US Politics Mega-thread - Page 1677

Officials in several Republican states that balked at participating in President Obama’s health-care initiative are now revisiting the issue, amid mounting panic over a possible Supreme Court decision that would revoke federal insurance subsidies for millions of Americans.

The discussions taking place in state capitals around the country are part of a flurry of planning and lobbying by officials, insurance and hospital executives, and health-care advocates to blunt the possible impact of a court ruling.

The justices hear arguments about the matter next week. And if the court sides with the plaintiffs, who argue that subsidies are not allowed in the 34 states that opted against setting up their own insurance marketplaces, the ruling could spark an immediate crisis. People could see their insurance bills skyrocket or be forced to abruptly cancel their insurance.

At least six states where Republican leaders had previously refused to set up state marketplaces under the Affordable Care Act are now considering what steps they might take to preserve the subsidies being paid to their residents.

Efforts to try to hold on to the subsidies are even under consideration in South Carolina, which supported the challenge now before the Supreme Court. South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) said in an interview that her state may consider setting up a marketplace, though it is unclear how such a proposal would fare in the staunchly conservative state.

“We’re going to start in this next week working on some things statewide,” Haley, one of the health law’s fiercest critics, said late last week.

A total of nine states now have bills under consideration to set up their own marketplaces, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, though in some cases these efforts began even before the court accepted the subsidies case.

On February 28 2015 03:19 Yoav wrote:


It's really kinda bizarre. Jesus invented the core to our idea of separation of church and state ("Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and render unto God what is God's.") I get your average guy doesn't read the Bible a lot, but embezzling other people's money is kinda the opposite of what Christianity is about.



Holy shit... hannah looking like the good guy. I'm... speechless... It's like when John Edwards did the gay dig at Dick Cheney and I found myself sympathizing with Darth Vader.

But seriously though, can we cut out the personal vendettas please? Given that moderation appears to have given up on this thread (understandably) [edit: yay for warnings!], it would be awesome if we could try to act like decent human beings without questioning GMATs or calling one another ideologues (hint: everyone here is one or another kind of an ideologue; that's why they're in the fucking politics thread. I almost wrote an exception or two, but it's not a lot and even them not consistently.)

On February 28 2015 03:03 JonnyBNoHo wrote:

Allow me to highlight some of your crap:

The numbers were not $2B customer equipment, full stop. There were other figures as well that you chose to ignore. This is lying by omission.

AT&T's profit for 2014 was $6B, Verizon $5B, Comcast $7B. I have no idea where you are getting your numbers from, but they are incorrect. Same goes for the 97% margin; that is a lie.

Wow, that's a lot of crap in just one post!

On February 28 2015 06:56 IgnE wrote:


To accuse me of lying by omission when you simply post cap ex expenditures as if that were the figure they were investing in the coaxial/fiber network that does the heavy lifting is nice. The numbers were for customer equipment, and we have no idea how or what that was spent on. I remember talking to consultant friends back in ~2010 about how Comcast had a huge warehouse in New Jersey full of tens of thousands of cable boxes they were trying to get rid of, because they had way too many. Yes, it's anecdotal. Yes, I don't really care to delve deeply into financial reports to break it all down for you, but your argument is basically: the cable companies are spending a few billions on cap expenditures, so everything must be going ok. That just doesn't hold water. The internet speeds have been going up slowly, because if they hadn't we'd be so far behind the rest of the world that it would be comical.

I know the 97% margin is a lie. Why don't you tell us what the real margin is and justify it.

I got the profit numbers from the Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/03/25/att-complains-it-needs-more-money-for-infrastructure-upgrades-no-it-doesnt/

For FY 2013 Cable Distribution $1.8B, Customer Premise Equipment $2.9B, etc.

On February 27 2015 22:15 Gorsameth wrote:

Someone tried to hide something from oversight, I would say cost of investigation should not be a consideration.

On February 28 2015 07:30 JonnyBNoHo wrote:

You are lying. And you continue to lie.

I never presented the cap ex figures as exclusive to fiber. I wrote: Arguing over which category is more important is a bit silly - you can't dump a truck full of fiber onto the freeway and call it high speed interwebs. It needs to be installed, linked to customers and serviced.

Moreover I've never claimed that everything is wonderful. My claim was that they're spending about as much on cap ex as they are earning in profit. I can (and have) backed that claim up with hard numbers. I have also previously said that I'd like to see more competition encouraged in the space. Yet again here, you resort to lying and claim that I think everything is fine as-is. Pathetic.

How would you like the margin estimated? Gross? Operating? Net? Company wide, which you've previously argued is correct, or just the segment, which you've also argued is correct. Company wide AT&T's gross is 54%, operating 9% and net 4.7%. None of those margines strike me as particularly fat.

As for your source, if you click his source you can readily see his error. He scrolled to the bottom of the table and assumed the number at the bottom was profit, but it's EBITDA, not net income. lol, just lol...

With just hours before the Department of Homeland Security runs out of funding, the GOP-controlled Senate voted to approve a plan that avoids shutting down parts of the agency.

But that was just the beginning.

Later in the afternoon, the House followed with a rival plan that would only fund DHS until March 19. With plenty of last-minute wrangling and in dramatic fashion, the measure failed in the House with a vote of 203 to 224.

This battle has been brewing in Congress for months, since President Obama issued a series of executive actions giving legal status to millions of undocumented immigrants.

Democrats have successfully stopped bills that seek to overturn his actions, so to thwart the them, some Republicans have suggested defunding DHS, the home of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

But Republicans in the House and Senate have failed to agree on a unified strategy. To avoid a partial shutdown of DHS, the Senate passed a so-called "clean bill" that would fund DHS until Sept. 30; the House leadership went forward with a more limited bill.

Ultimately, even after holding the vote open more than 30 minutes past the originally scheduled 15 minutes to try to flip votes, House Republicans could not cobble together the 217 votes they needed to pass the measure.

DHS funding is now in limbo, because it is unclear if House leadership will decide to vote on the bill passed by the Senate earlier or will try to vote again on the same measure after trying to persuade its members.

Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy warned the House that there may be additional votes tonight and perhaps through the weekend.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The University of Wisconsin requested that Gov. Scott Walker remove a requirement that all 26 campuses report allegations of sexual assaults to the state every year because it already submits similar information to the federal government, a UW spokesman said Friday.

The governor’s plan also calls for cutting out information about sexual assaults from orientation programs for new and existing UW students at all campuses, as well as removing the requirement that any employee who witnesses an assault or is told by a student that they’ve been assaulted report that information to the dean of students.

WASHINGTON — In a huge embarrassment for Republican leaders, the House voted down their bill Friday to avert a Homeland Security shutdown hours before the midnight deadline.

The House GOP plan was to pass a three-week stopgap bill to delay the immigration fight against President Barack Obama's executive actions until March 19.

But even that failed to pass, losing conservatives who considered it too much of a surrender to a lawless president as well as Democrats who demanded a yearlong DHS funding bill without any restrictions on Obama's immigration policies.

The vote was 203-224. Fifty-two Republicans voted against it, while 12 Democrats voted for it.

Rep. Barry Loudermilk, a Georgia Republican who recently became the chair of a key congressional subcommittee on science and technology, didn't vaccinate most of his children, he told a crowd at his first town hall meeting last week.

Loudermilk was responding to a woman who asked whether he'd be looking into (discredited) allegations that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) had covered up information linking vaccines to autism. He responded with a rather unscientific personal anecdote: "I believe it's the parents' decision whether to immunize or not…Most of our children, we didn't immunize. They're healthy."

On February 28 2015 09:07 GreenHorizons wrote:


Source

What is with Republicans and Rape?

On February 28 2015 09:07 GreenHorizons wrote:


Source

What is with Republicans and Rape?

On February 28 2015 10:12 Introvert wrote:


Do you read the articles you post? Or do you just fail to understand them?

A significant majority of Americans say combating climate change is a moral issue that obligates them – and world leaders – to reduce carbon emissions, a Reuters/IPSOS poll has found.

The poll of 2,827 Americans was conducted in February to measure the impact of moral language, including interventions by Pope Francis, on the climate change debate. In recent months, the pope has warned about the moral consequences of failing to act on rising global temperatures, which are expected to disproportionately affect the lives of the world’s poor.

The result of the poll suggests that appeals based on ethics could be key to shifting the debate over climate change in the United States, where those demanding action to reduce carbon emissions and those who resist it are often at loggerheads.

Two-thirds of respondents (66 percent) said that world leaders are morally obligated to take action to reduce CO2 emissions. And 72 percent said they were “personally morally obligated” to do what they can in their daily lives to reduce emissions.

“When climate change is viewed through a moral lens it has broader appeal,” said Eric Sapp, executive director of the American Values Network, a grassroots organization that mobilizes faith-based communities on politics and policy issues.

“The climate debate can be very intellectual at times, all about economic systems and science we don’t understand. This makes it about us, our neighbors and about doing the right thing.”

Some observers believe the pope’s message can resonate beyond his own church.

“The moral imperative is the way to reach out to conservatives,” said Rev. Mitch Hescox, president of the Evangelic Environmental Network, a large evangelical organization that advocates for action on climate change.

Talking in terms of values is “the only way forward if we are to bring our fellow Republicans along,” he added.

Some Republican politicians have begun to search for a new message on climate change, in an attempt to distance the party from those who oppose most efforts to limit greenhouse gases and have questioned the science explaining human-caused climate change.

On February 28 2015 10:18 GreenHorizons wrote:


What's your complaint?