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Why Costco?

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On Wednesday, on the heels of his landmark State of the Union speech about income inequality, President Barack Obama will be touring a Costco store in Lanham, Maryland. Why Costco and not Walmart, which is a much bigger and better-known discount retailer?

The answer is that Costco's labor practices help reduce income inequality while Walmart's labor practices widen it. Yes, Walmart is better-known, but what it's known for is low wages and abusive labor practices.

Costco's CEO Craig Jelinek has boldly made the case that investing in his workers is an investment in a successful business. Costco pays its employees living wages. Workers start at $11.50 per hour. The average employee wage is $21 per hour, not including overtime. Jelinek endorses Obama's proposal to raise the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. Paying employees decent wages, Jelinek told Bloomberg News, "puts more money back into the economy and creates a healthier country. It's really that simple."

Costco treats workers with respect. About 88 percent of its employees have company-sponsored health insurance. Not surprisingly, Costco employees are loyal. Among employees that have worked at the company for over a year, annual turnover is under six percent.

In contrast, Walmart pays most of its workers poverty-level wages, prefers employees to work part-time rather than full time, imposes chaotic work schedules, and harasses (and even fires) its "associates" if they complain. Unlike other major retailers around the world, the Bentonville behemoth even refused to take responsibility for its role in the deaths last year of over a thousand Bangladesh sweatshop workers killed when a factory that produced clothing for Walmart collapsed.

When Americans think of the phrase "working poor," they think of Walmart. Many of its employees make so little that they are eligible for food stamps, Medicaid, and housing subsidies. America's taxpayers are subsidizing Walmart's poverty-wage labor practices to the tune of billions of dollars. The company's low-wage business model contributes to its stocking problems, the low customer service ratings, and the retailer's current decline in sales.

Not only do Costco workers earn much more than their Walmart counterparts, but Costco's CEO makes considerably less than Walmart's CEO. So while Costco helps narrow the gap between the rich and the rest, Walmart widens it.

There are a number of ways to fix the problem of widening income inequality in the United States. Raising the minimum wage is an important part of the solution, but employers need to do their part, too. As the largest private employer in the country, with 1.4 million Americans in the Walmart workforce, the company could singlehandedly help reduce America's income gap by lifting its employees' starting pay above the poverty level to at least $25,000 a year. Better jobs at Walmart would be good for workers, our economy and the company.

That's what the Walmart workers were proclaiming when they engaged in protest rallies at Walmart stores around the country on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. That's what their community supporters were saying when they showed up at the those rallies carrying picket signs urging Walmart to boost starting pay to $25,000. Those protests not only reflect Americans' growing anger over widening inequality and declining wages, they also reflect Americans' concerns about Walmart's practices with regard to women, immigrants, the environment, and global sweatshops.

Walmart has a serious image problem. More and more consumers view Walmart like they view Wall Street -- as a company owned and run by people who are out of touch with the daily lives of working Americans. This is particularly true with core Democratic voters, many independent voters, and even a significant slice of Republican voters. Walmart has become a symbol of much that Americans think is wrong with the society.

Walmart's top brass is beginning to understand this. But instead of making substantive changes in its practices, it engages in spin and empty gestures. Its recent announcements about hiring vets and addressing food deserts have proven to be little more than publicity stunts designed to improve its brand.

What we saw play out at the 2012 Democratic convention -- where former Costco CEO Jim Sinegal was a prime-time speaker while Walmart's donations were returned -- is only going to grow with Americans' growing awareness of the company's policies.

If Democrats running for office, or even members of the current administration, want to gain the support of the party's core voters, they'd be wise to avoid being seen standing in front of TV cameras with Walmart executives. They should be seen standing on picket lines with Walmart employees.

*Peter Dreier teaches politics and chairs the Urban & Environmental Policy Department at Occidental College. His latest book is The 100 Greatest Americans of the 20th Century: A Social Justice Hall of Fame (Nation Books). * Reported by Huffington Post 9 hours ago.

New York may add health insurance option for people too poor to afford Obamacare

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Reported by syracuse.com 9 hours ago.

State of the Union Mixes Sound and Foolish Proposals Laced with Demagoguery

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State of the Union Mixes Sound and Foolish Proposals Laced with Demagoguery Promising to address inequality and strengthen the middle class, President Obama’s State of the Union combined sound and foolish proposals, laced with good old fashioned demagoguery.

Despite nearly five years of economic recovery, the fortunes of working Americans have decidedly worsened. The president’s policies should carry considerable culpability and bear correction.  

Instead, he pronounced upward mobility has stalled—when non-partisan economic studies show that’s not true—and insists the wealthy should pay to balance the accounts.

Thanks to the president’s free trade policies, multinational corporations and talented Americans have earned huge income gains selling knowhow and services around the globe. Meanwhile, the stuff ordinary Americans make is increasingly shut out of the fastest growing overseas markets.

GM boasts some of the best-selling cars in China, but high tariffs, regulations, and an artificially cheap currency keep out U.S.-made vehicles. The president refuses to effectively confront protectionism throughout Asia, denying Americans good paying jobs.

ObamaCare is driving up health insurance costs. Along with higher taxes, that curbs domestic purchases, slows economic recovery, and destroys jobs. Restrictions on offshore petroleum development, costly new banking and environmental regulations, and a shortage of lending by regional banks make it tougher for small businesses to expand and add employees.

No surprise, some 20 million Americans can’t find full-time work, and the inflation-adjusted wages ordinary workers earn are falling. Factoring in higher state and local taxes, most families are much worse off than five years ago, and record numbers of Americans depend on food stamps.

Now Obama wants to double down on failed initiatives. Instead of asking Congress to suspend the mandate that all Americans obtain excessive and expensive health insurance, he is launching an aggressive campaign to persuade young Americans to buy overpriced policies.

Presidential initiatives to build a national network of manufacturing innovation centers, strengthen infrastructure, federal job training and R&D, and rapidly expand industrial use of clean natural gas have great merit. Yet, no matter how strong the products and productive their workers, America’s factories need more customers at home and abroad to succeed, grow, and raise wages.

Unfortunately, the president proposes to push forward with new trade agreements in Asia that will further open U.S. markets to foreign competition without getting enforceable enough concessions on discriminatory regulations and currency manipulation that keep out American products and impoverish once-proud U.S. blue collar workers.

He wants Congress to approve a $10.10 an hour minimum wage. That’s a 39 percent jump, and hardly justified by the 9 percent inflation since the federal floor was set in July 2009. Such an increase would compel McDonalds to aggressively implement methods to cut employees. Smaller restaurants, whose customers simply cannot afford to pay another $2 for lunch, would close, and the same would repeat in other industries.

Comprehensive immigration reform would help. Bringing undocumented workers out of the shadows would raise the wages they command and those of citizens competing with them.

Republicans in Congress want a deal that really secures our borders from another surge of illegal immigrants. However, given the president’s poor record of sticking to his word in budget negotiations, critical members like Senator Marco Rubio are reluctant to trust him.

All this illustrates the central reason for Washington’s inaction on crucial issues.

The president dodges responsibility for the failures of his ideologically-motivated agenda by asking Congress to tax the “one percent” for simply exploiting conditions he created.

Americans judge the president by their own deteriorating conditions, and his credibility on economic issues is falling precipitously.

Members of Congress simply don’t trust him to address problems as the facts require and keep his word when it counts.

Peter Morici is an economist and professor at the Smith School of Business, University of Maryland and a widely published columnist. Follow him on Twitter.

 
 
 
  Reported by Breitbart 8 hours ago.

Barack Obama, war hero

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The big finish to President Obama's State of the Union address involved saluting Army Ranger Sgt. Cory Remsburg:



I first met Cory Remsburg, a proud Army Ranger, at Omaha Beach on the 65th anniversary of D-Day. Along with some of his fellow Rangers, he walked me through the program – a strong, impressive young man, with an easy manner, sharp as a tack. We joked around, and took pictures, and I told him to stay in touch.

A few months later, on his tenth deployment, Cory was nearly killed by a massive roadside bomb in Afghanistan. His comrades found him in a canal, face down, underwater, shrapnel in his brain.

For months, he lay in a coma. The next time I met him, in the hospital, he couldn't speak; he could barely move. Over the years, he's endured dozens of surgeries and procedures, and hours of grueling rehab every day.

Even now, Cory is still blind in one eye. He still struggles on his left side. But slowly, steadily, with the support of caregivers like his dad Craig, and the community around him, Cory has grown stronger. Day by day, he's learned to speak again and stand again and walk again – and he's working toward the day when he can serve his country again.

"My recovery has not been easy," he says. "Nothing in life that's worth anything is easy."

Cory is here tonight. And like the Army he loves, like the America he serves, Sergeant First Class Cory Remsburg never gives up, and he does not quit.



SOTU addresses traditionally include such recognition of America's heroes, and no one can dispute that Sgt. Remsburg deserves the honor.  This earned Obama a pass for using the Ranger's story to buttress the political themes of his speech.  If anything, critics noted that the President might have done himself no favors by using such an unforgettable story of heroism and sacrifice to cap off such a forgettable speech.  But here's what came next:



My fellow Americans, men and women like Cory remind us that America has never come easy. Our freedom, our democracy, has never been easy. Sometimes we stumble; we make mistakes; we get frustrated or discouraged. But for more than two hundred years, we have put those things aside and placed our collective shoulder to the wheel of progress – to create and build and expand the possibilities of individual achievement; to free other nations from tyranny and fear; to promote justice, and fairness, and equality under the law, so that the words set to paper by our founders are made real for every citizen. 

The America we want for our kids – a rising America where honest work is plentiful and communities are strong; where prosperity is widely shared and opportunity for all lets us go as far as our dreams and toil will take us – none of it is easy. But if we work together; if we summon what is best in us, with our feet planted firmly in today but our eyes cast towards tomorrow – I know it's within our reach.  Believe it.



No one familiar with Obama's rhetoric, much less his policies, can believe for one instant that he actually sees America this way.  This was the fallen nation he set out to transform, remember?  His wife famously said that his election was the first time she was ever proud of her country.  

Socialists are very good at appropriating the language of individual achievement and freedom - but he just had to slip that creepy reference to "our collective shoulder" in there, didn't he?  The entire point of Obama's political career is that individuals are helpless without the government.  This is the politician who just got finished bragging about all the jobs he created, without mentioning the even larger number of jobs he wiped out, and then told us America is in such wonderful shape that we need another emergency extension of unemployment benefits.  This is the man who thinks private citizens engaged in voluntary commerce can't be trusted to manage health insurance.  Last year he told small business owners they weren't responsible for their own success; last night he told them to give all their employees a raise, something they're too blinkered and greedy to do unless the President instructs or forces them.  Not a single program he has ever advocated would exist if he actually believed in "equality under the law," and that's before we get into his troubling habit of personally ignoring laws he finds inconvenient.

So drafting Cory Remsburg into service as a totem to fool the American people into thinking he respects them is disingenuous at best.  At least one Obama cultist, NBC News reporter Mark Murray, took it a step further and made it downright offensive: "Obama's ending on Remsburg wasn't just a story about America - it also was a story about Obama.  Nothing has ever come easy."

Yes, Obama's endless struggle to find just the right spot for sunbathing on his Hawaiian vacations, or shoot under par at the more challenging golf courses he frequents, is just like a war hero surviving a horrific attack.  More broadly, the notion that Obama ever endured any great suffering in his life is a fantasy his rabid fanboys indulge to both justify his current life of fabulous luxury, and keep his reputation for empathy alive, even as they're watching him dismiss millions of suffering Americans as non-entities because he finds them politically inconvenient.  The key to Obama's appeal - judging by the exit polls, nearly the only reason he won re-election - is the sense he's walked in his supporters' shoes, and understands their lives.  

It's not surprising that his more degenerate cultists would hear the Remsburg story, or any other story of heroism, and immediately think of how it reflects on the magnificence of their God-king.  Obama himself did not draw that comparison.  In fact, taking his subsequent words as offered, he's saying the exact opposite: he was offering an insincere encomium to the independence and can-do spirit of an America he actually thinks should be in a government-managed crib with very high rails.  But of course when his supporters hear the word "struggle," they think immediately of political struggles.

 
 
 
  Reported by Breitbart 7 hours ago.

GovBeat: San Francisco thinks Obamacare can cut costs, crime rates

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Across the country, an estimated 90 percent of those in county jails don’t have health insurance. About the same number would qualify for subsidized health-care coverage under the Affordable Care Act. And those prisoners are more susceptible to chronic illnesses that, without treatment once they are freed, cost millions in emergency room visits. Reported by Washington Post 6 hours ago.

Quick Life Insurance Quote Tool Added to Consumer News Portal

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Quick life insurance quote tool is now one of the featured tools at the Cherry News website. This insurer tool is offered to adults searching insurer rates online at http://cherrynews.com/life-insurance.

Pittsburgh, PA (PRWEB) January 29, 2014

The sources to research insurance products in the U.S. can be limited for adults who do not have instant access to rates data. The Cherry News company has helped to develop a new quick life insurance quote tool online. This tool is offered to adults at
http://cherrynews.com/life-insurance.

All insurance products that are related to life insurance can be researched while using this automated consumer system. The differences in the rates that can be found through different providers is one of the benefits featured when the system is accessed.

The quick quotes that are prepared and distributed to adults using this newly developed system are based on provider rates data. This data can include rates from brokers or third party agencies that are helping to establish discounts for different policies online.

"Our automated tool is one of the first on our website to help more consumers who have few resources to search in the insurance industry this year," said a source at the CherryNews.com company.

One way that the database is expected to generate quotes faster is through the entrance of zip codes in favor of medical information from users. Because many systems require adults to input their medical details, the CherryNews.com change to a zip code format is creating a faster price delivery method.

"Adults who depend on our system to find whole, guaranteed and term rates online can use their zip code to find providers now discounting these plans in the USA," said the source.

The CherryNews.com company is offering access to its research tools this year for no cost online. The life insurer quotes tool can now be used alongside the health insurance lookup tool at http://cherrynews.com/health-insurance.

This optional tool is designed to deliver medical insurance rates from selected providers based on entered zip codes. Each of these systems now feature the most updated annual price data available.

About CherryNews.com

The CherryNews.com company is one consumer resource currently providing automated tools to locate different consumer services online. This company has enabled a life insurance research tool now quoting adult policies 365 days a year. The CherryNews.com company supports all American consumers by publishing price guides, discount publications and other content to alert the public of discounts. The company media sources help to distribute company supplied content to new cities in the U.S. each day. The writing team and research team this company uses is responsible for the content publication. Reported by PRWeb 7 hours ago.

Business Insurance Agents Rates Now Viewable Online at News Portal Website

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Business insurance agents rates are now viewable at the Cherry News company website. National policy providers are now quoting rates for company policies online at http://cherrynews.com/business-insurance.

Chicago, IL (PRWEB) January 29, 2014

Obtaining approximate pricing for different insurance products online is one of the most difficult aspects of research for business owners, according to industry research. The Cherry News company has designed a new insurance research tool online for 2014 that includes business insurance agents rates through its portal at http://cherrynews.com/business-insurance.

This new tool is providing small business owners with a simple method of locating different insurance pricing for select products. The launch of this new tool is part of the insurance information currently included on the company website. The in-depth research provided with the automated system online is removing part of the frustrations commonly found in the insurance industry.

One aspect to the new system online that business owners are expected to benefit from during system use is the matching by zip codes. The easy to use system online is currently configured to accept any U.S. zip code to begin the process of matching different company rates online. Instant pricing is available using this method apart from entering business owner information.

"The insurance lookup process that many companies perform when researching different insurance plans for employees does not always include accurate rates," said a CherryNews.com company source.

The modifications entered into the company research system this year has improved the amount of policies currently available for research. Aside from general liability insurance, plans for health and workers compensation are now quoted using the finder system online. These common insurance types are quoted by top agencies.

"The arrival of the providers in the company system for this year is increasing policy types that are quotable using the business insurer finder system for small business owners," the source added.

The CherryNews.com company website featuring the insurance lookup system is part of the new phase of enhancements for research this year. The business insurance information is currently connected to the health insurance plans database added this month for easy research.

Both commercial and individual plans for medical insurance can be found using the research tool at http://cherrynews.com/health-insurance.

About CherryNews.com

The CherryNews.com company is one informative resource for consumers to access when learning about insurance quotations and policy declarations from American companies. A new set of automated tools are active on the company website to introduce insurer lookups. The CherryNews.com company continues to publish retail data that is of interest to consumers concerning price markdowns and available products for sale. The company content published daily is in syndication through various media sources in the U.S. this year. The company staff continues to participate in customer service for all website visitors. Reported by PRWeb 7 hours ago.

He's Just Not That Into You: Why Millennials Aren't Buying Up to the Affordable Care Act

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Uncle Sam's "We Want You!" finger is pointed directly at the nose of every young adult in America. But do we want him?

In stark contrast to the name-calling disaster that was the government shutdown of 2013, Congress quietly passed a spending bill this month with a whopping $1.1 trillion price tag.

The bill laid out what spending will look like over the remainder of President Barack Obama's second term, including the rollout of the Affordable Care Act, the crown jewel of his administration. What it doesn't manage to explicitly lay out in its 1,582 pages, however, is who is paying for it.

Millennials, whether we like it or not, are faced with yet another tab to pick up. And even though we're paying, the evidence suggests that we're just not buying it.

The success of the ACA lives or dies based on participation of young people. The White House confidently predicted that 40 percent of enrollments would come from "invincibles," or those of us between the ages of 18 and 34 who are in good health and will pay in to the system much more than we take out. Just one hiccup: only 24 percent of enrollees so far are 18 to 34 years old.

It looks like the ACA is still too expensive of a pill to swallow.

Former President Clinton reminded us that this number wasn't just an optimistic prediction -- it's essential to keeping the ACA afloat. And he's not the only Democrat hesitant to think the ACA is a slam-dunk. Jim Moran, 12-term Virginia representative, said not enough young people are signing up to make the law viable.

"I'm afraid that the millennials, if you will, are less likely to sign up," Moran said in an interview with WAMU American University Radio. "I think they feel more independent, I think they feel a little more invulnerable than prior generations. But I don't think we're going to get enough young people signing up to make this bill work as it was intended to financially."

And, indeed, a record number of Americans -- 42 percent -- now identify as independents.

The benefits seemed too good to be true: no pre-existing conditions, low premiums and the peace of mind that comes with medical insurance. But as word spread that premiums are set to increase by an average of 41 percent and millions of plans were canceled after we were promised we could keep them, our attitude toward the ACA remains stubbornly cynical.

Young people showed up in record numbers to elect President Obama with the promise that things would change. With two months to go before the March 31st deadline, the administration hopes to reignite that spark by quickly ramping up its advertising efforts, showing that the American healthcare system's success lies in the hands of Pajama Boy and Family Guy advertisements.

Amidst this landscape, older generations have dubbed us the lazy and entitled generation. It appears we're more concerned about spring breaks than spring enrollment deadlines. And as the number of uninsured young people actually increases despite awareness of the ACA penalties, it's easy to blame it on our sense of invulnerability.

In fact, the American Action Forum found that 6 out of 7 uninsured young people would spend less on healthcare by taking the penalty and foregoing health insurance. We already pay in to unsustainable Medicare and Social Security systems projected to fall miserably short in payouts once we reach old age. So maybe it's not that we're invulnerable--we're just not that gullible.

But regardless of one's generational perspective on the failures of the ACA, the lackluster response is symptomatic of an attitude spreading across the country. Twenty and thirtysomethings are turning against the idea that mother--in this case, the government--knows best.

As we foot the bill for President Obama's ever-growing list of entitlements designed to primarily benefit the aging population in charge, we're faced with a harsher reality we didn't ask for. And as healthcare reform leans on young people as a crutch, it should come as no surprise when we stay home this time.

To be clear, America's healthcare system is in desperate need of reform. We as a country pay substantially more for healthcare than our OECD counterparts and don't receive a higher payoff. But this reform is not it.

Perhaps not even Pajama Boy can turn a reviled entitlement program into the vibrant healthcare marketplace we need. Reported by Huffington Post 6 hours ago.

WaPo Fact Checker Rips Obama's State of the Union Falsehoods

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WaPo Fact Checker Rips Obama's State of the Union Falsehoods It is a beautiful thing being President Obama. You can pretty much say whatever you want and never be held accountable for it. Sure, a Washington Post fact-checker will dutifully note the brazen falsehoods. The media dutifully reports on most everything. But make Obama pay a political price for not telling the truth in a State of the Union address about the number of jobs created and number of ObamaCare enrollees?

Never.

Tuesday night, the president told Americans, “The more than eight million new jobs our businesses have created over the past four years.”

Nope.

[T]he data also show that since the start of his presidency, about 3.2 million jobs have been created — and the number of jobs in the economy still is about 1.2 million lower than when the recession began in December 2007.

Obama said: “Today, women make up about half our workforce. But they still make 77 cents for every dollar a man earns. That is wrong, and in 2014, it’s an embarrassment.”

Nope.

There is clearly a wage gap, but differences in the life choices of men and women — such as women tending to leave the workforce when they have children — make it difficult to make simple comparisons.

Obama is using a figure (annual wages, from the Census Bureau) that makes the disparity appear the greatest. The Bureau of Labor Statistics, for instance, shows that the gap is 19 cents when looking at weekly wages. The gap is even smaller when you look at hourly wages — it is 14 cents — but then not every wage earner is paid on an hourly basis, so that statistic excludes salaried workers.

And finally, there was Obama shameless inflation of the ObamaCare enrollment numbers: "More than nine million Americans have signed up for private health insurance or Medicaid coverage.”

Nope.

Obama carefully does not say these numbers are the result of the Affordable Care Act, but he certainly leaves that impression. But the Medicaid part of this number — 6.3 million from October through December — is very fuzzy and once earned a rating of Three Pinocchios. …

The private insurance numbers — about 3 million — are also open to question. The troubled federal exchange counts people as enrolled if an individual has selected a plan, but it does not know if a person enrolled and paid a premium because that part of the system has yet to be built.

Obama's falsehoods aren't small things. He is using these falsehoods to manipulate American policy. And he will continue to do so and the media will continue to dutifully report his doing so. But he will never be made to pay a political price.

 

Follow  John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC              

 
 
 
  Reported by Breitbart 5 hours ago.

Health First Announces Ed Griese as President & CEO of Health First Health Plans

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Health First is pleased to announce Ed Griese as its new president and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Health First Health Plans.

Rockledge, FL (PRWEB) January 29, 2014

Health First is pleased to announce Ed Griese as its new president and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Health First Health Plans. Ed has more than 25 years of experience, both in the U.S. and internationally, in senior leadership roles including managing health insurance and reinsurance companies, third-party administrators, business process outsourcing, IPAs/PHOs and health plans.

Griese previously served as Managing Director and partner in the Healthcare Industry Group of Alvarez & Marsal in New York and is recognized within the healthcare insurance community as a skilled strategist with exceptional business acumen. His career reflects successful startup, turnaround, consulting, and business development experience. Griese has a proven track record in identifying and attracting executive talent for his management teams.

He has served on the boards of directors for many companies throughout his career such as Munich Re America, America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), Best Doctors, and Cigna Life Insurance Company of Europe, S.A. Griese has also been a board member of nonprofit organizations such as Our Kids, The American School of Bombay and Princeton FC (soccer club) and earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota.

About Health First
Founded in 1995, Health First is Central Florida’s only fully integrated health system and employs more than 7,500 people and has four hospitals (including Holmes Regional Medical Center, Palm Bay Hospital, Cape Canaveral Hospital and Viera Hospital). Health First Health Plans also offers a wide variety of health insurance plan options for Brevard and Indian River Counties. In addition, Health First is home to Brevard County’s only Trauma Center. Health First Medical Group is the largest multi-specialty physician group on the Space Coast. Health First offers numerous outpatient and wellness services, including four Pro-Health and Fitness Centers. Visit http://www.Health-First.org for more information. Reported by PRWeb 5 hours ago.

Health Insurers Hiking Single Women's Long-Term Rates

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Health insurance companies are raising prices on single women's long-term-care policies nationwide, saying women live longer and collect more benefits. Reported by Newsmax 2 hours ago.

Insurance giant WellPoint enrolls 500,000 in Obamacare coverage

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Health insurance giant WellPoint Inc. has signed up 500,000 people for Obamacare policies across the country, and it struck an upbeat tone Wednesday about early enrollment trends under the healthcare law. Reported by L.A. Times 4 hours ago.

MSU legend Joe DeLamielleure says he has CTE, wants help from NFL

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DeLamielleure, a Detroit native and Charlotte resident who was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2003, faces a future of dealing with the disease with health insurance he receives only through his wife, Gerri's, work medical plan. The NFL doesn't provide health care to players starting five years after they have retired. Reported by Freep 3 hours ago.

Kreidler's health insurance rules proposal sparks criticism from Republican senator

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Washington Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler has proposed new industry rules that have drawn anger from a Republican senator who wants to abolish his office. Last month, Republican Sen. Randi Becker, of Eatonville, told Kreidler in a letter that his proposed rules would create more administrative costs for insurance companies, which would be passed on to the consumer. “Each of these regulatory activities is likely to result in higher costs for consumers resulting from new benefits being… Reported by bizjournals 1 hour ago.

Why Did Obama Cite the GM CEO’s Father’s Factory Job as an Example of the American Dream?

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Why Did Obama Cite the GM CEO’s Father’s Factory Job as an Example of the American Dream? GM CEO Mary Barra served as an example that the American Dream is alive and well during last night’s State of the Union address.

If you were busy not going blind with boredom watching the State of the Union pep rally last night, you missed President Obama’s callout to GM’s new CEO, Mary Barra. An intelligent and accomplished engineer and executive with an MBA from Stanford, she seems to be unable to get away from the facts that (1) she’s female and (2) she wasn’t born with a silver spoon in her mouth. To quote the prez directly:



They believe, and I believe, that here in America, our success should depend not on accident of birth, but the strength of our work ethic and the scope of our dreams. That’s what drew our forebears here. It’s how the daughter of a factory worker is CEO of America’s largest automaker.



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Not to discredit Ms. Barra or her father’s hard work, but is her ascent truly a Horatio Alger–level tale of an escape from poverty? Ray Makela, Ms. Barra’s father, worked for 40 years as a tool-and-die maker in a Pontiac factory. That’s not an easy job by any stretch, nor is it one that has ever been overcompensated. But according to the UAW, a veteran hourly worker at GM in 1970 would have made $49,500 per year, after adjusting for inflation. That was higher than the median household income in the U.S. in 1970 of $46,089, again adjusting for inflation. Those were also the days of robust health insurance and pensions (of the very kind that contributed to GM’s eventual bankruptcy).

Should we, then, be any more surprised that Ms. Barra went on to college, a managerial job at GM, a Stanford graduate degree, and then worked her way up the corporate ladder to the CEO’s office than we would be if she was the daughter of an accountant? Or a restaurant owner, pharmacist, or insurance seller?

Well, yes, we should. That’s because “factory worker” still carries a negative connotation in America. It implies an unskilled laborer toiling away in an Upton Sinclair nightmare, perhaps looking forward to spending twopence on a Cadbury bar at the apothecary on the way home. This isn’t true anymore, and it wasn’t true when Mary Barra’s father worked for Pontiac. But it was an old stereotype used for political rhetoric, just the same as Mr. Obama went on to show the American Dream at work when the “son of a single mom can be President.” Imagine the surprise felt by the millions of single mothers in America upon learning that their children aren’t consigned to mediocrity.

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If Mr. Obama is serious about wanting to rebuild the American middle class, he would do well to revisit Horatio Alger’s nineteenth-century novels. They weren’t usually rags-to-riches stories, but about people fighting their way up from poverty to the middle class. It’s a middle class that has been shrinking in size and capability ever since the mid 1970s, when the U.S. began to lose manufacturing jobs in droves. Demeaning today’s factory workers as being at the bottom of the ladder won’t help. Reported by Car and Driver 1 hour ago.

Obama, ACA support wane with Wisconsin voters: MU poll

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President Barack Obama, who won Wisconsin during both of his presidential elections, will return to the state for a post-State-Of-The-Union visit Jan. 30 with voter support waning due partly to the shortcomings of the Affordable Care Act, a new Marquette University poll shows. The Marquette poll found that Obama’s job-approval ratings from Wisconsin voters suffered since the rollout of the online health-insurance marketplace in October 2013. The poll interviewed 802 Wisconsin registered voters… Reported by bizjournals 58 minutes ago.

Arizona group echoes Hobby Lobby's Obamacare contraception fight

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A Scottsdale-based conservative legal group is representing a Pennsylvania-cabinet manufacturer in its Supreme Court challenge to contraception mandates on employer health insurance plans included in the Affordable Care Act. Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne also has filed an amicus brief backing Oklahoma-based Hobby Lobby in similar challenge. Obamacare mandates related to employer health coverage and paying for employees’ contraception and possibly day-after abortion inducing medications. How… Reported by bizjournals 28 minutes ago.

Pelosi To Republicans: 'Take Back Your Party'

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House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) tried to muster a surprised reaction on Tuesday as she listened to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee's quote about the government helping women "control their libidos."

But after serving in Congress for nearly three decades, Pelosi says she is so used to hearing her colleagues say things like that that she barely notices anymore. "This is a statement so from the past that I'm almost embarrassed for him, but understand it doesn't stand out as anything unusual from what we hear our members say here," she said in an interview before the State of the Union on HuffPost Live. "You don't have a long enough show for me to go into what you hear around here from the members of Congress."

Pelosi said her colleagues regularly talk disrespectfully about large categories of people.

"Whether it's about women and their judgment, whether it's about immigrants and their opportunities, about poor people or people who are out of work, there's a real disdain," she said.

That disdain for women, Pelosi said, extends far beyond rhetoric. As she and some of her Democratic colleagues push a comprehensive economic agenda for women, which includes equal pay legislation, a bill to raise the minimum wage, mandatory paid sick and family leave and affordable childcare for working mothers, Republican leadership has ignored those proposals and instead brought a bundle of abortion restrictions to the floor for a vote.

The No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, which the House passed on Tuesday, bans abortion coverage in the state health insurance exchanges set up by the Affordable Care Act. Until now, most private health insurance plans have covered abortion without controversy.

"It's really an insult to women and their judgment about the size and timing of their families, and it's an opportunity cost," the California congresswoman said. "This bill is going nowhere, and instead we should be putting on the floor legislation to extend unemployment benefits."

Pelosi said today's Republican Party is not what it used to be.

"I say to the Republicans, take back your party," she said. "This isn't who you are, who you have been, what you have done for America, the 'Grand Ol' Party.' This is an ideological, over the cliff, extreme element that has captured control of the Republican Party in the House and dominates policy making."

The Republican National Committee held its winter meeting last week, where party leaders and candidates were encouraged to push back against the Democrats' claim that the GOP is waging a "war on women." Republican politicians made a string of comments after the meeting that only further inflamed accusations that they do not understand the issues women face.

Huckabee, also a former Republican presidential candidate, accused Democrats of telling women "they are helpless without Uncle Sugar coming in and providing for them a prescription each month for birth control because they cannot control their libido or their reproductive system without the help of government." Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum (R) insisted the GOP has been "tremendous in supporting the equality of women in the workplace and a whole host of other places," and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) dismissed the fact that women are routinely paid less than men for the same work.

"This whole sort of war on women thing, I’m scratching my head, because if there was a war on women, I think they won," Paul said in an appearance on CNN's "State Of The Union.""In fact, I worry about our young men sometimes, because I think the women really are outcompeting men in our world."

On the day before the five-year anniversary of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which helps women legally challenge pay discrimination in the workplace, Pelosi said she is frustrated that Republicans dismiss women's economic struggles and the gender pay gap. "To hear them say that means nothing to me, the two that you quoted," Pelosi said, referring to Paul and Santorum. "In the polls, [people] said 55 percent thought the economy worked for men, 33 percent thought the economy worked for women. So they can say whatever they want. The fact is over 60 percent of the people who make the minimum wage are women."

A bill to raise the minimum wage, Pelosi said, might be gaining enough political momentum and public support to make it viable in the Republican-controlled House -- but leadership is not likely to bring bills to the floor any time soon that would address equal pay for women or paid family and medical leave.

Republicans did choose a woman, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (Wash.), to deliver the GOP's State of the Union rebuttal Tuesday night. But Pelosi said that symbolic action means little to the women in America.

"I even said it when I became speaker -- it's nice that I'm speaker, but it's not nice enough [if] women are still not paid according to their value," she said. "What's important is what's happening to women in America, and to say, 'Oh, isn't this nice? That makes things okay with you' -- no. It's about policy that turns into legislation that turns into improving the quality of life for the American people." Reported by Huffington Post 24 minutes ago.

Heartland Institute Experts React to President Obama’s State of the Union Address

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The following statements reacting to President Obama's State of the Union address from fellows at The Heartland Institute -- a free-market think tank -- may be used for attribution.

(PRWEB) January 29, 2014

The following statements reacting to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address Tuesday night from staff, fellows, and policy advisors at The Heartland Institute – a free-market think tank – may be used for attribution. For more comments, refer to the contact information below. To book a Heartland guest on your program, please contact Director of Communications Jim Lakely at jlakely(at)heartland(dot)org and 312/377-4000 or (cell) 312/731-9364.

“The president displayed a remarkable lack of gravitas in his State of the Union address. For a while, he was crouched over the lectern leaning on his elbows, like a college professor leading a discussion rather than the Leader of the Free World addressing the nation.

“There was so much else wrong with this speech. Taking credit for things he’s done so much to prevent (like rising oil production), the repetitive call-outs to sad sacks in the gallery in order to cite anecdotes instead of making credible arguments, the incredibly insulting and condescending notion that Congress should ‘give America a raise’ by raising the minimum wage. Do we all work for government? Would we not make more than $10 an hour unless government told our employers to pay us at least this much? That line – ‘give America a raise’ – should appear in dictionaries as part of the definition of ‘pandering.’

“His line about Obamacare – ‘come on guys, voting to repeal it 40 times is enough’ – trivialized an effort by a co-equal branch of government to keep promises its members made to voters back home, to repeal and replace legislation that was passed under false pretenses. He mocked his critics when he should have been apologizing for telling lies to the American people in order to get that legislation passed. The right thing to have said is: ‘I apologize for misleading members of Congress and the American people to get a piece of flawed legislation enacted. Let’s work together to repeal and replace it with something that can work.’”

Joseph Bast
President
The Heartland Institute
jbast(at)heartland(dot)org
312/377-4000

“The president continues to place his faith in government programs as a means to promote growth and prosperity. Economic history shows government efforts to direct and control the economy tend to detract from growth and impoverish people. America’s historical success is due to an alternative – faith in the freedom of individuals and markets.

“By replacing individual freedom with government control and direction, the president’s policies have produced the weakest recovery in over a century. Had our forefathers placed their faith in government instead of individuals, the U.S. today would be a third world nation. By moving to replace our precious individual freedoms with progressively more government control over the economy and markets, the president opts for policies that will continue to erode the living standards of most Americans.”

Robert Genetski
Policy Advisor, Budget and Tax Policy
The Heartland Institute
rgenetski(at)classicalprinciples(dot)com
312/565-0112

“The president says that the economy is improving substantially. Sadly, the average worker does not believe that. As President Barack Obama enters his sixth year in the White House, 68 percent of Americans say the country is either stagnant or worse off since he took office, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.

“There is good reason for the pessimism. In 2007, 66 percent of Americans over age 16 either had a job or were looking for one. Today, that is down to 62.8 percent, the lowest labor-force participation rate since 1978.”

Ronald D. Rotunda
The Doy & Dee Henley Chair and Distinguished Professor of Jurisprudence
Chapman University
rrotunda(at)chapman(dot)edu
714/628-2698

“In his meandering mess of a speech, President Obama managed to completely gloss over the relevant facts regarding the failures of his signature health care law. Rather than admit the problems and apologize for them, the president chose to ignore the millions of Americans who’ve learned that even if they like their plan they can’t keep it, or even if they like their doctor they can’t keep him. Instead, he based his metric of success on the number of Americans signed up for Medicaid, an already overburdened and failing entitlement system which offers the false promise of care to millions of Americans.

“President Obama has made health care unaffordable for millions of citizens while needlessly disrupting our economy. At most, his health care exchanges are signing up 15 percent of the uninsured Americans they were supposed to enroll. And why? Because the American people are finding that the promises he made about bringing down the price of health insurance for individuals and families were complete and utter lies. If all the promises he’d made about Obamacare had come true, the president’s speech would’ve been a victory lap. Instead, it’s a grim insistence that his broken policy will endure, despite how much it has hurt Americans across the country.”

Benjamin Domenech
Senior Fellow, Health Care Policy
The Heartland Institute
bdomenech(at)heartland(dot)org
703/509-1741

“President Obama dares to say ‘research shows government preschool is a great investment’ just a few months after yet another highest-quality study shows it’s fool’s gold. The president apparently prefers only the poor-quality research that supports his agenda of saddling kids with debt while failing to equip them to pay it off.

“The president is quite bold to claim his micromanaging, dictatorial education policies are already improving student achievement when the statistics show his penchant for making laws without Congress has slowed poor and minority kids’ achievement growth. The Common Core education standards and tests his administration has illegally pushed on schools still have no positive track record despite millions spent, and millions more to come.”

Joy Pullmann
Research Fellow, The Heartland Institute
Managing Editor, School Reform News
jpullmann(at)heartland(dot)org
312/377-4000

“Claiming credit for Common Core by name is problematic for President Obama because many parents and teachers (including even the largest teachers’ union in New York State) are rebelling against this nationalized, cookie-cutter model of education. However, by boasting of his administration’s Race to the Top bribes to bring states on board – plus its funding of the linked national assessments and curricular materials – Obama implicitly took full ownership of Common Core last night. To call it ObamaCore is no exaggeration. Indeed, its implementation is proving to be every bit as productive for education as ObamaCare is for health care.”

Robert G. Holland
Senior Fellow, Education
The Heartland Institute
rholland(at)heartland(dot)org
312/377-4000

“I sat down at my television set with a yellow legal pad and a mechanical pencil to take notes and jot down comments I’d like to make. My legal pad is blank. I fell asleep and might still be asleep if my daughter hadn’t nudged me awake. I’m not sure how long I was asleep, so maybe I missed something important but I doubt it. I didn’t hear anything inspiring, uplifting or amusing, aside from his quip about how mothers might appreciate a phone call from their kids to help them sign up for Obamacare.

“It seems to me if there was a theme that ran through his talk, it’s that executive orders will drop from his pen like leaves from trees on a breezy day in late fall. Congress should grow a spine and remind the president that its job is to make the laws, and the president’s job is to see that the laws are faithfully executed. That’s why Congress is called the legislative branch of government and the presidency is called the executive branch.”

Steve Stanek
Research Fellow, Budget and Tax Policy
The Heartland Institute
Managing Editor
Budget & Tax News
sstanek(at)heartland(dot)org
815/385-5602

“As a society, it is high time for us to recognize and embrace the truth. Contrary to President Obama’s misguided assertion, carbon dioxide is not a pollutant. Its increasing concentration only minimally affects earth’s climate, while it offers tremendous benefits to the biosphere. Efforts to regulate and reduce CO2 emissions are simply ludicrous. They will hurt far more than they will help.”

Craig D. Idso
Senior Fellow, Environment
The Heartland Institute
Co-editor, Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change
cidso(at)co2science(dot)org
312/377-4000

“The president said ‘climate change is a fact’ and vowed action via the Environmental Protection Agency in his State of Union Speech, but he did not ask for any new legislation such as the cap-and-trade bill he touted a year ago. As a scientist who knows without a doubt there is no significant man-made global warming, perhaps I should be pleased the president took a softer stance on the issue, But I am far from happy about the state of affairs on the issue.

“It has become purely a rock-solid, lock-step political position of the Democrat Party to believe in global warming, and of the Republican Party to disbelieve. I see no hint that the leadership in either party is truly interested in opening their minds to a scientific debate -- to study the evidence and reach a reasoned non-politically motivated position and take actions accordingly.

“Science and politics do not match well. Science is not settled by a vote, and slogans and platform planks are not scientifically significant. It is my deepest regret this has become a political issue. I think we will make little progress in obtaining an open hearing from the public as long as the political leaders line up their followers on one side or the other.”

John Coleman
Meteorologist, KUSI-TV San Diego
Policy Advisor, Environment
The Heartland Institute
coleman(at)kusi(dot)com
312/377-4000

“President Obama seems to have toned down his climate rhetoric this year given the obvious reality of no rising global temperatures for 17-plus years and the current cold snap gripping the nation. Saying the phrase ‘climate change is a fact’ is meaningless.

“When our children look us in the eye, we want to tell them that our generation rejected the belief that regulating emissions alters our climate and weather. We want to tell our kids that we rejected the belief that acts of Congress or the U.N. or the EPA could alter storms or global climate. We want to say ‘Yes we did’ to our kids when they ask us if we stopped bureaucrats at the EPA and in our government from attempting to restrict our energy choices based on the belief politicians can change the weather.”

Marc Morano
Publisher
Climate Depot
morano(at)climatedepot(dot)com
312/377-4000

“Mr. Obama is fortunate to be president during America’s energy revolution. Extraction of oil and natural gas from dense shale is occurring with no help from the administration. It is occurring on private or state-controlled lands and driven by private initiatives. According to 2012 statistics compiled by the Energy Information Administration, the production of oil, natural gas, natural gas liquids, and coal from federal lands and waters all fell. The difference between what is occurring on non-federal lands and federal lands demonstrates the economically punitive policies of this administration.

“The president correctly stated that climate change is a fact. It has been ongoing for hundreds of millions of years and there is little governments can do to stop it. The great fear of global warming was artificially contrived. For a president to declare that he will expand executive powers, without Congressional approval, to fight this non-threat is a drastic step towards authoritarian government. Already, the administration has contrived an artificial concept called the social cost of carbon. All life on the planet is carbon based. Is life a pollutant? Does life have a social cost? The concept is an insult to logic, language, and science.

“The Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) has produced reports reviewing appropriate scientific papers and concluded carbon dioxide emissions are not a major cause of global warming or climate change. Also, the reports cited thousands of studies in laboratories and in the field that demonstrate increased atmospheric carbon dioxide promotes growth of virtually all forms of green plants and is a tremendous boon to agriculture and the environment. Three decades of satellite observations confirm these findings.”

Kenneth Haapala
Executive Vice President
Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)
Ken(at)Haapala(dot)com
312-377-4000

“Last night’s State of the Union Address reminds me of the idiom ‘on one hand, on the other hand.’ On one hand, President Obama extolled efforts to increase fuel efficiency to ‘help America wean itself off foreign oil.’ He touted the new reality of ‘more oil produced at home than we buy from the rest of the world, the first time that’s happened in nearly 20 years.’ On the other hand, he promised to use his ‘authority to protect more of our pristine federal lands for future generations’ – which is code for more national monuments and endangered species designations that will lock up federal lands from productive use.

“He took credit for his ‘all of the above’ energy strategy, which he claims has ‘moved America closer to energy independence than we have been in decades.’ And, regarding natural gas, Obama said he’ll ‘cut red tape to help states get those factories built and put folks to work.’ He also proclaimed: ‘I’ll act on my own to slash bureaucracy and streamline the permitting process for key projects, so we can get more construction workers on the job as fast as possible.’ Yet, the Department of Energy has dozens of permits for liquefied natural gas (LNG) export facilities languishing on some bureaucrat’s desk. One of the few approved terminals – Cheniere Energy’s Sabine Pass LNG Terminal Project in Cameron Parish, Louisiana – created more than 2,000 jobs in 2013 and looks to create another 2,000 jobs in 2014. Let’s get those permits issued.

“On one hand, the president says he wants to help. On the other hand, everything he does hinders.”

Marita Noon
Executive Director
Citizens Alliance for Responsible Energy
marita(at)responsiblenergy(dot)org
505/239-8998

“In his State of the Union Address, President Obama asked whether we will leave our children’s children with a safer, more stable world with respect to the ‘settled’ issue of climate change. Why doesn’t Obama apply the same standard when it comes to government spending?

“Reckless overspending in Washington is creating an unsustainable mountain of debt that will be passed on to our children’s children. Yet throughout his speech, Obama outlined additional spending initiatives with no consideration of how they will be paid for. One such proposal would create a new ‘minimum wage’ for federal contractors. This gimmicky proposal will have little impact other than to force the federal government to pay more for goods and services – additional costs that will no doubt be passed on to future generations.

“If Obama is truly concerned about leaving our children’s children with a safer, more stable world, he should start by cutting government spending and reducing the tax burden on American workers so that the economy will finally begin to grow and the private sector will create jobs.”

Jonathan Steitz
Policy Advisor, Budgets and Taxes
The Heartland Institute
jonathan.steitz(at)gmail(dot)com
262/308-8885

“President Obama seems hell-bent on dismantling America and its system of government one day at a time. He continues, in my opinion, to cavalierly jettison the constitutional system of checks and balances which was the genius of the Founding Fathers. First came the unauthorized czars, and now we have the proclamation of anticipatory end runs around the legislative branch through executive fiat using the moniker of executive orders.

“These unilateral acts are those of a man who would be king, which he is not. As I recall we fired the king more than 200 years ago. Jefferson, Madison, and the legions who staked and gave their lives on creating this republic to operate as a democracy are surely turning in their graves.”

Kurtis B. Reeg
President/Managing Partner
Reeg Lawyers, LLC
Policy Advisor, Legal Affairs
The Heartland Institute
kreeg(at)reeglawyers(dot)com
314/446-3350

“Apart from throwing a few crumbs to his base, President Obama produced nothing novel or interesting in his speech. But he did sadly reaffirm his commitment to a virtually Utopian society in which government takes the initiative on nearly all fronts. And that is plainly not in the spirit of what is distinctively American or just.

“I had hoped for some learning from the president – to the effect that the private sector is where solutions lie to nearly all our real problems. Government’s only role must be, as Jefferson said, to ‘secure [our] rights’ – not to train Americans for anything other than, perhaps, defending the country from potential aggressors. It is not the job of government to ‘give us a chance,’ since our form of government doesn’t include some monarch handing out favors to subjects.”

Tibor R. Machan
Professor Emeritus of Philosophy
Auburn University
R. C. Hoiles Endowed Chair in Business Ethics and Free Enterprise
Argyros School of Business & Economics
Chapman University
tmachan(at)gmail(dot)com
312/377-4000

“From the SOTU, you’d never guess that we have a record low in number of people employed, record levels of debt, abysmal international standing in education, chaos in the Middle East, and millions losing their health insurance. But we’re going to the Olympics, finding natural gas (on private lands only), and planning (still) to close Gitmo (thereby upholding our constitutional ideals). Amanda in Arizona got health coverage, a small business opened in Detroit, and carbon emissions are way down (no attribution given to our dismal economy). All we need to do now is extend unemployment insurance, raise the minimum wage, and end gun violence. That last bit is one of a number of things Obama promises to do single handedly if Congress won’t cooperate.

“Now that ObamaCare has fixed health care, and reduced al Qaeda to a mere remnant, we can move on to fixing education.

“From the enthusiastic applause, it would appear that Congress is persuaded by this fantasy, though a few audience shots showed some dour-looking Republicans. They’re the ones getting blamed for ‘creating crises.’ Otherwise, all is well, and God bless America.

“How can anyone take this charade seriously?”

Jane M. Orient, M.D.
Executive Director
Association of American Physicians and Surgeons
janeorientmd(at)gmail(dot)com
520/323-3110

“What Obama delivered was a list of the same policies that have ill-served the nation. After five years, we know that what he cannot do is provide leadership sufficient to govern America. Foreign or domestic, his policies have been marked by failure.

“On the long roster of issues he addressed, he placed an emphasis on putting Americans to work again, but that remains a difficult goal to achieve when his administration is scaling new heights in the production of regulations that choke the nation’s business community, from large corporations to small businesses. There was no mention of the Keystone XL pipeline, which his own State Department estimated could produce 42,000 jobs.

“He advocated raising the minimum wage when all that will accomplish will be to reduce jobs and drive up costs to consumers.

“He dramatized Obamacare by using examples of people he said benefitted from it, but made no mention of the millions who have or will lose their health care plans and even their choice of a personal physician.”

Alan Caruba
Founder, The National Anxiety Center
Policy Advisor, The Heartland Institute
acaruba(at)aol(dot)com
312/377-4000

“President Obama’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night was all about ‘micro-management.’ It was micro-management at one level since he realizes that a divided Congress will not pass any ‘grand’ legislation that he might try to submit. Thus, he proposed a series of small changes that he hopes that either Congress would go along with, or that he can try to impose through ‘executive order’ without Congressional approval.

“But the other level of his focus on micro-management highlights the inescapable political paternalistic mindset in which he thinks:

He knows what wage government contractors should pay their workers;
He knows how pre-kindergarten children should be taught;
He knows how businesses should organize their use of energy in their manufacturing of products;
He knows how long people should be financially able to be unemployed between jobs while looking for employment;
He knows how divergent income inequalities should or should not be in America;
He knows how to create career opportunities for young people and the type of education they should have available;
He knows the type and quality of health insurance and medical care people should receive.
“This is why he has faced much of the congressional opposition, over which he is clearly frustrated. Many people in the United States, and their elected representatives, believe that these are not matters for the government. These are matters that should be left up to the judgment, planning, and decisions of individuals, families, and voluntary agreements among people themselves in their communities and in the workplace.

“The president’s government-imposed ‘one-size-fits-all’ solutions to what he considers to be America’s ‘problems’ are in stark contrast to the diversity of America, and the more reasonable and common-sensical view that people in their own circumstances and with their own knowledge can far better handle their own problems than someone in a far-away national capital with none of the real micro-knowledge of people’s lives. This partly explains the president’s low poll ratings. People come to resent the arrogant ‘do-gooder’ who presumes to know better how people should live than those people themselves.”

Dr. Richard Ebeling
Professor of Economics
Northwood University
ebelingr(at)northwood(dot)edu
914/ 564-7030

“President Obama mentioned his desire to see election reforms, including ‘reforms so that no one has to wait more than a half hour to vote.’ For all its conveniences, early voting threatens the basic nature of citizen choice in democratic, republican government.

“In elections, candidates make competing appeals to the people and provide them with the information necessary to be able to make a choice. Citizens also engage with one another, debating and deliberating about the best options for the country. Especially in an age of so many nonpolitical distractions, it is important to preserve the space of a general election campaign -- from the early kickoff rallies to the last debates in October -- to allow voters to think through, together, the serious issues that face the nation.

“The integrity of that space is broken when some citizens cast their ballots as early as 46 days before the election, as some states allow. A lot can happen in those 46 days. Early voters are, in essence, asked a different set of questions from later ones; they are voting with a different set of facts.”

Eugene Kontorovich
Professor of Law, Northwestern University
Policy Advisor, Legal Affairs
The Heartland Institute
e-kontorovich(at)law.northwestern(dot)edu
312/377-4000

“President Obama does not seem to grasp the fact that in a free-market economy an employee gets a raise by showing his or her employer that their value has increased through more training, skill acquisition, education, or productivity gains. Workers who are currently paid less than $10.10 are so because their contribution to total revenue is less than $10.10 per hour.”

Jack A. Chambless
Economics Professor
Valencia College
jchambless(at)valenciacollege(dot)edu
312/377-4000

“I fully support the president's proposal to increase the minimum wage. However, if this will work as the president believes to increase employment and reduce income inequality in America, would it not do the same for other countries as well? Therefore, America should eliminate foreign aid and tell our former aid recipients to simply raise their minimum wage. If it works for us, it will work for them as well.

“Our aid recipients are likely more savvy than our president and I would expect few to accept the advice.”

Barry Keating
Professor, Mendoza College of Business
University of Notre Dame
barry.p.keating.1(at)nd(dot)edu
574/631-9127

The Heartland Institute is a 30-year-old national nonprofit organization headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Its mission is to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems. For more information, visit our Web site or call 312/377-4000. Reported by PRWeb 35 minutes ago.

56 Briefs Support Hobby Lobby in Supreme Court Case

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Hobby Lobby Stores Inc. and its owners, the Green family, today hailed the filing of 56 supporting friend-of-the-court briefs in the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case of Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby –- including one from Congressional supporters of a religious liberty law central to the case.

Oklahoma City, OK (PRWEB) January 29, 2014

Hobby Lobby Stores Inc. and its owners, the Green family, today hailed the filing of 56 supporting friend-of-the-court briefs in the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case of Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby –- including one from Congressional supporters of a religious liberty law central to the case.

Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby involves the religious objections of Hobby Lobby and its owners, David and Barbara Green and their family. While the Greens’ health insurance provides 16 of the 20 contraceptive drugs and devices mandated by the Affordable Care Act, the Greens object to including four because they are potentially life-terminating, in violation of the family’s faith.

The Greens view the broad support of their position, expressed in friend-of-the-court briefs as a “strong affirmation of our right to live out our deeply held beliefs in our family business.”

“We are deeply grateful for the enormous outpouring of support,” said David Green, founder of the 28,000-employee company based in Oklahoma City. “The intellectual vigor invested in the documents and the breadth of scholars, religious leaders and elected officials who filed them is extraordinary.

“We are thankful to all of our supporters who filed 56 of the 81 briefs submitted to the court,” Green said. “And we are heartened by the unity of such a diverse group who share our belief in religious liberty.”

The supporters filing briefs with the High Court by the midnight filing deadline included:· A total of 107 federal legislators from both Houses and both sides of the aisle, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA). In particular, 15 U.S. Senators and Representatives who cosponsored or voted for the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act affirmed the legislation’s applicability to for-profit corporations such as Hobby Lobby
· 21 states, objecting to the federal government’s rationale for the case as infringing on long-established state corporation law
· A broad representation of prominent religious leaders, organizations and businesses from a range of faiths encompassing Protestant and Catholic theologians, universities, associations and ministries; Christian denominations; Christian and Jewish publishers; Orthodox Jewish groups; a Santeria church; a Hindu society; an influential Islamic scholar; and a halal food company
· More than 30 eminent legal and constitutional scholars
· Democrats for Life along with former Congressman Bart Stupak
· Medical groups; and
· Several women’s groups.

The Greens case, number 13-356, reached the nation’s highest court after federal appeals court held in favor of the Green family in June 2013. The district court issued an injunction the following month, and in November, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case after the federal government appealed. Oral arguments are set for March 25, and a decision is expected by the end of June.

Hobby Lobby and the Green Family are represented by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, and a full list of amicus filers and their briefs can be found at http://www.becketfund.org/hobbylobbyamicus/.

For more information and updates, please visit http://www.hobbylobbycase.com. Reported by PRWeb 9 minutes ago.
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