What’s interesting in the news today?
1. Like a laser people! Again…
From TheHill “The White House, for at least the fifth time this year, is seeking to pivot to the economy, this time in a bid to change the subject from the disastrous rollout of ObamaCare.
It’s a common play for the White House, which frequently seeks to refocus attention on its jobs and infrastructure agenda when facing political crises.
The move is so familiar that NBC White House correspondent Chuck Todd has dubbed it the “déjà pivot.”
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2. Senator Sessions has taken the Obama admin to task for their lack of border enforcement and disregard for US laws. He also blasted “big business” for attempting to put their monetary interests ahead of what’s best for the country.
From TheDailyCaller “Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions wants wealthy CEOs to butt out of immigration policy.
“America is not an oligarchy… A Republic must answer to the people,” Sessions said today, in a direct response to President Barack Obama’s latest effort to get wealthy California CEOs to increase their support for his unpopular push for increased immigration.
“Congressional leaders must forcefully reject the notion, evidently accepted by the president, that a small cadre of CEOs can tailor the nation’s entire immigration policy to suit their narrow interests,” Sessions declared in a populist statement that contradicts the media’s image of Republican coziness with CEOs.”
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3. Meanwhile our border agents who aren’t allowed to do their jobs are attacked by those who seem to think they are entitled to break our laws and just walk right in. I wonder where they got that idea? 🙄
From NBCSanDiego “A crowd of more than 100 people pelted Border Patrol agents with rocks and bottles as they tried to cross into the U.S. illegally, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
The incident happened Sunday in the Tijuana River channel, near the San Ysidro Port of Entry.
According to CBP, a Border Patrol agent ordered the Mexican nationals to stop, but they continued walking into the U.S.”
““They had their phones out so this group was out to spark an incident. That’s what they wanted to do, “ Border Patrol Union representative Gabriel Pacheco said.”
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4. The wife of the American pastor held hostage in Iran is asking why the Obama admin didn’t push for her husband’s release while “negotiating” with them.
From FoxNews “The wife of imprisoned American pastor Saeed Abedini says she and her family are devastated after learning that the Obama administration did not try to secure the release of her husband as part of the newly signed deal on Iran’s nuclear program.
Saeed Abedini, an American citizen, has been imprisoned in Iran for more than a year for practicing Christianity. The talks over Iran’s nuclear program were seen by his family and those representing them as one of the most promising avenues yet for securing his release.
But the White House confirmed over the weekend that Abedini’s status was not on the table during those talks. “
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5. Oh yeah, about that so-called “deal”……
From FarsNews “The Iranian Foreign Ministry on Tuesday called invalid a press release by the White House alleged to be the text of the nuclear agreement struck by Iran and the Group 5+1 (the US, Russia, China, Britain and France plus Germany) in Geneva on Sunday.
“What has been released by the website of the White House as a fact sheet is a one-sided interpretation of the agreed text in Geneva and some of the explanations and words in the sheet contradict the text of the Joint Plan of Action (the title of the Iran-powers deal), and this fact sheet has unfortunately been translated and released in the name of the Geneva agreement by certain media, which is not true,” Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Marziyeh Afkham said on Tuesday.
She said that the four-page text under the name of the Joint Plan of Action (which has been released by the Iranian foreign ministry) was the result of the agreement reached during the Geneva talks and all of its sentences and words were chosen based on the considerations of all parties to the talks. In fact one of the reasons why negotiations between Iran and the G5+1 took so long pertained to the accuracy which was needed for choosing the words for the text of the agreement, Afkham said, explaining that the Iranian delegation was much rigid and laid much emphasis on the need for this accuracy.”
Amateur hour continues. 🙄
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6. It looks like someone is finally going to suffer some consequences for the Benghazi scandal that cost 4 American lives.
Oh wait… Never mind, it’s a CBS reporter and not anyone at the White House or State Dept..
From NBCNews “CBS correspondent Lara Logan has been ordered to take a leave of absence after an internal review found her discredited “60 Minutes” segment on the Benghazi consulate attack was poorly vetted, the network said in a memo to staff.
The network also asked Logan’s producer, Max McClellan, to take a leave of absence. CBS did not specify a length for the leaves.
“As Executive Producer, I am responsible for what gets on the air,” CBS’ Jeff Fager said in the memo. “I pride myself in catching almost everything, but this deception got through and it shouldn’t have.”
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7. More no-bid ObamaCare contracts for friends of the Obama’s.
From CapitolCityProject “With the roll out of Obamacare being as disastrous as possible for the Obama administration, one group was given a $1 million grant to help lead a rebranding effort with hopes of salvaging the law in the eyes of the American people.
Families USA (FUSA) — an organization that describes itself as a “national nonprofit, non-partisan organization dedicated to the achievement of high-quality, affordable health care for all Americans” — was given a $1.1 million grant by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation on October 4, 2013, to gather “success stories” of Americans dealing with Obamacare and distribute them to the media who often refer to them as an “independent” group. This is part of a greater upcoming effort to bolster the perception of the lowly health care law.
“The purpose is to bridge the information gap for people who can significantly benefit from the Affordable Care Act,” Ron Pollack, the Co-founder and Executive Director of Families USA, told TIME on October 25, 2013.
However, the organization is a far cry from “non-partisan” and is extremely close to the Obama Administration and Enroll America – the group leading the efforts to sign people up for Obamacare.”
Propaganda sure is expensive.
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8. These photo-ops to help the President sure are the “Kiss of Death” for participants healthcare plans.
Welcome to reality ladies.
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Wandering Views 
Re #2: You are welcome.
Re #5: A friend, a former Naval Officer, posted on Facebook last night that whether the Iranian statement is true or false did you ever think that you would have to stop and question which one was right?
So, did you ever think that you would distrust our governement so much?
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From FoxNews, via Drudge.
Almost 80 million people with employer health plans could find their coverage canceled because they are not compliant with ObamaCare, several experts predicted.
Their losses would be in addition to the millions who found their individual coverage cancelled for the same reason.
Stan Veuger of the American Enterprise Institute said that in addition to the individual cancellations, “at least half the people on employer plans would by 2014 start losing plans as well.” There are approximately 157 million employer health care policy holders.
Need I point out that the driving force for Obamacare is “Forty million Americans are without healthcare.” You still hear it from time to time.
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Kim: No. The situation today is unique. I have often doubted the wisdom of some actions of our government. Jimmy Carter, even George Bush and others, I thought made bad decisions.
But never before, have I thought that they were working to the detriment of the USA.
I think so now. Neither Obama nor John Kerry love America. Kerry has changed his tune for political reasons, but his history belies that assertion.
The world is in deep turmoil and we are supporting the wrong side.
And Europe is no longer a factor in any of this. .
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From Newsmax
The Obama administration moved on Tuesday to rein in the use of tax-exempt groups for political campaigning.
The effort is an attempt to reduce the role of such loosely regulated yet influential super PACS as Crossroads GPS, which was co-founded by GOP political strategist Karl Rove, and Priorities USA, which ran searing ads against rivals of President Barack Obama to support his re-election last year.
The Internal Revenue Service and the Treasury Department proposed new rules that they said would prohibit such groups from using “candidate-related political activity” like running advertisements, registering voters or distributing campaign literature as activities that qualify them to be tax-exempt “social welfare” organizations.
“This proposed guidance is a first critical step toward creating clear-cut definitions of political activity by tax-exempt social welfare organizations,” said Mark Mazur, the Treasury’s assistant secretary for tax policy. “We are committed to getting this right before issuing final guidance that may affect a broad group of organizations.
http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/US-IRS-Political-Groups/2013/11/26/id/538880?ns_mail_uid=42135&ns_mail_job=1547884_11272013&promo_code=15C10-1#ixzz2lrRaaP7w
I haven’t heard, but I suspect this won’t apply to unions.
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Why I’m not overly worried about the employer plans going kaput … I think the ACA will either be repealed (in part or in whole) — or put on a way back-back-back burner at some point in the next several months. The whole thing is simply imploding and no Democrat is going to want to have to defend it.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2013/11/obamacare-repeal-watch.php
That said, the Republicans need to rally around some kind of alternative. There are problems in the health care system — both in access and in affordability (for most of us).
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