The Strange Effects Of The Health Insurance 'Annual Fee' Tax

Forbes  "The ACA’s individual tax penalty for not having health insurance is widely known. What is less well-known is that the ACA also imposed a tax that will fall on those who do buy health insurance. Recently, I examined this tax with an eye toward estimating how much this tax would increase average premiums. (The full report is here; a summary by Philip Klein of the Washington Examiner is here.)

....

"However, people who get their health insurance through an employer that does not self-insure will face the full burden of the tax, as will people who get coverage through the exchanges but are not eligible for subsidies. This isn’t just people with incomes too high to qualify for subsidies – it also includes people whose employers offer coverage to employees but not their families."

 

‘Communists!’ Howard Stern vows never to vote Dem again, even ‘if God becomes a Democrat’

BizPac Review  ... "He described a phone conversation he’d had with his agent earlier on his Friday show to sidekick Robin Quivers.

“ 'I go, ‘That’s it!’” Stern said. “[I] go, ‘You know what Don, I’ve voted Republican and I’ve voted Democrat. I have vowed I will never vote for a Democrat again. I don’t give a [expletive] – no matter who they are. I don’t care if God becomes a Democrat.’ I said, ‘I backed Hillary Clinton, I backed Al Gore, I backed John Kerry. I am done with them.’” 

Bush Tax Cuts Caused the Recession?

Michael Porfido "The Bush Tax cuts had the same effect on the economy that the Reagan, Kennedy, and Harding/Coolidge tax cuts had. They created sustained economic growth and jobs. The facts are as follows…

Year    GDP Growth Rate     Unemployment Rate

2003           2.5%                                     6.0%

2004           3.9%                                     5.5%

2005          3.2%                                      5.1%

2006          2.8%                                     4.6%

2007          2.0%                                     4.6%

...

"It is bad enough that the Democrats are trying to gain political advantage by ignoring facts.  It is, however, unacceptable that people in the media would propagate this falsehood when the facts are easily available.  The housing crisis caused the recession.  Unqualified people were able to get mortgages for little or no money down. 

 Michael has been an editor and contributor at the website www.freemarketsfreepeople.net for over 2 years. He has over 20+ years of diverse business experience, from running complex operations where he managed hundreds of people, to starting and running small businesses such as www.realinterestfund.com. -

Reading list: Obama administration lays down IRS, picks up FCC for it's next choice of weapons

http://terrellaftermath.com/

 

The Disintegration of the First Amendment    "The Federal Communications Commission, not to be outdone, is in the process of putting “researchers” into newsrooms and editorial offices of media outlets with an agenda of using their coercive power over the broadcasting licenses of radio and television stations to push them toward covering certain content in a way pleasing to the government. With this Administration’s obsession with Rush Limbaugh, and its proven willingness to use government against its political opponents, can there be any doubt that stations broadcasting Rush will be first in line for special “researcher” attention?"    Emphasis added.

Rick Manning is vice president of public policy and communications for Americans for Limited Government.

Rush Limbaugh: Journalists Won't Put Up with Regime Monitors in Newsrooms? Don't Be So Sure...     "All of this extreme outrageous stuff, like when known communists end up being hired in the Regime.  "Does Obama know?  How'd they sneak that guy by?' "

Wall Street Journal; Why is the agency studying 'perceived station bias' and asking about coverage choices?  ...."Though the Fairness Doctrine ostensibly aimed to increase the diversity of thought on the airwaves, many stations simply chose to ignore controversial topics altogether, rather than air unwanted content that might cause listeners to change the channel."

Mr. Pai is a commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission

 

Krauthammer’s Take: FCC Newsroom Study Latest ‘Trample on What Rights are Remaining’  "Before it goes any further, Krauthammer called on the House of Representatives to immediately pass a bill denying any federal funding to the study."

New Obama initiative tramples First Amendment protections  "The initiative, known around the agency as "the CIN Study" (pronounced "sin"), is a bit of a mystery even to insiders. "This has never been put to an FCC vote, it was just announced," says Ajit Pai, one of the FCC's five commissioners (and one of its two Republicans). "I've never had any input into the process," adds Pai, who brought the story to the public's attention in a Wall Street Journal column last week."  (Posted above)

 

Echoes of the IRS in the FCC Snooping Scandal

... "And what will these FCC monitors ask when they do get access? Here’s the list of questions to station owners, managers, or HR:

• What is the news philosophy of the station?

• Who is your target audience?

• How do you define critical information that the community needs?

• How do you ensure the community gets this critical information?

• How much does community input influence news coverage decisions?

• What are the demographics of the news management staff (HR)?

• What are the demographics of the on air staff (HR)?

• What are the demographics of the news production staff (HR)?

....

"The Obama governing philosophy combines the regulatory state with an intolerance of dissent. Taken together, this means an extreme level of government intrusion into private activity. Any entity whose business touches the federal government (and given the vast scope of the government, it touches and regulates virtually every entity) is deemed an open book for bureaucratic inquiry. The chilling effect is obvious and broadcasters decline to participate at their own risk."

 

Freedumbing of the Press

"Like Obamacare? Then you're going to love Obamanews - the exciting new FCC initiative to make sure that decision-making in the nation's newsrooms gets (ahem) "fixed" to assure that voters will hear only what they are supposed to hear."

'Green Acres' actress Mary Grace Canfield dies

 

MSN TV News   "SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) — Mary Grace Canfield,, a veteran character actress who played handywoman Ralph Monroe on the television show "Green Acres," has died. She was 89.

"Her daughter, Phoebe Alexiades, says Canfield died of lung cancer on Saturday at a hospice in the California coastal town of Santa Barbara.

Canfield had appearances on a number of TV shows during a four-decade career, including "General Hospital" and "The Hathaways".

"She was Harriet Kravitz on four episodes of the 1960s series "Bewitched."

"But she was best known for her role of Ralph Monroe in some 40 episodes of "Green Acres," which ran from 1965 to 1971.

"Monroe greeted folks in the town of Hootersville(sp) with a cheery "howdy doody," wore painters' overalls and was forever working on the Douglas family's bedroom with her brother, Alf."

Other celebrity deaths in 2014

Just kidding! Updates on gas prices.

Hat tip to cousin Joy Roeder of Garibaldi, Oregon.

Obama Vs. Bush On Gas Prices: It Is A FACT Obama Costs You At LEAST 85 Cents A Gallon More Than Bush Cost You – And Gas Is Going UP Under Obama  "What liberals ultimately want to do is take the very worst of Bush’s second term gas prices (which occurred while and BECAUSE Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate and refused to allow Bush to enact the policies that he ultimately pursued by executive order which LOWERED gas prices) and then compare them to some arbitrary Obama period."

 

An attempt to make an objective assessment/  

Heritage in 2011; In Pictures: Bush Vs. Obama On Gas Prices   "As Americans continue to feel the effects of President Obama’s anti-oil agenda at the pump, defensive liberals are circling back to a familiar line of counter-attack: blame Bush.  The media vacuum on gas prices has made this line of attack all the more promising with very little national coverage being given to the president’s destructive domestic drilling agenda. Unfortunately it misses an obvious point."

Frank Gaffney: Kerry’s Misplaced Warning

Lars Larson

Lars Larson

 

"Secretary of State John Kerry had to go to Indonesia to warn that climate change is one of the world’s greatest threats. “Climate change” is, of course, what used to be called “global warming.”

 

"Millions of Americans have been struggling for months with one of the worst winters in memory. Mr. Kerry’s contention that carbon emissions are making the sun overheat the planet is a hard sell at the moment.

 

"If you are going to worry about the sun doing something to the earth, focus on the biggest threat of them all: We know a massive solar storm is coming soon, one that will fry unprotected electric devices worldwide and create protracted blackouts, death and destruction here.

 

"Will John Kerry even acknowledge this danger – let alone exhort us to prevent the catastrophe it surely will unleash?"   Excerpt by Frank Gaffney; 

 

Originally posted at The Center For Security Policy

Hillary, Your Radical Marxist Roots are Showing

Conservative Hideout 2.0  "Hillary is more of an outright Marxist than Obama." ....

 

"In 1971, twenty three year old Yale law student, Hillary Diane Rodham served a stint as a clerk for what was at the time, the nation’s most Communistic law firm, Treuhaft, Walker and Burnstein. This law firm made no bones about it’s connection to the Communist Party*. Partner Doris Walker was a CP member at the time and another partner, Robert Treuhaft had left the CP in 1958 after being called before the House Un-American Activities Committee. They labeled him one of America’s most “dangerously subversive” lawyers. His firm made their name defending clients too radical for other lawyers. They defended Communists, draft-dodgers and even members of the militant group, The Black Panthers."

 

*"In an interview for her book, “Hillary’s Choice,” biographer and author, Gail Sheehy asked Treuhaft about Hillary’s tenure there. He said, “She did want to work for a left-wing movement law firm. Anyone who went to college or law school would have known our law firm was a Communist law firm,” Treuhaft told Ms. Sheehy in 1999."

 

Hillary Clinton's Radical Summer   "To this day, Mrs. Clinton's decision to work at the unabashedly left-wing firm is surprising, even shocking, to some of her former colleagues there and to those supporting her bid for the presidency. To the former first lady's enemies and political opponents, her summer at the Treuhaft firm is yet another indication that radical ideology lurks beneath the patina of moderation she has adopted in public life."

Politifact refutes all this   "There's not only no evidence Clinton was a communist sympathizer, Morris doesn't have his facts right (at least not in the version in the FrontPageMag.com article that made its way into a chain e-mail). Treuhaft was not head of the California Communist Party, nor was he a member when Clinton worked for his law firm. But she did intern for Treuhaft's firm. And he was, at one time, a member of the American Communist Party. So we rate the claim Barely True."

Obama’s Weaponization of Government

Intellectual Conservative   ... "There is a dangerous arrogance of power among the President and senior-level Democrats that should concern every American.

"Last week a senior United States Senator gave a speech stating that the IRS should be used to target and punish groups that disagree with the Democratic Party’s political agenda.  Sen. Chuck Schumer stated, “…there are many things that can be done administratively by the IRS and other government agencies — we must redouble those efforts immediately.”  Schumer was also one of a number of Democrat Senators who signed a 2012 letter to the IRS demanding they be more aggressive against conservative organizations"... 

 

 

New IRS Threats over ObamaCare    "Obama’s IRS is blackmailing businesses to protect Obamacare!   If medium-sized businesses are forced to lay-off employees because of ObamaCare costs, they’re not allowed to talk about it."  (Emphasis in the original) 

Kerry, Obama and the Flat Earth Society, standing together

patriotupdate.com

Salon: Actually, even the Flat Earth Society believes in climate change

"Yes, such a group exists. It thinks the world is flat -- but also getting warmer."

 Politico; John Kerry’s Phony Climate War by Rich Lowry   "If climate change does not consider itself duly warned, it has only itself to blame. John Kerry has proven himself fully capable of supporting hostilities against dangerous enemies of the United States (that he then regrets, and campaigns against—but that’s another story)."

Even the Demophilic NY Times questions the climate change / global warming / drought connection:  Science Linking Drought to Global Warming Remains Matter of Dispute

McNider and Christy: Why Kerry Is Flat Wrong on Climate Change   "But who are the Flat Earthers, and who is ignoring the scientific facts? In ancient times, the notion of a flat Earth was the scientific consensus, and it was only a minority who dared question this belief. We are among today's scientists who are skeptical about the so-called consensus on climate change. Does that make us modern-day Flat Earthers, as Mr. Kerry suggests, or are we among those who defy the prevailing wisdom to declare that the world is round?" 

Shouldn't that be Bill Clinton's face on this package?

Weasel Zippers

 

"Via NRO:

Meet the latest face of bootleg Pakistani Viagra: President Obama.

“Apparently a symbol of power and virility, Barack Obama is the unwitting face of contraband Viagra sold in this market in Peshawar,” according to a report from Agence France-Presse. The president is featured on a number of different forms of the drug."

Coming this year: 70th anniversary of the Normandy Landings on D-Day, June 6th, 1944

D-Day Revisited

 

Leaders in the Grand Alliance

 

Utah and Omaha Beaches

 

More to come as June 6th approaches. Meanwhile, let's reflect on this:

Obama admin shut down D-Day beaches, cemetery in Normandy...