Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
So I downloaded the book over the weekend and am about 2 hours into the 29.5 hours of listening pleasure. I am enjoying it immensely. Obama’s cadence is the calm I need in this moment of pandemic/transition tantrum/economic uncertainty. I found a few audio excerpts for you and thought you might like to discuss the man and the book itself.
https://twitter.com/TaMarasKitchen/status/1330996366609313792?s=20
JUST IN: Michigan election board certifies Biden win https://t.co/9N1LV1Ga9q pic.twitter.com/UhkUUIOHCt
— The Hill (@thehill) November 23, 2020
ETA:
new from my colleague @KristenhCNN:
GSA has informed president-elect Joe Biden the administration is ready to begin the formal transition process, according to a letter from administrator Emily Murphy sent Monday afternoon and obtained by CNN.— John Harwood (@JohnJHarwood) November 23, 2020
Monday Evening Open Thread: The Biden Transition ContinuesPost + Comments (226)
Because America apparently has not yet endured enough fucking Zoom meetings during the pandemic, a couple Republicans in Michigan are causing problems and trying to keep them from certifying the vote. As punishment, the canvassing board is now holding a live comment session so every random on the planet can come live and voice their opinion:
So far, the vast majority of the people are telling them they were involved in the process as poll watchers/challengers/etc., there was no fraud, and to just certify the vote.
It is, in essence, a giant waste of time because of a couple wingnut jackasses. It’s fucking absurd, and a reminder that our democracy is designed to function with people acting in good faith, otherwise, the system gets gummed up.
God bless Julie Matuzak, the one canvasser who is apparently my soul mate and sick of this bullshit.
I’ve been watching the Never Trumpers to see how they sketch out their next move. Jennifer Rubin has a piece in the Post titled The Republican Party has split in two. Let’s keep it that way.
When a little tiny chunk of ice falls off a glacier, is it split in two? When I cut a branch from the big tree in my front yard, did I halve it? Where Rubin sees a split, all I see are a (very) few of the usual suspects — Romney, Murkowski, Sasse, Portman, Liz Cheney — making some ineffective noise about Trump, and the rest of them doing what they’ve always done, which is either to vocally support Trump or quietly support Trump, which amounts to the same thing.
The fact that Rubin’s column is illustrated with a picture of Gov. Larry Hogan, the Maryland Republican who broke with Trump, shows how small the split really is. Sixty-six percent of his voting constituents voted for Biden. Both senators and 7 of 8 representatives from that state are Democrats. Hogan is going to stay elected in Maryland by predictably repudiating Trump — good for him, and so what?
It’s tough out there for the Never Trump Republicans. They keep searching for the big block of Republicans who share their hate for Trump and want to re-take the Party, but the bitter fact is that, as the X-rays clearly show, this thing was broken long ago. There is no such block and the dream of rehabilitation is a pipe dream.
As Biden begins to announce his cabinet picks, I have two thoughts.
First, ideology should take a back seat to bureaucratic competence. Job one is cleanup: rooting out Trump ticks that have buried themselves into agencies, and issuing reams of rule making that reverses Trumpy rules. So, when I read this in today’s Post story about his first three picks, I know he’s on the right track:
All three expected nominees have decades-long careers working at the highest levels of government, and a deep respect for institutions.
Second, we need to get our unfuckers into place as soon as possible. McConnell’s simple plan is to make Biden wait months if not years to get all his appointments confirmed. Trump never bothered with confirmations, which isn’t what I’m recommending (because it ends with courts overturning policies). The Democrats have to find a way around that by, say, forcing a Congressional recess if we lose Georgia. Of course, the best thing we can do is win in Georgia, tough as that might be.
I am utterly fascinated by the ACA choice space and choice architecture. Most of my ACA related research can tie into this fascination with no more than a wink and a nod. I currently have papers in pipeline that examine plan domination, zero premium effects, market re-entry, insurer strategy, competitive responses to market entry and exit on a few axis. I have long thought that the ACA “meaningful difference” regulation makes the choice space cluttered and confusing. Insurers have three basic tools to build a unique plan. They can alter the plan type (HMO/PPO/EPO/POS) which changes the out of network benefits and the gatekeeping functions, they can change the network of contracted providers and they can change the benefits offered by manipulating
An insurer can offer a dozen near clones of a basic plan in a “silver spam” strategy as I outlined in 2016:
a Silver spam strategy that has been a hobby horse of mine for a while. The goal is to proliferate a bunch of plans tightly clustered around the subsidy benchmark point. For markets where all insurers are paying near commercial rates, this is not a big deal. In markets where one insurer is paying Medicaid plus something or Medicare like rates and everyone else is paying commercial rates to providers, this is a big deal. It forces heavily subsidized buyers to choose between half a dozen affordable plans that are functionally similar from the same insurer or not really be able to afford a choice.
This is due to the lack of good meaningful difference regulation….
Insurers can silver spam by making small changes to one of the three categories while holding everything else constant.
Abbeville County, South Carolina is a prime example. I used the 2021 Landscape PUF and Plan Attributes PUF to identify a county where there are multiple insurers offering at least five plans on the same network and same plan type for each insurer. A few counties in the US met this qualification. Abbeville was notable:
Two insurers, Ambetter and BCBS of South Carolina are offering a total of 21 silver plans. Ambetter offers an HMO on a single Ambetter specific network with eleven variants that have a 16% premium spread between the cheapest Ambetter plan and the most expensive Ambetter plan. An Ambetter plan is the benchmark silver plan.
Blue Cross offers 10 silver EPO plans on a single Blue specific network. BCBS-SC has a premium range of 10% between their cheapest and most expensive variant.
This is a tough choice environment. Ambetter gives some clues with the inclusion of optional adult vision and dental benefits in their plan titles, but the choice environment is challenging. The different choices are attempts to both dominate the search engine optimization of display pages for marketing purposes, own the benchmark point which means owning the CSR eligible enrollment space, and segmenting the market by risk profiles. It is also likely to make a lot of people confused and perplexed as they attempt to make a good enough choice even if they accept that they will not make an optimal choice.
Simplifying the choice space can be done by regulation. California simplifies their choice space by only allowing an insurer to offer a standard benefit package for each metal level. Healthcare.gov may not want to be that interventionist in the market. However, meaningful difference could be redefined so that any dyad of plan type and network, an insurer has to offer plans with a meaningful difference in premium of 5% or more of the minimum premium offered within a metal level. This could allow insurers to offer variants that they think are critical to offer while removing some of the surplus confusion while at the same time allowing for the possibility of wider premium spreads and greater affordability for low income silver buyers.
WATCH: Joe Biden’s election win, Trump’s presidency and marriage difficulties in the White House: Here are some excerpts from former President Barack Obama’s wide-ranging interview with Oprah Winfrey pic.twitter.com/lLjwWdY8TR
— Reuters (@Reuters) November 21, 2020
… at driving the Worst People in the World ever farther out of their rotten little minds.
Monday Morning Open Thread: President Obama Remains the Undisputed MasterPost + Comments (225)