KABUL – Four U.S. troops died Tuesday in a militant attack in eastern Afghanistan, and NATO forces acknowledged for the first time that civilians were among the dozens killed in an airstrike on two hijacked fuel trucks.
Top NATO and U.S. commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal appointed a Canadian major general to lead an investigation into Friday’s strike on the fuel tankers in northern Kunduz province. An Afghan official appointed by President Hamid Karzai to examine the attack said his best estimate of the death toll was 82, including at least 45 armed militants.
Also Tuesday, McChrystal banned the sale of alcohol at the military alliance’s Kabul headquarters after becoming frustrated when he had trouble getting in touch with some of his staff after the attack in Kunduz, said Capt. Elizabeth Mathias, a U.S. military spokeswoman.
Mathias said four American troops were killed in “a complex attack” in eastern Afghanistan’s Kunar province but did not give details. More…
Two-thirds of the nation’s total income gains from 2002 to 2007 flowed to the top 1 percent of U.S. households, and that top 1 percent held a larger share of income in 2007 than at any time since 1928, according to an analysis of newly released IRS data by economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez.
During those years, the Piketty-Saez data also show, the inflation-adjusted income of the top 1 percent of households grew more than ten times faster than the income of the bottom 90 percent of households.
The last economic expansion began in November 2001 and ended in December 2007, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, which means the Piketty-Saez data essentially cover that expansion. The last time such a large share of the income gain during an expansion went to the top 1 percent of households — and such a small share went to the bottom 90 percent of households — was in the 1920s More…
Poverty Gap at widest point since Great Depression
WASHINGTON — President Obama, seeking to buttress his case for the kind of comprehensive health care overhaul that has eluded Washington for decades, told an audience of nurses on Thursday that the number of uninsured Americans rose by nearly 6 million as the recession intensified during the last 12 months.
“Now is the time to act,” Mr. Obama said, “and I will not permit reform to be postponed or imperiled by the usual ideological diversions.”
On the morning after Mr. Obama’s blunt address on health care to a joint session of Congress, he addressed the nurses on the White House campus — and received the endorsement of their professional association, administration officials said. He used his brief appearance to reinforce Wednesday night’s message that his plan will bring “security and stability” to those who have insurance, and coverage to those who do not. More….
But, a public option may not make it into the reform. Republicans, big business and some moderate Democrats are pushing the idea of a “non-profit” cooperative. This would allow public monies to be used to buy private insurance policies for those not currently insured.
Democratic leaders say health care bill to pass this year
WASHINGTON – Democratic congressional leaders predicted passage of health care legislation within a few months despite undimmed Republican opposition, claiming momentum Thursday from President Barack Obama’s speech and renewed commitment from lawmakers fresh from a month of meetings with constituents.
Increasingly, events in the Senate Finance Committee appeared pivotal, precursor to likely votes in both the House and the Senate by early October. “I’m confident the president will sign a bill this year,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California.
While effusively praising Obama’s speech from the night before, Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada signaled separately the president may not prevail in his call for legislation that allows the federal government to sell insurance in competition with private industry.
Reid said that while he favors a strong “public option,” he could be satisfied with establishment of nonprofit cooperatives, along the lines expected to be included in the bill taking shape in the Finance Committee. More…
In his speech to Congress Wednesday, President Barack Obama said the changes to health care that he’s proposing “would not apply to those who are here illegally.” That prompted Wilson, a South Carolina Republican, to shout “You lie!” from his seat in the House chamber. Wilson later apologized for the outburst, but he didn’t back down from his claim.
THE FACTS: The House version of the health care bill explicitly prohibits spending any federal money to help illegal immigrants get health care coverage. Illegal immigrants could buy private health insurance, as many do now, and they could also buy into a new government-run insurance plan if Congress creates one. But unlike legal residents, they wouldn’t get federal subsidies to help them. The bill’s exact language: “Nothing in this subtitle shall allow federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully in the United States.” Health care legislation in the Senate is also being crafted to exclude illegal immigrants from coverage. More…
Official Spokesperson: Dozens of Taliban killed after US deaths
Associated Press, September 13th, 2009
KABUL – A battle in western Afghanistan that included airstrikes killed dozens of Taliban militants after an insurgent ambush left three U.S. troops dead, an Afghan official said Sunday.
The hours-long battle took place Saturday in the western province of Farah after a complex attack that killed three Americans and seven Afghan troops, said Afghan army spokesman Maj. Abdul Basir Ghori.
The insurgent ambush involved two roadside bombs, gunfire and rocket-propelled grenades, Capt. Elizabeth Mathias, a U.S. military spokeswoman, said Sunday. Mathias confirmed that fighting in the west continued for six to eight hours after the ambush, but she could not provide any casualty figures.
“The combined ISAF and Afghan force was receiving significant small-arms, RPG and indirect fire throughout that time frame,” she said, referring to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force.
Ghori said about 50 militants were killed in Saturday’s battle, but no other Afghan officials could immediately confirm that figure.
NATO aircraft bombed areas where militants were firing from, Mathias said. “We are not sure right now how many people those munitions killed,” she said.
During the clash, a rocket fired by militants hit a home and killed a woman and a teenage girl, said Afghan police spokesman Raouf Ahmadi.
Obama highlights a Treasury report that, under status quo, half of Americans (under age 65) will lose health coverage at some point over next ten years.
In this week’s address, President Barack Obama highlighted a new report from the Treasury Department that found that about half of all Americans under 65 will lose their health coverage at some point over the next ten years. The report also found that Americans under 21 have more than a 50-percent chance of going uninsured at some point in that time. And more than one-third of Americans will go without coverage for longer than one year. The full Treasury report can be viewed HERE.
Seventy six percent of Americans agree that our health system is broken, and they agree that reform without at least a public option is no reform at all.
WASHINGTON – The White House and its Democratic allies on Sunday tried to play down the role of a government insurance option in health care legislation as the party in power worked to reclaim momentum on President Barack Obama’s top domestic priority. More…
Aside from the Republicans, and the White House, here are some “Democrats” that also want to ditch the public option. Click on the links below, if you’d like to give them a piece of your opinion.
Do you think anyone’s listening? Nearly 10% of physicians want only a public option (i.e. eliminate private insurance) and another 62% want a mix of public and private insurance options.
New England Jouranal of Medicine poll of 5,000 physicians from all specialties
A new study finds that a majority of physicians support the creation of a public health care option.
A Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) study published in Monday’s New England Journal of Medicine shows that 63 percent of physicians support a health reform proposal that includes both a public option and traditional private insurance. If the additional 10 percent of doctors who support an entirely public health system are included, then approximately three out of four physicians nationwide support inclusion of a public option. Only 27 percent support a private-only reform that would provide subsidies for low-income individuals to purchase private insurance.
Surveying a nationally representative sample of 5,157 physicians across America, researchers Salomeh Keyhani, M.D., M.P.H., and Alex Federman, M.D., M.P.H., from Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City queried physicians about a range of options for expanding health insurance coverage.
“There should be no confusion about where doctors stand in the debate over expanding health insurance coverage: they want reform,” said Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. “This survey reveals important information about the perspective of physicians on issues central to the health reform debate. Policy makers should listen to their doctors.” More at Huffington Post…
Americans must buy health insurance. Some Americans would be forced to use “non-profit health cooperatives” funded by the federal government that would in turn, purchase coverage from Blue Cross or United Health.
Baucus wants to stuff our money into Blue Cross and the insurance industry!
WASHINGTON — Senator Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat, on Wednesday unveiled his plan to extend health coverage to 29 million uninsured Americans, providing a detailed look at a legislative proposal that meets many of the requirements that President Obama laid out in his address to Congress last week.
The proposal is the result of more than a year of preparation by Mr. Baucus, the chairman of the Finance Committee, and three months of intense talks among a small group of Democrats and Republicans. The three Republicans in that group so far have refused to endorse the bill but negotiations will continue in the days ahead.
The Baucus plan calls for the creation of private, nonprofit health insurance cooperatives, a compromise aimed at bridging the gap between Democrats who want a government-run insurance plan and Republicans who adamantly oppose that idea. More…
