Sunday, November 8, 2015
Saturday, November 7, 2015
WaPo Gen Xer drinks climate Kool-Aid, attacks Baby Boomers for causing global warming and running up the $18 trillion debt
 |
| spotted headed to Mt. Rushmore |
Here:
"Boomers soaked up a lot of economic opportunity without bothering to preserve much for the generations to come. They burned a lot of cheap fossil fuels, filled the atmosphere with heat-trapping gases, and will probably never pay the costs of averting catastrophic climate change or helping their grandchildren adapt to a warmer world. They took control of Washington at the turn of the millennium, and they used it to rack up a lot of federal debt, even before the Great Recession hit."
Substitute "liberals" everytime you see "boomers" in the essay and it makes a lot more sense than attacking your parents per se. Instead the author prefers to commit Maoism in "Baby boomers are what’s wrong with America’s economy".
Meanwhile, exporting good jobs and importing cheap labor were artifacts of the 1960s revolution, advanced by people who were fellow travelers under FDR. The height of the baby boom generation was what, aged 10 in 1967?
In the end, Jim Tankersley can't add and subtract, but what his father gave him for Christmas in 2012 for his patricidal thesis says it all:
"After I first outlined this argument to my father in 2012, he gifted me an actual lump of coal for Christmas."
Well done, Dad! The earth remains full of coal, especially American earth, ensuring energy independence as far as the eye can see, as well as oil and natural gas and . . . thorium! If only we'll use it.
It makes more sense to rely on these going forward because they remain so plentiful, employing technologies to make them harmless to human health, invented by smart people from every generation.
But if a Maunder Minimum ensues in 2030, we might not care as much about the health as the warmth.
Friday, November 6, 2015
Rush Limbaugh: 94 million not in labor force are ALL on welfare, ALL have an EBT card, ALL getting food stamps, ALL getting disability
Today, here, with the right's version of The Big Lie:
"We don't have 5% unemployment. We've got 20% unemployment. Bob, we have 94 million Americans not working, not in the labor force. They're all on welfare, Bob, one way or another. You are talking about vandals basically coming in and ripping you off at the laundromat. Half of this country is on welfare, Bob. That's another reason why people aren't talking about it. Half the country that votes is on welfare, and they vote for Santa Claus, Bob. And to them, you're Santa Claus. And you're...
"I can understand exactly why you want to sell the business and get out of there. It's probably being stolen from you. Customers in there get harassed by people that want to commit vandalism or crime in there. I have total understanding, relatability, sympathy for what you're going through. But we've succeeded in letting so many people... Bob, 94 million Americans not working, and they all have an EBT card. They're all getting food stamps. They're all getting some form -- many of them -- of disability."
Carson calls Politico story a lie, but MSM repeats it as a fact
http://www.cnbc.com/2015/11/06/carson-got-caught-who-stands-to-benefit.html
http://www.woodradio.com/onair/the-insider-48410/developing-ben-carson-admits-to-fabricating-14102408
That second one is a real howler. A Rush Limbaugh affiliate, Wood Radio in Grand Rapids could actually monitor the broadcast to learn Carson's campaign says the story is a lie but would rather just go with the lie.
Politico attempts to discredit Carson's claims to being offered the full ride to West Point
Here.
The story tries to make hay with his claim to being offered a full scholarship at West Point when there isn't any such thing "per se", but admits that with an appointment "all costs are covered". Carson was evidently encouraged to apply by General Westmoreland at some point based on his qualifications and interest, but declined to do so in favor of a medical education.
Carson's story may stretch the facts and err in details but overall remains a plausible if understandably biased retelling of his ROTC experience in high school.
Who would fault a poor black kid from Detroit for emphasizing that a full ride through West Point had been within his reach?
Answer: the liberal hacks at Politico.
Commentary Magazine's Jonathan Tobin doesn't even read what he cites, making a hash of Obamacare story
Jonathan Tobin here:
"This is something of a misnomer because, as the Heritage Institute pointed out in a paper published last month, almost all of these people were simply added to the rolls of those receiving Medicare. If you only count those who are actually receiving insurance outside of Medicare, the net increase of those with coverage (the number of those buying these policies is offset by an almost equal reduction in the number of customers who have employer-based plans) is only 260,000 people."
Ah, no.
First of all the paper was from the "Heritage Foundation", not the "Heritage Institute". Perhaps he's heard of it? It's only been a Washington fixture since like the Reagan Administration. He does remember Reagan, right? Well, he is a neoconservative.
And it was the rolls of Medicaid which were expanded, not Medicare. What kind of a dummy gets that wrong? Medicare is for older Americans. Medicare is supposed to be paid for through payroll taxes, and it's blowing up as we speak, but that's another story. Medicaid used to be health coverage for the poor and the indigent, provided by the States. Leave it to Obama to expand it from DC and call it insurance.
The middle class of this country will end up poor and indigent and on Medicaid, too, if someone doesn't put a stop to this train wreck called Obamacare and soon.
Middle class people have just had their taxes raised dramatically to provide coverage and subsidies to pay for that coverage to about 9 million people who didn't have it before or didn't have what they're getting now. Middle class taxes went up in the form of health insurance premium increases, raised deductibles and skyrocketing pharmaceutical price increases. Middle class people buying the cheapest of plans now can expect to shell out over $13,000 in premiums and deductibles before their plans pay out one red cent of a big healthcare bill. The incentive for them is to avoid care even when they need it in order to save money.
All Tobin had to do to get the article moving in the right direction was to actually read the title of the Heritage paper and the accompanying abstract, but apparently he didn't do even that. One wonders if he even wrote the story himself. He is Commentary's "editor" after all.
What a putz.
Backgrounder #3062 on Health Care
October 15, 2015
2014 Health Insurance Enrollment: Increase Due Almost Entirely to Medicaid Expansion
By Edmund F. Haislmaier and Drew Gonshorowski
Abstract
Health insurance enrollment data for 2014 shows that the number of Americans with health insurance increased by 9.25 million during the year. However, the vast majority of the increase was the result of 8.99 million individuals being added to the Medicaid rolls. While enrollment in private individual-market plans increased by almost 4.79 million, most of that gain was offset by a reduction of 4.53 million in the number of people with employment-based group coverage. Thus, the net increase in private health insurance in 2014 was just 260,000 people.
Thursday, November 5, 2015
To pay for highway bill, US House relies on selling strategic oil reserve and privatizing IRS employment instead of raising gasoline taxes
From the story here:
"The bill is in fact financed with a collection of offsets that many lawmakers find objectionable, such as raising $9 billion by selling oil from the country’s emergency oil reserves. Roughly $2.5 billion comes from requiring the Internal Revenue Service to use private debt collectors, reviving a controversial program opposed by many Democrats, consumer groups and the union that represents agency employees."
Wednesday, November 4, 2015
At new book launch, Trump accuses Janet Yellen of keeping interest rates low to protect Obama's reputation
Donald Trump, quoted here by AP/Obama:
'"In my opinion Janet Yellen is highly political and she's not raising the rates for a very specific reason: because Obama told her not to," Trump said. "Because he wants to be out playing golf in a year from now, and he wants to be doing other things and he doesn't want to see a big bubble burst during his administration." ...
'The central bank decided in October to keep its key short-term interest rate at a record low in light of a weak global economy and slower U.S. hiring.'
Michigan Republicans increase gasoline excises by 7.3 cents, taking the state from 12th to 5th for highest gas taxes paid in America
Here's the current list of highest combined federal and state gasoline taxes per gallon paid in the top paying states, from highest to lowest:
PA: 73.70 cents per gallon
WA: 62.90
NY: 62.67
HI: 61.55
CA: 59.32
CT: 55.91
FL: 54.82
NC: 54.65
WV: 53.00
RI: 52.40
NV: 52.25
MI: 52.24
IL: 51.87
IN: 51.70
WI: 51.30
GA: 51.02
MD: 50.50
IA: 50.40
ID: 50.40
The tax increase in Michigan will bring the current level to 59.54 cents, ahead of California!
Lest you tree-hugging electric and hybrid drivers think you'll escape, you get slapped with $100 and $30 surcharges (hahahahaha!), according to the story here, on licenses, the rest of us 20% increases:
"Registration fees for passenger vehicles and trucks would rise by 20 percent in 2017, meaning an average $100 bill would rise to $120. The state would also assess a new $100 annual surcharge on most electric vehicles and $30 on hybrids."
And you thought Republicans were against raising taxes.
Raw temperature data have all been changed, 20% of it 16 times in the last 2.5 years
So says Marcia Glaze Wyatt here:
"Raw data is adjusted, sometimes justifiably (yet still injecting uncertainty), yet sometimes, arguably not justifiably, adding more uncertainty!!! Raw data have all been changed – 20% of it changed 16 times in the last 2 and a half years. This plot shows NOT the average surface T trend between 1880 and 2010, but rather the trend of changes made in the temperature anomalies (1880 to 2010) between May 2008 and May 2015. Take the month of January for comparison b/n 1915 and 2000. In May of 2008, the difference b/n January temperature anomalies for those years was 0.39oC. As of May 2015 note, the difference is 0.52oC (almost a degree F). ... And while one assumes that good intentions motivate the adjustments, one thing is obvious: temperatures adjustments prior to 1950 have resulted in a substantial cooling of the early century (20th) and adjustments made after 1950 have substantially warmed the record; consequently, the trend of temperature increase has significantly steepened over the years – a product of data changes. Is this an accurate reflection of reality? Uncertainty..."
Tuesday, November 3, 2015
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