jasonxctf

INDIANAPOLIS – Health insurer WellPoint blames the Great Recession and rising medical costs for its planned 39 percent rate increase for some California customers. To President Barack Obama, however, it's Exhibit A in his campaign to revive the health care overhaul. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who received the company's explanation in a letter Thursday, said "it remains difficult to understand" how premium increases of that size by can be justified when WellPoint Inc. reported a $2.7 billion profit in the last quarter of 2009.

Don't forget also that a big problem with US autos being undesirable has a large part to do with how they were being built. That all goes back to a workforce that didn't have to care about the quality of what they were building, because the workers were guaranteed their money, no matter what. Toyota came in here with a better product, and a more dependable one, and they did it for a whole lot less than the US workers did. I'm going to take issue with that comment. A guy on the assembly line stamping bumpers, can't be held accountable for poor engineering and design work. It all boils down to upper management. The US automakers built cars and tried to sell consumers on what they thought they wanted. The Foreign automakers asked consumers what they wanted, and then built it. How long did it take any US automaker to come up with Hybrid Cars? Prius, Insights? Even the Civic, while not a hybrid was a fuel efficient car, with an excellent track record and outstanding resale value. My wife and I just bought a Clean Diesel Car. We wanted a quality car, with great gas mileage and a "clean car" tax credit? How many US automakers are making clean diesel vehicles? The correct answer? Zero. Audi, VW, Mercedes and BMW. http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/taxLeanBurn.shtml

http://www.forexmotion.com/index.php/en/ma...ruta=PSD_US.xml Interesting graph on initial jobless claims.

Commerce National Bank 2010 Economic Forecast - Highlights Commerce National Bank hosted its fifth annual Economic Forecast featuring Dr. Robert T. Parry, the previous President and Chief Executive Officer of the San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank. Here are the highlights from Dr. Parry's presentation. · The U.S. economy technically ended the "great" recession in July or August of 2009. · The GDP increased by an impressive rate of 5.7% in the 4th quarter of 2009. · Dr. Parry is expecting the U.S. economy to continue to improve at the rate of 2-3% during 2010. · Unemployment will remain stubbornly high through 2010. · Business conditions will continue to improve, but at a much slower rate than we would like to see.

im about 5 miles from the center... shook like crazy. thought someone slammed into my house with a car.

Wow!!!!! A new poll of self-identified Republicans released Tuesday shows a large slice of the GOP believes President Barack Obama is a “socialist” who was not born in this country, should be impeached, wants the terrorists to win and only won the 2008 election because ACORN “stole” it for him. The survey of 2003 self-identified Republicans, who typically trend much more conservative than voters who “lean” Republican, was conducted by Research 2000 for the liberal blog Daily Kos. According to the poll, 63 percent of Republicans believe Obama is a socialist; 39 percent think Obama should be impeached; 24 percent said Obama wants “the terrorists to win”; and 31 percent agreed with the statement that Obama is “a racist who hates white people.” Those numbers are just a portion of the results from the poll that paints the GOP as much more socially conservative — and in some cases conspiratorial — than most analysts would be willing to grant. According to the survey, 36 percent of respondents do not believe the president was born in this country, and 21 percent think the liberal advocacy group ACORN stole the election for Obama. Meanwhile, nearly a quarter of the Republicans polled, 23 percent, want their state to secede from the union. Those polled also showed strong opposition to the expansion of gay rights. Fifty-five percent said gays should not be allowed to serve openly in the military, while 77 percent opposed gay couples getting married and 68 percent believe gay couples should not receive “any state or federal benefits.” In addition, 73 percent said openly gay men and women should not be allowed to teach in public schools. On other social issues the findings were similar. Fifty-one percent of those polled believe sex education should not be taught in schools; 77 percent want creationism taught in schools; 31 percent want contraception outlawed; and 34 percent believe birth control is “abortion.” Those polled showed excitement for this fall’s midterm election, as 83 percent said they plan to vote. Among those surveyed, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is the favorite candidate for the 2012 presidential election. Sixteen percent said they’d vote for Palin, tops in the field, though 42 percent said they are undecided. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney placed second with 11 percent, followed by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, and South Dakota Sen. John Thune. Asked whether they thought Palin is more qualified than Obama to serve as president, 53 percent said yes. Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0210/...l#ixzz0eP8MPTOO

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 04:37 AM) But won't again... depends who the opponent is. Rick Perry.. i don't see him doing too well in the Ohio/PA/VA/FL areas. In those areas, moderates tend to do better than conservatives. (and i think Perry is more conservative than McCain) Iowa, Colorado, NC, IN... he can probably win.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 02:13 PM) Alexei will make Illinois another Massachusetts with his Rezko ties. Went with Hoffman. see i dont get this. His bank lent $ to Resko. He was a senior lender at this bank. So what. Does no one know how the lending process works in this country?

i get dirty looks doing the same in Kane County.

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Voted early... Quinn and Alexi

the question is... can Rick Perry win Ohio, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Colorado, Florida, Virginia, Indiana, New Mexico, Iowa, North Carolina??? The current President can.

QUOTE (Rex Kicka** @ Feb 1, 2010 -> 09:42 PM) Oh yeah, I know I keep seeing stories on the news of unsuspecting Republicans having their at home family BBQ's ruined by angry purple shirted mobs. It's epidemic!

no doubt that happens... shoot it happens in the corporate world too. Try getting some customer service out of ComEd, AT&T, etc. It seems like some of the most important (duty wise) people in our society are union people. But we paint with a broad brush and degrade many of them. (teachers, police, fire, air traffic control people, etc)

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 1, 2010 -> 05:56 PM) Honestly I am more upset at the complete neglect of union influence while everyone cries about corporate influence. The complete misrepresentations of the issue are crap, yet no surprise at all. ive been shocked by peoples negative attitudes towards unions as a whole over the past 10 years. i dont get it, at all.

but what's the hurry? It's not like its been months. I think we are 10 days post election.

With the Senate Democrats indicating that they will wait for the state of Massachusetts to follow its own procedural guidelines for certifying a winner in the Massachusetts special Senate election, the next question should be asked: What are the state's guidelines and procedures? We asked Michelle Tassinari, the legal counsel for the state Elections Division, and she sent us over a list of the relevant statutes. First of all, no certificate of election can be issued until at least ten days following a special election, and in real terms it would probably be at least 15 days. State law can allow for a certificate seven days after a special election -- but that law is trumped by the federal laws governing overseas and military ballots, which are triggered because this is an election for federal office, and which create a longer window in this election. The delay between election day and certification of the winner is provided for by state law in order for local election officials -- there are 351 local election offices in the state -- to certify their totals, and to count overseas absentee ballots that have not arrived until after election day. The deadline for absentee ballots sent from overseas to reach their local election offices is 5 p.m. on January 29. Tassinari also explained to us that January 29 is not necessarily the endpoint. Ballots must arrive by 5 p.m. on that day, and the local election officials cannot have their meeting to count them until after 5 p.m. that day. The local election officials then have up to five more days to resolve any provisional ballots before they certify their local election results, which must be done by February 3rd. After the results are received from the local election officials, the Secretary of State will present the total results to the governor and the Governor's Council for certification. Only after the results are certified by the governor and the Governor's Council can a certificate of election be issued. (The governor and the council schedule their own meetings, which usually take place on Wednesdays.) So what does this all mean? Looking over these statutes, it seems clear that unless the result is very, very close (think Al Franken and Norm Coleman in Minnesota, or Scott Murphy and Jim Tedisco in NY-20), we should probably know on election night who has been elected when the vast majority of votes are counted. But even then, state law is clear that a certificate of election cannot be issued until at least 15 days later. And if Senate Democrats insist on a completed certificate -- just as the Senate Dems did in their unsuccessful attempts to keep out Sen. Roland Burris (D-IL), and Senate Republicans did in their successful blocking of Al Franken during the Minnesota litigation -- that would keep the winner out for at least 15 days.

what's the hurry?

QUOTE (Cknolls @ Jan 29, 2010 -> 08:20 PM) i believe there is precedent that an interim appointed Senator's term expires after a new Senator is elected by the people. Not after he is certified. so to play devils advocate, lets say Brown won by 1 vote. There's court cases, recounts, etc. Wouldn't you need to wait until his victory had been formally certified?

I saw this AM that Business Capital Expenditures were the big leader in this number. It was +13.3% or somewhere around there. (see my post prior about business spending increasing)

has the new senator been sworn in yet? i'm guessing its like the Nov elections. Just because someone wins on Nov 4th, doesn't mean that they get to participate on Nov 5th. Normally you have to wait until Jan.

Tufanos Video

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Jan 28, 2010 -> 05:16 PM) Tufanos on Vernon Park for cash-only italian

hey dont worry.. they've got the Yanks finishing 3rd the Angels having the 3rd worst record in the AL only 3 teams winning 90 games, and all of them reside in the AL East. (after 7 teams had 90+ wins in 2009) Oakland winning the AL West

provide true news... not opinion based news.