Here are the Bar Association recommendations in the judicial elections today.
Category: Politics As Usual
Don’t vote for Christie
No doubt helped along by numerous fawning media profiles, many New Jersey Democrats plan to vote for Chris Christie tomorrow. They talk about how he’s a “straight shooter” and gosh darn it, they just like the guy.
And you know, he can be very likable — at times. If your only exposure to him is a quick shot on the local news, he can be amusing, even charming.
Like most con men, he’s very good at simulating sincerity.
You like straight talk? I’ll give you some. Chris Christie is a high-living rich guy who does whatever even richer guys tell him to do. And if you vote for him tomorrow, you will strengthen the national profile of a persuasive liar who plans to take this country down a very destructive path.
He ran as a Republican who cares about the environment – and pulled out of the ten-state Regional Greenhouse Gas program, because the Koch brothers . (So if you think about it, he actually contributed to the conditions that created Hurricane Sandy.)
He asked the state legislature for a ban on the armor-piercing Barrett .50 caliber rifle — and then he vetoed it.. Because a group of New Hampshire wingnuts sent him a warning letter, and he has presidential ambitions. So much for his “courage.”
He’s vetoed voting reform moves — because the national Republicans oppose it. Why do you suppose he vetoed the new transit tunnel? Because national Republicans hate government progress. So much for his “independence.”
You know what his job was, before he became a U.S. attorney? He was a Wall Street lobbyist, working for now-convicted felon Bernie Madoff. You know what he accomplished? He got securities fraud removed from a consumer fraud act. “Chris Christie, looking out for you”? Don’t kid yourself.
This bully boy loves to pick on teachers — even though it was Republican policies that depleted the pension funds.
Blue Jersey has spelled it all out before:
When Chris Christie first ran for Freeholder and was sued for defamation, it wasn’t his fault and he did nothing wrong.
When Chris Christie went from “not a candidate for US Attorney” to being appointed US Attorney after he was directly responsible for raising hundreds of thousands (and his brother donates hundreds of thousands) for Bush, the donations had nothing to do with it.
And when many top NJ lawyers pointed out that Christie didn’t have any experience in criminal law and his appointment was directly connected to the above hundreds of thousands in donations for Bush, that was just a coincidence.
Continue reading “Don’t vote for Christie”
NYC votes today for mayor
Funny, the cable talking heads will pronounce a Christie victory as a “comeback for Republicans,” but a DeBlasio win will be treated like an anomaly:
New York votes for new mayor after Bloomberg (via AFP)
Millions of New Yorkers go to the polls Tuesday to elect a new mayor, with left-wing progressive Bill de Blasio tipped for a landslide victory to replace billionaire Michael Bloomberg. The 52-year-old public advocate and his black formerly lesbian wife…
Quote of the day
We actually spend more public money than many (most?) of our peer wealthy nations on health care, mostly Medicaid, Medicare, and veteran benefits. They get universal health care for their public expenditures. We get health care for just the elderly, the extreme poor, and some veterans.
‘Let’s stop trying to please Republicans’
Van Jones:
I don’t understand how this individual mandate is something that we’ve allowed the Republicans to define as some sort of, quote-unquote, government takeover. In fact, it’s their idea. The progressives were saying we want single-payer. Myself, I would say why do you need insurance companies for health care at all. Insurance is what you buy when you don’t know if something bad is going to happen. Maybe I’ll crash my car. Maybe I won’t. I don’t know. So I’m going to get car insurance just in case. Everybody’s going to get sick and die, so you know every single person’s going to need health insurance. That’s not something you can provide insurance for, that’s called a service.
So my view, single-payer. The Republicans always said, no, that’s too much government. So we came back and said, okay, no single-payer. How about a public option? So you’d a public program, everybody could join Medicare or compete with the private companies, too much government. We want individual responsibility. So we said, fine, you win. We’ll do it your way, individual mandate. And then, they say that is a socialist government takeover. Well, hold on a second now. You’re now a part of the pro-moocher caucus? You’re saying it’s okay for people to just dive bomb their way into the emergency room? Yeah, don’t worry about it. Don’t get any insurance. The government will pay for it. Now, you’re like the pro-freeloader party?
Continue reading “‘Let’s stop trying to please Republicans’”
The unemployment benefits cliff
As I think you’ve figured out by now, these cuts aren’t economically sound. They’re just punitive:
[…] unemployment benefits to jobless workers for longer than the normal maximum of 26 weeks have been extended repeatedly, although the maximum duration of benefits has fallen from a peak of 99 weeks to 73 weeks. The Emergency Unemployment Compensation program, financed by the federal government for states that meet certain unemployment and state benefit thresholds, is scheduled to end Jan. 1.
The recent fiscal showdown in Washington make further extensions less likely. And the end of these emergency unemployment benefits could create a further drag on the economy.
The so-called food stamp cliff “may be more of a sidewalk curb,” Mr. Feroli wrote in an email. “The bigger cliff, which I’m surprised people aren’t talking about, is emergency unemployment benefits Jan. 1.” That, he estimated, could shave 0.4 percentage point off growth in the first quarter next year.
I usually just call them ‘whores’
But I suppose “liberalwashing” works just as well!
Busting a dark money Koch ring
Seems like they shouldn’t just be able to buy the country, should they?
Dark Money, Honey: How a Koch Ring Got Busted (via LA Progressive)
Last week’s announcement of a settlement between the state of California and two political campaign organizations linked to the Koch brothers fittingly coincided with the centenary of the first scientific explorations of Los Angeles’ La Brea Tar…
Please call your congress critters
Spooky Obamacare tale debunked
It’s a shame that our lazy lapdog media, with rare exceptions, are scaring the shit out of people with Obamacare horror stories. Look how easily debunked this one was by Michael Hiltzik, the wonderfully conscientious LA Times reporter:
The bottom line is that Cavallaro’s assertion that “there’s nothing affordable about the Affordable Care Act,” as she put it Tuesday on NBC Channel 4, is the product of her own misunderstandings, abetted by a passel of uninformed and incurious news reporters.
I talked with Cavallaro, 60, after her CNBC appearance. Let’s walk through what she told me.
Her current plan, from Anthem Blue Cross, is a catastrophic coverage plan for which she pays $293 a month as an individual policyholder. It requires her to pay a deductible of $5,000 a year and limits her out-of-pocket costs to $8,500 a year. Her plan also limits her to two doctor visits a year, for which she shoulders a copay of $40 each. After that, she pays the whole cost of subsequent visits.
This fits the very definition of a nonconforming plan under Obamacare. The deductible and out-of-pocket maximums are too high, the provisions for doctor visits too skimpy.
As for a replacement plan, she says she was quoted $478 a month by her insurance broker, but that’s a lot more than she’ll really be paying. Cavallaro told me she hasn’t checked the website of Covered California, the state’s health plan exchange, herself. I did so while we talked.
Here’s what I found. I won’t divulge her current income, which is personal, but this year it qualifies her for a hefty federal premium subsidy.
At her age, she’s eligible for a good “silver” plan for $333 a month after the subsidy — $40 a month more than she’s paying now. But the plan is much better than her current plan — the deductible is $2,000, not $5,000. The maximum out-of-pocket expense is $6,350, not $8,500. Her co-pays would be $45 for a primary care visit and $65 for a specialty visit — but all visits would be covered, not just two.
Is that better than her current plan? Yes, by a mile.
If she wanted to pay less, Cavallaro could opt for lesser coverage in a “bronze” plan. She could buy one from the California exchange for as little as $194 a month. From Anthem, it’s $256, or $444 a year less than she’s paying now. That buys her a $5,000 deductible (the same as she’s paying today) but the out-of-pocket limit is lower, $6,350. Office visits would be $60 for primary care and $70 for specialties, but again with no limit on the number of visits. Factor in the premium savings, and it’s hard to deny that she’s still ahead.
Cavallaro told me a couple of things that are worth considering. First, what she likes about her current plan is that she can go to any doctor of her choice and any hospital. That’s not entirely true, because her current plan with Anthem does favor a network. Plainly, however, it’s broad enough to serve her purposes. She’s concerned that the new plans will offer smaller networks, which is probably true, though it’s not necessarily true that the new networks will exclude her favorite doctors, hospitals or prescription formularies.
She also mentioned that her annual income fluctuates. It can be substantially lower, or substantially higher, than it is this year. What if next year she earns too much to qualify for the subsidy? Also a fair point — at her current income, the subsidy is worth more than $200 a month to her. But that’s not the same as saying that “there’s nothing affordable about the Affordable Care Act,” because at her current income, the act is vastly more affordable to her than what she’s paying now.
When she told Channel 4 that “for the first time in my whole life, I will be without insurance,” it’s hard to understand what she was talking about. (Channel 4 didn’t ask.) Better plans than she has now are available for her to purchase today, some of them for less money.
The sad truth is that Cavallaro has been very poorly served by the health insurance industry and the news media. It seems that Anthem didn’t adequately explain her options for 2014 when it disclosed that her current plan is being canceled. If her insurance brokers told her what she says they did, they failed her. And the reporters who interviewed her without getting all the facts produced inexcusably shoddy work — from Maria Bartiromo on down. They not only did her a disservice, but failed the rest of us too.