Free Republic

CGI Federal is the Canadian IT contractor responsible for creating most of the ObamaCare website. Tuesday, after describing the site as a "complete train wreck," the Washington Post took an in-depth look at the company -- its origins, track record, and how it landed the ObamaCare contract. It is all worth a read, but one staffer told the Post that the working environment at CGI is so awful today that "People are getting sick, fainting in conference calls." The healthcare.gov debacle has taken its toll on the working environment at CGI Federal's 10-story complex in Fairfax, Va., according to a...

As the Affordable Care Act goes into effect, Andy Pudzer, CEO of conjoined fast-food chains Carl's Jr and Hardee's, went on Fox News to tell Megyn Kelly that President Obama is flat-out "wrong" in thinking that health-care reform has no widespread effect on the job market, claiming that employers, himself included, are overwhelmingly choosing to hire part-time employees to avoid paying for benefits. It's baffling that companies continue to admit their preference for hiring more part-time employees, rather than paying for health care for those working 40 hours a week. Here, Pudzer helpfully spells out his house rules. He tells...

So I am thinking of simply leaving the job I work at now and heading to a Southern state, Texas, North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Northern Florida, Tennessee, etc since I figure that, since I am one of those who does not have a reliable source of family aid of any kind, that this could be my only option. I am considering finding a church that has a sort of communal living situation, a farm, ranch, factory or other such source that could use additional workers and join one of them. I am thinking of it in light of a situation...

The federal government shutdown is here, and that means some places around town are offering freebies. Most of these deals are reserved for government workers only, but some are open to everyone. Furloughed workers receive 50% off weekday bookings to @GoApeUSA until 10/18 with Federal ID! Use code "FEDS50" to book at www.goape.com. by GoApeUSA 7:54 PM Reply Permalink ALL performances of Marry Me a Little FREE this weekend for govt employees with promo code GOVT at bpt.me (govt ID required) by cauldronevents 7:54 PM 2:40 PM TwitterOldDominionBrewhouse @OldDominionBrew Week 3 of the Government Shutdown! Happy Hour ALL DAY at...

First, some background: I've spent almost a decade in the healthcare insurance industry now, after departing my last job. I've •investigated fraudulent Medicaid and Medicare claims , personally having revoked some $113 milion worth, and disenrolled over 25,000 fraudlent Medicaid subscribers •Investigated fraud / waste / abuse trends in hospital and small clinic claims •Investigated and testified about waste and abuse in most electronic medical billing and diagnosis code platforms, as well as willful 'bundling' of unrelated and fraudlent charges by hospitals and clinics•Researched electronic eligibility and risk pool demographics and statistics in studying insurance rate increases and stabilizations •Worked...

The media, members of Congress, and the President of the United States have gleefully disseminated misinformation about what would happen if we do not raise the debt ceiling by October 17th. The biggest blow these lies encountered was when Moody’s, one of the nation's top credit rating agencies, released a memo on October 7th stating: “We believe the government would continue to pay interest and principal on its debt even in the event that the debt limit is not raised, leaving its creditworthiness intact...The debt limit restricts government expenditures to the amount of its incoming revenues; it does not prohibit...

Think you’re exempt from Obamacare’s individual mandate? Good luck proving it. The health law’s least popular component — the requirement to obtain insurance or face a tax penalty — also features a lengthy list of exceptions for people facing certain hardships like foreclosure, domestic violence or homelessness. Members of certain religious sects or Native American tribes also are exempt. But if the online system for getting into Obamacare coverage is rickety, the system for getting out of the mandate doesn’t even exist yet. HHS says it will take another month at least for the administration to finalize the forms. The...

The House's latest plan to raise the debt ceiling and end the government shutdown won't pass the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said on Tuesday. “It’s unproductive and a waste of time,” Reid said. “The House legislation will not pass the Senate.” Senate leaders are working on a deal that would end the shutdown, fund the government through Jan. 15 and raise the debt ceiling until February. House Republicans met Tuesday morning to discuss preempting the Senate by passing their own plan to raise the debt ceiling and end the shutdown. The House bill would delay Obamacare's medical device...

In a few minutes, House Republicans will meet in the Capitol’s basement. The chief topic of conversation: the emerging Senate deal. But before the meeting even begins, House conservatives are bashing it behind the scenes, and they’re pushing the leadership to reject the compromise. A flurry of phone calls and meetings last night and early this morning led the consensus among the approximatley 50 Republicans who form the House GOP’s right flank. They’re furious with Senate Republicans for working with Democrats to craft what one leading Tea Party congressman calls a “mushy piece of s—t.” Another House conservative warns, “If...

Katelyn Fossett / Foreign PolicyYou may not have heard of Gennady Onishchenko, but if his own accounts are to be believed, he’s the Russian government official who single-handedly averts major public health crises posed by foreign countries’ dangerously lax and unsophisticated food safety standards (including those in a certain country where the federal government has ground to a halt). To others, Onishchenko, Russia’s chief sanitary inspector, is also Russia’s chief manufacturer of elaborate food safety scares to wage geopolitically motivated trade wars with other countries, particularly former Soviet republics. On Wednesday, Onishchenko, the director of Rospotrebnadzor, Russia’s consumer-protection agency, announced...

This is a story out of California that’s been making the rounds this weekend and definitely needs to be filed under, “Who could have possibly seen this coming?” Some of the people who managed the feat of getting through the dysfunctional web site and actually getting quotes on health care policies under Obamacare have already been finding out that “low priced” can mean something entirely different than they may have thought. This is particularly true of older citizens on fixed incomes. But if your income is low enough, you can just scratch off a lot of the cost of those...

BOGOTA, Colombia -- Annual inflation in Venezuela hit 49.4 percent in September, up from 18 percent a year ago, and basic goods became harder to find, the Central Bank reported Thursday. The soaring consumer price index gives Venezuela the highest inflation in the hemisphere. In September alone, inflation spiked 4.4 percent, driven by agricultural goods, transportation, education expenses and a 19.3 percent hike in electricity prices, the government said. The new figures are ammunition for an opposition that is trying to turn December’s municipal election into a referendum on the six-month administration of President Nicolás Maduro. Inflation is a pocketbook...

.....The Maryland Health Connection enrolled just more than 1,120 people in the first 10 days — compared with more than 9,000 in Kentucky, which has fewer uninsured, and tens of thousands in California and New York. Other states have had similar problems, and the federal site, which serves 36 states, has been bogged down. But Maryland is now being targeted for criticism by conservatives on Capitol Hill and publications such as the Weekly Standard, which highlighted the fact that consumers could not search Maryland Health Connection to see if their doctors participate in the program. Some Obamacare supporters are also...

Beijing (AFP) - While US politicians grapple with how to reopen their shuttered government and avoid a potentially disastrous default on their debt, the world should consider 'de-Americanising', a commentary on China's official news agency said Sunday. "As US politicians of both political parties (fail to find a) viable deal to bring normality to the body politic they brag about, it is perhaps a good time for the befuddled world to start considering building a de-Americanised world," the commentary on state news agency Xinhua said.

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan lashed out at Senate Republicans for interfering with the House GOP’s talks with the White House to reopen the government and lift the debt ceiling, suggesting his colleagues on the other side of the Capitol were betraying Speaker John Boehner. “They’re trying to cut the House out, and trying to jam us with the Senate. We’re not going to roll over and take that,” Ryan told reporters. When asked if he felt “double crossed,” Ryan said “you look at the facts and draw your own conclusions.” Senate Republicans, led by Senator Susan Collins of...

Senate Democratic unity will face a test Saturday when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) moves forward with a plan to pass a 14-month debt-ceiling extension. The unity of the 54-member caucus has been Reid’s biggest asset in his showdown with House Republicans. Senate Democrats have voted together to reject various House proposals to link legislation unraveling ObamaCare to a government funding stopgap. If Reid keeps his rank-and-file members together, it would strengthen Democrats’ leverage in negotiations to avoid a federal default later this month. But the vote presents a political risk to red state Democrats who are undecided over...

Obama told 25 governors on a conference call that the shutdown "is hurting local economies." President Obama hit Congressional Republicans on Friday telling a bipartisan group of governors that the "brinksmanship strategy" of shutting down the government and threatening default is something "the country can't afford." Obama made the comments to 25 governors on a conference call aimed at discussing the effect of the federal shutdown on state budgets and the overall economy, according to a White House readout of the call....... Obama was joined on the call by senior adviser Valerie Jarrett, NEC Director Gene Sperling, Deputy Office of...

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Saturday morning is set to brief House Republicans on the status of negotiations with the White House to end the government shutdown and lift the debt ceiling. Congressional leaders left the Capitol on Friday evening with no agreement to resolve the standoff, just six days before the Treasury Department says the debt ceiling will be reached and warns of an unprecedented U.S. default..... At the White House, press secretary Jay Carney said Obama had "some concerns" about the GOP's latest proposal, and he signaled Obama would not support a plan that tied only a short-term...

Jonathan Bernstein considers what the pointless shutdown fight has done to Ted Cruz’s political prospects: It’s one thing to have a reputation as a loudmouth; it’s quite another to have a reputation as a loser. That’s what the shutdown fight has done to Cruz. Among true believers he’ll be the one who was a leader in a fight that surely would have won if the squishes hadn’t sold them out. But for most party actors, including many sympathetic to Tea Partyism, he’s going to be the guy who ran up the wrong hill. It would have been different if Cruz’s...

Looking for a distraction from the government shutdown and debt ceiling debate? I urge you to read Vanity Fair’s latest advertisement for “The New Establishment,” a list of “50 Titans Disrupting Media, Technology, and Culture,” the century-old magazine’s annual mash-note to the rich and powerful and self-satisfied. These disrupters innovate technologies, set the trends, define the limits of acceptable conversation in culture and politics and society, and pour money into the network of liberal foundations and Democratic campaigns around which our world is increasingly organized. They are the winners in the cognitive lottery that is the New Economy, the men...

PBS's Tavis Smiley made a comment Thursday that every African-American as well as liberal media member should sit up and take notice. Appearing on Fox News's Hannity, Smiley said, "The data is going to indicate sadly that when the Obama administration is over, black people will have lost ground in every single leading economic indicator category" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

A combination of budget cuts and escalating compensation costs will reduce the U.S. military’s fighting forces by at least 50 percent by 2021 and threaten national security, according to a report released Friday. The report by the Bipartisan Policy Center also said that the nearly $1 trillion in defense funding reductions over the next decade, known as the sequester, would cripple the readiness and modernization of military forces. The report pushed back against the notion that the sequester cuts have not been as debilitating as originally thought and actually helped to curb the nation’s mounting debt. While the cuts...

ORLANDO, Fla. — As if it's not hard enough applying for jobs, some businesses are now asking potential hires to hand over their Facebook and Twitter passwords so they can look through them before they're hired. But Sen. Jeff Clemens of Lake Worth wants to stop that, and Channel 9's Racquel Asa learned how the proposed bill could help job candidates. Tammy McCary is back in the job market after losing her job eight months ago. She said she's all for a law that prevents a potential employer from asking her for her Facebook information. "It's my personal life and...

President Obama seemed to go comparison-shopping on Friday as he met with Senate Republicans to discuss their proposals for ending the government shutdown and raising the debt ceiling. Obama did most of the talking but also took questions from GOP senators who rode buses down Pennsylvania Avenue to meet on the president’s turf. The Republican senators used their time to try to eke out details of the bargaining that had happened the previous evening between Obama and House negotiators. GOP senators are pushing their own plans to open the government and raise the debt ceiling. “We tried to find out...

[with AUDIO] House Republicans wouldn’t accept a bad deal on the government shutdown and the pending federal debt ceiling negotiations from President Barack Obama, House Rules Committee chairman Texas Republican Rep. Pete Sessions announced. “I will tell you we will not back down, but there is much, much that we must understand about what is out there and how to accomplish it,” Sessions said on an interview set to air on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show on Friday night. Hewitt asked Sessions about the possibility of a deal made by the first of the month to ensure the government fulfills certain...

In another sign Michigan’s economy is on the rebound, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis updated its reporting on the state's personal income growth over the past few years and found that Michigan's residents made billions more than previously stated. The release showed that personal income in Michigan increased by 3.1 percent in the second quarter of 2013 from the second quarter of 2012, growing the 8th most among the states. The top six states for growth were right-to-work states (see image nearby). Revisions to personal income. Michigan's 2010, 2011, and 2012 personal income has been restated upwards by 2.3...

Political Director of ABC News, Rick Klein pleaded with investors today to tank the stock market in order to “shake things loose” in the GOP ranks. In his ABC’s The Note piece today, Klein seriously proposed a stock sell-off designed for the express purpose of breaking the will of Republicans. When does Wall Street cast its vote? Bipartisan meetings are nice, and new plans that depend on the other side budging certainly can’t hurt at this stage of a standoff. But there may be only one way to jolt the system: SELL. Klein’s rationale: recent talks with beltway strategists suggest the GOP is...

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius had a front-row view of the problems plaguing the website that the government established to allow people to shop for health insurance under Obamacare. Sebelius and Steelers Chairman Dan Rooney were at an enrollment and education event on Thursday at Heinz Field to promote Healthcare.gov, but people who showed up encountered problems in signing up for coverage on the website. Unable to handle heavy online traffic and riddled with technical glitches, the website has been a source of criticism of the Obama administration and the new Affordable Care Act since its start on...

There is a misnomer about the “grassroots” on the right. (The misnomer is on the right and the grassroots is as well.) It goes something like this: Longtime congressmen and senators are in a D.C. bubble and out of touch with the grassroots. The authentic expression for those people can be found among talk show hosts (many of whom reside in either New York or Washington D.C.), certain D.C.-based Washington think tanks, and the most ferocious of the right-wing bloggers and TV talking heads. The problem: It isn’t true. Oh, and the latter group of people don’t really know what...

Senate Democrats say any short-term debt-limit increase should also reopen the government and may reject a House GOP proposal to extend the nation’s debt ceiling by a few weeks. [snip] Reid said he would proceed with his plan to push the expiration of the debt limit until Dec. 31, 2014. Reid has scheduled a Saturday vote on a motion to proceed to the 14-month debt-limit extension. It would, in effect, allow the administration to increase its borrowing authority by an estimated $1.1 trillion. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) panned the proposal. “The majority leader introduced legislation this week to...

Given how arcane the debt-limit debate can get, wouldn’t it help if we had responsible reporting? Today’s New York Times story by Jonathan Weisman, “Many in G.O.P. Offer Theory: Default Wouldn’t Be That Bad,” seems to get the definition of “default” wrong. Or at least isn’t understanding what the GOP congressman quoted are saying. Default, in the bond market, means missing a bond payment. If you haven’t read it yet, the article quotes various Republicans who are arguing that the government will indeed be able to meet its debt obligations, for some time at least, even if the debt-limit is...

From the summary of a new Goldman Sachs research note (this is a corrected version, which restates the potential GDP drop in the final point): – The federal government has been partially shut down for 4 days, and it appears likely that the situation could continue for a while longer. As the shutdown continues, the political focus has begun to shift to the next deadline: the Treasury expects to exhaust its borrowing capacity by October 17. We expect the Treasury’s cash balance to be depleted no later than October 31 and possibly quite a bit sooner. – After October 17,...

PHH Mortgage is laying off a third of its Jacksonville work force, cutting 365 positions by December. The move, of which employees were notified Thursday, leaves about 700 workers left on the First Coast. Most of those that are being laid off work in the mortgage origination department. They will received 60 days pay in lieu of notice, said Dico Akseraylian, vice president of communications for parent company PHH Corp. The move comes on the heels of Wells Fargo and Chase announcing layoffs in their mortgage department. PHH's reason for the cuts are similar to those of other industry players,...

Federal Reserve chair nominee Janet Yellen Wednesday suggested that she will put a renewed emphasis on “jobs” in her role as Chairwoman of the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank. President Obama nominated Yellen, a vice chairwoman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and former president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, to run the U.S. central bank Wednesday. If confirmed by the Senate, Yellen will become the first woman to run the Fed in its hundred-year history. Yellen is expected to accelerate the devaluation of the dollar by continuing or even expanding the...

Lawsuit reform is an issue that enjoys wide-ranging bipartisan support, with demonstrated appeal to advocates of small government and progressive government alike. All Americans have an interest in the fundamental rule of law and in the fair and justified treatment of participants in our economy. As lawsuit reform aims to pursue accurate justice, so it aims to keep the economy properly functioning. Oklahoma legislators recently voted in bipartisan majorities to reinstate more than two dozen lawsuit reforms that had previously been struck down on a technicality by the state supreme court. Alabama passed a key lawsuit reform with overwhelming majorities...

What has been Obama’s response to this new crisis? Obama told Wall Street that they should indeed be worried about the government shutdown. His Treasury Secretary, Jack Lew, has said that if the debt ceiling is breached, there would be catastrophic circumstances. “The sky is falling! The sky is falling!” Chicken Little Obama exclaimed. So, with the pending doom of the government shutdown and approaching debt ceiling, what did Obama do? He went golfing.

Public lands continue to draw attention in San Juan County. A series of public meetings in October will allow local residents to learn about several issues and make their voices heard. The US Fish and Wildlife Service has released an environmental assessment and an economic analysis of the Gunnision sage grouse proposals. ... Public comment on the studies will be accepted until October 19. It is expected that the US Fish and Wildlife Service will make a decision on designation by March 31, 2014. The federal agency is considering the designation of the sage grouse as an endangered species and...

.............For President Barack Obama, glitches involving his signature legislation are an unwelcome twist. A devoted smartphone user, his political campaigns were models of high-tech efficiency. Yet the problems that have surfaced so far with healthcare.gov don't even involve the site's more complicated functions. Allowing consumers to browse anonymously was one of the recommendations of Enroll UX 2014, a $3 million, 14-month project to design an optimal user experience for the insurance marketplaces. The well-known San Francisco design firm IDEO led the project and undertook extensive consumer interviews to create an easy-to-use site. "The first thing people said to us is,...

If you thought Republicans weren’t serious about a debt default, think again. While Democrats refuse to negotiate on the continuing resolution and the debt limit, apparently assuming the GOP will eventually cave, House Republicans insist they are prepared to bring borrowing authority to a screeching halt. “I can assure you it’s not posturing. It’s not a political play or anything like that,” Rep. Phil Gingrey, R-Ga., told CQ Roll Call on Tuesday. Gingrey said Republicans were “absolutely” prepared to lose the House to extract concessions on the CR and the debt limit, and he said the White House is “missing...

China as finally come out in very strong terms and told the U.S. to get its financial house in order. This is now in public. Their warning was straightforward as compared to previous warnings that were generally of the “read between the lines type.” They hold $1.3 trillion worth of treasuries and well over $3 trillion in dollar denominated assets. No matter what anyone says, China now has the ability to “pull our strings” in Washington. Without going any further I should add that I believe that they certainly will pull our strings AND pull the plug on this whole...

Maybe the rest of the world, the part that keeps loaning us money will see Republicans standing firm as a good thing! I sure do!Senator Obama had no trouble voting against raising the debt limit! He called the rising deficit a failure in presidential leadership! What's happened since he became president? Our national debt is more than two times what it was when he took office! Is that a failure in leadership? The Democrats are like spoiled kids. If they don't get their way they throw tantrums, yell and scream, threaten, and call you names! Sounds like a first grader!...

The Brayton Point Power Station, the largest coal-fired power plant in New England, is shutting down amid a prolonged slump in energy prices that is forcing power operators nationally to rejigger their budgets and seek out more affordable production strategies. The closure will result in 240 job losses at the Somerset, Mass.-based facility. Its owner, an affiliate of New Jersey-based private equity firm Energy Capital Partners, said in a statement that steps would be taken to mitigate the effects of the job cuts for Brayton Point’s former workers....

Just about everyone worries that Beijing, perturbed by the ongoing squabble in Washington, will sour on Treasuries. This concern is embedded in the provocative title of Eamonn Fingleton’s recent Forbes posting: “If Republicans Want to Shut Down Washington, They’ll Have to Ask China’s Permission First.” The Republicans in fact did not seek Beijing’s approval, and neither did Democrats. Are both sides making a mistake by not taking into account China’s “feelings,” as the Communist Party demands everyone do? It’s clear Chinese officials are watching closely. “The United States, the world’s sole superpower, has engaged in irresponsible spending for years,” observed...

"We apologize for the inconvenience. The marketplace is currently undergoing regularly scheduled maintenance andf will be back up Monday, 10/7/3013." That's the message New Yorkers received this weekened when they attempted to sign up for health insurance via the new online health exchange or marketplace, a key componenet of ObamaCare. ...

.............. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has said a clean continuing resolution doesn’t have the votes to pass the House. President Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Monday challenged Boehner to prove it by scheduling a vote. The Hill on Monday contacted the more than two dozen House Republicans who publicly favor, or who have said they would consider voting for, a clean bill. Not one said they would join forces with the Democrats. The Hill worked off a whip list that The Washington Post has compiled. Republican Reps. Mario Diaz-Balart (Fla.), Lou Barletta (Pa.), Frank LoBiondo (N.J.),...

This is the Weekly Investment & Finance Thread (Oct 7 - Oct. 11 edition)----  Trying to focus on the markets for today and each day and the economic news This is where you can exchange some investment opinions and advice If you see another FR economic thread you like and want to link to it here, please doPost your favorite economic site links. Your favorite economic blogs and precious metals blogs and sitesPing list -- on or off let me know here or via freep-mail. If I missed you then Freep-mail me I might ping you to other interesting economic threads a...

By refusing to negotiate the debt ceiling, the President has drawn another red line. Once again, he is in a tenuous box of his own making.Contrary to the myths presented by the President and his allies, consider the following:First, the President can prevent default on our debt and the disruption in the flow of critical entitlement via legislation. He has refused to sign it.Second, the debt ceiling has been referred to as the “nuclear” option, but it has nothing to do with the full faith and credit of the United States, which can be preserved regardless of the outcome of...

The traditional wood furniture industry has its share of problems. Faced with cheap plywood and chip wood that can be packed flat to ship inexpensively before assembly, furniture made of solid wood has become rarer and more expensive. 4 AXYZ founder and CEO Samir Shah has an idea. Instead of working with layers of cheap wood, he wants to work with layers of nice wood. And he’ll do it with 3D printing. “Effectively what you’re seeing is solid wood furniture is too expensive and quality is dropping. We have something that is not rocket science, even though it is patent...

Why can't we give Boehner a show of support? Will you call John Boehner and tell him we support him standing strong?

House Speaker John Boehner says he wasn't pulled into demanding concessions from Democrats to keep funding the government - he willingly joined with fellow Republicans. "I and my members decided that the threat of Obamacare and what was happening was so important that it was time for us to take a stand. And we took a stand," the Ohio Republican said Sunday on ABC's "This Week."....... "You've never seen a more dedicated group of people who are thoroughly concerned about the future of our country," he said of House Republicans. "It is time for us to stand and fight."