Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Lighten up, Francis.

Screw the Judean People’s Front. Splitters.

Dinky Hocker Shoots Smack!

I thought we were promised Infrastructure Week

Almost as fun as hiking the Appalachian Trail.

Our job is not to persuade Republicans but to defeat them.

Consistently wrong since 2002

Where tasty lettuce and good mustard aren’t elitist.

Not all heroes wear capes.

What fresh hell is this?

All your base are belong to Tunch.

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

‘Forty-two’ said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.

Word salad with all caps

Also, too.

Saul Alinsky is my co-pilot

No one could have predicted…

The revolution will be supervised.

A snarling mass of vitriolic vicious jackals

Just a few bad apples.

Women: They Get Shit Done

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity.

I personally stopped the public option…

We Survived Breitbartpocalypse!

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Zombie-Eyed Granny Starver

Open Thread: The NYTimes Longs for A Simpler Day…

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When the Very Serious Media People could pretend that the Tea Party was a ‘grassroots uprising’ of good folks very concerned about ‘fiscal responsibility’. Positive side, such as it is: Pushback was swift, vociferous, and (to a degree) effective:

… When Congress approved $320 billion in new spending this month as part of its latest budget deal, most Republicans in the Senate voted yes, prompting a lament from Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who was first elected in 2010 as a slash-and-burn fiscal conservative.

“The Tea Party is no more,” he said.

But Mr. Paul and others who have signed the Tea Party’s death certificate overlook one way it continues to define the country today. It ignited a revival of the politics of outrage and mistrust in government, breathing new life into the populist passions that continue to threaten the stability of both political parties. Even if the Tea Party’s ideas are dead, its attitude lives on.

“The energy that was with the Tea Party then was not even so much about fiscal discipline, but about holding Washington accountable for the promises it makes,” said Rory Cooper, a former aide to the Republican House leadership. As voters watched one promise after another go unfulfilled, he said, the anger eventually erupted in 2016 with Mr. Trump’s election. Voters said, in essence, “‘We don’t trust any of you, but we will trust this guy who makes every promise under the sun,’” Mr. Cooper said.

“Then what happened,” he added, “was they stopped caring about the promises.” …

IMO, the real reason for Jeremy Peters’ purported nostalgia was to set up a beat-sweetner for Mick ‘Acting Head of Everything’ Mulvaney:

… Of the 87 new Republicans elected to the House in 2010 — the most sweeping repudiation of a president and his political party in generations — one who has risen higher than most is Mick Mulvaney, Mr. Trump’s chief of staff.

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Why’s Everything That’s Supposed to Be Bad Make Me Feel So Good

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What’s your addiction? Is it money? Is it girls? Is it weed?
I’ve been afflicted by not one, not two, but all three.

Ahh, McSuderman:

No Republican was more vociferously opposed to the build up of public debt than Rep. Paul Ryan, the GOP speaker of the House who announced this morning that he would not run for reelection. For years, Ryan has served as the frontman for the GOP’s fiscal crusades, a role that helped elevate him into the upper echelons of party leadership.

Ryan repeatedly lambasted the fiscal policies of President Obama and the Democratic party. He charged that Obama “dodged the tough choices necessary to confront the threat of runaway federal spending,” and criticized the president for ignoring the recommendations of the bipartisan fiscal commission that he helped create. Under Obama, Ryan said in a 2011 op-ed, “Democrats have simply done away with serious budgeting altogether.” Ryan was serious about the deficit. Obama and the Democrats were not.

Repeat after me. Paul Ryan was never fucking serious about the budget. Let me clarify- he was never serious about deficit and debt. He may have talked all the time about them, but that’s the “confidence” in con artist part (I haven’t seen it in years, but House of Games is my favorite con artist film, from before when Mamet lost his shit. I wonder how it has aged.) They talk and talk and talk, and while they are talking, they are reaching into your back pocket.

Paul Ryan was serious about the budget in one sense- in shifting who benefited. He didn’t care about the overall size, he just wanted to take from the untermensch and give to the noble Randian superclass. That’s why he didn’t so much as flinch pushing the Trump tax giveaway, but had to be pulled over broken glass to reauthorize CHIP (even though it saved money in the long term) because it meant his precious going to the poors.

Democrats, to be sure, have not exactly been icons of limited government. But under Clinton, the deficit turned into a technical surplus. During his first term, discretionary spending actually dropped; it wasn’t until the second term, with Republicans in control of Congress, that it began to increase again.

Stop right fucking there:

Fucking google something, McSuderman.

Deficits ballooned during President Obama’s first term, and from day one of his presidency, Republicans were swift to blame Democrats for a lack of fiscal discipline. But the rapid increase actually started under Bush. Depending on how you run the numbers, it is possible to make the argument that most of the Obama-era deficits were caused by Bush-era policies.

NOT ONLY IS IT POSSIBLE, BUT IT IS THE ONLY WAY TO RUN THE NUMBERS. You might have heard of the crash of 2007 in between attending Arcade Fire fanfests.

Obama’s second term was marked by still large but shrinking deficits that Republicans, since taking over, have grown again.Who ran congress during that period and what signature legislation was passed (and paid for) that helped lead to those shring When Paul Ryan noted that Obama ignored the recommendations of the bipartisan committee on fiscal responsibility, he was right. But what Ryan didn’t say was that Ryan himself was on that committee—and he voted against its recommendations.

HE DOESN’T CARE ABOUT THE DEBT OR DEFICITS. HE CARES ABOUT WHO GETS THE MONEY YOU ASSHOLE.

I do not mean to suggest that Democrats are actually the party of good budgetary sense.

Fuck off.

In the long term, the largest drivers of the debt are Medicare and Social Security, and Democrats have, for the most part, been resistant to structural reforms.

No. Medicare and Social Security are fine and will be fine if YOU AND REPUBLICANS stop looting America, starting trillion dollar wars of choice, and spending 800 billion a fucking year on a bloated defense budget. And the only reason they want to “fix” both of them is because they want to privatize them, looting both for the benefit of their financial betters, which will no doubt make both of them worse and far more costly. But again, the actual cost is not what matters to Ryan. What matters is who gets the loot in this bust out.

Is there anything more addictive than the narrative that Democrats are bad for the economy and bad on fiscal matters?

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Nobody Likes Paul

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Paul Ryan’s fan club is limited to a couple hundred DC reporters. Outside the beltway, he’s political poison, so Conor Lamb ran against him, hard. This ad is great:

Kos has a new polling effort. Here’s their tracking poll on Ryan’s popularity, and it’s brutal:

Despite Ryan’s efforts to show a sad face every time Republicans fuck the poor and middle class, people get that he’s a little shit that will steal their Social Security and Medicare. And please don’t tell me that Lamb didn’t run as a Democrat. Social Security and Medicare are the core of being a Democrat.

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Well, I’m On My Way I Don’t Know Where I’m Going

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Let me say up front that I like Junius Rodriguez. He is the only viable Democrat running against unrepentant ZEGS fellator Darin LaHood, our current rep. And Junius works hard. Since last summer, he’s been going to every rubber-chicken dinner that can draw five cranky county Democrats between here and the Mississippi. He just posted that he’ll be attending fifty events in the next thirty days. He’s run before, knows how to do it, and has a relationship with all the local Dems. Since he’s a history prof at Reagan’s alma mater, Eureka College, it would be sweet if he could oust our local political princeling. (Darin is the son of beloved bipartisanship bemoaner, former representative, and Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood).

But when I read stuff like this:

and this…

… my enthusiasm deflates.

IL-18 is very red. It is a weird-looking district that includes about half of my town and some, but not all, of Peoria and Springfield. Republican candidates carried the district by around fifty points in the last three elections. I’m no gerrymanderologist, but it’s always seemed to me that the district was designed to keep it Republican, in spite of the fact that Democrats drew it up in 2010.

I’m not saying that Junius should go all Dennis Kucinich. That would be absurd and, I’m pretty sure, not his style anyway. Still, I feel like he is trying to peel off a few Republican votes with the kind of posturing above. Rather than make Sensible Centrist his brand, I would prefer he run as an out-and-proud Democrat. Tell us why Democrats are great, Junius! Not how you can feel like a conservative, but not vote for the Republican. All that being said, I will give him as much money and time as my resources allow.

In the marketplace of elections, however, there are more inspiring candidates running for local and–should Daniel Biss beat billionaire chickenheart J.B. Pritzker in the upcoming gubernatorial primary–even statewide office. And I think it’s natural for people, even if they are pragmatically inclined, to give just a little bit more to campaigns that dare to articulate something more ambitious.

But hey! At least we’re fielding someone here. We need to field someone everywhere.  So let’s heap more onto the fund that’s split between all eventual Democratic nominees in House districts currently held by Republicans.

Goal Thermometer

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Late Night Horrorshow Open Thread: Lyin’ Paul Ryan, Continuing to Debase Himself

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(Jeff Danziger‘s website)
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An important thing this evening

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Get mad, stay mad and then be effective in doing something. Balloon Juice is adopting at least one district and perhaps more. We will be effectively active and angry.

UPDATE I will set up a CA-49 Nominee fund tonight for Act Blue

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Late Night Open Thread: Pauli Boy (Weak & Nasty, But So Cleverly Marketed)

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What I wanna know — when did “wonk” become a synonym for “soulless ideologue”? Or is that just one of those IOKIYAR exemptions?
.

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Whats going to happen today?

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The short answer is mass chaos.

The longer answer is we will seeing some non-controversial bills come up under suspension rules this morning.  Around 10:00 AM, the Rules Committee will vote on the most recent set of changes that were placed in the bill overnight.     Those changes (stripping or punting EHB mainly) are probably going to cost a quarter of a trillion dollars and could lead to millions more not getting coverage but they are not waiting for a CBO score.  Once a special accelerated rule is voted on, the actual voting starts.

My opinion is that we are in good shape if there is an immediate blocking coalition of 23 Republican No votes in the first six or seven minutes.  At that point, the internal logic of the Republican caucus makes voting Yes and seeing the bill Fail become a no reward position so we could see a cascade towards No.  If we don’t see that, I would not be optimistic.

My gut feeling is that AHCA either passes by less than three votes or fails by more than fifteen. I can’t see the incentive structure for a narrow failure as the House leadership will hold the vote open for hours to arm twist a couple of hold-outs.

So call the House one last time.

Update 1:

 

He is from New Jersey, part of leadership and as of this morning he was in the New York Times Undecided/Unclear column. So him moving to a clear No is intriguing.

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Bronze is a great age

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I want to look at one element of the CBO score. It is the offered actuarial value of plans. Under the House Bill, out of pocket maximums would be fixed but there would be no age banding. The CBO sees this having an interestingly low effect.

Beginning in 2020, the legislation would repeal those requirements, potentially allowing plans to have an actuarial value below 60 percent. However, plans would still be required to cover 10 categories of health benefits that are defined as “essential” under current law, and the total annual out-of-pocket costs for an enrollee would remain capped. In CBO and JCT’s estimation, complying with those two requirements would significantly limit the ability of insurers to design plans with an actuarial value much below 60 percent.

Mechanically, under the House bill without a follow-on phase 2 or phase 3 bill, insurers can probably design plans that have at least 55% actuarial value (AV) coverage as the minimum level of coverage. Bronze right now is 60% +/-2 points of AV.

It will be very hard for people to buy a non-Bronze plan because insurers won’t offer them except at exorbirant prices. Let’s work through my logic.

Insurers are currently required to offer at least one Silver and one Gold plan if they want to sell on Exchange. Those plans are age rated at 3:1 with subsidies absorbing almost all of the local price increase risk for the Silver plan. Under the AHCA, those requirements are not in place and the subsidy is not tied to local pricing. Young buyers who are healthy will either opt out or buy the lowest actuarial value coverage possible because it will cost them very little.

Insurers then have to look at the people who actually need coverage and cost money to cover. They’ll offer a Bronze plan to get the young people in. But if they see a 58 year old asking for a Silver or Gold plan, they know that this person is going to be hyper expensive to cover as they have just self-identified as being high risk and high expense. Insurers won’t offer actuarial value levels above the minimum requirements because they will lose money on those policies.

So we will quickly see a proliferation of $6,000 to $9,000 deductible plans and very little else. That means the 64 year old who is seeing a $10,000 a year premium increase will also see their deductibles increase by $4,000 to $7,000 a year.

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Friday Evening Open Thread: Ryancare — It’s Terrible for Everybody

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Even — it is devoutly to be hoped — the Zombie-Eyed Granny Starver’s reputation?

That would be a lovely coda to trashing the GOP’s whole misbegotten “AHCA” (Always Helping Cronies Accumulate) no-health, no-hope plan.

What else is on the agenda as we start the weekend?

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It Begins, Again: Paul Ryan Drops His ‘Replacement ACA’ in the Punchbowl

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No matter how cynical you try to be…

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Evidence based care in Medicaid

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We want to do evidence based care.  We want to do things that work and avoid things that don’t work.  This sounds simple.  Let’s look at two very good natural experiments on unintended pregnancy rates:

Colorado:

    Since 2008, Colorado has successfully increased access to family planning services throughout the state, particularly for the most effective contraceptive methods, such as intrauterine devices (IUDs) and implants.

  • The Colorado Family Planning Initiative has increased health care provider education and training and reduced costs for more expensive contraceptive options, enabling more than 30,000 women in the state to choose long-acting reversible contraception….
  • When contraception, particularly the long-acting methods, became more readily available in Colorado between 2009 and 2013, the abortion rate fell 42 percent among all women ages 15 to 19 and 18 percent among women ages 20 to 24.
  • Colorado is a national leader in the use of long-acting reversible contraception, and reducing teen pregnancy and repeat pregnancies.

    • Teen birth rates in our state have declined more rapidly than in any other state or the nation as a whole.
  • The birth rate for Medicaid-eligible women ages 15 to 24 dropped sharply from 2010 to 2012, resulting in an estimated $49 million to $111 million avoided expenses in Medicaid birth-related costs alone.

More reliable and effective contraception was made available to Colorado women who had the choice to elect Long Acting Reverisble Contraception (LARC) or do something else.  A significant number of women elected to use LARC and the increased autonomy and reliability produced amazingly good results.

Texas

 

Reducing contraceptive availability led to higher abortion rates and higher unplanned pregnancies. Earlier live births have massively negative multi-generational repercussions for both the parents and kids.

The evidence strong suggests that significant improvements in quality of life can be made and significant expenditures reduced if contraception is made readily available.

And guess what Congress will consider to be a high priority:

House Speaker Paul Ryan announced Thursday that Republicans will move to strip all federal funding for Planned Parenthood as part of the process they are using early this year to dismantle Obamacare.

Wahoo… the evidence will strongly support the hypothesis that this policy will lead to more unintended pregnancies, more abortions and far worse outcomes for far more Americans.

Evidence based policy making — Hoo Yaa

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Open Thread: Could Not Happen to A More Deserving Zombie-Eyed Granny Starver

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ETA:

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All You Need To Know About Paul Ryan

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This:

…the speaker is torn between his personal feelings about the tape showing Donald Trump discussing grabbing women by the genitals and his desire to preserve the historic GOP majority in the House of Representatives.

My reaction:

A) Profile in Courage.

edouard_manet_-_the_rabbit_1866

B) Put his picture in the dictionary next to “Party Before Country”

I have many dreams about this election. One that is very unlikely — but less so than a week ago — is that the GOP loses the House, and Ryan loses his seat.

A boy can dream, can’t he?

Image:Éduoard Manet, The Rabbit,  1866.

ETA:  I’ll confess. This post was motivated in part by a desire to use that picture in association with today’s GOP.

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