CNN: Senate Democrats supported rule that led to insurance cancellations.

Senate Democrats voted unanimously three years ago to support the Obamacare rule that is largely responsible for some of the health insurance cancellation letters that are going out.

In September 2010, Senate Republicans brought a resolution to the floor to block implementation of the grandfather rule, warning that it would result in canceled policies and violate President Barack Obama’s promise that people could keep their insurance if they liked it. . . . On a party line vote, Democrats killed the resolution, which could come back to haunt vulnerable Democrats up for re-election this year.

Senate Democrats like Mary Landrieu, Jeanne Shaheen, Mark Pryor, Kay Hagan and Mark Begich – all of whom voted against stopping the rule from going into effect and have since supported delaying parts of Obamacare.

Ouch.

ANNALS OF CRONYISM: Obama Donor’s Firm Hired to Fix Website Mess It Helped Make.

SPYING: ‘Let Me Stress How Shocking These NSA Revelations Are’: A View From Inside the Defense World. “The surveillance-state apparatus—which as you point out is the greater danger to democratic survival than the direct casualties from any act of terrorist violence—creates a chilling effect on the very sort of democratic activity that is prerequisite to its dismantling. . . . And Obama’s Justice Department has used the anti-espionage statutes to treat investigative journalism in the national-security field as akin to treason. The things the Founders put in place to allow us to self-correct are caught up in the trap.”

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NOW ON YOUTUBE: My InstaVision interview with Virginia Postrel about her new book, The Power of Glamour: Longing And The Art Of Visual Persuasion.

ROGER SIMON: God, Lies and Obama.

MICKEY KAUS: What ObamaCare Pollyannas Miss. At this point, it takes a special person to be an ObamaCare Pollyanna.

CHANGE: Call 911! EBT benefits get cut. “How can President Obama have let this happen to his most loyal voters?”

JAMES TARANTO: President Haze: Obama and his supporters emit a fog of equivocation and euphemism.

“If you like your plan, you can keep it.” That assertion, repeated with small variations, was Barack Obama’s central pledge when he was campaigning for president and then for the enactment of health-care “reform.” The pro-Obama New York magazine has assembled a 95-second video montage of the future and current president making the assertion two dozen times between 2008 and 2010.

Surely this is the clearest example of a broken presidential promise since George H.W. Bush’s “Read my lips: no new taxes.” . . .

What do you call a political promise delivered repeatedly and emphatically only to be broken deliberately? David Firestone, an editorialist at the New York Times, calls it an “unfortunate blanket statement.” We suppose another example of an unfortunate blanket statement was “I am not a crook.”

Indeed.

GOING NUCLEAR: Roll Call: Biden Open to Filibuster Changes After Republicans Block Watt, Millett Nominations.

THE HILL: ‘Agitated’ Dems Vent On ObamaCare. They were unified against a delay back during the shutdown before the ObamaCare launch — but now it’s a case of “how are you going to keep them down on the farm, after they’ve seen . . . the farm.”

Related: ObamaCare contractor previously cited for endangering personal data.

SPYING: Feinstein shows off NSA “reform” bill that’s really about the status quo.

Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) has been one of the most stalwart defenders of widespread NSA surveillance since leaks with information about the programs started seeping out nearly five months ago. Civil libertarians and reformers have been none too pleased with her rhetoric—and they’re not going to get any happier after reading the bill she introduced today.

The FISA Improvements Act has already attracted plenty of critics who view it as no improvement at all. In fact, they say, Feinstein’s bill would make things much worse. It would actually enshrine the NSA “bulk data” collection programs into law and grant official Congressional approval to widespread surveillance programs that haven’t ever received such affirmation before.

Her bill comes on the heels of a competing bill introduced earlier this week that reformers say would be a real step in the right direction.

Question: How many of these California/Silicon Valley civil libertarians voted against Feinstein?

CBS NEWS: Only 6 People Enrolled In ObamaCare On First Day.

For 31 days now, the Obama administration has been telling us that Americans by the millions are visiting the new health insurance website, despite all its problems.

But no one in the administration has been willing to tell us how many policies have been purchased, and this may be the reason: CBS News has learned enrollments got off to an incredibly slow start.

Early enrollment figures are contained in notes from twice-a-day “war room” meetings convened within the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services after the website failed on Oct. 1. They were turned over in response to a document request from the House Oversight Committee.

The website launched on a Tuesday. Publicly, the government said there were 4.7 million unique visits in the first 24 hours. But at a meeting Wednesday morning, the war room notes say “six enrollments have occurred so far.”

They were with BlueCross BlueShield North Carolina and Kansas City, CareSource and Healthcare Service Corporation.

By Wednesday afternoon, enrollments were up to “approximately 100.” By the end of Wednesday, the notes reflect “248 enrollments” nationwide.

The health care exchanges need to average 39,000 enrollees a day to meet the goal of seven million by March 1. The war room notes give a glimpse into some of the reasons customers had problems:

“Direct enrollment (signing up directly on an insurer’s website) is not working for any issuers.”
“Experian” credit reporting agency is “creating confusion with credit check information.”
“Issuer phone numbers are not appearing correctly on the Pay Now page.”
The notes leave no doubt that some enrollment figures, which the administration has chosen to keep secret, are available.

“Statistics coming in,” said notes from the very first meeting the morning of Oct. 2. Contractor “QSSI has a daily dashboard created every night.”

But head of CMS Marilyn Tavenner would not disclose any figures when Rep. Dave Camp, chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, asked earlier this week.

“Chairman Camp, we will have those numbers available in mid-November,” she said.

Health and Human Services told CBS News Thursday it’s in no position to confirm or discuss enrollment figures because it doesn’t have any.

I believe she was under oath when she said that, wasn’t she?

I WONDER IF THIS HAS RELEVANCE FOR IMMIGRATION POLICY? Is Hazing Part Of Humans’ Evolved Psychology? “This may have been a time during which coalitions were exploited by newcomers. Our intuitions about how to treat newcomers may reflect this regularity of the past. Abusing newcomers—hazing—may have served to temporarily alter their behavior, as well as select out uncommitted newcomers when membership was non-obligatory.”

I seem to remember seeing research to the effect that people who are mildly to moderately hazed wind up being more loyal to the group they join than people who are simply admitted. This isn’t the one I remember, but it’s to similar effect. As a side note, it’s hard to research hazing on Google without being swamped by stuff from college Student Life offices.

FEMINIST PROFESSORS traffic in sexist male stereotyping. Yeah, I know, stop the presses . . . .

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TAXES ARE FOR THE LITTLE PEOPLE: 8,400 Security Clearance Holders Owe IRS $85 Million in Unpaid Taxes.

INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY WONDERS why so many military officers have been removed.

FEAR OF A LATINO PRESIDENT: The Democratic Party’s Halloween-themed email: the “Nightmare” of Ted Cruz as President.

A HALLOWEEN SONG: The Lakeview Man by The Rainmakers.

BOB ZUBRIN: America, Stop Breathing: The new Club of Moscow says the U.S. consumes too much oxygen.

IN THE L.A. TIMES: Obamacare: Unfair to the young middle class, punished enough already. “Most young, middle-class Americans I know are happy that millions of previously uninsured people will receive free or heavily subsidized insurance under the Affordable Care Act. We just didn’t realize that, unless we had health insurance at work, we’d be the ones paying for it.” Shoulda inquired a bit more before voting for Obama. . . .

WAS IT A HOAX? Man Accused of writing N-word on restaurant check hires handwriting expert who says it was written by waitress “victim.” He’s suing.

I GOT MY FLU SHOT: More than 40 percent of child flu death victims were healthy: Study. I speculate — and that’s all it is, really — that getting regular flu shots may have some generalized benefit, even for strains that aren’t covered, just by keeping your immune system primed for flu in general. I’m not aware of any research on that, though.

13 NUTRITION LIES that made the world sick and fat.