October 1-2, 2013
Oct 01 02:31 Mr. President, take a Valium Oct 01 03:41 Health insurance exchanges failing already Oct 01 10:30 Affordable Care Act, exchanges, off to chaotic start Oct 02 05:30 Affordable Care Act, Day II Oct 02 06:08 Is this a DFL press release? Oct 02 14:14 Harry Reid's latest temper tantrum Oct 02 15:56 Harry Reid's awful day gets worse
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Prior Years: 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
Mr. President, take a Valium
President Obama's statement on the government shutdown is filled with hysterics. For someone nicknamed No Drama Obama, he sure comes across as a drama queen:
In the event of a government shutdown, hundreds of thousands of these dedicated public servants who stay on the job will do so without pay. And several hundred thousand more will be immediately and indefinitely furloughed without pay. What, of course, will not be furloughed are the bills that they have to pay: their mortgages, their tuition payments, their car notes. These Americans are our neighbors. Their kids go to our schools. They worship where we do. They serve their country with pride. They are the customers of every business in this country. And they would be hurt greatly, and as a consequence all of us will be hurt greatly, should Congress choose to shut the people's government down.
It's predictable, if not ironic, that President Obama should talk about people with mortgages to pay and loans to pay off. President Obama's HHS Department gave big corporations a year's reprieve from the employer mandate. House Republicans tried extending that same protection to families with mortgages and loans to pay off. President Obama and Harry Reid told these struggling families that they weren't worthy of getting the special treatment that corporations get.
Last week, President Obama said that Republicans wanted to defund Obamacare before people found out that they really like it. That's the definition of chutzpah. Last week, I wrote this post highlighting the insurance premiums young people will pay, starting today, in Tennessee:
Today, a 27-year-old man in Memphis can buy a plan for as low as $41 a month. On the exchange, the lowest state average is $119 a month, a 190 percent increase .
Today, a 27-year-old woman in Nashville can also buy a plan for as low as $58 a month. On the exchange, the lowest-priced plan in Nashville is $114 a month, a 97 percent increase . Even with a tax subsidy, that plan is $104 a month, almost twice what she could pay today.
Today, women in Nashville can choose from 30 insurance plans that cost less than the administration says insurance plans on the exchange will cost, even with the new tax subsidy.
In Nashville, 105 insurance plans offered today will not be available in the exchange .
President Obama's statement that people would like the Affordable Care Act if they just got the chance is laughable. What thinking person would prefer having fewer health insurance policy choices rather than more choices? What thoughtful person would prefer higher insurance premiums with higher deductibles rather than having lower premiums with lower deductibles?
That's the people's options under the ACA. The ACA should be renamed. Its new name should be the ABACA, aka the Anything But Affordable Care Act.
Democrats will win the short-term victory but they'll pay a steep price for it. That's because they've voted against popular provisions that Republicans put into the continuing resolution.
Posted Tuesday, October 1, 2013 2:31 AM
No comments.
Health insurance exchanges failing already
Rep. Tim Huelskamp, (R-KS), tried signing up for the federal health insurance exchange. Apparently, the software wasn't up to the task. After attempting to use the federal exchange, Rep. Huelskamp issued this statement :
We have been warned time and time again that ObamaCare is not ready for prime time. Well, it turns out that is right. When I tried to sign up for the exchanges, I was met with error messages, unfinished security forms, and misspelled notices at every click. Seeing how poorly this has been implemented, I am surprised that Harry Reid and Senate Democrats are willing to shut down the government over a law that simply is unworkable, unaffordable, and increasingly unpopular.
Republicans warned that the exchanges weren't ready. President Obama and the Democrats insisted that they were. Here's proof that Republicans were right:
This isn't shocking. It's what people who'd paid attention expected, especially the problems with data security. This article contains some interesting information:
The Issue Brief provides the cost of something called a 'catastrophic plan' available to people under 30 years old. What is a catastrophic plan? It provides all preventive care and three primary care visits with no out of pocket costs. So young people can go see the doctor for diseases such as acne, strep throat, and sexually transmitted disease and not have to worry about paying anything out of pocket. Once they go beyond three visits, nothing is paid for until out of pocket maximums are met. I wish this plan had been offered to everyone, as most people only need to see the doctor infrequently.
The reason I think that's interesting is because this plan doesn't qualify as a government-approved health insurance plan. People buying this policy would still be subject to the Affordable Care Act's fine because it isn't approved by HHS.
That's significant because people who do the right thing shouldn't be punished for doing the right thing. This shouldn't fit into the glitch category. It's a better fit for the fatal design flaw category. People who work hard and do the right thing should be praised, not punished. The Obama administration and other Democrats think otherwise.
That isn't just interesting. That's illuminating as to the Democrats' governing philosophy. Apparently, they're control freaks with what's acceptable and what isn't. Once again, Democrats didn't listen to the American people. Either that or they listened, didn't like what they heard, then flipped the American people the proverbial bird.
Posted Tuesday, October 1, 2013 3:41 AM
Comment 1 by Patrick at 01-Oct-13 08:29 AM
Tried to check out HealthCare.gov for Wisconsin... two browsers returned garbage and the other said "please wait" - methinks this is gonna be a disaster!
Response 1.1 by Gary Gross at 01-Oct-13 08:59 AM
Thanks Pat. I'm betting that'll be the norm, not the exception.
Affordable Care Act, exchanges, off to chaotic start
Last night, Juan Williams told Bill O'Reilly and Mary Katherine Ham that Republicans making a fuss over Obamacare were fussing about something that hadn't failed yet . Twitchy's pictorial provides a mountain of proof that the exchanges are failing miserably. Make that a mountain range worth of proof.
Based on the tweets gathered by Twitchy thus far, it isn't that there are little glitches here and there. According to Harriet Brown's tweet California's Obamacare exchange is offline. That isn't unusual. According to Jon Gross, "Looks like no one in Oklahoma is going to be getting obamacare today!" According to Kelly Broderick, "@MarylandConnect isn't allowing people to sign up or browse." Daylight Disinfectant reports that "day one obamacare: the oregon exchange is down!"
They're but a handful of the tweets collected by Twitchy showing how the exchanges are failing frequently.
Cathy McMorris-Rodgers, (R-WA), wrote this op-ed highlighting what Democrats are fighting for:
That's why we voted Monday to delay the individual mandate and repeal the ObamaCare subsidy for members of Congress and their staffs - because if the American people have to bear the burden of ObamaCare, so too should their representatives in Congress.
This debate is about fairness. This is now the third bill we've sent to the Senate in the past two weeks to keep the government open - and instead of rejecting our attempts, it's time for the Senate to act. The American people have spoken: They want to keep the government open, and they want members of Congress to live by the laws they write. Now the Senate needs to listen to them.
The Democrats are fighting to continue protecting the privileged. That isn't acceptable. Yesterday, Democrats in the House and Senate voted to continue protecting themselves, their staffs and big corporations.
McMorris-Rodgers is right. This is about fairness. Twitchy is right, too. The exchanges are crashing. People can't buy health insurance through many state's exchanges or through the federal exchange because the websites keep crashing. They can't even create accounts.
That's justification for delaying the individual mandate. If people can't buy insurance through the exchanges through no fault of their own, they shouldn't be punished by the IRS for not having insurance. Without fixing the problems that the exchanges are having, the government doesn't have the right to fine them.
It isn't fair to punish the American people for the government's ineptitude.
Posted Tuesday, October 1, 2013 10:31 AM
No comments.
Affordable Care Act, Day II
Yesterday, the big story was the terrible roll-out of the Affordable Care Act's health insurance exchanges. I wrote here about the difficult time an MSNBC reporter had navigating the federal health insurance exchange. People can't deny the fact that the Obama administration wasn't prepared for yesterday. The administration's ineptitude was astonishing. It's on full display with the exchanges failing.
That said, that's only part of the administration's problem. In fact, it's the least troublesome problem in the Affordable Care Act. Insurance premiums spiked thanks to the Affordable Care Act. In Minnesota, Ellen Anderson talked about their best-in-the-nation insurance premiums. She told the Almanac hosts that Minnesota had competitive health insurance premiums.
It turns out that, in Ellen Anderson's mind, Affordable Care Act premiums being 22% higher than prior to the Affordable Care Act going into effect is competitive. Only a liberal shill would say that having insurance premiums jump by 22% is a positive thing.
Anderson said that Minnesota has the most competitive rates of all the state-run exchanges. Documentation verifies that as truth. That's irrelevant, though, because insurance still costs a family of 4 lots more money now than before the Affordable Care Act went into effect.
Still, that's only part of the story. Another part of the story is that the bronze policy comes with a $5,000-per-person annual deductible. Speaking just for myself, I haven't had $5,000 in medical costs in a year other than 1998, when I had an angioplasty after having severe heart pains. Officially, it was diagnosed as unstable angina, not a heart attack.
If a person wants the silver or gold policy, the deductible drops but the premiums skyrockey. Whichever option you choose, the Affordable Care Act is a terrible deal for people.
As companies drop coverage on their employees, these families will quickly find out how expensive the Affordable Care Act is.
Posted Wednesday, October 2, 2013 5:30 AM
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Is this a DFL press release?
The first thing I thought after reading this article was whether the media outlet just reprinted a DFL press release. Here's the opening to the DFL-issued statement:
St. Paul, MN (NNCNOW.com) --- Nearly $2.6 billion of the $2.8 billion borrowed from Minnesota schools has been repaid under the leadership of Governor Dayton and the DFL Legislature.
Governor Mark Dayton, Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk, House Speaker Paul Thissen, Management and Budget Commissioner Jim Schowalter, and Education Commissioner Brenda Cassellius announced that Minnesota schools were repaid an additional $636 million at the end of the 2013 fiscal year.
Talk about chutzpah. That's breathtakingly arrogant. First, the DFL's all taxes budget didn't go into effect until the start of the 2014 fiscal year. Further, the DFL legislature voted against the K-12 Education Omnibus bill. DFL senators didn't vote for it. DFL representatives didn't vote for it. Gov. Dayton signed it but only after he shut state government down for several weeks.
The GOP, thanks to the hard work of Pat Garofalo, Sondra Erickson and others, put together a fiscally responsible budget that produced a surplus. That surplus was used to refill Minnesota's rainy day fund before being used to pay down the school shift.
Under the leadership of Governor Dayton and the DFL legislature, Minnesota has now repaid nearly $2.6 billion of the $2.8 billion that was previously borrowed from our schools.
'Last spring, the DFL legislature and I passed the first responsible state budget in more than a decade,' said Governor Dayton. 'This additional repayment of the state's debt to our schools marks another step toward a clean fiscal slate, from which we will build a better Minnesota.'
First, raising spending by $3,000,000,000, then recklessly increasing taxes and fees by $2,400,000,000 isn't a responsible budget. Next, the money that repaid the school shift came from the budget that the GOP passed.
'Schools across Minnesota were put under enormous financial stress by the Republican school shift, and paying back every penny remains a priority in the Senate,' said Senator Bakk. 'This repayment, along with the significant investments in education approved last session, further strengthens the state's partnership with local school districts.'
The DFL legislature touts itself as 'the Education Legislature'. It's nothing of the sort. It's the enemy of school reform. I wrote here about how the DFL gutted the education reforms that the GOP put into place. Here's language from the GOP bill:
'The board must adopt rules requiring a person to pass a skills examination in reading, writing, and mathematics as a requirement for initial teacher licensure. Such rules must require colleges and universities offering a board-approved teacher preparation program to provide remedial assistance to persons who did not achieve a qualifying score on the skills examination, including those for whom English is a second language.'
Here's language from the DFL bill that gutted the GOP's accountability-oriented reform:
The board must adopt rules to approve teacher preparation programs. The board, upon the request of a postsecondary student preparing for teacher licensure or a licensed graduate of a teacher preparation program, shall assist in resolving a dispute between the person and a postsecondary institution providing a teacher preparation program when the dispute involves an institution's recommendation for licensure affecting the person or the person's credentials. At the board's discretion, assistance may include the application of chapter 14.
The DFL bill doesnt' require teachers to pass a test on their competency to teach a class. If the DFL wants to brag about gutting teacher accountability requirements, I won't object.
A decade of cuts, shifts, and gimmicks caused Minnesota to lurch from one budget crisis to the next, limiting the state's ability to fund education and job creation. This year, the Governor and DFL legislature put an end to roller-coaster deficits with a fair and balanced budget that put Minnesota on sound fiscal footing and delivered key investments in education.
Again, this isn't an editorial. It's an actual 'news story'. At least, that's what it purports to be. It's more like a DFL press release.
Posted Wednesday, October 2, 2013 6:08 AM
Comment 1 by J. Ewing at 02-Oct-13 09:33 AM
It's of a piece with the fact that it was Dayton who insisted on the school shift in the first place, and Republicans who wanted to repay it earlier, but had that bill vetoed by Dayton himself. Now he wants to take credit for "accidentally" fixing the situation that HE caused and HE refused to fix when he had the chance? It's either chutzpah on steroids or he's off his meds again. Or maybe on the wrong ones, who knows?
Response 1.1 by Gary Gross at 02-Oct-13 12:47 PM
Or all of the above?
Comment 2 by walter hanson at 04-Oct-13 04:27 PM
I say that he was trying to time it to take the credit and make himself look good, but with how he messed on the Vikings stadium, the farm bill, and a few other things that won't work.
The Republican Party sent out an email today point out Dayton's outright lieing on seat licenses on the Vikings stadium bill asking if he will lie on this what won't he lie about.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Response 2.1 by Gary Gross at 05-Oct-13 05:34 PM
Walter, it's lying, not lieing.
Harry Reid's latest temper tantrum
Lately, Harry Reid has thrown one temper tantrum after another. This morning, he threw another childish, mean-spirited hissy fit :
'Republicans have had a very bad week. On the same day that Democrats in Congress delivered quality, affordable health insurance to tens of millions more Americans, Republicans in Congress delivered the nation a government shutdown.'
'It's time for Republicans to stop throwing one crazy idea after another at the wall in the hopes something will stick. There has been a sensible plan to reopen the government right in front of House Republicans all along: the clean, six-week continuing resolution passed by the Senate last week.'
'Once [Republicans] reopen the government, Senate Democrats will gladly appoint conferees and work out our long-term budget priorities with the House of Representatives.'
Harry's taken too many punches. He's punch drunk. When he, Nancy Pelosi, Speaker Boehner and Sen. McConnell meet with President Obama tonight, I'm confident that he'll have to eat a plate full of crow. I'm confident that President Obama understands that he's losing momentum because he and Sen. Reid have overplayed (and misplayed) their hand by being totally intransigent.
If President Obama and congressional Democrats don't agree to give up their premium support, support that isn't available to others in the same income bracket, they'll be blamed for not working to solve the problem. The American people might agree with Democrats that the government shouldn't be shut down but that doesn't mean they can refuse to negotiate with Republicans. Americans, above all else, insist that people work together and play fair.
Right now, the American people are questioning whether Democrats are playing fair.
The other thing that's happening, in my opinion, is that reality is overtaking Sen. Reid's and President Obama's spin. Last week, President Obama said in a speech that Republicans want to kill the Affordable Care Act because they don't want people to sign up for the exchanges and like it. Thanks to this week's disastrous roll-out of the exchanges, Republicans can point to that and say 'We told you so. That's why we want it delayed a year.'
Night after night, day after day, Republicans announce their latest offer to fund the government. At first, the Democrats' spin message won the day. Bit by bit, the Republicans started winning that fight, thanks in large part to their showing the American people that they're trying to resolve this dispute.
It might take time but reality will overtake spin every time. It's just a matter of when, not if.
Harry Reid's calling the Republicans' proposals crazy might fool a handful of people for a little while but that won't last long. Night after night, Speaker Boehner or Rep. McCarthy have stepped to the microphone to tell the press what the latest bill contained.
Ed Morrissey has more on tonight's meeting :
The executive branch's handling of the shutdown has been a disaster, as has been the rollout of the ObamaCare exchanges. They need to win a messaging cycle badly now, and one way of doing that is to broker a fix on funding the government - perhaps even with a concession on Congressional exemptions to ObamaCare, if not an agreement on a repeal of the highly-unpopular medical device tax.
Reid's spin that Republicans were having a difficult week simply isn't credible. Ed's observations indicate that. Democrats got too full of themselves early on. They thought they could just run roughshod over House Republicans. This week, it's apparent that they thought wrong.
Posted Wednesday, October 2, 2013 2:14 PM
No comments.
Harry Reid's awful day gets worse
Watching this video should make President Obama cringe:
I wrote here about Sen. Reid's hissy fit from this morning. Now he's put his foot in his mouth when asked a question about not funding the National Institute of Health, saying that there are all kinds of people that government should be helping. In saying this, he's essentially said that saving a child with cancer isn't as important as some of his constituents in Nevada.
During this morning's temper tantrum, Sen. Reid said that Republicans were experiencing a bad week. If he thinks they're having a bad week, he should look in the mirror. It's looking like he won the disastrous week from hell grand prize. Sen. Reid's head must be ready to explode, especially after hearing about this :
House Republicans plan to keep trying their new piecemeal approach to solving the shutdown, setting up yet another round of votes Wednesday on bills that would fund veterans affairs and national parks and adding new bills to fund the National Institutes of Health and to pay the National Guard and the military reserves.
Earlier this week, President Obama promised to veto the bill. In light of the disastrous week he's had, it wouldn't be surprising if he hadn't changed his mind.
Wow! I'd initially posted the abridged version of the exchange between Sen. Reid and CNN's Dana Bash but I've replaced it with the full exchange between Sen. Reid and Ms. Bash. The unabridged version makes Sen. Reid look positively deranged.
BASH: If you all talked about children with cancer unable to go to clinical trials, the House is likely to pass a bill to at least fund the NIH, given what you've said, will you at least pass that, and if not, aren't you playing the same political games that Republicans are?
SEN. REID: Listen, Sen. Durbin explained that very well. He did it here. He did it on the floor. What right do they have to pick and choose which parts of the government to fund? It's obvious what's going on here. You talk about reckless and irresponsible. Wow! What this is all about is Obamacare. They are obsessed with Obamacare. I don't know what other word I can use. I don't know what other word I can use. They're obsessed with this Obamacare thing. It's working now and it willl continue to work and they'll love it even more than they do now by far. So they have no right to pick and choose.
BASH: But if you could help one child with cancer, why wouldn't you do it?
SEN. REID: Listen, why would we want to do that? I have 1,100 people at Nellis Air Force Base that are sitting home. They have a few problems of their own. This is -- to have someone of your intelligence ask such a thing is irresponsible.
BASH: I'm just asking a question.
That isn't just cringeworthy. That's downright nasty. That type of public image is why Democrats are losing a fight that the media wants them to win. The media however, isn't willing to go to any length to defend the Democrats. This is one of those instances where they won't defend the Democrats.
Tonight's meeting at the White House can't arrive too soon for Sen. Reid, President Obama and the Democrats. Right now, they look like the gang that juggled scissors while running up a set of stairs.
Posted Wednesday, October 2, 2013 3:56 PM
Comment 1 by walter hanson at 03-Oct-13 01:25 AM
Gary:
Just to update this temper fit by Harry, but didn't a bill pass which allowed the military to be funded and Obama still laid people off?
Or didn't Reid allow a vote on that in the Senate?
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
