“total power”

Delay the census.

I think the math is pretty straight forward in the big picture.

I’m nos sure which states it puts back in play – but that will show later.

get used to the idea.

Sure, he has numerous candidate flaws. Who doesn’t?

But if the Democrats think they can both save the party from a Sanders win and GOTV for voters who support him – the math doesn’t work.

It comes down to let voters vote  or blow up the party.

Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution: “And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince or foreign State.”

US Federal law

110.20 Prohibition on contributions, donations, expenditures, independent expenditures, and disbursements by foreign nationals (52 U.S.C. 30121, 36 U.S.C. 510)

A foreign national shall not, directly or indirectly, make a contribution or a donation of money or other thing of value, or expressly or impliedly promise to make a contribution or a donation, in connection with any Federal, State, or local election.

https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/candidate-taking-receipts/who-can-and-cant-contribute/

Campaigns may not solicit or accept contributions from foreign nationals. Federal law prohibits contributions, donations, expenditures and disbursements solicited, directed, received or made directly or indirectly by or from foreign nationals in connection with any election — federal, state or local. This prohibition includes contributions or donations made to political committees and building funds and to make electioneering communications. Furthermore, it is a violation of federal law to knowingly provide substantial assistance in the making, acceptance or receipt of contributions or donations in connection with federal and nonfederal elections to a political committee, or for the purchase or construction of an office building. This prohibition includes, but is not limited to, acting as a conduit or intermediary for foreign national contributions and donations.

A person acts knowingly for the purposes of this section when he or she has:

• Actual knowledge that the funds have come from a foreign national;
• Awareness of certain facts that would lead a reasonable person to believe that there is a substantial probability that the money is from a foreign national; or
• Awareness of facts that should have prompted a reasonable inquiry into whether the source of funds is a foreign national.

Pertinent facts that satisfy the “knowing” requirement include knowledge of:

• Use of a foreign passport or passport number;
• Use of a foreign address;
• A check or other written instrument drawn on an account or wire transfer from a foreign bank; or
• Contributor or donor living abroad.

Definition of foreign national

A foreign national is:

• An individual who is not a citizen of the United States, and not lawfully admitted for permanent residence (as defined in 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(20)); or
• A foreign principal, as defined in 22 U.S.C. § 611(b). Section 611 defines a foreign principal as a group organized under the laws of a foreign country or having its principal place of business in a foreign country. The statute specifically mentions foreign governments, political parties, partnerships, associations and corporations.

https://www.history.com/news/foreign-influence-constitution-founding-fathers

“… the framers needed a founding document that fully recognized and defended against the corrupting influence of foreign money and power, particularly on the president.

Article II of the Constitution gives such power to the president to run the executive branch that a president under the influence of a foreign nation would be far more dangerous than any other single individual,” says Stephen Saltzburg, professor at The George Washington University Law School. “That kind of conflict, between loyalty to the United States and loyalty to a foreign nation, would be intolerable.”

Protection Against Presidential Corruption

To guard against such conflicts and provide a remedy for a worst-case scenario of presidential corruption, the founders built two key provisions into the Constitution: the so-called “emoluments clause” and the power to impeach a president.

//
Lying liars and foreign influence.

QMB- qualified Medicare beneficiary

MFA – Medicare for all, including Medicare for others

Current
Medicare Part A

• covers inpatient care, including care received while in a hospital, a skilled nursing facility, and sometimes at home.
• Most QMB qualify for $0.00 premium Medicare Part A.
• Most QMB earn eligibility at age 65 by paying in through 40 quarters of qualifying employment,  their’s or their spouse’s
• Pays everything after annual deductible
• Annual deductible and lifetime caps
• Part A deductible, and the 40 quarters of paying in (most QMB pay in wayy more than 40 quarters) and the actuarial math provide a reasonable forecast of Part A cost. The Part A deductible is set annually.

Medicare Part B

• Covers outpatient medical services or supplies needed to diagnose or treat a medical condition; preventive services, doctor appointments, ambulance, physical therapy, durable medical equipment
• All QMB have a Part B premium (sometimes Medicaid or other source will pay it)

• Most QMB earn eligibility at age 65 by paying in through 40 quarters of qualifying employment, their’s or their spouse’s
• Pays up to 80% of Medicare allowed charges
• In the olden times – 1965 – the requirement was that the Part B premium be calculated to pay 75% of the cost of administering Part B. For a variety of reasons, that doesn’t really work anymore. But in concept, it’s helpful. Like A, the annual deductible, time paying in through qualified work, and the actuarial math using age and those factors provide a reasonable forecast of Part B cost.

  But the main funding for current Part A and Part B expense is all the current qualified employment paying in. Current workers are not paying for their own future medical expenses, they are paying for their eligibility and the current money paid in pays for current beneficiaries’ medical insurance.

MFA proposes to open the eligibility to a new class of beneficiaries, so the math has to be redone in order to pay for the new beneficiaries’ medical expenses. It’s complex, stochastic, actuarial and doable and could yield a premium/deductible structure that improves the stability of Medicare.

WIthout proving the math, any medical insurance plan becomes more stable by adding premium paying, younger, healthier members. Likewise, if there are more future beneficiaries paying in each year (qualified work) the plan gets more stable.

There are a variety of differing proposals to implement MFA. But an important common feature is the ginormous reduction in administrative expenses and the elimination of private market profit margins for most situations.

Current Medicare includes insurance plans to cover things Medicare doesn’t cover – mainly the 20% coinsurance for Part B services, also Part A services that exceed the cap of original Medicare and also optical, dental, chiropractic, acupuncture, etc. But in MFA a majority of insurance industry profit margin would be gone.

Part D prescription drugs and Math will be in part 2, but we can tell it would work.

An example: lowering eligibility age to 60.

• Lets call QMB who become eligible under the current rules RED
  And QMB who qualify under the new rules BLUE
• RED: nothing changes

BLUE:

If employed, continue paying in (otherwise it weakens the actuarial math for RED)

Coverage rules are essentially the same for RED and BLUE
Part A&B premium set to pay 100% of the cost from 60 to 65, and then BLUE QMB become RED.

In this model, if 50% of Americans who are enrolled in an exchange plan (ACA, Obamacare) now instead choose BLUE, the premium would be approx $450/mo.  Yes, way higher than RED, but way lower than the insurance currently available.

Yes- there is an actuarial problem with allowing BLUE QMB to opt in or out. The 50% most likely to opt in are the most ill and in need of expensive care. SO far better actuarially if eligibility for all BLUE would work like RED now.

Who wins:

BLUE QMB

Who loses:
– health insurance companies who profit from premium paying Americans age 60-65 who opt in to BLUE
– companies who need to retain staff and rely on the fear of the staff that they will not find insurance if they leave
– an economy that needs BLUE QMB to continue working as long as possible, not as long as they want, but as long as they possibly can

(this starts to get into the really complicated math – FDR’s guys did the math in the 30’s and chose 65 as the magic age and LBJ got Congress to do it 30 years later. Losing those workers’ means in order to preserve GDP and overall profitability, we need to add more workers to replace them – in the 40’s companies convinced FDR and the New Dealers they would cooperate later, after the war. Yeah – ok.)

Ow.

Here’s some things I learned this week. Or at least I heard ’em.  I only got one black eye, so supposedly there’s hope for me yet.

If you can get a carry permit (CCW or Open) and don’t, you’re just as responsible for the innocent deaths as the shooter.   Ow.

If you got the permit and carry, or just carry cuz you can, and you are there when the deranged white Christian guy starts shooting, or the terrorist non-anglo guy starts evildoing, and you don’t draw the gun and put ’em down- you are just as responsible as the shooter/evildooer.

Prayer is powerful enough to stop evil. Even though there is always free will.  But that means praying for the victims is far, FAR more than enough. But restricting the shooter from getting guns and requiring that he stick to praying for his killin’ just ain’t right, it;s no ‘Merican.

The so called “The Big Line” is way, wayyy off. Pols won’t fix it cause they’re stupid heads. Big ones.

Bump stocks should be… wait, what?  nevermind.

Penn State should have to disband and start over in 4 years. Pediophiles and manslaughterers and craven indifference and some good people too.  But jay-zus!

I pray to an awesome God, too.  And the answer isn’t always what I think I want, but it was yesterday, more or less.  (Now if we could all just come to our senses and instead of just outlawing the choice to declaw cats, we ban feeding them or (pretending too) keep them as pets, we could all get on step closer to God.)

Trump is going to be the nominee.

For this not to happen he would have to die, quit, or reveal some GIHUGENT scandal.  (Caution on the last – it could help him.)

The message to moderate, persuadable, right leaning family and friends needs to be “a D President won’t do much…we will still have the R Congress… .” 

We have been the laughingstock of the world before. We can do it again. But we need to think carefully about apathy and indifference that can result from anger and frustration.

So what our first choice D candidate didn’t get in?  Mine is not even in the race (because he’s not electable even though, maybe because, he is a successful Governor in California).

It’s Trump.  Everyone needs to persuade the middle, draw out more detail from the new guy than “it will be great,” and get out the vote. Voter registration, turnout is all it ever is.

ps- the open thread needs to resume at 6am. Bring back elected fpe- we got the easy stuff done.

Sure, they suck, so there’s that.

Sucking less than the other guys is just so disappointing. And a little frightening. My elder son is a socialist, he understands what it means but he also understands why “burn more coal!” is a recipe for not good. What he is only just starting to understand is why science, logic and better ideas don’t win elections as consistently as one might think.

Democrats are really bad at messaging.

I don’t mean avoid getting photographed with Shirley McClain or don’t talk about increasing revenue, talk about a strong economy.  I mean discussing the death tax as not unfair, and trying to win people over on healthcare because access is humane and should be a human right, or even the Christian thing to do. (Who really said if you want to cut Social Security, Medicaid, welfare, food stamps, etc. you have to stop claiming to want to build a Christian nation?)

Let’s talk healthcare. First, “healthcare” has become a conflation of medical insurance and medical services. Lumping them together is bad for the D message. More of the middle could get behind improved access to services, especially necessary services or minimally necessary services (that there is no other kind is not the point), if this did not also mean access to insurance. Insurance, we all fear, that is as good or even better than ours and cheaper due to subsidies.  

It is not and should not be about insurance. Even if it was, Liberals should be talking about tax cuts by making now required medical insurance premiums tax deductible. What?! Liberal tax cuts. Every Budget bill, every Defense bill every everything should have the tax deductibility of health insurance premiums attached.

Public vs. Private Health Insurance on Controlling Spending

Of course, public health insurance does better controlling costs. Lower overhead, better access, better administration. And they have the law on their side.

Of course (as more than one of the commenters points out), Altman leaves a lot out.

Example- Medicare has a bit over 50 million members, and they tend to be sicker, older and the most likely consumers of health services. Even the 10.5 million Medicare benificiaries under 65, are disabled or have ALS or kidney failure.

TRICARE would be a good comparison to the general population – at least based on age and large numbers. But it costs a little less than Medicare to run – and there is less fraud so Altman leaves it out.(I don’t have the data, but I predict it’s because TRICARE contracts out the contact management – call centers and billing and stuff.  $13.50/hr with skimpy benefits vs the federal employees running CMS and Medicare.

Of course public plans that can set their own payment schedule can control cost better. Of course,  a private self contained plan (like Kaiser or other HMO) can do the same but health plans that do not employ their own providers are stuck paying whatever rates they can. And public plans have no shareholders or profit seekers to satisfy. Of course, there are private non-profits too. But they still cost more and do worse controlling costs.

But here is the real dilemma: descriptors like “private” and “competition” assume a free market.  Health insurance is not a free market.  They also assume consumers can choose rationally based on price – and we cannot. 

If I go to the Cell Phone store I get some choice.   If I can get unlimited domestic voice and text with some data for $50/mo with a reasonably current and efficient smart phone or I can get the Gordon Gekko brick phone, and pay$200/mo and $1.00/min with no data or text – I know which to choose.  

But if I am shopping health insurance, and I can get plan A for Premium X with high deductible, low copays and thin network or Plan B with Premium (X*1.5), lower deductible, higher copays, and broader network – which is a better purchase? What about Plan C with Premium 2*x, higher deductible, higher copays, very thin network, but I can add my spouse and unlimited dependent family members for the same premium.

Maybe I can get something like Senator Gardner’s Golden Unicorn plan, low premium, no copays, and broad network. But what if it only covers “catastrophic” events and excludes a ton of stuff that I don’t understnd or care about.  And the only providers are located far from me.

The point is this – free markets work great when service providers and consumers can understand the services being exchanged through price.  I’ll take the small phone with tons of service for $50/mo onver the 1980’s style brick with no service. (Though I would like to have a Gekko brick.)  But markets fail when price fails to convey the necessary information for consumers to choose how much to demand or to communicate to providers how much to supply.

Markets fail for other reasons too – and if the market is for something “necessary” or a general good, then we (USA) regulate the markets and try to allow private (shareholder owned or mutal assocaitions) deliver, with subsidies and regualtions. Sometimes it has to be governement providers because there really is no private market.    Electric. Gas. Air traffic Contral and other safety for Commercial aviation. Used to be telephone – but the market evolved and Judge Green gave us a whole new world of telecom.

Health insurance for sure, and medical services possibly, as a for profit, private market have failed. We should regulate them like we do for the utilities (and other markets) unless or until providers invent or innovate a new product that supercedes the need.

Should we have single payer? Of course. Not like Canada or the UK or Germany.   A distinctly U.S. market, closer to the Swiss, with no restriction on supply.  

But the argument, the message, to get support of we the people – mostly the center – is not, cannot be because it’s the right thing to do, because it’s humane, because human rights, because fairness and justice,  yada yada yada… 

The winning argument – the ony argument – is the market has failed – and single payer will cost less and deliver better. 

Could be government run – just open Medicare, lowering the eligiblity age a few years at a time, charging market rates and watch Medicare outcompete every plan out there. It could be a regulated like a shareholder owned utility – like Excel or the old AT&T.

Here’s one more health insurance related example of Democratic party messaging sucks.  Medicare beficiaries who oppose insurnce and health care access for others are confident in their conviction that their Medicare should be inviolate and untouchable because they earned it, they paid for it. But the current FICA  taxes are NOT premiums that pay for the contributor’s future coverage.  They are the taxes that earn the payor’s (and their spouses’) future eligiblity and pay for current beneficiaries’ coverage.  In the future, future contributors  pay for the future beneficiaries.   No one messages on this. And that allows the myth to perpetuate.   It solidifies the current state of Medicare  – Ike was right only the stupid believe the voters will allow it to be repealed.  But it is the wrong message and it allows the U.S. to continue down a stupid path.

To be continued…

Campaign Romanoff sent an email : 

"Join the 2014 Team!"

 

 

That's why I'm asking you to join our 2014 Team. Team members pledge to raise $2,014 by March 31. Here's how: …..

 

The suggestions for how are pretty good and I spent a few minutes thinking about how I would do it.

Perhaps one hundred people writing a check for $20.14.

Maybe 50% response rate…so 200 requests.  Maybe 25% so 400.  Would I write the check if asked?  

Hmmm… well,  I like Andrew.  I would much rather have him than the guy in the seat now. Can he win?  I really, really, like to win.  

Sure – he's experienced, perceived as young, moderate and practical.  All favorables.  Women like him – and despite the incumbent's recent (expedient) reversals, I think Romanoff wins that part.  Miklosi was close – I think Andrew maybe could do it. 

Will he be able to run the kind of media campaign he would most likely need?  Maybe he could do it without $1 – $1.5million  (or more) dedicated to tv in Aug – Oct 2014.  Maybe.

But I think he's going to need big money donors. I do not believe he can self-fund.  I have not seen any hint that big enough private donors are willing to write the kind of checks that would be required.  I don't think he gets big enough dollars from house parties.  I think he's going to have to have PAC dollars. 

I have high hopes for the Cubs 2013.  I get slumps, but it's been 105 years. This one's gotta end sometime.

2014 is a ways away.  Until I see the path to a big enough media budget for the one thing, I'm focused on another starter or two and a no kidding slam-the-door closer.