The DON / redux

There have been American soldiers already convicted of theft. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_...lions_in_iraq_and_afghanistan_center_for.html

Thanks for the link Kevin. Was not aware of this.

Having said that, I don't think this is going to be a plus for DT in the public's eye especially after he slammed McCain for being a POW.

RCHeliGuy said:

Obamacare is a tough call. I know people who it helped and those it didn't.

More people are now insured.
People with pre-existing conditions can now get insured reasonably.
People who are lower income get subsidies making it more affordable.
Some people had their rates drop substantially.

Others lost their plans or had their insurer pull out.
Some have had their rates go up substantially.

I have a friend who is self employed and whose wife is chronically ill. He makes a very good income and his rates dropped because he was previously paying extortion rates because of his wife's condition.
I know other people who have said their rates dropped.
I've also heard a few accounts of rates going up very substantially.

My Mom was one of the people this would have helped. She had breast cancer when she was in her early 40's. A small lump was removed. She had treatment and until she died 30+ years later she never had cancer again.
She was told after she was clear 8 years her rates would drop, then it was 12, 15 and basically ended up as never. So my parents could only afford for a bare minimum catastrophic plan for her until she went on Medicare.

Obamacare is not remotely perfect and has lots of room for improvement, but instead Congress made over 60 attempts to repeal it rather then beating it into shape. What a waste of time and tax payer money!

The pragmatic approach that would be best for the country is to improve it, but because of partisan politics Congress made ZERO progress in this regard and the country has suffered for that.

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Agreed, it is not perfect. Obama had to make many compromises in order to get it through the house. You are absolutely right that the congress should work together to make it better, but good luck getting the republicans to the table. Also, I would point out that in most cases where rates went up and people are dissatisfied are in those states where the republican leadership chose not to go along.

slowGEEZR said:

Also, I would point out that in most cases where rates went up and people are dissatisfied are in those states where the republican leadership chose not to go along.

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Where do you get that information? A recent report by Kaiser shows that of the states that have so far submitted plans for their 2017 insurance rates, OR, NY, DC, MD, and CT have the highest rate increases, they all have state exchanges. But what would health insurance rates have to do with state vs federal marketplaces, or democrat vs republican leadership? Insurance rates are based upon loss ratios a company experiences with their own client base of insureds. The main driving factors for those rates would be the health of the population (in which age plays a big role) and the cost of living for a particular state. Of course, a company will break down their own population of clients and charge different rates by age, smoker vs nonsmoker and such. If Florida ends up with the highest average insurance rate of any state in the US, it would have more to do with the average age of their citizens, not whether the republican leadership chose "not to go along". http://khn.org/news/study-projects-sharper-increases-in-obamacare-premiums-for-2017/

This article does a good job of describing the uphill battle republicans face with Trump as their standard bearer: http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/283688-trumps-campaign-hits-a-wall

Kevin said:

The main driving factors for those rates would be the health of the population (in which age plays a big role) and the cost of living for a particular state.

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Disagree Kevin. Given Wyoming's low population (approx. 600,000) the rates to get insurance thru the ACA are substantially higher than in neighboring states such as Colorado, Utah, and Montana, which have a much larger population.

Also, there is only one insurance company in our state writing policies, which is BCBS. As a result, there is no competition and we all know what that means.

And our politicos in Wyoming have chosen not "to go along".

Gordon

I guess I should have added the qualifier, "all else being equal". Yes, your state is an outlier for several reasons. You are one of just a couple of states with one insurance company participating in the federal exchange, and your state is also one of the least densely populated states. Your sparse, rural population means that even that one company doesn't have much power to bargain for better rates with your health care providers, because in many areas, you don't have many health care providers. That is basically what I meant by the cost of living part of the equation, how much it costs to go see a doctor for service compared to the same service performed in another state.

But those are the reasons why your state is high and always has been high, not the reason why rates in most states are going up so much this year. The reason for the larger increase in premiums this year, for the most part, has to do with the health of individuals in the insurance companies risk pool. When Obamacare was originally implemented, the companies could only guess at what their risk pool would look like. They overestimated the number of young and healthy that would join, and underestimated the number of sick and older insureds they would have join. Now that they see the results of that in their loss ratios, they are adjusting the rates accordingly.

PS: I remembered making a statement on this site prior to the implementation of Obamacare. I did so on 11/12/2010, under the thread "The People", where I stated: "Just using commonsense, how do you reduce premiums by adding to the rolls of the insured whose premiums are paid by taxpayers, cover people with prexisting conditions (would be nice if people along the coast could purchase home insurance right before a hurricane), and not having the ability to cap payouts or produce nonrenewals, and not to mention the added government jobs for overseeing all the new regulations? Looking at every other government program ever started and realizing that costs went way above the original predictions doesn't say much either. One can debate whether the increases are worth it, but I would bet that premiums will rise above normal before all is said and done." Around the same time Obama was stating the law would reduce the insurance premiums for the typical American family by $2500 before the end of his first term. I am not nearly as educated as Obama. So how did my commonsense lead me to right conclusion while all of his "education" led him to be terribly wrong?

The verbal diarrhea coming out of Trump's mouth these days is just amazing.

He recently said in NH, may need to Annex Mexico to secure America's safety from Mexican terror attacks using planes. Cheaper than a wall, and deportation camps can then be built there where Americans won't have to see them. Need somewhere to house the over 3 million US citizens who are Muslim as well, again for National Security, and Mexico is big enough to accommodate both.

RCHeliGuy said:

The verbal diarrhea coming out of Trump's mouth these days is just amazing.

He recently said in NH, may need to Annex Mexico to secure America's safety from Mexican terror attacks using planes. Cheaper than a wall, and deportation camps can then be built there where Americans won't have to see them. Need somewhere to house the over 3 million US citizens who are Muslim as well, again for National Security, and Mexico is big enough to accommodate both.

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What an idiot he is. Frankly, he has been spewing his verbal diarrhea from the beginning of his campaign.

RCHeliGuy said:

He recently said in NH, may need to Annex Mexico to secure America's safety from Mexican terror attacks using planes.

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Wow. Missed that one. How incredulous. Maybe he was dropped on his head (numerous times apparently) when he was a baby.

So the delegates that are "supposed" to be representing the wishes of the people are trying to be set free of that so they can present any candidate that they want.

Let anyone who believes the falsehood that we actually live in a Democracy think about that for a moment.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...-in-effort-to-sidetrack-trump-nomination.html

How does any American draw a straight line from this act to a US presidential candidate asking a foreign nation to hack a former Secretary of State's email server to uncover these lost emails?

This is now the new normal? This is how we define patriotism now? Let's ask Russia to penetrate our digital walls as long as its to Trump's advantage? How do you spin this? What mental gymnastics are Trumpers performing to nod "yes" to this insanity?

I'm completely at a loss.

What if he asked the Chinese to do this? Would that somehow be different?

What is your point mark? I am missing it. The so called trump somehow was involved in any email scandal and implored the soviets to do it is ludicrous. And that thought was brought about by the Democrats. So are u implying the democrats are idiots for suggesting this notion? What have I missed.

Timm, perhaps you will understand Mark's point better when it is explained by a former head of the CIA: http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/27/world/leon-panetta-amanpour-trump-russia-hillary-clinton/index.html

Crimea: Donald Trump Says He Would Consider Recognizing Disputed Land as Russian Territory
The peninsula was a part of Ukraine until 2014, when Russia annexed it.
The U.S. and the European Union have not recognized the annexation and have levied sanctions on Russian businesses.

Sorry but Trump seems just a bit too chummy with Russia these days.

RCHeliGuy said:

How does any American draw a straight line from this act to a US presidential candidate asking a foreign nation to hack

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As an outsider, I am aghast. A presidential candidate asks (challenges!) Russia to hack your government's computers. Wow. Just wow.

Sadly it appears like the US has received a frontal lobotomy lately, with a bunch of people engaged in a school yard battle of, "I know you are but what am I?"

What is EXTREMELY unfortunate is that people tend to be surrounded by others who they agree with such that they believe that most people are on their side. I recently heard a Trump support say that it was obvious that most of the country was voting for Trump and that if Hillary won, it would mean the election was rigged.

What scares me about that statement is that if it were to get traction, it would guarantee rioting.

Panetta, a Democrat who was President Clinton's chief of staff before serving in President Obama's cabinet, was aghast.

Wow. What a surprise. Trump makes a comment on essentially our governments inability to find 30000 emails on hillarys server - yet somehow Russia supposedly hacked into the DNC servers. So I get the tongue in cheek response. And you guys don't find it absurd that the Clinton campaign tried to throw some responsibility on the DNC hack on trump? Yah. The word of the day. I'm aghast.

Panetta, a Democrat who was President Clinton's chief of staff before serving in President Obama's cabinet, was aghast.

Wow. What a surprise. Trump makes a comment on essentially our governments inability to find 30000 emails on hillarys server - yet somehow Russia supposedly hacked into the DNC servers. So I get the tongue in cheek response. And you guys don't find it absurd that the Clinton campaign tried to throw some responsibility on the DNC hack on trump? Yah. The word of the day. I'm aghast.

To the Don supporters I'm curious to know what makes you trust him? Is it because he give you simple solution to difficult problems? Is it because he makes grand promises? My personal dislike of Trump started way back in 90's before he was a reality star and when he was a democrat. When i first read about the Vera Cooking story I was pretty ****ed. A millionaire tycoon bullying an old widow to sell her house that her and her husband spent their entire life in so he could build a casino. When he couldn't bully her he tried to use eminent domain to force her out. I believe that you should judge people by what they do, not by what they say. Trump has proven time and time again that he's a meglomaniac who has no empathy for anyone.