Open Thread–2/12/2013

 Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 122013
 

I had hoped to give you more than an Open Thread today, but  slept poorly last night and need to sleep a few hours before leaving for prison to do volunteer work.  I’m current with replies.  I will return late tonight, having missed my evening sleep cycle, so I’m sure I will be too tired to do more than an Open Thread tomorrow, but I should be all the way back on Thursday.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Todays took me 4:56 (average 5:35).  To do it. click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From MoveOn: SHOCKING: The Truth About Who’s Running The NRA

 

This is one of the most effective exposés of NRA bullshitology I have seen. There can be no doubt that the NRA does not represent gun owners. It represents the gun industry, and they do not care how many die or how many mourn, as long as profits remain high. This is the epitome of Vulture Capitalism. They own virtually all Republican legislators and a few Democrats as well.

From NY Times: A sharp and surprisingly persistent slowdown in the growth of health care costs is helping to narrow the federal deficit, leaving budget experts trying to figure out whether the trend will last and how much the slower growth could help alleviate the country’s long-term fiscal problems.

In figures released last week, the Congressional Budget Office said it had erased hundreds of billions of dollars in projected spending on Medicare and Medicaid. The budget office now projects that spending on those two programs in 2020 will be about $200 billion, or 15 percent, less than it projected three years ago. New data also show overall health care spending growth continuing at the lowest rate in decades for a fourth consecutive year.

You can be sure Republicans are still using the old projections to justify their intent to gut Medicare and Medicaid to give more money to billionaires. Considering that Obamacare has not even been fully implemented yet, I think we can expect further reductions in health care costs, further negating the Republican War on Seniors.

From MSNBC: The Latest from the ChickenHawk

 

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

During the Bush regime there was nobody at any post as qualified as either Kerry or Hegel. And for national security, Democratic competence brought us the death of Osama bin Laden. Republican incompetence brought us 9/11.  That says it all.

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Another Reason We Need Medicare for All

 Politics
Feb 062013
 

Many US employers do offer their employees excellent health care benefits, and they should be commended for doing so.  It is not uncommon for people to hang onto a job, just to hang on to their healthcare benefits.  Some are even putting off retirement.

6health-benefits-retirementTying health insurance benefits directly to employment is forcing most Americans to work longer than they would have otherwise, a new study from the Employee Benefits Research Institute finds.

According to the study’s results, more than three fourths of retired Americans ended up working longer than they initially planned because they didn’t want to lose access to their employer-based health benefits. And a majority of the Americans who are currently in the workforce are also planning to delay their retirement in order to keep the insurance plans they have through their employer:

This builds upon previous research that shows the Great Recession has seriously impacted older Americans’ ability to retire. An estimated 62 percent of working Americans now report they’re planning to put off their retirement — up from 42 percent in 2010 — largely due to job losses and financial insecurity. These issues go hand-in-hand particularly because, as health care costs continue to rise, Americans are increasingly worried about being able to afford their insurance coverage…

Inserted from <Think Progress>

My concern with this is different from that of the author, because I’m not bothered that people who would like to retire before they are eligible for Medicare are inconvenienced.  However, it is better, if people who wish to retire early can do so, as it frees jobs for people who want to work.

However, I am concerned for employers who provide excellent health care for their employees.  If a greedier competitor provides no health care benefits, that puts the good employer at a competitive disadvantage.  With universal, single-payer coverage, such as Medicare for all, there will be no such inequities.  In addition, it would make US companies more competitive in the world economy.

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Open Thread–1/12/2013

 Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 122013
 

I’m still down.  Today is a high holy day in the Church of the Ellipsoid Orb, and my Broncos’ conference semifinal meditation with the Ravens will be televised here.  I’m current with replies.  Sooner or later…

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:54 (average 5:01).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From MoveOn: This Is Why You Listen Up When Robert Redford Has Something To Say

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Now that’s a good idea, and a sure way to get Republicans to oppose defense spending.

From NY Times: In a bold experiment in performance pay, complaints from patients at New York City’s public hospitals and other measures of their care — like how long before they are discharged and how they fare afterward — will be reflected in doctors’ paychecks under a plan being negotiated by the physicians and their hospitals.

The proposal represents a broad national push away from the traditional model of rewarding doctors for the volume of services they order, a system that has been criticized for promoting unnecessary treatment. In the wake of changes laid out in the Affordable Care Act, public and private hospitals are already preparing to have their income tied partly to patient outcomes and cost containment, but the city’s plan extends that financial incentive to the front line, the doctors directly responsible for treatment. It also shows how the new law could change longstanding relationships, giving more power to some of the poorest and most vulnerable patients over doctors who run their care.

This an example of a fee-for-outcome delivery system, and is exactly the kind of reform I have advocated over fee-for-service.

From MSNBC: Who has reduced the deficit and who hasn’t?

 

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

"No peacocks, no jerks, no whiners" excludes the entire Republican Party. It is the Democratic Party that has a record of responsible fiscal policy. It is the Republican Party that has a record of runaway spending, deficit and debt. So when Republicans talk about those "tax and spend" liberals they are, as usual, projecting, blaming us for their own faults.

Cartoon:

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In today’s House, it would probably not be allowed to come to the floor for a vote, and it would be filibustered in today’s Senate.

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Open Thread–1/11/2013

 Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 112013
 

There’s still no change in my status.  I’m current with replies.  This has to end sometime.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:39 (average 4:52)  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From MoveOn: Jon Stewart Asks ‘What Would Anyone Who Isn’t An A**hole Do?’

What would anyone who isn’t an asshole do? They would oppose the Republican Party.

From NY Times: An authoritative report issued by the Institute of Medicine this week found that, on average, Americans experience higher rates of disease and injury and die sooner than people in other high-income countries. That is true at all ages between birth and 75 and for even well-off Americans who mistakenly think that top-tier medical care ensures that they will remain in good health. The study found that even upper-income Americans with health insurance and college educations appear to be sicker than their peers in other rich nations.

The study was commissioned by the National Institutes of Health, the federal government’s top medical research agency, and was carried out by experts appointed by the National Research Council and the Institute of Medicine, two units of the prestigious National Academy of Sciences. It is the first analysis to compare the burden of multiple diseases and injuries in the United States and 16 other affluent democracies, including Western European countries, Australia, Canada and Japan.

American men ranked last in life expectancy among the 17 countries and American women ranked next to last. The United States also ranked at or near the bottom in nine areas, including heart disease, chronic lung disease, obesity and diabetes, injuries and homicides, and sexually transmitted diseases.

This is a byproduct of emphasizing profit over health in US health care delivery. Multi-payer for-profit coverage and fee-for-service delivery are both obsolete. The best way to overcome this shameful state of affairs is to switch to single-payer coverage and fee-for-patient or fee-for-outcome delivery.

From MSNBC: Ed Schultz interviewed Bernie Sanders on financial inequity.

 

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The statistics show how absurd it is to balance the budget on the backs of the 80% of Americans who own just 5% of the wealth. Bernie made it clear that is exactly what Republicans are trying to do. To do this they are telling the lie that spending is the problem, when the bulk of the problem stems from keeping the share of revenue paid by the very rich at an all-time low and failing to make sufficient investment in economic recovery,   Bernie is right that filibuster reform is an absolute necessity.

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Open Thread–8/15/2012

 Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Aug 152012
 

Yesterday I was working with about a dozen of my guys in prison.  We discussed how lack of self-esteem interferes with opting for the healthiest choices.  We also discussed how we need to realize that we cannot change others, only ourselves.  Trying to change others usually leads to manipulation, which tends to destroy relationships.  These concepts sound easy, but putting them into practice is tough, and I’m thoroughly pleased with my guys for their dedicated attempts to do so and their successes.  On the down side my bad hip took a sudden turn for the worst, and I can barely walk.  Also there is no A/C in prisoner areas, and we sweltered.  I cooled the apartment down to 82° overnight, but two of the next three days are forecast as record highs.  I have two other stories.  I’m pretty sure that I am too worn out and in too much pain to distribute links.  I don’t know if I can catch up on comments.  We’ll see want tomorrow brings.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:13 (average 4:56).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From MoveOn: This Girl Has A Question That’ll Stump Your Conservative Friends

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For Republicans, life begins at conception and ends at birth. Otherwise, all their policies are pro death.

From CNN: Hundreds of thousands of people who entered the United States as children but without documentation can apply — beginning Wednesday — to remain in and work in the country without fear of deportation for at least two years.

This is what Obama did on the face of Republican bigotry.

From ABC: "We got a real clear picture of what they all value," Vice President Joe Biden said at a campaign event in Virginia yesterday, referring to the Republican budget conceived, in part by newly-minted vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan. "Every Republican’s voted for it. Look at what they value and look at their budget and what they’re proposing. Romney wants to let the — he said in the first hundred days he’s going to let the big banks once again write their own rules, ‘unchain Wall Street.’ They’re going to put y’all back in chains."

-Joe Biden

Republican’s have their panties in a bunch over this, probably because it’s true.

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Republicans Plan to Keep YOU Uncovered

 Politics
Jul 082012
 

We have already discussed how Republicans are trying to create an Obamacare gap by refusing Medicaid expansion funds to upgrade Medicaid to cover all under 133% of the federal poverty level.  This would create a coverage gap between the percentage at which red states cut off Medicaid eligibility (as low as 25% of federal poverty level) and 133%, when federal subsidies kick in.  If this was not bad enough for America, Republicans are now trying to deprive people in the states they control of federal health care subsidies for those over 133% of the poverty level.

8HCRCritics of the new health care law, having lost one battle in the Supreme Court, are mounting a challenge to President Obama’s interpretation of another important provision, under which the federal government will subsidize health insurance for millions of low- and middle-income people. Starting in 2014, the law requires most Americans to have health insurance. It also offers subsidies to help people pay for insurance bought through markets known as insurance exchanges.

At issue is whether the subsidies will be available in exchanges set up and run by the federal government in states that fail or refuse to establish their own exchanges.

Critics say the law allows subsidies only for people who obtain coverage through state-run exchanges. The White House says the law can be read to allow subsidies for people who get coverage in federal exchanges as well.

The law says that “each state shall” establish an exchange. But Washington could be running the exchanges in one-third to half of states, where local officials have been moving slowly or openly resisting the idea.

The dispute has huge practical implications. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that 23 million uninsured people will gain coverage through exchanges and that all but five million of them will qualify for subsidies… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <NY Times>

This should not fly.  The intent of the law is clear.  States are required to set up exchanges.  The ability of the federal government to set up exchanges is provided only as a remedy to be used when states willfully violate the law.  The notion that a states residents may be punished by state governments, because those state governments refused to meet their legal obligations, is absurd.  Nevertheless, there is no depth to which Republicans will not stoop.

Every penny Democrats spend on providing health care for worthy families
is a penny Republicans can’t give to unworthy billionaires!
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Open Thread–7/3/2012

 Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jul 032012
 

I’m headed out to physical therapy today and have several errands to run while I’m out.  I will not have time to distribute links to today’s articles until tomorrow.  I am not current with replies and plan to catch up by tomorrow.  Tomorrow appears routine.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:29 (average 5:08).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From MoveOn: The Power To Fight The Koch Brothers Is Sitting Next To Your Toilet

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Thou shalt not be a Koch sucker!

From NY Times: Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign threw cold water on a central Republican attack line on Monday, saying that President Obama’s health care mandate should be thought of as a penalty and not a tax.

That message, delivered first by a top aide to Mr. Romney on television and later by the campaign, contradicts top Republican Party officials and leaders in Congress, who have spent the last several days eagerly accusing the president of levying a new tax.

Isn’t it nice when the circular firing squad isn’t Democratic, for once?

From USA Today: Just in time for the summer, the ALCU in New Jersey is offering a free app that allows citizens to secretly record and store their encounters with police, The (Newark) Star-Ledger reports.

It follows the release in June of the ACLU New York’s "Stop and Frisk" app, which is available in English and Spanish.

What an excellent idea!

Cartoon:

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Red states, get over it!

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