Honolulu Star Advertiser reporter June Watanabe did an outstanding job with her Kōkua Line column. She published answers to readers’ questions after she does her usual comprehensive research.
In a 2013 column, a reader asked about laminating HMSA, Medicare and Social Security Cards. The answers are interesting, but more important, the article provided links to Medicare and Social Security websites where you can request replacement cards.
Question: Is it OK to laminate your Medicare and HMSA cards? These cards are required when we register at the Medical Group and for lab tests. The Medicare card is also used to verify Social Security numbers.
Answer: HMSA says it’s OK to laminate your card.
However, both the Social Security Administration and the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services advise against laminating Social Security and Medicare cards, although it is not illegal and doing so will not invalidate the cards.
“While it isn’t recommended, there is no penalty for doing so,” said Sharon Y. Yee, of Medicare’s Region IX office.
She provided a link to a Social Security Administration bulletin —is.gd/fFOLp7 — that says lost or damaged Medicare cards “are easily replaced online at no charge.”
(Go to http://www.socialsecurity.gov, click on “Numbers & Cards,” then on “Replacement Medicare card.” A replacement card will be mailed in about 30 days.)
Meanwhile, Jane Yamamoto-Burigsay, Social Security spokeswoman in Hawaii, said the administration “DOES NOT want people to laminate the Social Security cards.”
She pointed to the Social Security website is.gd/kWelcX. It says, “Laminated cards make it difficult, if not impossible, to detect important security features and an employer may refuse to accept it.”
It goes on to say, “The Social Security Act requires the Commissioner of Social Security to issue cards that cannot be counterfeited. We incorporate many features that protect the card’s integrity. That includes highly specialized paper and printing techniques — some visible to the naked eye and some not. Further, we continue to actively explore and adopt new technologies that hamper duplication.”
The administration also advises keeping Social Security cards in a safe place: “Do not carry it with you.”
Your account was used for fraudulent activity. Did you just see your life flash before your eyes?! This is one of the scariest things you can be told. Getting your identity back after it’s been stolen is no easy task. With how dependent we are on technology, identity theft protection is an absolute must. About 15 million U.S. residents fall victim to identity theft with a loss totaling around $50 million. So why not take control of your identity before it’s too late?
You hear lots of talk about carbohydrates, but what are they, really — and how do they affect people with diabetes?
Retiree News received the sad news this afternoon that CMSgt Robert “Bobby” Choi passed away on Tuesday of natural causes. He was a month short of his 96th birthday.
Bobby was the last surviving charter member of the Hawaii Air National Guard from 1946. He has the distinction of being the first HIANG member promoted to the rank of Chief Master Sergeant on April 21, 1963.
Bobby’s photograph is from a briefing for retired Chiefs in 2008 held at Hq, Hawaii Air National Guard.
Services are pending and Retiree News will post the information when received.
Rest in Peace Bobby
Congratulations to Colonels Kenneth Hara and Suzanne Vares-Lum! The United States Senate confirmed both officers promotion to brigadier general.
The National Guard Bureau email announcement said in part:
The Chief of the National Guard Bureau is pleased to announce that on 05 August 2015, the United States Senate has confirmed the attached list of Army National Guard officers for Reserve of the Army appointment in the grades indicated. He joins the Secretary of the Army, Chief of Staff of the Army and Acting Director of the Army National Guard in extending congratulations.
GO-15-061 Senate Conf (14A Board)
Both officers will execute their promotion certificates when a brigadier general position in the Hawaii Army National Guard becomes vacant.
Caller ID is easy to spoof and it’s leading to a host of real threats, from account recovery fraud to marketing scams to malicious pranks resulting in SWAT teams showing up at a victim’s door.
Obamacare is a major revision of how we pay for healthcare, but what does it mean for the quality of that care?
The president recently signed into law the Veterans Entrepreneurship Act. The new law waives the upfront guarantee fee for veterans applying for 7(a) express loans through the Small Business Administration (SBA), helping recently discharged service members and other veterans with opportunities to start new businesses. According to the SBA, one out of 10 small businesses across the U.S. Is veteran-owned.
For information on resources available for veteran-owned businesses, visit the Small Business Administration website at www.sba.gov/content/veteran-service-disabled-veteran-owned and VA’s Veteran Entrepreneur Portal at www.va.gov/osdbu/entrepreneur/.
Read the text of the new law at www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/114/hr2499.
You can register to receive an email every time there is a new post. In the “Follow Blog via Email” section and press “Follow”. On the next screen, enter your email address and press ENTER. Shortly, you will receive a confirmation email to your address from WordPress.com. You acknowledge the email and you are a registered reader.
After you compete this short registration process, you get a notification email every time there is a new posting. The email has a quick teaser of the posting, along with tags that indicate how the posting relates to special topics/areas. There is a direct link to the website (Read more of this post)
click on graphic to enlarge
Special Thanks to Wes Tanaka who registered to “Follow Blog via Email” last week.
Charles J.K. Hall Sr., 73, of Kapolei, a retired Honolulu Police Department detective and Hawaii Air National Guard veteran, passed away on July 3, 2015. He was born in Honolulu.
He is survived by wife Patricia; sons Charles Jr., Michael, Patrick and John; daughter Malia; brother Fred; sisters Poliala Katschman and Edwina Maijala; and 14 grandchildren.
Visitation: 5:15 p.m. Friday at Mililani Mortuary-Waipio, mauka chapel. Services: 6:30 p.m. Aloha attire. No flowers.
The following is off the Norton by Symantec website. This post provided as information to Mac owners and no endorsement is given or implied.
OS X Yosemite Bug The first recently discovered bug affects OS X Yosemite, version 10.10. It’s a bug that allows cybercriminals to install malicious software on your Mac without your consent or password. Learn More
Thunderstrike 2 Worm The second is a computer worm designed by researchers specifically to attack Apple OS X computers and peripherals through a bug in the devices’ firmware (software that tells the computer how to power up properly and how to load the operating system). Fortunately, it has not been exploited by cybercriminals yet.
How to Stay Safe: Make sure that you update your Apple firmware as soon as possible. Apple gives instructions on how to do this on its website.
The Maroon Bar on the website
In the last several months, there have been revisions to the drop down menus on the maroon bar below the masthead photograph. The following is a quick description of information provided on the maroon bar.
Home
– Clicking on “Home” will get you back to the home page from anywhere on the website.
– When you hit “Home” when you are the home page, a dropdown menu item called “Welcome” appears.” Welcome” provides information about the Retiree News website.
Events
– Click on “Events” and the dropdown menu has upcoming events. The individual event postings will have the “who, what, when and where” of the event, or the event flyer is posted. An event remains posted until the event occurs.
Periodicals
– This drop down menu features website links to popular military related periodicals.
Federal Benefits
– Individual postings include exchange information, commissary information and a Space “A” link.
Medical Benefits
– Postings include TRICARE and Veterans Administration information. More information and links about other benefit programs will appear soon.
State Benefits
– State benefits a covered in these postings.
References
– Information like Air Force Fact Sheets are in this section.
Bereavement
– One posting lists the contact information of organizations that you need to contact after a retiree passes.
– There is a link to the DOD site that covers funeral honors and who the family can contact when a retiree passes.
About
– This dropdown menu provides general information about the Retiree News website, history, photograph credit and other things.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but everyone knows ugly. And there have been many repellent, revolting and unnecessarily misshapen wheeled vehicles over the years. But these 100 in particular, well, they’re the ugliest cars of them all.
Look at the list and you’ll find that vehicles built before World War II aren’t here. That’s not because there weren’t some heinous contraptions built before then, but to 21st-century eyes it’s tough to make judgments in the context of 75 or 85 years ago. And before that, the way a car looked was almost always determined solely by how its primitive parts bolted together. Design virtually didn’t exist. But since the war, ugly has been on a terrific tear.
Each disaster here is listed by the first year of its hideous generation. What’s shocking is that some of these ugly cars were in production not just for years, but decades. Decades.
Beauty may be skin deep, but ugly runs deep throughout the unibody.
Photograph from Wikimedia Commons, licensed from Intel Free Press
If Soldiers were still unsure of what bad behavior looks like online, the Army clarified it for them in an “All Army Activities” message — commonly called an ALARACT — that went out force-wide last week.
Online misconduct, it says, is “the use of electronic communication to inflict harm. Examples include, but are not limited to: harassment, bullying, hazing, stalking, discrimination, retaliation, or any other types of misconduct that undermine dignity and respect.”
