Obamacare Schadenfreude For The Most Depressing Day of the Year

According to this article (it's a British tabloid, so it has a better chance of  being right than the New York Times, right?), which I swiped from last night's Overnight Thread at Ace's, the Monday of the first full week week of work following New Year's is the most depressing day of the year:

But over the past three years, researchers analysed more than 2million tweets posted by Britons in January looking for negative language and phrases indicating a drop in mood.

They found that today, there will be nearly five times the average number of tweets relating to guilt, as people abandon their promises to pursue a healthier lifestyle.

The analysis, by drinks company Upbeat, also found complaints about the weather will be six times higher than usual – and men will feel more miserable than women.

Today has also been dubbed Divorce Monday by legal experts. It is the most popular day of the year for starting divorce proceedings. And January is the busiest divorce month, with twice as many divorces being filed as the second most popular month September.

Seems about right to me; maybe that's why I couldn't find the motivation to post anything yesterday other than the 6 AM eye opener and the Obamacare Schadenfreude post du jour.

The weather certainly is depressing here, a dull, rainy day, expected to turn snowy, and then frigid later resulting in the worst possible road conditions, at least temporarily. Now, onto today's litany of Obamcare Schadenfreude:

By way of Ann Althouse, unindicted felon David Gregorie's nipple verbal slip:

David Gregory, in a word choice he immediately regrets, speaks of Obamacare unraveling. This was on "Meet the Press" this morning, at the end of an interview with a couple doctors (the delightfully named John Noseworthy of the Mayo Clinic and Toby Cosgrove of the Cleveland Clinic):

Thank you both for helping us get beyond the debates about Obamacare. I’d love to have you back and as this thing un-- unravels over the course of the year- - not unravels in a bad way -- but continues to roll out over the course of this year…

But you can hear what he's thinking behind the mask of support.

Jim Geraghty discusses the Obamacare chaos on Fox: 50 Shades of Chaos



Let it not be said though that I dwell only on the negative aspects of the Obamacare rollout; there are those who see it through rose colored glasses:

Will Obamacare Enrollments Surprise the Dissenters?

It's been an unbelievably ugly start for Obamacare, which, according to the Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, is setting a signup target of 7 million individuals by the mid-March coverage cutoff date. Between the countless technical glitches associated with the federally run Healthcare.gov, and a number of ongoing state-run health exchange issues, less than 365,000 people had fully enrolled for health insurance through the first two months of the health marketplaces being open.

But are expectations now so low that they're primed to be toppled? That very well could be the case!

According to statistics from The Washington Post, last-minute sign-ups for Obamacare's twice-delayed Dec. 24 coverage cutoff date surged in three reporting states. California estimated that 27,000 people fully enrolled for insurance on Monday, which follows 29,000 sign-ups the prior Friday. The Washington Post notes that California had averaged 15,000 signups per day over the previous week. Washington state also estimates that between Friday and Monday roughly 20,000 people fully enrolled for health insurance. Finally, New York estimated that it had roughly 20,000 people sign up on Monday.

Although these three states (which are all state-run exchanges) are just a limited subset of data leading into the coverage cutoff date for Jan. 1 coverage, which has now come and gone, it could portend that enrollments handily outpaced significantly lowered expectations.

It may not be quite as awful as the worst case scenario!  Victory!

Mean old Senator Cornyn is still picking on the poor little old Administration for keeping their jackboots on the necks of the Little Sisters of the Poor.

Sen. Cornyn: ‘Mandate-happy’ White House trying to silence nuns

An interesting approach to an article in which the Administration and Planned Parenthood's answer to the issue are presented ahead of Corny's statement which forms the basis of the articles title:

Cornyn countered Saturday that the administration’s push against the stay was an overt effort “to silence a group of nuns” who object to the provision.

“It’s an absurd new low for this mandate-happy Administration and an unacceptable affront to religious freedoms and fidelity,” the Texas Republican said in a scathing statement. “We should be concerned about the lengths President Obama will go to force his government-knows-best agenda on the American people.”

Cornyn, a former Texas attorney general and Texas Supreme Court justice, faces a primary challenge next year from Rep. Steve Stockman (R-Texas).

The implication being, I suppose that if the nasty, short sighted, anti-American Tea Party wasn't pushing him, he would look the other way against the religious persecution?  It's possible.

Shockingly, this morning's Washington Post points out a new bug "feature" of Obamacare that I hadn't heard of until today:  Churning between Medicaid and exchanges could leave gaps in coverage

In 2014, millions of people are expected to shift between the health exchanges and Medicaid as their income fluctuates. That could be costly for states and insurance companies, and patients could wind up having gaps in coverage or having to switch health plans or doctors.

The process — called “churning” — is common in Medicaid, the state-federal program for the poor and disabled. Typically, people lose Medicaid eligibility after their income spikes temporarily, such as when they get a seasonal job or pick up extra hours at certain times of the year. They re-enroll when their income drops.

Until now, people who churn out of Medicaid because of an income bump often wound up uninsured because they cannot afford private insurance. Starting this month under the Affordable Care Act, many will become eligible for insurance and subsidies through the exchanges.

But experts warn that churning will continue to be a problem as patients bounce between Medicaid and the exchanges. Patients in an exchange plan may end up in a Medicaid managed-care plan run by another company, with different doctors, or vice versa.

And the system has been so quick to respond to the requirement that people sign up...

Glen Kessler, The Washington Post's Fact Checker Spinner, in a transparent effort to make for having given the administration a couple of Pinocchios for claiming that their target for Obamacare enrollment had never been 7 million, gave the Daily Caller and John Boehner a balancing two Pinocchio's for stating that it's now official that Obamacare has led to more people losing insurance than regaining it:

..This is one of those cases where the exact phrasing could make a big difference in the Pinocchio rating. The Daily Caller article by itself would merit Four Pinocchios, while the actual phrasing of Boehner’s tweet is technically correct but a misleading accounting of apples and oranges. In linking to an obviously mistaken article, Boehner compounds any misunderstandings about the point of his tweet.

Moreover, it is worth remembering the enrollment period is only at the halfway point, so the data are incomplete. If Republicans are trying to claim that more people lost private insurance than gained it under Obamacare, the jury is still out and the verdict won’t be in until April 1.

So Glen is giving two Pinocchios to Boehner for telling the exact truth, while he rationalizes the Pinocchio's for Boehner by demanding that it forsee the future. I give Kessler three Pinocchios for " Significant factual error and/or obvious contradictions."

And finally, Republicans continue to wield Obamacare as a might stick against vulnerable democrats:

Tillis ties Hagan to Obama in first ad

"Kay Hagan enabled President Obama's worst ideas. She refuses to clean up his mess, so you and I have to clean up hers," Tillis says in the spot.

Polling shows Obama's weakened position could hurt Hagan in the state. An early December automated poll by the North Carolina-based Democratic firm Public Policy Polling found his approval rating had dropped to 44 percent, with 55 percent disapproving. In that poll, Hagan had a narrow 2-point lead on Tillis, who was unknown by most voters.

Hagan's support of ObamaCare has been a focus of the attacks against her. Tillis joins in, ripping the law as a "disaster," and knocks politicians of both parties for failing to rein in the national debt.

And now, I must go back to my breakfast of Kaboom and Postum...