truth – R&R – Reachout and Rebuild

Attacks on Science

David Posnett — Tue, 09 Jul 2019 15:53:43 +0000

From Jenny Mulligan:

Attacks on Science

The Trump administration and 115th Congress have been actively dismantling science-based health and safety protections, sidelining scientific evidence, and undoing recent progress on scientific integrity.

We’ve seen this movie before. And we know how to fight back. We’re standing up for science. We’re inviting scientists to securely share information on scientific integrity abuses. And we’re encouraging our supporters to watchdog this administration and Congress, as we did during the George W. Bush administration and the Barack Obama administration.

Below is a running list of attacks on science—disappearing data, silenced scientists, and other assaults on scientific integrity and science-based policy. The list provides a representative sample of threats to the federal scientific enterprise.

Beyond this list, many other moves by the president and Congress degrade the environment for science and scientists in this country. For example, the president’s Muslim ban hurts science and scientists, including those working for the federal government.These actions are also important to document, and we continue do so on the UCS blog.

Share these stories on social media. Tell us about case studies you think we should add through these encrypted channels.

The White House Suppressed Science from Congressional Testimony

White House officials stopped scientific information on climate change from being submitted in a written testimony to the House Intelligence Committee.

EPA Ignores Scientists that Say Wisconsin’s Air is Dirty and Could Make People Sick

The EPA is ignoring scientists who say that data does not support its decision that several southeastern Wisconsin counties had not violated air pollution standards.

Scientists Sidelined as CPSC Politicizes Children’s Safety

The CPSC did not consider scientific evidence in a decision to not recall a jogging baby stroller shown to harm children.

Here is what you can do about it:

share this with your friends and social media contacts
Write your member of Congress to support strong congressional oversight of agencies important to your community’s health and safety.

Tell Congress to hold the Trump administration accountable. >

Individual Mandate Repeal in Latest Tax Bill Draft

David Posnett — Wed, 15 Nov 2017 16:30:36 +0000

Author Shannon Muchmore @stmuchmore

Published Nov. 15, 2017

Dive Brief:

Republican leaders said Tuesday the latest version of their bill to overhaul the tax system would repeal the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said he estimates the repeal would save $338 billion that could be used to offset tax cuts elsewhere in the legislation, Politico reported.
The Congressional Budget Office and Joint Taxation Committee earlier issued an analysis that concluded eliminating the individual mandate would result in 14 million people losing coverage by 2025 and premium increases of about 20%.

Dive Insight:

As anyone who has watched Congress debate ACA legislation this year knows, a proposed bill can change frequently during negotiations. The individual mandate repeal could still be tossed before a vote, but several Republicans are still looking for any way to deal a blow to the ACA.

The mandate is an essential part of the law, although it’s an unpopular one. Requiring most people to have insurance helps more young and healthy people to enter the risk pool. This helps payers offset the costs of covering people with pre-existing conditions. A repeal of the mandate would likely lead to more insurance companies choosing to pull out of the ACA exchanges.

Repealing the mandate would add to a string of actions weakening the law. President Donald Trump’s administration has taken a number of steps to undermine the ACA, including putting an end to cost-sharing reduction payments to insurers and paving the way for more catastrophic health plans. HHS has also drastically scaled back efforts to promote the open enrollment period.

Call Lee Zeldin to voice your opinion! (202) 225-3826

There is a Phone-in “townhall” tonight on the topic of taxes!

https://zeldin.house.gov/contact/opt-request-telephone-town-halls

A Crazy Man for President

David Posnett — Wed, 07 Jun 2017 19:54:57 +0000

OK, it took all of four months, but I think it’s been pretty well established by now: we’ve elected a crazy man for President. Not that for most of us there were any doubts on that score on November 9^th or on Inauguration Day. But for those of us who held out some slim hope that what we saw during the campaign was all an act, a reality show designed to get the widest possible viewership, a sales pitch aimed at selling the product to a mass market, and that behind the curtain there lurked a shrewd, savvy wizard who might surprise and delight us – sorry, not going to happen! Or alternatively that the Presidency itself, the solemn responsibilities of the office, might transform the campaign caterpillar into a beautiful butterfly – again, sorry, not going to happen!

If anybody still doubts that we’ve elected a crazy man for President I beg them to ponder the following three items, selected at random from countless more that could be cited:

Item: President Trump withdraws the United States from the Paris Agreement, making it 194 parties remaining in the agreement and 1 choosing to leave. No point in attempting to refute the Trumpian claim that the Paris Agreement is a “bad deal” for the United States. Anybody anywhere can renege on a painstakingly negotiated deal, claiming to really really deserve more for less. Simple. Trump’s underlying attitude here reminds me of the Mel Brooks joke about the world’s first national anthem, dating from prehistoric times: “May they all go to hell, except Cave Seven!”

Item: President Trump submits a budget cutting $1 billion from cancer research. Cancer research! I get the cuts to PBS and the National Endowment for the Arts. That’s been on the Republican hit list for decades. I even get the cuts to the National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service, which operates satellites tracking hurricanes and gathering climate data. Wouldn’t want to gather more empirical evidence of global warming; let’s poke out our eyes. But cancer research? Cancer research? Really?

Item: After a terrorist attack in London, the mayor of London tries to reassure rattled citizens that the appearance of lots of police on the streets toting automatic weapons does not mean that a new attack is underway or imminent. President Trump twists his words to make a racially-fueled, politically motivated attack on the mayor. Not that different from hurling abuse at firemen attempting to put out the flames. But this is the President of the United States hurling the abuse.

So how did we get here? How did we get a crazy man for President? I’m afraid a complete answer to this question would require far more insight, knowledge, and wisdom than I possess. Maybe in twenty or fifty or a hundred years historians will understand the forces that led us to this pass. But I think a few widespread beliefs, every one of them fallacious, can be identified as contributing to this mess.

You may get a crazy man for President if you believe that the best qualification for the office is being a rich businessman. No, not all rich businessmen are crazy. But some are. And the skill set of a businessman is no closer to what the presidency demands than the skill set of, say, a janitor (consider: a janitor keeps things clean and running, knows something about repairs, sometimes needs to manage a crisis, etc.)

Related to this: you may get a crazy man for President if you think the country should be run like a business. Which I guess means that the most successful countries are those which show a profit? Anyhow, I think we already tried this one back in the day with Bob McNamara and a “metric” for everything, including “body counts”. It ended in tears. Not enough space to deconstruct the deep confusion of values this kind of thinking represents.

You may get a crazy man for President if you believe that saying out loud whatever pops into your brain is the same thing as “honesty”.

You may get a crazy man for President if you think having a sane President is not as important as hanging on to a stolen seat in the Supreme Court. (Note to “strict constructionists”: maybe my copy of the Constitution is missing a page or something because I can’t find anything in it about the popular election of Supreme Court Justices)

You may get a crazy man for President if you think they’re all bums so what difference does it make. If this is what you believe, then given the choice between a crazy man and a sane women, you may go with the crazy man because he seems to be more fun, or simply throw up your hands altogether and let everybody else decide.

You may get a crazy man for President if you believe that the job of the President is not to do what is best for the entire country but to give those you despise a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

You may get a crazy man for President if you believe that things are so bad now they can’t get any worse. Actually, they can.

You may get a crazy man for President if you think that all reporters are biased and all news is slanted one way or the other. Shocking fact: there is such a thing as journalistic standards and there are actually reporters and news outlets that take them very seriously. And there are also those that don’t. And that matters.

You may get a crazy man for President if you notice the clear evidence of his insanity during the campaign but decide to ignore it and vote for him anyway because his party is your party, and besides it’ll probably be OK, he’ll surround himself with sane adults and somehow be kept under control.

It’s frustrating and seemingly pointless to try to reason with a crazy man. Rational argumentation seems so much wasted breath. At the risk of sounding vindictive (I wish no physical harm to the man) it seems to me the best advice is: “Don’t get mad, get even”. Which means winning elections. It’s the only way of reducing and hopefully eliminating the power of this crazy man and his enablers to do immense and lasting harm.

John Oliver Blasts ‘F–king Egomaniac’ Trump for Leaving Paris Climate Accord

David Posnett — Mon, 05 Jun 2017 19:06:15 +0000

By now we should all know, the Paris agreement was about “2 degrees Celsius”. If global warming exceeds these 2 extra degrees things become irreversible. Bad things.

Most people understand this, which is why it was possible (although not easy) to get nearly all nations to sign on to the Paris agreement (except for Nicaragua and Syria).

You can look at the list of nearly all major companies that are highly critical of the latest Trump move, you can take a look at the first ever tweet of Lloyd Blandfein (CEO of Goldman Sachs):

“Today’s decision is a setback for the environment and for the U.S.’s leadership position in the world. #ParisAgreement” (Note: Lloyd Blankfein had never used twitter before, this was his first tweet and it got over 10,000 retweets and 23,000 likes.)

or you can check the fact checkers on Trumps speech trying to justify his (or Bannon’s?) move. It is apparently full of lies and deceptions:

and the list goes on and on…

Or you can just throw up your arms in despair (as I did) and watch this by John Oliver! It is better for your mental health and you might even smile!

Finally, if you care about what Europeans think of all this, and if you like opera, check this out! (Courtesy of Margaret Backman).

Trump is Frustrated Right Now

David Posnett — Fri, 02 Jun 2017 12:16:12 +0000

By Amber Phillips May 31 in WaPo

President Trump has been in office for four months, and according to one of the best indicators of what he’s thinking — his Twitter account — he seems pretty frustrated about it.

Which makes sense. Trump has hardly any legislative victories to tweet about but lots of news about his campaign’s ties to Russia to defend.

Congress hasn’t accomplished much, and it may not: Lawmakers have only seven weeks of work left before their five-week break in August.

What Trump has tried to do alone has been stopped by the courts. Then there’s the near-ceaseless news about the investigation into Russia meddling in the election and Trump’s ties to it.

Let’s take a moment to put all of that in context by looking what, exactly, is frustrating Trump

Republicans in Congress have a long to-do list — and not a lot done

1) They want to roll back the Affordable Care Act

The hold up: Republicans are trying to do this without Democratic votes, but divisions in their own party aren’t much easier.

2) Reform the tax code for the first time in decades

The hold up: Republicans are trying to do this without Democrats, but see above.

3) Pass a budget to keep the federal government open by Oct. 1

The holdup: Republicans will probably need Democrats’ support.

4) Raise the debt ceiling, which the Treasury Department wants done by August

The holdup: Republicans probably need Democrats’ support for this, too.

What Republicans in Congress have done is limited

1) They’ve put Judge Neil M. Gorsuch on the Supreme Court (after blowing up the 60-vote filibuster for Supreme Court nominations).

2) They’ve repealed more than a dozen Affordable Care Act regulations (but the obscure law they were using to do this over Democrats’ heads has expired).

What Trump has done without Congress is also limited

1) He tried to temporarily ban travelers from several majority-Muslim countries

But that got held up: Federal courts have paused both his travel bans.

2) He tried to force sanctuary cities to hand over illegal immigrants when asked

But a federal judge said Trump’s method of doing this isn’t legal.

3) He rolled back President Barack Obama’s greenhouse gas limits

This will be caught up in courts, too.

4) He fired his FBI director because of “this Russia thing” (he has yet to name a replacement).

Speaking of Russia, a lot has happened on that front

1) The FBI confirmed to Congress that it is investigating whether the Trump campaign helped Russia meddle in the U.S. election.

2) The FBI’s investigation isn’t just looking at former Trump campaign aides; it’s looking at Trump’s son-in-law and top adviser, Jared Kushner.

3) The Justice Department appointed a special counsel to have wide latitude to investigate Russia and Trump.

4) The House and Senate intelligence committees are also conducting their own investigations of Trump and Russia.

[The three most damning paragraphs from the revelation about Trump pushing back against the FBI]

On top of all this, Trump is also one of the most unpopular presidents in modern history and inexperienced in politics. Which means that even if Republicans in Congress were free of family problems, Trump isn’t in a position of strength to negotiate with them.

Call it a slow start for a newbie president, call it a Republican Party getting used to governing. Call it a witch hunt, if you want. But it’s clear that these first four months of Trump’s presidency are not playing out how Trump envisioned.

The Pulse of the Resistance is Just Fine

David Posnett — Thu, 25 May 2017 13:27:48 +0000

Yesterday I attended an event featuring former Rep. Tim Bishop. During the Q&A session, I asked him what advice he might have for resistance groups on Long Island. He responded, “don’t let the intensity wane”.

We all know that raw emotions rapidly dissipate. When you are angry it is often a good idea to ”sleep over it” before you mouth off! So perhaps you would expect, or fear, that the outrage at our current government might dissipate too?

But here are the facts:

the numbers of new resistance groups across our county (and nationwide) continue to grow
within our own group R&R, the number of participants continues to grow. Nearly every day someone asks to join
the followers of Facebook groups, like Let’s Visit Lee Zeldin, have grown steadily
the participation of citizens at rallies and demonstrations remains strong and the number of such events is difficult to keep up with!
while most of us are fatigued by the daily bombardment with news, I don’t know of anyone who has “given up”, or signed off from email lists, etc.
the number of views of our blog continues to rise since January 1st, 2017 when it was started:

I conclude that the intensity of the resistance is not waning. On the contrary, it seems to be gaining steam.

Why? I guess the answer is obvious. The daily news is hard to ignore. We go to bed angry after watching the latest news about Trump or Zeldin. We wake up and there is even more recent awful news. Our anger is rekindled. It is impossible for the emotions to dissipate!

Yesterday in Montana, the Republican candidate (Gianforte) for Congress assaulted a journalist in front of witnesses and he was charged today with a misdemeanor. That is illegal behavior. Our President has encouraged violence against journalists and demonstrators on numerous occasions. Republicans generally acquiesce and remain silent, rather than condemning such behavior. Hooligans and hoodlums were a feature of NAZI brown shirts in the early 1930’s and this type of violence, including killings, is characteristic of regimes like those of Putin (in Russia), Dutarte (in the Philipines) and Erdogan (in Turkey), all of which are apparent role models for Mr. Trump. Trump and his enablers, including Zeldin, pose an existential threat to our democracy and our freedom. That is why the resistance will not abate.

If you need encouragement watch this great video: TED talk.

Is Zeldin Untruthful about Healthcare?

David Posnett — Sun, 21 May 2017 19:23:42 +0000

In a recent OpEd in the Riverhead Local, Lee Zeldin asserts:

“We must also improve health care on Long Island as a top priority”

And this week, Rep. Lee Zeldin released an op-ed he said is meant to address “the misinformation campaign targeting the American Health Care Act.” Here, are Zeldin’s own words followed by my comments.

“Obamacare has resulted in higher premiums, higher deductibles, lost doctors, and canceled policies, among many other challenges…” “We must also improve health care on Long Island as a top priority. Obamacare has been nothing short of a disaster for countless hardworking families and our economy. This flawed law has resulted in higher deductibles, higher premiums, canceled policies, fewer choices and lost doctors, among many other challenges.

Response: The Republicans in Congress have made it their No 1 priority to sabotage Obamacare since 2009. If you want to improve something, you don’t go about sabotaging it!

“Obamacare has resulted in higher premiums, higher deductibles, lost doctors, and canceled policies, among many other challenges…”

Response: Higher premiums and deductibles have multiple causes. They have been going up for many years and guess what, they will continue to go up, even more so under AHCA compared with ACA, and especially for the old, and the sick. Only the young and healthy may see some temporary relief. The issue about the insurances pulling out of certain markets is due to congressional resistance to support those insurances as called for originally under Obamacare via so-called “risk corridors”. It was Sen. Marco Rubio who scuttled risk corridors. The main point is that the risk-reducing features were never put to work. When Republicans state that premiums, co-pays, deductibles are rising — well here is the main reason.

Marco Rubio Quietly Undermines Affordable Care Act

Non-payment of funds promised to the insurance companies is simply more sabotage. Of course, they will leave a program that Congress is not supporting. Likewise for docs, if you don’t make it worth they’re while they won’t participate. All of these were fixable problems.

“Under the American Health Care Act, the individual and employer mandates are being removed, Obamacare’s taxes are almost entirely eliminated — over $800 billion in tax relief — and there will be more choices, competition, and affordability than under current law, while continuing to protect Americans with pre-existing conditions and allowing children to stay on their parents’ policy as they can under current law. This is one important step of a three-step process to ensure a smooth transition to a better reality for health care in our country”

Response: Basic household economics tells you that this is impossible: get rid of all moneys/taxes that are meant to fund Obamacare and simultaneously provide “more choices, competition, and affordability” – that just does not add up. So what is missing from this equation: perhaps 24 Mio people losing health care insurance? Perhaps getting all chronically ill (expensive) and older patients off of health care and just allowing them to die? Zeldin’s constituents can see right through this.

“There is so much misinformation being circulated on this bill…Here are some specific facts to set the record straight regarding untruthful claims …”

“Is it true that under the current plan Members of Congress will be exempt? No. At the same exact time the American Health Care Act was passed in the House of Representatives, the House also passed legislation. or H.R. 2192, to make it crystal clear that members of Congress would not receive any special treatment whatsoever.

Response: LZ is WRONG. Congress did exempt itself and here is why: The House passed the American Health Care Act with the exemption intact after first passing a separate bill that would repeal the exemption that would be created by the AHCA if both bills became law. That sounds crazy. Here is the reason. Republicans are attempting to pass the AHCA through a process called reconciliation. This process, created by the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, allows the Senate to pass certain bills relating to the federal budget with just a simple majority. There is no need to get 60 votes, i.e. democratic support.

“Is it true that the American Health Care Act changes the definition of pre-existing conditions? No.

Response: Prohibition on pre-existing condition exclusion periods is not changed. But short term non-renewable policies can continue to exclude pre-existing conditions.

“Is it true that under the American Health Care Act, 310,000 NY-1 residents with pre-existing conditions will lose their health insurance? Not within a million degrees of accuracy in any way, shape or form.

Response: I don’t know where this comes from!

A perhaps more accurate and alarming set of predicted numbers for NY CD-1 are as follows:

1) The uninsured rate has gone from 9.5% to 5.6% under the ACA – this could be reversed

2) 423,300 likely to lose cancer screenings and flu shots currently covered by ACA

3) 482,000 with employer-sponsored insurance, likely to lose protection against annual and lifetime limits, protection against unfair policy rescissions, and coverage of preexisting health conditions

4) 23,100 who have purchased high quality Marketplace coverage now stand to lose their coverage as ACA marketplaces are dismantled

5) 4,700 individuals in the district who received financial assistance to purchase Marketplace coverage in 2016, risk that coverage will become unaffordable when premium tax credits are eliminated

6) 1,600 individuals receiving cost-sharing reductions to help with deductibles, co-pays, and coinsurance, now at risk as cost-sharing reductions are eliminated

7) 41,800 individuals covered by Medicaid expansion now stand to lose coverage

LZ gives no references and has no data for example from OMB – rather than loose talk about “million degrees of accurate” perhaps it would be wise to get some official predictions by experts?

“Is it true that in New York insurers will be able to charge people more if they have a pre-existing condition? No. New Yorkers with pre-existing conditions cannot be denied health insurance coverage for their pre-existing condition and cannot be charged more for their pre-existing condition.

Response: Uhm? Not so fast. The blast of organized and grass-roots energy in opposition to the bill had all been generated by one measure, added to the legislation to assure its passage, that allowed states to seek federal waivers to ignore certain mandates in the Affordable Care Act — including the one blocking insurance companies from charging people more because of pre-existing conditions:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/05/us/politics/republican-health-care-bill-pre-existing-conditions.html?_r=0

“But what if New York asks for a waiver? New York is not asking for a waiver, but even if it did, New Yorkers still cannot be denied health insurance coverage for their pre-existing condition and as long as they maintain continuous coverage without a lapse for more than 63 days then they cannot be charged more either. Even if there is a lapse for more than 63 days, states remain required to protect people with pre-existing conditions to ensure they have access to affordable policies, which comes with financial help from the federal government. It is hysteria to claim that people with pre-existing conditions are not protected even if the protection is a little different than in non-waiver states.

Response: So now LZ is guaranteeing what the State will do in the future? His “friend” Gov. Cuomo, perhaps? People lose jobs, people get divorced, etc. and that means people may have a lapse of coverage and not be able to get affordable coverage within 63 days. This is not far fetched. I know someone who lost her coverage after a divorce and got cancer 3 months later and went broke paying USD 400,000 for her chemotherapy. Why play Russian Roulette with people’s lives?

“Is it true that there was no Congressional Budget Office, or CBO, score for the American Health Care Act? No. The CBO has already weighed in on almost this entire bill.

Response: Wrong again. http://www.snopes.com/cbo-ahca-score/

White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders confirmed during a press briefing on 4 May 2017 that the bill hadn’t yet been scored when the House voted on it, saying:

Look, I think even if they were to score it it’s impossible to score a lot of the things that would go into this because it has so many different factors that you simply can’t predict what governors may do in their states, specific conditions that patients may have.

So even if it was to be scored, I think it would be impossible to predict how that might actually affect and impact.

CBO did score previous iterations of the bill on 13 March and 23 March and both times determined that if passed as-is, both versions would have resulted in increased numbers of people lacking health insurance in comparison with the current legislation, the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

“Is it true that no one actually read the bill? No. Speaking for myself, I sure did. It’s only 138 pages long. Three amendments were added last week, and I read those myself before the vote.”

Response: No comment on whether he read the bill. But I don’t care whether he read it or not. I want professionals to weigh in. Professionals that study health care policies and nothing else. It is astounding that every professional organization representing patients, doctors, nurses, and hospitals have been highly critical of AHCA/Trumpcare. So who cares whether he read it or not.

truth – R&R – Reachout and Rebuild

Attacks on Science

From Jenny Mulligan:

Attacks on Science

The White House Suppressed Science from Congressional Testimony

EPA Ignores Scientists that Say Wisconsin’s Air is Dirty and Could Make People Sick

Scientists Sidelined as CPSC Politicizes Children’s Safety

Individual Mandate Repeal in Latest Tax Bill Draft

Author Shannon Muchmore @stmuchmore

Published Nov. 15, 2017

Dive Brief:

Dive Insight:

Recommended Reading:

Call Lee Zeldin to voice your opinion! (202) 225-3826

A Crazy Man for President

John Oliver Blasts ‘F–king Egomaniac’ Trump for Leaving Paris Climate Accord

Trump is Frustrated Right Now

Speaking of Russia, a lot has happened on that front

The Pulse of the Resistance is Just Fine

Is Zeldin Untruthful about Healthcare?