More insurance questions

Will insurers raise rates before health-care reform?
Ezra Klein WaPo March 22, 2010; 2:29 PM ET

...There's nothing the bill will do to roll back past rate increases. But a lot of people are concerned that private insurers will jack their rates up in anticipation of the exchanges. This is not a concern I fully understand, to be honest. The virtue of a competitive market -- that is to say, a market in which it's easy for a lot of people to compare products and prices -- is that this sort of behavior is actually very difficult..."

Free Market, health insurance? Nonsense.

I want to know if the practice of raising the premium rates if the insurance is used will continue? I can't prove that that is what happened to me, but that is what it looked like to me.

Will the newly eligible government subsidized patient's caregiver's be reimbursed enough to cover their costs? It's not happening now, so it's hard to find a doctor who will accept these patients.

Obama to sign health bill, celebrate with allies
After signing health care bill, Obama to celebrate historic overhaul effort with supporters
DARLENE SUPERVILLE
AP News
Mar 23, 2010 08:25 EDT

Guest post by Barbara from Mahablog

Would Health Care Reform Help You?

Many obstacles and stumbling blocks remain in the way of health care reform. The House and Senate bills will have to be merged, and then the House and Senate both will vote on the final bill. We don’t yet know what will be in the final bill, or if the final bill will be passed into law. Passage will be especially difficult in the Senate, where it will need 60 votes to pass. It is still possible that after all this angst, just one grandstanding senator could kill the whole thing.

But just for fun, let’s look at what conventional wisdom says will be in the final bill and see if there is anything in it that will be an immediate benefit to people with mesothelioma cancer and other asbestos-related disease.

It is likely that the final bill will provide additional funding for state high-risk insurance pools. Currently more than 30 states run such pools, which are nonprofit, state-sponsored health insurance plans for people who can’t buy insurance because of pre-existing conditions. The biggest problem with such pools is that, often, the insurance they offer is too expensive for many who might need it. Both the Senate and House bills provide $5 billion in subsidies for state high-risk pools to make the insurance more affordable.

Under the Senate bill, beginning in 2014, private companies would no longer be able to deny coverage to adults with pre-existing conditions, nor could they charge higher premiums for people with pre-existing conditions. Until then, the state high-risk pools could provide some help.

Closing the Medicare Part D coverage gap — also called the “doughnut hole” — is another potential provision that could help some patients with asbestos-related disease. The “doughnut hole” is the gap between the coverage for yearly out-of-pocket expenses provided by Medicare Part D and Medicare’s “catastrophic coverage” threshold.

For example, in 2009 Medicare Part D paid at least 75 percent of what patients paid for prescription drugs up to $2,700. After that, patients must pay for all of their prescription medications until what they have paid exceeds $6,154. At that point, the catastrophic coverage takes over, and Medicare pays for all but 5 percent of the patient’s drug bills. The final health care reform bill probably will provide for paying at least 50 percent of out-of-pocket costs in the doughnut hole.

You may have heard the bills include budget cuts to the Medicare program, and this has been a big concern to many people. Proponents of the bill insist that savings can be found to pay for the cuts, and that people who depend on Medicare won’t face reduced services. But this is a complex issue that I want to address in a later post.

The long-term provisions probably will include many other provisions that would benefit patients with asbestos-related disease, including increased funding for medical research. Although there are many complaints about the bill coming from all parts of the political spectrum, on the whole it would be a huge benefit to many people.

— Barbara O’Brien

March 22, 2010

Republican hypocrisy is getting old

"...In fact, of the 22 times that reconciliation has been used since 1980, Republicans have used it 16 times -- often to provide tax breaks to the wealthy and slash health care for the elderly and poor..."

The Hurt Locker

Okee Dokee. I wanted to see this because Kathryn Bigelow is the first female director to win the Oscar , right, and then there's the best picture thing. I thought they would explain to the audience where the title came from:

The title is a colloquialism for being injured in an explosion, as in "they sent him to the hurt locker ",^[6] or for "a place of ultimate pain".^[7] It dates back to the Vietnam War, where it was one of several phrases meaning "in trouble or at a disadvantage; in bad shape."<sup>[8]


Response among veterans

Right, you don't have to be a vet to know that the three man team, split up and playing cowboy was ludicrous. I had to remind myself to suspend disbelief.

I thought they might incorporate this into the story but they didn't:

(USA Today 2005)
"One enterprising EOD soldier recently came up with the idea of using a remote-controlled toy car to deliver tiny blocks of C4 plastic explosive used to blow up IEDs. The tiny radio-controlled cars, which can be equipped with video cameras, are much less costly to replace or repair than remote-controlled robots."

Right, we didn't see the toy cars, or the $5,000 BomBots. in the movie. I'm tired of searching for a cost range for robots similar to what is seen in the movie. The spec ranges are wildly variant, but from what I could quickly find, pricing appears to begin at $100,000, a lot more than a toy car and a lot less than medical and psych treatment for a soldier injured in an IED explosion. I suppose today is as good a day as any to watch this movie, but today...

Today marks the seventh anniversary of the US-led invasion of Iraq. On March 19, 2003, the United States began dropping bombs on Baghdad as thousands of US forces poured across Iraq’s borders. Seven years later, the occupation continues. In that time, over 4,300 American soldiers have died. Many thousands more have been wounded. As many as 650,000 Iraqis have been killed, with the number of wounded unknown.

Meanwhile, Iraq is suffering the worst refugee crisis in the world today. According to the United Nations, more than 4.2 million Iraqis have fled the country, many of them to neighboring Jordan and Syria. Another 1.9 million are internally displaced.


And we're in the hurt locker and Iran is stronger in the region. Bitchin'</sup>

Friday squirrel blogging

I have nothing to say about the rodents today.

I watched Coco before Chanel last night. I didn't think I would like it since I have absolutely zero interest in fashion, but I did like it. "Coco" Chanel was a strong and independent woman. The movie is about her life before she became an instantly recognizable fashion icon.

The movie piqued my interest in more of her life, so I went here and here .

Here are some Coco Chanel quotes.

Tomgram: William Astore, You Have No Say About Your Military

Posted by William Astore at 10:50am, March 18, 2010.

"Here’s an American reality: the Pentagon is our true welfare state, the weapons makers our real “welfare queens,” and we never stop shoveling money their way."

Still reading

Not one of them is holding my interest for more than 10 or 20 minutes straight, and one of them is simply a fun book to read.

This article caught my eye today:

The Truth About American and Israeli Interests Comes Out
Posted on Mar 17, 2010
By William Pfaff

In particular, this part of the article:

"The most important and dangerous pretense has been that American and Israeli interests in the Middle East coincide. They actually conflict in basic respects. The American interest in the region is permanent good relations with the oil-producing Arab states, which remain in doubt so long as the Palestine question is unresolved."

The violence will magically end if the "Palestine question is resolved?" Well, by all means, wave that magic wand.

Gah, hollyweird

I'm watching The King . I found myself irritated with some of the details. I'm trying to figure out why the filmmakers chose to focus on the rifle. Dude got out of the Navy. I've been here in this Navy town all my life and never met anybody who developed such an important relationship with his rifle and got out and kept his rifle. Especially if they got a dishonorable discharge, which is a given for this particular character. I'm irritated with the way Gael pronounced Chula Vista. I lived there, my kid was born there, & I've lived around squids my whole life. Even Hispanic squids pronounce it 'Chew-lah 'Vih-stah, not the Spanish pronunciation 'Shoe-lah 'Vees-tah. I've also never seen anybody tattoo their ship on themselves. "Tribal" silliness, gang signs, girl's names, all kinds of crap, but a ship? Puhleeeeeeeeeze! Captive on a fucking tin can for 6 and sometimes up to 9 months and they're going to put a picture of their cage on their body forever? What nonsense. To listen to the commentary is difficult enough for me because I find it annoying when the writers congratulate themselves on how fucking brilliant ("genius") they are. Their obvious disdain for ordinary people gets on my last nerve.

If the point of this movie is to horrify, disgust and paint a picture of a truly reprehensible character then the movie is a success. Gael García Bernal can play some really creepy parts, and William Hurt can do anything you put in front of him, but come on, this would have the movie walked out on, or the DVD pulled out of the player in a LOT of homes. If not for the actors' and actresses' performances this piece of shit wouldn't be worth a fiddler's fart. I just hope that I don't ever come face to face that whoever wrote this sick piece of crap.

Shit, I missed Chuck watching this thing? Oy. Chuck is way over the top, but it doesn't take itself seriously.

ps, I wonder how many residents of that cutthroat, hamburger grinder-like county of LA are aware of how close to death they are on a weekly basis? I know I'm aware of it now, but it's not something my stupid parents chose to inform me of.

Gee, I wonder why the women protest?

Married for a Minute
Is Iran's mullah-backed system of temporary marriage a godsend for the sexually frustrated—or religious prostitution?
— By Nadya Labi

"...Iranian feminists ardently oppose sigheh. In the summer of 2008, they were infuriated by President Ahmadinejad's attempts to push through a new "family protection" law that would have made it easier for men to contract temporary marriages...

...Only a man has the right to renew a sigheh when it expires—for another mehr—or to terminate it early. While women may have only one husband at a time, men may have four wives and are permitted unlimited temporary wives..."

I'm still reading The Devil We Know by Robert Baer. Not that I didn't know already, but ,Shia rather than Sunni Islam dominates Iran. Most fascinating to me, Baer refers to taqiya .


After reading The Ayatollah Begs to Differ by Hooman Majd and Treacherous Alliance by Trita Parsi I feel like I'm back at square one as far as Iran goes. It has gained more power and influence in the Middle East since our disastrous wars there, and I believe that it is stupid to refuse to talk to those who really have power in Iran.

Talking helps. The sanctions against Iran don't work. They just force dealings on the black market.

Beyond Sanctions: How to Solve the Iranian Riddle
By Trita Parsi Monday, Mar. 15, 2010

Death in the war on drugs

Update 1:11 PM 3/16/2010

"Many experts have pointed out that militarizing the drug war is counterproductive. Shortly after his inauguration in 2006, President Felipe Calderon began assigning large numbers of troops to fighting the drug war. The National Human Rights Commission specifically cited the case of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico’s murder capital, when it concluded that “using the Mexican military against drug cartels has brought no improvement in public safety.” "

Mexico gunmen kill American consulate staff

They kill journalists don't they?

That's what this movie was about. Juarez and dead journalists and dead factory worker girls. It's about murders, not about the drug trade, but with journalism being so dangerous, how do we know those girls were not just collateral damage?

I've been reading this site for years. They are all over the Americas. I guess I missed this one:

Tijuana: Gringo, This Bullet Is For You
Posted by Bill Conroy - February 28, 2010 at 3:22 pm

Yeesh, the article doesn't make me want to run out and get a passport to go play tourist in Tijuana, that's for sure. Didn't used to have to have a passport to go to Tijuana.

'Hit teams' attack US consular staff, families in Mexico: US
(AFP) – 7 hours ago

"...Shortly after the killings were disclosed by the White House, the State Department issued a travel warning for Mexico.

It said Americans working in consulates in the northern cities of Tijuana, Nogales, Ciudad Juarez, Nuevo Laredo, Monterrey and Matamoros were authorized to send family members home until April 12 because of security concerns.

The departure authorization only affect relatives of US government personnel in those cities, the statement said..."

The travel warning said that due to the "recent violent attacks," US citizens were urged to "delay unnecessary travel to parts of Durango, Coahuila and Chihuahua states."

Full State Dept (Mexico) warning

17 killed as Acapulco tourist idyll shattered by growing drug violence
March 15, 2010

Fucking idiot drugs gangs are shitting in their own nests by killing people on the outskirts of Acapulco.

Think the US govt works for you?

defunding ACORN


Healthcare vs Pork
hat tips to
Danny

Do you really think congress cares more about your health than they do the campaign contributions they get from Big Ag? Allooooo? Watch King Corn on Netflix. You really think health insurance companies and Big Ag want to fight over subsidies? Fuck no they don't. They're gonna take your money to make you sick and they're gonna take your money to send your ass to the hospital and they're gonna be subsidized by your taxes for the whole sick cycle. The whole fucking time. My suspicion is that that is why we ain't getting a public option if THEIR congresswhores have anything to say about it. There. I said it.

Oversight in who's pocket this time?

Raymond J. Learsy
Scholar and author, "Over a Barrel: Breaking Oil's Grip on Our Future"
Posted: March 13, 2010 12:14 PM

Gary Gensler of the CFTC: Reformer or Wolf in Moth Eaten Sheep's Clothing?

CFTC has been defanged before:
Interview: Brooksley Born

Think again.

Be a big, white collar criminal

Bill Black’s Top Ten Ways to Crack Down on Corporate Financial Crime
24 Corporate Crime Reporter 10, March 5, 2010
Ninety-five percent of criminologists study blue collar crime. Five percent study white collar crime.

Friday, March 12, 2010
UBS says IRS has 20 Swiss banks in its sights Copyright 2010. The Associated Press

Dirt Diggers Digest
chronicling corporate misbehavior (and how to research it)
Attacking the Wrong Earmarks
March 11th, 2010 by Phil Mattera

"...It’s amusing to watch the posturing about these small amounts at a time when Congress may be about to endorse what can be seen as perhaps the largest earmark ever: the healthcare subsidies that will pass from lower-income Americans to private insurers in a public-option-less system..."

Tomgram: Andy Kroll, Welcome to America, Sucker
Posted by Andy Kroll at 8:30am, March 12, 2010.

Expert Names Top Five Prisons for White-Collar Criminals

Hand caught in the corporate cookie jar?

Guilty on all counts?

Judge sentences you to the slammer?

Fear not, dear corporate CEO.

There is a guide for your post-conviction life.

It’s called the Federal Prison Handbook 2005.

And it’s co-author – Alan Ellis – wants you know – there is prison, and there is prison.

While the guidebook profiles each of the nation’s 178 federal prisons, only about a third of them are minimum security prisons – or federal prison camps – suitable for your average CEO.

And Ellis says – this is what you want – a federal prison camp.

Choose Your White-Collar Criminal Pen Pal HERE >

(I wouldn't recommend Dookie Cunningham, my ex-congressman, he's not the sharpest tool in the shed)

Harry Reid Slams Supreme Court Justices John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy For Campaign Finance Decision

Good for Reid, glad he grew a pair. I can't even describe the loathing I have for the Roberts Court.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Such a pretty song

by Leonel Garcia (Léon Polar)

Yo luche por tu amor por la buena y por la mala
Yo renuncie a volar cuando cortaste tus alas
Si se que hay cosas que nunca se deben perder
Pero entiende que yo te amaba

Si yo luche la guerra a veces hasta por los dos
Y como perdí y como sangre las batallas
Y hoy te puedo ver partir con mucho dolor
Pero sin cargo de conciencia
Sin cargo de conciencia no,

No lo puedo fingir siento mucho temor
Pero sin cargos de conciencia
Sin cargos de conciencia no

Di lo mejor de mi nunca me he guardado nada
Di todo lo que soy creo que a ti no te gustaba
Si se que hay veces que ya nada se puede hacer
Pero hasta hoy murió la esperanza

Si se que todo el equilibrio siempre lo mantuve yo
El que se mato por equilibrar la balanza
Y hoy te puedo ver partir con mucho dolor
Pero sin cargo de conciencia
Sin cargo de conciencia no

No lo puedo fingir siento mucho temor
Pero sin cargos de conciencia
Sin cargos de conciencia no

Hoy te puedo ver partir con mucho dolor
Pero sin cargo de conciencia
Sin cargo de conciencia no,

No lo puedo fingir siento mucho temor
Pero sin cargos de conciencia
Sin cargos de conciencia no

(Google translation)

This made me think

I have been critical of some of our military personnel here. Some of that was personal, you guys know you're hard on the local girls, especially when your girl back home dumped you. "Young and dumb and full of cum" ring a bell?

However, those of us who have waited for a phone call or a letter knowing that our loved ones might have had to make this leg of the trip know. We know the world is ungrateful for what our guys do. Of course, not all of the world is disinterested in what happens there, so our guys don't do it all alone.

It's the corruption, greed, waste and mismanagement of the big shots who tell our guys what to do that pisses me off to no end.

I was listening to this report on KPBS this morning on the power of surfing to heal ex-service members with serious injuries and I wondered if they have any problems with surfer turf. They didn't mention specific beaches, so I'm thinking the recovering service members are not using the same beaches. The surf's probably too rough and the competition gets ugly.

5:14 PM 3/9/2010
See if you can watch Body of War without tearing up. I couldn't, I cried. I got mad and wanted to pound W's face. I don't even want to know how many times Nathan has been deployed or what happened to him.

Reading now -- The Devil We Know by Robert Baer

I know Baer had something to do with Syriana and I love that movie, I threw a fit till my husband bought me a copy and I only own about a dozen movies. I don't beg my husband any more, I buy what I want. Between Neflix and the public library systems in this county, I don't need much.

Review: 'The Devil We Know'
Reviewed by Elaine Sciolino (NYT)
Published: Tuesday, October 28, 2008

I haven't read the book yet, so I don't know if I agree with the review, but I do know that we don't know shit about Iranian culture, my neighbor has been there for years and I'm still baffled, even after reading . this book , but reading it helped. The Ayatollah Begs to Differ by Hooman Majd is definitely worth reading if you are curious about Iranians, and easier to read than some Iranian authors because dude is Iranian-American who has lived here most of his life.

I came across this this morning while I was trying to remember the name of the book and author who helped me understand Iranians.

2 Missing Teen Cases, 2 Different Police Responses

re: Amber "The news media showed little interest."

Not true. Escondido PD is busier than the Poway sheriff's dept, though, the population is larger and there are more lower income people in Escondido.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Wendell Potter is great!

He was a health care CEO, now he's helping us understand the politics of health care. C'mon, you got 20 minutes, right?

Who says those wars haven't been successful?

NY Times: Afghan Opium Kingpin On CIA Payroll

Brother of Afghan Leader Said to Be Paid by C.I.A.
By DEXTER FILKINS, MARK MAZZETTI and JAMES RISEN
Published: October 27, 2009 NYT

Marine reportedly killed by opium-fueled private contractors
By John Byrne
Thursday, March 4th, 2010 -- 9:43 am


Fallujah birth defects blamed on US weapons
By Daniel Tencer
Thursday, March 4th, 2010 -- 1:26 pm
Iraqi doctors reportedly warn women not to have children; Doctors pressured not to 'embarrass the United States': claim

Those previous stories are just "collateral damage" or ... ummm... "tools" or some shit, lets define "success."

Western producers like BP, Exxon Mobil, and Shell are enjoying their best access to Iraq's southern oil fields since 1972... March 4, 2010, 3:50PM EST (Bloomberg)


Yeah, that's the ticket!

*sigh*
Just 1/2 way though Dexter by Design by Jeff Lindsay , and wondering if season 3 of Leverage and season 4 of Dexter(Showtime TV) will ever show up on Netflix. I refuse to pay $60 a month for cable to be barraged with more ads. I'm also wondering if Dexter will ever kill any mass murderers, umm, say this guy?


satire

Bob Dylan's songwriting

And someone else's voices, please.

Why do we allow the dinosaurs to order us to war?

Who Killed the Electric Car?

Who Killed the Electric Car? (Wikipedia page

Who Killed the Electric Car? Week of 6.9.06 PBS NOW

Why do we allow the oil companies and the Saudis and all the others to hamper our use of inventions of innovative men like Stanford R. Ovshinsky ?

Chile

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Update 12:16 PM 3/3/2010
Published on Wednesday, March 3, 2010 by Published on Wednesday, March 3, 2010 by CommonDreams.org
Chile's Socialist Rebar
by Naomi Klein

This made me laugh out loud

Inhofe trying to get Bunning to end filibuster so highway funding doesn’t expire.

wolves

There might not be any connection here, but I can't help wondering if energy interests who basically controlled the Bush administration are afraid they might not be able to do whatever the fuck they want to do any more. Not that Obama is having much luck re-regulating what the Bunnypants/Cheney administration managed to get deregulated.

8.8 earthquake in Chile causes tsunami watch

Huge Quake Hits Chile; Tsunami Threatens Pacific
February 27, 2010
by The Associated Press
Earthquake Strikes Chile

122 dead so far, but the toll will not be like Haiti because the building codes are followed. They are used to quakes in Chile. I find it amusing that we are under tsunami advisory here in San Diego. The lifeguards here didn't sound that freaked out. It's raining here. The scariest thing about storms here are the idiots on the road.

I do not feel well today. I am going back to bed and watch stuff on Netflix. I've been watching the 1st season of the Brotherhood. I dunno what's easier to hate, the obnoxious accents or the nasty things some of the characters do.

Bush V Gore legal adversaries team up to push back Prop h8

Theodore Olson and David Boies speak with Bill Moyers

February 26, 2010
Once adversaries in 2000's Bush v. Gore Supreme Court case, now two of the nation's premier lawyers – one conservative and one liberal – have teamed up to make the constitutional case for same-sex marriage.

Watch here

I loved watching them. I haven't watched the actors go over the trial, but here it is.

If you want to check out the spoofalicios responses to the h8 ad Moyers shows, they are much funnier.

Climate change deniers: let's connect the dots, shall we?

The Attack on Climate-Change Science
Why It’s the O.J. Moment of the Twenty-First Century
By Bill McKibben
February 25, 2010

"...Not surprisingly, perhaps, the latest poll on the American public’s attitude toward climate change shows startling drops in the belief in the very existence of climate change, in humanity's role in causing it, and in its import for the planet: a 14-point drop since October 2008 in Americans who believe climate change is happening at all (to 57%), a 10-point drop in those who believe that human activity is at the root of the problem (to 47%), and a 13-point drop in those who claim to be “somewhat” or “very” worried about the problem (to 50%). .."

Americans are affected by spin, because many don't know any better. They don't understand how news delivery gets paid for. The big money runs with any doubt. The same thing helps them win in the court room over and over again. That is my opinion, based on years of looking up how the news is delivered; TV is expensive, somebody sponsors it, finding out who owns what , and using a bit of common sense. And oh yeah, these guys helped...a LOT. So did figuring out that more often than not, the congress is bought and paid for by large corporate interests in the form of campaign contributions.

"...So let’s figure out how to talk about it. Let’s look at Exxon Mobil, which each of the last three years has made more money than any company in the history of money. Its business model involves using the atmosphere as an open sewer for the carbon dioxide that is the inevitable byproduct of the fossil fuel it sells. And yet we let it do this for free. It doesn't pay a red cent for potentially wrecking our world

Right now, there’s a bill in the Congress -- cap-and-dividend, it’s called -- that would charge Exxon for that right, and send a check to everyone in the country every month. Yes, the company would pass on the charge at the pump, but 80% of Americans (all except the top-income energy hogs) would still make money off the deal. That represents good science, because it starts to send a signal that we should park that SUV, but it’s also good politics...."

Read the Economist article, it's the last link in the last copied paragraph of McKibben's article ( ↑ ).

Exposing the Great American Bubble Barons: Join Us in the Investigation

Join AlterNet's collective investigative project into the bubble barons who got obscenely rich as they destroyed our economy. Help hold them accountable with Citizen Journalism.

Wow. Sounds an awful lot like what the author of the book I'm still slogging through has been trying to tell us. Unfortunately, this shit is not confined to within the United States borders.

This disgusts me

From Israel, a plan to win friends and influence people by working on its image

The government of Israel is launching a citizens' campaign to change their image, including 70 workshops for Israelis on how to hold a civil discussion when they travel abroad.

What? No, I'm not disgusted that Israel needs some good PR, I know that. I've always known that, we lived in a Jewish neighborhood when I was little. Just read the article and see if you can spot why I'm disgusted.

If I were nicer

I might not be hoping that


Darth Cheney would croak this time.


Unfortunately, just today I was reading about a kid who was stationed here locally who died from lung cancer after 4 months at 25 years old. The kid didn't smoke. His parents didn't smoke.



Darth Cheney couldn't wait for KBR to get contracts in Iraq. KBR is being sued by over 300 people who's health has been seriously affected by the burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan. So I wonder if all the war casualties from both sides of the conflict are worth anything to Darth Cheney other than financial profits that he scooted out of the country?

If there is a hell I hope he burns in it. He sure doesn't care who or what he burns in his quest for financial gain.