Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

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

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

People are complicated. Love is not.

This blog will pay for itself.

It was, in fact, named Jelly.

All your base are belong to Tunch.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

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

Everybody saw this coming.

I did not have this on my fuck 2021 bingo card.

Not all heroes wear capes.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

No one could have predicted…

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Let there be snark.

Open Thread: #MoscowMitch Says the Quiet Part Out Loud

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Yeah, because #MinorityLeader ‘Speed Bump’ McConnell can’t even manage a ten-minute presser without stepping on his own… tongue:

Philip Bump, at the Washington Post — “Awkward phrasing isn’t the only problem with his argument”:

Shortly after the Senate voted down a proposed change to filibuster rules — thereby dooming a Democratic push to implement federal voting standards — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and other top Republicans held a brief news conference…

A reporter raised the most extreme version of concerns about that change to McConnell, referring to the legislation that would no longer move forward.

“What’s your message for voters of color who are concerned that without the John L. Lewis Voting Rights Act they’re not going to be able to vote in the midterm?” he asked.

McConnell replied, “Well, the concern is misplaced, because if you look at the statistics, African American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans.”…

“A recent survey, 94 percent of Americans thought it was easier to vote,” he continued. “This is not a problem. Turnout is up, biggest turnout since 1900. It’s simply — they’re being sold a bill of goods.”

The point about turnout being up significantly in 2020 is true. This was the same point President Biden made during his news conference on Wednesday, that turnout had been so high even without new federal rules, which he presented as a reason for some optimism. But this ignores a crucial point: Turnout was that high because voting access was expanded in response to the coronavirus pandemic. With more states implementing the sorts of changes that the Democratic proposal would standardize — and, of course, with a hyperpolarizing incumbent on the ballot — turnout was up.

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‘Clown Car on Fire’

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The revelations in this CNN reporting aren’t totally new — we knew Republican operatives put forward fake slates of electors for Trump; they did so openly. Cooper’s description of the effort as a “clown car on fire” is apt in the context of Giuliani’s idiotic post-election loss stunts, including the “Four Seasons” fiasco, and the ridiculous antics of deranged Trump cultists like Sidney “Kraken” Powell, the Pillow Guy, etc.

As we also know, Republican establishment figures were involved in the plot, including Federalist Society members like John Eastman who’ve been embedded in Republican administrations for decades. The new reporting confirms what we’ve long suspected — top campaign officials were up to their eyebrows in the plot to overturn the election by submitting fake slates of electors, and Pence, Trump, etc., all knew it and directly reacted to it as the plot unfolded.

What’s critical now is to ensure broader public understanding that this wasn’t just a vanity project to spare a demented egomaniac blushes over his humiliating defeat. It was a bona fide attempt to overturn the people’s right to choose their president by removing the rightful victor and substituting the twice-impeached, two-time popular vote loser:

Washington (CNN)Trump campaign officials, led by Rudy Giuliani, oversaw efforts in December 2020 to put forward illegitimate electors from seven states that Trump lost, according to three sources with direct knowledge of the scheme.

The sources said members of former President Donald Trump’s campaign team were far more involved than previously known in the plan, a core tenet of the broader plot to overturn President Joe Biden’s victory when Congress counted the electoral votes on January 6.

Giuliani and his allies coordinated the nuts-and-bolts of the process on a state-by-state level, the sources told CNN. One source said there were multiple planning calls between Trump campaign officials and GOP state operatives, and that Giuliani participated in at least one call. The source also said the Trump campaign lined up supporters to fill elector slots, secured meeting rooms in statehouses for the fake electors to meet on December 14, 2020, and circulated drafts of fake certificates that were ultimately sent to the National Archives.

There were seven states that submitted fake electors. In two of those states — Pennsylvania and New Mexico — the certificates included hedging language stating that the fake electors were “electors in waiting” in case a court or process overturned the legitimate electors. But in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, Michigan and Wisconsin, the certificates falsely state that the Trump operatives were the legitimate electors.

That’s a massively consequential lie on an official document, and the people involved should be prosecuted under any applicable state and federal law for forging those documents. Maybe they will:

“Under state law, I think clearly you have forgery of a public record, which is a 14-year offense, and election law forgery, which is a five-year offense,” Michigan Attorney general Dana Nessel, a Democrat, told MSNBC last week, about the fake certificates signed by pro-Trump electors.

Meshawn Maddock, co-chair of the Michigan GOP, is one of the people who should be charged. State party leaders are already meeping about “political prosecution,” even though Maddock and her fellow forgery enthusiasts haven’t been charged yet.

It’s possible that the sheer clownishness of the plot — from the “carnival barker” former POTUS on down — makes it harder to take the attempt to subvert democracy seriously. Let’s hope that doesn’t enter into the charging decisions of state and federal officials, and let’s hope the upcoming January 6 committee hearings air every bit of dirty laundry — in context — to underscore the stakes. It was a clown car on fire, as Cooper noted, but it was also deadly serious, and the consequences must be commensurate.

Open thread.

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MLR rebates, negative premiums and option values

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Some people have been effectively paid to buy health insurance on the ACA marketplaces.

What do I mean by this?

The ACA requires individual market insurers to spend 80% of qualified premiums on qualified claims or quality improvement expenses.  If, over a 3 year period, an insurer spends less than this amount, they have to write a check to the policy holders of the last year that reduces premium so that the medical loss ratio (MLR) is updated to 80%.  The check is usually written twenty months after a policy is purchased (the 2021 checks will be written August/September 2022 for instance).  The size of the check is a function of the proportion of gross premiums a policy holder pays.  This means that people with higher value plans and who are older and from larger families get larger checks than younger families with skinnier policies.

Note the important phrase above is “GROSS PREMIUM”.

Many ACA buyers are subsidized. They pay NET PREMIUMS that are often much less than the gross premium.  Some people pay nothing in monthly premiums.  If they purchase an ACA plan that generates an MLR rebate for that policy year, they are effectively getting paid to buy insurance.

Some MLR rebates are fairly idiosyncratic.  An insurer might have a shock year like 2018 where every insurer massively overpriced due to mis-estimating how many people would be chased out of the marketplaces due to political uncertainty.  But before and after that one off shock year, normal-ish years resumed so the MLR rebate is not particularly predictable nor anticipatable when plans are purchased.  Some MLR rebates are somewhat predictable ahead of time. Insurers could have a big shock ear like 2018 and then in 2019 and 2020 have very profitable years as they still could have high premiums relative to claims and low competition.

Can we think of buying an ACA plan as buying both health insurance and also buying an option on an MLR rebate?

There is some probability that at the point of purchase that an MLR rebate will be generated for a particular plan.  The probability is seldom 100% but in many areas for certain plans the probability is well above 0%.  There is variance on the size of an MLR rebate ranging from zero to a lot.   Some people have an expected MLR rebate of effectively zero.  Some people have an expected MLR rebate that could be quite large ($1,000 +).

Does this drive decision-making?

Do people realize that when they purchase ACA health insurance plans, there is a possibility that their plan choices could lead to a potentially big MLR rebate check.  Do people who are are exposed to a higher probability of a big pay-off choose differently which plans they are buying to reflect the lagged effects of an MLR rebate on premiums.  Do they buy a plan that has a high probability of an MLR rebate that has higher initial premiums than they otherwise would have if they were not taking into account MLR rebate probabilities?

This is a messy problem.  It requires knowledge of the MLR mechanics and history.  It involves long lags.  It involves optimal rational maximization problem solving under many axis of uncertainty.  It is a nasty problem.

My hypothesis is we should not see effects due to informational and behavioral frictions.  But I’m curious about this.

 

 

 

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Friday Morning Open Thread: Happy Anniversary, President Biden

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He’s earned it — we all have.

Remember, sharing is caring!

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COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Thursday / Friday, Jan. 20-21

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On The Road – Steve from Mendocino – Mendocino Village – Fifth Set

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Looking ahead at next week.. we have a treat from BigJimSlade, who is taking us along for a week of hiking in the Italian Dolomites!

Steve from Mendocino

Mendocino Village and the surrounding towns are primarily tourist destinations. According to The Guardian, Mendocino has 1,000 full time residents and 2,000 daily visitors. The pandemic has had the predictable impact on this tourist town, but a severe drought has compounded these challenges. Signs are everywhere asking people to take extreme measures.

People have been skipping showers; restaurants have installed porta potties; many inns are on the verge of shutting down. An additional challenge has been the aging of the resident population in the coastal communities, with tradesmen retiring and not being replaced. Property values have been skyrocketing as Bay Area people move up here intending to telecommute going forward.

I need maintenance on my house, and the contractor I’ve used in the past told me that there’s not the remotest possibility of him looking at my project for a year and a half, since he’s committed to two new house contracts right now.

These pictures, though, are pre-pandemic, pre-drought, pre-Trump.  Life was nicer.

On The Road - Steve from Mendocino - Mendocino Village - Fifth Set 8

Ford House at sunrise.  The only public bathroom in town is located in this building.  Not very fancy, but there’s plumbing.

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Late Night Open Thread: Readership Capture

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I know you Left-Coasters tend to get stuck with the nasty bits, so here’s a nice memory, as a treat.

Mr. Souza has one hell of a fine eye for just the right moment…

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