The Smartphone Menace



[...]
One of the educators at the table added that the problem is not limited to the content accessed through the phones, but to the way using these devices is radically distorting the way kids communicate with each other, or fail to. Even if the kids only accessed benign content, and did not use social media to attack each other, they nevertheless spend enormous amounts of time on their smartphones, ignoring everyone around them. Some of them have trouble sustaining an actual conversation for more than a few minutes. All of them are losing the habits of common courtesy that has since forever been how human beings in social situations treat each other.

Listening to this, I thought about the time we had a dinner party at which the youngest guest at the table, a woman of about 24, pulled out her smartphone and began checking her mail. I thought perhaps she was expecting an urgent message; why else would someone drop out of the conversation and turn to her iPhone at the dinner table. But no, that’s exactly what she was doing. She sat in her seat ignoring everyone else at the table for a good 10 minutes, until, it seemed, the conversation topic turned to something that interested her. It was appallingly rude. But that’s how kids are today.



http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/the-smartphone-menace/

If you are a new religion in a town ; in order to have more followers , you hire infidel killers, houses and after that you say "if you have eternal life protection from my religion, ill protect you, and all of your property" and make more followers. In this case it is clearly seen that you arent an infidel killer but in fact you are the savior.

 

Yep.

 

At ‘students of color’-only Mizzou activism meeting, white journalists kicked out








A “Concerned Town Hall” meeting advertised to “black students and students of color” at the University of Missouri on Wednesday turned out to be less-than-inclusive to white reporters attempting to cover the event.

The gathering was organized by Concerned Student 1950, which led protests on campus last fall accusing the institution of racism; it describes itself as seeking the “liberation of all BLACK collegiate students” on Twitter.

As the meeting began Wednesday night inside the A. P. Green Chapel at the public university, a student organizer announced: “If there are any reporters in here, can you please exit? That was my nice warning.”

That according to a video of the event taken by Mark Schierbecker, a student at the school and freelance videographer who contributes to The College Fix.

His video shows a white male reporter from the mainstream city newspaper, The Columbia Tribune, introduced himself and say “we will definitely respect your privacy. Just curious, um – why are you guys afr — why are you guys asking us to leave? …”

“Um, just because I asked you to,” came the reply. “We just want to discuss some things.”

“Sure, OK, that’s totally fine,” the reporter replied, handing over his business card before he exited the chapel. Two white females also left the room.

Schierbecker, however, politely declined to leave, repeating “my personal preference is to stay.”

“This is considered a limited public forum,” Schierbecker told his peers. “It’s open to the public, and especially to students of the university. I am here on assignment for a story and it is my personal preference to stay.”

Concerned Student 1950 is a campus activism group that garnered national attention after its protests led to the resignation of top Mizzou leaders last fall. Schierbecker, a former contributor to The Maneater campus newspaper and one of two students who got into a confrontation with Professor Melissa Click during those protests arguing for the rights of student journalists to cover the protesters’ tent city on campus, once again prompted anger and frustration from the group when he would not leave the chapel Wednesday night.

“Cuz this is once again, like, white people being privileged,” one student said to him.

The back and forth between Schierbecker and the group continued, at times getting slightly heated. When one student explained her perspective, another interjected: “You don’t give him any explanation because, like, that’s not necessary.”

In the video, Schierbecker promises to stow his camera if he could be assured that campus police would not intervene, reportedly over talk that officers had been called over a “bias incident.”

“If MUPD [campus police] is not going to be a problem, I will put the camera away,” Schierbecker said.

The town hall ended promptly within minutes of starting when students decided to relocate the forum to a more private location.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7NTXnUMpGs

Millionaires Are Qualifying for Medicaid Under Obamacare



Millionaires living in states that expanded Medicaid are benefiting from government-sponsored health insurance, and taxpayers are footing the bill for it.

In states that expanded Medicaid, people with high net worths and low monthly incomes qualify for Medicaid because of loosened eligibility requirements implemented under Obamacare. And in rural states like Iowa, Americans whom many would consider wealthy are taking advantage of this “loophole” and enrolling in coverage paid for by taxpayers.

Jesse Patton, an insurance broker living in Iowa, has had clients with net worths ranging from $2 million to $5 million, which often stem from farmland or assets from divorce settlements. And those clients, he said, are enrolled in Medicaid in expansion states like Iowa.

“It was designed to help the lower-income population,” Patton told The Daily Signal of Medicaid. “But without the asset test, there are folks that have the financial means and assets there that are good at figuring out how to work the system and capture a benefit they’re entitled to.”

Under the Affordable Care Act, states that opted to expand Medicaid did away with an asset test, which was previously used to determine eligibility in regular Medicaid. To qualify for the program, the government considered a combination of income and net worth.

Now, under the law, eligibility in states that did and did not expand Medicaid is linked solely to modified adjusted gross income, keeping it in line with the tax code.

“This was a move to standardize as much as possible, so you’re bringing in more people, but you’re not complicating the system to where you can’t figure it out,” Joy Wilson, director of health and human services policy at the National Conference of State Legislatures, told The Daily Signal.

Though changing the requirements for Medicaid eligibility put the program in line with the tax code, it also created a “loophole” for those many would consider wealthy to enroll in the government-sponsored program.

“When you get into the Midwest and states with an agriculture market, you can have several million [dollars] in farm ground that you’re not reporting with income,” Patton said.

Patton said he’s encountered Iowans whose net worths top $1 million, and they’ve had no problem enrolling in Medicaid because their annual incomes are below 138 percent of the federal poverty line, or $16,000 for an individual—the new income threshold to qualify for Medicaid in states that expanded the program.

The Iowa broker specifically recalled the case of one woman who had $1.5 million in land and received another $500,000 from a divorce settlement. The land and cash settlements, which went into a trust, were not reported as income, so the woman was able to enroll in the government-run health care program.

“In our market, we’ve got quite a few people people who are either farmers or have gone through divorce settlements where they received considerable amounts of money, but it’s not showing up as income to them at this point in time,” Patton said.

Wilson said that though it’s likely there are some worth millions who are enrolling in Medicaid, they represent a small share of the overall Medicaid population.

“With every system there are issues, and there are always some people trying to help someone who might have a workaround,” she said. “But I would hope that’s not a large number of people, and I suspect if it became big enough, they would have to go and amend the law.”

“It’s safe to say the bulk of the individuals who qualify by income don’t have a lot of assets,” Wilson continued. “There’s always an exception to the rule, maybe someone’s parents died and they got a $1 million house. But that’s not your typical person coming in at the poverty level.”

But those who are asset-rich, like enrollees who own large amounts of land, are not the only population who can qualify for Medicaid under Obamacare.

Ed Haislmaier, a senior fellow in health policy studies at The Heritage Foundation, said that graduate students may find themselves eligible for the program, as many likely qualify for Medicaid based solely on their incomes.

Such was the case for Hartford, Conn., student Brendan Mahoney, who signed up for health care through Connecticut’s exchange when it opened in 2013 and learned he was eligible for Medicaid. Mahoney, a third-year law student at the University of Connecticut, had a school-sponsored health plan prior to Obamacare’s implementation but found he could enroll in Medicaid instead.

“It’s distorting the program away from those whom it was designed to help who are most vulnerable and don’t have other options,” Haislmaier said. “Unlike the farmer or divorcée who could cover it out of dipping into their substantial assets, or the graduate student who could cover it through student loans or a part-time job, the poor kid or the disabled adult, don’t have those options. They’re the ones whom Medicaid was set up for.”

The Obama administration expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act with the intention of expanding coverage for low-income Americans. Under the law—and in the 31 states and the District of Columbia that expanded Medicaid—adults who earn below 138 percent of the federal poverty line, or around $16,000, can enroll in the program.

The federal government will cover all the costs of Medicaid expansion until the end of this year. Participating states are required by cover 10 percent of the costs by 2022.

Haislmaier warned that wealthy Americans who can dip into their assets to pay for health insurance are taking advantage of a program designed for people who don’t share the same lifestyle.

“It has introduced new inequities into the system,” he said.

Questions regarding the population of Americans benefiting from aspects of the Affordable Care Act were raised after CNBC published a report last month detailing how millionaires are able to qualify for subsidies when purchasing coverage on the state-run and federal exchange.

Just like eligibility for enrolling in Medicaid in expansion states, eligibility for the health care law’s subsidies is based solely on income, not a combination of net worth and income.

As a result, the news organization found that a Florida-based financial adviser was helping clients whose net worths were in the millions enroll in coverage through Obamacare and qualified for subsidies.

In one case, one client in Florida received a monthly subsidy of $423, which lowered the price of the client’s coverage to $240 per month. Another client received a monthly subsidy of $737, lowering the premium to $435 per month.


http://dailysignal.com/2016/02/09/millionaires-are-qualifying-for-medicaid-under-obamacare/

DNC rolls back Obama ban on contributions from federal lobbyists







The Democratic National Committee has rolled back restrictions introduced by presidential candidate Barack Obama in 2008 that banned donations from federal lobbyists and political action committees.

The decision, which may provide an advantage to Hillary Clinton’s candidacy, was viewed with disappointment Friday morning by good government activists who saw it as a step backward in the effort to limit special interest influence in Washington.

“It is a major step in the wrong direction,” said longtime reform advocate Fred Wertheimer. “And it is completely out of touch with the clear public rejection of the role of political money in Washington,” expressed during the 2016 campaign.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/dnc-allowing-donations-from-federal-lobbyists-and-pacs/2016/02/12/22b1c38c-d196-11e5-88cd-753e80cd29ad_story.html

Jake Tapper’s interview with the DNC Chair on superdelegates and the train wreck that followed



[...]

    TAPPER: What do you tell voters who are new to the process who say this makes them feel like it’s all rigged?

    WASSERMAN-SCHULTZ: Let me just make sure I can clarify what was available during the primaries in Iowa and New Hampshire. The unpledged delegates are a separate category. The only thing available on the ballot in a primary and a caucus is the pledged delegates, those that are tied to the candidate that they are pledged to support and they receive a proportional number of delegates going into our convention.

    Unpledged delegates exist, really, to make sure that party leaders and elected officials don’t have to be in a position where they are running against grassroots activists. We are, as a Democratic Party, really highlight and emphasize inclusiveness and diversity at our convention and we want to give every opportunity to grassroots activists and diverse committed Democrats to be able to participate, attend and be a delegate at the convention and so we separate out those unpledged delegates to make sure that there isn’t competition between them.

    TAPPER: I’m not sure that that answer would satisfy an anxious, young voter but let’s move on.


http://hotair.com/archives/2016/02/12/jake-tappers-interview-with-the-dnc-chair-on-superdelegates-and-the-train-wreck-that-followed/

Our culture? Raping defenseless children is a sign of Evolution now?

This story is true in every, single democratic country in the whole world. Not just UK.

Islam is not a race.

You know in these days making the illegal immigrants and the radical muslims bear everything going wrong in the country is the real politically correct thing to do xD

 

Official: Top Clinton aides also handled ‘top secret’ intel on server | Fox News



EXCLUSIVE: At least a dozen email accounts handled the “top secret” intelligence that was found on Hillary Clinton’s server and recently deemed too damaging for national security to release, a U.S. government official close to the review told Fox News. 

The official said the accounts include not only Clinton’s but those of top aides – including Cheryl Mills, Huma Abedin, Jake Sullivan and Philippe Reines – as well as State Department Under Secretary for Management Patrick F. Kennedy and others.  There is no public evidence they were authorized to receive the intelligence some of which was beyond Top Secret.

A second source not authorized to speak on the record said the number of accounts involved could be as high as 30 and reflects how the intelligence was broadly shared, replied to, and copied to individuals using the unsecured server.

“My contacts with former colleagues and current active duty personnel involved in sensitive programs reveal a universal feeling that the HRC issue is more serious than the general public realizes,”  Dan Maguire,  a former strategic  planner with Africom, and with 46 years combined service, told Fox.  “Most opine they would already be behind bars if they had apparently compromised sensitive information as reported.”

Without access to the actual e-mails, Maguire said it was hard to ascertain what damage might have been done by the disclosure of human spying intelligence and secret material.

“Either way, the intelligence community is undoubtedly conducting damage assessments and evaluating the viability of any ongoing operation that may have been exposed to unauthorized personnel. The vulnerability of HRC’s server to foreign government hacking cannot be overlooked - even the DCI, John Brennan, has been the target of hackers,” he said.

Former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey told Fox, “It is counterintuitive to suggest that they (Clinton’s aides) all had authorization and access through a non-secure server to information of that sensitivity.” 

The State Department recently confirmed that the messages in question include the most sensitive kind of intelligence. On Jan. 29, Fox News first reported that some emails on Clinton’s server were too damaging to release in any form. The State Department subsequently announced that 22 “top secret” emails were being withheld in full; these were the messages being handled by more than a dozen accounts.

Pressed on whether a damage assessment was being done, State Department Spokesman Mark Toner said, “To your broader question – what is being done to -- as you said spillage – I can’t speak to those efforts today. We’re aware obviously of those concerns.  We are taking steps, but I don’t have any more details to provide.”

Aside from this week’s letter confirming the FBI investigation is focused on Clinton’s server, the Bureau has not publicly acknowledged whom it has contracted or interviewed.

Kennedy recently told the House Benghazi Select Committee that he knew about Clinton's personal email from the beginning, but did not understand the "scope" of its use for Clinton’s government business.   

Kennedy's testimony now appears to conflict with emails released through the Freedom of Information Act that show he routinely sent and received government business from the Clintonemail.com account.

Toner said Kennedy learned about Clinton’s arrangement later. “He did not have knowledge of the computer server that she had set up [for] personal email or computer server she'd set up at her residence,” he said.

However, on the official State Department website, Patrick F. Kennedy’s biography says that he has worked for the department since 1993 and, in his current position as Under Secretary for Management,  he is responsible for the “people, resources, budget, facilities, technology, financial operations, consular affairs, logistics, contracting, and security for Department of State operations.”


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/02/10/sources-at-least-dozen-email-accounts-handled-top-secret-intel-on-clinton-server.html