Dave Baker

Robin, have you installed a "utility" program that was designed to cause something to happen when you move your mouse to certain corners of the screen? It sounds like such a program was installed at some point but is crashing when it actually tries to do whatever it is supposed to do (e.g., close the window, or minimize the window to your task bar). See if there's something like that in your list of installed programs using the Windows add/remove programs "control panel."

Are you trying to log in under the penman username using the same computer that you're using to log in under the Partly Cloudy username? I suspect it's a "cookies" issue (the little text files that are stored on your computer to make it convenient to log back in the next time). Try scrolling down to the bottom of the front page of the message boards (http://benefitslink.com/boards/index.php) and click on the "Delete cookies set by this board" link. Then scroll back up and log in using the penman username and password. Let me know if this works for you; thanks! (OK to post a reply onto this message thread.)

Yes, we did have visitors from Bulgaria on Saturday, a little after noon. The vulnerability was my fault; I hadn't upgraded the message board software in quite a while. I had looked at the newest version of the software a couple months back but didn't see that it had enough features to merit the trouble of an upgrade. But I forgot that one very good reason to keep up with the latest versions of software is to take advantage of changes that have been made to patch vulnerabilities. The damage to the boards appears to have been limited to changing the home page on BenefitsLink and the message boards ("You've been hacked, etc."); I don't think they were able to access the database holding the content of the messages. Oh, and the other change was that the characters "lol" (as in "laughing out loud") were added to the start and end of every word ... that one took me a little while to figger out We're now running the latest and greatest version of the software; I need to tweak it to provide some of the graphics we had before, but I'm happy that I don't have to worry about my Bulgarian friends now. The upgrade was difficult in part because the upgrade instructions from the software vendor (Invision Power Services) were flawed; I had to find the flaws and fix 'em. Plus the size of the database (29,000 message threads) meant the conversion process was a couple of hours for each attempt. I wish it hadn't taken so long on Monday and Tuesday to get the new software up and running, but I was working on it full-time. Thanks for lolhanginglol lolinlol loltherelol loleverybodylol !

One user of these boards has suggested to me that a Circular 230 disclaimer ought to be available as a clickable "boilerplate" addition for message posts... I wonder if such a disclaimer raises the risk that somebody would argue the text of a reply message contained "advice" to him or her upon which he or she was able to legally rely (for purposes of suing over negligent advice)?

To scroll down a web page, you can just hit your space bar if you're using the Firefox browser (instead of having to use your mouse).

Marvelous, oriecat!

Here's a neat Firefox trick-- if you would like more than one "home" page to show up when you click the home icon-- each page will appear in its own tab-- just type the URL of each page into the usual home page field (Tools -> Options -> General) separated by the "pipe" character (it appears on my keyboard as the shift-backslash key, and looks like this: | ). For example, to open the BenefitsLink search page and the BenefitsLink buzz page as your two home pages (each on a separate tab), you'd type this into the home page field (ignore the word CODE): http://benefitslink.com/search|http://benefitslink.com/buzz/short.html

Thanks, everybody! And the company's other three employees -- Holly, Mary and Jeanette -- wave hello, too! Here are some shots from the Wayback Machine: http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://benefitslink.com and more fun stuff here: http://benefitslink.com/whatsnew/archive/ Those were the days. The "What's New" page changed once a month; the first was August 1995. Then in September of 1996 we moved to a weekly update. At some point it became daily, both on the web and via email newsletters.

Yikes, we have a catfight on the retirement plans board! The squawling has reached your humble BenefitsLink publisher all the way up in his ivory tower. Will everyone please take a deep breath? Might be smart not to post anything further for a day. I would've expected this on the VEBAs message board, but not here. Thanks for your participation on the message boards, everybody ... we have the sharpest bunch of actuaries/lawyers/administrators/marine life/mammals on the net.

Let's find him and send him a nice gift! One of the best people the IRS ever had, for the employee plans community.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?t.../technologyNews "Volunteers will be asked to download a program to their computers that runs when the machine is idle and reaches out to request data to contribute to research projects. "Organizers say the Grid can help unlock genetic codes that underlie diseases like AIDS and HIV, Alzheimer's or cancer, improve forecasting of natural disasters and aid studies to protect the world's food and water supply. " Details can be found at http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/ Join "Team BenefitsLink"! See http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/team/vie...ue=benefitslink

Microsoft has released a program that scrubs various "hidden" information from Microsoft Word, Powerpoint and Excel documents (XP or 2003 versions): http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...&displaylang=en "With this add-in you can permanently remove hidden and collaboration data, such as change tracking and comments, from Word 2003/XP, Excel 2003/XP, and PowerPoint 2003/XP files." "You should run the Remove Hidden Data add-in on files when you are ready to publish them. This is because some of the data that the tool removes is used by Office for collaboration features, such as Track Changes, Comments, and Send for Review."

Appleby, you think the BISYS materials are detailed enough for experienced administration consultants? I have not seen them. Are they basically online texts? Similar to the Panel Answer Books? How long have you been using the BISYS materials?

A couple of COBRA software products are listed at: http://benefitslink.com/software.shtml

The firm that sponsors the plan -- is it a partnership or a corporation (called a professional association in some states)? The new physician's former practice ... was it a corporation? If not, what sort of entity? I think it's important that the two entities be merged as a matter of state law (with the various formalities/documents), which unfortunately requires a takeover of both assets and liabilities by the existing firm. Otherwise the IRS would wonder why this particular individual's service with some previous employer (even if named in an amendment to the plan document) is worthy of being counted but not the service of a non-highly compensated nurse (for example) who previously was employed by an unrelated hospital (which doesn't get the benefit of a special plan amendment). Will any other individuals who worked at the physician's former practice also be coming over? If any such individuals actually come over and receive service credits too, that's awfully helpful in avoiding a potentially disqualifying discrimination argument from the IRS.

Make sure you sign up for our free daily email newsletter: http://benefitslink.com/newsletter/ It's not a replacement for the various big-publisher services, but you'll get links to fresh articles that have all sorts of interesting perspectives and that provide a look at the work product of most of the industry's bigger players as well as many astonishingly good smaller ones (law firms, consulting firms, administration firms, actuarial firms and others).

November 21, 2003 by Dave Baker Yesterday's BenefitsLink Retirement Plans Newsletter contained links to two message theads started by Janet Krueger on a Yahoo! discussion group, which itemize her reasons for disliking cash balance plans and her view of what it would take in order to design a "good" cash balance plan. (The newsletter is archived online at http://benefitslink.com/2003/2003_11_20_retirement.html ) A reader wrote to ask about Ms. Krueger; the links in the newsletter failed to explain who she is. Krueger is a former employee of IBM; she and several IBM employees reportedly started a web site several years ago at http://cashpensions.com (see http://www.uswestretiree.org/a47.htm and http://www.pensions-r-us.org/member_groups/ibm_employees.htm ).

The Florida courts ... well, I won't go there. The Florida Bar might take my Bar card away, which I might need if I return to the practice of law in Florida. OK -- tie decision. Tie goes to the runner? In a case of dueling experts, why not presume the individual is still "in there" and wants to continue to live? Oops, the appellate judges tipped their hand! Call the lady a vegetable and it gets a lot easier, for sure. Thanks for that insight, your honors, but in the long run, we're ALL dead! I'd like to forestall that eventuality by continuing to eat, however. Let's presume Terri would like food and water, too. Nobody's taking anybody else's "lives" away, except the "guardian" who's decided that's what Terri wants. The fellow who's living with his girlfriend and their child. Another one on the way. The fellow from whom Terri said she wanted a divorce, shortly before the "potassium imbalance" that induced her "heart attack" at age 26. (Don't you just hate it when that happens?) Her husband can get a divorce and "continue" with his life if he chooses to leave Terri ... her folks are desperately wanting to continue to use their lives to help their daughter enjoy hers, such as it is.

Some recent news -- late Monday evening -- from an AP article on the Tallahassee [Fl.] Democrat Web site: House votes to let governor intervene in Schiavo case JACKIE HALLIFAX Associated Press TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - The Florida House voted Monday to give Gov. Jeb Bush the power to issue a "stay" in the case of a brain-damaged woman whose feeding tube was removed last week by her husband's order. The House voted 68-23 for the bill. The Senate planned to take it up Tuesday. * * * Senate President Jim King, R-Jacksonville, originally said he didn't want to intervene. He later agreed to, but said he wanted to limit the scope of the bill as much as possible. --------------------------------------------------- Another newspaper covered the Jim King angle yesterday, before the newly reported agreement on his part to go along with a special bill on the Senate side. http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=35161 From that article: "Volunteers with the Terri Schindler-Schiavo Foundation have learned Senate President Jim King is opposed to the bill and has said he would not present it to the upper house for a vote. "According to his website, King is a member of the Florida Hospice Board of Directors and the Florida Task Force on Government-Financed Health Care, and is a recipient of the Hospice Hall of Fame Award. "Last year he wrote an amendment to the Advanced Directives Law expanding the definition of "proxy." "'The way it reads now, a total and complete stranger that doesn't even know the patient can come into the institution and say it's in the patient's best interest to die – that was his contribution to the law,'" said Pat Anderson, attorney for Terri's parents, Robert and Mary Schindler." --------------------------------------------------- A hospice is a wonderful place for folks who want to live their final days as comfortably as possible. My cousin was ably and lovingly assisted by hospice employees when she died of cancer recently. But doesn't someone like King risk at least the appearance of impropriety by simultaneously being on a task force on government-financed health care as well as the board of directors of a hospice trade association? As in, "let's encourage the really sick, old ones on 'life support' to go to a hospice rather than run up hospital or rehab expenses"?

When we choose life, we all benefit. An affirmation of the value of human life has value to society. Though such a value is hard to pin down in dollars, it needs to be part of the balancing, too, if there is balancing to be done.

More news: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/16/national/16FEED.html "The case has attracted members of religious groups and advocates for the disabled who say that Mrs. Schiavo's death could set a chilling precedent. "'This case threatens all people who are deemed incompetent whether it's due to dementia, Alzheimer's, brain injury or mental retardation," said Diane Coleman, president of Not Dead Yet, an organization in Forest Park, Ill., that opposes the right-to-die movement. "What disabled people are seeing is the courts will not protect us, and the health care system will not honor our rights.'"

This seems to set an awful precedent for any disabled person who can no longer feed himself or herself -- any such person arguably has become dependent on "artificial life support" and is a candidate for a guardianship-assisted "right to die": http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewCulture.asp?Pag...L20031015b.html http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/15/national/15FEED.html

http://home.nc.rr.com/tuco/looney/acme/acme.html "ACME is a worldwide leader of many manufactured goods. From its humble beginnings providing corks and flypaper to bug collectors ("Buddy's Bug Hunt/1935") to its heyday in the American Southwest supplying a certain coyote, from Ultimatum Dispatchers to Batman outfits, ACME has set the standard for excellence. "For the first time ever, information and pictures of all ACME products, specialty divisions, and services featured in Warner Bros. cartoons (made by the original studio from 1935 to 1964) are gathered here, in one convenient catalog."

What's the exact language of the plan document? Who is the plan administrator who's responsible for applying and interpreting the terms of the plan document?

I'll put a link to this topic at the end of that Q&A!