The Obamacare pig needs a lot more than lipstick

Galen Institute; The administration’s audacious blame game  "The White House is trying to shift responsibility to health insurance companies for forcing people out of their existing health plans, but the companies are required to discontinue these plans to comply with the president’s health law.

"The administration is trying to deflect Americans’ rightful anger over losing the health plans they were promised they could keep, but the strategy of shifting blame flies in the face of the facts." ...

 

No Such Thing as a Free Lunch   "Obamacare came about because people were willing to make slight changes to the health-care system because of concerns over the uninsured. Only 44 percent of the respondents were satisfied with the “overall quality of the American health care system,” but this was out of concern for what they thought was happening to others, not their own health care." 

Time to use the f-word about Obamacare  The word is "fraud." It is now clear that the American people and their representatives in Congress were lied to, in order to obtain passage of Obamacare. When someone is induced to undertake an action based on false representations, that constitutes fraud. Investor's Business Daily  lays out the calculation that motivated the fraud."

 

 Democratic Senator Jumps Ship  "Landrieu to introduce bill to keep Obamacare promise of "if you like your health plan, you can keep it' ."

 

Happy Halloween! Obamacare: It Was A Graveyard Smash

Weasel Zippers

From Watchdog.org:  "Happy Halloween and Happy Obamacare enrollment period!"

Obamacare Navigator Hasn't Signed Up Anyone Because It's Too Expensive

"Thus far everybody has taken a look at the rates and they've walked out the door."

The Weekly Standard,  "Al Jazeera finds an Obamacare navigator in Colorado who hasn't signed up anybody for the new program because it's too expensive:"

Sharyl Attkisson: Insurance 'Death Spiral' Could Cause ObamaCare's 'Collapse'

"Besides facing a "credibility death spiral" on the issue of ObamaCare, as political director John Dickerson recently put it, Sharyl Attkisson pointed out on Tuesday's CBS Evening News that the very structure of the so-called reform could encounter a separate "death spiral" due to the "enrollment fiasco" surrounding HealthCare.gov." More. 

Obamacare Didn’t Cancel Your Plans. He blames it on insurance companies and threatens them if they speak out

Be very afraid of this man.

 

 

Obama and Sebelius: Obamacare Didn’t Cancel Your Plans  "But President Obama and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius are now denying this.

"Yesterday, they both came out publicly to tell America that it’s not Obamacare that’s causing you to receive a cancellation notice—it’s your insurance company.
"Obama called insurance plans that are getting canceled “substandard” and said people could actually keep those plans if insurers still offered them (which they can’t under the President’s health care law). He said those plans are getting canceled only if “insurers decided to downgrade or cancel these substandard plans” (which they must under the law)."

Well, I guess. My wife and I are in our seventies and have just discovered after all these years that our Blue Cross/ Blue Shield plan covers neither birth control nor prenatal care.

Obama re-demonizes insurance industry  I'm glad to never have been a coworker with Obama in the private sector, aren't you? Can you imagine how he would be in the boss's office, blaming you for everything that went wrong?
During my working years, we referred to people like that as "weasels" and "backstabbers". The Tunnel Dweller

"We reported on this before.  Health insurance execs afraid to talk on record about Obamacare computer problems.
"CNN reports today, White House Pressuring Insurance Companies To Not Criticize ObamaCare:"   Emphasis added.

Thank these Republicans for Obamacare

Ann Coulter  "We have Obamacare for one reason and one reason only: For a brief, ghoulish period in recent history, Democrats controlled the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives.
"We don’t have Obamacare because the public was clamoring for it. We have it because Republicans lost elections."  Full Article.
....
"When your new health insurance premiums arrive in the mail, and you can’t find a doctor in your plan who speaks English, tell me the fight between Republicans and Democrats is not that important."

eaglerising.com

Halloween and Obamacare

 

 

 

 

 

 

Watcher’s Council Nominations – ObamaCare Trick Or Treat Edition 

The World's Most Powerful People 2013 (UPDATED)

Forbes

"Who’s more powerful: the autocratic leader of a former superpower or the handcuffed commander in chief of the most dominant country in the world? This year the votes for the World’s Most Powerful went to Russian President Vladimir Putin. He climbs one spot ahead of U.S. President Barack Obama, who held the title in 2012."....

UPDATE: Is Putin Really More Powerful Than Obama?   "The second and far bigger point is that Barack Obama is weak internationally by choice. At home he’s amassing immense, unprecedented powers over the economy."...



....
"Internationally, however, Obama is the weakest President of the post-World War II years."  (Emphasis added, TD)

The President Who Has Done the Most Damage

"The only question is whether it can ever be undone. "

iowntheworld.com

Dennis Prager   ...."But I have never written or broadcast that our country was being seriously damaged by a president. So it is with great sadness that I write that President Barack Obama has done and continues to do major damage to America. The only question is whether this can ever be undone."....

"....Nearly everything he has touched has been made worse.
"He did, however, promise before the 2008 election that “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” That is the one promise he has kept."

The bystander president

More Photosnark from Rich Terrell

Terrell Aftermath

NY Times: Where the Buck Stops, Some See a Bystander  "President Obama finds himself under fire on two disparate fronts these days, both for the botched rollout of his signature health care program and for the secret spying on allied heads of state. In both instances, his explanation roughly boils down to this: I didn’t know."

Controversies show how Obama’s inattention to detail may hurt his presidential legacy    From Hot Air: "Let’s start with the latter example from Scott Wilson, whose posits that talking big and having no interest in doing the necessary work forms a coherent management philosophy:"....

 

Reposted from an earlier TW:  Victor Davis Hanson: Is Obama Still President?   "His cadences soar on, through scandal after fiasco after disaster."

 

­What didn’t the president know, and why didn’t he know it?   "Once you lose a reputation for competence, it is hard to get back. And much of the media are now depicting Obama as less than a hands-on leader.
"Take this slap in the face:
“ 'For a smart man, President Obama professes to know very little about a great number of things going on in his administration.' ”  Dana Milbank of the WaPo.

Obama just got used to saying things that were never challenged  "President, and before, candidate Obama had the benefit of saying things that the media never challenged.  It's true that they were challenged by the GOP but that is partisan.  What we did not have was an aggressive, but respectful media."

A Deficit of Stories

National Review Online  

"How did it happen? How did we wake up one day to find ourselves cast as the bad guys for trying to save future generations from a lifetime of indebtedness? Why are we punished for pointing out that if we keep spending more money than we take in, we won’t continue to be a great country? Why do Americans view the Republican party more negatively than they view Democrats, when it’s Democrats who gave us Detroit? And Democrats who might soon turn America into Detroit?"

Comment on this article in Freedomworks:

MR: "Holding the government hostage attempting to blackmail Congress is a valid reason for people to dislike any party."

Tunnel Dweller: "But it was the Obama administration that spent great amounts of our money to build spite fences around monuments. Whether Republicans were right or wrong to lead the shutdown, that cannot be denied."

Obama's Military Coup Purges 197 Officers In Five Years

Investors.com "What the president calls "my military" is being cleansed of any officer suspected of disloyalty to or disagreement with the administration on matters of policy or force structure, leaving the compliant and fearful.
...."Yet what has happened to our officer corps since President Obama took office is viewed in many quarters as unprecedented, baffling and even harmful to our national security posture." Watch him say it

 

politelypatrician.blogspot.com
 

strangemilitary.com

Is Obama Still President?

"His cadences soar on, through scandal after fiasco after disaster."

 

Victor Davis Hanson  "We are currently learning whether the United States really needs a president. Barack Obama has become a mere figurehead, who gives speeches few listen to any more, issues threats that scare fewer, and makes promises that almost no one believes he will keep. Yet America continues on, despite the fact that the foreign and domestic policies of Barack Obama are unraveling, in a manner unusual even for star-crossed presidential second terms.
"Abroad, American policy in the Middle East is leaderless and in shambles after the Arab Spring — we’ve had the Syrian fiasco and bloodbath, leading from behind in Libya all the way to Benghazi, and the non-coup, non-junta in Egypt."....

....
"Second, the other half of Americans gladly accept that Obama is an iconic rather than a serious president. Given his emblematic status as the nation’s first African-American president and his efforts to craft a vast coalition of those with supposed grievances against the majority, he will always have a strong base of supporters."....

 

The Environmental Enemies of Energy

Alan Caruba  "....there is another threat to our future as environmental groups like the Sierra Club and Friends of the Earth continue their assault on the provision of electrical energy, the lifeblood of the nation’s economy and our ability to function at home and on the job."

"Coal, oil and natural gas are labeled “dirty” for propaganda purposes, but what the Sierra Club and others do not tell you and will never tell you is that they account for most of the electricity generated in America, along with nuclear and hydropower. Wind and solar power provide approximately 3% of the electricity and require government subsidies and mandates to exist. Their required use drives up the cost of electricity to consumers."

Operation Market Garden, Sept 1944

Market Garden 1944  "On this website we will not try to provide you with an all-inclusive report about the battle that took place. We will try to give you an impression through the recollections of men and women that where involved in this battle. We will not focus only on the battle."

Coming in 2014: 70th Commemoration of Market garden 1944-2014
You can find the info about the 2014 commemoration here.
 800 photos from market garden here in Dutch archives.

UK Daily Mail: 'All ranks now exhausted': Desperate telegram that spelled end of 'A Bridge Too Far' battle when 9,000 British airmen launched bid to break into Germany is found

"Now, the desperate telegram calling for reinforcements has come to light."

"The main problem the British men faced was the unexpected encounter of two elite German Panzer tank divisions that happened to be resting in Arnhem."More here.
 

Another video: World War Two: Operation Market Garden 1944

(Photo, right) British prisoners captured in the suburbs of Arnhem, September 26, 1944

The book, "A Bridge Too Far"

Below: Short clip from the TV series, Band of Brothers



http://www.csupomona.edu/~rosenkrantz/paratroop/newspaper.htm

The trailer from the film A Bridge Too Far

Several eyewitness accounts of the Waal crossing in the book, Strike and Hold

Press account: NAZIS DIED LIKE FLIES IN BATTLE OF NIJMEGEN BRIDGE, over the river Waal.
Tuesday October 10, 1944, by the Indianapolis Times Foreign Correspondent.

Rosenkrantz, with a machine gun squad, was in position at the northern end of the bridge when suddenly a whole battalion of German infantry, unaware that the crossing had been made and intent on escaping back toward Germany, started across in marching formation, three abreast. The small band of paratroopers, outnumbered more than 10 to one, waited until the bridge was clogged with Germans from end to end and then, revealing their commanding position, called on the advance foe to surrender. Instead, the Germans began throwing hand grenades.

German units opposing the British at Arnhem were the 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions. Here are history summaries of these two units:
The 9th SS Panzer Division Hohenstaufen

10th SS Panzer Division "Frundsberg"   German WW2 documentary on Frundsberg
 

Tourist video of the Waal crossing site 

A Picture Worth a Thousand Words

Katie Pavlich

"I would like to point out that the percentage of the population actually involved in or supporting the "20-year-olds in 2011" is small, but the entitlement attitude in America is completely out of control. This also gives us an opportunity to thank the 20-year-olds in 2011 who are opposite of the occupiers: our young men and women serving voluntarily in our armed forces in the fight for freedom against radical Islam. In an age when true sacrifice is rare, we should be thanking them even more."



Ms. Pavlich thanks I am the 53% for this post:

 

15 Pop Culture Jack O’Lanterns That You Wish You Made Yourself

Buzzfeed    "How do you make a pumpkin more delightful? Carve in your favorite fandom. After that, you’ll be happier than Dracula at a blood bank! And just as happy as a person calling GEICO customer service."

Barack Obama: The Most Uninformed President in History

Big Government  ...."This weekend, we learned that President Obama "didn't know about" NSA spying on world leaders, especially German Chancellor Angela Merkel. He also "didn't know about" the posthumously obvious problems with the rollout of the ObamaCare website exchanges. According to the New York Times, these problems were evident eight months ago. Yet, it seems, they never made it to the President's desk.

"President Obama was also completely unaware that the IRS was subjecting conservative organizations to undue scrutiny on their tax-exempt applications. At the time of the alleged targeting, the IRS Commissioner visited the White House more than almost any other federal official, but, apparently, never disclosed his agency's targeting of political opponents of Obama."....
But wait! There's more!
And: "President Obama also, presumably, was unaware of the Justice Department's program to allow Mexican drug gangs to purchase military-grade arms from the US."....
 And: "President Obama also, apparently, didn't know that his spy agencies were monitoring millions of phone calls...."
 And: "President Obama also didn't know that his diplomatic mission in Libya had requested more security and felt threatened by rising tension in the war-torn country."....
....
So: He has advisors, right? He gets regular briefings, I assume. None of this ever comes up?...."

politics.ie/forum

Has Your Health Insurance Plan Been Canceled?

http://terrellaftermath.com/

Below is the text of a letter I wrote in the Tillamook, Oregon Headlight-Herald in 2012. It was titled, "Liberal solutions bring about mediocrity"

     My own father died nearly destitute, largely because of my hypochondriac mother who required bags-full of prescriptions and a schedule filled with doctor appointments.

      Another good friend was forced out of his home due to the oppressive expenses of caring for his wife with Alzheimer’s. The same happened to another relative whose wife had dementia. I see what long-term illness can do to a family’s finances and desperately wish something could be done to help.

     But I also see how the present solution of Pelosi-Obama’s vast plan can reach into every corner of our lives; and make no mistake about it, this government or one like it will. Liberal solutions unfailingly bring about mediocrity in everything they touch and you can be sure this will happen to medical practice. I saw socialized medicine during a three-month stay at the Camp Lejeune hospital where dependents of Marines seeing doctors were given the standing appointment time of 0800.
     There the room was filled with mothers and children, waiting in folding metal chairs for their turn with a doctor to come. Their numbers gradually grew smaller through the day while the remaining children grew more and more restless with no place for them to play, only to run around the rows of steel chairs where their mothers continued to wait.
     By the afternoon, there were only a couple of families left, waiting since 8 a.m. All this because the hospital was government-run and had no incentive to encourage patients’ selection of them as medical provider.
     I desperately wish those mentioned here could have been taken care of, but never by committed socialists whose supporters hang Che posters and communist flags in their offices.   The Tunnel Dweller
 Now, on to the subject of cancellations:

 Heritage  “Before, I had a plan that I had a $1,500 deductible,” she told CBS News. “I paid $199 a month. The most similar plan that I would have available to me would be $278 a month. My deductible would be $6,500, and all of my care after that point would only be covered 70 percent.”

"The cancellations are still being announced in Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, and Maryland. Over the next year, NBC News reports, between 50 percent and 75 percent of the 14 million consumers who buy insurance on the individual market could get cancellations."

From Godfather Politics: "We know that Nancy Pelosi never read the Act she voted for. Her response has become six seconds of liberalism stripped naked: “We have to pass the bill so you can find out what is in it.' ”

The Liberal blog Think Progress gives us this opinion: Here Is What’s Wrong With That Story About Obama Knowing That Your Health Care Policy Would Get Cancelled  "The goal of grandfather regulations is to allow a consumer to keep their existing policies, while also ensuring that there are some basic patient protections built into these plans. If insurers make changes that significantly burden enrollees with lower benefits and increased costs they have to come into compliance with all consumer protections."....

"So yes, individuals can keep the plans they have if those plans remain largely the same. But individuals receiving cancellation notices will have a choice of enrolling in subsidized insurance in the exchanges and will probably end up paying less for more coverage."

 

But what changes with regard to the deductible?

Does the failure to reach proper standards have to do with the fact that my wife and I -both in our seventies - do not have prenatal coverage?

Premium increases under Obamacare

Florida Woman's Insurance Rate Increases 10X Under Obamacare  "I just want to know why I can't keep what I have. ... Why do I have to be forced into something else?"
...."One Florida woman is going from paying $54 a month to $591 under Obamacare, CBS reports:"


With His Premiums More Than Doubling, This Dad Would “Rather File Bankruptcy” Than Deal with Obamacare  "Ben Neptun and his wife Charla are “furious” their family’s health insurance premium will be raised from $419 to $899 per month because of Obamacare."

Insurance cancellations; WH: 'It's True' Some Americans Won't Be Able to Keep Their Health Care Plan Under Obamacare

The Weekly Standard  "White House spokesman Jay Carney explained at today's briefing that "it's true" some Americans will not be able to keep their health care plan under Obamacare: 

"The journalist Ed Henry asked, "The president, when he was trying to get the law passed, repeatedly said, if you currently have health insurance you will be able to keep your plan. This morning David Axelrod was pressed on that point and said, the majority -- the vast majority -- will be able to keep their plans. He no longer works at the White House. From the podium, will you admit that when president said, if you have a plan, you'll get to keep it, that that was not true?"

"After some throat clearing, Carney said, "So it's true there are existing health care plans on the individual market that do not meet those minimum standards and therefore do not qualify for the Affordable Care Act.' "
The discussion continues with this video
 

Hat tip to Eddie Stidham at US Tea Party Political Activists National Assembly

Californians getting slammed by cancellations, rate increases 
" 'She said, 'I was all for Obamacare until I found out I was paying for it,'" Kehaly said. (My emphasis)"
Obama's reelection is now explained with that confession. There were rock concerts followed by the concertgoers being directed to polls close by for early voting. Democrats knew they were sweeping the low-information voters to their causes, no matter what the consequences to this nation.
Obama had near 50 million votes, equal to the O.J. Simpson jury times four million. TD

NRO: No, You Can’t Keep It   "When and if the website is finally functioning, many of these people won’t like what they see. .... For millions of Americans, Obamacare will be an experience in plumbing the depths of the dishonesty of President Obama’s case for his signature domestic accomplishment."

Obama admin. knew millions could not keep their health insurance  "Four sources deeply involved in the Affordable Care Act tell NBC NEWS that 50 to 75 percent of the 14 million consumers who buy their insurance individually can expect to receive a “cancellation” letter or the equivalent over the next year because their existing policies don’t meet the standards mandated by the new health care law. One expert predicts that number could reach as high as 80 percent.....' ”  

Benghazi Report: First Western eyewitness in Benghazi to go public gives account of attack, warning signs

Fox News  via Lucianne  "The first Western eyewitness to the deadly Benghazi terror attacks has given an account of the seven-hour assault on the U.S. outpost in Libya and says Americans knew such an incident was inevitable.

"The witness -- a former British soldier who for decades helped protect U.S. diplomats and military leaders -- told CBS’ “60 Minutes” that Al Qaeda forces first attacked the U.S. Special Mission Compound in which Ambassador Christopher Stevens was killed. Then they launched a second attack on a secret CIA annex about a mile across the city.

“ 'They knew what they were doing,” the security guard told CBS. “That was a well-executed attack.' ” 
Video at the link, but you have to sit through a commercial.

Legal Insurrection; 60 Minutes confirms Benghazi is a real scandal, and you’ve been lied to   "....the Obama administration lied about these warnings after the attack.
"Hillary* and Obama blamed a video and stood by the caskets perpetuating that lie.
"And remember how almost all of the media obsessed with Mitt Romney’s statement over Benghazi, and colluded to ask Romney gotcha questions while downplaying and obfuscating what really happened."
*File this away for 2016 

Bill Whittle – Common Core Is Obamacare For Education (UPDATED)

American Glob  Government control over education just as Obamacare is control over our healthcare and our lifestyles.

 

Common Core – Teaching Alinsky to first graders   "Do first graders really need to learn how to use emotional words in writing to bring about social justice? Common Core thinks so."

 

 

UPDATE from the WaPo: Principal: "I was Naïve about Common Core"   "Here’s a powerful piece about how an award-winning principal went from being a Common Core supporter to an opponent. This was written by Carol Burris, principal of South Side High School in New York. She was named the 2010 New York State Outstanding Educator by the School Administrators Association of New York State. She is one of the co-authors of the principals’ letter against evaluating teachers by student test scores, which has been signed by 1,535 New York principals."

....

Recalling how she and her colleagues were once fully behind Common Core, she  confesses,
"I even co-authored a book, “Opening the Common Core,” on how to help schools meet that goal.  It is a book about rich curriculum and equitable teaching practices, not about testing and sanctions. We wrote it because we thought that the Common Core would be a student-centered reform based on principles of equity.

"I confess that I was naïve...."

Utahns Against Common Core  This lists many organizations you are familiar with that oppose Common-Core.

How Many Have Enrolled in Obamacare?

Taegan Goddard's Political Wire  AP: "The Obama administration will face intense pressure next week to be more forthcoming about how many people have actually succeeded in enrolling for coverage in the new insurance markets. Medicare chief Marilyn Tavenner is to testify during a House hearing Tuesday, followed Wednesday by Sebelius before the House Energy and Commerce Committee."

"Meanwhile, the New York Times reports economists and policy wonks behind the Affordable Care Act worry that the technical problems bedeviling the federal portal could become much more than an inconvenience. If young applicants "decide to put off or give up on buying coverage, rising prices and even a destabilized insurance market could result.' "

That NY Times article: Health Site’s Woes Could Dissuade Vital Enrollee: the Young and Healthy

Organizing For Action workers in Arlington, Va.,  inform the public

about the launch of Obamacare on Oct. 1.

 

"The economists and policy wonks behind the Affordable Care Act worry that the technical problems bedeviling the federal portal could become much more than an inconvenience. If applicants like Mr. Jackson decide to put off or give up on buying coverage, rising prices and even a destabilized insurance market could result."