I’m writing for tomorrows, and it’s late in the day, as I’ve been busy with a variety of tasks. Good news! I got the word that phase one of my formal volunteer training has been approved, and I’ve been scheduled for phase two, institution specific training at OSP. I’ll be spending two nights away from home early next month. Fortunately I’ll be staying in a motel, not a cell. :twisted: Let’s see… should I stay at the Super 8 Motel I used the last trip down, or the Motel 6 I used the trip before that? ;-) Tomorrow morning I have a Podiatrist appointment for my quarterly surgery to cut the growth from my foot. Therefore I may have little or nothing for you on Wednesday. Day 15.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:57 (average 5:42). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From NY Times: Last week, House Republicans released a deliberately misleading report on the status of health reform, crudely rigging the numbers to sustain the illusion of failure in the face of unexpected success. Are you shocked?
You aren’t, but you should be. Mainstream politicians didn’t always try to advance their agenda through lies, damned lies and — in this case — bogus statistics. And the fact that this has become standard operating procedure for a major party bodes ill for America’s future.
About that report: The really big policy news of 2014, at least so far, is the spectacular recovery of the Affordable Care Act from its stumbling start, thanks to an extraordinary late surge that took enrollment beyond early projections. The age mix of enrollees has improved; insurance companies are broadly satisfied with the risk pool. Multiple independent surveys confirm that the percentage of Americans without health insurance has already declined substantially, and there’s every reason to believe that over the next two years the act will meet its overall goals, except in states that refuse to expand Medicaid.
Paul Krugman went on to say that Republicans will not admit they were wrong. I agree with him, and American voters must be informed over and over again that they are lying, until after they stop.
From Alternet: Lie number one: The rich and CEOs are America’s job creators. So we dare not tax them.
The truth is the middle class and poor are the job-creators through their purchases of goods and services. If they don’t have enough purchasing power because they’re not paid enough, companies won’t create more jobs and economy won’t grow.
We’ve endured the most anemic recovery on record because most Americans don’t have enough money to get the economy out of first gear. The economy is barely growing and real wages continue to drop.
We keep having false dawns. An average of 200,000 jobs were created in the United States over the last three months, but huge numbers of Americans continue to drop out of the labor force.
This is just one of Robert Reich’s four biggest Republican lies about inequality. Click through for the other three. As always, the Reich on the Left is right and the Reich on the Right is wrong.
From TPM: Billionaire environmentalist Tom Steyer’s attempt to lure Charles and David Koch out of the shadows appears to have fallen short.
Steyer had challenged the conservative benefactors to a public debate on climate change. But the brothers aren’t interested.
“We are not experts on climate change,” Koch spokeswoman Melissa Cohlmia in told the Wichita Eagle in an e-mail on Friday afternoon. “We do believe there should be free and open debate on the climate issue and it should be based on sound science and intellectual honesty."
For guys who claim not to be expert, they sure spend a lot of $millions convincing sheeple that climate change is a hoax. What hypocritical cowards they are!
Cartoon:
It’s another bowl of crow for Rush Limbaugh to eat, and his bowls runneth over these days. 
Fox News stopped airing President Barack Obama’s joint press conference Friday with German Chancellor Angela Merkel because, the network said, reporters weren’t asking him about Benghazi.