Having reached my late 60’s with no major illnesses that I know of, I can comment on the current health care insurance debate with the cool perspective of an objective observer.
I’m also an objective observer of the free market system, as I don’t own a business of my own, although I’ve had relatives who did, even in the insurance industry, as well as other relatives who were/are socialists or libertarians.
If we had the opportunity to design the health care insurance apparatus from scratch to ideal specifications, we would not make it a part of the free market system, useful and practical as that is. One reason for this is that there is no room for profit, especially if we want to pay doctors, nurses, health care aides and therapists of all kinds the money they deserve for the work they do.
We need to have a low-overhead government run system similar to Social Security, which taxes everyone according to their income and pays for the health care expenses of everybody. Possibly the government should also pay malpractice insurance fees, with an eye toward retraining medical professionals who seem to be accident prone, into another side of the profession where no one could get hurt.
What if we also paid for disease prevention for everybody, helping people to exercise every day, stop smoking, achieve a healthy weight, eat 5 or more servings of fruit/vegetables every day, cut down on refined and processed foods, for instance? We could incentivize it by offering, say, a 1% cut in your income tax if you reach a certain percentage of health maintenance milestones in a year.
There may be millions of dollars in our present system being wasted on scams of one kind or another. We could also incentivize reporting and whistle-blowing to uncover fraudulent activity and unnecessary or unhelpful services. Maybe offer another 1% income tax cut for the person who provides information leading to the conviction of a perpetrator of health care fraud; or a 1/2% cut for showing a service is unnecessary and unhelpful. (But don’t try to take away my homeopathic allergy pills and drops!)
The problem with designing a more effective and efficient health insurance system is it can’t be implemented without displacing the multitudes of people who work in the private health insurance businesses; and the multitudes more who have health insurance and pharmaceutical companies in their investment portfolios and retirement/pension accounts. (Are these the same companies? Have the Insurance companies all bought pharmaceutical companies, and the pharmaceutical companies all bought insurance companies?)
Then our problem becomes finding work projects for the people and money displaced by the new, more efficient system of paying for health care. Some of them can find work in the government health care administration, although we won’t need the thousands of people charged with rejecting claims.
We could put the money into investments in businesses to promote healthy living, such as neighborhood gyms and smaller-scale regional food production farms.
Freed up investment money could also support businesses involved in energy independence, such as promoting and implementing geothermal in new and existing buildings. Here’s an idea for development: neighborhood gyms could produce kinetic energy to power the whole block by fitting the treadmills and elliptical machines to turn human energy into electricity.
Hello MYBO family,
I just want to let people know about my new business.
www.greenteastop.com
come visit me and see what I have.
Mark
I just wanted to express my heartfelt condolences to Senator Obama and his family on the loss of his grandmother. I, too, was extremely close to my grandmother and her death was the hardest thing I have ever gone through. The only comfort I could find was in knowing that she was with God in Heaven, no longer sick and in pain. I hope that Senator Obama and his family can also find some comfort and peace with the knowledge that their grandmother is now also free from illness and suffering, and will definitely be with them tomorrow night!
It's hard to believe that tomorrow is Election Day! I so look forward to being able to celebrate when the voters of the United States elect Barack Obama as our next President! The future looks bright and hopeful once again.
I haven't acted as an "official" volunteer, but have been on the phone with family members (some very staunch Republicans) in other states and am happy to say that they are going to, or already have, voted for Senator Obama. Many of them have even gotten active in their own communities to Get Out The Vote for Obama!
CNN reporter last night completly mislead audience by stating Greenspan didn't know what to do with Financial Crisis.
Actually Greenspan basically testified that his Idealogy on Free Market Degulations was fatally flawed. He believed that Banks would self regulate themselves in order to self preserve. He forgot about Greed in his financial model.
Welch, ex chairman of GE said on TV interview that he thought Sunny Days were ahead in last quarter of 09 due to new regulations.
I want to bring this up because of John McCains' thinking about getting rid of the Railway Labor Act and his support for Foreign Ownership of Airlines. Pilots need to be reminded of what their careers and life would be like with a McCain Administration. This banking mess would look like a fender bender compared to what would happen to the Airline Industr.
Also, a McCain staffer said in a TV interview that th U.S. needs to stop all employer paid Health Insurance. He supported this statement by saying GM was a Health Care Insurance Co. that just happened to build cars. These people just hate Sick calls as well.
The press seems determined to mistate Greenspans' testimony or ignore what he said. This is an excerpt from some of what was said from the NY Times:
NY Times Oct 23rd
But on Thursday, almost three years after stepping down as chairman of the Federal Reserve, a humbled Mr. Greenspan admitted that he had put too much faith in the self-correcting power of free markets
“Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself included, are in a state of shocked disbelief,” he told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
On a day that brought more bad news about rising home foreclosures and slumping employment, Mr. Greenspan refused to accept blame for the crisis but acknowledged that his belief in deregulation had been shaken.
He noted that the immense and largely unregulated business of spreading financial risk widely, through the use of exotic financial instruments called derivatives, had gotten out of control and had added to the havoc of today’s crisis. As far back as 1994, Mr. Greenspan staunchly and successfully opposed tougher regulation on derivatives.
The Federal Reserve had broad authority to prohibit deceptive lending practices under a 1994 law called the Home Owner Equity Protection Act . But it took little action during the long housing boom, and fewer than 1 percent of all mortgages were subjected to restrictions under that law.
Despite his chagrin over the mortgage mess, the former Fed chairman proposed only one specific regulation: that companies selling mortgage-backed securities be required to hold a significant number themselves.
On October 14th, the Barack Obama campaign lost one of its biggest grassroots supporters who was diagnosed one year ago with pancreatic cancer.
Beth Wehrman of LeClaire, Iowa was involved in the campaign from its onset in Iowa. She traveled into the Davenport office frequently to make calls, stuff envelopes, enter data into computers, knock on doors, etc. so she could see the end result, Barack Obama as our next POTUS.
Beth was a dedicated wife, mother, grandmother, nurse, and friend. She will be missed by many people.
Beth had been hospitalized for treatment just prior to the Iowa caucus. She was in the hospital when she received a phone call from Barack. It thrilled her to be able to speak directly with Barack and let him know about how her insurance was handling her case amongst other things. Her most recent honor was to see Barack again in September when he was in town for a small town hall gathering with undecided voters. In fact,she had just been released from the hospital earlier that day. She would not miss this for anything. Her strength and family were with her through it all. Her goal had been to see Barack Obama elected. I am sorry to say that she didn't make it. Only 19 days out but she just could not hang on.
To top it off, her husband was recently diagnosed with prostate cancer. He was honored by being the republican turned Obama supporter who introduced Barack at the town hall in Davenport.
My thoughts and prayers are with the family and friends of Beth's. My special message to them, we will celebrate Barack's victory and toast Beth as the avid supporter she was.
Joe the Plumber evidently makes over $250,000/year, yet John McCain thinks Airline Pilots are overpaid, underworked bus drivers. What does he think of Nurses? Does McCain think everyone makes over $250,000 a year?
Watching C Span....contrary to what the Republicans want you to think the majority of the Subprime Loans went to Middle/Upper Income homeowners...not to minorities. Morgage originators received a 1% fee for a conventional loan, 3.5% fee for a subprime. so they pushed buyers that could qualify for a conventional mortgage into a more expensive Sub Prime. It appears these Banks and Mortgage companies want to blame the minority victims, rather than take responsibility for their own actions while dipping into the taxpayer pocket. There existed widespread fraud. Why would McCain want to buy these mortages at Full Price rewarding the crooks?
This Campaign to blame the minorities for Subprime Mess is just another example of how McCain sold his soul to the Deviants managing his campaign.
I am now a Obama/Biden supporter. McCain is an oxymoron....McCain says he is for absolute truth while running a smear/fear campaign that is full of lies. He and his fellow Navy Pilot Keating ( I still think highly of Naval Aviators) were as tight as money at the Banks. Today McCain would probably be in jail if he were treated equally as Martha Stewart.
Every time I see McCains' "Absolute Truth" statement I think of the sign on a dest of a Senior V.P. that completly falsified his background.
Jim
Thank God for Barack Obama
It is often forgotten that the Russians had armed nuclear missiles aimed at the U.S. and the Military wanted to Bomb Cuba thinking that the missiles were not armed. President Kennedy called Khruschev and averted a disaster what could have ended the U.S. as we know it.
The Bush/McCain strategy of calling the Iranians names like a disturbed sixth grader is fatally flawed and has failed.
McCain has a Jekyll/Hyde personality...reminded me of Jack Nicholson in "A Few Good Men" during the Debate. A McCain Presidency is scary.
22 million counterfeit prescriptions filled in U.S. last year. Tainted drugs, food that kills our dogs, no consumer protection, manipulation of the financial markets, these are just some of the results of the Bush/McCain Deregulation Plan. They have elevated excesses of greed to a new high.
Also, the $650 Billion we owe the Chinese for financing the Iraq War. I suspect this is why McCain wants to allow foreign ownership of U.S. Airlines. (Paybacks are a bitch)
It wasn't broke until they fixed it.
Watching Paulson's testimony I thought we have gone beyond the Fox guarding the Chicken coop.
It is now invite the Fox over for dinner and then asking the Fox to bring all his friends.
Paulson doesn't have a plan. He wants to play the game his way, and make up the rules as he goes along. I began to get the feeling his "Experts" are the same people that got us into this mess.
And, What is this talk of including Foreign Banks? Maybe McCain wants to give taxpayer money to the Foreign Airlines as well?
Barack Obama has assembled an impressive team of Economic Advisors.
I would be much more comfortable if Congress limited the first payment to $100 Billion and then let Barack Obama take charge. It is my judgement that Robert Reisch and Robert Rubin have proven integrity with intellectual ablities far beyond that of Paulson and Ben Bernanke.
Have you purchased your Obama yearbook yet? You MUST! Money will go to the campaign and you in turn will receive an fabulous color yearbook filled with many memories of the campaign so far. There are two color pages for each state. Look at what each state AMbassador has done for this creative endeavor. It is a keepsake that you will treasure forever.
Simply go to www.obamayearbook.com and place your order!
Thank you goes out to Karen Benzer who dreamed of this project and saw it through to completion and beyond!!!!
Own your piece of history. Who knows, maybe you will have Barack Obama sign the yearbook for you and make it even more special!!!!
Obama raps McCain for ignorance of his own houses
By MATT APUZZO Associated Press Writer
In this Feb. 5, 2008 file photo, Republican presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., watches Super Tuesday election returns from the kitchen area of his home in Phoenix, Ariz. Days after he cracked that being rich in the U.S. meant earning at least $5 million a year, McCain acknowledged that he wasn't sure how many houses he and his wealthy wife actually own. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia)
WASHINGTON (AP) -- John McCain may have created his own housing crisis. Hours after a report that the Republican presidential nominee-in-waiting didn't know how many homes he and his multimillionaire wife own, Democratic rival Barack Obama launched a national TV ad and a series of campaign stops aimed at portraying McCain as wealthy and out of touch.
With the economy the top issue in the race, Obama sought to turn McCain's gaffe into one of those symbolic moments that stick in voters' minds.
Think John Kerry sailboarding or the first President Bush wowed by a grocery store checkout scanner, Michael Dukakis riding in a tank or Gerald Ford eating a tamale with the husk still on.
"I think - I'll have my staff get to you," McCain told Politico when asked Wednesday how many houses he owns. "It's condominiums where - I'll have them get to you."
Later, the McCain campaign told Politico that McCain and his wife, Cindy, have at least four in three states - Arizona, California and Virginia.
Property records reviewed by The Associated Press show McCain and his family appear to own at least eight homes: A ranch and two condos in Arizona; three condos in Coronado, Calif.; a condo in La Jolla, Calif.; and another in Arlington, Va. The number of houses is a bit trickier to determine since the ranch has at least four houses and a two-story cabin on it.
Last week McCain cracked that being rich in the U.S. meant earning at least $5 million a year. His latest comments gave Democrats an opportunity to suggest that McCain cannot relate to ordinary voters.
Campaigning in Chester, Va., Obama said: "I guess if you think being rich means you've got to make $5 million and if you don't know how many houses you have, it's not surprising you might think the economy is fundamentally strong." He returned to the McCain remark later, saying of teachers: "Most teachers hold themselves accountable. They didn't go into teaching to make money. They don't have seven houses."
The Obama campaign also announced 16 campaign events across the country to highlight the comment and try to turn the tables on McCain's effort to cast him as an elitist. In the battleground state of Michigan, Obama's campaign asked volunteers to guess how many houses McCain owns, a contest dubbed, "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire: McCain Edition."
While both sides are trying cast the other as too rich to understand the working class, the truth is neither candidate is hurting for money.
McCain's tax returns showed a total income of $405,409 in 2007. According to her 2006 tax returns, Cindy McCain had a total income of $6 million. Her wealth is estimated by some at $100 million, based on her late father's Arizona beer distributorship. She has not released her 2007 returns, which she files separately from her husband.
Obama and his wife, Michelle, reported making $4.2 million in 2007.
In the 2004 campaign, Republicans tried to use wealth against Kerry even though President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney were multimillionaires themselves. In 2005, Kerry reported a net worth between $165 million and $235 million, most of it controlled by his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry.
Underscoring how seriously the McCain campaign takes the house controversy, the Republican National Committee responded with a Web site highlighting Obama's ties to Chicago businessman Antonin "Tony" Rezko, a friend and contributor who was convicted in June on more than a dozen felonies in a corruption scandal.
Obama and his wife bought their home in Chicago in 2005 for $1.6 million after getting advice from Rezko. The corruption case had no connection to Obama, and Obama has said it was a mistake to work with Rezko on buying the house.
"Does a guy who made more than $4 million last year, just got back from vacation on a private beach in Hawaii and bought his own million-dollar mansion with the help of a convicted felon really want to get into a debate about houses?" asked McCain campaign spokesman Brian Rogers.
However, the campaign got one thing wrong: Hawaii has no private beaches. Obama, who was born in Hawaii and spent most of his youth there, visited relatives during a recent vacation and joined the public swimming and surfing in the ocean.
In a forum last week with the Rev. Rick Warren, McCain was asked to define the word "rich" and to give a figure. After promoting his tax policies, McCain said: "I think if you are just talking about income, how about $5 million?" The audience laughed, and he added: "But seriously, I don't think you can - I don't think seriously that - the point is that I'm trying to make here, seriously - and I'm sure that comment will be distorted - but the point is that we want to keep people's taxes low and increase revenues."
Asked the same question at the forum, Obama said those making $250,000 and higher are in the top 3 to 4 percent and "doing well."
Come join us at the Labor Day Parade in East Moline
http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/detail/communityservice/gpgy5j
August 21, 2008
Obama camp links McCain to Abramoff scandal
Posted: 02:11 AM ETFrom CNN Ticker Producer Alexander Mooney
Obama's campaign is out with a tough new campaign ad featuring Jack Abramoff.
(CNN) — Barack Obama's campaign is linking John McCain to the infamous Jack Abramoff scandal that ended several Republicans' political careers three years ago in a new campaign ad hitting Georgia airwaves Wednesday.
The 30-second spot is the Obama campaign’s second negative ad in the past 24 hours. It attacks the Arizona senator for his association with former Christian Coalition head Ralph Reed, one of the Republicans implicated in the scandal.
The ad also seems to suggest McCain didn't call Reed to testify before a Senate panel he chaired in return for political favors.
“When the Senate investigated, the senator in charge never even called Reed to testify….And that senator? John McCain. And who’s now raising money for McCain’s campaign? Ralph Reed," the ad's narrator says. "For 26 years in Washington, John McCain’s played the same old games. We just can’t afford more of the same.”
The TV spot sparked a sharp rebuke from McCain campaign spokesman Brian Rogers, who called it "ridiculous," and noted Obama's connection to Bill Ayers, the current University of Chicago professor and one-time leader of the militant group "Weather Undeground."
“If Barack Obama wants to have a discussion about truly questionable associations, let’s start with his relationship with the unrepentant terrorist William Ayers, at whose home Obama’s political career was reportedly launched," Rogers said. "Mr. Ayers was a leader of the Weather Underground, a terrorist group responsible for countless bombings against targets including the U.S. Capitol, the Pentagon and numerous police stations, courthouses and banks."
Reed, who lost a bid in 2006 for lieutenant governor of Georgia, had promoted a McCain fundraiser last week in the Atlanta area that netted the presumptive Republican nominee $1.75 million in campaign cash. Though Reed did not attend the event (after intense Democratic criticisms), he circulated "special invitations" to several Republicans in the Atlanta area seeking donations.
That prompted several watchdog groups to call on McCain to cancel the event — although his campaign noted the fundraiser was sponsored by the Republican National Committee, not Reed.
Barack Obama bites back against John McCain
Senator Barack Obama has stiffened his rhetoric against Senator John McCain, after complaints within Democratic ranks that he was allowing attacks to go unanswered.
By Alex Spillius in Washington Last Updated: 9:01PM BST 20 Aug 2008
As the White House race heated up ahead of the first party convention next week, the Democratic candidate has said his Republican rival "doesn't know what he's up against" in this election and challenged him to stop questioning his character and patriotism.
Mr McCain had said Mr Obama "tried to legislate failure" in the Iraq war and had put his ambition to be president above the interests of the United States.
Apparently enjoying getting under his rival's skin, Mr McCain said yesterday: "Senator Obama got a little testy on this issue. He said that I am questioning his patriotism. Let me be clear: I am not questioning his patriotism, I am questioning his judgment."
Mr Obama also for the first time hit back at personal attacks on his popularity in McCain campaign advertisements which compared him to Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.
"Our job in this election is not just 'win,' although I'm a big believer in winning," Obama said. "I don't intend to lose this election. John McCain doesn't know what he's up against.
"He can talk all he wants about Britney (Spears) and Paris (Hilton), but I don't have time for that mess," Mr Obama said.
Despite vowing to eschew negative tactics, Mr Obama yesterday launched a series of hard-hitting advertisements in swing states that verged on contravening his pledge.
They portrayed Mr McCain as a member of the wealthy elite disconnected from the struggles of ordinary families. One used a Jan 2008 quote from the Arizona senator: "I don't believe we're headed into a recession".
Another presented a mock book of Economics by John McCain, with Chapter Two titled $10 Billion A Month In Iraq. The Republican has been a staunch advocate of the war from its inception.
A decorated Vietnam war veteran and member of the Senate armed services committee, Mr McCain has sharply questioned whether the 47-year-old Obama has the experience and character necessary to serve as commander in chief.
He also has spoken out strongly against Russia's invasion of the former Soviet republic of Georgia, using Obama's absence from the campaign trail during a Hawaiian holiday last week to take a hard line against Moscow.
Mr Obama has always vowed not to let attacks go unanswered, having seen the disastrous effects of John Kerry's failure in 2004 to respond quickly to slanderous questions about his war record in Vietnam.
But political brawling goes against his nature, and his campaign will try as far as possible to stay above the fray, keeping its powder dry for the final eight weeks of the campaign, which follow the end of the Republican convention on Sep 4.
According to some Democratic strategists, that is the right course of action. "Over the summer we have seen a bit of a rope-a-dope strategy, but at the conventions we will see the dynamic of the campaign change," said Dan Gerstein, who worked on Al Gore's 2000 campaign.
After Mr Obama has formally accepted the party's nomination in front of 75,000 people on Aug 28, he believes the Illinois senator's campaign will launch a sustained counter-attack, linking McCain to fellow Republican George W Bush. "You will hear the phrase 'Bush's third term' a lot," he added.
by Ted Robbins
Listen Now [4 min 16 sec] add to playlist
Kathleen Hensley Portalski displays newspaper clippings of her father in World War II, as well as snapshots of herself as a child with her father.
Portalski is shown with her late father, Jim Hensley, who also was Cindy McCain's father.
Read the original profile on Cindy McCain.
Nicholas Portalski, whose mother is McCain's half sister, says it's "very, very hurtful" that he and his mother haven't been recognized.
All Things Considered, August 18, 2008 · Last Tuesday, NPR broadcast a story about Cindy McCain's business and charity work. In it, Ted Robbins described McCain as the only child of Jim Hensley, a wealthy Arizona businessman. The next morning, NPR received an e-mail from Nicholas Portalski of Phoenix, who heard the story with his mother.
"We were listening to the piece about Cindy McCain on NPR, All Things Considered, and it just struck us very hard," Portalski said.
His mother, Kathleen Hensley Portalski, is also Hensley's daughter.
The Portalski family is accustomed to hearing Cindy McCain described as Hensley's only child.
She's been described that way by news organizations from The New Yorker and The New York Times to Newsweek and ABC.
McCain herself routinely uses the phrase "only child," as she did on CNN last month. "I grew up with my dad," she said then. "I'm an only child. My father was a cowboy, and he really loved me very much, but I think he wanted a son occasionally."
McCain's father was also a businessman — and twice a father.
"I'm upset," Kathleen Portalski says. "I'm angry. It makes me feel like a nonperson, kind of."
Who Is Kathleen Hensley Portalski?
Documents show Kathleen Anne Hensley was born to Jim and Mary Jeanne Hensley on Feb. 23, 1943. They had been married for six years when Kathleen was born.
Jim Hensley was a bombardier on a B-17, flying over Europe during World War II.
He was injured and sent to a facility in West Virginia to recuperate. During that time, while still married to Mary Jeanne, Hensley met another woman — Marguerite Smith. Jim divorced Mary Jeanne and married Marguerite in 1945.
Cindy Lou Hensley was born nine years later, in 1954.
She may have grown up as an only child, but so did her half sister, Kathleen, who was raised by a single parent.
Portalski says she did see her father and her half sister from time to time.
"I saw him a few times a year," she says. "I saw him at Christmas and birthdays, and he provided money for school clothes, and he called occasionally."
Jim Hensley also provided credit cards and college tuition for his grandchildren, as well as $10,000 gifts to Kathleen and her husband, Stanley Portalski. That lasted a decade, they say. By then, Jim Hensley had built Hensley and Co. into one of the largest beer distributorships in the country. He was worth tens, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars.
Sole Inheritor To Hensley's Estate
When Hensley died in 2000, his will named not only Portalski but also a daughter of his wife Marguerite from her earlier marriage. So, Cindy McCain may be the only product of Jim and Marguerite's marriage, but she is not the only child of either.
She was, however, the sole inheritor of his considerable estate.
Kathleen Portalski was left $10,000, and her children were left nothing. It's a fact Nicholas Portalski says his sister discovered the hard way.
"What she found in town — on the day of or the day before or the day after his funeral — was that the credit card didn't work anymore," Nick says.
The Portalskis live in a modest home in central Phoenix. Kathleen is retired, as is her husband. Nicholas Portalski is a firefighter and emergency medical technician looking for work.
They say it would have been nice if they were left some of the Hensley fortune.
They also say they are Democrats, but Nicholas Portalski says he had another reason for coming forward.
"The fact that we don't exist," he says. "The fact that we've never been recognized, and then Cindy has to put such a fine point on it by saying something that's not true. Recently, again and again. It's just very, very hurtful."
Kathleen Portalski says she'd like an acknowledgment and an apology.
NPR asked the McCain campaign — specifically, Cindy McCain — to comment or respond. Neither replied.
Rachel Gets Her Own MSNBC Show
by Keith Olbermann
Tue Aug 19, 2008 at 02:05:19 PM PDT
Happy Now? The network will be formally announcing this tomorrow, but I am pleased to inform you in this fully authorized leak, that as of Monday, September 8, our mutual friend Ms. Maddow will become host of her own show, on MSNBC, at 9 PM Eastern Time. And, yes, we will be making another unofficial announcement of this on tonight's edition of Countdown. My guest to analyze the Rachel Maddow news will be Rachel Maddow.
Let me answer the key questions in advance: 1) No, she will not be serving as a VeeJay introducing music clips or cartoons. 2) No, I don't think we have the name of the show chosen yet. She wanted to use "Countdown With Keith Olbermann" and I said, that's where I draw the line. 3) No, the format isn't set, though there have been a lot of discussions out there and they have all centered on how to best allow her to both give her laser-quality insights while soliciting the opinions of others. 4) Yes, I had something to do with it. 5) Yes, you had something to do with it. 6) Yes, this is why I never really responded to any of the 41,754 comments that all pretty much read "And get Rachel her own show, nitwit." 7) No, I'm not sure it will replay later in the evening but I bloody well hope so. 8) Yes, I did like the description of her in The Nation: "Everything about her radiates competence and a deft, bright careerism." 9) Billy Loes. A teammate of Hodges in 1950, an opponent of Adcock in 1954, an opponent of Colavito in 1959, a teammate of Mays in 1961. 10) No, this actually happened pretty quickly. Less than five months between first paid appearance and own show is pretty fast. I believe I still hold the MSNBC record: I came back to guest host for three days in 2003 and 39 days later I had a contract to do the 8 PM show. With people as talented like Rachel, getting it locked down quickly is a good thing. 11) No, I have no idea who will start guest hosting Countdown. Took me five years to find her. Dammit! Why didn't I think of this! She can't be the guest host any more! I knew I'd forgotten something! 12) No, there will not be pie. Well, you may bring your own pie, but I can't be bothered with pie now! I have to go find another guest host. Dammit.
