USA Today: Almost 4 million seniors saved about $2.16 billion through discounts for their prescription medications in 2011, the Department of Health and Human Services plans to announce today. This, administrators say, should help keep costs to the government down in the future.
“Before, many beneficiaries were forced to stop taking the drugs,” said Jonathan Blum, director of the Center for Medicare. “This reduces costs through better management.”
…. The 2010 health care law required a 50% discount on prescription drugs in the so-called doughnut hole, or the gap between traditional and catastrophic coverage in the Medicare drug benefit, also known as Part D. In 2012, the coverage gap is $2,930. The Affordable Care Act eliminates the doughnut hole by 2020.
The previous report, with numbers through the end of October, had shown 2.65 million Medicare recipients saved $1.5 billion on prescriptions. That rose to 3.76 million recipients by the end of December.
The Hill: Senate Democrats raised more than $5.3 million in February, marking the third straight month in which they raised more than the month before.
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) ended February with almost $19 million in the bank. That’s about $3.5 million more than it had one month ago, meaning the committee saved most of what it raised.
Democrats have cleared their debt and raised more than $52 million during the cycle. DSCC Executive Director Guy Cecil said it was the most successful February the committee has ever had.
CNN: Mitt Romney’s overall favorable ratings have dropped, while Rick Santorum’s standing has jumped among Republicans, according to a new national survey.
…. In the new survey, 54% of Republicans said they hold a favorable opinion of Romney, while 67% said the same in January. Among all Americans, 34% described the candidate as likable, down from 41% last month.
…. only one presidential candidate in the race has a national favorable rating above the 50% mark: President Barack Obama.
Among all Americans, Obama received positive reviews from 53%, with the poll suggesting he may have grown more popular in recent months.
Bob Cesca: Regular people are donating to the president’s re-election campaign in record numbers:
According to an analysis by The Huffington Post, the Obama reelection campaign committee, Obama for America, pulled in at least 45 percent of its contributions from donors giving less than $200 during each of the fundraising quarters it was active in 2011…..
This is another strong indicator that the anti-Obama smearfest on the left is out of touch with the rest of the American left…..
Wednesday: PBO will travel to Master Lock in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to continue to discuss his blueprint for an economy built to last based on American manufacturing and the importance of companies insourcing and investing in America. He will then travel to Los Angeles, California where he will attend campaign events. He will spend the night in Los Angeles.
Thursday: PBO will attend campaign events in Corona del Mar, California before traveling to San Francisco, California to attend campaign events. He will spend the night in San Francisco.
Friday: PBO will travel to the Seattle where he will continue to discuss his blueprint for an economy built to last. He will also attend campaign events in the Seattle area before returning to Washington, D.C. later in the evening.
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From left, Chief of Staff Jack Lew, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, National Economic Council Director Gene Sperling and U.S. Ambassador to China Gary Locke confer as President Barack Obama holds a bilateral meeting with Vice President Xi Jinping of the People’s Republic of China in the Oval Office, Feb. 14, 2012. Kurt Campbell, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs; Mike Froman, Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economics; and Lael Brainard, Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs, are also pictured. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
ABC: For Jenna Lyons, Michelle Obama has been the best endorsement J. Crew has ever received …. (her) penchant for J. Crew clothing has been “the most incredible gift that keeps on giving.” Not only did the company see a “huge lift” in business, Lyons credited Obama, 48, with creating a special bond with customers.
…. When Obama appeared on “The Tonight Show” in 2008 and told Jay Leno that her yellow sweater, skirt and blouse were a “J.Crew ensemble,” the company’s stock went up 8.2 percent. In 2011, Business Insider credited her with contributing to one of the most successful re-branding campaigns ever…
Bob Cesca: As predicted, the Keystone XL pipeline has now been officially rejected by the Obama Administration after the Republicans chose to hasten the timeline for approval with a rider inserted into legislation that extended payroll tax-cuts and unemployment benefits for 2 months.
….. [when] Speaker Boehner whines about this today … you should keep this in mind:
Environmentalists note that in December 2010, according to Boehner’s financial disclosure forms, he invested $10,000 to $50,000 each in seven firms that had a stake in Canada’s oil sands, the region that produces the oil the pipeline would transport….
350.org founder and Keystone XL protest leader, Bill McKibben, had the following reaction the news that the State Department is expected to reject the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline later this afternoon:
“Assuming that what we’re hearing is true, this isn’t just the right call, it’s the brave call. The knock on Barack Obama from many quarters has been that he’s too conciliatory. But here, in the face of a naked political threat from Big Oil to exact ‘huge political consequences,’ he’s stood up strong. This is a victory for Americans who testified in record numbers, and who demanded that science get the hearing usually reserved for big money.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accepts a Los Angeles Lakers uniform from NBA legend, and State Department Cultural Ambassador, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, during their meeting in Washington, January 18.
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President Barack Obama will be in Phoenix next Wednesday as part of a swing through Iowa, Michigan and Western states after the State of the Union address on Tuesday.
The President is slated to visit Cedar Rapids, Iowa and Phoenix on Wednesday, Jan. 25 and then Las Vegas and Denver on Thursday, Jan. 26. That will be followed by Detroit on Friday, Jan. 27.
Mediaite: In a preview of Wednesday’s Piers Morgan Tonight, former President Jimmy Carter surprised host Morgan with his somewhat blunt (by mainstream media standards) assessment of Newt Gingrich. Speaking of his standing ovation moment at Monday night’s debate, President Carter told Morgan “I think (Gingrich) has that subtlety of racism that I know quite well, that Gingrich knows quite well, that appeals to some people in Georgia.”
“Really?” Morgan exclaimed as Carter spoke, later adding, “That’s a pretty serious charge to level at Newt Gingrich, that he’s being racist.”
“I’m not saying he’s racist, but he knows the subtle words to use to appeal to a racist group,” Carter responded.
NYT Editorial: Preaching Division in South Carolina. By mixing falsehoods with racial condescension, Newt Gingrich brought a raucous presidential debate crowd to its feet on Monday night in South Carolina, further cheapening his reputation and that of the state Republican Party.
For months, Mr. Gingrich has made racial resentment an integral part of his platform as a conservative challenger to Mitt Romney. He has traversed the country calling President Obama “the greatest food-stamp president in American history” and presenting African-Americans with the great revelation that they should prefer paychecks to federal handouts….
The fact is that Mr. Obama has “put” no one on food stamps. People apply for food assistance, known officially as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, because they’re poor or out of work and their families are hungry. The number of people using the program, which is now at a peak, began rising with the recession, in 2007, and continued through four of the toughest years ever faced by the poor and near-poor in modern history. Mr. Obama eased the eligibility requirements as part of his stimulus program, a desperately needed measure that helped struggling families and the economy…..
Chris Weigant: The Huffington Post ran an article today titled “Gov. Martin O’Malley Urges Dems To Focus More On Romney’s Governing Record, Less On Bain.” In it, the governor of Maryland makes the following case:
“I think a point that needs to be emphasized was that in easier times when he [Romney] was governor of a pretty innovative state, Massachusetts ranked 47th out of 50 [in job creation],” he said. “You contrast that to the tougher times we have now, under Governor Deval Patrick’s leadership, Massachusetts is 5th in the nation.”
O’Malley makes a good point. President Obama’s re-election team should heed it …. the real issue to put before the voters is what Mitt Romney did after he left the private sector for politics.
Extreme Liberal has a terrific post (which I linked yesterday – here) with a transcript from a recent podcast from The Bob and Chez Show (featuring Bob Cesca and Chez Pazienza).
In case you you don’t listen to podcasts, the video above has an extract from the show (recorded after OFA New Mexico State Director Ray Sandoval sent an email to supporters attacking Firebaggers and Paul Krugman).
It’s the best analysis of the Firebaggers I’ve heard. Be good to yourself, subscribe to The Bob and Chez Show on iTunes.
Extreme Liberal: If you haven’t gone to iTunes and subscribed to the Bubble Genius Bob and Chez Show podcast, you are missing out on the best political analysis around and a lot of great laughs. You can find them at their respective blogs, Bob Cesca’s Aweseome Blog! Go! and Deus Ex Malcontent where they consistently tell it like it is.
A few weeks ago, they did a show called “Stop Whining”, which I highly recommend you listen to, after you subscribe to them on iTunes. But in case you prefer reading or are at work and can’t really listen, I took the time to transcribe a large portion of that show for your reading pleasure. I think it exposes the true motivations and agenda of those who have become known as the “Professional Left” or the name I prefer, “Firebaggers”……
Bob Cesca: The Republicans are growing a little worried about the mission they mandated to the “Super Committee” because the Obama Administration is now seeking to use that committee to pass the president’s jobs proposal.
…. what the president is asking the committee to do is to agree to even more deficit reduction, and just when I thought this administration couldn’t impress me any more with their deviousness, they pull another rabbit out of their hat.
…. In case you don’t understand – the Congressional Budget Office has scored the president’s jobs proposal as deficit-reducing beginning in 2013. This is accomplished by accounting for the closure of tax-loopholes and the revenue that will be generated by a wave of new jobs. This mean’s the “Super Committee” can include the president’s jobs proposal in their mandated mission to find over a trillion in savings over the next 10 years.
This is why the Republicans are now downplaying their expectations of the Super Committee and suggesting the committee should go small. Not big.
They’re playing catch-up to President Obama, and opposing a jobs bill and more deficit reduction at the same time may be beyond the vast, obstructionist powers of the Republicans. Their only remaining option may be to stall and do nothing…..
Bob Cesca: Several members of the firebagger high command appeared on a panel at Netroots Nation to beat their myopic unrealistic mythological drum about how President Obama is the worst president ever, etc, etc.
…..it was Dan Choi, John Aravosis of AmericaBlog and, naturally, Jane Hamsher collectively lying about the president’s record on, among other things, LGBT rights.
Dan Choi appeared on Lawrence O’Donnell last night to repeat all of the hyperbolic silliness about how the president has broken all of his promises to the gay community – an accusation that simply is not true….
Here’s Aravosis during the panel: “…. We were told he’d be a fierce advocate, and he’s been not fierce at all and not much of an advocate.”
Not a fierce advocate? Not that into you? Horseshit. Utter horseshit. In addition to the Obama administration deciding not to enforce the Defense of Marriage Act because, in in the view of the Obama Justice Department, the law is unconstitutional, the president has also racked up the following LGBT achievements: see here
Check that out. That’s a long, long list for someone who “just isn’t that into” same-sex rights.
….Worse than Bush!
…..the firebaggers need to ditch this fiction about the president and embrace reality – or, better yet, people simply need to stop buying into their ridiculous whining, lying and undermining of a realistic progressive agenda.
It’s completely sublime how the real progessives, like Bob Cesca, are destroying the Firebaggers’ comical appearance at Netroots with plain old facts. Love it.
