Tag: policy

A medical school official urges denial of all medical care for all “Obamacare nonbelievers”.

9:12 am

Leftwing civility: A medical school official urges denial of all medical care for all “Obamacare nonbelievers”.

The article also describes the growing list of other recent and vicious rants by leftists, including the communications director of the Democratic Party in Sacramento, all wishing harm on those who disagree with them. As the author rightly notes, now that the incivility is aimed at conservatives, Obama’s “pious talk about civility in the wake of the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords is down the memory hole.”

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Only two weeks before Obamacare goes into effect, the law’s health exchanges can’t figure out what people will have to pay for coverage.

10:32 am

Not finding out what’s in it: Only two weeks before Obamacare goes into effect, the law’s health exchanges can’t figure out what people will have to pay for coverage.

It appears the software for determining premiums doesn’t work. But don’t worry, the Democrats voted to fund this turkey today!

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Home Depot joins Walgreens in dumping tens of thousands of employees from their employer heath insurance plan, because of Obamacare.

12:43 pm

Finding out what’s in it: Home Depot joins Walgreens in dumping tens of thousands of employees from their employer heath insurance plan, because of Obamacare. Key quote:

The accelerating shift of workers to Obama’s taxpayer-funded network will likely drive up costs to taxpayers, disadvantage companies that try to pay for their employees’ health-care and make more voters dependent on health-care decisions made by Democratic officials and legislators. The switch is also making a mockery of Obama’s promise that Americans would be able to keep their pre-Obamacare insurance if they prefer. “If you like your health care plan, you’ll be able to keep your health care plan, period. No one will take it away, no matter what,” he said in June 2009. [emphasis mine]

Obama’s statement in 2009 was an obvious lie and an insult to everyone’s intelligence. Unfortunately, it appears he estimated the intelligence of too many Americans quite rightly.

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The House vote to fund the government but not Obamacare will force vulnerable Senate Democrats to either endorse the unpopular law again or shut it down.

9:57 am

The House vote to fund the government but not Obamacare will force vulnerable Senate Democrats to either endorse the unpopular law again or shut it down.

Exactly. Force these Democrats to once again endorse this turkey of a law, just as it is about to go into effect. Even if the Republicans eventually back down, they will have successfully put these senators on record, only a year before the next election.

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New documents show that more than 80% of the organizations targeted by the IRS in 2011 for harassment were conservative.

10:22 pm

Working for the Democratic Party: New documents show that more than 80% of the organizations targeted by the IRS in 2011 for harassment were conservative.

A handful of liberal organizations were definitely targeted for close inspection, but it appears to me that these were merely picked to give the IRS some cover while it mainly focused at harassing as many conservatives organizations as possible.

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Another look at the leaked IPCC draft report.

10:11 pm

Another look at the leaked IPCC draft report. Key quote:

To those of us who have been following the climate debate for decades, the next few years will be electrifying. There is a high probability we will witness the crackup of one of the most influential scientific paradigms of the 20th century, and the implications for policy and global politics could be staggering.

The article also takes a close look at the contradiction between the data and the IPCC models and says this:

[W]hat is commonly called the “mainstream” view of climate science is contained in the spread of results from computer models. What is commonly dismissed as the “skeptical” or “denier” view coincides with the real-world observations. Now you know how to interpret those terms when you hear them.

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The Obama administration has decided to actually follow the law and not give its Democratic union buddies a waiver on Obamacare.

3:58 pm

Finding out what’s in it: The Obama administration has decided to actually follow the law and not give its Democratic union buddies a waiver on Obamacare.

It shows us how far we have fallen that we are surprised that the Obama administration is going to follow the law, as written and passed by Congress, rather than arbitrarily rewrite that law illegally into order to help its political allies. Nowadays we are increasingly expecting this administration to treat the law as a plaything that it can ignore willy-nilly, without any opposition from anyone.

This story also illustrates the danger of blindly supporting the actions of one political party. Union leaders have for decades allied themselves with the Democratic Party, without ever really questioning the wisdom of anything those Democrats were doing. Obamacare was only one example of this foolishness. Now they are going to suffer badly for their blind partisanship.

It would have been much smarter for those unions to have done what conservatives and tea party advocates demanded back in 2009 and 2010: Read the damn law before you pass it!

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Before the Minnesota Obamacare health exchange has even officially opened there has been a security breach of the private health records of more than 2,400 individuals.

9:27 am

That didn’t take long: Before the Minnesota Obamacare health exchange has even officially opened there has been a security breach of the private health records of more than 2,400 individuals.

Stay tuned for more screw-ups and the misuse of private health records for political purposes. The Obamacare health exchanges are inherently insecure.

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Indiana University is laying off 50 maintenance workers to avoid Obamacare costs.

4:34 pm

Finding out what’s in it: Indiana University is laying off 50 maintenance workers to avoid Obamacare costs.

The employees will now work for an independent company, which I am sure will either make sure its total staffing is under 50 or those employees work less than 30 hours per week in order to also avoid Obamacare.

The numbers here aren’t gigantic, but the story is notable in that these employees and the university that had employed them almost certainly supported Obamacare and Obama blindly this last five years. The sad thing is I doubt they will finally face reality and link their troubles with his policies.

And then there’s this: Trader Joe’s to drop health insurance for part-time workers because of Obamacare.

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The two Colorado Democrats who were key instigators of that state’s new gun control laws were both decisively voted out of office yesterday in recall elections.

10:26 am

Pushback: The two Colorado Democrats who were key instigators of that state’s new gun control laws were both decisively voted out of office yesterday in recall elections.

The election, which came five months after the United States Senate defeated several gun restrictions, handed another loss to gun-control supporters. It also gave moderate lawmakers across the country a warning about the political risks of voting for tougher gun laws.

The recall elections ousted two Democratic state senators, John Morse and Angela Giron, and replaced them with Republicans. Both defeats were painful for Democrats – Mr. Morse’s because he had been Senate president, and Ms. Giron’s because she represented a heavily Democratic, working-class slice of southern Colorado.

The article says almost nothing about Angela Giron’s defeat, which I find intriguing. She was not expected to lose, considering her district was so Democratic, but her margin of defeat was actually larger than Morse’s. See also this article for a very good election analysis which suggests that any effort by Democrats to impose oppressive gun control laws is going to backfire for them very badly.

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A Russian astronaut, scheduled to fly to ISS in 2015, has unexpectedly resigned.

11:02 pm

An experienced Russian astronaut, scheduled to fly to ISS in 2015, has unexpectedly resigned.

No explanation other than that he found “a more interesting job” was given for his resignation, but this paragraph might give us a hint:

The Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center has been rocked by reorganization problems since 2009, when it was transferred from the Defense Ministry to the civilian Federal Space Agency. An unnamed Russian cosmonaut told the Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper last year that the prolonged reorganization had affected cosmonauts’ income and career prospects, breeding discontent in the ranks.

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Taxing both the rich and the sick to pay for Obamacare.

9:43 am

Finding out what’s in it: Taxing both the rich and the sick to pay for Obamacare.

Key quotes:

The change will negatively impact parents who have special needs children and who use FSA funds to help pay for tuition in special needs schools, says Xavier Epps, owner of XNE Financial Advising.

and:

For the more than 10 million individuals and families that claim medical expenses in 2011, there’s more bad news. In order to claim medical expense deductions in 2013, the claims must be at least 10% of AGI, up from 7.5% in the past. There’s an exception for people who are age 65 and older at the end of the year and for married taxpayers with only one spouse age 65 or over. Their threshold will remain at 7.5% until the 2017 tax year.

Y’know, I have yet to find any documented evidence of Obamacare lowering costs or improving health coverage anywhere. So far, this law has done nothing but balloon costs, limit options, and reduce the ability of people to either get health insurance they can afford or healthcare they need.

But that’s all right. The Democrats passed it! It must be good! Let’s vote for them again so they can do this kind of masterwork in many other places. (Right now, the Middle East and Syria comes to mind.)

Update: Obamacare will hike the cost of healthcare in Wisconsin as much as 125%, while forcing almost 100,000 people to lose their health insurance.

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A businessman fights a federal regulatory effort that destroyed his business. The government responses by trying to destroy him.

8:54 pm

A businessman fights a federal regulatory effort that destroyed his business. The government responds by trying to destroy him.

Read the article. It will send chills down your spine. The business was legal, did no harm, and was very successful. The government shut it down, killed it. Now they are going after the creator because he had tried to stop them.

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No Atlantic hurricanes in August for the first time in eleven years.

5:13 pm

More extreme weather, eh? There were no Atlantic hurricanes in August this year, for the first time in eleven years.

As I’ve noted repeatedly, there is no evidence yet of an increase of extreme weather events as predicted by global warming advocates. In fact, some recent data suggests a decline, though I personally wouldn’t take that seriously either.

So, when Al Gore or Barack Obama or Dianne Feinstein starts running around like Chicken Little, claiming the sky is about to fall, remember these facts.

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The IRS harassment of conservatives continues.

9:02 am

Working for the Democratic Party: The IRS harassment of conservatives continues.

An IRS letter sent to [a tea party] group last week and obtained by The Washington Times contains a laundry list of requests related to virtually all the group’s activities, including its involvement in the 2012 election cycle and its get-out-the-vote efforts, fundraising activities, all radio and TV advertising, and other information. The IRS also is asking for detailed financial records, including “the amounts and percentages of your total expenses that were for fundraising activities in the tax year 2011, 2012 and 2013.” [emphasis mine]

Key quote: “We got away with discriminating against you and we’re not stopping.”

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The Israeli spring.

9:26 am

The Israeli spring.

In comparison to the ruined economies of the Arab Spring — tourism shattered, exports nonexistent, and billions of dollars in infrastructure lost through unending violence — Israel is an atoll of prosperity and stability. Factor in its recent huge gas and oil finds in the eastern Mediterranean, and it may soon become another Kuwait or Qatar, but with a real economy beyond its booming petroleum exports.

Israel had nothing to do with either the Arab Spring or its failure. The irony is that surviving embarrassed Arab regimes now share the same concerns of the Israelis.

Read it all. It gives you a different but (I think) more accurate perspective on the chaos in the Middle East.

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Healthcare premiums have climbed almost $3,000 since 2009.

9:28 am

Healthcare premiums have climbed almost $3,000 since 2009.

The important point however is this:

And while annual premium increases have moderated over the past two years, that’s due to trends in the insurance market largely unrelated to ObamaCare, and trends the law could actually reverse.

To save money on insurance people had been shifting to plans with high deductibles. Obamacare however has outlawed such plans, thus requiring health insurance coverage in cases where people really don’t need it or can’t afford it.

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UPS announced today that it is dropping the spousal coverage for 15,000 employees because of the cost of Obamacare.

2:40 pm

Finding out what’s in it: UPS announced today that it is dropping the spousal coverage for 15,000 employees because of the cost of Obamacare.

To the Obama administration and the Democrats, this is proof that Obamacare works. According to a spokeswoman for U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, “The health care law will make health insurance more affordable, strengthen small businesses and make it easier for employers to provide coverage to their workers.” Well, obviously!

Orwell called this kind of thinking doublethink, the ability to hold two completely contradictory statements in your brain and see nothing contradictory about it.

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“Impeach Obama” protesters arrested for peaceably assembling.

3:54 pm

Freedom in today’s America: “Impeach Obama” protesters arrested for peaceably assembling.

With video, which is definitely worth watching. I would have done exactly as these protesters did, been arrested, and would be on the phone with my lawyers this instant putting together a lawsuit. The cop who made the arrest in this case broke the law and should pay for that.

And I agree with one of the comments at the website: If the protesters had labeled themselves “Occupy Wall Street” the cops would have probably brought them donuts instead while allowing them to shut down traffic illegally.

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The Obama administration has failed to meet more than half of the deadlines mandated by Obamacare.

9:36 am

Ignoring what’s in it: The Obama administration has failed to meet more than half of the deadlines mandated by Obamacare.

Meanwhile, here’s another example of a company switching all of its workers to part-time to avoid Obamacare. The result is that those employees will not only earn less, they will lose their company health insurance. So much for Obama’s promise, “If you like your healthplan you keep your healthplan.”

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“Liberals have targeted this man for personal destruction to create a climate of fear.”

9:15 pm

“Liberals have targeted this man for personal destruction to create a climate of fear.”

It is beyond disgusting the number of recent witch hunts being instigated by the left against individuals who have merely said things they didn’t like. Unfortunately, what’s worse is the willingness of too many Americans to pay no attention, or make believe it isn’t happening, or to make excuses for this totalitarian behavior merely because of partisan favoritism.

Oppression is oppression, and should not be tolerated by anyone, not matter what the politics.

And then there is the media, which has joined in the effort to target the weak and innocent while protecting the powerful who do commit acts of bigotry and hate.

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True the Vote has found 173 cases of voter fraud in Florida.

5:37 pm

What racists! True the Vote has found 173 cases of voter fraud in Florida.

These are examples where someone has registered and voted in two different states. According to modern Democratic Party dogma, trying to stop such behavior is clearly racist and an attempt to suppress the vote, which is probably why the IRS as well as other federal agencies aggressively harassed True the Vote for several years.

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An analysis of the climate models used by global warming advocates to illustrate the consequences of climate change finds them to be totally useless.

11:56 pm

Climate fraud: An analysis of the climate models used by global warming advocates to illustrate the consequences of climate change finds them to be totally useless.

These models have crucial flaws that make them close to useless as tools for policy analysis: certain inputs (e.g. the discount rate) are arbitrary, but have huge effects on the SCC estimates the models produce; the models’ descriptions of the impact of climate change are completely ad hoc, with no theoretical or empirical foundation; and the models can tell us nothing about the most important driver of the SCC, the possibility of a catastrophic climate outcome. IAM-based analyses of climate policy create a perception of knowledge and precision, but that perception is illusory and misleading. [emphasis added]

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A federal appeals court has ruled that the Obama administration has been violating the law by delaying a decision on the proposed nuclear waste facility in Yucca Mountain, Nevada.

1:56 pm

The law is such an inconvenient thing: A federal appeals court has ruled that the Obama administration has been violating the law by delaying a decision on the proposed nuclear waste facility in Yucca Mountain, Nevada.

This is the typical behavior for this Democratic administration. Whether it involves Obamacare, nuclear waste, environmental rules, gun smuggling, federal appointments, or IRS tax regulations, the White House and President Obama believe themselves above the law, able to do anything they want, regardless of what the law actually says.

But don’t worry, Democrats, Obama will protect you from those evil tea party conservatives who simply want the Constitution followed!

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