What the left could love about the NSA Presser

Time was when President Obama's forceful style at today's presser would have had "teh left" exploding with approval on the social nets. Those days are over. Opening with the appointment of a blue ribbon commission to study the NSA didn't thrill the spectators. We've seen that movie many times before and it rarely has a satisfactory ending.

That's not to say there wasn't a couple of (largely ignored) satisfying moments hidden in the Q & A. The two standout quotes for me came first in answer to Major Garrett's question on appointing a new head for the Federal Reserve. Obama answered in part:

But the other mandate is full employment. And right now, if you look at the biggest challenges we have, the challenge is not inflation; the challenge is we’ve still got too many people out of work, too many long-term unemployed, too much slack in the economy, and we’re not growing as fast as we should. And so I want a Fed chairman who’s able to look at those issues and have a perspective that keeps an eye on inflation, makes sure that we’re not seeing artificial bubbles in place, but also recognizing, you know what, a big part of my job right now is to make sure the economy is growing quickly and robustly, and is sustained and durable, so that people who work hard in this country are able to find a job.

Seem to remember many calls for exactly this statement from the bully pulpit. Saw the sum total of one tweet from someone else having noticed it. Neither have I seen any recognition for the strength of Obama's defense of the ACA outside of one tweet afterward from Ed Henry, who asked the question.

[Obama]: Now, what’s true, Ed, is, is that in a normal political environment, it would have been easier for me to simply call up the Speaker and say, you know what, this is a tweak that doesn’t go to the essence of the law -- it has to do with, for example, are we able to simplify the attestation of employers as to whether they’re already providing health insurance or not -- it looks like there may be some better ways to do this; let's make a technical change to the law. That would be the normal thing that I would prefer to do. [...]

Now, I think the really interesting question is why it is that my friends in the other party have made the idea of preventing these people from getting health care their holy grail, their number-one priority. The one unifying principle in the Republican Party at the moment is making sure that 30 million people don't have health care and, presumably, repealing all those benefits I just mentioned...

And let me just make one last point about this. The idea that you would shut down the government unless you prevent 30 million people from getting health care is a bad idea. What you should be thinking about is how can we advance and improve ways for middle-class families to have some security so that if they work hard, they can get ahead and their kids can get ahead.

Read the transcript for the full remarks. Our POTUS delivered as brilliant a defense of Obamacare as is possible for a black President leading during the biggest resurgence of institutional racism since the days of Jim Crow. That deserves more notice than it's likely to get.

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The trouble with Obamacare

From the GOP's perspective the biggest problem is Obamacare is working too well.

Individuals buying health insurance on their own will see their premiums tumble next year in New York State as changes under the federal health care law take effect, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced on Wednesday.

State insurance regulators say they have approved rates for 2014 that are at least 50 percent lower on average than those currently available in New York. Beginning in October, individuals in New York City who now pay $1,000 a month or more for coverage will be able to shop for health insurance for as little as $308 monthly. With federal subsidies, the cost will be even lower.

This is just the latest report I've seen of plunging insurance rates coming from states that aren't deliberately trying to sabotage a successful implementation of the provisions. Meanwhile back in Boehner's House of Dysfunction, Republicans are still desperately trying to cripple the entire bill.

The House has scheduled votes later Wednesday to delay the law’s individual and employer mandates, the 38th time the GOP majority has tried to eliminate, defund or scale back the program since Republicans took control of the House in January 2011.

And that's not all that's troubling the GOP. Booman points out "an Obamacare pilot program successfully demonstrated that we can save money in Medicare."

Granted this behemoth bill is far from perfect for many reasons but when people start seeing their rates fall for the first time in many years and costs coming down, I suspect public opinion will warm up considerably. Which is of course, the GOP's worst nightmare.

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When liberals legislate abortion

When Democrats are in charge of statehouses they pass laws to protect women's health which both sides of the aisle support. As SteveM put it:

What do you get in a situation like this in a state where Democrats control the governor's mansion and both houses of the legislature? You get a reasonable set of regulations intended to address the real problems. What do you get in states with Republican governors and legislatures? You get legislation intended -- solely intended -- to make liberals furious and women seeking abortions miserable, while making right-wingers pump their fists and do a victory dance.

The difference couldn't be more stark. Liberal Democrats only legislate women's health services to improve safety. Liberal Democrats don't abridge women's freedom of choice.

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GOP Obamacare hypocrisy

Proving that the GOP's alleged concern about Obamacare is based solely on politics and Obama Derangement Syndrome, Lee Fang at the Nation unearthed a treasure trove of Republican requests for Obamacare funding from Republicans who trash the program on a near daily basis and have voted dozens of times to repeal the bill altogether.

The list of these hypocrites is too long to list to them all, but it's instructional to see how they praise the program when they've got their hand out for the money.

House Republicans and the Senate Republican Policy Committee have trashed the ACA’s Community Transformation grants as an Obamacare “slush fund.” In the letters seeking these grants, however, GOP lawmakers have heaped praise on their potential. Cornyn writes in his letter that the grant would help “improve the health and quality of life of area residents.” Congressman Aaron Schock, a Republican from Illinois, congratulated a local nonprofit for winning a Community Transformation grant, noting that the program will give “people the tools to live healthier and longer lives.”

And adding to their disgusting deceit:

Whether cutting a ribbon or signing a letter, no Republicans have acknowledged that the health programs they are endorsing are provided by Obamacare.

You won't see this mendacity reported on the teevee news programs outside of MSNBC. But the rest of the BigMedia will be happy to "report" every false utterance these asshats spew to try undermine the program simply to rob Obama and the American people of a chance at successful health care reform.

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Obamacare, it's lowering costs

There was some article going around a week or so ago where one of the big health insurers was claiming rates would rise by something like 384% because of Obamacare. Which unsurprisingly turns out to be pure bullcrap. The news out of California, our biggest state with some 7.1 million uninsured residents, is rates are going to be significantly lower than even neutral observers had predicted.

I couldn't access the original New Republic piece. Apparently you need to be a subscriber now to read it, but Ed Kilgore has a good summary:

Based on the premiums that insurers have submitted for final regulatory approval, the majority of Californians buying coverage on the state’s new insurance exchange will be paying less—in many cases, far less—than they would pay for equivalent coverage today. And while a minority will still end up writing bigger premium checks than they do now, even they won’t be paying outrageous amounts. Meanwhile, all of these consumers will have access to the kind of comprehensive benefits that are frequently unavailable today, at any price, because of the way insurers try to avoid the old and the sick.

Ed has the numbers and a policy that was expected to cost $450 a month will actually be $300 and that's before the government subsidies kick in. For healthy 20 years old, the subsidies will completely cover a bare bones policy and a single individual making under $45k a year, estimated to be about 12% of the population, will get generous subsidies as well finally making health care affordable for just about everybody. And this is even with major insurers opting out of the exchanges.

And it's not just in California. Obamacare is lowering rates in other states too because, competition.

We've see this happen in other states. Earlier this month, rate proposals released by insurance companies in Washington state showed some people's premiums would actually go down. Premera Blue Cross had estimated that premiums would rise about 50 percent to 70 percent. When Oregon released proposed health care premiums online in May, two insurers requested the chance to adjust their rates — to make them lower. Why is this happening? "The premiums and participation in California, Oregon, Washington and other states show that insurers want to compete for the new enrollees in this market," the Kaiser Family Foundation's Gary Claxton told The New Republic. The glories of the free market.

This is why the GOPers keep trying to repeal it. Their greatest fear is it will succeed and prove the reformers, and Obama, were right.

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Why our health care costs so much

Ezra posts a fascinating long read today about an experimental health care program that saves money. It's based on a simple concept that doesn't require costly medical equipment. It basically consists of regular home visits to housebound elderly patients by registered nurses. It kept these patients who suffered from chronic but easily treatable conditions from ending up in hospitals. Apparently it worked too well.

But Health Quality Partners, with its emphasis on continuous nurse-to-patient contact, did work. Of the 15 programs, four improved patient outcomes without increasing costs. Only HQP improved patient outcomes while cutting costs. So Medicare extended it again and again — now it’s the only program still running under the demo. But Medicare has notified Coburn that it intends to end HQP’s funding in June.

Medicare mumbled something about the program not being scalable, which isn't really true. The real reason comes down to corporate control over our health care system.

But not all hospitals are run by the local Village Improvement Association. Many seek to turn a profit. That makes models like Health Quality Partners something of a threat. “If we scaled what Ken is doing,” Brenner says, “you would probably shut down a third of the hospitals in the country. It’s a disruptive innovation. It just guts the current business model.”

See also this:



And this:



The HQP program was only allowed to succeed because it was being sponsored by a group who weren't interested in profits. Meanwhile the industry trend is to ever greater consolidation under larger corporate umbrellas. They spend millions on lobbyists to ensure their business model endures in order to protect their bottom line. This is how we ended up with the Rube Goldberg reform bill we now call Obamacare even though an expansion of Medicare would have been much more cost efficient.

The clear lesson here is, for profit, corporate health care is neither about health or care. Not sure how it's possible considering the breadth and strength of the lobby that protects it but the only way to truly fix it is to take out the profiteering altogether.

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Women caught in conservative TRAP in Virginia

Conservative Virginia lawmakers vote for stealth rules to shut down women's access to reproductive health services.

The vote stems from legislation that cleared the legislature two years ago and has been slowly making its way through implementation.

The General Assembly voted in 2011 to impose stricter building codes on clinics, calling for costly physical renovations, such as wider hallways and doorways, expanded parking and entrance awnings. Supporters said the ­changes ensure the safety of women undergoing abortions at the clinics. Opponents said the measure was a veiled attempt to shutter them.

Actually, you don't have to be an opponent to see the agenda here. Couldn't be more obvious. Besides it's no secret. The theocrats have publicized their plan to the boss of all our lady parts.

The regulations — part of a nationwide anti-choice campaign to adopt so-called Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers, or TRAP, laws...

Friday’s vote represents the latest skirmish in an ongoing conservative war on abortion clinics. In the past three months, states have proposed an astonishing 694 provisions restricting or rolling back women’s reproductive rights. Efforts to shutter local abortion clinics disproportionately impact low-income women and significantly increase the incidence unintended pregnancies.

The theocrats assure us they only have the best of intentions:

“We need to be assured that a Kermit Gosnell-type practitioner is not operating in Virginia,” said Janet Robey, state director of Concerned Women for America.

Which of course has it ass-backwards. It's exactly this kind of restriction on responsible health care providers that leads to "Gosnell-type practitioners" who are more than willing to prey on low income and otherwise desperate women.

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GOP plans to fight Obamacare forever

Bit of buzz today about the "secret Republican plan" to kill Obamacare. After at least 37 failed attempts, they're not willing to give up the fight yet. Their secret weapon is Mitch McConnell.

Steve Benen already has the details down:

The "secret Republican plan" really isn't much of a secret. Hell, it's not really much of a plan, either. McConnell's idea is apparently to have Republicans win a bunch of elections and then destroy the law through the reconciliation process so Democrats can't filibuster the GOP's anti-Obamacare crusade.

That's roughly the same plan Republicans came up with last year, right before the electorate re-elected President Obama and expanded the Democratic majority in the Senate.

But as is the case with so many issues -- taxes, deficit reduction, Planned Parenthood, Paul Ryan's budget, etc. -- GOP officials are determined to pretend 2012 didn't happen and the will of the voters is irrelevant.

They really thought they were going to sweep the elections in 2012. That they actually lost by a rather large margin doesn't really figure into their version of reality. As Mitch said:

“We were prepared to do that had we had the votes to do it after the election. Well, the election didn’t turn out the way we wanted it to,” McConnell told National Journal in an interview. “The monstrosity has ... begun to be implemented and we’re not giving up the fight.” [...]

But, in the next two years, Republicans are looking to bring the issue back in a big way. And they’ll start by trying to brand the law as one that costs too much and is not working as promised.

This part of the plan is already happening. My idiot GOP Senator is tweeting this sort of anti-Obamacare propaganda daily. It could work over time I suppose, but for the moment, I'm seeing more pushback by liberals than support from the local cons in the responses. So there's that... [graphic via]

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