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Medicaid backlog creates payment hassles for physicians | Medical Economics
And the docs will pay if the patient doesn’t qualify . . .
Though 6 million new patients have enrolled for Medicaid coverage due to expansion of the program, media reports say that nearly half of those enrollment applications have yet to be processed.
Because of the bureaucratic backlog, physicians might get stuck waiting even longer on Medicaid reimbursements for patients who have yet to receive authorization. In addition, practices may incur costs from patients who signed up for but were denied Medicaid coverage.
via Medicaid backlog creates payment hassles for physicians | Medical Economics.
We will not be suckered by elitist Republicans
George Rodriguez explains the new #RPT Immigration plank. Hint: there’s a reason it was placed in the “Sovereignty” subsection.
Opposing them were citizen delegates — taxpayers, consumers and ordinary citizens who see their lives growing more difficult because the American dream is slipping away. They saw the “Texas Solution” as a cheap-labor plank masquerading as Hispanic outreach that would complicate an already out-of-control immigration crisis.
Grassroots conservatives over the past year also began to realize that the “Texas Solution” was light on enforcement. Given that over 160,000 illegal immigrants have been detained on the South Texas border since October 2013, these conservatives knew that any immigration solution must start with border security.
The new party platform truly addresses immigration in several ways.
What Cantor’s Defeat Means « Commentary Magazine
Perhaps that #RPT Immigration plank wasn’t a fluke, after all. This is much bigger than the Tea Party, alone. Or the Tea Party is bigger than anyone thought!
Eric Cantor wasn’t supposed to lose. His own pollster had him up by, get this, 34 points the other week. He’d raised nearly $5 million, and in the past two weeks spent $1 million against his rival’s $79,000. Not enough.
**********
So is this a case of the Republican Right eating one of its own to prove a point? Perhaps. Or it could just be he was hit by a perfect storm of anti-Washington sentiment and his own advocacy for an immigration bill that made him a whipping boy for ratings-hungry radio chatters. He lost touch with the voters in his own district and was done in.
Why Are Children Flooding the U.S. Border?
Government officials from Guatemala and Honduras have also gone to speak to the children. None appeared to have been kidnapped, robbed or abused during their journey through Mexico, which is a departure from the common experience of transmigrants. The children also said that it had taken them between less than a week to cross through Mexico, a voyage that typically takes migrants about a month.
Immigration Plank of Republican Party of Texas Platform 2014
Amendment to Preliminary 2014 Platform of the Republican Party of Texas Submitted by Peter Batura, SD 17
Click to access immigration-plank.pdf
America is proudly a nation of immigrants. Throughout our history, our nation has attracted productive, industrious and gifted people to America because she is exceptional, and those immigrants and their descendants helped make America the world’s unrivaled economic and military superpower. It remains imperative to create fair and consistent procedures that will again enable freedom-loving, hard-working and law-abiding immigrants to join us, by providing them an efficient, practical method of legal entry, so they can lawfully take positions where their labor is needed, without exploitation or harassment.
Our national interests are poorly served by our broken, embattled, and outdated immigration system, and patchwork attempts to mend its deficiencies will not prepare us to continue to meet the challenges of an increasingly complex global economy that demands the legal movement of people to fill jobs at all skill levels. An efficient, profamily and market-based system will provide a more workable solution that is compassionate, equitable and respects the rule of law.
But by failing to create a rational and effective system that encourages and facilitates legal immigration to the benefit of the nation, Congress has forced states to deal with the consequences of a broken immigration system, including human, sex and drug trafficking, the direct criminal activities of cartels and gangs. This situation must end so America can, once again, enjoy the fruits of a vibrant and beneficial system of legal immigration.
In addition, with 92 million Americans not working, the labor force at 36-year low and a lethargic economy, the United States of America can ill-afford a guest worker program designed to depress wages.
The following outlines specific actions needed to address these critical issues:
• Secure the borders through
o Increasing in the number of border security officers
o Increasing joint operations and training with local law enforcement, DPS and the Texas State Guard
o Contiguous physical barrier coupled with electronic, infrared and visual monitoring• Ending In-State Tuition for Illegal Immigrants
• Enhancing state smuggling laws
• Prohibiting sanctuary cities
• Prohibiting the knowing employment of illegal immigrants
• Providing civil liability protections for landowners against illegal immigrants
• Protecting the ability of law enforcement officers to inquire of the status of someone in custody
• Modernizing Current Immigration Laws to address the following:
o Any form of Amnesty should not be granted, including the granting of legal status to persons in the country illegally
o We support replacement of the current employment visa system with an efficient cost effective system
o We support ending country of origin quotas
o We support ending the annual green card lottery• Once the borders are verifiably secure, and E-Verify system use is fully enforced, creation of a visa classification for non-specialty industries which have demonstrated actual and persistent labor shortages.
The Texas Solution – just some thoughts
It looks as though one of the big fights at next week’s biennial State Convention of the Republican Party of Texas will focus around the “Texas Solution,” a plank in the 2012 Platform. (See below **) As usual, I have an opinion or two to share.
Of course, as a 2014 delegate, I’m not sure how I’m going to vote until I see the drafts. I do know that – as in the past – I won’t allow one plank – or even several planks – to overcome my support for the only Party that protects life, liberty, property and is unquestionably the best defender of vulnerable life and marriage. If I’m willing to work with the Party, rest assured that I will be more than happy to work on common ground with the people in the party who have different opinions.
I do agree with most of the 2012 Texas Solution. I am most concerned with maintaining our Republican Party support of the rule of law rather than expediency and appeal to emotion. For the most part, I disagree with the parts that were left out, along with the Solution’s call to end birthright citizenship “without exceptions.”
I was a member of the 2012 Platform Committee. Due to pressure from influential Texans, we voted on the Solution at the very last minute, when we had no time to debate or win support proposed amendments. Our report was due at the printers at a given time, so we had a strict time line.
The Committee narrowly voted against an amendment (made in spite of that deadline) that would have added a requirement that the process for a worker’s permit begin in the applicant’s country of origin. If we support allowing them to apply at an office in the US, we not only repeat the mistake of the Reagan amnesty of 1986 (encouraging an influx of illegal aliens hoping to qualify), we increase the vulnerability of the current illegal alien. Applicants would have to walk into a government facility, admit to being here illegally (whether they entered illegally or over-stayed a visa) , and our laws would need to either punish (fines), forgive or ignore his admission that he broke the law.
I am in favor of a very few exceptions to the above in the case of young adults who were brought here by parents when they were minors, but reached the age of majority. In those cases, the applicants don’t actually admit to breaking laws and we don’t have to ignore the rule of law.
However, I’m firm on the opinion that minors should live with their parents, even if the parents go back to their home country.
I disagree with the people who want to shut down immigration completely and those who want to end birthright citizenship (although minors with citizenship would need to go home with their parents at the end of the work visa until they aren’t minors). I also disagree with those who hold that people who have permits shouldn’t be allowed to bring their families. Our Party supports the family.
You may notice that I haven’t given links or names of the people who are talking about the Texas Solution. That was on purpose, because I don’t want to add to what is already acrimonious in-fighting. These are truly “just some thoughts” of my own. What do you think?
**The Texas Solution as it appeared in the final 2012 Platform of the Republican Party of Texas:
The Texas Solution – Because of decades-long failure of the federal government to secure our borders and address the immigration issue, there are now upwards of 11 million undocumented individuals in the United States today, each of whom entered and remain here under different circumstances. Mass deportation of these individuals would neither be equitable nor practical; while blanket amnesty, as occurred with the Simpson-Mazzoli Act of 1986, would only encourage future violations of the law. We seek common ground to develop and advance a conservative, market- and law-based approach to our nation’s immigration issues by following these principles:
1. Secure Our Borders – The U.S. Border must be secured immediately! We demand the application of effective, practical and reasonable measures to secure our borders and to bring safety and security for all Americans along the border and throughout the nation.
2. Modernize the United States Social Security Card – We support the improvement of our 1936 Social Security card to use contemporary anti-counterfeit technology. The social security card will not be considered a National ID card for U.S. citizens.
3. Birthright Citizenship – We call on the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial branches of the United States to clarify Section 1 of the 14th amendment to limit citizenship by birth to those born to a citizen of the United States with no exceptions.
4. Create an Effective and Efficient Temporary Worker Program – A national Temporary Worker Program should be implemented to bring skilled and unskilled workers into the United States for temporary periods of time when no U.S. workers are currently available. The program should also require:• Self-funding through participation fees and fines;
• Applicants must pass a full criminal background check;
• Applicants with prior immigration violations would only qualify for the program if they paid the appropriate fines;
• Applicants and/or Employers must prove that they can afford and/or secure private health insurance;
• Applicants must waive any and all rights to apply for financial assistance from any public entitlement programs;
• Applicant must show a proficiency in the English language and complete an American civic class;
• Temporary Workers would only be able to work for employers that deduct and match payroll taxes;
• All participants would be issued an individual Temporary-Worker Biometric Identification ard that tracks all address changes and both civil and criminal court appearances as a defendant.
American Academy of Family Physicians resignation
I wrote a very difficult letter today. I resigned from the organization that is supposed to support Family Physicians in our education, practice management and good medical care of our patients. Instead, the American Academy of Family Physicians too often strays toward forcing its members to be complicit with controversial policies such as condoning gun control and over-the-counter contraceptive drugs, and condemnation of “reparative therapy” for homosexual patients, even when those patients are unhappy with their sexuality. I write about my main conflicts and the “final straw” in the letter:
It is with great regret that I write this letter as notice that I have decided not to renew either my Texas or American Academy of Family Practice membership. While I am still a family doctor, neither the Texas Academy of Family Practice (TAFP) nor the American Academy of Family Practice (AAFP) represent my political or ethical views.
The political, social and ethical controversies were the main reason I remained in the Academy for the last few years since I left full time practice. I hoped that I could make a difference by volunteering my time and money as an active participant in the Texas Academy, the National Conference of Special Constituencies, the AAFP list serves, the Academy Legislative meetings in DC and our annual AAFP Congress of Delegates.
From the time of Hillary Clinton’s closed meetings on healthcare to the endorsement of the passage of the ACA before it was written, the political actions of the AAFP leaders has disappointed me in Washington, DC. Our practice hassle factors have grown and grown, too often with the blessings of – and sometimes due to the experiments with alternative methods of practice by – the Academy.
The AAFP advocated for elective abortion before I joined as a Student member and I accepted that the burden of persuasion was on those of us who disagreed.
However, the Academy’s decision to advocate for the redefinition of marriage in 2012 and the refusal to reconsider the extracted Resolution on marriage neutrality at the 2013 Congress of Delegates in San Diego were the final proof that there’s no tolerance for family doctors who hold conservative politics or traditional ethics in the Academy.
Unfortunately, our TAFP spokesperson to the 2013 AAFP Reference Committee on Advocacy misrepresented the Texas Delegation’s instructions from the Directors on marriage. As I remember the discussion and vote, the intention was to allow the Texas delegates wide latitude in voting on any final form of the Resolution.
I hereby resign from the Texas Academy of Family Physicians, the American Academy of Family Physicians and as a Fellow of the AAFP.
I waited to resign after nearly 30-year membership until the last minute before being dropped (for lack of paying my annual dues). There were several reasons for my hesitancy. For one thing, I didn’t want to be an undue influence on other members when they considered whether or not to write that hefty annual check to the Academy. For another, while I will continue to work with the AAFP and the Christian Medical and Dental Association to protect the right to life, marriage, the conscience rights of doctors within the profession of medicine and the specialty of Family Medicine, I do believe that it is important to work to persuade from within the organization. The biggest problem with finally writing the letter was that I was looking for a way to somehow keep my integrity while allowing the Academy to claim to represent me.
However, now that I’ve resigned, please consider sharing my letter with your family doctor. Many of them are unaware of the policies that our professional organizations push on good doctors of today and the students and residents who will be our doctors of tomorrow.
Our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The First Amendment protects political speech, which includes donating what we want, when we want, and to whom we want.
The Supreme Court today did not get rid of the individual candidate limit with the ruling, only the limits on overall donations to multiple candidates. You still can’t give more than $5200 per campaign cycle to any one candidate for Federal office.
Like the signers of the Declaration of Independence, we may pledge our fortunes to political candidates – within limits.
Taking vs. Redistribution
“The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.” Alex De Tocqueville
A March 27th Op-ed in the San Antonio Express News by Nicholas Kristof calls us a “Nation of Takers,” claiming that the US government gives welfare to the wealthy with mortgage tax “subsidies” for the wealthy and lower capital gains taxes as opposed to earned income taxes.
Forget that Kristof doesn’t understand the difference between taxes – where the government takes from some – and subsidies – where the government gives tax money to the benefactors the government selects. Taxes take, subsidies and benefits give.
Kristof assumes that all money is the government’s to tax, rather than the property of individuals who have the unalienable right to earn and accumulate what they earn to provide for themselves, their dependents, and for the future when they are unable to earn. The money doesn’t belong to even the most utilitarian – or Utilitarian* – government plan for its use.
Those capital gains taxes are on money already taxed and invested for a certain period of time. If you want to encourage investment, don’t tax it. If you want to encourage hoarding on the other hand . . .
As to those yachts and beach homes – people who don’t use these dwellings as their actual homes can’t claim the mortgage deduction. In any case, thanks to the effects of the alternate minimum tax, the wealthy don’t receive any mortgage tax deduction.
*Utilitarian good is the idea that government should rule “for the greatest good.” We end up with the biggest gun, the most charismatic leader or the majority voting — and eventually, “might makes right.”
“I have never understood why it is ‘greed’ to want to keep the money you’ve earned, but not greed to want to take somebody else’s money.” – Thomas Sowell
Feds List Lesser Prairie Chicken as Threatened
What about evolution?
The Obama administration said Thursday it is placing a grassland grouse known as the lesser prairie chicken on a list of threatened species, a move that could affect oil and gas drilling, wind farms and other activities in five central and southwestern states.
The decision by the Fish and Wildlife Service is a step below “endangered” status and allows for more flexibility in how protections for the bird will be carried out under the Endangered Species Act.
Dan Ashe, the agency’s director, said he knows the decision will be unpopular with governors in the five affected states — Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado and New Mexico — but said the agency was following the best science available.
“The lesser prairie-chicken is in dire straits,” Ashe said in an interview. “The bird is in decline and has been in decline for more than a decade.”
The prairie chicken, a type of grouse known for its colorful neck plume and stout build, has lost more than 80 percent of its traditional habitat, mostly because of human activity such as oil and gas drilling, ranching and construction of power lines and wind turbines, Ashe said. The bird, which weighs from 1-1/2 to 2 pounds, has also been severely impacted by the region’s ongoing drought.
Biologists say a major problem is that prairie chickens fear tall structures, where predators such as hawks can perch and spot them. Wind turbines, electricity transmission towers and drilling rigs are generally the tallest objects on the plains.
via Feds List Lesser Prairie Chicken as Threatened – ABC News.
Conservative answers about small government and marriage
Libertarians within the Republican Party and Republicans who are called “moderate” because they aren’t social Conservatives claim that we will win over more voters and that it’s hypocritical of small-government Conservatives to use government to define or license marriage.
Radio talk show host and commentator Dennis Prager destroyed the claim that Republicans could win elections by dropping our social conservative platform planks in his recent essay :
“To respond to the first argument, it is hard to believe that most people who call themselves fiscal conservatives and vote Democrat would abandon the Democratic Party if the Republican Party embraced same-sex marriage and abortion.
“The left and its political party will always create social issues that make Republicans and conservatives look “reactionary” on social issues. Today it is same-sex marriage, the next day it is the Republican “war on women,” and tomorrow it will be ending the objective male-female designation of Americans (Children should have the right to determine their gender and not have their parents and their genitalia determine it, even at birth). Or it will be animal rights, race-based affirmative action or an environmentalist issue.”
Contrary to the claims of those libertarians, traditional marriage of one man and one woman encourages smaller, not larger, government. State marriage licenses prevent the need for a formal legal contract (and a lawyer) before marriage in order to clarify the mutual duties and rights of spouses, inheritance, and a myriad of paternity/maternity rights within intact marriages, at death, and on dissolution of the marriage. Recognizing that not all marriages result in children, the laws do recognize the State’s “compelling interest” in defending the child’s right to life, liberty and property.
While some (on the Right, as well as the Left) might favor laws making entering into a marriage as burdensome and expensive as divorce, many people would simply cohabit. When they go their separate ways – or if one dies – without a marriage license, the Courts will still determine the separation of property and child custody. At best, the new burden will be added to the old. Or, more likely, whole new layers of court rulings and State or Federal legislation would have to be added to replace current law.
There are strong historic, biologic and societal reasons behind the support for defending the Conservative definition of marriage. The new definition is not clear-cut and has very little history. However, the proponents of gay marriage are seeking not only all of the legal – government – benefits and protections afforded traditional marriage, as well as special protection from those same governments to coerce everyone with a business license into participating in their nuptials. There’s nothing “small government” about “getting the State out of the marriage.”
4 Texas Dem Candidates Make Themselves Ineligible (More?)
You’ve read about arrests and raids on Democrat candidates, but have you heard about those who have made themselves ineligible to run for office in Texas?
At least four Texas Democrats have been quietly disqualified by Democrat leaders after they made themselves ineligible to run as Dems by voting in the Republican Primary. (Check your local Primary voters!)
In Seguin, Guadalupe County, the Democrat candidate for Justice of the Peace, Precinct 2, Manuel Cavallos, has been disqualified after the County Elections Administrator noticed that the unopposed Dem had voted in the Republican Primary.
In Liberty County, Texas, Monique Duffie Brooks, candidate for Justice of the Peace, voted early in the Republican Primary.
And in Refugio County, an anonymous tipster alerted the County elections administrator that two Democrat incumbent (again, unopposed) candidates voted Republican. Current County Commissioner Stanley Drew Tuttle and County Treasurer Elaine Henning will lose their jobs and salaries ($47,670 and $52,065, respectively).
All of these candidates will be replaced by their County’s Democrat Executive Committee. However, it was hard to find news articles about these four, even though I thought I knew where to look. With the very quiet news media, I wonder how many like them there are out there?
The battle over Medicaid expansion
When people have the facts, they oppose ObamaCare and Medicaid expansion.
When Virginia voters learn that ObamaCare’s Medicaid expansion slashes seniors’ Medicare, gives taxpayer-funded Medicaid coverage to former prison inmates and could deplete funding for critical state priorities, their support for ObamaCare’s Medicaid expansion plummets; this according to a new poll released today by the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA), a multi-state free-market think tank based in Florida.
The 10-question poll was conducted between March 7 and March 9, 2014, with 469 likely Virginia voters responding to all 10 questions.
Gordon Crovitz: Drones Cleared for Takeoff – WSJ.com
A victory for less regulation in our lives. Can’t wait to see what happens next.
This month a federal administrative judge held that the FAA has no legal authority to meddle in the market and dismissed a fine levied against an operator who defied regulators by getting paid to use a drone to film the University of Virginia campus. Judge Patrick Geraghty of the National Transportation Safety Board ruled that the agency had only issued internal guidance on drones and hadn’t followed any process to apply restrictions to the public. He ridiculed the FAA’s broad assertion of power to regulate drones by saying the agency could use the same argument arbitrarily to block “a flight in the air of a paper aircraft, or a toy balsa wood glider.”
Marriage, Activist Courts, Democracy and Evolution
An unelected Federal judge overturned the Texas Constitution’s definition of marriage, proving the Courts’ lack of respect for our Constitutional Republic – and democracy in general.
Marriage is what it is: the union between one man and one woman. No one, least of all a lawmaker in the form of an activist judge, can make two men or two women “one flesh,” literally or figuratively. Biology isn’t destiny, but it does have consequences. The biological reality is that the male form and the female form are complementary for both pleasurable sex and for procreation.
No one ever claimed that the design of water fountains made one fountain suitable for one race and another fountain suitable for the other. In contrast, there is an obvious biological and common sense suitability in the sexual union of the male and female body – as well as potential consequences of that union– that can’t be found in homosexual sex acts.
Even in polygamous marriage, the man enters into many marriages, each between himself and an individual woman. Polygamy doesn’t create a marriage between the man, his wives and that woman. There’s certainly more history in support of polygamy than for same sex “marriage.”
In their zeal to redefine marriage and restructure society, the Left and the US Federal Courts engage in the equivalent of LaMarckian experiments with the fundamental institution of social organization of our society and government.If, as the Left claims, our Nation has “evolved” toward their definition of marriage, why must the Courts turn over State Legislature after Legislature?
That the People and the States were to be sovereign over the United States Federal government is supported both by the 9th and 10th Amendments to the Constitution and the original document’s provision for an orderly Amendment process. The Courts must stop acting as though the Constitution reserves the major decisions to the Federal Courts, while only allowing the People and our elected Legislatures to decide inconsequential matters.
Note to the Anti-Incumbent Republicans
The “anti-establishment’ comments from the Right always remind me of the Left’s “don’t trust the establishment” anti-America crowd of ’60’s and ’70’s. It’s the same knee-jerk, across-the-board, ignore-loyalties, and follow-the-(anti-establishment)-leaders chant and rant heard around 1970.
This isn’t the first time I’ve written on this subject, but here goes, once again.
The Republican’s problem is that we failed to get out the Republican vote and lost what little majority we had in the House in the 2006 mid-term election and allowed the media and the Left to claim it was because of the war on terror (read former Secretary of Defense Bob Gates’ memoirs, Duty, for verification of the belief in DC). Then, conservative voters refused to vote for Republican candidates for President in 2008 and 2012. They ignored Reagan’s “80%” rule (“The person who agrees with you 80 percent of the time is a friend and an ally — not a 20 percent traitor.”), stayed home, claiming “purity.”
(Or, how about Sarah Palin’s observation that the Dems never talk about “DINO’s:”
“Some far-right conservatives are enamored of the term “RINO,” standing for “Republican in name only.” But is there an equivalent term “DINO,” standing for Democrat-in-name-only? No, the Party of the Donkey isn’t that politically stubborn. They just call them “Democrats.” They win with their approach — and we lose (too often) with ours.”)
The reality we have to deal with is that there is a majority of Dems in the Senate, the White House and the media. Every effort – even the valiant effort to defund Obamacare by the House and Boehner in September – is twisted into something else. Have any of the anti-incumbents said one good thing about that effort by the House and Boehner, or did they just turn on the “establishment?”
Did they support Boehner and the House Republicans when they passed the bill defunding ObamaCare? Have they corrected anyone who claimed that the House Republicans cut Veterans benefits, when in fact, they cut the increase from 5% to 4%?
The anti-incumbents are teaching the same “lessons” of 2006-2012: Republicans can’t be counted on.
Filibuster: A tool used by the Republican Senate
For those who claim that the Senate Republicans “cave” too often, a graph showing the increased use of the best tool the minority has in the Senate:
About Katrina Pierson for Congress
I hope everyone is looking carefully at the anti-incumbent candidates in the upcoming Republican Primary. Not all of them are as conservative as they would have you believe.
For instance, there’s the candidate running against conservative, prolife, pro-family Congressman Pete Sessions of the Texas Congressional District 32.
Katrina Pierson, who last achieved notoriety when she called an honorable man “deformed” due to his injuries as a Marine in Iraq.
However, few heard about Pierson’s anti-Conservative tweets on “social issues” and “homosexuality” which were the subject of a Wingright.org post a month later, just before the run-off in July, 2012.
(These Tweets are evidently still on her Twitter account, as I downloaded them anew, today, February 16, 2014. I wonder how long she’ll leave them up?)
It’s important that those voting know about how the candidates really feel about the “social issues,” don’t you think?
I’ve asked some supporters of Pierson to speak to her and get her on record as pro-life and pro-marriage, but haven’t heard back from them. I hope before you vote for her, you will ask her yourself.
You say “Mispoke,” I say “Lie” – NYTimes.com
“That, they say, violates President Obama’s pledge that if you like the insurance you have, you can keep it.
“Mr. Obama clearly misspoke when he said that.”
Food Stamp Enrollment Growth (with Interactive Map)
If Federal 
If the Federal government increases spending and decreases limits, is it surprising that people take advantage of it?
If you’re concerned about the news that the Federal food stamp program funding will be cut 5%, take a look at this map from the June, 2013 Wall Street Journal, showing the percentage of population in each state which receives Federal food stamps.
It is accompanied by a graph of growth of food stamp enrollment depicting periods of enrollment. 
That bright red line is Texas’ growth, which is nearly parallel with the US average, shown as a grey-green line. (Take a look at the annual spikes of Alaska’s enrollment, which I guess is due to the disbursement of the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend.)
But take a look at the growth since the “Stimulus” was passed by the Dem-controlled House and Senate, nearly doubling funds for food stamps and increasing the number of recipients from 28 million to 48 million.
Since the increase in enrollment has been over 70%, that 5% cut in payments will not bring the spending levels back to pre-recession levels. Wouldn’t it make sense to tighten up on the eligibility requirements, rather than make an across-the-board cut?
Unions to win delay of ObamaCare tax (Not the rest of us, tho’)
Labor unions are poised to score the delay of an ObamaCare tax in the bipartisan budget deal emerging in the Senate.
The bargain under negotiation would make small adjustments to the healthcare law, including delaying the law\’s reinsurance fee for one year. The three-year tax is meant to generate revenue that will stabilize premiums on the individual market as sick patients enter the risk pool.
via Unions poised to win delay of ObamaCare tax in budget deal – The Hill’s Healthwatch.
“Welcome to the Party, Pal” | The Northern Right
Amen to this:
“So what do we Americans do with a feral, out of control administration, misusing and abusing their authority? Well, we can start transferring power and authority out of Washington DC back to the many states. Doing this with all public lands, National Parks, National Forests, Wilderness Areas, National Monuments and everything else the feds own and operate would be a good first start. Follow it up with moving all licensing and permitting back to the states.”
UnitedHealthcare drops physicians from Medicare plan – Financial Mines
“Keep your doctor?” NOT!
Physicians across the state are reeling after they were informed that they will no longer be participants in a popular Medicare program.
UnitedHealthcare sent a letter dated Oct. 2 to 810 primary care physicians and 1,440 physician specialists, telling them that the separation from its Medicare Advantage network would be effective Feb. 1, 2014.
The business, a unit of Minnetonka, Minn.-based UnitedHealth Group, said affected physicians have the right to appeal and told them that their agreements for other UnitedHealthcare networks will not be impacted.
The notification came as a surprise to the Fairfield Medical Association, which counts 1,499 physicians in its ranks.
“They’re letting 19 percent of the physicians in the network go,” said Mark Thompson, executive director of the association. “This is where insurance companies are using insurance contracts to interfere with the doctor-patient relationship.”
via UnitedHealthcare drops physicians from Medicare plan – Financial Mines.
ObamaCare begins to “Ping” the IRS for information
What might have been missed in all the emotional media coverage about the troubles people are having with the ObamaCare exchanges and the news that the IRS official shared tax information with the WhiteHouse:
Hall Ingram said a key piece of the healthcare law’s new infrastructure — the federal “data hub” — is working well.
When consumers apply for insurance and tax subsidies through an exchange, the exchange uses the data hub to draw information from several state and federal agencies to confirm applicants’ identity and calculate the subsidies they can receive.
Exchanges have successfully pinged the IRS’s servers to request income information about applicants, and the IRS has been able to respond, she said.
“As far as we can tell, and we are looking on a daily basis, it\’s operating well,” Hall Ingram said.
via GOP grills IRS’s ObamaCare chief – The Hill’s Healthwatch.
Obama Stumbles Despite Friendly Press « Commentary Magazine
After explaining his “history,” of posturing and hiding unpopular legislation by attaching it to another Bill, President Obama truly stumbles:
“And you know, we don’t get to select which programs we implement or not.”
via Obama Stumbles Despite Friendly Press « Commentary Magazine.
Iguess it depends on the meaning of “select,” because as the article notes,
“Obama chooses which parts of which laws he wants to implement and enforce at will, as if Congress were a supercommittee brainstorming ideas rather than a coequal branch passing laws . . “
Even the CDC is victim to the #ShutDown #TemperTantrum!
Someone was paid to put this notice on the Centers for Disease Control website! On the home page, it’s on a red background! (But don’t worry: they also have a reminder to sign up for ObamaCare.)
Due to the lapse in government funding, only web sites supporting excepted functions will be updated unless otherwise funded. As a result, the information on this website may not be up to date, the transactions submitted via the website may not be processed, and the agency may not be able to respond to inquiries until appropriations are enacted.
Updates regarding government operating status and resumption of normal operations can be found at http://www.usa.gov.
Update, 7:30 PM 10/7/13: The National Institutes of Health also has a disclaimer.
The New Face of Prejudice – WSJ.com
I’ll let you read the translation byJames Taranto’s Best of the Web Today (in the Wall Street Journal) of this little bigoted “memo” against the Republicans, the Tea Party and Evangelicals sent out by “Democracy Corps'” Stan Greenberg and James Carville on your own ( The “memo” is also available for download online in pdf) , but you probably won’t have too much trouble anticipating it from this excerpt:
We expected that in this comfortable setting or in their private written notes, some [participants] would make a racial reference or racist slur [sic] when talking about the African American President. None did. They know that is deeply non-PC and are conscious about how they are perceived. But focusing on that misses how central is race to the worldview of Republican voters. They have an acute sense that they are white in a country that is becoming increasingly \”minority,\” and their party is getting whooped by a Democratic Party that uses big government programs that benefit mostly minorities, create dependency and a new electoral majority. Barack Obama and Obamacare is [sic] a racial flashpoint for many Evangelical and Tea Party voters.
How could anyone take seriously a memo co-authored by these two men? Especially one that is supposed to explain Republicans, using “word cloud” graphic, featured above? Mr. Taranto didn’t, but found at least one author on Bloomberg who did.
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1996: Virgin Islands beach reopened
Judge orders Virgin Islands beach reopened
January 4, 1996
Web posted at: 12:45 a.m. EST
ST. CROIX, U.S. Virgin Islands (CNN) — A federal judge Wednesday ordered the National Park Service to reopen the Buck Island Reef National Monument despite the ongoing federal budget crisis.
Two Virgin Island residents sued in federal district court to have the park reopened, arguing they were being hurt by the closure of the beach at Buck Island. They said the shutdown had denied them the ability of “freely enjoying a cherished natural resource.” They further argued that the Park Service had violated the federal Open Shorelines Act by closing the beach.
The National Park Service argued it had no choice because the budget crisis had forced it to reduce the normal staff of “two to three employees” to one employee and one volunteer.
Feds “own” or “run” too much – Update
It’s not just that this is the first time that US citizens have been barred from the Lincoln Memorial due to a government shutdown, the National Parks service is barring us from scenic drives and overlooks on public and state highways, open beaches and the waters around them, and private businesses that are paying tenants of “government” lands and waters.
One former Secretary of the Interior, Gale Norton, flatly states that these decisions are political and most likely being made in the White House.
Perhaps, instead of blaming one Party or another (or increasing government involvement in something as vital and intimate as the delivery of medical care), it’s time to decide whether our government is responsible enough to own and control so much of our lands.
Update: more closings
1. The City Tavern in Philadelphia, because the Feds own the building, not the business.
2.Nauset Knoll Motor Lodge, which leases land in Cape Cod National Seashore.
3. All sorts of fishing, rafting and hiking. Search the news on any of these topics – there are too many to post.
4. Government sponsored travel, such as the President’s Asian trip. But it also will block scientific conferences.
Edited Oct 4, 2013 at 2 PM to change the picture to one that I own.
White House Ordering Hundreds of Privately Run, Privately Funded Parks to Close
The order to shut down business that pay money to the Federal government rather than cost money came from ” ‘above the department’, which I presume means the White House” . . .
“My company, based in North Phoenix, operates nearly over 100 US Forest Service campgrounds and day use areas under concession contract. Yesterday, as in all past government shutdowns, the Department of Agriculture and US Forest Service confirmed we would stay open during the government shutdown. This makes total sense, since our operations are self-sufficient (we are fully funded by user fees at the gate), we get no federal funds, we employ no government workers on these sites, and we actually pay rent into the Treasury.”
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