Time to Open Up the NCAA Basketball Tournament to ALL Teams!

You know, it is just so sad when a team doesn’t make the NCAA tournament. Why, there are only 65 NCAA tournament teams, 64 NIT teams and two other 16 team post season tournaments.

That means that only 161 teams get into post-season play! That is so, well, elitist!

I say:

1. Let every team into the NCAA tournament.
2. Don’t eliminate any team after a game; after all a team that got more points really isn’t “better”; it is “different”. Elimination hurts the feelings of the players and fans.
3. National Championship trophies for each team! It is only “fair”.

We can call it: “self esteem madness”.

16 March 2010 (am)

Workout notes Yoga with Ms. Vickie. Then, 4000 yard swim: 1000 warm up in 17:44; 5 x 100 (25 front kick, 75 free) on the 2:10. 5 x 100 (25 sfs, 75 free) on the 2:10. 5 x 100 (25 3g, 75 free) on the 2, 5 x 100 (25 catch-up, 75 free) on the 2, 10 x 50 fist on 1, 10 x (25 free, 25 back) on the 1:10.

At no time did I use my “toys” (paddles or zoomers).

I was somewhat sore.

Injury: last night the pain returned though once again it went away quickly with movement.

Science Scientists continue to find life in strange places:

In a surprising discovery about where higher life can thrive, scientists for the first time found a shrimp-like creature and a jellyfish frolicking beneath a massive Antarctic ice sheet.

Six hundred feet below the ice where no light shines, scientists had figured nothing much more than a few microbes could exist.

That’s why a NASA team was surprised when they lowered a video camera to get the first long look at the underbelly of an ice sheet in Antarctica. A curious shrimp-like creature came swimming by and then parked itself on the camera’s cable. Scientists also pulled up a tentacle they believe came from a foot-long jellyfish. [...]

The video is likely to inspire experts to rethink what they know about life in harsh environments. And it has scientists musing that if shrimp-like creatures can frolic below 600 feet of Antarctic ice in subfreezing dark water, what about other hostile places? What about Europa, a frozen moon of Jupiter?

Note that it is highly unlikely that these creatures swam from other places just to get at the camera.

Health care reform
Here is a summary of what is in the bill:

1. IMMEDIATE CHANGES

Uninsured people with medical problems will have a workable alternative. The bill pumps $5 billion into high-risk insurance pools run by the states to provide coverage to those in frail health. Taxpayer-backed insurance won’t be free, but premiums should be much lower than what’s charged by private insurers willing to take those in poor health.

For people with private health insurance – about two-thirds of Americans – there would be some new safeguards. For example, insurers would be barred from placing lifetime dollar limits on coverage and from canceling policies except in cases of fraud. Children could stay on their parents’ coverage until age 26. [...]

2. THE SELF-EMPLOYED

Starting in 2014, self-employed people and those whose employers don’t offer coverage would be able to pick a plan through a health insurance exchange, like a supermarket. It’s modeled on the federal employee health program available to members of Congress, with a range of private plans. Small businesses could also join.

About 25 million people would buy coverage through state exchanges, and nearly 6 in 10 would be eligible for help with their premiums. The new tax credits would be computed according to income and other household characteristics. The money would go straight to the insurer. To consumers it would look like a discount – generous for lower-income families, less so for those solidly in the middle class.

For example, a family of four making $44,000 would pay $2,763 in premiums -about 6 percent of its income- for a policy worth $9,435.

But a similar family making $66,000 would have to pay $6,257 in premiums, close to 10 percent of its income. That may be less than a mortgage, but it’s more than a car payment.

Once the exchanges open, most Americans would be required to carry health insurance or pay a fine. Medicaid would be expanded to cover childless adults living near poverty, bringing the total who’d gain coverage to more than 30 million.

People with employer-provided insurance would not see major changes. But if they lost their job, they’d be able to get coverage through the exchange.

- SENIORS

Seniors have been understandably worried about the health care plan, much of it financed with Medicare cuts the government’s own experts say could be unsustainable.

In the crosshairs are subsidies to private Medicare Advantage insurance plans, which now enroll about one-quarter of seniors. The government overpays the plans when compared to the cost of care under traditional Medicare. That largesse translates to lower costs for seniors in the plans, and the overhaul could trigger an exodus from Medicare Advantage as insurers are forced to raise rates to stay in business.

But seniors stand to gain as well. Obama would gradually close the coverage gap in the middle of the Medicare prescription drug benefit. The so-called doughnut hole would start to shrink immediately, but it wouldn’t be fully closed until 2020. In the meantime, seniors in the gap would get a 50 percent discount on brand name drugs.

The plan also improves preventive benefits for seniors in traditional Medicare. [...]

Surf to read more.

The chances of it passing looks good: