[OPINION] The Unaffordable Care Act Works Like Hell

It Performs Exactly As Designed

Michael Tanner of National Review Online points out some of the awesome positives we see with Glorious Obamacare!

Obamacare generates piles of relative surplus value without requiring any innovation.

Already we’ve seen requests for increases for individual plans as high as 64.8 percent in Texas, 61 percent in Pennsylvania, 51.6 percent in New Mexico, 36.3 percent in Tennessee, 30.4 percent in Maryland, 25 percent in Oregon, and 19.9 percent in Washington. Those increases would come on top of premium increases last year that were 24.4 percent above what they would have been without Obamacare, according to a study from the National Bureau of Economic Research.

This is, admittedly mitigated by the sort of economic competition that Obamacare sought to eliminate.Hospitals, ambulance providers and physicians have all sought out ways of carving this surplus away from the insurance companies. Numerous other parasites have latched on to the insurance companies for their share of the bounty. Karl Denninger describes the process below.

Pull out your car insurance bill and the declarations page. You will find a line there called “Medical Payments” (it may be called “PIP” or similar in some states) which is state-mandated coverage. The price of that coverage is five times what it should be and for drivers with lower liability limits it’s frequently the most expensive part of their policy. In addition, your Bodily Injury coverage cost is jacked, typically by at least twice, due to this same racket. It doesn’t end with auto insurance either; Workman’s Compensation, which is required of businesses once they hire their first employee, is also a multiple of real cost for the same reason and this reflects back into the price of everything you buy from a hamburger to a gallon of gasoline.

Obamacare limits the extent to which insurance companies are ever made to pay back out.

At the same time, deductibles for the cheapest Obamacare plans now average about $5,180 for individuals and $10,500 for families.

Obamacare eliminates policies from the market that compete against the overpriced, shoddy plans insurers make the most money off of offering.

The ACA sets minimum standards for what a plan has to include. What this does is effectively shut competition out of the market. It forces people who would not pay into the racket to pay into it or get fined for not being insured. It makes people buy far more insurance than they need to subsidize other customers that can’t afford the benevolent care they receive from the Unaffordable Care Act. It becomes a wealth transfer vehicle that taxes the young and healthy for as long as they are crazy enough to remain young and healthy.

So The Unaffordable Care Act works like Hell. It robs the bank without exposing the perpetrators to hostile gunfire from the security firm. It works the way Billy Tauzin, Kaiser Permanente and numerous other healthcare industry apparatchiks wrote it to work. Thus, it comes as no surprise they find the potential outcome of King v. Burwell so potentially unpleasant.

Regulating the USG the way our healthcare industry does is all well and good, but it doesn’t do any good if a bribe proof, unaccountable entity shuts off their money reservoir. You can’t buy people who don’t have to run for office. They don’t work for you the way Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) 64% and Barack Obama willingly do. If these SCOTUS Justices decide to become do-gooders and break up the racket, it would mess up something that the politicians and the healthcare companies see as a beautiful thing. The American People are not so enamored, but two out of three isn’t bad. It wasn’t written for the people, so it’s silly to expect it to work for them. Which is fine, because it isn’t like the government works for the people anymore either. It’s not like they did all the hard work of writing themselves an Unaffordable Care Act.

Via: Red State

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[VIDEO] Police Shut Down Lemonade Stand Run By Two Little Girls for Operating Without a Permit

- Zoey and Andria Green, seven and eight, were running store by their home

- Girls had lemonade for sale at 50 cents a cup and popcorn for $1

- They wanted to raise money to for water park trip on Father's Day

- Chief of police in Overton, Texas, told them they needed a permit

Police shut down a 50-cents-a-go lemonade stand being run by two sisters because they didn't have an official city permit.

Via: Fox Nation

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[VIDEO] If SCOTUS guts subsidies, voters want Congress to fix Obamacare

As the Supreme Court prepares to unveil its decision on King v. Burwell, which could gut health care subsidies to millions of Americans on the exchanges–a point that some in the media say could harm Republicans. Hence, why some on the Hill are saying they might temporarily extend those subsidies if the Court nixes them. King is similar to another case–Halbig V. Burwell–that virtually argued the same thing:

Whether the Internal Revenue Service may permissibly promulgate regulations to extend tax-credit subsidies to coverage purchased through exchanges established by the federal government under Section 1321 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Last summer, George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley and the Washington Examiner’sPhilip Klein outlined the background for the case–and the consequences if the Court rules that the IRS does not have the authority to extend the subsidies. 

Via Turley:

The Halbig case challenges the massive federal subsidies in the form of tax credits made available to people with financial need who enroll in the program. In crafting the act, Congress created incentives for states to set up health insurance exchanges and disincentives for them to opt out. The law, for example, made the subsidies available only to those enrolled in insurance plans through exchanges “established by the state.”

But despite that carrot — and to the great surprise of the administration — some 34 states opted not to establish their own exchanges, leaving it to the federal government to do so. This left the White House with a dilemma: If only those enrollees in states that created exchanges were eligible for subsidies, a huge pool of people would be unable to afford coverage, and the entire program would be in danger of collapse.

Indeed, the Halbig plaintiffs — individuals and small businesses in six states that didn’t establish state exchanges — objected that, without the tax credits, they could have claimed exemption from the individual mandate penalty because they would be deemed unable to pay for the coverage. If the courts agree with them, the costs would go up in all 34 states that didn’t establish state exchanges, and the resulting exemptions could lead to a mass exodus from Obamacare.

The administration attempted to solve the problem by simply declaring that even residents of states without their own exchanges were eligible for subsidies, even though the law seemed to specifically say they were not. The administration argues that although the statute’s language does limit subsidies to residents of places with exchanges “established by the state,” that wording actually referred to any exchange, including those established by the federal government.

Via: Hot Air

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Opinion: GOP targets Latinos’ ability to vote

Even as a diverse coalition of Americans unite around the principle that voting rights are an essential American principle that needs to be protected, the Republican Party remains firmly committed to doing the opposite. Their continued push for policies that make it more difficult for people to vote disproportionately affects minority and young voters.

Republicans – including leading Presidential candidates – have for years been pushing initiatives that make it harder to vote. Jeb Bush supports states’ efforts to enact voter ID laws, and as governor, he restricted early voting and infamously purged 12,000 eligible voters before the 2000 presidential election. Marco Rubio asked, “What’s the big deal?” with voter ID laws. Scott Walker enacted what has been described as “one of the most restrictive voter ID laws in the country.”

Voter ID laws systematically target Latinos’ and other minorities’ ability to vote. In 2012, measures to restrict voting could have affected over 10 million Latino voters. A Brennan Center for Justice study reported, “In Colorado, Florida, and Virginia, the number of eligible Latino citizens that could be affected by these barriers exceeds the margin of victory in each of those states during the 2008 presidential election.”

And it’s no accident that these laws disproportionately affect Latinos. A separate study from last year found “a solid link between legislator support for voter ID laws and bias toward Latino voters, as measured in their responses to constituent e-mails.” And yet another study that was released earlier this year found that even in states without voter ID laws, Latinos were targeted: “Election officials themselves also appear to be biased against minority voters, and Latinos in particular. For example, poll workers are more likely to ask minority voters to show identification, including in states without voter identification laws.”

Some Republicans have explicitly made known their intentions of suppressing Latino and African-American voters in order to win elections. Over 30 years ago, ALEC-founder and co-founder of the Heritage Foundation Paul Weyrich spoke plainly:  “I don’t want everybody to vote…As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down.” Republican after Republican has continued in his footsteps: An Ohio GOP County Chair stated he supports limits on early voting because, “I really actually feel we shouldn’t contort the voting process to accommodate the urban – read African-American – voter-turnout machine.” Pennsylvania House Speaker Mike Turzaibelieved voter ID laws would “allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania.” Former GOP Precinct Chair Don Yeltonused the “n” word as he tried to deny that a voter ID law in North Carolina was racist (and he explained that “the law is going to kick the Democrats in the butt”). Conservative activist and notoriouslyanti-immigrant Phyllis Schlafly said, “The reduction in the number of days allowed for early voting is particularly important because early voting plays a major role in Obama’s ground game.” Schlafly’s Eagle Forum endorsed Marco Rubio in his run for Senate (here’s a lovely picture of the two of them) and applauded Scott Walker for his opposition to legal immigration.

Via: Fox News Latino

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Labor Department Employee Looked At Porn For HOURS Every Day

A Department of Labor (DOL) official looked at porn for hours every single day and wasn’t fired for months.

The Daily Caller first reported that a DOL “Grade 14 employee” — who made between $107,325 and $139,523 per year on the taxpayer dime — was caught looking at pornography at work on his official government computer.

Now new information has emerged on the porn-watcher and his obsessive, libidinous habits.

The Daily Mail obtained redacted copies of DOL inspector general reports through a Freedom of Information Act request that detail the employee’s self-confessed porn addiction.

The worker “downloaded a voluminous amount of adult pornographic movies and images,” according to the reports.

He also “entered the name of actress Alyssa Milano on [his] computer and pornographic sites appeared.”

His porn-watching was all-consuming. The employee “visited pornographic sites for several hours a day.”

His habits were first noticed by a colleague in August 2014, but the employee was not fired for another four months.

DOL could have vetted the porn addict before he ever started getting taxpayer money. According to the reports, the employee was fired from a previous job for “accessing sites with women wearing little clothing.”

Alyssa Milano, 42, was a regular on the television series “Who’s The Boss” before appearing nude in films, according to the Daily Mail report.

It is unclear whether the employee ever pursued his work habit to completion.

Via: Daily Caller

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OPM Hackers Stole Data on Every Federal Employee

June 11, 2015 The hackers that infiltrated the Office of Personnel Management last year swiped the personal information of every federal employee working in government, a number potentially far greater than the 4 million previously reported, according to a labor union of government workers.

In a letter sent to OPM director Katherine Archuleta and obtained by National Journal, American Federation of Government Employees President J. David Cox wrote that the hackers stole social security numbers, birthdays, addresses, military records, job and pay histories and various insurance information, in addition to age, gender and race data.

"Based on the sketchy data OPM has provided, we believe that the Central Personnel Data File was the targeted database, and that the hackers are now in possession of personnel data for every federal employee, every federal retiree, and up to one million former federal employees," Cox wrote in a letter dated Thursday.

"We believe that Social Security numbers were not encrypted, a cybersecurity failure that is absolutely indefensible and outrageous," he added.

Cox said that the 18 months of credit monitoring and $1 million in liability insurance that OPM has offered affected employees is "entirely inadequate, either as compensation or protection from harm."

Last week federal officials announced that data of as many as 4 million former and current federal employees had been exposed. The breach occurred in December and was detected in April, officials said, and many have attributed the intrusion to China. The size of that hack was already considered one of the largest and most devastating on record. After the breach was announced, OPM signed a $20 million contract with a private cybersecurity company to provide identity-fraud protection services for affected employees.

(RELATED: Syrian Electronic Army Claims Hack of Army Website) 

Officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Earlier on Thursday, the Senate rejected a push by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to allow a cybersecurity measure to be added as an amendment to an ongoing debate over the National Defense Authorization Act. McConnell had tried to use news of the OPM hack to jam the bipartisan measure through, but Democrats—including some of the bill's supporters—argued that such important legislation was deserving of fuller debate.

Via: NJ

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DHS SECRETLY VIDEOTAPING CITIZENS TO 'PREDICT CRIME'

Traveling through the T. F. Green Airport of Providence, Rhode Island?

If so, the Department of Homeland Security may be collecting video of you as part of a project to sniff out behavioral indicators of “malicious intent.”

In other words, the DHS wants to use video images of passengers to predict crimes.

On Tuesday, the DHS quietly released online a “privacy impact assessment” that provides the legal justification for an ongoing experiment it is calling “Data Collection for the Centralized Hostile Intent Project.”

The 14-page document, reviewed in full by WND, reveals the DHS’s Science and Technology Directorate will conduct an exercise at the Providence airport at an undisclosed date.

The DHS is planning to collect video images at designated areas throughout the airport, including at TSA security checkpoints, ticket counters, baggage claim and the airport entrance. No audio will be recorded at any time, states the document.

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The stated goal is to evaluate “whether the behavioral indicators used to screen for passengers with hostile intent can be reliably observed by BDOs (Behavior Detection Officers) via live video images as opposed to in person.”

The document states the video data acquisition will entail collecting and even storing “Personally Identifiable Information in the form of video images that include the face and body of trained actors and members of the traveling public.”

The experiment, the paper makes clear, is focused on video collection of trained actors at designated airport areas. However, it concedes that the agency “may incidentally collect Personally Identifiable Information from members of the traveling public and airport personnel who may be near them.”

Via: WND

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GOP Critical of New Obama Rules To Create 'Utopian' Neighborhoods

Housing regulations aimed at diversifying wealthy neighborhoods, which some are calling executive overreach for the purpose of establishing a utopia, are expected to be released by the Obama administration this month.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) will release the rules with the aim of ending segregation in neighborhoods around the country, The Hill is reporting. 

HUD plans to offer grant money to communities willing to build affordable housing within affluent neighborhoods. On the flip side, the federal agency will also give money to poorer neighborhoods to improve those communities through better schools, parks, libraries and grocery stores. 

"HUD is working with communities across the country to fulfill the promise of equal opportunity for all," a HUD spokeswoman told The Hill. "The proposed policy seeks to break down barriers to access to opportunity in communities supported by HUD funds." 

The regulations are a continuation of a rule made by the Obama administration in 2013, in which HUD started gathering data about diversity in neighborhoods around the country for the purpose of making such policy changes. 

The new regulation has its share of critics, especially among conservatives. 

Arizona Republican Rep. Paul Gosar, who is working to block the rule, said that the Obama administration "shouldn’t be holding hostage grant monies aimed at community improvement based on its unrealistic utopian ideas of what every community should resemble."

"American citizens and communities should be free to choose where they would like to live and not be subject to federal neighborhood engineering at the behest of an overreaching federal government," Gosar told The Hill. 

Via: News Max

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Black prof thinks white privilege overshadows classroom discussions

Koritha Mitchell, a professor at Ohio State, wrote that white privilege is standard in class syllabi now because faculty are afraid to include reading materials from non-white authors.

Mitchell claims she challenges her students “simply by existing.”

One professor at Ohio State thinks that colleagues who change their materials for fear of offending students are “cowards.”

Koritha Mitchell, an associate professor of English at Ohio State University, argued on Vox that her presence as a black, female faculty member, combined with the white privilege her students are bombarded with on a daily basis, causes the classroom community to fear controversial discussions.

"My students, after all, have grown up bombarded with the message that people who belong in authority—especially authority based on intellectual accomplishments and expertise—are men, usually white men."    Tweet This

In her article titled, “I'm a professor. My colleagues who let their students dictate what they teach are cowards,” Mitchell says that her very presence makes students uncomfortable because she does “not fit any picture society has given them of an expert.”

“My students, after all, have grown up bombarded with the message that people who belong in authority—especially authority based on intellectual accomplishments and expertise—are men, usually white men,” she elaborates. “I challenge my students simply by existing.”

According to Mitchell, students also grow up learning that real literature is only written by white authors. However, she claims this learning trend isn’t limited to a certain “identity category.” She alleges that students are made uncomfortable by the presence of even a couple of required readings by authors who are not white. Mitchell said she doesn’t have the luxury of changing her curriculum to make her students more comfortable.

Universities, Mitchell said, treat students as consumers and therefore: “The customer is always right.” That is why she “read[s] about professors being afraid of their own students and changing what they teach in response to that fear.”

Edward Schlosser, the pseudonym of a college professor writing in Vox, said that he had “intentionally adjusted my teaching materials as the political winds have shifted. In this type of environment, boat-rocking isn't just dangerous, it's suicidal, and so teachers limit their lessons to things they know won't upset anybody.”

“Who can most afford to teach in ways that are least likely to inspire controversy?” Mitchell asks. The answer is anyone who is not hurt by dominant ideas: the white heterosexual male perspective dominates all others despite claiming to be neutral, the professor writes.

"Have you ever noticed how, even if standards are changed to accommodate someone, Americans never worry about standards being lowered unless the person getting the opportunity isn't white?" she continues.

Later in her article, Mitchell claims that everyone is taught that a dead black person is not a true societal loss.

“If whiteness inspires sympathy, then those who are not white will most often become targets,” she writes.

“The most influential positions are held primarily by those who are white and male not only because of this country's long history of directing affirmative action toward whites but also because white men continue to insist that their whiteness and maleness has little bearing on their actions,” Mitchell concludes her article. “The more that Americans allow this lie to hold sway, the more the culture of fear will expand.”

Via: Campus Reform

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Ben Carson Dodges CNN’s LGBT Question: Can’t We Talk About Something ‘More Important?’

In an interview on Fox News Wednesday night,Ben Carson said he doesn’t equate gay rights with civil rights because he’s never seen a “straight only” water fountain. So, when he joined CNN’s Brianna Keilar by phone Thursday afternoon, she had a very simple question for the Republican presidential candidate: “Do you think that gay Americans are discriminated against, that they face discrimination?”

Over the next two minutes, Keilar asked him some variation of that question at least six more times. At first Carson said he didn’t want to talk about the “gay issue” except to repeat the question he posed to Fox News’ Bret Baier: “What position can a person take who has no animosity toward gay people, but believes in the traditional definition of marriage that would be acceptable?”

Keilar decided not to take a stab at that one but instead told Carson she felt it was “fair” to ask him her original question because as a candidate for president part of his job was to explain his positions. When she repeated her question, he would only say that the Constitution “protects every single American” and “everybody has equal rights, nobody has extra rights.”

“Can we move on to something more important?” Carson asked, as Keilar attempted to elicit a yes or no answer. “Is there anything more important to talk about?”

After she asked him two more times, Carson admitted that “every group faces some type of discrimination,” including Christians. “I wish we would talk more about that.”

When Carson insisted he had answered her question, Keilar stated, for the record, “I think you gave me part of an answer, but not a complete one.”

Via: Mediaite

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California Trains Professors To Avoid ‘Microaggressions’

 University of California president Janet Napolitano’s office has been training faculty members at the University of California to avoid describing America as a “land of opportunity,” along with other phrases the school claims are offensive “microaggressions.”

According to activists, “microaggressions” are subtle actions, usually unintentional, that perpetuate discrimination against disadvantaged groups even in environments where overt discrimination has been abolished. Now, the UC system has fully committed itself to formally training faculty to avoid and root out these perceived microaggressions for the good of all.

The attack on microaggressions is the centerpiece of a series of faculty leadership seminars carried out by Napolitano’s office at several campuses across the UC system. One document used in the seminars is titled Tool: Recognizing Microaggressions and the Messages They Send, and lists dozens of menacing microaggressions for faculty to avoid.

One of the largest categories of microaggressions are those that that promote the “myth of meritocracy.” According to the document, this “myth” is spread by statements such as “America is the land of opportunity,” “I believe the most qualified person should get the job,” and “Affirmative action is racist.”

Other examples of sinister microaggressions, according to the guide, include:

• Describing America as a “melting pot” (it orders people to assimilate)
• Stating that “there is only one race, the human race” (denying the significance of a person’s ethnic or racial history)
• Asking Asians, Hispanics, or Native Americans to speak up more (“pathologizing” foreign norms and treating white norms as “normal”)
• Using “he” as a generic pronoun for all people (it makes the male experience universal and the female experience “invisible”)
• Using forms where individuals must identify as male or female (it excludes the full LGBT experience)

The guide was used in faculty training sessions for UC faculty members throughout the 2014-15 school year, but its contents only recently drew more widespread attention when one professor notified The College Fix about the materials.

Via: California Political Review

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Ignoring Terrorism but Celebrating Gay Pride

President Obama and his administration apparently haven’t had enough time—though it’s been more than a year—to develop a strategy to combat the anti-American terrorist group known as the Islamic State. But the Department of Defense has certainly found enough time and money to celebrate June as “Pride Month” at the Pentagon and highlight the “husbands” of top male generals

.

The celebrations include events inside the Pentagon, posters and PowerPoint presentations, and even a special video from the news agency of the Department of Defense. The Department of Defense also conveyed its approval by “rainbow-ing” its website.

DoD News quotes Defense Secretary Ash Carter as saying that diversity and inclusion are critical to recruiting and retaining the force of the future. He made the comments at Tuesday’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) “Pride Month” event held at the Pentagon.

Surveys show about one or two percent of the population is homosexual, and the percentage in the military is probably even lower. Yet, considerable Pentagon resources are now being devoted to highlighting their involvement in the Armed Forces and getting more of the LGBT community to join.

This month’s rainbow-colored Pentagon “pride” poster celebrates “victories that have affirmed freedom and fairness,” to quote President Obama, except for the more important but elusive “victory” over the Islamic State.

Obama’s embarrassing disclosure about having an incomplete strategy to win over global Islamic terrorism has certainly received its share of media attention. “We don’t have, yet, a complete strategy,” he said. “The details are not worked out.”

The comments were followed by a report that the Islamic State is more of a tough fighting force than previously believed because the wives of the leading terrorist figures in the group “may play a greater role in operations and communications,” and the U.S. has been ignoring them, according to CNN.

Via: Canada Free Press

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A Vote for Trade Promotion Authority Is Not a Vote for Obama

Before presidential politics — the game of getting to 270 electoral votes — completely eclipses governing, there is the urgent task of getting to 217 votes in the House of Representatives to pass Trade Promotion Authority (TPA). This would guarantee a vote without amendments on the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. Without TPA, any trade agreement will be nibbled to death in Congress by persons eager to do organized labor’s bidding. So, Republicans who oppose TPA are collaborating with those who oppose increasing the velocity and rationality of economic life.

TPA touches two challenging problems: one economic, one constitutional. Regarding both, conservatives have special responsibilities. 

The economic challenge is to generate economic growth sufficient to restore vigor and upward mobility to an underemployed America, sustaining national security and entitlements as, every day, another 10,000 baby boomers become eligible for Social Security and Medicare. The constitutional problem is how to restore institutional equilibrium by bringing the presidency back within the restraints the Founders devised with the separation of powers. 

Only conservatives can turn economic policy away from the self-defeating aim of redistribution, and toward growth. This goal would be advanced by the trade agreement among the twelve nations who together account for 37 percent of the world’s GDP and one-third of world trade. Defeating TPA, and thus the agreement, is a service most House Democrats will perform for a reactionary faction, organized labor. Defeat would, however, make economic dynamism even more elusive, punishing the nation without meaningfully disciplining the president.

 This vote comes in the turgid wake of a first quarter in which the economy shrank 0.7 percent — the third quarterly contraction during the anemic recovery that is slouching into its seventh year. The aging recovery began in June 2009; another recession may arrive without there having been a real recovery from the previous one. For Democrats devoted to policies of redistribution, economic growth is an afterthought. Only Republicans can make possible the freer trade that can combat the lingering stagnation that is Barack Obama’s painful legacy.

Via: National Review

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Climate Change: Where is the Science?

Is it twice as likely that the Earth is cooling than that it is warming? That humans and fossil fuels have nothing, or everything to do with it, or somewhere in between? Or is it over 99% certain that anthropogenic carbon burning-induced warming is sweeping us to the apocalypse, with all other possibilities combined being less than one percent probable?

The only way to find out is through the most rigorous and critical application of the scientific method, from laboratory practice to public discourse. Anything less than that increases the risk that the 'solution' could be more catastrophic to humans than the results of climate change itself.

Let us examine what the climate change alarm community has done and how they have done it, and see if it qualifies as the rigorous and unimpeachable science that its proponents claim it is. We'll walk it back from results to first principles.

First, results. Nothing defines science so well in the popular mind than the predictive power of scientific theory. "If the conditions, materials and/or forces A, B, C, and D come together in such-and-such a way, then the outcome WILL BE 6.7294874X. If variables P, Q, and R are substituted for A, C, and D, then the outcome will be 2.1 milligrams of tetrahydrocannabinol in combustion." Awesome.

Via: American Thinker

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