Federal appeals court strikes down key part of Obamacare

Please chip in to my Paypal account at Darksydothemoon-at-aol-com if you can. My circumstances are dire and getting worse. Here’s just the latest example of the many ways rich, conservative nutjobs are methodically destroying the lives of people like me: The ACA may be heading back to the Supreme Court after an appeals court struck down a key component of the law today. The decision could have lethal consequences for millions of people currently insured individually or under their employers’ plan: [Read more…]

A poll for Republican Jesus

In the Bible, Jesus spoke clearly on the spiritual mandate that all people of any means must heal the sick, feed the hungry, empower the powerless. A reasonable person might then conclude that a majority Christian government of the people, by the people, and for the people would reflect those sacred directives. And for the most part, people do. But few Republicans agree: [Read more…]

Obama approval rate by religions & atheism

GallupApproval

“The results are based on aggregated data from more than 88,000 Gallup Daily tracking interviews conducted in the first six months of 2014 — a time when the president averaged 43% job approval among all Americans. Gallup interviewed 552 Muslims and at least 1,700 respondents in every other religious group during this time.”

Gallup has released an long term aggregate poll of President Obama’s approval rating cross-tabbed to religion and even have a tab and breakout graph for what atheists and/or those who profess no religion feel about the President. Click images or here for full results.
AtheistApproval

Tasty right-wing tears of unfathomable sadness

I’m sweating, waiting for a callback on a job I’ve been told I may get. It’s a network support job, a useful skill, that would pay an almost living wage. But while I sweat that out, at least there’s entertainment galore in Wingnutville, where mighty Fox has struck out trying to crash Obamacare.

Here at the Zingularity, we wouldn’t normally come within three degrees of separation between this blog and a link to Ramesh, but this is a very special day: [Read more…]

Conservatives could have and should have owned Obamacare

Apparently, if the temperature in Central Texas drops below 40 for any length of time, my Internet, cable TV, and phone networks all collapse. Dutifully noted. And, since this happened on a weekend, it took until just now for a tech to make it out here and get full service restored. So I haven’t had much of a chance to thank all of you who have pitched in this holiday season, as well as those who are helping with my computer-building project. Both are going well. I’ll probably have the parts I need for the PC, and plenty enough in contribs to keep my bills at bay, by this weekend.

Below is an interesting piece on the ACA and I’ll say right here what strikes me thinking about it today: conservatives missed the boat on this. They didn’t even make it to the dock. [Read more…]

Early indications on Healthcare-dot-gov are promising

Click image for holiday bleg snail-mail details
Again I apologize for bombarding readers with a plea for holiday generosity, but without it this blog and my health would be much worse off. I used to only ask once a year, but beginning earlier this spring a freak heart attack and subsequent complications, combined with disability pay that clocked in below minimum wage, forced me to virtually panhandle like my life depended on it. The response was heartening. Without the help of a few dozen regulars, I would have been juggling couch surfing with friends or outright homelessness, while trying to recover from an ongoing, life threatening condition. The end may finally be near, if I get through this month, there’s good reason to hope things will begin to improve in every way.

Going through that nerve-wracking, humiliating ordeal while the national discourse was tainted with delusions and wanton cruelty emanating from (usually) ultra-conservative critics, many of whom proudly profess a belief in the principles of mercy and charity as conveyed by their savoir Jesus Christ, ranks among the most surreal, gritty , at times truly Orwellian experiences in my life. That rare kind of personal intrusion, where news ceases to be a TV show and suddenly leaps out from my screen, with intent to harm on par with an armed thug suddenly crashing through the front-door. After a glitchy roll out, and no end of Teaparty whining about people like me having an affordable option to preserve our health, the news this week has markedly improved for Healthcare.gov: [Read more…]

Grad student & fellow Texan signs up using Healthcare-dot-gov for pennies

plan

Click the image fore details on the total cost on a Silver Plan when s/he was done …. three cents a month! S/he’s also in the same boat I am: if the diarist makes just a tiny bit less than what s/he estimated for 2014, they will not qualify for a private policy and there is no Medicaid expansion option.

With my eligibility confirmed, I was ready to select an actual plan. I already knew basically what was available and basically what plan I was going to pick, because I had done a bit of research over the past month or two. Two really useful websites I found are Value Penguin and The Health Sherpa, which both have good estimators of the costs of Obamacare plans.

Sen Ted Cruz (R-sociopath) is afraid we commoners might get “addicted to the sugar,” like some poor child eating their way to ADHD down at the local candy store. Except the “sugar” is, you know, having a shot at beating cancer or other inopportune diseases and injuries …