Saturday morning links

Blogs are getting worked up on the Navy SEAL's article re "Don't Tread on Me" -yet it is, so far as I can tell, single sourced from The Daily Caller. The Daily Caller article referenced an Anonymous letter writer that the DC writer trusts. Not worth repeating if there is not more evidence out there that this is a real military order (and from more than one renegade commander).

#2 Ron Snyder on 2013-11-02 08:54 (Reply)

Re: Northeastern elites

Nowhere that I am aware of is the Northeastern elite's claim to culture more prevalent than in their relentless pursuit of their right to be THE JUDGE and JURY on good architecture. For a century now they have steadfastly ignored the best quality architecture, some which has come out of the Mid West, Southern and Western states. My Gosh how it grieves the elitist critics in NY City to acknowledge the "other greats"!

Because BD has always gifted us with a lovely read on Saturdays I would like to add to today's appreciation of art and culture, I offer you this link it is quite short--but, I think enjoyable. You will note these film makers did not graduate from eastern schools--but did find it necessary to go east to film their little work. Probably had more to do with the money than with culture! Enjoy:
http://www.archiculturefilm.com/index.html

#3 Faculty Wife on 2013-11-02 09:43 (Reply)

EBT cuts? Shouldn't be a problem, now that Obamacare is saving the average family $2,500 a year. That will replace a lot of food stamps.

#4 Texan99 on 2013-11-02 11:07 (Reply)

Y'know this could be cunning ploy to increase voter turn out in 2014. Then there's the still pending farm subsidy bill.

#4.1 walt moffett on 2013-11-02 11:20 (Reply)

By White House standards, Medicare is junk coverage that should be outlawed like meat infested with e. coli. Medicare is essentially catastrophic coverage strictly for expensive hospital stays. Of course many seniors also want coverage for expensive, frequent office visits and prescriptions, and there is coverage for that. Voluntary coverage. Voluntary, private coverage for which they pay their own money to insurance carriers in the private market.

We can't just let people make up their own minds about whether to carry only catastrophic coverage, right? That would be like letting them drive a Ford pinto. And we can't expect them to pay for their own coverage beyond the catastrophic level, right? And yet, as the commenter points out, what Medicare makes optional for vulnerable seniors, Obamacare mandates for young invincibles.

In other news in bizarro-policy world, maternity care is now mandatory for the middle-aged but optional for women under 30 years of age, who are the only ones now legally permitted to buy bare-bones catastrophic coverage.

#5 Texan99 on 2013-11-02 11:20 (Reply)

"healthy, white, heterosexual, Christian” men hold an unfair advantage over other races..."
This is of course the dog whistle the left uses to inflame racial tensions. Ironically the truth is the exact opposite. It is blacks, browns and females who are legally given an unfair advantage and white males who are discriminated against.
But no matter "the beatings will continue until morale improves".

#6 GoneWithTheWind on 2013-11-02 12:11 (Reply)

“Pentagon training manual: white males have unfair advantages”
I used to live in Florida near Patrick AFB. Back then they had the Defense Race Relations Institute, sarcastically refered to as watermellon U. They have changed the name but they are still peddling the same victimization crap.

#7 Ray on 2013-11-02 16:20 (Reply)

Does anyone see . . .

Dear MF folks, can anyone shed some light on this most recent event in my insurance life? In MT we have had Blue Cross/Blue Shield for a long time. Our state insurance company appears to have been an independent franchisee until this past July 31.
https://www.bcbsmt.com/Pages/aboutushist.aspx

On July 31, Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Montana sold it's "assets" to HCSC (Health Care Service Corporation) of you guessed it--Illinois! Here is the history of HCSC. On both sites you will notice that the sites already include HCSC as owner of BCBSMT.
Has anyone heard what might be going on with this 'sudden sale of assets'? This HCSC website makes it look as if they have always owned our MT corporation:

http://www.hcsc.com/overview.html

#8 apple pie on 2013-11-02 20:36 (Reply)

I have heard that some insurance companies are doing some careful rearranging of subsidiaries so that, if the expected death spiral occurs in the exchanges, only part of their business will go under. They're hoping enough off-exchange policies will be sold to offset the collapse. But even the off-exchange policies have to meet the new ACA requirements, which include abandoning all medical underwriting and insuring all comers regardless of medical condition, as well as offering a maximum deductible of $6,350 per person, and covering all kinds of free screenings and exotic needs regardless of any customer's personal needs. So even the off-exchange business model will be under severe strain as insurance companies try to find people willing to pay twice what they're used to paying for insurance.

So that's just a guess why the assets might be getting moved around now.

#8.1 Texan99 on 2013-11-02 22:57 (Reply)

Another reason might well be that the math doesn't add up and the health insurance companies see bankruptcy in their future so they are diversifying either to limit the bleeding when it happens or to get out of the health insurance business completely before Karl Marx care implodes.

#8.1.1 GoneWithTheWind on 2013-11-03 11:55 (Reply)

It's not just NorthEast types against Southern types. It's urban ignorance versus rural politness.

I grew up in a very rural midwestern town. It's pretty simple. If you're reasonably polite and don't conduct your 'personal business' or sexual preference in public we really don't care much what you do behind closed doors. We may well disapprove of what you're doing [if we have any idea of what it is you're doing], but we respect privacy, and being "a good citizen" by following local mores in public.

Urban types, OTOH, seem to revel in "trying to shock the rubes" and in loudly proclaiming their cultural superiority while pointing out what they see as flaws in those not like them.

Rural types believe in "Get along" and "getter done."

As near as I can tell, politeness to [at least some] others not like you never enters into the thinking of too many urban types. And they seem to have no real interest in "understanding" the culture and mores of those gap-toothed savages who live more than a few miles into the hinterlands. Their loss.

#9 JorgXMcKie on 2013-11-03 12:38 (Reply)

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Saturday, November 2. 2013

Saturday morning links