Sounds Kinda Important, Actually

via Balloon Juice yesterday:

Today is the day that a significant part of the Affordable Care Act took effect. Today is the day that companies that sell and provide health insurance have to start spending 80% to 85% of their income from insurance premiums actually delivering the services for which they charge their customers. Overhead like office space and supplies, marketing expenses, salaries, and yes, profits have to come out of the remaining 15-20%. The rule is called the the medical loss ratio, and in an important decision recently by the Department of Health and Human Services, the insurance companies cannot count the sales commissions that they give out to the people who sell you your insurance plan against the medical loss ratio.

So lemme see - Repubs are promising to "repeal ObamaCare", which (so far) means:

• they want 4,000,000 small businesses to lose their tax breaks
• they want state governments to lose federal help in meeting their Medicaid obligations
• they want the feds to stop cracking down on Medicare fraud
• they want people taking early retirement to lose their Gap Coverage
• they want 4,000,000 seniors to lose the donut hole discounts on Brand Name meds
• they want the 15,000,000 young adults who can now stay covered by their parents' insurance to lose their coverage
• they want insurance companies to go back to using tricks and traps to justify rescinding coverage; and they don't want any way for a patient to appeal rescission. 
• they want the 20,000,000 Americans who used to be subject to denial of coverage due to "pre-existing conditions" to lose their coverage
• they want the insurance companies to arbitrate payouts according to business considerations instead of clinical evaluation.
• they want 20,000,000 low-income Americans to lose access to Community Health Centers
• they want Americans living in (mostly rural) underserved ares to lose support for the docs and nurses who want to stay in those places, but can't afford it

And as of 02-DEC-2011, they want the insurance companies to continue to have the option of jacking up your premiums in order to pay sales bonuses, and to pay out nice fat stock dividends, and, and, and - the law now requires the insurers to pay out 80% of their revenues to healthcare providers.  As much as I hate strict regulation on actual levels of profit and reward, I can't help but see this as a common-sense attempt to get us all to understand that healthcare is just one of the things that can't be shoehorned into the standard business school model.

Take a quick peek at the ObamaCare Timeline.

Crooks & Liars vs Naomi Wolf

C&L blogger Karoli is engaged in what I characterize as a cat fight with Naomi Wolf over Wolf's assertion that some city governments coordinated with DHS regarding the crackdown on OWS.

While I agree with a lot of the commenters that Karoli doesn't need to parse Wolf's statements quite so closely, I think Karoli is mostly right to remind us that intuition is important and should not be ignored, but real evidence is what we're supposed to be looking for - not suspicion and innuendo and assumption. 

Naomi Wolf Defends Herself By Ignoring Her Grand Conspiracy Theory

Oops - Herman Cain Could Be Out

So my prediction turns out to have been (apparently) totally wrong.  In a post from early November, I said the allegations of sexual impropriety would help Cain rather than hurt him.  Looks like I was way off on that one - and that should come as no big surprise to anybody.

Anyway, Herman says he'll be meeting with Mrs Cain this weekend, and should be making "a major announcement" about plans for his campaign.

Given that "sources close to the Cain family" have said Herm's marriage "never felt real", and that it seems he had to request a meeting with his wife to talk it over, everybody's calling this one done.

Christmas Lights

This is easily one of my absolute favorite times of the year.  I just get kinda jazzed about Christmas.  And one of the things that really gets me going is seeing the decorations go up - especially the ones that show a sense of the season that's a little (or a lot) skewed from "normal".

Coin-Operated Politicians

From the Ron Paul campaign (hat tip - BlueGal via facebook)

Somethin's Up

I'm not a big fan of either Dennis Kucinich or Ron Paul, but when they're both singin' the same tune on a particular issue, I start to get the feeling I should pay a little more attention to what they're trying to say - at least on that one thing.

Cuz God Made It So

I repeat - I'm a capitalist because God's a capitalist.

But we have to do it better; we have to get back to an understanding that the system has to serve the people, not the other way around; and we have to adjust the model so it's comprised of interlocking closed loops, rather than a series of disconnected linear dead ends.  Unfortunately, we've been suckered (again) into believing that the only way to make it work is to continue removing the controls.  Well, guess what you get when the free market system is completely unfettered - you get exactly what Americans had to fight a revolutionary war to throw off in the 18th century.  Aristocracy and entitlement, despotism and cronyism, inequality and slavery - any crappy thing you care to name that one human can do to another human.

Lastly, we have to remember that capitalism is a lousy substitute for democracy.

Today's Pix

When Newt Was Bullish On The Individual Mandate

Where did this Gingrich go? Well, he had to hide because the rubes who're running the GOP now drank the KoolAid that he insisted they drink on a constant basis thru the 90's. And he knows he doesn't stand a chance if he doesn't completely abandon even the appearance of the kind of rationality he used to talk about. He doesn't even try to sound reasonable any more - the rubes won't let him. (hat tip - Little Green Footballs)

Keeping Score

Anybody with a living, functioning brain knows DumFux News is a sham.  When was the last time they won any of the several awards for any kind of journalism?

From Loose Live Stock in 2007: (*)

CBS News: 154
ABC News: 122
NBC News: 114
PBS: 42
CNN: 33
BBC News: 15
MSNBC: 3
CNBC: 3
Dumont: 1
Fox News Channel: 0

Fun Fact #1:  Dumont only survived for about 12 years, and has been off the air for 55 years - and they still have more awards than DumFux News.

Fun Fact #2: The Daily Show with Jon Stewart is on Comedy Central for 30 minutes a night, 4 nights a week, about 40 weeks a year - Jon Stewart has won the Peabody more often than DumFux News.

Fun Fact #3: The only "awards" DumFux News has managed to win are the ones that have been made up by either former News Corp execs, or by the heavy hitters behind phony organizations like AEI and AFP.

(*) A quick turn thru Wiki and the awards sites indicates that the only thing that's changed is that everybody's won a couple of more times - except for Dumont and DumFux News.

Stay On Message

When Newt Gingrich imparts his wit and wisdom to us regarding OWS, and Rush Limbaugh points to 'rape, and property damage' in Zuccotti Park, remember one thing: it's not about any of that, so there's no need to defend against any of that. That's a typical ploy of someone who's trying to argue from a weak position.  They try to change the focus of the debate, and it works too damned often.

Ignore this bullshit - you can say straight out that it's not about any of that if you feel the need, but you must avoid helping them prop up their straw man.  If you take that particular bait, you'll end up sounding like you're trying to justify or rationalize criminal activities on the part of OWS protesters.

So pick a few of the points that are most important to you - points you think OWS represents to you - and stick to your guns.  BTW: these things don't have to have anything to do with any "Official OWS Statement".  Whatever you'd be protesting if you were organizing the thing is what you get to argue.  At it's heart, it's about free speech in a democracy, remember?


If you wanna try it, you can do a little sales-y thing called Isolating the Objection.  To wit: "So except for some bad actors, you agree with what OWS stands for - good - let's talk about the decline in wages over the last 35 years...; the dramatic rise in childhood poverty last year...; the fact that 52% of all Americans can expect to spend at least one year below the poverty level..."

You can also try a variation on The Turnaround:  "So we're agreed that illegal activity in any venue is immoral, and that it doesn't matter who the perpetrator is - so if it was a few very rich and powerful bankers committing crimes in Zuccotti Park, would you be arguing for or against holding them accountable?"

Tradition Addition Edition

My mother-in-law visits us every Thanksgiving for several days, and being full-blood Ukrainian (as is my lovely bride), she always helps us create some pysanky and we make a big (fully justified) fuss over the homemade perehe she brings us for dinner.

This year, a colleague who is married to a 1st generation Ukrainian beauty brought his family unit for a little visit, and introduced us to Medivka - a traditional concoction of vodka, spices and honey.  All I can say is "mighty fine".  And it's right next to spectacular when added to the morning coffee.

Pysanky

Perehe (aka pirogi)

Medivka:

1-1/4 cups water

Zest of 1 orange, tangerine and/or lemon

3 whole cloves

1 tsp. allspice

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

1 cup buckwheat honey

2-1/2 to 3 cups vodka (or grain alcohol)

Place the water, citrus zest, cloves, allspice, and nutmeg in a small saucepan. Cover and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes.

Strain the water through a clean cotton cloth into another pan and add the honey.

Bring to a low simmer, skimming the foam from the top.

Warm the vodka (or alcohol) in a bottle, in a water bath. 

Add the honey mixture to the warmed vodka (or alcohol), shake well, cap, and let cool.

A Meme Is Born

via quickmeme.com

And I saved the best (mine, of course) for last.

Best Guitar Player You Never Heard Of

Tommy Emmanuel - sorry about the sound quality; still looking for something better.

Meme Wildfire