This is how I am thinking about the ACA and CSR’s absent a full repeal.
Open thread
by David Anderson| 14 Comments
This post is in: Anderson On Health Insurance, Open Threads
This is how I am thinking about the ACA and CSR’s absent a full repeal.
Open thread
by Betty Cracker| 130 Comments
This post is in: Election 2016, Open Threads, Politics, Republican Stupidity, Republican Venality, Trump Crime Cartel, Trump-Russia, Assholes, General Stupidity
Trump taunted “liddle'” [sic] Bob Corker all morning on Twitter. Corker unloaded on Trump a few hours ago:
Some choice quotes for those who can’t / won’t watch the video:
“Nothing that he said in his tweets today was truthful… I would hope the staff over there would figure out ways of controlling him when they know that everything he said today was untruthful.”
“It’s amazing. Unfortunately, I think world leaders are very aware that much of what he says is untrue. Certainly people here are because these things are provably untrue. I don’t know why he lowers himself to such a low, low standard and debases himself the way he does, but he does.”
“The president has great difficulty with the truth. On many issues.”
“We’re going to be in our hearing process addressing the fact that he with only the one other person on the defense side has tremendous powers [i.e., nuclear launch capabilities]… I expressed concerns a few weeks ago about his leadership, stability and lack of desire to be competent on issues…”
Corker also said he wouldn’t support Trump for president again. And I suppose it’s a good thing that he’s speaking out now, if only on the infinitesimally small chance that it might inspire other Republicans to sack up (haha — not gonna happen!).
But hearing those remarks also makes me want to grab the (liddle’) sumbitch by the shoulders and shake him until his teeth rattle. Exactly what part of Trump’s mean-spiritedness, instability, incuriousity, incompetence and mendacity wasn’t blazingly obvious all along?
Corker says “debasement of the country” will be Trump’s legacy. Enabling Trump will be Corker’s.
“He’s obviously not going to rise to the occasion as president.”Post + Comments (130)
This post is in: Dolt 45, Military, Republican Venality, All we want is life beyond the thunderdome, Not Normal
She’s 25 years old. She’s pregnant. She has 2 kids. She just lost her husband. And she went on nat’l TV to speak truth to power #respect
— Michael Cohen (@speechboy71) October 23, 2017
Here's the full interview with Myeshia Johnson, widow of fallen soldier Sgt. La David Johnson pic.twitter.com/1pbqEonlH0
— Yashar Ali ?? (@yashar) October 23, 2017
I bet if you asked her, she would say she is not strong. What she is, is brave. She gets up & keeps going because he deserves justice.
— LizzDregne (@LizzDregne) October 23, 2017
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It’s not going to get any better. He’s only going to get worse, and so is the news out of Niger.
So how long will it be until Trump attacks Myeshia Johnson directly?
— Michael Cohen (@speechboy71) October 23, 2017
I'm told there are currently no plans for the administration to reach out to the family of Sgt. La David Johnson again.
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) October 23, 2017
Here's a list of ALL Republicans in Congress who condemned @realDonaldTrump for attacking Gold Star families & defending neo-Nazis:
?
?
?
?— Jon Cooper (@joncoopertweets) October 24, 2017
For every angry Tweet about the Trump-Wilson dustup, I'm thinking of replying with a link to the Go Fund Me page for scholarships for La David Johnson's kids https://t.co/3VEcWWfaMf
— Marc Caputo (@MarcACaputo) October 21, 2017
by DougJ| 147 Comments
This post is in: David Brooks Giving A Seminar At The Aspen Institute, Fuck Yeah!
A bunch of Third Way wankers did a tour of flyover country and were saddened by all the negativity. For some reason, I decided to skim the article about their trip, and I liked where these unions guys were coming from:
At the Labor Temple Lounge in Eau Claire, nine gruff, tough-looking union men sat around a table. One had the acronym of his guild, the Laborers International Union of North America, tattooed on a bulging bicep. The men pinned the blame for most of their problems squarely on Republicans, from Trump to Governor Scott Walker. School funding, the minimum wage, college debt, income inequality, gerrymandering, health care, union rights: It was all, in their view, the GOP’s fault. A member of the bricklayers’ union lamented Walker’s cuts to public services: “If we can’t help each other,” he said, “what are we, a pack of wolves—we eat the weakest one? It’s shameful.”
But their negativity toward Republicans didn’t translate to rosy feelings for the Democrats, who, they said, too frequently ignored working-class people. And some of the blame, they said, fell on their fellow workers, many of whom supported Republicans against their own interests. “The membership”—the union rank-and-file—“voted for these Republicans because of them damn guns,” a Laborers Union official said. “You cannot push it out of their head. A lot of ‘em loved it when Walker kicked our ass.”
This made the Third Wayers sad:
Debriefing after this particular group, the Third Way listeners said they found the union men demoralizing. “I feel like they can’t see their way out,” Hale said.
“They were very negative,” Paul Neaville, another researcher, concurred.
They were so fixated on blaming Republicans, Hale fretted. “It was very us-and-them.”
Here’s the thing though: those union guys are fucking right. If the right-wing really is out to fuck you, and they are, you should hate them and see it as us-and-them.
Doesn’t reality count for anything with centrists?
by David Anderson| 14 Comments
This post is in: Anderson On Health Insurance
This is a follow-up from yesterday’s post on how systems need to change to address the weirdness of Silver Loading and Gold Gapping in the individual market. Today’ we’ll talk about what you should do. This only applies if you buy your insurance in the individual market.
First, let’s establish some basic guidelines for everyone:
The Kaiser Family Foundation has a great set of FAQs for everybody to peruse. That should be your first stop.
The second thing to do is check to see if you are Medicaid eligible. The exchange should send you towards Medicaid if your income qualifies you. This is under $16,600 for a single person or $33,900 for a family of four.
If you are not Medicaid eligible and earn between 100% and 150% FPL ($12,060 to $18,090) go Silver. You still qualify for the reduced out of pocket expenses. The insurer has to give that to you. The entire CSR fight is a behind the scenes fight on how these costs are reimbursed to the insurer.
No Load States (North Dakota, Vermont, Washington DC)
Nothing has changed, do what you did last year.
Broad Load States (Delaware, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Oklahoma, Colorado)
All plans are more expensive. Bronze plans will be comparatively cheaper for subsidized buyers and Gold/Platinum plans will be comparatively more expensive. The benchmark Silver will cost the same for subsidized buyers and the least expensive Silver will be slightly cheaper as the gap is bigger. Off-Exchange, you’re paying more. Look around and determine what is the minimal network you need and be ready to switch insurers and plans to save some money.
Silver Load and Silver Switch States
This is where it gets confusing. In some regions of the state, the price order will be Bronze-Silver-Gold-Platinum. In those areas, follow the rules of Broad Load.
In other regions, the price order will be Bronze-Gold-Silver-Platinum. Here is where you need to pay attention.
If you make between 150% and 200% FPL ($24,120) you have some choices to make. You still qualify for good CSR but the monthly premiums will be higher than some Gold plans. Gold plans for people who qualify for mid-range CSR have higher deductibles but may have lower premiums. If you see a Silver plan and a Gold plan with an insurer and network that you like, you have to make a choice. Do you trade a bigger monthly payment for a smaller out of pocket maximum. For people who think that they are likely to be healthy and have some assets to absorb a financial hit, this trade for Gold may make sense. For people who know that they will hit the out of pocket max no matter what, staying with Silver is probably a good idea.
In the Silver Load and Silver Switch states, the complexity really starts to happen. We’ll work through Pennsylvania’s Silver Switch loading below the fold:
Not every county in Pennsylvania has a Gold Gap. The counties that don’t have a Gold Gap are the counties where one company decided to Broad Load and everyone else decided to Silver Load. This makes the Gold plan just slightly more expensive than the benchmark Silver. In those counties people have to make the decision as to whether or not paying a little more for Gold per month is worth buying the much lower out of pocket expenses. In most cases in Pennsylvania it will be as most counties the extra premium for Gold is less than $25 per month for a single individual. $300 a year to avoid several thousand dollars in out of pocket expenses is a reasonable trade for many people. However there are counties like Franklin and Lancaster where Gold is priced significantly above Silver so this is not an automatic case.
In most counties in Pennsylvania including the two largest, Philadelphia and Allegheny, Gold is less expensive then the Benchmark Silver. In Allegheny County, the choice is simple, the least expensive Gold plan is from my former employer, UPMC Health Plan. It is on the same network (Partners) as the benchmark Silver and they are both EPOs. The Gold plan in this case dominates the benchmark Silver as it is the same network with lower out of pocket costs and lower premiums. In Allegheny County anyone who makes between 200% and 400% FPL should not buy Silver if they are only shopping on price.
Greater Philadelphia is more complicated. There is a Gold plan $1 less than the benchmark Silver. There is also a Silver plan $102 less than the Benchmark Silver for a 21 year old (for a 64 year old that plan is $306 less than the Benchmark). The challenge is figuring out if the extra premiums for a Gold plan are worth the lower out of pocket hit. For people who know that they are likely to max-out, Gold is probably worth it if the network is sufficient. For people who think that they will be pretty healthy, Silver in Philadelphia is still a decent choice.
So yeah, this is complicated. In regions where there is only a single insurer, it is simpler when there is Silver Loading. In regions with multiple insurers making multiple choices, there will be a good deal available compared to last year but there are no hard and fast decision rules.
by Alain Chamot (1971-2020)| 14 Comments
This post is in: On The Road, Open Threads, Readership Capture
capGood Morning All,
This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.
So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.
You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.
For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, roacdescription, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.
Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!
Just two pictures today as I had more issues. I’ll be addressing those soon!
So, from a year ago::
I was in Austin for a family wedding and it was nice seeing a city that was a big part of my childhood, with family memories and events being brought up, all-grown-up (me and Austin!). Some places were plain gone, many others still weird and wonderful. Seeing things like glass-ball Halloween ornaments on cactus tips that intruded into narrow public sidewalks made me miss the nutty artistic hippy THING that is Austin.
At the reception, I saw my first gathering of my aunt and her girlfriends who used to babysit me in the mid-late 1970’s since I moved away in 1979. It wasn’t as big a deal for them, since they get together often, but it was amazing seeing the same neat, quirky, passionate, intelligent women after all these years and all their adventures. They are all so different yet so the same. It was like a brief homecoming to a part of my childhood.
As a child, I often recreated near this pink granite edifice in the mid-late 1970’s. It’s truly a different world, then and now.
I appreciate metal work as do I stone and landscape. I found this fence surrounding the Texas Capitol to be impressive.
Today, pictures from valued commenter Redshift.
On our trip to Europe this summer, Ms. Redshift and I went to Kiev to see the girls from Belarus and Ukraine we hosted in a summer children’s program 8-12 years ago. While there, we toured Kiev, and spent quite a bit of time in the Maidan, site of the mass protests that toppled the Russian-backed government of Ukraine. It was powerful, and very moving to be there. It really makes you think about what you’d be willing to risk, what you’d be willing to do.
Panorama of the entire square
Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Independence Square), Kiev, Ukraine
360 Panorama of the entire Maidan
Thank you so much Redshift, do send us more when you can.
Travel safely everybody, and do share some stories in the comments, even if you’re joining the conversation late. Many folks confide that they go back and read old threads, one reason these are available on the Quick Links menu.
One again, to submit pictures: Use the Form or Send an Email
This post is in: Dog Blogging, Open Threads, Proud to Be A Democrat, Readership Capture, Women's Rights Are Human Rights, Daydream Believers
Tens of thousands of people paraded down NYC’s Fifth Avenue #OTD in 1915 in support of women’s suffrage. Women got the vote 5 years later. pic.twitter.com/N65jLT2FBO
— Civil Rights (@civilrightsorg) October 23, 2017
At the time, the @nytimes ran an article warning if “granted the suffrage, they would demand all the rights that implies.” They were right. https://t.co/rRZ54nc93N
— Kamala Harris (@SenKamalaHarris) October 23, 2017
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NEWS – @OFA enters partnership with Holder redistricting group @DemRedistrict, Obama to announce it himself shortly https://t.co/34H4ctzVpk
— Edward-Isaac Dovere (@IsaacDovere) October 23, 2017
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Apart from proudly owning your ambitions, what’s on the agenda for the day?
This tiny dog picked out the biggest toy in the store — and she's carrying it to the car ALL BY HERSELF. pic.twitter.com/BFld656WNx
— Animal Gifs ?? (@BabyAnimalGifs) October 20, 2017
Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Grab the BIG Prize!Post + Comments (159)