Official Random Thoughts Thread - Part 3

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

I wonder what the all-dreadlock team would be. George Hill, Nene, Faried... are there any guards with dreads?

Lakers reserve C/PF Jordan Hill has dreads. Zonker, you might be thinking of him instead of George, since you're asking for guards.

Marquis Daniels, Celtics reserve has dreads as do both Cartier Martin and Roger Mason.

[Zonkerbl]

Yeah, I was thinking of the dude on the Lakers w/ dreads. Didn't quite catch his first name.

So no PGs (too bad Allen Iverson's retired)?

SG: Roger Mason
SF: Cartier Martin
PF: Faried/Hill
C: Nene

[montestewart]

Yeah, I was thinking of the dude on the Lakers w/ dreads. Didn't quite catch his first name.

So no PGs (too bad Allen Iverson's retired)?

SG: Roger Mason
SF: Cartier Martin
PF: Faried/Hill
C: Nene

What's the availability of dreaded PGs and PFs coming out of school? The Wizards are a little weak in those areas.

[willbcocks]

In case any government employees missed it: there's now a ROTH option to the TSP instead of just the traditional 401k model.

This is truly great news for me. Unless I am missing something, I am a perfect candidate for a ROTH 401k program:

-Married and filing jointly with a spouse that doesn't work; just started my career so I'll be in the 15% bracket for (10?) years.
-No kids, no house, too high a minimum income so I miss all the tax credits and incentives
-Low/no state income tax currently
-pension on retirement
-And the clincher: my wife is not a U.S. citizen and I'm not sure when she'll get a green card, so I haven't been confident that it is legal to help her set up and max her own ROTH IRA.

Way too excited about contributing to an account I can't withdraw from for 30+ years, but I guess that's better than not getting excited at all.

[dobrojim]

with the Roth TSP, which fund do you go for?

[verbal8]

In case any government employees missed it: there's now a ROTH option to the TSP instead of just the traditional 401k model.

This is truly great news for me. Unless I am missing something, I am a perfect candidate for a ROTH 401k program:

-Married and filing jointly with a spouse that doesn't work; just started my career so I'll be in the 15% bracket for (10?) years.
-No kids, no house, too high a minimum income so I miss all the tax credits and incentives
-Low/no state income tax currently
-pension on retirement
-And the clincher: my wife is not a U.S. citizen and I'm not sure when she'll get a green card, so I haven't been confident that it is legal to help her set up and max her own ROTH IRA.

In the 15% bracket ROTH is clearly the way to go. Even for people where it will likely be a wash(same tax bracket in the future) having some ROTH retirement savings is not a bad idea. The ROTH gives you a lot more flexibility with your withdrawls(or not withdrawing), so it can be a great source for years where you need extra income in retirement, but don't want a tax hit of moving up a bracket.

[nate33]

The social safety net is unsustainable. The lousy economy and unforgiving demographics conspire to expand the size of the dependent class, and it's only going to get worse. We are near a critical mass where the dependent class will have the voting majority in order to take indiscriminately from the productive class. Taxes will be higher in the future than they are now. Any measure you can take to pay your taxes now and be done with it forever (i.e., the Roth IRA and 401K) should be taken. Max out your Roth IRA and Roth 401K to the full extent possible. They are much better options than conventional Roth IRAs or 401Ks, at almost any tax bracket.

[Zonkerbl]

I plan on retiring and joining the dependent class and voting for tax hikes on my kids.

[dobrojim]

The social safety net is unsustainable. The lousy economy and unforgiving demographics conspire to expand the size of the dependent class, and it's only going to get worse. We are near a critical mass where the dependent class will have the voting majority in order to take indiscriminately from the productive class. Taxes will be higher in the future than they are now. Any measure you can take to pay your taxes now and be done with it forever (i.e., the Roth IRA and 401K) should be taken. Max out your Roth IRA and Roth 401K to the full extent possible. They are much better options than conventional Roth IRAs or 401Ks, at almost any tax bracket.

slight changes in Soc Security are all that is needed to sustain it beyond the 22 years
where it is still projected to be able to pay out all benefits. After 22 year, it can still pay
something like 80% of benefits. Raise or eliminate the cap on FICA taxes and you have
a completely sustainable system.

all that said, I'm socking away as much as I can into both Roth and my reg TSP account.

edit to add - Social Security is the most successful anti-poverty program in the
history of mankind and an example of how govt can improve things for most people.
That's a major reason why cons hate it.

[nate33]

The social safety net is unsustainable. The lousy economy and unforgiving demographics conspire to expand the size of the dependent class, and it's only going to get worse. We are near a critical mass where the dependent class will have the voting majority in order to take indiscriminately from the productive class. Taxes will be higher in the future than they are now. Any measure you can take to pay your taxes now and be done with it forever (i.e., the Roth IRA and 401K) should be taken. Max out your Roth IRA and Roth 401K to the full extent possible. They are much better options than conventional Roth IRAs or 401Ks, at almost any tax bracket.

slight changes in Soc Security are all that is needed to sustain it beyond the 22 years
where it is still projected to be able to pay out all benefits. After 22 year, it can still pay
something like 80% of benefits. Raise or eliminate the cap on FICA taxes and you have
a completely sustainable system.

all that said, I'm socking away as much as I can into both Roth and my reg TSP account.

edit to add - Social Security is the most successful anti-poverty program in the
history of mankind and an example of how govt can improve things for most people.
That's a major reason why cons hate it.

Social Security is only successful in that it's a Ponzi Scheme that hasn't yet reach it's inglorious conclusion. There is no lock box. That money has been spent. It's a pay as you go system. It worked when it started because there were 16 donors for every one on the dole. It won't work when the ratio is 2 to 1 - which is coming soon.

[dobrojim]

it's been successful for 70 years or so...

when push comes to shove, they'll tweak it (again).

[Ruzious]

The social safety net is unsustainable. The lousy economy and unforgiving demographics conspire to expand the size of the dependent class, and it's only going to get worse. We are near a critical mass where the dependent class will have the voting majority in order to take indiscriminately from the productive class. Taxes will be higher in the future than they are now. Any measure you can take to pay your taxes now and be done with it forever (i.e., the Roth IRA and 401K) should be taken. Max out your Roth IRA and Roth 401K to the full extent possible. They are much better options than conventional Roth IRAs or 401Ks, at almost any tax bracket.

slight changes in Soc Security are all that is needed to sustain it beyond the 22 years
where it is still projected to be able to pay out all benefits. After 22 year, it can still pay
something like 80% of benefits. Raise or eliminate the cap on FICA taxes and you have
a completely sustainable system.

all that said, I'm socking away as much as I can into both Roth and my reg TSP account.

edit to add - Social Security is the most successful anti-poverty program in the
history of mankind and an example of how govt can improve things for most people.
That's a major reason why cons hate it.

The thing to make it secure for the future is to make changes MUCH sooner rather than later - before it becomes a problem that spirals out of control. And change the rules in time so that people can plan. Ditching Social Security is not an option and will never be one as long as I'm living in this country. And it wasn't long ago in the US that almost everyone from both major parties felt that way. I differ from other Dems in that I think the biggest change should be in raising the age that benefits are received (rather than raising or eliminating the cap), but that's an issue that belongs in the politics thread.

[dobrojim]

agree that the adjustments to be made, whatever they may be, should
be done sooner rather than later. Pols/govt don't/doesn't work that way. And at the
risk of continuing the political in the random, it's not the recent way
that private/corp operate either. It's all short-term crisis driven.

[Ruzious]

agree that the adjustments to be made, whatever they may be, should
be done sooner rather than later. Pols/govt don't/doesn't work that way. And at the
risk of continuing the political in the random, it's not the recent way
that private/corp operate either. It's all short-term crisis driven.

Pols don't do anything about it, because we're too lazy to insist on it. We need to make it a current issue. It's on us and our lazy arse generation to show we care enough to make it an issue, and quite frankly - f the folks who want to kill the system and f the folks who are too lazy to tweak it.

[Zonkerbl]

Huh... you know, if your average professional sports career is less than 10 years...

If you earn $10 million over your ten year sports career, that's equivalent to earning less than $300k a year for 35 years...

What's the average length of career and average earnings per year for an NBA player?

Football players are really screwed, aren't they?

[Severn Hoos]

The two weeks before the Lottery have got to be the toughest of the year for this board. The team itself has long since finished playing actual games. The playoffs are going on, which only serve to remind us as Wiz fans that: A) our team is irrelevant, and B) playoffs are a time for rooting against players and teams, not for them. And if the SuperFriends manage to win a title, I'm going to cry.

There are no international events to distract us (or give us hope, if we have a player involved) for another month or two.

The Olympics (hopefully we'll have a Wiz player or two representing other countries?) are 3 months away.

We could have had something to talk about if we were looking at a shakeup in the front office or in the coaching staff - a la the Magic - but it looks like that isn't happening. [Side note - I suspect the reason we haven't heard about a coaching change, or confirming Wittman as the permanent coach, is that they are indeed looking to interview one or more assistants from teams still in the playoffs. Here's hoping it includes Budenholzer...]

The only chance for actual news is likely to be bad news - Dray getting into trouble, Dray still out of shape, Dray appearing in court, things like that.

So we talk about IF we win the lottery, or IF we can get this guy at whatever slot we end up, or IF....

Even the draft sites have pretty much stopped updating their mocks until after the Lottery, because - what's the point?

So we rehash the same arguments for or against this draftee, that FA, etc. But frankly (and this is no knock on anyone, keep up the dialog!) there's just not much new to cover.

Can I set up an auto-post like we do for e-mails when we're out of the office?

I sure hope the Wiz win the Lottery, Davis would be great on the front line.

If we don't get #1, I sure hope we can get a wing, either Beal or MKG.

Drummond looks like a bust waiting to happen. Could become a good player, but too much risk, and he'd probably get there on his second contract. Been there, done that - no thanks.

Robinson's a nice player but not really a difference-maker, and would only marginally improve the team based on its current makeup.

Great value available in the late 1st/early 2nd. Crowder, D. Lamb, Jenkins, Melo, Jeff Taylor, among others.

Hoping for a young/1st time coach to grow with the team - Joerger & Budenholzer as top choices to annoy WaPo editors for the next few years. SVG is the best coach out there, but have to consider how he would interact with the players. Not interested in D'Antoni. If all else fails, Wittman's not a bad fallback, given that many of the players have already endorsed him.

Still love Ilyasova as a high value addition, especially if MKG is the pick. Obviously won't happen if Davis is the pick.

That should about cover it for another 10 days or so.

[barelyawake]

Just read an astounding sentence.

"Zach Galifianakis to star in 'A Confederacy of Dunces.'" If you haven't read the book, read it. It's the funniest book in the history of literature. Full stop. And Zach was born to play the lead. The tale of the history of the book makes it even more interesting. From Wiki...


"The difficult path to publication

As outlined in the introduction to a later revised edition, the book would never have been published if Toole's mother had not found a smeared carbon copy of the manuscript left in the house following Toole's 1969 suicide at age 31. Thelma Toole was persistent and tried several different publishers to no avail.

Thelma repeatedly called Walker Percy, an author and college instructor at Loyola University New Orleans, demanding he read it. He initially resisted; however, as he recounts in the book's foreword:
"...the lady was persistent, and it somehow came to pass that she stood in my office handing me the hefty manuscript. There was no getting out of it; only one hope remained—that I could read a few pages and that they would be bad enough for me, in good conscience, to read no farther. Usually I can do just that. Indeed the first paragraph often suffices. My only fear was that this one might not be bad enough, or might be just good enough, so that I would have to keep reading. In this case I read on. And on. First with the sinking feeling that it was not bad enough to quit, then with a prickle of interest, then a growing excitement, and finally an incredulity: surely it was not possible that it was so good."[9]
The book was published by LSU Press in 1980. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1981."


However, seeing as how Hollywood destroyed the second, funniest book, "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," I have little hope that the movie will ultimately be what it should be -- one of the funniest movies in the history of film. I'm talking Python good. It's the only book that ever made me cry laughing... several times...

PS CCJ, I never filmed adult movies. But, let's keep that rumor going...

PPS, Doc you got mail...

[tontoz]

If there's something more tedious than reading posts from people reminding everyone of how right they were about everything, I'm not sure what it is. When I see words like... Just like I have been saying for years... I stop reading.

I've said all along that it's annoying when people do that.

If people want to brag about being right then fine but don't complain when someone brings up an old post where the poster was wrong or contradicts himself. You can't have it both ways.

Seems like the same guys who like to say "Look how right i was" are the same guys who can't handle it when their old posts are proven wrong.

[dobrojim]

wife had cspan on this morning (like she usually does) and Norm Ornstein and
Tom Mann were on. So I listened. Then I wanted to call in since so many of the
callers were low-information morons (or just flat out wrong on their 'facts').
Wasn't able to get through but decided when I got to work to shoot off a
quick email to Mr Ornstein (@AEI) which I did and actually got a very nice
reply. I told him that they were quite diplomatic in their responses considering
how clueless some of the questions were. They should have just said...'are you f'ing stupid?

[montestewart]

If there's something more tedious than reading posts from people reminding everyone of how right they were about everything, I'm not sure what it is. When I see words like... Just like I have been saying for years... I stop reading.

I've said all along that it's annoying when people do that.

If people want to brag about being right then fine but don't complain when someone brings up an old post where the poster was wrong or contradicts himself. You can't have it both ways.

Seems like the same guys who like to say "Look how right i was" are the same guys who can't handle it when their old posts are proven wrong.

If you just waffle about your position all the time like I do, you can have it both ways. Resolute flip flopping.