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April 02, 2014 06:42 AM UTC

Wednesday Open Thread

  • 53 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

"Never express yourself more clearly than you are able to think."

–Niels Bohr

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53 thoughts on “Wednesday Open Thread”

  1. Not a prediction, but a warning…and a challenge. What are your best ideas to GOTV? (get out the vote) In 2014? 2016? And what about Independents and unaffiliated, 1.3 of the voters in Colorado? Here's another question: Do political parties still tell you anything important about how people will vote on issues?

    This comic is credited to David Horsey of the LA Times.

    1. MJ, motivating the base is a problem but only one of the problems for the Dems in 2014.  

      The other big problem is the generalized who would you prefer to vote for a Democrat or a Republican.  That is not a get out you base issue.  That is an issue of who people will vote for.  Those number historically favor the Dems.  The Dems advantage is down to less than 1% which is about where it was this time in 2010.

      If the Dems overcome the Republican enthusiasm advantage, which they won't, but the unaffiliated favor the Republicans which they are on track to do nationally, you lose the Senate anyway.

  2. Hobby Lobby Invests In Abortion Pill Manufacturers

    The owners of Hobby Lobby, a Christian-owned craft supply chain, were so offended by the idea of having to include emergency contraceptives and intrauterine devices in their health insurance plans that they sued the Obama administration and took the case all the way up to the Supreme Court. But Mother Jones reported on Tuesday that the company's retirement plan has invested millions of dollars in the manufacturers of emergency contraception and drugs used to induce abortions.

    So including birth control in medical insurance is a no-no. But making money selling birth control to others is a good thing. Got it!

    2. Do you think the owners are directing or even know what is in their employee's retirement plans?  Is it a fund and the fund manager makes investments?

      Seems to me there is a missing link.

      If they directly made the investment in the company, you would have a point.  I suspect that they did not.

      Do you at any point in time know what company's stock your company retirement plan owns?

        1. Hey, it wasn't even important enough to Tanc, signature issue getting rid of undocumented workers, to ask the contractor he hired to do his basement remodel if all those Spanish only speaking guys working in his own home were here legally. It was the cheapest bid and, when questioned about it, he basically said it was the contractor's concern, not his. So you expect Hobby Lobby to check out investments on what they consider a life and death issue?  That might mean having to invest in something with a lower return. Principles before profits?  These are Republicans. Are you serious?

    3. Abortion and birth control are not the main reasons HL is against the affordable care act. Guns were not the reason for the recalls. Individual mandate was not the reason 25 states didn't expant Medicaid for their poorest residents.

      It's always, always, about money and political power. Cut into profit margins for the 1%, they get self-righteous and start lobbying. Threaten a political monopoly, suddently you get astroturf and fake grassroots groups with millions of dollars out in political ads.

      When the hypocrisy is exposed, as it is here, there are brief hours of trying to explain or excuse it, then back to business as usual.

    4. Here is a comment posted in Forbes that I think does a good job in explaining things:

      Grossly misleading headline! Perhaps you can try “Hobby Lobby 401k Invests in Mutual Funds that Invest in Pharmaceuticals.” No wait, that would actually be accurate and not fit the narrative. We can’t have that now can we?

      And you can talk about all the mutual funds they “could” have bought all you want, but that applies if and only if know of the existence of the funds which is not guaranteed and if and only if those funds are available through the brokerage managing the 401k. I just took 5 minutes to look through the investments available through my current 401k provider (not just those available in my plan) and through my previous 2 providers, and do you know what all 3 of those had in common? None of the 3 deal in those “cottage industry” mutual funds.

      Secondarily, the claim that these funds are “just as good” is abject nonsense. Actually looking at the returns, I see funds that in general don’t perform as well as index funds, while having higher expense ratios than many other actively managed funds. If I were a corporate benefits manager I would be seriously concerned about getting slapped for breach of fiduciary duty if I selected these funds when better performing funds with lower expenses were available.

       

    5. Hobby Lobby directly funded "abortions," before they were against funding "abortions." From the Mother Jones article:

      The Green's contention that the pills cause abortions is a central pillar of their argument for gutting the contraception mandate. Yet, for years, Hobby Lobby's health insurance plans did cover Plan B and Ella. It was only in 2012, when the Greens considered filing a lawsuit against the Affordable Care Act, that they dropped these drugs from the plan.

      Perhaps they weren't aware of what was in their previous health plans, or their investments.

    6. I saw this elsewhere. If the attorneys seeking to reverse H.L.'s policy are worth their salt, this came up in the arguments or in the briefs filed. I caught part of the oral arguments on C-SPAN but didn't hear this. We'll see.

  3. Do you at any point in time know what company's stock your company retirement plan owns?

    Yes…it is knowable and anyone who feels strongly about an issue SHOULD know. There is NO EXCUSE for this level of hypocrisy…none.

      1. Thanks to the bankers on Wall St. (yes, Jamie Dimon, I mean you) I no longer have an IRA. Every investor has the option of examining their funds and divesting themselves of any stocks or funds they don't like. It happens every day.

        1. So what you are saying is you don't have a company retirement plan and probably did not know that the owners are prohibited from making investment decisions in most of them.

          1. I am self-employed. If I had a company retirement plan, I would know exactly in what I was investing. My wife has a 401K, started by an employer. She HAS let her broker know in what she is unwilling to invest and they have accomodated her wishes…

            once again….you are clueless. 

            1. So a self directed 401K and a company retirement plan presumably administered by a third party administrator are the same in terms of what the beneficiaries know about the investments and how they are controlled?

              Do you really think that?

                2. God knows what they invest in, and since they live their Christian values in the workplace, those actions reflect that faith.  He will know of their material co-operation in sinful acts.

                    1. Not all.  Jesus had no cotton with mindless absolutists . . . 

                      . . . It's written somewhere that even the worst ROI backsliders were able to earn some sort of a large-donor indulgence . . . 

        2. This is BS.  My wife's fund (for Kaiser Permanente) is not only limited to a specific fund group (Vanguard – yuk!) but to a very small number of Vanguard funds.  She can't change that and neither can most people who are invested in company funds.  Also, while I believe that the company can change fund managers, I also believe that the company itself doesn't have or for that matter want the liability of picking what this stuff is invested in.

          1. Which would all be fine except they claim that this is of such over-riding importance to them that they couldn't possibly allow their employees coverage that includes birth control much less abortifiacients. If they are willing to go to the extraordinary effort of taking the mattre all the way to the Supreme Court they ought to be willing to make damn sure they aren't in the business of financing the very family options they are denying their employees. It's either worth extraordinary effort, including accepting more liability exposure, to stay in compliance with their religious beliefs or it isn't. 

            You can't have it both ways. If it's OK to be loosy goosy when it comes to investments, for the sake of convenience, practicality and liability related issues, then it should be OK to comply with ACA and leave it to their employees to decide whether or not to use the family planning coverage.

        1. You are making assumptions about how things work that are not informed. There are religious based investment funds.  If you are the investment advisor charged with investing the funds of the retirement plan (not the owners) what do you need to consider?  What is the expected return on investment of the religious based investment funds vs. the return on investment of the funds as invested?  Assume the religious funds expected return is lower. What is the investment advisor required to consider in fulfilling their obligations?  In my view it is creating the maximum return on investment with the minimum risk.

          Once the retirement funds are turned over to a third party for administration the ethics of the game has changed.

          2. Hobby Lobby is privately owned. The owners can make whatever decision they want on any part of the business, however short-sighted or damaging. Want to set up retirement plans that only invest in jelly bean futures– no problem, though it would likely have to be managed in-house.

            They're not obligated to offer retirement benefits, and while there may be some regulation about fiscal responsibility once a retirement fund is established, the Greens have shown a willingness to sue in order to carve out religious exemptions in their health insurance already. If they are so diligent in combing through the insurance offered by the company to weed out reproductive coverage, it seems pretty lax that they haven't put the same effort into staying right by the Lord in their financials.

             

  4. “In the beginning the church was a fellowship of men and women centering on the living Christ. Then the church moved to Greece, where it became a philosophy. Then it moved to Rome, where it became an institution. Next it moved to Europe where it became a culture, and, finally, it moved to America where it became an enterprise.”

    ~Dr. Richard C. Halverson (1916-1995) Chaplain, US Senate

     

    Our very own "Archbishop of Bling",  From the Peach State…

    “I failed to consider the impact on the families throughout the archdiocese who, though struggling to pay their mortgages, utilities, tuition and other bills, faithfully respond year after year to my pleas to assist with funding our ministries and services,” he wrote.

    “I am disappointed that, while my advisors and I were able to justify this project fiscally, logistically and practically, I personally failed to project the cost in terms of my own integrity and pastoral credibility with the people of God of north and central Georgia,” Gregory said in the Catholic paper.

    If these Lords of Bling spent half as much time getting their hands dirty while serving the least amongst us, and expended half the energy in local homeless shelters as they do preaching fire-and-brimstone damnation from the pulpit on social issues, perhaps many of us who call the Church 'home' would start taking them seriously.

    Not that he's alone on the shores of America, nor that Catholics have a corner on these embarassing revelations.  From New Jersey:

    What can the example possibly suggest about the church to the residents of Newark, where 28 percent of the population lives below the poverty level? How does one, in that context, explain the Lazarus story? The rich young man? The beatitudes? What does one say in the face of Pope Francis' call for a humbler church, for bishops who walk with their people, with his urging a poor church for the poor? Myers swims in his endless pool while the city of Newark drowns in poverty.

    WWJD?  He'd get out the bullwhip, start swearing, and clear the Temple.

     

  5. COLORADO SB14-093 IS DEAD The House just voted to hold the bill until May 9th.  That's why I love state-based work: getting people involved can actually trump bought-and-paid-for politics.

    In other news ….

    Yesterday, in a 5-4 decision written by Chief Justice John Roberts, the Supreme Court in “McCutcheon vs. Federal Election Commission,” went beyond “Citizen’s United” to strike down overall limits on how much an individual may contribute in one election cycle to innumerable federal candidates and to party committees. Overturning 40 years of national policy and 38 years of judicial precedent, the Court’s decision allows federal officeholders to solicit and individual donors to pour as much as $3.6 million directly into federal campaigns every election cycle – buying unparalleled personal influence in Washington and drowning out the voices of ordinary citizens. This is the most brazen invitation to oligarchy in Supreme Court history.

     

     

     

      1. It is not a victory for free speech…it is a victory for Big Money. And you really think the Koch bros. have your best interests at heart? Bwahahahahaha!

        They continue to be a force because of simpletons like you.

        1. AC is your standard delusional useful idiot.   Just play ball and do our bidding, and maybe down the road there will be something for you.  Very aspirational.

    2. That's good news on SB14-093. I wrote to my own Senator, and the Committee Senators about it.  I'm not quite clear on what "laid over" means -just more time for citizens to weigh in on the bill? The language allowing utility companies to take eminent domain over private property for pipelines seems to be intact.

      re: SCOTUS McCutcheon decision: If Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin knew that the first amendment had been twisted so that money is now considered free speech, (with this decision, unlimited free speech), and corporations are now considered to be people, they'd be rocking the town halls to get it fixed. "Tea Parties" wouldn't be the half of it.

      1. The Colorado legislature is constitutionally required to adjourn after 120 days.   This year, that deadline is May 7.   Laying a bill over until May 9 thus kills it — any bill not passed by session's end is at one with Nineveh and Tyre.

      2. MJ, the idea that corporations are people entitled to all the rights of other people has a lenghty history.  By the 1820's there were a few US Supreme Court decisions to that effect.  By 1896 the US Supreme Court in  Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad – 118 U.S. 394 (1886) put it this way:

        "The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does."

        Don't tell me you are an originalist in interpreting the Constituion?

          1. Dingleberries. Dint ya larn nuthin in primry skool?

            The War Across Five Aprils was fought over the ugly issue of whether southern states could continue to be beholden to corporations? After the northern states lost, the southern coalition pushed for, and passed, the 14th Amendment. The fact that some Kenyan born muslim fascist mongrels also take advantage of the provisions of the 14th Amendment is just a perversion of corporate justice administered by effin' activist judges.

            Or, as Supreme Hugo Black noted, in Connecticut General Life Insurance Company v. Johnson, Treasurer of California (1938):

            Of the cases in this court in which the Fourteenth Amendment was applied during the first fifty years after its adoption, less than one-half of one percent invoked it in protection of the Negro race, and more than fifty percent asked that its benefits be extended to corporations.

    3. I wouldn't be holding my breath on that if I were you (on SB 93 being dead). Rumors at the capitol is that it will come back as a late bill (a REALLY late bill).

       

    1. Huh. Interesting how this article appeared recently in the Glenwood Springs Post-Independent:

      GARFIELD COUNTY — Health providers around the county are in stand-by mode as they wait to hear the results of an investigation by a state epidemiologist looking into a reported rise in the number of fetal anomalies among pregnant women in the county.

      Valley View Hospital last week confirmed that they had received information from a prenatal care clinic and that the fetal anomalies were being seen in pregnant women from Carbondale to Rifle. However, the hospital declined to disclose any specific types of birth defects, a time frame or by how much the number may have increased.

  9. Hilarious:

    When Bill and Hillary first got married Bill said, "I am putting a box under our bed. You must promise never to look in it." In all their 30 years of marriage, Hillary never looked. However, on the afternoon of their 30th anniversary, curiosity got the better of her and she lifted the lid and peeked inside.

    In the box there were 3 empty beer cans and $1,974.25 in cash. After dinner, Hillary could no longer contain her guilt and she confessed saying, "I am so sorry.. For all these years I kept my promise and never looked in the box under the bed. However, today the temptation was to much and I gave in. But now I need to know, Why do you keep the empty cans in the box?"

    Bill thought for a while and said, "I guess that after all these years you deserve to know the truth. Whenever I was unfaithful to you, I put an empty beer can in the box to remind myself not to do it again."

    Hillary was shocked, but thought to herself, "I am very disappointed and saddened, but I guess after all those years away from home on the road, temptation does happen and I guess three times is not that bad considering the number of years we have been together…"

    They hugged and made their peace. A little while later, Hillary asked Bill, "So why do you have all that money in the box?"

    Bill answered. "Well, whenever the box filled up with empty cans, I took them to the recycling center and redeemed them for cash."

  12. Under the category, "I wish I was making this up…."

    While the cultivation of industrial hemp continues to be prohibited through federal law, the US consumer market for its products grew by an estimated 24% last year to $581 million.  The United States is the largest consumer market in the world, yet remains the only industialized nation to prohibit its cultivation. 

    S.359 and H.R. 525, the "Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2013" still awaits their hearings in Congress.  The bills in both chambers enjoy wide, bi-partisan support – yet gridlock has prevented even common sense legislation such as this to see the light of day.

    To rub a small amount of salt in to the wound, it was announced last week that our government is considering purchasing Ukraine industrial hemp to bolster their rural economy.

    While POTUS could end this charade with a simple Executive Order, I think he has been prudent in not exercising such authority.  Doing so would only give the industry the balance of time left with this Administration – leaving the fate of our industry in the hands of the subsequent President. 

    It's no way to (re)build an industry – and no way to empower the very rural communities that could benefit broadly from ending prohibition. So we wait.  And wait.  And wait. 

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