Everything Costs Something To Someone

Earlier this year, the National Bureau of Economic Research found that the No Slacker Left Behind provision resulted in wage reductions of about $1,200 a year for workers with employer-based insurance coverage -- whether or not they had adult children on their plans. In effect, childless working people are subsidizing workers with adult children who would rather stay on their parents than get their own.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2016/11/16/the_slacker_mandate_and_the_safety_pin_generation_132360.html

And, even the benefits are overestimated ...

The Obama White House will brag that the slacker mandate has resulted in increased coverage for an estimated 3 million people. As usual with Obamacare numbers, it's Common Core, book-cooked math. Health care analyst Avik Roy took a closer look and found that the inflated figure came from counting "(1) young adults on Medicaid and other government programs, for whom the under-26 mandate doesn't apply; and (2) people who gained coverage due to the quasi-recovery from the Great Recession."

Federalism Means ...

During Sunday night’s game against the Seattle Seahawks, the New England Patriots won Time of Possession, 30:35 to 29:35. But they lost where it counted, like Hillary Clinton.

Clinton winning the so-called popular vote, an aggregation of the votes in the 50 states and District of Columbia, is irrelevant. Our federalist system, spelled out in the U.S. Constitution, awards the presidency to whichever candidate wins a majority of the Electoral College.

With no Republican U.S. Senate candidate on the ballot in California, Clinton ran up the score, amassing enough votes in the Golden State to overtake Trump nationally.

This may soothe Clinton supporters still feeling the sting from last week’s upset, but it does not provide any reason to scrap the Electoral College. There have been some longtime critics of the Electoral College, but the newfound fervor to replace it is mostly sour grapes.
- See more at: http://www.unionleader.com/editorial/College-education-Popular-vote-doesnt-matter-11162016#sthash.v13vqvd3.dpuf

Unity? Anything but

At the time of the Constitution's ratification in the late 1700s, its proponents expected federal power to be restrained by having a wide swath of different Americans in a large republic form many factions. These diverse factions would restrain federal action by hindering consensus. In James Madison's words in Federalist #10:

"The smaller the society, the fewer probably will be the distinct parties and interests composing it; the fewer the distinct parties and interests, the more frequently will a majority be found of the same party; and the smaller the number of individuals composing a majority, and the smaller the compass within which they are placed, the more easily will they concert and execute their plans of oppression. Extend the sphere, and you take in a greater variety of parties and interests; you make it less probable that a majority of the whole will have a common motive to invade the rights of other citizens; or if such a common motive exists, it will be more difficult for all who feel it to discover their own strength, and to act in unison with each other."

Thus, according to Madison, having a lot of people with diverse interests restrains federal power and protects liberty by deterring the formation of oppressive majorities.

Since America has consistently had two major political parties instead of dozens of factions, Madison was, in a word, wrong. He overlooked the significance of voting rules.
https://fee.org/articles/the-accidental-genius-of-the-electoral-college/

TF Has No Idea

The idea that large numbers of manual factory jobs can be returned to America if we put up a wall with Mexico or renegotiate our trade deals is a fantasy. Trump ignores the fact that manufacturing is still by far the largest sector of the U.S. economy. Indeed, our factories now produce twice what they did in 1984 — but with one-third fewer workers.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/02/opinion/donald-trump-voters-just-hear-me-out.html?ref=opinion&_r=0

He says he understands about Trump, he has no idea.

Cannot Be Shamed

As the presidential campaigns sink to the challenge of demonstrating that there is no such thing as rock bottom, remember this: When the Clintons decamped from Washington in January 2001, they took some White House furnishings that were public property. They also finished accepting more than $190,000 in gifts, including two coffee tables and two chairs, a $7,375 gratuity from Denise Rich, whose fugitive former husband had been pardoned in President Clinton’s final hours. A Washington Post editorial (“Count the Spoons”) identified “the Clintons’ defining characteristic: They have no capacity for embarrassment. Words like shabby and tawdry come to mind. They don’t begin to do it justice.”

Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/441669/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-campaign-2016-sleaze-sweepstakes

CO2 War?

National polls show that climate change is low on the list of voters’ priorities. For good reason: In the U.S., and for much of the world, the most dangerous environmental pollutants have been cleaned up. U.S. emissions of particulates, metals and varied gases—all of these: ozone, lead, carbon monoxide, oxides of nitrogen and sulfur—fell almost 70% between 1970 and 2014.

Further reductions will come from improved technologies such as catalytic removal of oxides of nitrogen and more-efficient sulfur scrubbers. This is a boon to human health.

But a myth persists that is both unscientific and immoral to perpetuate: that the beneficial gas carbon dioxide ranks among hazardous pollutants. It does not.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-phony-war-against-co2-1477955418

When will they just admit - they have no way to test the degree to which CO2 adds to heat retention?

Biggest Policy Flop in a Generation

By now, everyone knows that Obamacare is the public-policy flop of this generation. With the latest news of premiums increasing 22 percent, insurance companies dropping out, rising taxes and less completion, this is truly the Hindenburg of health plans.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2016/11/01/obamacare_implosion_exposes_web_of_lies_and_deceit_132214.html

Every. Promise. Broken.