Tag: politics

Another news report suggests that Republicans are preparing to surrender in budget talks.

10:02 am

Another news report suggests that Republicans are preparing to surrender in budget talks.

Senior aides familiar with the talks say the emerging agreement aims to partially repeal the sequester and raise agency spending to roughly $1.015 trillion in fiscal 2014 and 2015. That would bring agency budgets up to the target already in place for fiscal 2016. To cover the cost, Ryan and Murray are haggling over roughly $65 billion in alternative policies, including cuts to federal worker pensions and higher security fees for the nation’s airline passengers.

Republican leaders are also seeking additional savings to knock a small dent in deficits projected to exceed $6 trillion over the next decade. But the deal would do nothing to trim the debt, which is now larger, as a percentage of the economy, than at any point in U.S. history except during World War II. [emphasis mine]

To me, the biggest disappointment of this surrender is that Paul Ryan is negotiating it, proof that he too is no fiscal conservative and worse is far more stupid than I had thought.

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No, you can’t keep your medicines either under Obamacare.

9:42 am

No, you can’t keep your medicines either under Obamacare.

The article is long and detailed. It seems a lot of expensive but life-saving drugs might be excluded from many plans because of cost. Worse,

The biggest problem in all of this is that consumers will have a very hard time figuring out where they stand. In many cases, the health plans being offered in the Obamacare exchanges don’t make information about their drug formularies readily available. In some cases, it doesn’t seem to be published anywhere.

The government was supposed to mandate that plans made this information easily accessible. But that never happened.

In fact, state and federal regulators must have approved the health plans without reviewing final drug formularies. Many plans are also not publishing information about their networks of doctors, or when they do; the information is unreliable (listing, for example, doctors who argue that they aren’t part of the plans).

Aren’t you glad those brave Democrats and President Obama shut the government down in October to prevent those evil Republicans from making any changes to Obamacare?

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The latest IRS power grab.

12:38 am

The latest IRS power grab.

Why is the IRS regulating political activity at all?

The answer is that many Democratic politicians and progressive activists think new rules limiting political speech by nonprofits will benefit Democrats politically. Stymied by judicial decisions restricting direct government regulation of political speech, and by a Federal Election Commission whose bipartisan makeup prevents Democratic commissioners from forcing through partisan rules on a party-line vote, these politicians and activists have decided to dragoon the IRS into doing their work.

More precise terms to describe this kind of behavior are fascists and jack-booted thugs.

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Obamacare insurance plans are routinely excluding the world’s top hospitals.

8:16 pm

Finding out what’s not in it: Obamacare insurance plans are routinely excluding the world’s top hospitals.

Amid a drive by insurers to limit costs, the majority of insurance plans being sold on the new healthcare exchanges in New York, Texas, and California, for example, will not offer patients’ access to Memorial Sloan Kettering in Manhattan or MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, two top cancer centres, or Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles, one of the top research and teaching hospitals in the country.

You pay more for the plan, pay higher co-pays and deductibles, and for these higher expenses you get fewer benefits and excess to fewer good doctors. Why is anyone complaining? Aren’t we all glad the Democrats and Obama are standing firm to defend this law?

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Obamacare, where the liberal dream crashes and burns.

4:44 pm

Obamacare, where the liberal dream crashes and burns.

The botched website was an unforced catastrophe. But that’s not the real problem with Obamacare. The real problem, as dozens of thoughtful commentators have concluded, is the law itself. Obamacare is a massive policy experiment that seeks to remake one-sixth of the U.S. economy – a body that’s so fantastically complex, with so many players and so many moving parts, that nobody can possibly understand how they all interact. Tweak one part, and other parts will behave in unpredictable ways. Pull on a thread and half the sweater may unravel. Even Max Baucus, the Democratic Senate finance chairman, has warned that implementing a law so complicated could be a “train wreck.”

Generally, the way leftists and liberals have succeeded in gaining power is to work incrementally, in very small steps. This way, the link between their actions and the problems those actions have caused is easily hidden. They can then point to these new problems and demand another small incremental increase in their control and power in order to solve those problems, which in turn causes new problems that they can then use to justify another incremental step. And so forth.

Obamacare, however, broke this pattern. Rather than being incremental, it tried to do it all in one big massive attack. The result is that the policy is very clearly the cause of the disaster, the left can’t hide it, and their entire agenda for the past century now stands exposed as the fraud it is. The only way I can see them surviving this disaster is to try to seize power illegally, another typical leftwing technique that they use often when reality starts to go against them.

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The head of India’s research team at its Antarctica base has been recalled after he ordered the shut down of power at the station.

9:01 am

Welcome to the movies: The head of India’s research team at its Antarctica base has been recalled after he ordered the shut down of power at the station.

From October 7 to 12, ISRO’s satellite ground station at Antarctica, lost all transmission when its power supply was allegedly shut down by the team leader of the 32nd winter expedition to Bharati. The scientist, whose name was not revealed, has since been suspended and brought back to Goa. On October 14, NCAOR had also filed a police complaint against the scientist for the ‘wanton act of shutting down power’, said a statement released by the Ministry of Earth Sciences on Saturday.

This story had this tidbit:

It is believed the probe was ordered after the team leader allegedly ordered for the station’s power supply, which is obtained from diesel generators, to be cut off. A former chairman of ISRO, on the condition of anonymity, said: “If shortage of fuel was the issue, why would the ISRO station not take stock of fuel two months before it was to get exhausted and make arrangements for additional supply from South Africa? It is the most obvious thing to do. Unless there is some confusion or some issues, such a thing in Antarctica is unheard of. If power is switched off, people inside will freeze. So why was the power ordered to be cut off and why wait for diesel to get over?”

It also appears that three people are involved in this story, though details remain scant.

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Without permission California’s Obamacare exchange distributed the contact information of tens of thousands of people who had visited their website.

8:31 am

O joy. Without permission California’s Obamacare exchange distributed the contact information of tens of thousands of people who had visited their website.

I love this quote from the guy in charge:

Peter Lee, executive director of Covered California, acknowledged that these consumers did not ask to be contacted by the state or its certified insurance agents. But he said the outreach program still complies with privacy laws and it was reviewed by the exchange’s legal counsel. “I can imagine some people may be upset,” Lee said in an interview Friday. “But I can see a lot of people will be comforted and relieved at getting the help they need to navigate a confusing process.”

To be so cavalier about handing out people’s contact information without permission suggests that they are likely to be as cavalier about poking into people’s confidential medical information without permission.

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Rumors suggest that Republicans are moving to accept a budget deal that would end sequestration.

8:30 pm

The stupid party strikes again! Rumors suggest that Republicans are moving to accept a budget deal that would end sequestration.

At issue are efforts to craft a compromise that would ease across-the-board spending cuts due to take effect in January, known as the sequester, and replace them with a mix of increased fees and cuts in mandatory spending programs.

As de Rugy notes:

The sequester, no matter how imperfect a policy, is arguably the only victory for fiscal conservatives in a very long time. Their victory is also president Obama’s biggest defeat (outside of the self-inflicted disastrous Obamacare rollout). It is also another opportunity to remind the American people that the alarmist predictions that we were all subjected to about the devastating impact sequestration would have on our economy didn’t materialize.

She adds:

So let’s sum this up: a massive and unnecessary surrender on the sequester, some tax hikes, and more unemployment benefits. It seems to me that the Republicans are learning their moves from the French army.

Not only do most Democrats have to be replaced, so do a significant number of Republicans. Too many of these politicians have no interest in serving the citizenry being crushed by this out-of-control federal government. Instead they serve that government instead.

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Seven out of ten doctors in California are refusing to participate in Obamacare.

2:02 pm

O joy: Seven out of ten doctors in California are refusing to participate in Obamacare.

It isn’t surprising the doctors are rebelling. California refuses to pay them realistic fees. The factoid, however, that is really startling from this article is this:

[The doctors] also pointing out that Covered California’s website lists many doctors as participants when they aren’t. “Some physicians have been put in the network and they were included basically without their permission,” Lisa Folberg said. She is a CMA’s vice president of medical and regulatory Policy. “They may be listed as actually participating, but not of their own volition,” said Donald Waters, executive director of the Alameda-Contra Costa Medical Association. [emphasis mine]

Par for the course. Everything about Obamacare has been fraud and deception. This just adds another layer to that dishonesty.

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One person describes the experience she and her mother had under Obamacare.

10:15 am

One person describes the experience she and her mother had under Obamacare.

Beside the fact that the doctor hardly looked at them (consumed as he was entering data on his laptop as required by the law), the mother was deemed “too old [for an MRI] and ObamaCare will not approve payment” and their prescriptions were not ready at the pharmacy at the time promised. Her conclusion:

ObamaCare is not just very expensive insurance that most of us cannot and will not afford without drastic changes in lifestyle. It delivers lousy service, uncaring and poorly paid doctors, inadequate reimbursement, longer wait times, and selective rationing.

She also notes Obamacare’s requirement that all medical records be digital results in a complete loss of privacy.

As all these computers communicate with each other through the various electronic portals, do not expect any medical privacy or cyber security of any kind. Your entire life’s history, health, meds, warts, skin lesions, bunions, surgeries, hospitalizations, Social Security numbers, income, addresses, smoking history, salt intake, soda drinking and fat-eating habits, sexual preferences, gun ownership, and biometric data are up for grabs for all to see and use. All your private medical history and information will be sent to a clearing house with or without your permission in January 2014.

Aren’t you glad the Democratic Party and Obama insisted on shutting down the government in October to prevent any changes to this law?

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Obama tells Chris Matthews what he really thinks of the IRS harassment of conservatives.

9:07 am

Obama tells Chris Matthews what he really thinks of the IRS harassment of conservatives.

[Y]ou’ve got an office in Cincinnati, in the IRS office that — I think, for bureaucratic reasons, is trying to streamline what is a difficult law to interpret about whether a nonprofit is actually a political organization deserves a tax exempt agency. And they’ve got a list, and suddenly everybody’s outraged.

I seem to remember Obama himself expressing outrage to the press soon after the scandal broke and promising an investigation. Obviously, he lied about his outrage. He also lied about the investigation, since it is now more than six months later and the so-called investigation has yet to contact any of the victims of the IRS harassment.

Gee, he seems to lie a lot, doesn’t he? I also wonder if he has any outrage over the IRS’s auditing of that cancer patient and his insurance agent soon after the patient appeared on Fox criticizing Obamacare. I suspect not.

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Here’s another report on the planetary sciences/NASA dispute this week over funding and grant scheduling.

11:08 pm

Here’s another report on the planetary sciences/NASA dispute this week over funding and grant scheduling.

From this report it appears that the complaints by the planetary science community might have been a bit overstated. It doesn’t appear that NASA is cutting the planetary sciences grant program in any significant way.

I suspect that the reason the planetary scientists are so touchy is because they do not trust the Obama administration, based on its previous efforts to eliminate the planetary program entirely. (It is also possible that they are right.)

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A new poll shows Democrats as out-of-touch extremists.

9:50 am

A new poll shows Democrats as out-of-touch extremists. Hat tip to Doug Ross.

The public overwhelmingly believes the country is headed in the wrong direction, that current economic policies aren’t working, that President Obama is doing a bad job, that government should be smaller and that ObamaCare should be repealed. But not Democrats.

On issue after issue, in fact, Democrats are the outliers by wide margins, according to an analysis of the December IBD/TIPP survey. They are, by and large, Pollyanna-ish about the economy, they can see no evil when it comes to Obama or ObamaCare, and they are extremists when it comes to the size and role of the federal government.

This close-mindedness is increasingly disturbing. How can we fix our problems if one significant portion of the population refuses to consider that they might be wrong?

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Let the space price war begin.

9:20 am

Let the space price war begin.

Two money quotes:

This latest launch is bad news for Russia, Europe, Boeing, and Lockheed Martin. SES paid $55 million to SpaceX for the launch; rivals typically charge $100 million to $200 million. SpaceX has a backlog of about $4 billion worth of launches, many for commercial customers that it can now begin to serve.

and this:

We’ll really get a sense of SpaceX’s abilities over the next year. The company plans to launch rockets at a much more ferocious clip, to refine their reusability and to prepare for sending humans to the International Space Station. You can also expect to see SpaceX tormented by politicians with ties to existing launch contractors and military suppliers. May we live in interesting times.

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A new poll suggests that the young are finally abandoning Obama and the Democratic Party.

9:17 am

A new poll suggests that the young are finally abandoning Obama and the Democratic Party.

They aren’t rushing to the Republicans very much either, but this detail is significant:

According to the poll, 57 percent of millennials disapprove of Obamacare, with 40 percent saying it will worsen their quality of care and a majority believing it will drive up costs. Only 18 percent say Obamacare will improve their care. Among 18-to-29-year-olds currently without health insurance, less than one-third say they’re likely to enroll in the Obamacare exchanges.

In other words, they are finally beginning to pay attention, and have discovered that their blind faith in Democrats was a big mistake. They might not like Republicans, but if Republicans offer to kill Obamacare the young will likely favor Republicans in the coming elections.

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In a 376-5 bi-partisan vote, the House has approved a one year extension to the liability exemption of the 2004 Space Amendments Act.

9:27 am

In a 376-5 bi-partisan vote, the House has approved a one year extension to the liability exemption of the 2004 Space Amendments Act.

Though this is helpful, it still leaves intact the regulations imposed by that 2004 law, all of which make difficult the future of space tourism. That this extension was passed in conjunction with an effort by Congress to overhaul the law is encouraging.

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According to one online hacker/security expert, no security was ever built into the Obamacare website.

8:04 pm

O joy: According to one online hacker/security expert, no security was ever built into the Obamacare website.

The issue is not so much that the website is a dangerous place to enter personal information (bad as that is) but that no one should be surprised by any of this. Allowing the equivalent of the Motor Vehicle Administration to run the whole health insurance industry was guaranteed to produce these problems, as conservatives repeatedly noted in 2010.

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Russia consolidates its space industry into one giant government-owned corporation.

5:20 pm

Russia consolidates its space industry into one giant government-owned corporation.

While the U.S. is working to increase the number of space companies and thus the competition to get into space, Russia is returning to its Soviet-era roots. This second story about this consolidation includes this telling quote:

The country is set to radically centralize its space industry in a bid to combat major inefficiencies and cut down on the misuse of funds under plans unveiled by Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who oversees the defense and aerospace sectors.

This decision does not really bode well for Russia’s effort to compete on the open market. You never solve inefficiencies or cut costs by eliminating competition. Instead, the lack of competition encourages inefficiency and increased cost.

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A Canadian disabled woman was denied entry to the United States after a customs agent cited her supposedly private medical details.

9:20 am

Does this make you feel safer? A Canadian disabled woman was denied entry to the United States after a customs agent cited her supposedly private medical details.

“I was turned away, I was told, because I had a hospitalization in the summer of 2012 for clinical depression,’’ said Richardson, who is a paraplegic and set up her cruise in collaboration with a March of Dimes group of about 12 others. The Weston woman was told by the U.S. agent she would have to get “medical clearance’’ and be examined by one of only three doctors in Toronto whose assessments are accepted by Homeland Security. She was given their names and told a call to her psychiatrist “would not suffice.’’

At the time, Richardson said, she was so shocked and devastated by what was going on, she wasn’t thinking about how U.S. authorities could access her supposedly private medical information.

If Homeland Security can get access to a Canadian woman’s confidential medical records, how easy do you think it is for them to get access to your Obamacare records?

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No more seasonal hurricane predictions from Colorado State University.

9:49 am

No more seasonal hurricane predictions from Colorado State University.

They lost their funding, which is no surprise.

At the beginning of this year’s season, the team predicted 18 named storms. Nine of those, it said, would become hurricanes. Four would be major hurricanes. Here’s how it shook out: There were 13 named storms. Only two became hurricanes. Neither was a major hurricane.

They, like NOAA, expected an increase in extreme hurricanes and were wrong. In fact, they were so wrong that they illustrated clearly how much a guess all of these climate predictions are. You might as well flip a coin.

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The Federal Trade Commission goes after piano teachers.

11:06 am

We’re here to help you: The Federal Trade Commission goes after piano teachers.

[T]he MTNA has existed since 1876 solely to advance the cause of music study and support music teachers. The 501(c)(3) has about 22,000 members, nearly 90% of them piano teachers, including many women who earn a modest living giving lessons in their homes. The group promotes music study and competitions and helps train teachers. Not exactly U.S. Steel.

The association’s sin, according to the feds, rested in its code of ethics. The code lays out ideals for members to follow—a commitment to students, colleagues, society. Tucked into this worthy document was a provision calling on teachers to respect their colleagues’ studios, and not actively recruit students from other teachers.

Such evil. Thank god we have Washington bureaucrats around to stamp it out!

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Scott Walker’s epic battle to beat the unions in Wisconsin.

10:30 am

Scott Walker’s epic battle to beat the unions in Wisconsin.

When they and Democratic legislators failed to prevent passage of Act 10 [the law that defanged the unions], they tried to defeat — with a scurrilous smear campaign that backfired — an elected state Supreme Court justice. They hoped that changing the court’s composition would get Walker’s reforms overturned. When this failed, they tried to capture the state Senate by recalling six Republican senators. When this failed, they tried to recall Walker. On the night that failed — he won with a larger margin than he had received when elected 19 months earlier — he resisted the temptation to proclaim, “This is what democracy looks like!”

Read it. It describes the way our country can defeat the fascists.

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