The Goat Pen

http://www.knoxnews.com/story/money/ind ... 428888001/

If there were no uncertainties over subsidies, then for the first time since the exchange came into place, BCBST would have been on track for a "nominal" rate increase, it wrote the state. "Our 2017 claims experience so far shows that we have rightly balanced rates with medical and operating costs, and that newfound balance means we could propose 2018 with a nominal increase," it's filing read. If the mandate is not enforced, the insurer expects healthier people to forego buying insurance..//.. negatively effecting the risk pool

In a nutshell, Tennessee's exchange premiums would have stabilized - but with the forecast of Congress eliminating subsidies and the mandate, BCBS jacked up the amount of the increase they are filing for in 2018 (21%). And this is happening all over the country.

Sure. The boogeyman has been defeated once and for all per the Ministry of Truth and we can all go home and let those regions handle their own affairs.

I'm actually in favor of putting a giant fence around the Middle East (minus Israel) and declaring it the world's largest insane asylum. I only want to get involved with them if there is a direct threat to the security of the US. ISIS is a threat to Europe, for sure. Just ask the French and the British. We are a little bit safer because we don't have millions of immigrants from the Middle East landing on our shores.

I think we can protect ourselves from ISIS with robust intelligence, special operations, and drone strikes. No more nation building.

I think the Minister of Truth called ISIS the JV team and sent them and the cartels weapons. Lets keep our conspiracies straight.

The Ministry of Truth is still chasing ghosts of Trump-Russia collusion (complete with golden shower dossiers).

http://www.salon.com/2017/06/30/trump-s ... rchitects/

Fearless Leader claims our media and intelligence agencies are fake, but he's just as anxious to claim our elections are a fraud too. Nobody need be alarmed that his lackeys are demanding voter rolls from all 50 states with dobs/socialsec#s/addresses/etc. The power of the presidency wrt voter integrity shall not be questioned.

I'm more alarmed that the Obama administration was using its intelligence and law enforcement agencies to spy on the campaign of the presidential candidate for the opposing party. That's the real Watergate 2.0 that really happened, not some phantom conspiracy myths about Trump.

I'm also more alarmed that the Democrat party rigged their nomination process for Hillary and against Bernie. That's the real stolen election, not wild ghost legends about the Russians.

I mean - seriously. President Douchebag wants all the states to hand him (and his re-election staffers) every speck of info on every voter in the last presidential election. Yet he won't even disclose his own tax returns.

You like a good irony too, don'tcha prof?

I would like to take this moment to say how proud I am of Tennessee's Secretary of State, a republican with some integrity, who responded to the Trump Inquisition's demand for voter rolls by basically saying GFY. Apparently a majority of states are doing likewise.

Long live democracy and representative government.

Actually, on this, I agree with you. As a Libertarian, I believe in minimum power to the federal government and maximum delegation to the states. If President Hillary wanted all that information from states' voter rolls, I'd react the same way. So I join you in applauding Tennessee for resisting Trump on this.

First Tennessee gives the middle finger to California and their childish travel ban, and now they resist Trump's ill-advised info grab. Dang, you guys are on a roll.

Furthermore, in this moment of comity, I wish to state that Trump's tweets are flat out nuts.

Article by Michael Goodwin about the media breaking point in 2016.

It will fall on deaf ear to the journalist who think their job is to influence public opinion as opposed to report the news.

"'Only two people now had a chance to be president, and the overwhelming media consensus was that it could not be Donald Trump. They would make sure of that. The coverage of him grew so vicious and one-sided that last August, I wrote a column on the unprecedented bias. Under the headline “American journalism is collapsing before our eyes,” I wrote that the so-called cream of the media crop was “engaged in a naked display of partisanship” designed to bury Trump and elect Hillary Clinton."

"Thus began the spate of stories, which continues today, in which the Times routinely calls Trump a liar in its news pages and headlines. Again, the contrast with the past is striking. The Times never called Barack Obama a liar, despite such obvious opportunities as “you can keep your doctor” and “the Benghazi attack was caused by an internet video.” Indeed, the Times and the Washington Post, along with most of the White House press corps, spent eight years cheerleading the Obama administration, seeing not a smidgen of corruption or dishonesty. They have been tougher on Hillary Clinton during her long career. But they still never called her a liar, despite such doozies as “I set up my own computer server so I would only need one device,” “I turned over all the government emails,” and “I never sent or received classified emails.” All those were lies, but not to the national media. Only statements by Trump were fair game."

http://nypost.com/2017/07/01/why-the-me ... -of-trump/

Lucid thoughts, prof - well done. Have an extra hot dog tomorrow on me.

celebrating Brexit 1776

I'm also more alarmed that the Democrat party rigged their nomination process for Hillary and against Bernie.

Without question the DNC subverted democracy, in some cases illegally, in an attempt to keep the neoliberal regime in power. They played every dirty trick they thought they could get away with as well as used a corrupt system of super delegates and closed primaries to win. It's all pretty much standard politics 101 of ends justifying means, but hopefully enough people are pissed about it that we can get real progressive leadership in the WH next cycle as well as key Congressional turnover in the next midterm. The way I see it our country is very bad off, much worse than we realize, but the fact that Bernie came as close as he did on a grassroots campaign with no super PAC money, no corporate support, and the establishment system gunning against him is huge.

http://www.mediaite.com/online/trump-su ... ependence/

good stuff

Trump did say that he loved the poorly educated. He knew full well who is people are and this is more evidence that he was right. The morons have mobilized and they’ve put one of their own in charge. I’m sure it will work out just fine.

Are you saying Hilary is one of your own?

I hope Trump tweets a pollock joke today.