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December 2013

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 11, 2013 25 Comments
Mary Landreiu is inextricably tied to the passage of Obamacare. The most recent Louisiana Purchase was not about land, it was about securing Landreiu's vote. She also voted against fixes proposed by Republicans to prevent people from losing their plans. The problem for Landrieu and all other Democrats up for reelection in 2014 is that the Obamacare rollout has been a disaster, and not just as to the website. Landrieu is getting hammered by ads throwing her own words back at her: Landreiu's apparent strategy is to try to thread a needle. Landrieu's first ad of the political season is damage control, an attempt to isolate the loss of plans and shift the blame to someone else, namely Obama (via Politico, h/t Townhall):

Posted by Mandy Nagy on December 11, 2013 12 Comments
The Department of Health and Human Services released health insurance enrollment statistics Wednesday, and while numbers have increased, they still fall far short of original projections for the end of November. From the Associated Press, Health care signups pick up but may not close gap:
With time running short, the nation's health care rolls still aren't filling up fast enough.New signup numbers Wednesday showed progress for President Barack Obama's health care law, but not enough to guarantee that Americans who want and need coverage by Jan. 1 will be able to get it. Crunch time is now, as people face a Dec. 23 deadline to sign up if they are to have coverage by New Year's. That means more trouble for the White House, too, after months of repairing a dysfunctional enrollment website. Next year could start with a new round of political recriminations over the Affordable Care Act, "Obamacare" to its opponents. The Health and Human Services Department reported that 364,682 people had signed up for private coverage under the law as of Nov. 30. That is more than three times the October figure, but still less than one-third of the 1.2 million that officials had projected would enroll nationwide by the end of November. The administration's overall goal was to sign up 7 million people by next March 31, when open enrollment ends.
What remains an issue is how many of those who have signed up for coverage have actually made a payment. From Politico:

Posted by New Neo on December 11, 2013 24 Comments

Obamacare was pushed through Congress at high speed, without much debate and without the usual haggling. The reason was that, like thieves in a hurry to grab what they could and get out safely before being caught, Democrats were eager to move the legislation through...

Posted by David Gerstman on December 11, 2013 13 Comments

Seen in a Giant parking lot in Pikesville, Maryland....

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 10, 2013 13 Comments
Update 12-11-2013 a.m. The police action failed to dislodge the protest encampment, and may have backfired as more people are moving to Independence Square to join the protesters. You can still file live coverage at the video and Twitter embeds below. https://twitter.com/DEShellenberger/status/410767401555226625 https://twitter.com/herszenhorn/status/410769635492257792 --------------------------------- Is tonight the night Ukrainian police dismantle the protest camps in Independence Square in Kiev? The protesters are trying to keep Ukraine from falling back under de facto Russian control. For more background, see out prior posts. Several live feeds fro different locations are embedded below.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 10, 2013 29 Comments
I just watched the press statements from Paul Ryan and Patty Murray. The details are being described all around as "modest" and a time out. The key is that nothing much was accomplished as to the overall budget trajectory. There also was "sequester relief," meaning that one of the only things restraining spending was weakened (Ryan justified that by saying that new sequester cuts were mostly from the military). While there are no "new taxes," beleaguered airline passengers will see new ticket fees. But it's not a tax! Most of the MSM headlines are predictable -- Congress is working again! NBC summarizes the "deal" as follows:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 10, 2013 55 Comments
There war on little boys in elementary schools continues unabated. Little children are being punished with suspensions, expulsions, and permanent damage to school records based on standards of conduct carried into elementary schools from the adult world. Typically, but not exclusively, the insanity is directed at little boys for alleged violation of zero tolerance gun and sexual harassment policies. KRDO reports:
A Canon City school six-year-old boy has been accused of sexual harassment and the school suspended him for kissing a girl on the cheek and hand. A child psychologist said the tough treatment could have negative consequences. She said the kissing is normal behavior for children of that age. Lincoln School of Science and Technology is home to young growing minds from Kindergarten to 5th grade. Six-year-old Hunter Yelton is one of them suspended two days for kissing a girl once on the hand and another time on the cheek. Sandy Wurtele, a child clinical psychologist at UCCS, specializes in child sexual development and the prevention of childhood sexual abuse. She said she wasn't surprised when we told her about Hunter kissing a classmate. "For most six-year-old boys, absolutely. That would be a normal behavior,” said Wurtele. However, she was surprised to hear the school suspended him.
The Principal is defending the punishment:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 10, 2013 16 Comments

The news of the day is that John Podesta, the founder and head of The Center for American Progress,  is becoming a White House advisor.  The NY Times reports, Ex-Clinton Aide Expected to Join Obama: President Obama, after a rocky year that leaves him at the lowest...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 10, 2013 8 Comments
We covered the Alabama last second loss to Auburn.  Even that game became political when the Alabama student newspaper ran the cartoon featured above. James Taranto of The Wall Street Journal reports:
This isn't a sports column, but there's a reason we opened with a nine-day-old play-by-play. Back in Tuscaloosa, the Alabama loss led to a kerfuffle last week involving the student newspaper, the perplexingly named Crimson White. Its cartoonist drew a strip, published Thursday, depicting the final play under the title "This Is What Happens in OBAMA'S AMERICA." The last two words were in massive letters, drawn in horror-movie style, with what was supposed to look like blood dripping from them. Later that day, editor Mazie Bryant posted "A Statement From the Editor-in-Chief" in which she explained that "the cartoon was meant as satire . . . as a lighthearted look at some of the more absurd explanations given for Alabama's collapse at the end of the Iron Bowl game against Auburn last Saturday."Only in Obama's America could something so obvious have eluded anyone. "Unfortunately," Bryant noted, the cartoon "has been perceived by many readers as having racist intentions."

Posted by David Gerstman on December 10, 2013 9 Comments
One of the tactics of the anti-Israel Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS) movement is to disrupt appearances not only by Israeli speakers, but also dancers, artists and musicians. In 2010, for example, the Jerusalem Quartet had to stop its performance in London after a BDS protester would not stop shouting. In September 2011, a concert by the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra in London also was disrupted. I had not been aware of the history of the Israel Philharmonic until recently. The orchestra was founded as the Palestine Orchestra by a Polish Jewish violinist, Bronisław Huberman. Huberman anticipated the rise of the Nazis, and set about creating the orchestra to save Jewish musicians in Europe. In all - including the musicians and their families - he is credited with saving nearly 1000 people. Throughout its history the Israel Philharmonic has featured some of the greatest contemporary musical talent. One of the guest artists who performs with the orchestra, is two-time Grammy winning Russian pianist Evgeny Kissin.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 09, 2013 60 Comments
I told you there were problems with the most recent arrest of George Zimmerman allegedly for pointing a shotgun at his girlfriend, when it came out that the girlfriend, Samantha Scheibe, was shopping for a paid interview prior to the incident. Now, according to court filings (embedded at bottom of post), Sheibe wants to drop the charges. Via Orlando Sentinel:
George Zimmerman's girlfriend — who authorities said accused him of pointing a shotgun at her — no longer wants him to be prosecuted, and wants to resume their relationship, according a new motion. A sworn statement made by the girlfriend, Samantha Scheibe, was attached to a motion by Zimmerman's lawyer seeking to modify the conditions of Zimmerman's bond in his domestic violence case. In the statement, Scheibe says she felt "intimidated" when police questioned her about the Nov. 18 incident that led to Zimmerman's arrest. She adds that she "may have misspoken." "I want to be with George," Scheibe says in the statement, adding later: "I do not want George Zimmerman charged. I make this decision freely, knowingly and voluntarily," and without coercion, she says. She says that she and Zimmerman had an "argument," but Zimmerman "never pointed a gun at or torward my face in a threatening manner."
The original 911 call (language warning):

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 09, 2013 32 Comments
With each passing day, we learn more and more about the horrible effects of Obamacare. Here are just some of the "new" revelations. While there is ample evidence that premiums have risen for many if not most people, the NY Times finds that the supposedly lower premiums come with much higher deductibles, On Health Exchanges, Premiums May Be Low, but Other Costs Can Be High:
For months, the Obama administration has heralded the low premiums of medical insurance policies on sale in the insurance exchanges created by the new health law. But as consumers dig into the details, they are finding that the deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs are often much higher than what is typical in employer-sponsored health plans.... In El Paso, Tex., for example, for a husband and wife both age 35, one of the cheapest plans on the federal exchange, offered by Blue Cross and Blue Shield, has a premium less than $300 a month, but the annual deductible is more than $12,000. For a 45-year-old couple seeking insurance on the federal exchange in Saginaw, Mich., a policy with a premium of $515 a month has a deductible of $10,000. In Santa Cruz, Calif., where the exchange is run by the state, Robert Aaron, a self-employed 56-year-old engineer, said he was looking for a low-cost plan. The best one he could find had a premium of $488 a month. But the annual deductible was $5,000, and that, he said, “sounds really high.” By contrast, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, the average deductible in employer-sponsored health plans is $1,135.
That is not exactly news, but that the NY Times is now up to speed with the rest of us is important because it helps filter the information down even to low information NY Times readers. https://twitter.com/gabrielmalor/status/410029530636894208 Jim Geraghty has more bad news, But Other Than All That, Obamacare Had a Good Weekend!:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 09, 2013 25 Comments
The trial of the murderers of British army drummer Lee Rigby with machetes and knives on a London street continues. We reported before, Murderers of Lee Rigby searched for British soldier to kill. The trial is receiving almost no mainstream media coverage in the U.S. One of the killers took the stand today, and was proud of what he had done, as reported by The Telegraph:
Michael Adebolajo, 28, also told the Old Bailey jury that he was a “soldier of Allah” and that he had no regrets over the killing because he was obeying his god. He said after the case he should be either “ransomed” back to his Mujahideen brothers, freed or killed.
At the start of his defence in chief, Adebolajo sat in the witness box of Court number 2, surrounded by five security guards and just feet from Fusilier Rigby’s family. He and Michael Adebowale, 22, are accused of murdering Fusilier Rigby by running him down with a car and then hacking him to death with a meat cleaver and knives near Woolwich Barracks in south east London on May 22. Asked who al Qaeda were by his counsel, David Gottlieb, Adebolajo replied: "Al Qaeda, I consider to be Mujahideen. I love them, they're my brothers. I have never met them. I consider them my brothers in Islam." He added: "Mujahideen are the army of Allah." He said: “I am a soldier and this is war.” When asked what his defence to the charge of murder is, Adebolajo said: "I'm a soldier. I'm a soldier of Allah and I understand that some people might not recognise this because we do not wear fatigues and we do not go to the Brecon Beacons and train and this sort of thing. But we are still soldiers in the sight of Allah as a mujahid. "This is all that matters, if Allah considers me a soldier, then I am a soldier."

Posted by A.F. Branco on December 09, 2013 12 Comments

Note: You may reprint this cartoon provided you link back to this source.  To see more Legal Insurrection Branco cartoons, click here. Branco’s page is Cartoonist A.F.Branco ...

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