Government Shutdown

[Sloan]

"shutdown" is absolutely the wrong term and caused all sorts of bullshit. i wouldn't worry about it.

 

[JeffTD]

"shutdown" is absolutely the wrong term and caused all sorts of bullshit. i wouldn't worry about it.

Yeah, unless you work for or depend on services provided by the NIH, CDC, Dept of Housing/Urban Development, DHS's e-verify program for employment, National Parks Service, EPA, Labor Department, or OSHA, need to get a passport, are a veteran living on disability or pension payments, or rely on the Women, Infants, and Children program for food and health care (that's like 9 million people who can't otherwise work there alone).

And that's just in the short-term. If it lasts longer than a week or so, we'll see things like unemployment benefits, FHA loans, SBA small business loans, and farm loans will be stalled until things get worked out.

It may not affect you, but it's going to and already has affected a shitload of people who had literally no control over it. What it doesn't affect are the paychecks and benefits of the congressmen who are literally not doing the job we pay them to do. It's not cool and shouldn't be dismissed as something that won't matter.

 

[egan.]

Yeah, lets also not forget that the entire infrastructure of the DC area is controlled by the federal government.
Also:
"When he added up all the numbers, he found that the true size of the federal government was about 11 million: 1.8 million civil servants, 870,000 postal workers, 1.4 million military personnel, 4.4 million contractors, and 2.5 million grantees."
That's 4% of the total US workforce who could potentially go without a paycheck.

Anecdotally, my girlfriend is currently on furlough (unpaid leave) as a UNC employee who works in the EPA library. The federal employees have had it worse with literally a month unpaid so far this year.
On another note, I've got a friend who live on the NC outerbanks and right now it is illegal to be on the beach because they're national parks-- quite an inconvenience on a 1/4 mile wide island.

 

[TheWinterSnow]

1. Stop calling it Obozocare. I don't give a shit what you think about the law - it's called the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare. Calling it "Obozocare" and him "Obozo" just makes you sound like a god damn idiot and makes it frustrating to read. Imagine replacing every occurrence of Sneap's name with the phrase "Andy Snooperpooper" - regardless of what you think of the guys mixes, it's just frustrating and childish. You're above that, or at least I'd hope to think you are.

While I have no respect whatsoever for the man, out of maturity of the conversation, I will refrain, as I have realized I have kind of stooped to the level of my liberal friends who keep referring to republicans only by the name terrorists.

Though, Andy Snooperpooper is a pretty great name, maybe even as good as Andy Sneaptor

2. You're leaving out one huge important fact - ACA is a fucking law. It passed both House and Senate, was signed into law by POTUS, deemed constitutional by SCOTUS, and was then a central part of Obama's 2012 campaign. You know, the campaign for the re-election which he won.

Coming from a complete polar opposite political platform as yourself, just because it was passed as law, does not mean that it is just or valid. I take is being a political economics undergrad you are familiar with political philosophy topics like natural law and rule of law, so my previous sentence should make sense there. Now even if it was passed and even if the majority of the American people supported it, that still at a philosophical level does not necessarily mean that it is right, just or constitutional. Keeping that in mind and with your quote above, the ACA was written by the POTUS and passed the House and Senate when they were both Obama-supporting-democrat controlled. There was no opposition to the ACA because there were not enough republicans in office. Now that there is a balance we now come to this stalemate. Unfortunately this stalemate is horridly stupid and the republicans are just shooting themselves in the foot. If they were really smart they would wait until we had a republican president and a republican controlled house and senate to repeal and replace it with something else but they won't do that. As to how the SCOTUS approved the ACA, I have been scratching my head on that one, I don't know how fining someone though taxes if they don't buy a mandated product constitutional in any sort of form, it sounds like complete government control telling you what you have to buy whether you like it or not.

I have always felt that there are better ways to allow all people to get access to doctors and medicine, I think this current more socialist (or socialized...or commonwealth) platform solution is a very bad way of solving the problem, but that is beyond the point when it comes to the shutdown.

The shutdown has nothing to do with the ACA, it has everything to do with the GOP they have an agenda they want to prove or push forward and unlike them, they don't get there paychecks cut, the hardworking Americans are the ones that get no pay and are out of a job. Instead of cutting the pay to government jobs, how about we cut and FIRE all members of the house and senate. If that were only a possibility. Obviously that is not financially possible. Realistically it should be the members of the House and Senate that suffer for their decisions, not us the American people.

 

[JeffTD]

While I have no respect whatsoever for the man, out of maturity of the conversation, I will refrain, as I have realized I have kind of stooped to the level of my liberal friends who keep referring to republicans only by the name terrorists.

Though, Andy Snooperpooper is a pretty great name, maybe even as good as Andy Sneaptor



Coming from a complete polar opposite political platform as yourself, just because it was passed as law, does not mean that it is just or valid. I take is being a political economics undergrad you are familiar with political philosophy topics like natural law and rule of law, so my previous sentence should make sense there. Now even if it was passed and even if the majority of the American people supported it, that still at a philosophical level does not necessarily mean that it is right, just or constitutional. Keeping that in mind and with your quote above, the ACA was written by the POTUS and passed the House and Senate when they were both Obama-supporting-democrat controlled. There was no opposition to the ACA because there were not enough republicans in office. Now that there is a balance we now come to this stalemate. Unfortunately this stalemate is horridly stupid and the republicans are just shooting themselves in the foot. If they were really smart they would wait until we had a republican president and a republican controlled house and senate to repeal and replace it with something else but they won't do that. As to how the SCOTUS approved the ACA, I have been scratching my head on that one, I don't know how fining someone though taxes if they don't buy a mandated product constitutional in any sort of form, it sounds like complete government control telling you what you have to buy whether you like it or not.

I have always felt that there are better ways to allow all people to get access to doctors and medicine, I think this current more socialist (or socialized...or commonwealth) platform solution is a very bad way of solving the problem, but that is beyond the point when it comes to the shutdown.

The shutdown has nothing to do with the ACA, it has everything to do with the GOP they have an agenda they want to prove or push forward and unlike them, they don't get there paychecks cut, the hardworking Americans are the ones that get no pay and are out of a job. Instead of cutting the pay to government jobs, how about we cut and FIRE all members of the house and senate. If that were only a possibility. Obviously that is not financially possible. Realistically it should be the members of the House and Senate that suffer for their decisions, not us the American people.

Considering what the House GOP is doing is literally economic terrorism, I hardly find your friends to be stooping.

No, the fact that it was tried by SCOTUS and found to be constitutional is what makes it constitutional. I don't get how you're arguing that. It's a law, cut and dry. You're trying to bring in some kind of convoluted philosophical argument to say that it isn't just or right... talk about desperate. It's a law, it's constitutional, get over it. You sound like Scalia right now - if you want to take a very narrow reading of the Constitution then that's great, but don't expect your views to be well accepted or popular in the least.

The ACA was written by the Heritage Foundation, more or less. Not enough Republicans in office? You mean they hadn't won elections? That's kind of how congress works.

It's not my fault if you don't understand the interstate commerce clause. The reason the gov't has the power to tell you something to buy it whether you like it or not (like with car insurance) is that if you don't have it, it fucks over other people. Nobody would buy insurance until they had what's considered a pre-existing condition if they weren't required to by law, and that's not how an insurance pool works.

The current method is not in any way, shape, or form socialist or socialized. Stop with your buzzwords.

Yes, I also think it should be them who suffer, but that's not how the system works and throwing out the entire congressional body isn't exactly a feasible solution. These representatives were elected 11 months ago and have only been on the job for 9 months; it's not like we didn't have a chance to give them the boot.

 

[egan.]

I have always felt that there are better ways to allow all people to get access to doctors and medicine, I think this current more socialist (or socialized...or commonwealth) platform solution is a very bad way of solving the problem, but that is beyond the point when it comes to the shutdown.

I don't want to get off track but I do want to address this as the free-market healthcare system is constantly trumpeted in libertarian circles as superior to other options. The reality is that there are no proven examples of that system ever working in the post leaches age. On the other hand there are numerous examples of single-payer universal systems with demonstrably better outcomes and quality of care than the US government and citizens spend twice as much for.
The constant banging of the American Exceptionalism drum ignores the fact that our founding fathers were steeped in lessons from the successes and failures of European governments.

 

[StoneLord]

This forum has it all. Even our own little piece of freerepublic.com.

 

[MotherEel]

I have always felt that there are better ways to allow all people to get access to doctors and medicine, I think this current more socialist (or socialized...or commonwealth) platform solution is a very bad way of solving the problem, but that is beyond the point when it comes to the shutdown.

Make health free. Doctors should be paid to keep you healthy. If they are failing, then it should be at their cost, like it is with any other service or product.

Wanna see how socialist it can get...?

 

[JeffTD]

Make health free. Doctors should be paid to keep you healthy. If they are failing, then it should be at their cost, like it is with any other service or product.

Wanna see how socialist it can get...?

You're joking, right? This is like paying teachers based on how smart their students are. It's not something they can control and it would incentivize doctors to only treat patients they knew would make full recoveries. Got terminal cancer? You won't even get basic treatment.

Unless you were trying to use it as a point to bash on 'how socialist it can get,' in which case I have to point out that there's nothing even remotely socialist about performance based pay for professionals.

 

[Jind]

Jeff, your doing a admirable job in this thread - keep up the good work for as long as you can while maintaining your sanity, mine would be at it's frayed ends by now - probably at about the time that you needed to explain just what "it's the law" means

Right wingers love to hold up the constitution as a holy, all together immutable, the basis for all rights and freedoms... until the point the body tasked with determining constitutionality decides something they don't like is constitutional.

What you are seeing now is a party that truly believed President Obama would be a one term president and this law would never be enacted suddenly realizing they woke up with a losing hand in the last election and they would not have 2/3 majority to do anything about it. This simple fact has lead to the massive playground tantrum you now see in the Republican party. Add to that the fact that there are less and less old white guys in the world today and an almost biblical need to alienate every person not old, not white, and not male and you find yourself where we are today - the world is a very bleak place for that mindset.

Before the second term election they were so sure they were going to win you heard the terms "repeal and replace", putting forth the premise that they had a plan for something else that would provide some form of universal healthcare; after the election all they can say is "repeal" - the smoke and mirrors of pretending to have a clue has been removed and they have been shown for what they really are - desperate men battling for the status quo (unfortunately the status quo of their vision of the good ole' "ye olden days".)

But keep up the good work Jeff, just don't let the stupid rub off on you

 

[MarcusGHedwig]

Jind, Jeff, and Egan dropping the knowledge once again

 

[TheWinterSnow]

No, the fact that it was tried by SCOTUS and found to be constitutional is what makes it constitutional. I don't get how you're arguing that. It's a law, cut and dry. You're trying to bring in some kind of convoluted philosophical argument to say that it isn't just or right... talk about desperate. It's a law, it's constitutional, get over it.

I don't see things that black an white and could never do so in politics. Slavery was deemed legal and constitutional but that still didn't make it right, the ruling of Dred Scott v. Sanford was law but was not right. What about the 18th amendment? Just because it is ruled "constitutional" now doesn't mean that it is morally right.

As for it being law, get over it, that is so Authoritarian its scary. So you are supposed to obey whatever the government deems is the law and simply "get over it?" That's again a pretty scary thought.

You sound like Scalia right now - if you want to take a very narrow reading of the Constitution then that's great, but don't expect your views to be well accepted or popular in the least.

I am fairly aligned with Scalia and agree with him 9 times out of 10, regardless, I like taking a more direct approach of the constitution, having a broad interpretation usually means you are trying to find a loophole in the wording to justify bending the rules. I have said before in many of these political debates that even bending the rules starts the slippery slope of slowly and further bending the rules or even slowly eroding an amendment away. When it comes to the bill of rights, if a state of the federal government can effectively dismantle one amendment, what stops them from attacking others? Again I think it is a slippery slope that shouldn't even be entertained.

Not enough Republicans in office? You mean they hadn't won elections? That's kind of how congress works.

You mean how it works when we have a two party system. That was kind of the reason our founding fathers warned against a two party system, more often than not one party would have total control and have no system of checks and balances.

It's not my fault if you don't understand the interstate commerce clause. The reason the gov't has the power to tell you something to buy it whether you like it or not (like with car insurance) is that if you don't have it, it fucks over other people. Nobody would buy insurance until they had what's considered a pre-existing condition if they weren't required to by law, and that's not how an insurance pool works.

I don't know what broad reading of Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3 or The Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 you have done, but neither one has anything to do with car insurance or any similar situation. Also Car Insurance isn't quite the same thing as mandated health insurance. You don't have to buy or own a car and thus car insurance, with the ACA, you have no choice.

The current method is not in any way, shape, or form socialist or socialized. Stop with your buzzwords.

Universal Health Care, yeah that kind of sounds like socialized medicine to me, no "buzzwords" intended.

I don't want to get off track but I do want to address this as the free-market healthcare system is constantly trumpeted in libertarian circles as superior to other options. The reality is that there are no proven examples of that system ever working in the post leaches age. On the other hand there are numerous examples of single-payer universal systems with demonstrably better outcomes and quality of care than the US government and citizens spend twice as much for.

There have been no true examples of Classical Liberal philosophies and law ever working because no country has had a Government relinquish enough power to allow for such policies to be born. Fortunately though the situation in Detroit not having anything for a government anymore has led to privatization of most of the public services from police to public transit that are actually doing really well and have better quality services that what the city used to provide and are turning out profits. It would be interesting to see how that all plays out in the long run.

Also, just because something has never been done before, since when did we stop coming up with new solutions and experimenting with new political ideas to solve problems for the same old solutions or thought process that works sometimes and kind of works but really other times? Why can't we continue innovating new political and social ideas, not just the US and the world. When did we become so fearful of change?

As for healthcare costs yeah that is a huge concern. I had looked into it a few months back and can't find one of the articles I read (among many). The biggest reason healthcare costs are so much in the US is because insurance companies choose contracts for medical treatment and equipment thus eliminating any form of competition in the aspect of making cheap and better products. The way they look at who they give the contract is based more on who can sell their product the best, not the quality or price, therefor more often then not, the contracts that are chosen might be the most expensive and also not necessarily the best.

In the big article that I read they laid out a plan that insurance companies could do to get healthcare down and make more money for themselves in the process. Basically it would involve the companies getting together and finding the cheapest hospital for a given procedure and all say that for that procedure we will only pay as much as hospital x is charging, if you want to go to another hospital not covered under the insurance plan, you have to pay whatever the differences are out of pocket. The example they gave was a hip replacement surgery. While the mean price is around $30k some hospitals have been known to charge well over $100k for. If your covered up to $30K at your hospital, but you wanted to go to a hospital that charged $40k, then you will have to pay the difference. If all insurance companies and their partnered medical practices followed, the more expensive hospitals would be forced to drop their prices, therefor if the prices drop and the insurance companies don't lower their premiums, they make more money. So the patient can go to any doctor or hospital they prefer and the insurance company makes more money, sounds like a win. On top of that it would force the hospitals to start looking for cheaper contracts or stop using contracts entirely so that they save. That would ultimately force down the over inflation medical supply companies are charging.

A few welly written and placed government regulations are all that is needed to get a process like that started. Give the insurance companies some sort of incentive to bring healthcare costs down.

Another big reason healthcare cost are high in the US is the high rate of lawsuits. Even when the doctor makes no mistakes but there were complications, people go sue happy for very very large sums for malpractice. There was a country in Europe that had a similar problem, I want to say Belgium or The Netherlands that passed a law (or amendment) limiting the basis of Medical Lawsuits and reasonable compensation and shortly after medical costs and insurance premiums dropped.

The constant banging of the American Exceptionalism drum ignores the fact that our founding fathers were steeped in lessons from the successes and failures of European governments.

No American Excpetionalism here, so please don't confuse me with someone who is caught up in that.

 

[JoeMeek12397]

1. Stop calling it Obozocare. I don't give a shit what you think about the law - it's called the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare. Calling it "Obozocare" and him "Obozo" just makes you sound like a god damn idiot and makes it frustrating to read. Imagine replacing every occurrence of Sneap's name with the phrase "Andy Snooperpooper" - regardless of what you think of the guys mixes, it's just frustrating and childish. You're above that, or at least I'd hope to think you are.

2. You're leaving out one huge important fact - ACA is a fucking law. It passed both House and Senate, was signed into law by POTUS, deemed constitutional by SCOTUS, and was then a central part of Obama's 2012 campaign. You know, the campaign for the re-election which he won.

3. If you're trying to use the "uneducated folk" thing as a diss towards me... Good luck. I spent the last four years of my life getting a degree in this exact topic (political economics) from one of the best public institutions in the country. I'm not going to speak down to you because you don't have a similar background, but I am going to scrutinize your opinions and statements a bit more harshly than if you did.

This specific shutdown is 100% the fault of the House GOP. Blaming Democrats, Obama, anyone else is just incorrect and misleading. A law was passed. They didn't like it. They held the government hostage and when their counterparts on the left wouldn't budge they stuck to their guns.

The House GOP has a problem with specifics of the ACA. They introduced bills to specifically address those grievances (41 times in fact). 41 times they tried and 41 times they failed to amend a law. They couldn't get their way by playing by the rules (read: the Constitution), so they threw a temper tantrum and shut down the government. They did this in 1995/1996 with Gingrich's "back of the plane" freakout, too.

If you want to talk about our national debt or the debt ceiling, great - that's an entirely different discussion, but it's not one we're having here.

For what it's worth, Belac hit the nail on the head in post #3.

If I had hide behind a name, I would be considered a liberal, but labels like this are an excuse for not having to think for yourself.

Just because you went to school and ingested the bullshit they spewed your way doesn't mean you learned a goddamned thing, and it DOES mean that you are talking down to people. According to that logic you could also say that someone that went to Full Sail to study engineering or Berklee to study performance would automatically be educated about or be better at either of those positions and all that goes with it. That is complete bullshit no matter how you look at it.

Also, just because something is the law doesn't mean that it is right. Sounds like typical patriotic, fan-boy bullshit, its ok, just drink the koolaid. Elections aren't always legit, has everyone already forgot about Florida in 2000? Car insurance and health insurance are completely different things. If you are as educated as you claim to be, that would have been obvious.

No, the fact that it was tried by SCOTUS and found to be constitutional is what makes it constitutional. I don't get how you're arguing that. It's a law, cut and dry. You're trying to bring in some kind of convoluted philosophical argument to say that it isn't just or right... talk about desperate. It's a law, it's constitutional, get over it. You sound like Scalia right now - if you want to take a very narrow reading of the Constitution then that's great, but don't expect your views to be well accepted or popular in the least.

And when police conduct internal investigations they hardly ever find the officers at fault. Its a slightly different situation but it can absolutely be applied here.

The current method is not in any way, shape, or form socialist or socialized. Stop with your buzzwords.

Socialize-
2. make (someone) behave in a way that is acceptable to their society.

 

[JoeMeek12397]

This is what I don't understand about republicans. They found themselves on Christian values yet when push comes to shove they are more concerned about money than the lives of others.

I don't mind people worshiping money and stepping on the health of fellow countrymen. But what bothers me is that these same people run around praising the lord and then killing people over issues like abortion and queer marriage, not to mention promoting wars for oil. The hypocrisy is what kills me.

Exactly, Christian values.

 

[He's Dead, Jim]

Jesus, people on this site have a serious aversion to accepting facts from people with degrees. Granted, social sciences are not as cut-and-dry as the physical sciences, but would you really say a PhD biologist was being a jerk for claiming he knew more about biology than you? Probably not, so why would you call out a political economy student like this for saying he probably knows more about economics than you? I think Jeff's statement re: his degree was perfectly reasonable. I mean, would I call any of you guys an elitist snob-douche for saying my mix wasn't very good? No, I would take your opinions into account and try to learn from them. And I would certainly never say you were being arrogant for saying you have more experience than me.

And if you are going to challenge someone who knows more about this stuff, present some data. For example: "Car insurance and health insurance are completely different things. If you are as educated as you claim to be, that would have been obvious."

Actually, they're incredibly similar, and many economists have used the two as analogous cases! Both are unique insurance markets in which collective action is an even more substantial problem and creates more negative externalities than most other insurance markets. And, in most countries, both are required and/or provided through tax revenue (the difference is minimal, because with an NIH-type system, you're going to utilize the services even if you don't really care about them) precisely for this reason. Nobody cares if you don't buy flood insurance in Kansas, because your particular house being flooded doesn't pose a problem for other people except insofar as it affects the size of the insurance market. But if you get hit by a car and you don't have health insurance, every single other taxpayer ends up paying for your ER visit. To use the car analogy, if you get into an accident without car insurance, there's a gaping hole where somebody has to pay up or go into huge amounts of debt. The problem is orders of magnitude worse when only old, sick people get coverage in a health care market, which is what Obamacare is attempting to fix.

The basic similarities are in the severity and extent of what happens when people aren't covered, and the ubiquity and size of the market.

And lastly:

And when police conduct internal investigations they hardly ever find the officers at fault. Its a slightly different situation but it can absolutely be applied here.

So by your estimation,

1. The Supreme Court is useless and judicial review serves no function, meaning Brown v. Board of Education is also similarly without merit, and

2. The fact that the Supreme Court is currently a 5-4 majority conservative institution (let's be honest, Kennedy usually sides with the conservatives except on social issues) and John Roberts voted to uphold the ACA has absolutely no bearing on the ruling?

It's a slightly different situation indeed, sir. You're basically saying the principle of separation of powers is completely stupid and meaningless, and no branch of government has ever contradicted another branch.

 

[JoeMeek12397]

^ Dude how many Doctors have you met that have no idea what they're talking about and just throw drugs at you? I'm not claiming that I know more, because I don't, but people can make it all the way through school and not learn anything. What I was saying is just because you completed that doesn't mean anything, it can but it in and of itself doesn't.

I'm not trying to challenge anyone. You guys are pointing out this entire situation is not cut and dry, but continue to explain it with your cut and dry type mindset.

I guess I'm also a "Liberal" but that doesn't mean that I follow or agree with everything they do. That is beyond childish.

 

[JoeMeek12397]

He's Dead, Jim

With the way the system is set up, there really is no separation of power. We let the powerful oversee the powerful.

Oh, and the way the NSA spies on us was also considered constitutional.

 

[He's Dead, Jim]

^ Dude how many Doctors have you met that have no idea what they're talking about and just throw drugs at you? I'm not claiming that I know more, because I don't, but people can make it all the way through school and not learn anything. What I was saying is just because you completed that doesn't mean anything, it can but it in and of itself doesn't.

Not a lot, frankly.

I'm not trying to challenge anyone. You guys are pointing out this entire situation is not cut and dry, but continue to explain it with your cut and dry type mindset.

How is anything either of us said cut and dry? If Chris Christie runs for president I'm going to vote for him, and I voted for Obama twice. I actually don't think Boehner is a bad guy at all.

But I agree with Jeff on this because the situation right now is manifestly and plainly the fault of the House of Representatives. I can back that up with polarization data and district gerrymandering maps if you really want, but the point is that, for this particular issue, which is what we're discussing, there isn't really a lot of gray area. The Republicans hate Obamacare, so they shut the government down, even though Obamacare is still going into effect. That's what happened. End of story. Similarly, a lot of Democrats refuse to vote for social security reforms even though the current algorithms are going to leave us bankrupt in several decades. Not every issue has a gray area, unfortunately.

I guess I'm also a "Liberal" but that doesn't mean that I follow or agree with everything they do. That is beyond childish.

I don't think Jeff does, either. He said he wanted a single payer system, which only some Democrats supported. So do I. I think it's the most economically efficient and humane system out there, despite some of its faults. Maybe Jeff is an ideologue, but all of his statements in this thread thus far have been factually correct, and the people arguing against him pretty plainly are incorrect and, as far as I can tell, don't have as good a grasp on the issues.

 

[TheWinterSnow]

@Jim, there are people with PhD's in political and economic sciences that fundamentally don't agree with each other since you can't really prove political philosophies are scientifically right or wrong. Likewise as someone who also has a degree (in something different but I have taken economics classes) we can all be wrong at times a degree doesn't make us immune to error.

I explained earlier why in the sense of a mandate why health insurance is not the same as car insurance. You can choose not have a car, you can opt out if you want to. That isn't so possible when it comes to healthcare as its your health and regardless and you can't opt out of that regardless if you have health insurance or not. Other than that you can say that there is a financial impact when you have people who don't have health insurance (like auto insurance) and I do believe that we and the government can do something to allow for everyone to have healthcare with as little tax payer burden as possible, all I have said is that philosophically I don't agree with how it is being done. I think the best thing to do would be to open a sensible dialog about it and weigh out the options.

 

[JoeMeek12397]

^ Dude how many Doctors have you met that have no idea what they're talking about and just throw drugs at you? I'm not claiming that I know more, because I don't, but people can make it all the way through school and not learn anything. What I was saying is just because you completed that doesn't mean anything, it can but it in and of itself doesn't.

Not a lot, frankly.

I think this says it all. You can't and SHOULDN'T believe everything you're told.