Romney stated nothing new. They are the same old indictments. Romney is more guilty of many of his statements than Trump ever could.

Republicans have people impoverished and in understanding that, there is also a Republican 47% and they are still ignored by the Republican establishment. Romney called up the dead statesmen in warnings about Democracy. Romney has absolutely no place in stating others are the bad guys when it comes to destroying democracy. Republicans equate democracy with capitalism.

As far as I am concerned the New York Times overstepped their authority to admitting to a private meeting. It raises questions about the trustworthiness of it's editorial boards. The fact of the matter is national politics is far different than party politics. That goes for both parties. The idea Donald Trump will probably alter his STATEMENTS on the national level is realistic. He has openly stated to the people at a rally, "You will always be in my heart and priorities." That statement came about money and the future campaigns. Donald Trump has a very long relationship with his constituency. This speech by Romney is water off a duck's back. I don't believe Donald Trump should give the speech validity or respect.

I should not be surprised The New York Times will violate any understanding of privacy or safety. The newspaper was more than willing to expose concerns of President Obama's Homeland Security about the London Olympics with the purpose to push voters in favor of Mitt Romney. The New York Times has no policy of safety regarding the public and doesn't mind if millions are in danger if it doesn't fit it's politics.

Ahead of the Republican debate Donald Trump releases his plan to replace the ACA.

March 3, 2016
By Debbie Lord

In Wednesday, Donald Trump, (click here) front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, released details for his plan to reform healthcare should he be elected president in November.
Trump issued a familiar Republican call to repeal the Affordable Care Act – Obamacare – and also said individuals should be allowed to deduct all of their insurance premiums from the income tax they owe.
Another part of the plan would require “price transparency” from all healthcare providers – a move that would allow individuals to shop around for competitive prices for medical treatment.
The plan also addresses prescription drug prices,  calling on Congress to give consumers access to drugs  sold in other countries....

This is a very brave move by Donald Trump. The last time he set a policy into the public's hands he was viciously attacked on its merits. It would seem today, he has decided to be viciously attacked again at the debate although the public has been requesting his plan. The Republican establishment doesn't have a plan, but, they do now and they will mimic it with different vocabulary to PRETEND it is not Donald Trump's plan.

I am quite sure Donald Trump is up to the challenge for more vicious attacks this evening. After all the only people in the audience are those that will boo him and give standing ovations to others. I wonder why? They are probably worried peace might set in and there will be no more war at the very least. Funny, I don't call peace initiatives incompetency; rather the other way around.

March 1, 2016

By the Editorial Board

In any other February, (click here) the Obamacare enrollment numbers released last month would have been big news. The Department of Health and Human Services announced that 12.7 million people had chosen health-care plans in the exchanges the law set up — far more than the 10 million HHS predicted would have exchange-based insurance in 2016. The number will likely go down, as some people fail to pay their premiums; the best case, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation’s Larry Levitt, is that about a million more people will be covered in 2016 relative to last year....

When the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was written there was supposed to be a Public Option. The reason for that was to provide a reasonably good government plan that would be in competition with private insurers. It was not suppose to eliminate private insurers, it was suppose to push back against high prices.

Currently, the only aspect of the law that pushes back against high prices is the 15% rule. Private insurers cannot keep more than 15% profit over their operating costs. That isn't good enough. That 15% can be manipulated by providing higher payments to the medical industry. THAT is why the costs of insurance is going up. The private industry WHEN WRITING THEIR CONTRACTS are paying more for services, hence, the operating costs goes up and the 15% increases exponentially. 

When Joe Lieberman demanded the Public Option be eliminated in order to win his vote he did a great deal of damage to the American people and never reined in the skyrocketing costs of health care and their premiums.

The Public Option was suppose to be there to help set the costs within the health care industry. The American people need to see the Public Option as it was intended to be law, in that it was a method to control prices and introduce other methods of payment. It is important the Public Option be put in place as soon as posislbe and Hillary Clinton is correct in that. But, there is no need for it to be on a trial basis. The Public Option would have helped bring prescription drug costs down as well.

As to Hillary Clinton:

The guy that is getting amnesty from prosecution would not cooperate at all. He evidently was excising his 5th Amendment rights.

Earlier the former Secretary Hillary Clinton stated, "...I wish he would just talk to the FBI and clear all this stuff up...." Those may not have been her exact words. I have trouble seeing her say "stuff."

But, this is most probably the FBI cleaning up details before they finalize their report. There may be more questions after he gives his testimony, but, perhaps not. We just have to wait and see if anything develops.

It was an attempt at being scandalous back in September 2015. This is from "The Washington Times," not the Washington Post.  The Washington Times used to sell for 25 cents about ten years ago and it probably still does.

September 9, 2015
By Victor Morton

...The lawyer for the man (click here) who set up and oversaw Hillary Rodham Clinton’s email server — and asserted his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination on the subject — says his client will not give congressional panels an advance look at what he might say if he were to testify.

Republican Sens. Charles Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin have been negotiating a possible “proffer” — a legal term for a preliminary overview on what a potential witness might say — in order to determine whether to offer Bryan Pagliano immunity from prosecution in exchange for his testimony....

There is no reason for the Public Option to be an experiment. Massachusetts has had a public option for a long time. It is time to go forward with it.

March 3, 2016
By Seth Chandler

Presidential candidate (click here) Hillary Clinton has revived recently the idea of adding a “public option” to the Exchanges. Apparently, at least for now, she would permit or perhaps encourage each state to create a publicly operated insurer that would augment private insurers in selling health insurance policies to individuals. Her website suggests she would not mandate a public option at the federal level — at least for now — or somehow force the states to create one.  All of that would require her to push legislation through Congress. The “encouraged” public option, by contrast, could be implemented by cooperation between states and the federal executive without a need for any revisions to the Affordable Care Act....

The RNC has four hundred of the audience tickets at the Republican Debate tonight and only 50 tickets for the public. There are 21,000 requests by the public for tickets.

It is called corruption. Why didn't the privileged Republicans have to stand in line with everyone else?

Bankruptcy is a part of American life. Banks get bailouts, not people.

Personal bankruptcies (click here) in the United States have had a dynamic history over the past 100 years. Bankruptcy filings in the first half of the 20th century averaged 0.15 per 1,000 people and grew at an average annual rate of 2.4 percent. Bankruptcies began to increase during the 1960s and have grown dramatically since 1980. Between 1980 and 2004, bankruptcies grew at an annual average rate of 7.6 percent a year. As of 2004, the filing rate was 5.3 per 1,000 people, more than four times the 1980 rate and nearly 80 times the 1920 rate.

These statistics, however, disguise the fact that personal bankruptcy filings are not equal across the country. For example, at the state level, Tennessee had the highest rate of personal bankruptcy filings in the nation in 2004, with more than 10 filings per 1,000 people (nearly twice the U.S. rate) whereas Massachusetts ranked last with 2.8 filings per 1,000 people. States in the Eighth Federal Reserve District had an average filing rate of 7.7 per 1,000 people in 2004, which is greater than the U.S. average, but the growth in bankruptcy filings in Eighth District states between 1980 and 2004 averaged 7.2 percent a year, slightly below the U.S. average growth of 7.6 percent a year....

And then came 2008 and enormous unemployment.

The employment report out on Friday just goes to show that the American economy is still struggling to create jobs for average Americans.  In fact 85,000 more jobs were lost in December but that isn’t the biggest data point out of the report.  The civilian labor force shrunk by a stunning 661,000 and that is really the only reason the unemployment rate is still at 10 percent.  This economy that is still very much in a jobs recession has pushed more and more Americans into the ultimate economic distress equivalent of a SOS.  Bankruptcies are soaring and in 2009 1.41 million Americans filed for personal bankruptcies, a jump of 32 percent from 2008.

This must put the recent stock market rally into perspective.  The average American is still trying to negotiate the new economic landscape while the select few are able to increase their wealth at the expense of the many.

Free Trade Agreements are not okay.

March 2, 2016
By Jonathan Oosling

..The Vermont U.S. senator, (click here) who won four of 11 state primaries on Tuesday and faces increasingly long odds in his quest to win the Democratic nomination, spoke with The Detroit News ahead of his speech and said he expects to do well in Michigan on March 8.
“State after state we have closed the gap, including here in Michigan,” Sanders said in an exclusive interview. “… We think that short term and longer term, a lot of states out there are in play and we can win. ... I’m not going to tell you it’s necessarily an easy path, but it is a path.”
Sanders said he will seek to differentiate himself from Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton in Michigan by pointing out their “very different views” on trade policies often derided by unions. He noted he opposed the North American Free Trade Agreement that Clinton’s husband signed into law....

LOL.

Mr. 47 percent. Who's phony?