JosephH

To show the climbing community can police itself even if it takes 4-5 years to get around to it. See above... If done right, you'd never know it was ever there. It could simply be chopped again. I would have no problem with that...

Breaker bar is my choice - I hate bad work whether it's bolting or chopping. If you're going to go up there and bother doing the right thing then you should be removing/breaking them and patching with epoxy even if that means humping a sh#tload of it up there, and you should be hauling the trash hangers and bolts out.

I think the official acronym is 'prg-o'

yes, but will there be a stranger one...?

Kevin, is it then also ego under your rubric if the person you disagree with believes you under-bolted the route and they add bolts - is that ego or did you just inherit the ego for bolting a route bolder than the next guy? Maybe the guy who thinks it's over-bolted simply had a life situation such that he was able to hone his skills, craft, and lead head such that he genuinely felt it was over-bolted for the grade and what the route offered. Is that really ego or a difference of opinion? Sounds like you're saying taking action on such a difference of opinion either way - bolting or chopping - is a matter of ego. To some extent taking responsibility for your own actions does require some degree of ego, I'll admit. Over on rc.com, though, 'Fracture' just wrote about 10,000 words in a thread on how it is actually a matter of duty-bound 'community service'.

It wasn't me, I've been too busy lately for that level of community service...

End of story, Kevin? Just how is it you arrived at this idea that any bolt that gets weasled into rock is somehow sacrosanct? Ego? I can't think of many more audacious acts of ego than placing a bolt. If one were to run your logic out you could say the same thing about removing graffiti. But just which is the more willful expression of ego - the graffiti or the removal...? I see no difference whatsoever given both bolting and graffiti deface a surface and it's a pain in the ass to restore either to its original condition once the deed is done. Removing bolts in many instances is simply a community service no different than removing graffiti. They're both a case of 'art' being in the eye of the beholder. Don't get me wrong, I think there's a place for both bolts and graffiti, but when they end up everywhere and indiscriminantly just because someone likes to see their own spray it can become highly problematic and require remedial action.

Please, having to say "trad climbing" after "climbing" got hijacked by clipping bolts was bad enough - "adventure climbing" is an almost unbearable abomination that simply serves to shuffle real climbing even further back into the shadows. In fact, that this pejorative adjective even exists is about as sad commentary on the real state of climbing today as I can imagine. I mean, what would that make sport climbing if you were to extend the same lexical logic to it, "pedestrian climbing"?

Not at all, it all goes hand in hand, and obesity rates are going up in industrialized countries around the globe. Preventative care is also all about education and training, and dealing with obesity will require a lot of both. I never said it was a sole component of competitiveness, but rather a foundational element no different than infrastructure. You have two options - either you have a healthy educated workforce or an expendable one. India and China are operating on an expendable model and working furiously towards a healthy educated one. They recognize it's all about education. At this point they can afford to pump education and not worry overly about overall health - they'll gleam the best as they go for some time. But no one, not even the Chinese, want to invest in educating people who then are not healthy enough to produce. It isn't rocket science.

You'll get no argument from me there - the self-feeding cycle of corruption and entitlement is killing us...

The U.S. will never stop the competitive slide with this approach. Again, an educated workforce is the only competitive edge we will have going forward and 'baseline catastrophic coverage' will never provide the necessary baseline of family health necessary.

I peg healthcare as a prerequisite for a qualified workforce. Folks can't concentrate on acquiring an education and skills if their families are constantly battling healthcare issues and costs.

Now I've made it repeatedly clear I have no doubt you work for an employer with superb coverage, care to say who? Microsoft? Safeco? I'm guessing not Boeing or WaMu. But again, what are the odds of you maintaining that coverage switching from your current employer? And, again, how much do you suppose that coverage actually costs (in total) and how many people or even employers do you suppose can afford coverage like that? Is your point that everyone should get the same coverage as a well-educated, white male? Or are you saying we should compete for healthcare and only high achievers should be so rewarded? Maybe all our infrastructure should be the same way? You know only well-educated, highly competitive individuals should get good roads, clean water, and sewage systems. As a businessman I can assure you universal healthcare is a foundational competitive advantage for our country - without it we will continue to decline.

And never in the history of our nation has this been so succinctly illustrated as under the administration of George W. Bush at the helm of all three branches of government under Republican control.

And how much do you suppose that coverage actually costs (in total). The question was if you, your wife, or child ended up with cancer and for some reason had to switch employers what do you suppose would be the result? And how many people do you suppose can afford coverage like that? Yep, that's how the country was built. My views as both a self-employed person and as an employer are no different than most all employers grappling with the issue of the high cost of healthcare and the rapidly declining return on the dollars spent. Small business is being jack-hammered by healthcare costs. Again, just what percentage of our citizens have coverage like yours - and even yours is incredibly fragile if anything catastrophic occured and you had to change jobs. P.S. A survey just released said 51% of Americans had deferred filling a perscription or seeking medical help due to cost considerations - sounds like a great and highly competitive nation, doesn't it - a real leader.

I send my kid to private school and happily pay for public education as well - there is absolutely no difference.

And you arrive at this prodigous conclusion how?

Again, if you or a member of your family had cancer, a serious illness, or suffered some major accident and had to switch jobs for any reason COBRA would do you no good whatsoever and the only coverage you could get would be incredibly expensive and would not cover your pre-existing conditions - you'd be screwed. Think differently and you're just kidding yourself. If you develop cancer in a smaller company that self-insures you can bet your ass in most cases they'll do everything humanly possible to get rid of you. As for how the healthcare system fails me - well, I'm self-employed so it fails me instantly by the fact I and my family pay exorbitant rates for coverage. It fails me because I know how badly our system burdens employers and makes us less competitive as a nation - and that effects my business. It fails me because paying for the medical costs of un- and under-insured Americans costs inordinately more than it should and comes out of my pocket. It fail me, you, and all of us by making us incredibly less competitive and as an obstacle to the widespread adoption of preventative medicine.

Ericb, again, how would you fair if you developed cancer, and then got laid off or your company went under? Think you'd do well? As for entitlement, that's a matter of opinion. If you are saying that everyone should compete for the right to reasonable healthcare then I'd say absolutely not. For our country to compete we need a highly skilled and educated workforce which by definition means a healthy populace - the two are inseperable. Competing internally for basic necessities simply creates a nation corporations will flee when burdened with the associated costs.

There absolutely is no litigation or malpractice crisis - that is classic Republican fear-mongering at its best. Malpractice litigation is still the only really effective independent oversight of the medical profession that exists today. And kkk is right, by and large doctors are no longer rich. That's because the same folks who raped pension funds in the 80s and who specialize in raiding piles of loose cash identified doctor salaries as one of those loose piles in the late 80's and removed about 150-250k from each doctor over the course of the 90's. That's part of what provider corporations and HMO's was all about. As for the let's blow off insurance companies and pool revolution, it cannot and will not happen as a grassroots level because by definition it's about a single massive pool, not a hundred thousand small ones. A single risk pool of all citizens along with a single transaction system is the only way to achieve real, effective reform.

JayB, Nearly all the proposed 'reform' plans simply add yet another layer on top of the ones we already have. Until we are in a single pool, using a single transaction system, we will never escape the overhead inherent in our current system. And what is to be gained fracturing the pool even by states? Hell, you see states now attempting to pool together to get some leverage. There is nothing gained by us all not being in a single risk pool and transaction system - nothing. There are simply too many parasites attempting to make a profit on the system we have today. Those parasites drain resources that could easily fund technical advances and preventative medicine. In fact, the current system will never support even the premise of preventative medicine.

That's a joke no doubt - the families of those same individuals do not have adequate, secure health insurance coverage either. Hell, who does have decent coverage that wouldn't be canned in a heartbeat at a job change after a serious illness, accident, or cancer? You? Are you sure?

JayB - dollar for dollar our healthcare system is a complete and dismal failure. It is utterly sinking under the weight of everyone that wants a piece of the pie. Employers are bailing on it faster than rats off a sinking ship, insurers are dumping any and everyone with any risk of serious illness, growing tens of millions are without any coverage. Which part of the system is it that works - your policy? Congress'? Corporate executives? Hopefully you won't get cancer, get laid off, and try to get coverage at a new job - or just get a new job for that matter. This isn't manufacturing, it isn't the service sector, it isn't media (though I don't hear you touting what a glowing achievement of capitalism that that consolidation is). It's a basic requirement of every citizen - but instantanced as a shrinking risk pool so as to only cover healthy, young adults and even that at exorbitant rates. Anyone posing a risk is summarily dumped - it is unsustanable, untenable, and unconscionable. It is very much a part of why we are loosing ground in the world economy.

Our defense procurement system is not a service system, it is a corporate and state welfare system first and foremost and a defense procurement system second. The problems are wholly related to the closed-loop nature of the purpose of defense and states desires to share in the largess. The U.S. desperately needs a single, universal health insurance system. We can retain various healthcare service providers, but again, we need a single healthcare insurance system where every citzen is covered and all coverage is uniform. Our current healthcare system is killing both people and their employers unnecessarily. Ah, clearly a happy Microsoft customer. Outside of operating systems, we don't sell to a uniform base of customers who would benefit greatly from the sort of large-scale aggregation desperately needed in healthcare. There is no, repeat, no advantage for all citizens to not be in a single health insurance pool.

Once again, "Corporations without proper government oversight are indistinguishable from organized crime."