Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
What a difference a day makes. A day after Willard "Mittens" Romney insulted the NAACP Convention and used them as a photo-op stage prop to rally the "white, old, fat" people of FAUX Nation, Team Obama addressed the organization with respect and to raucus applause. Videos below the fold.
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
The Arizona Daily Star today published a condensed version of this McCaltchy News report by Maeve Reston of the Los Angeles Times on Willard "Mittens " Romney's speech to the NAACP Convention on Wednesday. Romney's speech to NAACP draws boos from audience. I was struck by a key passage in Reston's reporting:
But murmurs of disagreement ran through crowd when he argued that his policies would help "families of any color more than the policies and leadership of President Obama." And he was met with loud boos when he said he would reduce spending in part by eliminating "expensive, nonessential programs" and repealing the health care law. For 15 seconds, Romney stood quietly, smiling at the audience as they voiced their disapproval.
Here is how another McClatchy News report by William Douglas and David Lightman of McClatchy News accurately reported this key moment in Romney's speech. As Romney courts NAACP, audience boos vow to repeal health law:
The overwhelmingly Democratic group roundly booed him, however, when he declared that he'd repeal the health care law.
"I'm going to eliminate every nonessential, expensive program I can find; that includes Obamacare," Romney said to a long chorus of jeers. A woman in the back of the hall shouted, "You mean Romneycare?"
The Arizona Republic published an AP report by Kasie Hunt that also accurately reported this key moment in Romney's speech. Romney makes NAACP economy pitch, is booed:
[Romney]was booed when he promised to get rid of the Obama administration's health care overhaul.
"I will kill every expensive and unnecessary program I can find, and that includes Obamacare," Romney said, then waited and smiled through the crowd's disapproval.
So it was Arizona Daily Star readers who were treated to the "softened" reporting by Maeve Reston of the Los Angeles Times. A reader who did not see this moment of the speech (video below the fold) would not understand why the NAACP was booing Romney.
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Remember when the TanMan, Weeper of the House John Boehner, said the GOP agenda was "jobs, jobs, jobs"? Yeah, he lied. Since Tea-Publicans took control of Congress, the only votes they take are related to restrictions on contraception and abortion, and repealing the Affordable Care Act. Mr. Boehner, where are the jobs?
The Tea-Publican House held another symbolic vote today, for the 31st 33rd time [correction], to repeal the Affordable Care Act, by an almost straight-line party vote of 244-185, with every Republican voting for “full repeal” and all but five Democrats voting against it. Greg Sargent reports Republicans vote to repeal Medicare cuts they voted for and are campaigning against:
That headline is not an exaggeration or a parody.
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This vote came after a parade of Republicans went to the House floor today bashing Barack Obama, the Democrats, and the health law for cutting $500 billion from Medicare — one of their central attacks on Dems for two straight cycles now — despite supporting those very same cuts in their own budget, the Paul Ryan plan.
On top of this, they repeatedly claimed today — still! — that they intend to repeal and replace the bill, despite the continued absence of any replace bill, or even hearings to develop a replace bill, two years after campaigning on their “replace” pledge.
It’s one thing to keep making promises, even as you fail to keep them. Politicians, we know, do that all the time. It’s one thing to slam a program that your party and your party-aligned think tanks were in large part responsible for devising in the first place, a program that your presidential nominee passed when he was a governor. Hey, parties can change their minds.
But it really takes an astonishing amount of chutzpah to run against a spending cut in dozens of races across the country, to come to Congress and vote for that cut anyway, and then to continue to rail against it as though you still think it’s the worst thing Congress has ever inflicted on the American people. Even if they hadn’t voted for these exact cuts, it’s really impossible to square general GOP rhetoric about cutting spending, specifically on entitlements, with their insistence that every dollar that Obamacare cuts either through the Medicare Advantage cuts or from the Independent Payment Advisory Board is the end of the world for seniors.
Democrats are tying today’s vote back to the Paul Ryan "Kill Medicare" budget plan.
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
if our ideological extremist Tea-Publican Governor and legislature say no to the expanded Medicaid provisions of the Affordable Care Act, they are also saying no to economic stimulus and job creation. You read that right.
Sarah Kliff at Ezra Klein's WonkBlog reports Medicaid’s stimulative effect:
Here’s one factor governors may want to weigh as they consider participating in the health law’s Medicaid expansion: Study after study has found that federal Medicaid dollars spur economic activity beyond the initial investment.
Researchers find that a dollar of Medicaid spending increases spending both in the health-care sector and in other industries.
“For every dollar that a state spends, federal funding filters through the state economies,” says Robin Rudowitz, associate director for the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured. “That tends to go both into health service vendors as well as other sectors.”
Medicaid acts as a stimulus in two ways. First, increased federal spending on health care can, in tough budget times, free up state dollars for other spending. Medicaid spending can also ripple through the private sector, stimulating increased employment that leads to higher household spending.
Rudowitiz recently reviewed 29 state-level studies of Medicaid’s stimulative impact. Across the board, she says, “it was pretty consistent that Medicaid spending did generate economic activity.”
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One recent study found that every $100,000 in stimulus dollars increased employment by 3.8 job years. Each stimulus dollar had a multiplier of 2, meaning that every $1 of Medicaid spending resulted in a $2 increase in gross domestic product.
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
The Neoconfederate "states' rights" Tenthers who are Tea-Publican Governors and legislators, like we have here in Arizona, are threatening not to participate in the "expanded Medicaid" provisions of the Affordable Care Act on ideological grounds. "We hate Obama! We hate the federal guvmint!"
They also object to covering more people under expanded Medicaid on the ground that it will cost taxpayers too much money. This is code for access to medical care is a privilege, not a right, and should be rationed according to the ability to pay. Medical care is only for those who can afford it. If you can't afford it, the GOP healthcare plan is simple: "Let them die!" How this comports with their alleged Christianity, I don't have a clue.
The first three years of expanded Medicaid is 100% covered by the federal government. Thereafter, the state share would gradually increase to around 10%. Suzy Khimm at Ezra Klein's WonkBlog has this important factoid. The truth about Medicaid’s cost to states, in three charts:
What would happen to state budgets if all states went ahead with the Medicaid expansion? The Congressional Budget Office says that it would increase state spending on the program by $73 billion by 2022—the equivalent of a “2.8 percent increase in what states would have spent on Medicaid from 2014 to 2022 in the absence of health reform,” the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities explained.
That said, this is an aggregate look at the expansion: the budgetary impact on states will vary considerably, depending on how far a state has gone already to cover its low-income residents. The Urban Institute has a state-by-state breakdown of the impact, available here. (.pdf).