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News/Politics 12-14-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

Open thread, here’s a few to start off.

1. They just don’t learn. There is no such thing as a moderate Islamist.

From TheLongWarJournal  “After the US’ efforts to prop up the Free Syrian Army have failed and the larger Islamist brigades of the FSA, which have fought alongside al Qaeda, have defected and created the Islamic Front, the Obama administration is now seeking to court the Islamic Front. The catch: The group must denounce al Qaeda and join the peace process.  Here is an excerpt:

The Obama administration is willing to consider supporting an expanded Syrian rebel coalition that would include Islamist groups, provided the groups are not allied with al-Qaeda and agree to support upcoming peace talks in Geneva, a senior U.S. official said Thursday.

In addition, the official said, the Americans would like the Islamic Front groups to return U.S. vehicles, communications gear and other non-lethal equipment they seized last weekend from warehouses at the Syria-Turkey border.”

Maybe we should make them pinky swear too, just to be sure. 🙄

And maybe a pretty please will get your stuff back too.

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2. Remember folks, taxpayer dollars don’t fund abortion. But it frees up 1.5 million a day that will.

From TheDailyCaller  “Planned Parenthood’s 2012-2013 annual report is out, and a pro-life group has already found that the pro-abortion group received nearly $1.5 million a day in government funding over the year.”

“Twenty-six percent of Planned Parenthood’s revenue came from private contributions in 2012, 25 percent came from non-government health services revenue and 4 percent came from “other.” Government grants and reimbursements accounted for 45 percent of Planned Parenthood’s revenue, or $540.6 million.

The organization further reported over $1.3 billion in net assets and $58.2 million in excess revenue.”

The Hyde Amend. is just one more law in a long list that this administration ignores or refuses to enforce or defend.

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3. Which brings us to this piece.

From TheWeeklyStandard  “Congressman Tom Rice of South Carolina, a Republican, is sponsoring a resolution in the House of Representatives that would, if adopted, direct the legislative body “to bring a civil action for declaratory or injunctive relief to challenge certain policies and actions taken by the executive branch.” In other words, Rep. Rice wants to take President Obama to court for not faithfully executing the laws.

“President Obama has adopted a practice of picking and choosing which laws he wants to enforce. In most cases, his laws of choice conveniently coincide with his Administration’s political agenda. Our Founding Fathers created the Executive Branch to implement and enforce the laws written by Congress and vested this power in the President.  However, President Obama has chosen to ignore some of the laws written by Congress and implemented by preceding Presidents,” Rice wrote in a letter to fellow House members to ask them to co-sponsor this resolution.

“This resolution allows the House of Representatives to bring legal action against the Executive Branch and challenge recent actions, inactions, and policies.” The “legal action against the President” would be, according to an aide for Rep. Rice, “for ignoring Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution.” Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution states,

He shall from time to time give to the Congress information of the state of the union, and recommend to their consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in case of disagreement between them, with respect to the time of adjournment, he may adjourn them to such time as he shall think proper; he shall receive ambassadors and other public ministers; he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed, and shall commission all the officers of the United States.”

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4. DHS is urging insurers to cover people starting January 1st, even if they haven’t paid yet.

Yeah, that’ll work. 🙄

From CNSNews  “Fearing that many people will think they have health insurance coverage  when they do not,  Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is “urging” insurance companies to “give  consumers  additional time to pay their first month’s premium and still  have  coverage beginning Jan. 1, 2014.”

Insurance companies should cover people who haven’t yet paid, in other words.

With just a few weeks to go until Obamacare takes full effect, Sebelius announced additional changes on Thursday,  some that tell insurance companies how to run their business and others  that “strongly” encourage insurance companies to waive their rules — on  premium payments, for example.

Sebelius now says insurance companies MUST accept payments through December 31  (instead of Dec. 23) for health care coverage that begins the next day,  Jan. 1.”

They ignore and re-write this as they go along. Also illegal according to their own law.

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5. And as if things weren’t bad enough, a new glitch that steals money from your bank account. Nice. 🙄

From KGW/Portland  “For the second week in a row, the Washington Healthplanfinder website is down, and it’s causing problems for people who are dealing with billing issues. Some of them say the website is mistakenly debiting their accounts.

Shannon Bruner of Indianola logged on to her checking account Monday morning, and found she was almost 800 dollars in the negative.”

“The Bruners enrolled for insurance on the Washington Healthplanfinder website, last October. They say they selected the bill pay date to be December 24th. Instead the Washington Healthplanfinder drafted the 835 dollar premium Monday.”

“One viewer emailed KING 5 saying, “They drafted my account this morning for a second time.”

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News/Politics 12-13-13

What’s interesting in today’s news?

There’s a whole bunch, so I’ll try to be brief.

1. Politifact has chosen it’s “Lie of the Year.”

From Politifact  “It was a catchy political pitch and a chance to calm nerves about his dramatic and complicated plan to bring historic change to America’s health insurance system.

“If you like your health care plan, you can keep it,” President Barack Obama said — many times — of his landmark new law.”

“For all of these reasons, PolitiFact has named “If you like your health care plan, you can keep it,” the Lie of the Year for 2013. Readers in a separate online poll overwhelmingly agreed with the choice.”

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2. You’ve heard of so-called “white privilege.” Now there’s a new meme.

I give you…. “Christian privilege.”

From TheWashingtonExaminer  “It’s settled, then: Christian conservatives use religion as a justification for their discriminatory behavior, and Americans will only enjoy true religious freedom when their so-called “religious liberty” claims are defeated.

That was the consensus Thursday at a panel discussion sponsored by the Center for American Progress in Washington.

“People [are] using the term ‘liberty’ when they really mean ‘my liberty, your slavery,'” the Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy, president of the Interfaith Alliance, said during the discussion. He made the statement while arguing that liberals’ view of religious liberty springs from a true, originalist reading of the Constitution that was once universally understood. Unfortunately, he said, the American people have become “confused” about this question because of misleading claims made by the U.S. Conference of Catholic bishops.” 🙄

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3. I’ve always known that teachers unions went out of their way to fight for bad teachers. But this is disgusting, even for them.

From EAGNews  “The Michigan Education Association is going to arbitration to try to force the West Branch-Rose City school district to pay a former teacher who was convicted of molesting a student a $10,000 severance buyout.

The father of the victim is outraged, calling the union’s efforts on behalf of the sex criminal “ludicrous” and saying any school money due to the teacher should go to his son, who is “out there trying to make it in this world all messed up.”

Neal Erickson, a former math teacher at Rose City Middle School, was convicted this summer of raping a young student over three years, from 2006 to 2009, and sentenced to 15-30 years in prison.”

Disgusting.

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4. OK fine, now do something about it.

From TownHall  “In a letter sent late Wednesday, Chairman of the House Oversight Committee Darrell Issa reminded Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that obstructing a congressional investigation is a crime.

  Issa’s Committee has been looking into the details of how Obamacare was implemented, along with the major problems with Healthcare.gov and has requested a number of documents from HHS, none of which he’s received. The documents requested pertain to companies hired by HHS to build and operate Healthcare.gov.

  “The Department [HHS] subsequently instructed those companies not to comply with the Committee’s request. The Department’s hostility toward questions from Congress and the media about the implementation of Obamcare is well known. The Department’s most recent effort to stonewall, however, has morphed from mere obstinacy into criminal obstruction of a congressional investigation,” Issa wrote.”

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5. The natives are getting restless. 🙂

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6. Casual handshake, or something else?

From TheDailyMail  “Obama shook Raúl Castro’s hand after SIX MONTHS of secret U.S.-Cuba talks, report claims

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7. In govt circles, I’m sure this is called a bargain. What the rest of us call it is a debacle.

From AmericansForTaxReform  “Taxpayers Shell Out $14,000 per Obamacare “Enrollee”

$5.2 billion for just 364,682 “enrollees”

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8. Harry Reid is up to some pretty slimy dealings. Again.

From TheDailyCaller  “Senate Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid took an intense interest in pushing through visas for dozens of shady Asian investors for a Las Vegas casino represented by his son, Rory Reid, documents and reports show.”

“In a Dec. 5, 2012 email to officials at the Department of Homeland Security obtained by The Washington Times, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Legislative Affairs official Miguel Rodriguez wrote, “This one is going to be a major headache for us all because Sen. Reid’s office/staff is pushing hard and I just had a long yelling match on the phone.””

“Initial attempts by Sen. Reid’s office to expedite the visa requests were denied on Dec. 17, 2012, prompting the majority leader to personally call USCIS Director Alejandro Mayorkas.”

““Within a few short weeks of Mr. Reid’s personal intervention, the decision not to expedite the visas was reversed, allowing the hotel to secure major funding from JP Morgan Chase,” the Times reports.”

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News/Politics 12-12-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. The Tea Party members of the party are not a big fan of the budget deal.

From TheWashingtonTimes  “Tea party and conservative groups pounced on the budget proposal that congressional leaders carved out behind closed doors, saying that the plan is based on the faulty premise of increasing spending now in exchange for future spending cuts that will never materialize.

They said that House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, the GOP budget negotiator, can kiss goodbye any chance of winning over grassroots activists if he chooses to run for president in 2016 after he surrendered ground on across-the-board “sequester” cuts to spending rolled back in the new deal.”

“Mr. Ryan and Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray, Washington Democrat, announced late Tuesday that they had reached a two-year budget deal that would reduce the deficit by $23 billion over ten years without raising taxes.

The proposal restored $63 billion on the across-the-board “sequester” cuts to defense and non-defense programs. It also included higher fees on airline travel and requires federal employees to contribute more for their retirement benefits.”

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2. Democrats are making use of the change in filibuster rules. This was their motivation, to stack the court that most directly oversees the White House with like-minded liberals.

From HotAir  “Senate Democrats revealed their primary motivation for changing the filibuster rules today when they confirmed Obama nominee Patricia Millett to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on a 56-38 vote:

Senators voted 56-38 to approve Washington lawyer Patricia Millett to join the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, the nation’s second most powerful court.

Both sides saw Millett’s appointment as pivotal. It will give Democratic-appointed judges a 5-4 majority over those chosen by Republican presidents for that court, which rules on the legality of White House actions and federal agency regulations.

That last part is the important part: the DC Court of Appeals has jurisdiction over regulatory and executive matters. The last few years have shown us that blurring the lines on exactly what constitutes regulatory and executive authority has been a key tool of the Obama Administration.”

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3. Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn) has fired his chief of staff Ryan Loskarn after his home was searched in a child porn investigation.

From NBCNews  “Alexander, a veteran senator who’s up for re-election in 2014, said that law enforcement agents had conducted a search this morning of the residence of Ryan Loskarn. Alexander announced earlier in the day that Loskarn had been placed on administrative leave, and later released a statement to announce had been let go.

“The courts will judge Mr. Loskarn’s guilt or innocence, but under these circumstances, he cannot continue to fulfill his duties as chief of staff of this office. Therefore, as of today, I have removed him from the payroll,” Alexander said in a statement.”

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4. Told ya’ so. Why do liberals always have to learn the hard way?

Any aid you give ends up in the hands of the radicals Islamists. It’s who the rebels are. This is a good start, now make sure you turn off ALL of the weapons supply too.

From BuzzFeed  “The United States has suspended delivery of non-lethal aid into northern Syria due to concerns over gains by Islamist rebels there, a U.S. official said on Tuesday.

The suspension halts direct U.S. assistance to Syria’s rebel-held north, long an opposition stronghold and the focal point of U.S. efforts to support the country’s moderate opposition. The affected aid includes supplies such as food and medicine, as well as vehicles and communications equipment.

The official said that humanitarian aid — which the U.S. channels through international and non-governmental organizations — will continue “and is not impacted by this suspension.”

The suspension comes in response to a worrisome development for the Free Syrian Army, or FSA, the moderate rebel coalition backed by the U.S. and its western allies. The FSA has been losing ground steadily to hardline rebel factions, including local affiliates of Al-Qaeda and a powerful rival coalition called the Islamic Front. On Friday, Islamic Front fighters overtook several key FSA headquarters and warehouses in Atimeh, a town near the Turkish border, dealing the FSA a bracing blow — and drawing alarm from the U.S.”

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5. Yet another ObamaCare navigator nailed by Project Veritas.

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6. Grinch Alert!!!

This lady thinks Santa needs a PC makeover, so the kids don’t get scarred for life. 🙄

From Slate  “When I was a kid, I knew two different Santa Clauses. The first had a fat belly, rosy cheeks, a long white beard, and skin as pink as bubble gum. He was omnipresent, visiting my pre-school and the local mall, visible in all of my favorite Christmas specials.

Then there was the Santa in my family’s household, in the form of ornaments, cards, and holiday figurines. A near-carbon copy of the first one—big belly, rosy cheeks, long white beard: check, check, check. But his skin was as dark as mine.”

“And so I propose that America abandon Santa-as-fat-old-white-man and create a new symbol of Christmas cheer. From here on out, Santa Claus should be a penguin. That’s right: a penguin.

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News/Politics 12-11-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. Looks like a budget deal been reached.

From TheWashingtonPost  “House and Senate negotiators unveiled an $85-billion agreement late Tuesday to fund federal agencies through the fall of 2015, avoiding another government shutdown and ending the cycle of crisis that has paralyzed Washington for much of the past three years.

In a rare display of bipartisan cooperation, House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) stood side-by-side in the Capitol with Senate Budget Committee chairman Patty Murray (D-Wash.) to announce the deal, which would cancel half the sharp spending cuts known as the sequester for the current fiscal year.”

“I am very proud to stand here today with Chairman Ryan to say that we have broken through the gridlock,” said Murray, calling the agreement “an important step in helping to heal some of the wounds here in Congress and show we can do something without another crisis around the corner.”

Ryan called the agreement “a clear improvement on the status quo” that protects the Pentagon from fresh cuts set to hit January while trimming deficits by more than $20 billion over the next decade.”

Call me unimpressed.

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2. I told you the other day about Holder’s DoJ was steering settlement money to community organizers. Seems the USDA has a similar program to steer large piles of cash to questionable individuals and groups.

From TheBlaze  “Between 2008 and 2011, the U.S. government awarded roughly $6.12 million in federal farm subsidies to several groups in the Chicago area, including a charity owned by Louis Farrakhan’s The Nation of Islam, according to a report released by government watchdog group Open the Books.

The report, titled “Farm Subsidies and the Big Dogs,” is based on data released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture & information obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. The report examines total farm subsidies that have been paid into selected cities and urban areas.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, federal farm subsidies are being poured into several non-farming metropolitan areas, including New York City and Chicago, according to the report.

Several entities in Chicago, for example, “receive the federal subsidies at their downtown loop office buildings or residential mansions,” the report reads. “Nearly every neighborhood in the city receives federal farm subsidy payments — including the Gold Coast, Downtown — Loop, Lincoln Park, and even the President’s neighbors in Hyde Park.” A total of 930 entities in the Chicago area received farm subsidies between 2008 and 2011.”

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3. A Dem pollster has been shocked to find no racism in Tea Partiers. So they had to make some up. 🙄

From Mediaite  “The Democratic pollster Democracy Corps, commissioning research from Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, recently dug into that foreign species commonly referred to as “the conservative voter.” In a dispatch that reads like the curious field notes Charles Darwin scribbled while observing the natural wonders of the Galapagos, the Democratic pollsters have found that the family Republican is made up of a variety of genera, including moderates, tea partiers and socially conservative evangelicals.”

“We know that Evangelicals are the largest bloc in the base, with the Tea Party very strong as Well,” the memo reads. They feign shock at the notion that Republicans view President Barack Obama as a “liar” and a “manipulator,” two designations that the majority of American voters would agree with but to which the Democratic base’s Pavlovian response is to point and shriek “racism.”

Indeed, the pollsters even confess that they “expected” to find more racism among Republican voters. “We expected that in this comfortable setting or in their private written notes, some would make a racial reference or racist slur when talking about the African American President,” they confess. “None did.”

“But this response by the voters they surveyed is viewed by Democracy Corps pollsters more as a clever evolutionary response to a history of predation. The Republican voter, the pollsters declare, harbors racial consciousness that is only masked by an effective camouflage:”

They couldn’t find any, but just know it’s there. Why else would they be against Obama, right? 🙄

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4. More Common Core indoctrination masquerading as education.

From EAGNews  “Next month, the organization, Creating Balance in an Unjust World, will hold its annual conference on “math education and social justice”.

The conference is sponsored by Radical Math, an organization founded by Jonathan Osler, a math and community organizing teacher at a Coalition of Essential Schools high school in Brooklyn, NY.

The Coalition of Essential Schools (CES) is the progressive education reform movement expanded by President Obama and domestic terrorist William Ayers through their work with the Chicago Annenberg Challenge in the 90′s.”

“Radical Math’s website provides over 700 lesson plans and other resources covering a wide range of political and social issues (with extreme bias), including globalization, the redistribution of wealth, and various ways the poor are discriminated against and oppressed by whites, banks, corporations, the rich, and the government. One such resource, Rethinking Mathematics: Teaching Social Justice by the Numbers, contains chapters titled, “Sweatshop Accounting”, “Racism and Stop and Frisk”, “When Equal Isn’t Fair”, “The Square Root of a Fair Share”, and “Home Buying While Brown or Black”.”

Yeah…..

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5. Hey Canada…. what gives, eh? 🙂

From MyFoxNY  “Canada plans to make a claim to the North Pole in an effort to assert its sovereignty in the resource-rich Arctic, the country’s foreign affairs minister said Monday.

John Baird said the government has asked scientists to work on a future submission to the United Nations claiming that the outer limits of the country’s continental shelf include the pole, which so far has been claimed by no one.

Canada last week applied to extend its seabed claims in the Atlantic Ocean, including some preliminary Arctic claims, but it wants more time to prepare a claim that would include the pole.”

“Countries including the U.S. and Russia are increasingly looking to the Arctic as a source of natural resources and shipping lanes. The U.S. Geological Survey says the region contains 30 percent of the world’s undiscovered natural gas and 15 percent of oil. If Canada’s claim is accepted by the U.N. commission, it would dramatically grow its share.”

Will Santa’s workshop be in the claim too? 😯

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by

News/Politics 12-10-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. Fast and Furious was bad. This might be worse. And I also find it interesting that the same admin calling for further restrictions on folks with possible mental issues, is the same admin who is arming people with mental issues to prove their point about the necessity of such restrictions. Create the solution and then create the problem.

From HotAir  “Twitter went crazy last night after an NYT editor teased a story they were working on for the a.m. as “very unusual” and “groundbreaking.” The result didn’t live up to the hype — it’s good, but not the world-rocking expose you’d expect when the Times braintrust is buzzing. This, on the other hand, is world-rocking. Not because it’s surprising to find the ATF engaged in dubious tactics, but because the tactics they used were so dubious even though the stakes were so, so small. If you strain very hard, you can semi-defend Fast & Furious as an idiotic response borne of desperation in trying to solve a serious problem. What’s the defense, though, when desperate and idiotic methods are used to catch penny-ante criminals, some of them profoundly mentally disabled?

I don’t often tell you to read the whole thing, especially when it’s as long as this, but I’m telling you now. The ATF’s M.O. was to open some sort of store, be it a pawn shop or a tattoo parlor, in a poor neighborhood and then try to bait the locals into committing drug or gun crimes. If some of those locals were handicapped, hey — that just makes reaching the monthly quota of guilty pleas and convictions easier. There’s no way to do it justice via excerpt, but here’s a taste of one instance where they recruited a guy with an IQ in the mid-50s to buy guns for them in the community:”

“That’s not all, but I’ll leave you to read about the ATF teaching people how to make sawed-off shotguns and fire machine guns. At least one machine gun went missing during these operations; in other cases, convicted felons were allowed to leave the store with guns they had just bought. But then, losing track of dangerous armed men is par for the course in ATF stings these days. Two exit questions for you. One: How soon before Darrell Issa holds hearings? And two, for legal eagles: How is there no entrapment in any of this? They might not have explicitly suggested the crime in each case but they clearly created incentives for committing the crime. The point of an entrapment defense, I thought, is to discourage overzealous cops from encouraging otherwise law-abiding people into wrongdoing. “Encouraging” can mean a lot of things, especially with a defendant who’s disabled.”

The report from The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is here.

It’s very long, and it’s infuriating. They preyed on these poor people, while creating the problem in the first place.

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2. Grinch Alert!

Or as some like to call him, Mikey Whinestein.

From FoxNews  “The Baby Jesus has been kicked off Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina, according to an organization who relishes any opportunity to eradicate Christianity from the U.S. military.

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation praised officials at Shaw Air Force Base for removing a Nativity scene located near Memorial Lake on Friday. The traditional Nativity included plastic statues of Mary, Joseph, the Baby Jesus and an assortment of animals.

Apparently, an undisclosed number of Airmen were so emotionally troubled by the sight of a manger scene that they immediately notified the MRFF.”

“Loebe swiftly alerted MRFF President Mikey Weinstein who then called his BFF’s at the Pentagon. That led to an immediate investigation and more than two hours later, the Nativity had been removed.”

Of course it was. 🙄

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3. Yet another ObamaCare lie.

From InvestorsBudinessDaily   “The people most threatened by ObamaCare have pre-existing conditions, meaning health problems that make it hard to get insurance. To sell ObamaCare, the president actually lied, claiming he would protect these people.”

“The pre-existing conditions problem affects about 2 million people in the individual market. The best options for these sick people are being closed because of ObamaCare.

In 35 states, they currently get coverage through high-risk pools, where premiums are subsidized to help keep them within reach. Most of these pools have long waiting lists. But high-risk pools must close on Dec. 31, 2013, or shortly after, because the Affordable Care Act directs ill patients to enroll in ObamaCare exchange plans.

The problem is, most exchange plans severely limit their choice of hospitals and doctors, excluding academic hospitals and specialty cancer centers. State insurance commissioners are scrambling to delay closing the high-risk pools.”

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4. And yet another unintended consequences of ObamaCare. They never think this stuff thru. They were in too much of a hurry to get it passed.

From TheDailyMail  “Volunteer fire departments all across the U.S. could find themselves out of money and unable to operate unless Congress or the Obama Administration exempts them from the Affordable Care Act.”

“Since the Obamacare law doesn’t specifically carve out an exemption for them, fire departments where 50 or more people work – either as volunteers or real employees – are expected to provide health insurance for every one of them.

In towns with more than one volunteer fire department, all the staffers will likely be lumped together for tax purposes, pushing many above the 50-worker threshold.

That could cost department of life-savers hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. Those that dump their volunteers into the federal insurance exchanges would still have to pay an annual $2,000 fine for each ’employee’ after the first 30.”

There’s a cynical part of me that wonders if it’s an attempt to rid towns of these fire depts. to bring in unionized govt. employees paid for with taxes.

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5. The official loss to taxpayers on the GM bailout is $10 billion.

From HotAir  “And with that, it’s “Government Motors” no more. At least, not officially.

U.S. taxpayers no longer own any of automaker General Motors. The Treasury sold the last of its remaining 31.1 million GM shares today.

The taxpayer loss on the GM bailout finishes at $10.5 billion. The Treasury department said it recovered $39 billion from selling its GM stock, and had put $49.5 billion of taxpayer money into the GM bailout. …

GM and Chrysler both went through government-scripted Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganizations. Treasury put $12.3 billion into Chrysler and recovered $11.13 billion of that.”

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News/Politics 12-9-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. The Holder DoJ is using financial lawsuit settlements to pay off community organizers. Another end run around the no funding of ACORN law.

From HotAir  “It seems Attorney General Eric Holder has created a multi-million dollar backdoor kickback for activist groups in the $13 billion JP Morgan Chase subprime loan deal recently settled, WND reports.”

“But wait… you can’t just take the penalty money and hand it out to your friends, can you? According to the breakdown from Investors.com, apparently you can.

Just when we thought its post-crisis probe of banks couldn’t get more corrupt, the Obama administration has cut radical Democrat groups in on the record $13 billion JPMorgan Chase subprime loan deal.

On Page 5 of “Annex 2″ of the recently released consent order, you’ll find this little gem: The Justice Department mandates that JPMorgan fork over any unclaimed or unpaid consumer damages to a nonprofit group that finances Acorn clones and other shakedown groups.”

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2. Now who’s cherry-picking data to justify an unpopular war? Can’t blame Bush for this one.

From YahooNews  “Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh has dropped yet another bombshell allegation: President Obama wasn’t honest with the American people when he blamed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for a sarin-gas attack in that killed hundreds of civilians.

But in a long story published Sunday for the London Review of Books, Hersh — best known for his exposés on the cover-ups of the My Lai Massacre and of Abu Ghraib – said the administration “cherry-picked intelligence,” citing conversations with intelligence and military officials.”

“A former senior intelligence official told me that the Obama administration had altered the available information – in terms of its timing and sequence – to enable the president and his advisers to make intelligence retrieved days after the attack look as if it had been picked up and analysed in real time, as the attack was happening. The distortion, he said, reminded him of the 1964 Gulf of Tonkin incident, when the Johnson administration reversed the sequence of National Security Agency intercepts to justify one of the early bombings of North Vietnam. The same official said there was immense frustration inside the military and intelligence bureaucracy: ‘The guys are throwing their hands in the air and saying, “How can we help this guy” – Obama – “when he and his cronies in the White House make up the intelligence as they go along?”’

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3. Is the President stacking the DHS Immigration Enforcement Office with pro-amnesty lawyers so they won’t enforce US laws?

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4. A disturbing opinion piece from a Lt. Col. on gun rights in America. The Obama admin is purging leaders who don’t play along, especially Christian ones. This is the type he’d like them replaced with. One who advocates disarming the citizenry and tossing the Supreme Courts opinion on the matter because he disagrees. Dictators love military leaders like him.

From Esquire  “We crossed the line some time ago, it has just taken me a while to get around to the topic. Sadly, that topic is now so brutally evident that I feel shame. Shame that I have not spoken out about before now — shame for my country, shame that we have come to this point. People, it is time to talk about guns.”

“Guns are tools. I use these tools in my job. But like all tools one must be trained and educated in their use. Weapons are there for the “well regulated militia.” Their use, therefore, must be in defense of the nation. Shooting and killing somebody because they were not “upset enough” over the loss of a college football team should not be possible in our great nation. Which is why I am adding the following “Gun Plank” to the Bateman-Pierce platform. Here are some suggestions:”

“2. We will pry your gun from your cold, dead, fingers. That is because I am willing to wait until you die, hopefully of natural causes. Guns, except for the three approved categories, cannot be inherited. When you die your weapons must be turned into the local police department, which will then destroy them. (Weapons of historical significance will be de-milled, but may be preserved.)”

“4. We will submit a new tax on ammunition. In the first two years it will be 400 percent of the current retail cost of that type of ammunition. (Exemptions for the ammo used by the approved weapons.) Thereafter it will increase by 20 percent per year.”

He’d also limit approved weapons to muskets, shotguns, and bolt actions with 5 round max capacity.

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5. Uncle Omar and the “culture of lies.”

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6. What’s that ticking noise?…

From TheNYPost  “The good news, if you want to call it that, is that roughly 1.6 million Americans have enrolled in ObamaCare so far.

The not-so-good news is that 1.46 million of them actually signed up for Medicaid. If that trend continues, it could bankrupt both federal and state governments.

Medicaid is already America’s third-largest government program, trailing only Social Security and Medicare, as a proportion of the federal budget. Almost 8 cents out of every dollar that the federal government spends goes to Medicaid. That’s more than $265 billion per year.

Indeed, already Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid account for 48% of federal spending. Within the next few years, those three programs will eat up more than half of federal expenditures.”

And who’s on the hook for it?…. Yep, taxpayers. 🙄

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7. Ruh-roh.

From TheLATimes  “Raising concerns about consumer privacy, California’s health exchange has given insurance agents the names and contact information for tens of thousands of people who went online to check out coverage but didn’t ask to be contacted.

The Covered California exchange said it started handing out this consumer information this week as part of a pilot program to help people enroll ahead of a Dec. 23 deadline to have health insurance in place by Jan. 1.

State officials said they are only trying to help potential customers find insurance and sign up in time. But some insurance brokers and consumers who were contacted said they were astonished by the state’s move.

“I’m shocked and dumbfounded,” said Sam Smith, an Encino insurance broker and president of the California Assn. of Health Underwriters, an industry group.”

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8. A little poetic justice.

From Politico  “Capitol Hill staffers are hitting multiple obstacles in trying to enroll in the Obamacare exchange just days before the federal government’s deadline for getting coverage.

They and lawmakers have until Monday to sign up on DC Health Link, the District’s insurance exchange, if they want to maintain the government’s generous employer contribution to their health insurance.”

“But as crunch time approaches, Democratic and Republican staffers are getting error messages, denials, notices that they’re enrolled in multiple plans and incomplete confirmation — as well as a website that went down briefly Thursday.”

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News/Politics 12-7-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

Open Thread, as always.

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1. First NY, now Cali. The revolt continues.

From TheWashingtonExaminer  “An estimated seven out of every 10 physicians in deep-blue California are rebelling against the state’s Obamacare health insurance exchange and won’t participate, the head of the state’s largest medical association said.

“It doesn’t surprise me that there’s a high rate of nonparticipation,” said Dr. Richard Thorp, president of the California Medical Association.”

“California offers one of the lowest government reimbursement rates in the country — 30 percent lower than federal Medicare payments. And reimbursement rates for some procedures are even lower.”

“Independent insurance brokers who work with both insurance companies and doctor networks estimate that about 70 percent of California’s 104,000 licensed doctors are boycotting the exchange.”

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2. So who is really behind these grassroots  astro-turf wage protesters at Wal-Marts and McDonalds?

From TheNYPost  “These are busy — and profitable — times for rent-a-mobs. Just days after Black Friday protests against Walmart stores, many of the same agitators will be out again on Thursday protesting at fast-food restaurants in New York City and across the country.”

“At the forefront of this perpetual protest machine is New York’s Restaurant Opportunities Center, the union-founded “worker center” infamous for its protest shakedowns of nonunion restaurants.”

“In fact, ROC pioneered this model: A union front group organizes as a nonprofit “worker center,” which lets it skirt federal labor laws that set reasonable limits on union protests. A novel idea when it launched in New York in 2002, ROC is now one of hundreds of worker centers nationwide, including SEIU-backed groups with names like Fast Food Forward and Fight for 15. ROC itself has expanded to over 30 cities, with reported plans for a new, SEIU-funded chapter in Seattle.”

“Multiple congressional investigations are looking into just how smelly it all is. The House Education and the Workforce Committee has demanded that the Labor Department produce the documents it used in determining that ROC should be exempt from labor-law disclosures under the Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act. The same committee is separately demanding HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius reveal how ROC managed to get named an ObamaCare navigator in New York. (ROC withdrew as a navigator just days after the program launched.)”

Right back to Democrats and the White House, who control both the Labor Dept and DHS. And ROC is just ACORN Version 2.0.

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3. Like I said, to the White House….

Oh, and I forgot one little detail…..  

We’re paying for it. 🙄

From WatchDog.org  “The Restaurant Opportunities Center, a union front and ACORN knockoff, is extending its reach by working with other groups to stage protests in 100 cities Thursday.

In a push for a higher minimum wage and more union members, ROC is also hiring a national campaign director to shepherd the center’s multimillion-dollar budget, partially plumped by taxpayer dollars.

Though registered with the Internal Revenue Service as a nonpartisan nonprofit, ROC is closely aligned with the Democratic Party and Big Labor, notably the Service Employees International Union and the AFL-CIO, said Mike Paranzino, spokesman for the group ROC Exposed.

“With her insider credentials, ROC co-director Saru Jayaraman was at the White House in May to participate in an unannounced strategy session on raising the minimum wage.”

They’ve received $1 million from the Dept of Labor, $200,000 from the CDC, and $500,000 from NYC, paid with federal stimulus funds. They completely ignore that it’s illegal to give taxpayer money to ACORN, and this IS ACORN.

And many of the people involved with this are the same people pushing for amnesty.

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News/Politics 12-6-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. Chaos for doctors, and bad news for Medicaid patients.

From CNBC  “Right now that back end is in chaos. … We don’t even know if we should sign up for these plans, because we have a suspicion that many of [them] offer very little reimbursement or offer a loss to the physicians who are going to see these patients,” Grace told Larry Kudlow on CNBC’s “Kudlow Report”.

“No physician wants to take money out of his pocket and put it in the government’s.”

“The administration released a 50-state report Tuesday morning saying that nearly 1.5 million people had been found eligible for Medicaid during October, far outpacing enrollment eligibility in subsidized private coverage. But as Obamacare puts more people in the Medicaid system, Grace said fewer doctors are treating Medicaid patients.

“The problem is, who’s going to care for you when you have Medicaid?” he said. “For an hour-and-15-minute evaluation of a cancer patient, I get $6.50. That won’t even pay for the electricity. What kind of physician will you get … what kind of specialist will you get?”

I can answer that. This kind.

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2. Low-information leadership?

With a Hat Tip to Michelle. 🙂

From TheWallStJournal  “It’s a shock for most people that it’s a shambles. A fellow very friendly to the administration, a longtime supporter, cornered me at a holiday party recently to ask, with true perplexity: “How could any president put his entire reputation on the line with a program and not be on the phone every day pushing people and making sure it will work? Do you know of any president who wouldn’t do that?” I couldn’t think of one, and it’s the same question I’d been asking myself. The questioner had been the manager of a great institution, a high stakes 24/7 operation with a lot of moving parts. He knew Murphy’s law—if it can go wrong, it will. Managers—presidents—have to obsess, have to put the fear of God, as Mr. Obama says, into those below them in the line of authority. They don’t have to get down in the weeds every day but they have to know there are weeds, and that things get caught in them.

It’s a leader’s job to be skeptical of grand schemes. Sorry, that’s a conservative leader’s job. It is a liberal leader’s job to be skeptical that grand schemes will work as intended. You have to guide and goad and be careful.

And this president wasn’t. I think part of the reason he wasn’t careful is because he sort of lives in words. That’s been his whole professional life—books, speeches. Say something and it magically exists as something said, and if it’s been said and publicized it must be real. He never had to push a lever, see the machine not respond, puzzle it out and fix it. It’s all been pretty abstract for him, not concrete. He never had to stock a store, run a sale and see lots of people come but the expenses turn out to be larger than you’d expected and the profits smaller, and you have to figure out what went wrong and do better next time.

People say Mr. Obama never had to run anything, but it may be more important that he never worked for the guy who had to run something, and things got fouled up along the way and he had to turn it around. He never had to meet a payroll, never knew that stress. He probably never had to buy insurance! And you know, his policies were probably gold-plated—at the law firm, through his wife’s considerable hospital job, in the Illinois Legislature, in the U.S. Senate. Those guys know how to take care of themselves! Maybe he felt guilty. Maybe that’s to his credit, knowing he was lucky. Too bad he didn’t know what he didn’t know, like how every part has to work for a complicated machine to work.”

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3. As I’m sure you’re aware, Nelson Mandela has died. Mary Katharine Ham has written a good piece on him and his impact on the world.

From HotAir  ““Our nation has lost its greatest son,” [South African] President Jacob Zuma said in a televised address on Thursday night, adding that Mr. Mandela had died at 8:50 p.m. local time. “His humility, his compassion and his humanity earned him our love.”

The Internet is awash with remembrances of Mandela from people who never knew him. Some will be self-important and tiresome, but most are just the honest, gut feelings of millions—each a testament to the reach of this towering, touching figure of the 20th century. I never knew him, but I knew the power of his inspiration and his example. As a kid, attending majority-black schools in North Carolina less than a generation removed from segregation, my classmates and I knew we were there, together, because of the bravery and leadership of good people who came before us. It was a hard thing to grasp at 7 (likely easier for my black classmates), vague at first. We played hopscotch under the arc of the moral universe, rarely looking skyward to see where it was bending. But there were moments when, in our innocence, we could feel the weight of what happened before we were born— a trip to Woolworth’s in Greensboro just minutes away or the release of Nelson Mandela on the other side of the world.”

“Greater awareness and hormones intervened, turning middle school into a place of racial tension where old friendships were taboo and anger reigned. Mandela’s example of a man supremely wronged who did not let bitterness overtake him seemed amazing, otherworldly. I’ll always be thankful he was the leader who rose while a bunch of confused teenagers in North Carolina were hurting from wounds old and new. Mandela’s life and death, of course, are not about me or my experiences. But the enormity of what Mandela did gave so many the opportunity to discover the beautiful joys and challenges we experienced alongside all God’s children. And, he gave my friends and me an idea of the giant people and giant sacrifices required to allow us to live in a neighborhood where “little black boys and girls” literally, routinely held hands with “little white boys and girls.” It was a gift and it wasn’t always a given. But it’s easy to take for granted what seems impossible after it’s already been done.”

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4. Huh. It seems the new Egyptian govt is smarter than ours when it comes to the Brotherhood. They’re not afraid to admit the obvious, unlike the Obama admin who funded them.

From TheJerusalemPost  “Egyptian media reported Thursday that the government is preparing to deem the  Muslim Brotherhood “a terrorist organization,” as pro-Morsi organizations sent  out a call for protests to be held over the weekend.

The Egyptian El-Watan newspaper, which tends to support the military and oppose the Muslim  Brotherhood, reported that interim Prime Minister Hazem el- Beblawi discussed in  a closed meeting with a number of ministers a detailed directive that declares  the Brotherhood a terrorist organization.

The government blames the  organization for violence and terrorism that has taken place since Mohamed Morsi was removed from power on July 3.”

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5. And last, a really bizarre story on numerous Russian diplomats arrested for Medicaid fraud. An attempt to blacken their eye in retaliation for Syria?

From NBCNews  “Dozens of Russian diplomats and their spouses living and working in New York have been charged with defrauding the Medicaid system of about $1.5 million in benefits over a nine-year period, federal prosecutors say. 

A federal criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan says the alleged scheme by 49 diplomats and their spouses included submitting false applications for Medicaid benefits associated with medical costs for pregnancy, birth and young children, benefits they were not entitled to receive. The 18-month investigation by the FBI revealed a pattern of fraudulent Medicaid application submissions by the defendants, including under-reporting household income and false statements about the citizenship status of children in order to continue dependents’ health care coverage, prosecutors say. Court papers say 92 percent of the births to Russian diplomats and their spouses between 2004 and 2013 in New York City were paid for by Medicaid benefits. 

While collecting Medicaid benefits, prosecutors say the Russian diplomats and their spouses spent tens of thousands of dollars on luxury vacations as well as jewelry and clothing at Bloomingdale’s, Tiffany’s and other retailers. They also spent thousands of dollars online to buy merchandise including Apple products and concert tickets.”

11 of the 49 have diplomatic immunity.

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News/Politics 12-5-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. More Benghazi testimony says the Obama admin had plenty of time to respond, but didn’t. This matches previous testimony on the matter.

From PJMedia  “Members of the House Intelligence Committee learned in a closed-door briefing yesterday that more contractors are corroborating the report that the Obama administration had plenty of time to respond to the attack on the Benghazi diplomatic facility.”

“And essentially what they were able to prove today, they basically backed up the other contractors who were on the ground in the two previous hearings. So this is an ongoing investigation,” Nunes said Tuesday evening. “And I think they gave us a lot of good leads today and I feel very comfortable moving forward with where we are at today.”

The congressman confirmed the White House claim that the attack was sparked by protest over a YouTube video “was a completely lie, and we always knew that.”

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2. They’re just wingin’ it now.

From HotAir  “President Barack Obama’s administration has found a short-term fix to pay insurance companies for plans selected on HealthCare.gov, the not-yet-complete government website used to shop for insurance required under Obama’s healthcare program.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has not yet finished building the part of the website that would transfer billions of dollars in subsidies for plan premiums and cost-sharing payments to insurance companies. …

The administration is planning a “workaround” for payments, said Daniel Durham, vice president for policy and regulatory affairs at America’s Health Insurance Plans.

What will the “workaround” be? Well, the insurers will tell HHS what taxpayers owe them in subsidies, and, er … HHS will cut checks with no questions asked:”

Sure. What could possibly go wrong? 🙄

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3. Here’s another slick holiday weekend move, so the media is sure to mostly ignore it.

From TheFreeBeacon  “The Obama administration quietly finalized the Health Insurance Tax (HIT) over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, a provision in Obamacare that will cost nearly $60 billion over the next five years and raise health care premiums by 3 percent.

The final rule, published on Nov. 27, imposes a fee beginning in 2014 for health insurers with premium revenues over $25 million per year. The annual tax is levied for “United States health risks,” and is hidden from consumers since it is directly assessed on health insurance companies.

David R. Burton, a senior fellow in economic policy at the Heritage Foundation, said the tax will disproportionally impact small businesses.”

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4. Another Common Core lesson with questionable methods and no educational value.

From IllinoisReview  “An assignment sent home from an Oak Forest, IL high school government class is raising eyebrows among parents who are shocked by the questionnaire they and their children are required to fill out. The questionnaire (below) has the parents identify their positions on a number of highly-charged issues, and then places them on a “political spectrum.”

The survey is from the textbook “U.S. Government 2“, published by the “The Center for Learning”. It is part of Oak Forest High School’s Common Core curriculum, which according to the school district’s website is to …”provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them.”

I’m sure this will be used to profile students and parents who might be a problem.

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5. Here’s a group of students rebelling against liberal indoctrination. They’re white, so they must be…….?

From TheDailyCaller  “The politics of faux victimization are spiraling out of control at a community college in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where several white students, their black professor and irritated administrators have one-upped each other with complaints, reprimands and now a lawsuit.

The trouble began in English professor Shannon Gibney’s Introduction to Mass Communications class at Minneapolis Community and Technical College. Though the class ostensibly has little to do with race, Gibney considers herself an activist on racial issues, and frequently invokes white privilege and oppression during class time, according to her students. (She has previously taught classes on race and gender.)

Recently, several white students announced that they had had enough with Gibney’s incessant racial screed. They interrupted her during a lecture, and said, “Why do we have to talk about this in every class? Why do we have to talk about this?” according to Gibney’s account of the incident, which was recorded by the City College News.”

“As a vocal black female younger looking… faculty member here, unfortunately this is no the first time,” she said. “I’ve actually had multiple verbal and institutional attacks on me by white males, whether they were students, faculty, administration or staff.”

How original. 🙄

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News/Politics 12-4-13

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. First up today an interesting study on the effects of daughters on political persuasions. It’s finding differ from some previous studies.

From HotAir  “In newly published findings that challenge earlier research, Dalton Conley of New York University and Emily Rauscher of the University of Kansas found that having more daughters than sons and having a daughter first “significantly reduces the likelihood of Democratic identification and significantly increases the strength of Republican Party identification.”

Not only is the daughter effect statistically significant, it’s substantively large.  They found that overall, “compared to those with no daughters, parents with all daughters are 14% less likely to identify as a Democrat….[and] 11% more likely to identify as a Republican than parents with no daughters,” they write in the journal Sociological Forum.

As a woman with a daughter, I’m perhaps qualified to theorize about this. But as a woman who’s been sure about her ideological and policy leanings from about the age of 8, I’m perhaps not a good analog for the average parent of daughters. This study challenges the findings of other studies, which have found at different times that politicians with more daughters vote more liberally or that having more daughters increases identification with the Liberal and Labor Parties in Britain.”

More here from ThePewReaserchCenter

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2. This is what decades of one-party rule will get you. The Democratic Utopia of Detroit.

From USAToday  “The city of Detroit officially became the largest municipality in U.S. history Tuesday to enter Chapter 9 bankruptcy after a judge declared it met the specific legal criteria required to receive protection from its creditors.

The landmark ruling ends more than four months of uncertainty over the fate of the case and sets the stage for a fierce clash over how to slash an estimated $18 billion in debt and long-term liabilities that have hampered Detroit from attacking pervasive blight and violent crime.”

“In a surprise decision Tuesday  morning, Rhodes also said he will allow pension cuts in Detroit’s bankruptcy. He emphasized that he won’t necessarily agree to pension cuts in the city’s final reorganization plan unless the entire plan is fair and equitable.”

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3. Issa has accused the FBI of impeding the congressional IRS investigation. Which means the Holder DoJ and Obama White House are orchestrating it. Shocking right? 🙄

From TheWashingtonTimes  “The House’s chief investigator says the FBI is stonewalling his inquiry into whether the agency and the Internal  Revenue Service targeted conservative group True the Vote for special scrutiny, and Rep.  Darrell E. Issa is now threatening subpoenas to pry loose the information  from FBI Director James B. Comey Jr.

Mr. Issa, California Republican, and Rep. Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican, are leading the  House  Oversight and Government Reform Committee’s IRS inquiry. They also said the FBI is refusing to turn over  any documents related to its own investigation into the IRS,  which began in the days after an auditor’s report revealed the tax agency had  improperly targeted tea party groups for special scrutiny.”

“Six months after it began, the FBI’s  investigation has resulted in no release of information. The congressmen said  the FBI even rescinded an  offer for an in-person briefing with the assistant director in charge of the  investigation. The reversal, after the FBI consulted with the Justice  Department, suggests political meddling, the two investigators said.”

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4. The White House is also refusing to brief Congress on the security flaws in the ObamaCare website, not even in closed session.

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5. The Obama admin is also trying to buy compliance from insurance companies as it relates to his “fix” for cancelled plans. Taxpayers will pay for it, of course. The first of many “bailouts” to come I’m sure.

From TheNYTimes  ” The White House is offering more money to insurance companies as an incentive for them to let people keep insurance policies that were to have been canceled next year.       

The administration floated several proposals on Monday to “help offset the loss in premium revenue and profit” that it said might occur if insurers went along with President Obama’s request to reinstate canceled policies.”

“To reduce this risk, the administration said it could provide financial assistance to certain insurers through a program under which the government will share in their losses and profits for the next three years.       

Any such assistance would come on top of federal subsidies that the government plans to pay insurers to make coverage more affordable for low- and middle-income people under the new law. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that those subsidy payments will exceed $1 trillion over the next 10 years.”

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6. Some Republican doctors are running for office, hoping their expertise will help solve this mess.

From TheHill  “Eleven Republican doctors are running for the Senate, hoping that voters will see their medical expertise as an asset amid the administration’s botched rollout of ObamaCare. 

“Doctors are in a very unique position to look at the financing of healthcare,” Rep. Paul Broun, a family physician running for the GOP nomination for Georgia’s open Senate seat, told The Hill.”

““We go into medicine for one reason, and one reason only: Because we care about people, we want the people who we serve to have a productive, happy, healthy life,” he added. “That’s the kind of policymaker we should have in place in dealing with healthcare policy.”

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