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President Obama exercises a fluid grip on the levers of power

Sun, 19 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Philip Rucker, Peter Wallsten - May. 19 (Comment) - President Obama’s professed ignorance of the targeting of conservatives by one government agency and his support of tracking journalists’ sources by another highlight one of the great paradoxes of his presidency: Sometimes he uses his office as aggressively as anyone who’s held it; other times he seems unacquainted with the work of his own administration. ...

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How ‘political intelligence’ can come from Congress itself

Tue, 07 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Jia Lynn Yang, Tom Hamburger, Dina ElBoghdady - May. 07 (Comment) - On the same morning a congressional staffer told investors in a private call that odds were improving for a government decision that would help medical insurers, trading spiked in a major health-care company. ...

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Is a new study of Medicaid a game changer?

Fri, 03 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

PolitiFact - By Louis Jacobson - May. 03 (Fact Check) - On May 1, 2013, the New England Journal of Medicine published a landmark study with important implications for President Obama’s health care law -- and, in a much less far-reaching way, some of our recent fact-checks. The topic: Medicaid, the government-run health insurance program for the poor. Under Obama’s law, states can get federal dollars to enroll their uninsured residents in Medicaid. Some politicians argue that taking the federal money now leaves the state on the hook for long-term fiscal commitments it can’t afford. On April 8, we fact-checked a claim by Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, that went beyond the ... >>More

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Op-Ed Columnist: Bold on Both Ends

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 01:12:00 -0700

New York Times - By By DAVID BROOKS - Apr. 12 (Opinion) - It’s time to entertain the possibility that President Obama is a right-wing extremist. After all, look at where he’s taking the country over his second term.

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Op-Ed Columnist: Insurance and Freedom

Mon, 08 Apr 2013 01:19:00 -0700

New York Times - By By PAUL KRUGMAN - Apr. 08 (Opinion) - President Obama will soon release a new budget, and the commentary is already flowing fast and furious. Progressives are angry (with good reason) over proposed cuts to Social Security; conservatives are denouncing the call for more revenues. But it’s all

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The Leeches are Back and are Urging the Wrong Prescription: The Grand Bargain Returns

Thu, 21 Feb 2013 00:00:00 -0800

nationofchange.org - By Kevin Zeese JD, Margaret Flowers MD - Feb. 21 (Opinion) - Leeches could also be used in bloodletting. The withdrawal of so much blood as to induce syncope (fainting) was considered beneficial, and many sessions would only end when the patient began to swoon. As the economy shows signs of recession, the leeches return. Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles have issued a new report calling for even deeper austerity.

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Since Alan Simpson has the President on the Defensive, House Dems Must Hold the Line

Thu, 21 Feb 2013 00:00:00 -0800

nationofchange.org - By Richard (RJ) Eskow - Feb. 21 (Opinion) - Alan Simpson, along with Erskine Bowles, represents a well-funded cadre of spokespeople who are only willing to present a narrow band of corporate- and billionaire-friendly economic policies. There’s just one approach in their world, one which Simpson and Bowles reiterated just this week: Medicare and Social Security benefit cuts for seniors and the disabled and the gutting of middle-class tax breaks, paired with further tax reductionsfor corporations and the wealthiest Americans.

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USDOJ: Florida Physician to Pay $26.1 Million to Resolve False Claims Allegations

Tue, 12 Feb 2013 00:00:00 -0800

justice.gov - By Office of Public Affairs - Feb. 12 (News Report) - “Anyone cheating patients and taxpayers should expect to pay a high price,” said Daniel R. Levinson, Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. “Besides paying more than $26 million, Dr. Wasserman is excluded from treating patients and being paid under Medicare, Medicaid and all other federal health care programs.”

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The TPP, IP and the Australasian healthcare industry - what's at stake?

Sun, 27 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0800

mondaq.com - By Chharles Tansey, Gareth Dixon - Jan. 27 (Special Report) - there are fears that the TPP may reduce access to affordable medicines throughout the region party to the agreement. Additionally, many worry that the TPP may not be flexible enough to accommodate existing non-discriminatory drug reimbursement programs and the diverse health systems of the member countries.

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Transcript And Audio: Barack Obama's Second Inaugural Address

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0800

All Things Considered - Jan. 21 (Speech) - "That is our generation's task — to make these words, these rights, these values — of Life, and Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness — real for every American," President Barack Obama said during his speech.

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U.S. CEOs push plan to raise full retirement age to 70

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0800

CBS News - Jan. 16 (News Report) - An influential group of business CEOs is pushing a plan to gradually increase the full retirement age to 70 for both Social Security and Medicare and to partially privatize the health insurance program for older Americans.

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No on Lew

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0800

readersupportednews.org - By Bernie Sanders - Jan. 11 (Opinion) - As a supporter of the president, I remain extremely concerned that virtually all of his key economic advisers have come from Wall Street. In my view, we need a treasury secretary who is prepared to stand up to corporate America and their powerful lobbyists and fight for policies that protect the working families in our country. I do not believe Mr. Lew is that person.

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Cut Corporate Welfare, Not the Safety Net

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0800

readersupportednews.org - By Carl Gibson - Jan. 08 (Opinion) - In Congress' latest "fiscal cliff" deal that supposedly had to be passed in order to avoid economic calamity, we spent $30 billion on extending unemployment benefits for a year, and $205 billion on corporate tax breaks, subsidies and excessive tax loopholes. Most of these Christmas gifts for corporate America are benefiting major, multi-billion-dollar corporations that haven't paid a dime of US income taxes in years, like GE and Boeing. In other words, taxpayers spent six times more on giving free money to companies making record profits than we did to making sure the people who were laid off by these corporations can still feed their families

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The Hoax of Entitlement Reform

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0800

readersupportednews.org - By Robert Reich - Jan. 08 (Opinion) - "Entitlement reform" sounds like a noble endeavor. But it has little or nothing to do with reducing future budget deficits. Taming future deficits requires three steps having nothing to do with entitlements: Limiting the growth of overall healthcare costs, cutting our bloated military, and ending corporate welfare (tax breaks and subsidies targeted to particular firms and industries). Obsessing about "entitlement reform" only serves to distract us from these more important endeavors.

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What the Fiscal Cliff Deal Was Really About

Wed, 02 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0800

AlterNet - By Joshua Holland - Jan. 02 (Opinion) - I hate this deal. It's simply a hostage exchange. The Republicans gave up the fiscal cliff, and will now take the debt limit, the federal budget and automatic across-the-board cuts to discretionary spending (the sequester), and have another standoff in 2-3 months time. The deal wouldn't have gotten 85 GOP votes in the House without the leadership giving right-wingers ironclad guarantees that they'll have another hostage soon.

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Fix the Debt Empties Its Trojan Horse

Wed, 02 Jan 2013 00:00:00 -0800

ips-dc.org - By Sarah Anderson, Scott Klinger - Jan. 02 (News Analysis) - In late October, the Institute for Policy Studies began exposing the Fix the Debt campaign's Trojan Horse. While they presented themselves as a patriotic bipartisan group, merely seeking a “balanced” deal, their own lobby materials revealed they were out to use the fiscal cliff as an opportunity to win massive new corporate tax breaks paid for with cuts to earned benefit programs like Social Security and Medicare. The hypocrisy was stunning.

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Soaring cost of military drugs could hurt budget | www.

Sun, 30 Dec 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Austin American-Statesman - By Jeremy Schwartz - Dec. 30 (News Report) - Last year, the Pentagon spent more on pills, injections and vaccines than it did on Black Hawk helicopters, Abrams tanks, Hercules C-130 cargo planes and Patriot missiles — combined

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Orcs v. Goblins: Crazed Republicans Turn on Each Other in Ugly Fiscal Cliff Battle

Wed, 26 Dec 2012 00:00:00 -0800

AlterNet - By Lynn Stuart Parramore - Dec. 26 (News Analysis) - the orcs. These are the lunatics who favored your Santorums, Gingrichs, Bachmanns, Herman Cains and so on -- the assorted nuts in the GOP who are willing to fight ideological warfare with the battle cry “no taxes” and the battering rams of bad math and Ayn Rand-style social theory to send the land into total chaos. It's not enough for them to cut Social Security at a time when the retirement of hard-working Americans has not been so vulnerable since before the Great Depression. These monstrous right-wingers would rather see every American’s taxes rise than increase taxes on a single millionaire by a nickel. The orcs have got the upper hand in the House and it is they who have blocked a deal on the fiscal cliff. They were last seen dancing around a bonfire made from Econ 101 textbooks and an effigy of John Boehner.

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Obama Will Ride to the Rescue ... for Republicans

Sat, 22 Dec 2012 00:00:00 -0800

AlterNet - By Cenk Uygur - Dec. 22 (Opinion) - President Obama is dying to do the Grand Bargain. He will do it at any cost. In fact, he actively wants to cut Social Security and Medicare. He can't wait for that pat on the back from the establishment when they finally call him post-partisan, above party politics, and a statesman for screwing over his own voters. This is by far his greatest wish.

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Health-care dominoes

Fri, 07 Dec 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Washington Post - By Ruth Marcus - Dec. 07 (Comment) - Raising the eligibility age for Medicare sounds like a fiscal no-brainer. After all, the Social Security retirement age is rising to 67. It would seem sensible for Medicare to have the same rule. After all, life expectancy is growing.

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The Obscenely Rich Men Bent on Shredding the Safety Net

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 00:00:00 -0800

AlterNet - By Lynn Stuart Parramore - Dec. 04 (News Analysis) - The Campaign to Fix the Debt is a huge, and growing, coalition of powerful CEOs, politicians and policy makers on a mission to lower taxes for the rich and cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid under the cover of concern about the national debt.

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Opinion: A Health Insurance Detective Story

Sat, 01 Dec 2012 22:50:00 -0800

New York Times - By By FRANK LALLI - Dec. 01 (Opinion) - I’VE had a long career as a business journalist, beginning at Forbes and including eight years as the editor of Money, a personal finance magazine. But I’ve never faced a more confounding reporting challenge than the one I’m engaged in now: What will I p

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CEO Evening News?

Mon, 26 Nov 2012 00:00:00 -0800

FAIR - Nov. 26 (News Analysis) - The CBS Evening News has decided the best way to inform viewers about the impending "fiscal cliff" is to let corporate CEOs affiliated with the Fix the Debt campaign recommend cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

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Patty Murray will be key voice in Senate on budget deal

Sat, 24 Nov 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Washington Post - By Rosalind S. Helderman - Nov. 24 (News Analysis) - One of the biggest winners in the sweeping Democratic victories in Senate races this month was a woman whose name appeared on no ballot: Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) With a low-key style that contrasts with some of the Senate’s camera hogs, Murray may be the most powerful senator a whole lot of people have never heard of outside of the two Washingtons where she lives and ...

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6 Reasons the Fiscal Cliff is a Scam

Fri, 23 Nov 2012 00:00:00 -0800

AlterNet - By James K. Galbraith - Nov. 23 (Opinion) - In the nature of stampedes arguments become confused; panic flows from fear, when multiple forces – economic and political in this instance – all appear to push the same way. It is therefore useful to sort through those forces, breaking them down into separate questions, and to ask whether any of them justify the voices of doom.

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