spugbrap’s blog

For the most part, I’ve been ignoring the barrage of radio and TV commercials for Obama and McCain that have been coming with increasing frequency as we get closer to election day. They’re almost always 90% focused on bashing the opponent, and every time I listen to one of these ads it makes me dislike BOTH candidates more, because I hear bad things about one of them and I get annoyed at the other for mudslinging.

This morning, on the way to work, I heard an ad for each candidate in the course of about 5 minutes. I actually paid attention this time, because there was a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that there was a discrepancy between ads I’d recently heard from both of them.

Sure enough:

- Obama’s ad said that McCain’s plan will cause 20 million Americans to lose their health insurance coverage.

- McCain’s ad said that Obama’s plan will cause 50 million Americans to lose their health insurance coverage.

Going by the “lesser of two evils” approach, it seems like I should vote for McCain, because 30 million fewer Americans will lose their health insurance coverage. That’s a significant number, representing roughly 10% of the U.S. population!

However, I’ll still feel guilty for being somewhat responsible for that unfortunate 20 million Americans that will lose their coverage under McCain’s plan (around 6.7% of the U.S. population).

I’ve created some 10×10 grids to graphically represent the number of Americans without health insurance as of 2007 (about 15%, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities), and the numbers if McCain and Obama are both giving realistic estimates (highly unlikely) in their ads attacking each other’s health care reform plans.

The shaded regions in the grids indicate the number of Americans without health insurance in each of these cases.

15% without health insurance in 2007	22% without health insurance under McCain’s plan	32% without health insurance under Obama’s plan

Aren’t infographics fun? Ideally, there would be no shaded regions, or a candidate would offer a health care reform plan that would result in fewer shaded regions (i.e. fewer uninsured Americans).

So, how many Americans are you going to help screw out of health insurance in this election? I’d love to hear what you think about these numbers, about my infographics, or anything else you might want to share with regard to the 2008 presidential election!

I’m not going to go into detail about last night’s episode. Just going to post a few observations and make fun of a couple people. :)

What was up with Simon having his hand up by his head like 1 moose antler all night? Lacey and I kept seeing it and cracking up, and both kept thinking “Nanu, nanu”. We realize that the hand sign was different, seeing Simon Cowell doing that over and over reminded us of Robin Williams’ quirky behavior on Mork and Mindy.

Next we come to the boy that Jena and Lacey have been referring to as “Vampire Boy” all season: Jason Yeager. I didn’t understand why, so Lacey tried to show me last night. She said he had very pointy canine teeth, but I kept watching and could not see what she was talking about–until she paused it at just the right time:

Don’t see the sharp, pointy fang? How about a closeup?

I was sold at this point. That tooth is a bit pointier and sharper than normal, and the one next to it (towards the back) looks a bit fang-like as well. But Lacey is good with the remote. Real good. She managed to pause it at just the right time again, a minute or so later, so we could check out the other side of his mouth:

…and another closeup, if you’re not convinced:

Okay, enough about Vampire Boy. If I remember correctly, his performance was “just aiight for me, dawg.” Most of them have been that way, so far this season, and last night was no different.

Our next victim is the boy who Lacey and Jena have nicknamed “Man Cuddy” (or something like that), after Lisa Cuddy on House, M.D. (one of our favorite TV shows). I have to agree, there is some resemblance.

I was going to link to a picture of Cuddy to prove this point, but when I looked at their pictures side-by-side I didn’t really see it. But from memory, if you’re a fan of House, you may see a younger, more masculine version of Cuddy in the following 4 pics of Jason Castro:

Lacey thinks Cuddy’s much cuter as a guy. She liked his performance last night, too. I was fine with it, but not blown away.

The kid at the end, though (David Archuleta)–the one who sang John Lennon’s Imagine–he was definitely the best of the night and maybe even the season so far. If I wasn’t confident that he’ll get a TON of votes, I would have voted for him (haven’t voted yet this season, probably won’t for a while still).

I got an email from DirecTV recently, telling me that prices are going up. They linked to a PDF with new pricing info. It looks like the price of just about every subscription plan/feature they offer is going up by $2-5/month. It was not customized for me, though–it was very generic.

To find out how much my own rates were going to increase, I had to login to my account on directv.com. When I got there, though, I had a very hard time figuring out exactly what my current plan is, and how much I’m currently paying for it.

See, the problem is that I signed up with my bank to receive e-bills from most of my billers, including DirecTV. For some reason, because I usually like to view and pay all of my bills from one central location (my bank’s website), DirecTV will not allow me to view any of my bills–past or present–on directv.com.Here’s what I got when I tried to view a bill (to see which subcription package/rate plan I’ve been on for the past few years):

Our records show you are signed up to view your DIRECTV bill through your financial institution, or another bill paying web site, and not through directv.com. Because the DIRECTV online bill view service allows you to view your bill at only one web site, you are unable to view your bill at directv.com.


To view your bill here instead, you must first discontinue the online bill view you set up at your other bill paying website, by following the instructions they provide. Once de-enrolled from their bill view feature, it may take up to 30 days before you can view your bill statement at directv.com.


In the meantime, you still have access to all other directv.com account functions, including making an immediate, one-time check or credit card payment. Thank you.To ensure the privacy of your personal information, this message will no longer appear once you close the pop-up browser window.

I don’t understand the point of preventing me from viewing my bill from multiple locations. I encountered this same odd behavior with Verizon in the past. Does anybody know why they would do this? I could understand limiting users to having monthly e-bills sent to only one bank. But I think you should always be able to view your account information, including at least the most recent bill, on the company’s site, itself.

To make matters worse, it can take a month or two to get them to start sending e-bills to a bank, and then it can take a month to stop them from sending e-bills to that bank. That huge delay puzzles me, as well. Online customer account management and B2B communication should be instantaneous. 30 days is worse than snail mail! Couldn’t DirecTV print out my bill, send it to my bank via horseback mail carrier, and have someone at my bank type the bill into their system in less than 30 days? Ugh!

Anyways, my rate increase is about 5.5%. Oh well, not like I have much choice. It’s Comcast or DirecTV, here, and I’m happy with my DirecTV DVR that I got before their agreement with Tivo ended. I tried Comcast cable for a while, last year, but I couldn’t deal with the horrible Scientific Atlanta DVR that came with that.

**UPDATE BEFORE POSTING**Okay, I’ve been meaning to blog about this for several weeks, now. I logged into my account at directv.com, a few minutes ago, and I was able to see the name and price of my subscription plan right at the top of the main Account Details page, in a section called “Activity Since Last Bill.”

Click the above link to see the expanded Activity Since Last Bill section from my directv.com Account Details page.

I’m not sure if I just didn’t notice/find this link when I was looking for it, a few weeks ago, or if they’ve since made some changes to their website. I think I’m seeing a lot more DHTML/AJAX going on, so I’m thinking they made some UI improvements recently.

Unfortunately, the “View Bills” link still takes me to that page quoted above, where they tell me that I can’t view my bill on their site since I signed up to be able to receive e-bills on my bank’s site. Hmpf.

I was trying to register to take a CLEP exam, to earn some credits and work towards finishing my degree at University of Phoenix, but I had trouble with a couple questions on the registration form. Question #22 on the CLEP registration form asked for information about the “Score Recipient”, which, in my case, is University of Phoenix. But the form asked for a “Code No.” and “Institution Name and Address”.

Here is the appropriate information, according to my academic counselor. She said it’s the only “Code No.” and “Institution Name and Address” that anyone needs, when trying to have any test scores (not just for CLEP tests) sent to UOP:

CLEP TEST CENTER ADMISSION FORM

22. Score Recipient:

Code No. 014593

Institution Name and Address:

Phoenix-Uopc-Student Services AA-K101
1221 N. College Ave
Tempe, AZ 85281

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Okay… I just had to share that information publicly, since it was rather difficult for me to find. Now, I’ll discuss how hard it was for me to find it.

Well, I couldn’t find the information in any of the CLEP-related emails and documents that my academic counselors have sent me, over the past few years, so I searched on the UOP student website. I couldn’t find the code number, and did not know which of UOP’s addresses was the one to have test scores sent to. Since UOP has campuses all over the US (and beyond?), as well as a particularly large online presence, I didn’t know whether the scores should be sent to my local campus, or the main Phoenix, AZ campus, or what.

When I looked up UOP on the College Board’s website, I found a code number, and two addresses: some kind of main address, and the admissions office; both of which were in Arizona. I didn’t know which one to have the scores sent to.

So, I emailed my academic counselor, giving her the information I’d found, and asked which address to use. I was feeling impatient, though, because I’ve been procrastinating this CLEP stuff for a *very* long time, and was so close to finally dealing with it. So, I kept looking for the info, myself.

The main UOP website was not very useful, but I did run across some kind of “Chat with someone NOW” link, so I tried that. When I asked the person for the info that I needed, he was not sure, so he asked for my phone number, called me, and conferenced me in with my academic counselor. I felt bad for nagging her, since I had just sent her that email so recently, but she was able to find the information that I needed.

Hopefully the information is correct, and hopefully others will have an easier time finding it, now. I’ll post some sort of follow-up, to let you know how things go with my CLEP registration, as well as the subsequent score reporting.

From the FIA Card Services (aka Evil Spawn of the Bank of America+Fleet and Bank of America+MBNA mergers) Privacy Policy (emphasis added by me):

This notice describes the privacy practices of FIA Card Services for consumer financial products and services governed by the laws of the United States of America and applies to open, closed and inactive accounts with FIA Card Services.

For some reason, this concerns me a little bit.

I have two open accounts with them right now, and am going to go ahead and opt out of their information sharing options for both accounts. But it’s not people like me that I’m concerned about.

I’m concerned about people who may have ever had an account with Bank of America, MBNA, or any of the other credit card companies that they have collectively gobbled up over the years. People who may have canceled their cards long ago, cut them up, and forgotten all about them. People who may have even thrown away all of their bills/terms/etc., because it’s been so long.

According to the paragraph quoted above, FIA Card Services may share their information with other companies, even if their accounts are closed! Maybe I’m just naïve, but I never would have imagined that after I closed a credit card account, and stopped doing business with a company, they might still share my personal data with arbitrary third parties.

I’ll bet they don’t still mail annual Privacy Policy notices to everyone who has closed accounts. But, all of this may be a moot point. The wording is ambiguous enough that even though they *might* do something with that data, they probably don’t, and I have no positive proof that they actually do engage in this unethical practice. So, they get the benefit of the doubt, for now. But it’s still creepy, and they’re still evil for other reasons.