Archive for 2014
June 27, 2014
MARK FITZGIBBONS: How to control the IRS and America’s untouchable caste of bureaucrats.
THIS IS A PROBLEM: Dems struggle to show anti-Koch amendment is ‘reasonable.’ “The proposed amendment would give Congress authority to regulate every dollar raised, and every dollar spent, by every federal campaign and candidate in the country. It would give state legislatures the power to do the same with state races.”
YA THINK? ObamaCare’s Prognosis Grows Dimmer.
A nightmare for Affordable Care Act supporters has been the possibility that only the sick would be left to purchase insurance through its exchanges, driving premiums up and insurers out. While the law’s boosters have been quick to dismiss the possibility that such a so-called death spiral could occur, data published in the Wall Street Journal suggest that this chain of events may not be so far-fetched after all.
The findings are significant not just for what they say about how Obamacare is working now, but also for their impact on the political debate over its future.
At its base, the data show that people insured through the law’s exchanges have higher rates of serious medical conditions. Of the enrollees who have seen a doctor or other health-care provider in the first quarter of this year, 27 percent have significant medical problems, including diabetes, cancer, heart trouble and psychiatric conditions. That rate is substantially higher than that for patients in nonexchange market plans over the same period. And it’s more than double the rate of those who were able to hold onto their existing individual market insurance plans after President Barack Obama was forced to allow them to keep them.
This outcome should not surprise anyone. The law’s one-size-fits-all regulatory regime, which requires insurers to offer coverage to all comers and prohibits pricing of coverage based on an applicant’s health status, was bound to increase the number of relatively sicker people purchasing insurance through the exchanges. Moreover, Obama’s executive action, which effectively allowed many people who had individual market plans to remain in them through at least 2016, bifurcated the insurance markets such that healthier people remained in the plans they already had, while relatively sicker patients were left to acquire coverage through the Affordable Care Act’s exchanges.
Related: Why ObamaCare Can’t Be “Fixed.”
CATHY YOUNG: The Surprising Truth About Women And Domestic Violence: Traditional stereotypes have led to double standards that often cause women’s violence—especially against men—to be trivialized. “Family and intimate relationships—the one area feminists often identify as a key battleground in the war on women—are also an area in which women are most likely to be violent, and not just in response to male aggression but toward children, elders, female relatives or partners, and non-violent men, according to a study published in the Journal of Family Violence.”
WEALTH INEQUALITY in Obama’s America.
ED DRISCOLL: Hillary, Chelsea, and America’s Ruling Class.
SHOCKER: Report: American Born Workers Struggle To Compete With Immigrants. “Among the working-age (16 to 65), what employment growth there has been has entirely gone to immigrants (legal and illegal).”
THE HILLARY TAPES, PART TWO: Bill Clinton in the 1980s: ‘I think I’ve Been Able to Change My Bad Habits.’
Plus, Hillary’s thoughts on moving: “As long as they speak English, I could be comfortable.”
HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Flaccid American Universities.
TAMMY BRUCE: When a reporter’s story hits the White House wall: Sometimes it’s dangerous to challenge the liberal narrative.
Lara Logan, Sharyl Attkisson, Judith Miller — all esteemed investigative reporters. Among numerous other awards, Ms. Miller is a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter. Ms. Logan and Ms. Attkisson have both won numerous Emmys and Edward R. Murrow Awards for their investigative journalism.In other words, they are serious, recognized, accomplished and fearless women who exemplify what it takes to be investigative journalists.They are all women who are under attack.
Their crime? They dared to follow stories to their natural conclusions, instead of to a preferred liberal end.
It’s partly punishment, partly an example to others.
FUNNY, THERE WERE A LOT OF DEM PUNDITS AND JOURNALISTS SAYING OTHERWISE LAST WEEK: Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker not target of criminal probe into campaign coordination.
June 26, 2014
21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: China Introduces an Automated Sperm Extractor.
FOR FITNESS, PUSH YOURSELF. “Intense exercise changes the body and muscles at a molecular level in ways that milder physical activity doesn’t match, according to an enlightening new study. Though the study was conducted in mice, the findings add to growing scientific evidence that to realize the greatest benefits from workouts, we probably need to push ourselves. . . . Catecholamines are released only during exercise that the body perceives as stressful, he said, so without some physical strain, there are no catecholamines, no messages from them to the CRTC2 protein, and no signals from CRTC2 to the muscles. You will still see muscular adaptations, he added, if your exercise is light and induces no catecholamine release, but those changes may not be as pronounced or complete as they otherwise could have been.”
This has been my experience. For years I went to the gym regularly, but I was really just going through the motions. Working harder lately, I’m seeing bigger gains.
BILL WHITTLE: Firewall: Get To Work!
SO TWO WATERGATE-ERA HEROES DIED TODAY. Howard Baker, who famously asked “what did the President know and when did he know it?” and Johnnie Walters, the IRS Commissioner who refused to go along with Nixon’s efforts to target his enemies. Both were Republicans who stood up for the rule of law.
Where are the Democrats willing to stand up for it under this Administration?
21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: Match.com teams up with Mensa to create a dating site for geniuses.
THE TINY ELITE: Feminism, American Style.
LATEST POCKET-PICKING EFFORT: Climate Reparations—A New Demand.