“The Dawning Of Reality”: Chris Christie’s 2016 Access Lane Has Been Closed
Chris Christie was never going to be the president of the United States. That issue was settled long before gridlock set in on the lanes leading to the George Washington Bridge. The New Jersey governor’s record on the critical measures for any state executive bidding for the presidency in 2016—job creation and economic growth—were dismal, and his positions on economic and social issues were far too conservative to attract swing voters in a country that had already rejected John McCain and Mitt Romney.
What remained uncertain was whether a Republican Party that has not nominated a winning candidate with a name other than “Bush” since the 1980s would gamble on Christie. And that issue is now settled, as well.
Even before The New York Times reported on Friday that former Port Authority of New York and New Jersey official David Wildstein, an old friend of the governor who gained his position with Christie’s blessing, has written a letter explaining that it was on “the Christie administration’s order” that access lanes to the bridge were closed—thus gridlocking Fort Lee, a city where the Democratic mayor had refused to endorse the Republican governor’s re-election bid—Republicans across the country were looking elsewhere.
After his re-election last fall, Christie led the Republican pack in national polls and polls from battleground states.
That’s over.
A Washington Post/ABC News survey released this week determined that Christie “appears to have suffered politically from the bridge-traffic scandal engulfing his administration.”
That’s polite newspeak for: Christie’s numbers among those most likely to support him have tanked.
In the Post poll, only 43 percent of Republicans viewed the governor favorably—not that much better than his favorable rating among Americans in general: 35 percent.
The survey found that Christie had sunk to a weak third-place position in the nomination race, with support from just 13 percent of Republican-leaning voters. The candidates who have benefitted most from the governor’s collapse—nationally known Republicans with big names and well-established histories—were soaring. Congressman Paul Ryan, the party’s 2012 vice presidential nominee, who is looking a little more like a 2016 contender these days, was at 20 percent. Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush was at 18 percent.
Worse yet for Christie, his 13 percent support level was barely better than that found for Texas Senator Ted Cruz (12 percent), Kentucky Senator Rand Paul (11 percent.) and Florida Senator Marco Rubio (10 percent).
There was a line of analysis that suggested Christie—who after a marathon press conference three weeks ago, in which he tried and failed to explain himself, has pretty much avoided the media—might ride the storm out and get back into contention.
But reality has to be dawning on even the most ardent Christie enthusiasts, now that Wildstein’s lawyer has released the letter claiming that “evidence exists as well tying Mr. Christie to having knowledge of the lane closures, during the period when the lanes were closed, contrary to what the governor stated publicly in a two-hour press conference.”
It is far too early to say where the inquiries and investigations of the bridge scandal—and all the other scandals that have arisen in its wake—will ultimately end up. It is far too early to speak in conclusive terms about what Christie knew, or when he knew it. But it should be clear by now that the sorting out of this governor’s troubles is going to take a very long time. Christie will be fighting in that time not to restore his presidential prospects but to regain the confidence of voters in his home state. Indeed, before this is done, he could well be fighting to retain the governorship through the end of his current term.
That’s not how a candidate secures the Republican nomination for president.
And that is why the time really has come to accept that Chris Christie’s brief period as a presidential prospect is absolutely finished.
By: John Nichols, The Nation, January 31, 2014
“There’s Something About Darrell”: Issa Praises Waxman For Ideas Issa Opposed
Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), one of the most effective federal legislators in a generation, announced he will retire at the end of this term. House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), a frequent sparring partner of Waxman, issued a nice statement honoring his fellow Californian’s “long and distinguished career.”
“While I didn’t always agree with Chairman Waxman on matters of both policy and oversight tactics, his tenure helming the Committee set important precedents and innovated new investigative tools such as the use of subpoenas for closed-door depositions.
“A number issues [Waxman] doggedly began to follow during his two years as Chairman such as the use of the White House Office of Political Affairs to advance partisan political agendas with taxpayer funds, the over-classification and pseudo-classification of information to hide embarrassing government blunders, and the problematic use of non-official e-mail accounts for official government business remain on the Committee’s agenda today.”
It is, to be sure, a nice gesture when a member from one party extends best wishes to a member from the other party.
But there’s something about Issa’s praise for Waxman’s investigations that seems odd.
In his press release, note that Issa expressed admiration for some specific efforts launched by Waxman during his two-year tenure as chairman of the House Oversight Committee, including the “use of the White House Office of Political Affairs to advance partisan political agendas with taxpayer funds” and “the problematic use of non-official e-mail accounts for official government business.”
Issa’s not wrong about the merit of Waxman’s efforts during the final two years of the Bush/Cheney presidency, but I was following the Oversight Committee pretty closely at the time and I recall a Republican member of the panel expressing outrage that Waxman would dare launch these investigations.
I believe the member’s name was Darrell Issa.
On the former, Bush’s Office of Political Affairs, as led by Karl Rove, engaged in alleged misconduct over and over again. Investigators later reported that Bush’s political office, in one of the era’s lesser-appreciated scandals, engaged in “a systematic misuse of federal resources.”
When Waxman began looking into this in 2007, Issa not only opposed congressional subpoenas intended to get to the bottom of the story, the Republican also rejected the very idea that there was anything untoward about a White House political office using taxpayer money for partisan purposes since Congress does the same thing. “It’s a little bit of hubris that one body can’t do something without the other body pretending that we don’t do what we do,” he said at the time.
And yet, now Issa is praising Waxman for launching the investigation Issa opposed.
As for using non-official e-mail accounts for official government business, when Waxman began looking into this in 2008, Issa could barely contain his disgust, accusing the committee of becoming a “Peeping Tom.”
“Mr. Chairman,” Issa said at the time to Waxman, “I think what you are doing is going to prove in retrospect to be shameful.”
So much for that idea.
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, January 31, 2014
“The State Of Where We’re At”: Lizz Winstead Delivers ‘State Of The Uterus’ Address
It wasn’t an official response, but it was probably the most colorful.
After President Barack Obama delivered his State of the Union address Tuesday night, comedian, author and “The Daily Show” co-creator Lizz Winstead delivered to the world the “State of the Uterus,” a progressive response complete with a uterus hand puppet.
“I thought, ‘Well, maybe the uterus needs to do a recap of the state of where we’re at,'” Winstead told Whispers. “So instead of being like vitriolic or ‘we’re so angry,’ we decided to take the satirical page of celebrating how great it is that government has gotten so involved and the great plans that they have for all the uteri in the country.”
So what did the Uterus have to say?
The Uterus thanked “Republicans and Republicans alike” for “tirelessly fighting so the uteri of America will have the same rights as the uteri of Saudi Arabia.” The Uterus name-dropped former Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, two anti-abortion conservatives who’ve voiced controversial positions on abortion and the Democratic Party, respectively. And, at the end of the video, the Uterus tipped over a Deer Park water bottle as an homage to Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.
“There’s not really a whole lot of comedy rapid response – in fact, there’s none,” Winstead said. “And so we kind of want to carve out our space there.”
The State of the Uterus was posted on the website Lady Parts Justice, which Winstead helped create. The site already got some attention because of a video comedian Sarah Silverman made for it, where she talks to Jesus Christ about birth control.
“So it went out and then all of a sudden our project exploded a month before we were actually getting our staffing in place and getting our people on board,” Winstead laughed. “It’s fine, it’s really fun actually.”
In the coming months, Winstead will have other famous faces – including “Girls'” creator Lena Dunham – participate in her progressive, pro-abortion rights videos. The spots will shine light on what lawmakers are up to on a more local level in the areas of abortion and birth control. And a big event, entitled “V to Shining V” is being planned for Sept. 27, where women will gather in every state capital to have a gay pride-like celebration for reproductive rights.
“We’re really, really, really focused on local and state legislatures, that’s really our thing,” Winstead said. “Because no one is and those are the feeder programs where we go, ‘Oh, my God, somebody needs to dam up this horrible, horrible river because it is spawning people who are absolutely not invested in compromise or the truth or science or education or anything else.'”
By: Nikki Schwab, Washington Whispers, U. S. News and World Report, January 29, 2014
“Republican Alternative To Obamacare”: Pay More, Get Less, Put The Insurance Companies Back In Charge
Boy, can Democrats have fun with the new Republican alternative to Obamacare. It puts the health insurance companies back in charge and raises costs for almost all Americans. In particular, it substantially raises costs and threatens to cut coverage for the half of all Americans who get health insurance at work. Seniors, the group that Republicans have scared witless about Obamacare, would lose the real benefits they receive under Obamacare. The proposal from three Republican senators is a golden opportunity for Democrats to contrast the specific benefits of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) with what a repeal-and-replace agenda would really mean for Americans’ lives and health.
When it comes to the politics of health care reform, my first adage is “the solution is the problem.” That is because once you get past vague generalities, like lowering costs and making coverage available, to proposing specifics, people will look to see how the proposals impact them personally. This is why health reform is such a political nightmare. Unlike most public policy issues, the impact is very understandable and real.
With the ACA as the law of the land, in analyzing the Republican proposal we must compare its impact to the law it would repeal. The pre-ACA model of health insurance is irrelevant. Here is how the Republican plan would impact people, compared with the ACA:
People who get health insurance at work – bottom line: pay more for worse coverage.
Almost half of all Americans (48 percent), or 148 million people, obtain health insurance at work. The Republican plan would tax 35 percent of the average cost of health insurance benefits at work. This is a big tax increase on working people and is extraordinarily unpopular, as the Obama campaign used to devastating impact on John McCain. And while people would pay more, they would get less coverage, as the GOP plan would allow insurance companies to once again limit the amount of benefits they will pay out in one year and return to the day when employers could offer bare-bones plans.
While taxing health benefits would apply to all employer-provided coverage, the Republicans would give the 30 percent of people who work for businesses who employ fewer than 100 workers a tax credit. That might balance out the increased taxes for some people. However, doing so would create a huge set of economic distortions, as employers might seek to keep firm size under the 100-employee threshold.
Individuals who buy coverage on their own or who are uninsured – bottom line: insurance companies could again deny coverage for pre-existing conditions and offer bare-bones coverage, while the cost of decent coverage would go up for most people.
This is the group that the ACA is most aimed at helping, including the 5 percent of Americans who buy private health insurance and the 15 percent who are uninsured, totaling 64 million people. The ACA offers income-based subsidies to these people when they earn between 100 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty level (FPL) and enrolls people under 133 percent of FPL in Medicaid, when states agree.
The Republican plan is toughest, in comparison with the ACA, on the lowest-income people and on the higher-income middle class, compared with Obamacare. But many families in between will do worse too.
The Republican plan would wipe out the expansion of Medicaid to people earning less than 133 percent of FPL, a provision the Supreme Court has made optional. It would cut back on Medicaid, ending the federal government’s offer to pay 90 percent of the cost of expanded coverage and replacing that with the federal government paying what it has paid historically, which is between half and three-quarters of the cost of Medicaid, with poorer states getting a bigger share. Crucially, the funding would only be for pregnant women, children and parents with dependent children who earn under the poverty level, as opposed to the ACA’s funding of all adults up to 133 percent of FPL. That means many fewer people covered and states getting less Medicaid money. Republican governors may not complain, but you can bet hospitals will. Adults without dependent children would not be covered by federal Medicaid, which means millions will stay uninsured or lose coverage they now have, unless states pay for coverage without federal support.
For individuals not covered by Medicaid or employees of firms with fewer than 100 workers, the Republican plan would replace the ACA’s sliding-scale subsidies, which now go to 400 percent of FPL, with a subsidy that is the same for everyone of the same age who is under 200 percent of FPL and lowersubsidies for people from 200 percent to 300 percent. In addition, the subsidies would be higher for older people than younger. The Republican plan also would take away the requirements that insurance plans offer decent benefits and free preventive care and charge women the same prices as men for coverage, along with every other consumer protection, with the exception of keeping in place no lifetime caps for covered benefits.
Comparing the value of the Republican plan subsidies vs. the ACA subsidies for the people who would still qualify depends on income, age, and family size. Generally, it appears that the Republican subsidies are much less than the ACA for people under 150 percent of the FPL ($35,000 for a family of four) and much less than the ACA for younger people, but more for older people. However, insurance rates for younger people would go down some at the expense of older people, who insurance companies could charge a lot more than under ACA. And families with incomes above $70,000 for a family of four would lose subsidies entirely.
Seniors and the disabled on Medicare – bottom line: seniors would pay more for prescription drugs and preventive care.
By repealing the ACA, the Republican plan would take away its two concrete benefits for seniors. One is that preventive care services are now free under Medicare (as they are under all insurance). The other is that the ACA is lowering drug prices for seniors by slowly closing the “donut hole,” under which seniors must pay the full cost of prescription drugs even though they are paying premiums for drug coverage. In other words, the Republican plan is simply bad news for seniors, the constituency that they have scared the most about Obamacare… groundlessly.
It is not surprising that Republicans have been reluctant to come up with a replacement for Obamacare. It’s much easier to throw darts – or bombs – at the ACA than to come up with a replacement that meets Republican ideological tenets of less regulation and less government. Any plan that meets the ideological test will be much worse for people in ways they can understand. It is our job to explain it to the public clearly: pay more, get less, put the insurance companies back in charge. This debate is not simply the political game Republicans want to make it. It is about our health and our lives.
By: Richard Kirsch, The National Memo, January 29, 2014
“Life Changing And Life Saving”: Remembering What Matters About The Affordable Care Act
On the Affordable Care Act front today, there’s very good practical news, and not-so-good political news. That gives us an excellent opportunity to remind ourselves to keep in mind what’s really important when we talk about health care.
Let’s start with the good news. First, as Marketplace reported this morning, a new report from PriceWaterhouseCoopers shows that the average health insurance premium on the exchanges is actually lower than the average premium in employer-sponsored plans. And it isn’t because the coverage is inadequate; according to a spokesperson, “even when you factor in all the out-of-pocket costs, the average top tier gold and platinum plans are similar to employer ones.” It’s hard to overstate what a success this is. If you’ve ever bought health insurance on the individual market before now, you know that if you could get covered at all, you were likely to get a plan that was expensive but had lots of gaps and lots of cost-sharing. The whole point of the exchanges was to give people buying insurance on their own the same advantage of pooling large numbers of customers that you get when you’re covered through your employer. If it’s working, then that’s something to celebrate.
Second, as Jonathan Cohn tells us, Wellpoint, one of the nation’s largest insurers, is reporting that exchange sign-ups are meeting their expectations; they have 400,000 new customers, and expect the number to rise to a million by the end of open enrollment. Even more critically, although their new customers are slightly older than the population as a whole, they expected this because people with a more pressing need for insurance would be the first to sign up, and they already incorporated that into their rates for this year. That means they’re unlikely to lose money, there is unlikely to be a huge rate spike next year, and the dreaded “death spiral” looks less and less likely.
This supports the contention I’ve had for some time, that in its first few years the Affordable Care Act is going to basically be fine—it may not create a health care paradise, but nor will it be the disaster conservatives are so fervently hoping for.
Before we get to sorting through what matters from what doesn’t, let’s look at the not-so-good political news. The Kaiser Family Foundation is out with their latest health care tracking poll, and there isn’t a lot to be glad about. More people have an unfavorable than a favorable view of the ACA. Most Americans are unaware that almost all the provisions of the law are now in force. And maybe most troubling, nearly half of Americans are still unaware of the law’s most popular provision, that insurance companies are no longer allowed to discriminate against people with pre-existing conditions:
Before you say, “Obama should have told people about it!” I must remind you that during the last four years you spent away from Earth, the administration and its allies did in fact repeat over and over and over again that the ACA prohibits insurance companies from denying you coverage if you have a pre-existing condition. There are many reasons why so many people haven’t yet understood, but you can’t say they didn’t try (you can read more about the myth of the bad sales job here).
In any case, here’s what we have to remember: On the scales of history, a person with a pre-existing condition who gets health coverage weighs much more than a person who doesn’t know that because of the ACA, people with pre-existing conditions can get health coverage. We spend so much time talking about politics that it’s easy to forget that politics are not an end in themselves, they’re a means to an end. Liberals advocated for comprehensive health insurance reform for so many decades not because it was politically advantageous (at some times it was, and at other times the voters didn’t seem to care), but because it was right. The fact that so many millions of Americans had no health security up until now was a moral obscenity. The ACA is beginning to fix things—slower and less completely than we might like, but it is a beginning. And if it never becomes the political boon you were hoping for, it was still the right thing to do.
That isn’t to say that political effects don’t matter, because they do. If the Republicans take over the Senate this fall, bad things would result, particularly if they also win the White House two years later, and if the ACA’s political troubles contributed to that turn of events, it would be unfortunate. But in the long run, what matters most is the effect on Americans’ lives. When you get distressed by a story about a Democratic member of Congress who’s in a tough race where her opponent is hitting her for supporting Obamacare, you can think of the families who never had health coverage before, but do now. For millions of people it will life-changing, and for many, literally life-saving. Try not to forget.
By: Paul Waldman, Contributing Editor, The American Prospect, January 30, 2014
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