the continuous market process of finding new and more precise risk groups which enables to differentiate the premiums between members and also provide an incentive for someone to, obviously within the realm of what’s under their control, get into the lower risk group and lower the premium. This process would go in the direction of expanding inclusion of lower-income patients while at the same time punishing high-risk members if the risk is somehow due to their own behaviour, like for example librarians would to a diminishing extent be financing through their premiums medical procedures for professional skateboarders). Now, that’s on the risk side of things, but there’s also the cost part. If we had lively competition between insurance providers, a natural desire for finding more innovative and cheaper ways of carrying out medical procedures would emerge. Of course, this doesn’t mean denying health care to minimize costs for two reasons: 1)the scope of services is agreed upon beforehand in a contract and 2) the threat of a competitor taking over the customers’ business would hurt more on the revenue side than any gain on the cost side could possibly compensate for. I am somewhat aware of the current problem with major insurers denying access to patients but I have not studied the issue enough to find the culprit and I have no problem admitting my ignorance here, which I’ll try to remedy. However, I would warn before proclaiming too soon that it’s the greedy private insurers’ fault, because the competition in health insurance is severely limited through state policies and therefore the possibility for punishing such blatant instances of overreach by competitors is also reduced.

There is also the case of people who through no fault of their own have absolutely no resources at their disposal and will not be able to afford health care. Here we are fully dependent on charitable giving. There are two possibilities: non-profit charities which would still advertise their efficacy in helping the unfortunate in order to gain donations over other charities and a state monopolist financed through taxation.

First of all, as societies get richer, we can expect that the pool of charitable donations will grow not only in absolute terms, but also relative to incomes, because with increased income people move on from satisfying their most basic needs to the more altruistic ones. Here I recommend to look at the sheer amount of charitable donations by the rich. I don’t belittle the middle-class for giving away less as a % of their income obviously, but as soon as we elevate the standard of living of the many, they will be more inclined to part with their incomes and help out the least able/fortunate, who in any system will rely on the help of others, be in direct or indirect.
There is also the aspect of motives. Charities are formed entirely with the goal of helping the social group they choose and eventually alleviating the problem entirely (presumably by selfless people who do this because of their calling or whatever), while the state monopolist has only taken over this role at one point, almost as an afterthought and has to some extent the incentive to perpetuate the dependency of certain groups on it, which obviously grants it their approval in the form of votes or a supportive opinion. This would certainly undermine the case for granting the state the chance to help the poor. It is not my intention to debate how strong that incentive is, but the presence of it is I think undeniable regardless of political views, as long as we are interested in unravelling the truth and not advancing political agenda (which I obviously do not suspect you of).

Second of all, regarding healthcare service as privation of other services, I think that illness is an unpredictable damocle's sword. Irrespectively of the efficiency of a treatment which could save your life, the right of being cured shall be set forth no matter what.

Here I vehemently disagree with you. It’s not a problem of economic analysis but of a moral judgement in part informed by economics. Again, there’s no way of ensuring a right to be treated in abstract. There is no such thing as a free lunch, as one prominent, although a bit inconsistent libertarian once proclaimed. You are logically imposing an obligation on someone to provide that treatment. As a libertarian I strongly reject such claims as partial slavery, obviously incomparable in degree to the historical instance of slavery but the same in moral principle. Then there’s the aspect of efficiency. How effective will that forced health care be if the incentive to provide it doesn’t originate in a mutually beneficial economic exchange but rather a coercive act?

Sure you can gamble with luck, but I ask myself if it's funny for a surgeon not to attack again a finger because the insurance won't cover the expenses, or that a high-risk client is dumped by his insurance. And that can happen just because someone is born under a bad sign.
Is that a society which grants equal opportunities to everyone?

I hope I have answered this objection above somewhat extensively. There’s no need to repeat that.

WHen you face health issues, it's the moment you get the importance of health. In fact, perceived value is *perceived through the subjectivity of oneself's sight and situation. That's why I enjoy donating to help a bit the QL scene, I am not a jobless, old man about to pay for an expensive treatment.

Here I think I can convince you of the dubiousness of your proposition by taking it to its logical conclusion. Would you oppose if I took by force the money you donated for QL and gave it to someone to get medication? If I still did this despite your opposition, do you think a punishment would be justified? If so, why do you support an analogous activity as long as the government does it? Surely, in the act of taxation, it too deprives you of a part of your money which you would spend on your own. It’s you who is okay with helping the poor (So am I) but if I were not, would you forcibly take part of my wealth? Let’s just discuss the moral case here, disregarding for a second the superior economic efficiency of a fully voluntary health care, which I hope you agree with at least a bit more than before reading my response.

Regarding your link, i would like you to comment it on its 4 points:
1) how can you deregulate a such important market? It's too delicate with respect to speculations, wouldn't it worsen problem as drug trials, barkers preparing toxic drugs, corruption of not-well-defined volunteer control agencies?

I’ll be brief here cause my response is slowly becoming a booklet.
The basic argument is this: if one is for deregulation in providing an unimportant good, one should definitely be for deregulation in providing those that are absolutely crucial. The same set of economic rewards and punishments which prevents a restaurant or a food company from putting arsenic or an old rat in your food works just as well for making sure that you’re putting a safe drug on the market. Speculation is essentially having a view of a future set of affairs and acting accordingly. As long as your risks are not dumped on someone else (for example as was the case with big banks being bailed out time and again through the Greenspan era at the Fed or the Treasury in 2008 which encouraged reckless behaviour), it’s precisely you who bears the brunt of your mistakes or reaps the benefits. There’s no fundamental difference between a short-seller of Lehman stocks and Apple introducing the new iPhone or Pfizer coming up with a new drug. The ultimate decision as to the product’s successfulness is up to the consumers who pick one product and abstain from others. I cannot stress that enough. If the government introduces regulations, they give the consumers a false sense of security (a product has the state’s seal of approval so it’s all great) and displace private alternatives which would not suffer from the possibility of being bribed by the producers or they would be immediately exposed by their current competitors or potential new entrants into the product verification business.

Such problems as you’ve mentioned arise when you get one “one size fits all” protocol that gets you through regulation and then shields you from competition. This is exactly the type of arrangement that FDA’s or the AMA’s existence ensures. This is exactly the type of arrangement present in any industry dominated by big businesses - deliberately and for their great benefit.

2) FDA, that is certifications may seem useless, but if an hairdryer is half the price of competitors but there's a moderate risk of being electrocuted, would you buy it? please don't answer you are bald :D
I know privatization may bring advantages, but:
- a deregulation doesn't only imply price reductions (i think about dentist fees in my country, the status quo on drug patents, or how generic-equivalent drugs are much harder to be found than famous and expensive brands)
- when you deal with one of more person's lives, you have to take in account human greed. that's the same reason why i am against nuclear energy.

Unfortunately, human greed doesn’t disappear once you become an employee for a governmental agency. It is precisely there that human greed is allowed to thrive to the detriment of society, because you acquire resources through involuntary means, without being in competition for them in a competitive and voluntary environment.

3) Profit is the only goal of insurers, so genuine insurance risk would mean anything than a morally fair and equal treatment. I.e. if DNA tests show A is likely to develop huntington corea and B is not, i know which one would have a better premium.

Okay, let’s try an example on car insurance. It would work equally on health but that’s where people usually lose sight of logic and think that saving one life is always worth impoverishing a thousand, which is contradicted by their everyday decisions, but I digress.

So we have a market for car insurance. There are two crash risk groups – high risk and low risk. The company offers each group a policy adequate to their respective risks. To the extent that the high risk members can alter their driving and become low risk members, they have an incentive to do so. That’s all there is to it.

Now, in your scenario. The company is forced to insure both of them at the same price. Suddenly you have an incentive for low risk members to become high risk members, because the cost of insurance is the same, driving quickly is much more fun and, let’s face it, cars nowadays are safe enough that they won’t probably get killed or badly injured. This is certainly a scenario that you haven’t intended to bring about but that’s an unintended consequence of limiting participants to the free market with respect to entering agreements that are optimal for them.

I am aware that you cannot try to change risk groups in your particular example of huntington’s, but we can think of many instances where that would actually be possible in health care (e.g. smoking or eating healthy). In those cases a policy of non-discriminating for pre-existing condition would end up worsening the situation. That’s unfortunately the case today in the US, with a growing number of low-risk patients opting out of the system and paying the (so far) small penalty for not buying out health insurance. This will inevitably lead to a surge in costs, as only high-risk patients will stay in the system, which in turn will make more people claim that unguarded capitalism had wrecked health care. But maybe that was the goal all along? Who knows.

4) "subsidies create more of whatever is being subsidized."
Yes, life is addictive.
On a serious note, the lack of subsidies strenghtens will to live. Yes, when? Mostly when you are already in trouble. Again, until someone hasn't the correct perception of how precious health is, he won't strenghten the will to live healthy. such good habits come with education and experience.

I think I’ve shown how subsidizing risky behaviour by equalizing premiums essentially means a transfer of wealth from the low-risk group to the high-risk group and consequently increases the number of high-risk group’s members.

I am afraid your other argument should properly be used to strengthen my side of the argument. If someone is not reasonable enough to take care for himself, maybe lower premiums will be enough of an encouragement?

Also, i can't see how you can strengthen the will to work (for paying your treatments) if your medical condition doesn't allow it. Damn, point 4 is SPARTA!

I think you’re missing the point that Hoppe was clearly talking about people who are productive but in the current institutional environment it’s more beneficial to them to take money from the government. The growing number of Americans enrolling for disability checks for more and more bogus reasons is alarming.
As I’ve already alluded to before, assistance for the involuntarily unproductive (the disabled, the elderly but also the children) is best achieved by making population rich and allowing entrepreneurship work in the field of charity as well. I don’t think you should ever assume that whenever someone has a different, maybe even radical, opinion on state income redistribution in various forms, he’s automatically in favour of dumping the less fortunate into the sea to drown.

One more thing: I use the term ‘state’ not to mean one of fifty political units of the US, but a monopolist of ultimate decision making (more or less ‘government’ but there is a sense in which state=/government)

holy fucking shit. This is way tl;dr but I want you to know that I'm impressed.

yesterday night i got drunk and that's the moment i decided i will read it. sooner or later.

You do realize there's a new law called the Patient Protection Law and Affordable Care Act (aka 'Obamacare') that does exactly this, right?

For those who are not covered by gov't programs for the elderly (Medicare) or the poor (Medicaid), the majority (60+%) have health insurance provided by employers. As of 2010, the US spent 17% of it's GDP on healthcare (far more in absolute dollars than ANY other nation). Given how much is spent on healthcare in this country, it is extraordinarily inaccurate to say that the USA in general does not "adequately care" about the health of its citizens. It has long been a political topic in the US for the past several decades. In fact, presidents have been pushing for healthcare reform dating back to the 1910s. Both Democratic and Republican presidents. Richard Nixon (a Republican) included health care reform in his 1974 State of the Union address.

The main concerns of the US system are the rising costs and how to control them. Prior to the passage of the ACA, some of the significant problems is that, despite given the opportunity to get fairly decent coverage at affordable prices, many healthy people in the US decided not to purchase health insurance on the individual markets. Since the effectiveness of insurance depends on pooling risk, the lack of low risk (low cost) payers in risk pool has driven costs up. Another cost drivers include the growing sophistication, private torts, and redundant treatments that many are provided by the prior healthcare system in the US.

It is misleading political rhetoric to say this country has not and is not dealing with health care.

But what about those that - in practice - don't have any form of health care, at all.

In other nations leaving 1% without coverage is outrageous, whereas in the US the number is at least ten times that and somehow it isn't a truly major concern. The majority is not enough if the minority doesn't have access to a fundamental right; certainly a "not adequate" situation.

At the same time citizens, the employed and their families aren't the only ones in the country. Lets use my personal case, applicable to hundreds of thousands: when I was there if I had gone sick I'd have been been in a quite funny position, with a working prohibition due to visas and scholarships, while there was practically no health coverage beyond a band aid. There's many much more relevant cases out of the system, such as millions of working non-citizens (hey, they are people too), which all summed up lead to the US' health care system outrageous numbers. Now, in European countries that do care about their residents you just go and are attended for free, no matter what and with the highest of standards. That's public health care.

This only scratching the surface, as I only talked the very basics of coverage. Other major concerns are quality and costs for individuals, among others, because it's one thing to appear on a sheet of paper as covered/insured and another is having to spend $50,000 to save your mom's life, regardless.

In the end it all comes down to empathy. In other civilized countries people can't say all that with a straight face, whereas somehow the US works exactly like that. Luckily I haven't been in such situations, but I can empathize with those that are; a crucial difference between the US and the rest of the world.

ok we can now go back to the usual 'cooller' spam

Hospitals in the US are, by law, required to provide health care to anyone (regardless of whether they have insurance or not) and without consideration of insurance. If you have to go into emergency surgery, they cannot deny you depending on whether you insurance. This means everyone gets the necessary care (even illegal/undocumented aliens who get a completely free ride).

So the issue is not whether if someone lacks the care but who pays for it? The Affordable Care Act has changed the status quo by taxing individuals who do not pay into the system (and thereby broaden the risk pool), providing subsidies to those who can not afford healthcare, and taxing "Cadillac" plans that are usually purchased only by the wealthiest individuals in the country. The ACA also prohibits insurers from discriminating against those who have preexisting conditions. But there are still many complications with this law that are not easily remedied which is why there is still significant resistance to it and is still considered unfavorable by the majority (including people on both sides of political spectrum) in the US.

I don't claim to have all the answers. No, it's not a perfect system (but I don't think you'd say the European system is either). Also, looking at healthcare divorced from the larger economy is losing a significant portion of the story. Health has an effect on all components of the economy and many trends in the economy have effects on health. Income disparities, disposable income, unemployment and underemployment rates, etc., all play significant roles in how well the health insurance industry can function.

Moreover, it's not just about the money. There are larger differences of philosophical and legal opinion on the provision of healthcare and insurance in the US. What role does government have in dictating to people? What is the desired balance between a paternalistic government that dictates everything versus providing free agency for people to determine how to live their own lives (whether that be wisely or not)? Is health care the role of the federal (centralized) government or should this be the role of the state (decentralized) governments?

Emergencies are certainly covered everywhere in the world, but consults (without waiting for months), treatment and planned surgeries are not. A gun shot is not the only necessary care.

Yes, in the end it comes down to a philosophical decision. The thing is most developed and somewhat developed countries chose the central government to have a key role in health, including the necessary trade off that the majority and the wealthy will have to pay more in order to have a broader and better system, but the wealthiest country of them all opted for a considerably more liberal position, widely criticized internally and externally for being very much so. Luckily now it's taking a left turn, as 15 years ago it truly was unacceptable.

Personally I'm more of a liberal person, atheist too, but at the same time believe there are aspects in which governments have to step up, regardless if that's considered paternalistic. That's the idea of having one. This means I agree on having private health (better when paying more), directly funded by us privates and everything else, which is different from the highly regarded European solutions, but the system has to provide complete and competent public health care for everyone, even if they don't pay a penny. Someone shouldn't die or have a miserable life because of not having enough funds; and actually is pretty sick that a society chooses not to pay for someone to live.

Same goes for higher education, which is another story and maybe with even more inconsistencies (US parents saving up their whole lives for financing their bizarrely expensive unis, while we foreigners study there for free, lots if not most backed up by the unis themselves or by the US).

I am on the fence about the role of government since there are many problems inherent in having a government (particularly an incompetent government) making decisions that are best made by individuals but I also agree there will always be a role for government. To what degree, though, I am not sure. Regarding whether a centralized or decentralized government is better: I think that can be a good compromise in the balance between paternalism and self-determination to have a decentralized government implement these policies. If people object to subsidizing those who they see as free-riders, they can move to another state where the public "basket of services" matches their preferences. They will make the rational, Tiebout choice that's best for them in their given situation. If a policy is truly superior, it will naturally diffuse to other states over time (for a variety of economic and political reasons).

Not sure what you mean about foreigners studying for free in the US. I know many nations have programs to send students to the US to get an education (on the basis of their repatriation to teach what they learned in the US). China, for instance, has expansive programs to pay for their youth to attend college in the US. There are also scholarships being doled out for supposedly highly qualified students but that's the case for American students as well (not just foreign students). Most highly qualified students will likely get a free ride on the basis of scholarships in the US.

The costs are not too bizarre/unexplained and are well studied (this is actually related to what I study). The vast majority (60-70%) of higher education costs are for personnel. The faculty at major universities are paid extremely well and have created an expansive intellectual "elite" social class in the US. This is why many people around the world prefer to teach in the US if they can because it might mean making very good money with a great deal of flexibility/autonomy. Tenure affords faculty with a very unique degree of job security not see in any other industry and other benefits, such as sabbaticals, provide faculty with a great deal of autonomy/flexibility to do whatever they're interested in doing.

I work at a mid-to-upper tier university and I would say the average entry-level, tenure-track faculty makes an annualized $80,000/year (if they bring in research grants for their summer salaries) and the upper-tier faculty (full professors or "eminent" scholars) make upwards of $400,000/year (annualized). This is very good pay in the US. Whether or not this is an efficient/ideal use of those dollars within the US economy is a different question. But for the individuals, I am sure many people with tenure-track positions in the US higher education system are very satisfied with their jobs.

There are other reasons why costs are inflating for higher ed (increasingly fancy facilities/amenities, particularly), but the majority is attributable to personnel.

Wow such BS... they forgot mojo again.

M O J O
O
J
O

GO MOJO!

I am so proud to be an American. God bless America. The most powerful nation in the world.

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ALL HAIL USA USA

Good for you.

holy fucking shit, he looks like Kano from mortal kombat

Cooller!


YAY0? Clawz?

Avek.....at least for commentary?

When we going to see a proper Quake at Quakecon, like Quake 2, with some actual talented and skilled players.

Not these Quakelive morons dumbing down e-sports over and over.

haha, thanks for making me laugh!

Hi Rigg5

CYPHER
YPHER
PHER
HER
ER
R

Full list of players posted: http://esreality.com/post/2593811/quakecon-20...l-masters/