If All You See…

…is heat created snow that probably burns like blacktop in summer, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is American Power, with a post skewering Obama over the healthcare.fail rollout.

Read: If All You See… »

Insurance Cancellation Has Always Been Baked In The Obamacare Cake

No matter how many times (NMP) Obama stated that if you liked your plan you could keep your plan, it was always a concern. Glenn Reynolds notes and reposts this CNN article (yes, CNN)

Senate Democrats voted unanimously three years ago to support the Obamacare rule that is largely responsible for some of the health insurance cancellation letters that are going out.

In September 2010, Senate Republicans brought a resolution to the floor to block implementation of the grandfather rule, warning that it would result in canceled policies and violate President Barack Obama’s promise that people could keep their insurance if they liked it.

“The District of Columbia is an island surrounded by reality. Only in the District of Columbia could you get away with telling the people if you like what you have you can keep it, and then pass regulations six months later that do just the opposite and figure that people are going to ignore it. But common sense is eventually going to prevail in this town and common sense is going to have to prevail on this piece of legislation as well,” Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley said at the time.

“The administration’s own regulations prove this is not the case. Under the grandfathering regulation, according to the White House’s own economic impact analysis, as many as 69 percent of businesses will lose their grandfathered status by 2013 and be forced to buy government-approved plans,” the Iowa Republican said.

Senator Grassley was a bit high on his figure. Still, 51% of businesses losing their coverage due to the Obama admin’s own rules is no laughing matter.

On a party line vote, Democrats killed the resolution, which could come back to haunt vulnerable Democrats up for re-election this year.

Senate Democrats like Mary Landrieu, Jeanne Shaheen, Mark Pryor, Kay Hagan and Mark Begich – all of whom voted against stopping the rule from going into effect and have since supported delaying parts of Obamacare.

People in those states, including my own home North Carolina, home to Kay Hagan, should remember those votes as they see their health plans cancelled, followed by rising premiums, deductibles, and waiting lines to see a medical professional.

Read: Insurance Cancellation Has Always Been Baked In The Obamacare Cake »

Bummer: Dull Leaves “Spectre Of Climate Change”

Obviously, we’re doomed or something

(Post Gazette) Unusually warm October weather and less September rain explain why leaves failed to produce brilliant splashes of gold, orange, red and purple, with many remaining green into the first week of November.

It also raises the spectre of climate change.

Every year has seasonal variations, but some scientists say this year may be a harbinger of a more likely occurrence in coming years — warmer temperatures pushing back the peak foliage season from the third week of October to later in the month or even early November. Such a trend also forebodes duller leaf coloration.

In Warmist world, everything is harbinger of doom, all because Someone Else drove a fossil fueled vehicle and refuses to unplug ever appliance not in use from the wall outlet. If it was rainy in September, they’d complain about that. Interestingly, the article fails to note that most of the year was very cool

Warmer fall temperatures and resulting duller leaves also signal that local tree species, including sugar maples, will begin migrating northward with other plant and animal species, in search of ideal climate. More extreme temperatures, storms and droughts are anticipated.

Doooooom!

The Appalachian State University biology department has published a position paper that duller autumn colors portend problems.

“Although less brilliant fall foliage displays may not rank high on the list of concerns about global change, those muted colors could be the canary in the mine shaft telling us that these shifts could be markers for more subtle and potentially more consequential changes in our world,” states its essay, “Will Global Climate Change Affect Fall Colors?”

“A tree stressed is a symptom that something larger is wrong with our world. Our civilizations depend on healthy, functioning ecosystems for services such as clean water, erosion control and clean air, not to mention food, fiber and shelter.”

See? Doom. Something larger is wrong with our world. Because the world has never been warmer or something. There weren’t multiple warm periods going back 7,000+ years during the stable part of the Holocene. It’s not like the majority of the country was below average or something during

Are we really doomed from, at best, a 2-4 degree F anomaly for some of the country during a short period of time? Is there anything there that denotes anthropogenic “climate change”, or is this simply the way nature and natural forces work?

A good chunk is below average, some is just a bit above average. Just another year in the wacky and typical climate of the Earth. 20 years ago people would have simply complained about dull fall foliage (it’s pretty impressive around here in Raleigh, such as it has started). Now, they whine about doom from fossil fuels and plastic bottles (please recycle them).

(Data from High Plains Regional Climate Center)

Read: Bummer: Dull Leaves “Spectre Of Climate Change” »

D.C Court Of Appeals Strikes Down Contraception Mandate

One thing to remember, the contraception mandate isn’t really a mandate in terms of being in the law: HHS made the rule that employers must provide free contraception, sterilization, and abortifacients through their health insurance plans

(The Hill) A federal appeals court on Friday struck down the birth control mandate in ObamaCare, concluding the requirement trammels religious freedom.

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals — the second most influential bench in the land behind the Supreme Court — ruled 2-1 in favor of business owners who are fighting the requirement that they provide their employees with health insurance that covers birth control.

Requiring companies to cover their employees’ contraception, the court ruled, is unduly burdensome for business owners who oppose birth control on religious grounds, even if they are not purchasing the contraception directly.

“The burden on religious exercise does not occur at the point of contraceptive purchase; instead, it occurs when a company’s owners fill the basket of goods and services that constitute a healthcare plan,” Judge Janice Rogers Brown wrote on behalf of the court.

Don’t expect this to end here, Team Obama will most likely take it to the Supreme Court

The Obama administration said that the requirement is necessary to protect women’s right to decide whether and when to have children.

2 of the 3 judges didn’t buy that argument

Brown wrote that “it is clear the government has failed to demonstrate how such a right — whether described as noninterference, privacy, or autonomy — can extend to the compelled subsidization of a woman’s procreative practices.”

Team Obama apparently feels that women are two frail, incompetent, and stupid to be able to afford to purchase condoms and birth control pills.

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

Read: D.C Court Of Appeals Strikes Down Contraception Mandate »

Obama Signing More Hotcoldwetdry Executive Orders Today

The man with the Largest Carbon Footprint In The World is intent on Doing Something about “climate change”…eh, who are we kidding, he just likes to abuse his power. From the NY Times this morning

The White House is expected to take new steps on Friday to help society adapt to global warming, an acknowledgment that worldwide efforts to control emissions will be inadequate to head off big climatic shifts.

Between himself, Clinton, and President Bush, they’ve already done a great deal, since there has been no statistically significant warming since 1997.

White House aides said President Obama would sign an executive order on Friday morning directing federal agencies to make it easier for states and communities to build resilience against storms, droughts and other weather extremes. For instance, when federal money is being spent on projects like roads, bridges, flood control and many others, the plan would encourage greater attention to the likely climate conditions of the future, which might require making the structures stronger or larger.

In other words, he’s making it easier to spend even more taxpayer funds on infrastructure programs. Most of which will probably line the pockets of his campaign contributors.

Pre-posting update: between the time I wrote the post (this morning) and actually posting it, Obama and his 41k metric ton carbon footprint (the average Americans is about 19 tons) dropped a press release about this. You’re welcome to read it, but it all comes down. To a few things

1. Spending more taxpayer money on infrastructure, especially in Dem states

2. Increasing federal, and to a lesser extent, state government control

3. Attempting to change the subject from Obamacare, Benghazi, IRS, a truly lousy economy, his falling poll numbers, NSA domestic spying, Sid I mention the perpetually crummy economy?

4. A bit of red meat for his unhinged base, most of whom do not practice what they preach.

Read: Obama Signing More Hotcoldwetdry Executive Orders Today »

James Cameron, Other Warmists, Take Lots Of Fossil Fueled Travel To Talk About “Climate Change”

More from the climahypocrite crowd

(EW) This April, James Cameron joins forces with producer Jerry Weintraub and Showtime for Years of Living Dangerously, a multi-part television event that focuses on the effects climate change has on the environment and its citizens all around the globe.

In eight episodes, the series will travel everywhere from Texas to Maine, the Middle East, the North Pole, Bangladesh, the South Pacific and more. Along for the ride are a number of celebrity correspondents, who meet with those affected by climate change and hear their stories. The list of celebrities includes Ian Somerhalder, Harrison Ford, Matt Damon, Olivia Munn, Jessica Alba, Don Cheadle, America Ferrera, and Michael C. Hall.

Obviously, the weather should never change. I wonder how much Bad Weather has been created thanks to all the fossil fueled travel by these celebuhysterics?

Read: James Cameron, Other Warmists, Take Lots Of Fossil Fueled Travel To Talk About “Climate Change” »

If All You See…

…is snow that has been created because of too much heat, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Fire Andrea Mitchell, with a post on one of Obama’s DHS advisors claiming America is an Islamic country.

Read: If All You See… »

100K Lose Insurance In New York State

Another day, more people lose their plans

(NY Post) Insurers are canceling the medical policies of about 100,000 New Yorkers enrolled in individual health plans because of ObamaCare, state health officials said.

But the figure is actually much higher because it doesn’t take into account hundreds of thousands covered under small business group policies that are being scrapped or rewritten to conform to the requirements of the Affordable Care Act.

Let’s go to the NY Times, which drops a front page story about three people who have been dropped

Still, many people were surprised by how the law could affect them. Some said they felt betrayed, given that the president pledged that people could keep their insurance plans.

And now people have to go through the complicated, confusing, and frightening (the words of NY Times writers Katie Thomas and Reed Abelson) process of dealing with the new health insurance paradigm.

Read: 100K Lose Insurance In New York State »

Would You Be Surprised That Warmists Are Making Themselves Mentally Sick?

I’d suggest that the best way for Warmists to lift their depression would be to go “carbon neutral”. Give up their fossil fueled vehicles and travel, do away with their refrigerators, their hairspray, their modern lifestyles, and live like it’s 1499

(No Tricks Zone) The strategy of scaring people into action on climate change has backfired totally, so writes Kathrin Burger of the German leftist TAZ daily in a piece titled: Horror Scenarios Promote Depression.

It turns out the alarmists, with all their climate doom and gloom, have only succeeded in spreading depression among themsleves and those around them.

It’s only normal that people who surround themselves with incurable pessimists also eventually become pessimistic themselves, and eventually get depressed or mentally ill. This is what’s happening within the climate movement in Germany, enviro-psychologists say.

It can be convincingly argued that mental illness is indeed a chronic problem among many climate alarmists and their followers. Many are paranoid that a trace gas is causing a climate catastrophe. They even blame bad weather on the Co2 trace gas, with some even going so far as to blame earthquakes and war on the man-made CO2 molecules in the air. Seemingly educated scientists are obsessed with a coming climate catastrophe to the point where they even refuse to believe any data showing to the contrary.

In other words, Warmists are bat-guano insane, and make those around them bat-guano insane, all over a trace low level greenhouse gas. They refuse to acknowledge that their cult is falling apart. From the paper, using Google translation, which is so-so

However, those who still close look at the possible consequences of climate change and peak oil, which runs the risk of becoming depressed, some are already calling it the “Doomer-depression”. This mental disorder results according to the Green Paper of individually perceived feelings of powerlessness.

The article also notes that kids are being put in this condition, thanks to loony parents, schools, and government, all of whom spread the apocalyptic version of “climate change”. 100 years in the future, of course.

Read: Would You Be Surprised That Warmists Are Making Themselves Mentally Sick? »

Team Obama Mid-range Estimate Says 51% Of Employer Health Plans Will Be Cancelled

You know how I’ve been mentioning that the individual market health insurance cancellations are just the beginning? That we’ll start seeing plans offered through companies being cancelled? Well, I’m not the only one who’s saying this (via Ace)

(Forbes) Section 1251 of the Affordable Care Act contains what’s called a “grandfather” provision that, in theory, allows people to keep their existing plans if they like them. But subsequent regulations from the Obama administration interpreted that provision so narrowly as to prevent most plans from gaining this protection.

“The Departments’ mid-range estimate is that 66 percent of small employer plans and 45 percent of large employer plans will relinquish their grandfather status by the end of 2013,” wrote the administration on page 34,552 of the Register. All in all, more than half of employer-sponsored plans will lose their “grandfather status” and get canceled. According to the Congressional Budget Office, 156 million Americans—more than half the population—was covered by employer-sponsored insurance in 2013.

Old and busted: “If you like you’re plan, you can keep your plan. Period.” New hotness: “It may be good enough for you, but it’s not good enough for Obama”. The article is mostly in context of Typical Baghdad Bob spin from Jay Carney, who lies as well as his boss. But, wait, it gets better!

Another 25 million people, according to the CBO, have “nongroup and other” forms of insurance; that is to say, they participate in the market for individually-purchased insurance. In this market, the administration projected that “40 to 67 percent” of individually-purchased plans would lose their Obamacare-sanctioned “grandfather status” and become illegal, solely due to the fact that there is a high turnover of participants and insurance arrangements in this market.

How many people are exposed to these problems? 60 percent of Americans have private-sector health insurance—precisely the number that Jay Carney dismissed. As to the number of people facing cancellations, 51 percent of the employer-based market plus 53.5 percent of the non-group market (the middle of the administration’s range) amounts to 93 million Americans.

So, there you go: the mid-range estimate from team Obama is that 93 million Americans will lose their plans. Will the new plans be better? That depends upon your definition of “better”. If you think paying higher premiums and deductibles for a small network while getting free condoms and free checkups is “better”, you must be a low information voter with an Obama sticker on car.

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

Read: Team Obama Mid-range Estimate Says 51% Of Employer Health Plans Will Be Cancelled »

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