The Republican Party has apparently decided that they really want to have a big public fight with President Obama over whether or not employers with connections to religious institutions should be required to provide birth control as part of their employees’ health insurance. The GOP is acting like they believe the issue is a political [...]

I know that because of the large percentage of federal employees, lobbyists and other factors about the nature of government contracting that the District of Columbia isn’t nearly as susceptible to an economic downturn as the rest of the country. But I still find these numbers from Gallup on economic confidence shocking. According to their [...]

Some Connecticut legislators are seriously looking into creating a Basic Health Plan for people who make between 133 and 200 percent of the federal poverty level, instead of forcing them to use the new private health insurance exchanges. From CT News Junkie: Over the next few months the legislature will have to tackle some tough [...]

Health care policy expert Ezekiel Emanuel, brother of former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, makes the bold prediction in the New York Times that in just eight years the health insurance industry will be extinct in America. He claims it will be replaced by accountable care organizations, or ACOs. Emanuel’s description of how [...]

On the front of Politico is an article about how the big bipartisan deals that used to be relatively common in Congress now appear to be a thing of the past. From Politico: Call it the Split the Difference Scenario — a dream of Washington at its civic-minded best that has flourished for decades, even [...]

President Obama came into office promising a new age of cooperation and an end to partisan division. That promise has been an absolute and complete failure. According to Gallup Obama has been a historically polarizing figure in his three years in office, with a massive gap between his support from Republican and Democrats. By a [...]

In addition to the individual mandate being extremely unpopular, opinions about the entire Affordable Care Act have remained negative and been trending downward. The Kaiser Family Foundation poll found 44 percent view the law unfavorably while just 37 percent now view it favorably. From Kaiser: While the trend is very slight and not perfect, looking [...]

Even after almost two years since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, the individual mandate continues to be as unpopular as always. An overwhelming 2/3rds of the county holds an unfavorable view of the mandate and the majority thinks the Supreme Court should strike it down. From Kaiser Family Foundation poll: As for the [...]

I’m of two minds about President Obama’s shout out for Senate rules reform in his State of the Union speech. I’m glad he brought attention to the need for reform, but mostly I’m very disappointed with what he chose to call for. From the State of the Union: Some of what’s broken has to do [...]

The organization Reporters Without Borders conducts an annual ranking comparing each nation’s level of press freedom, and they’ve just dropped the U.S. rating by 27 places. The dramatic drop came as a result of the many arrests and efforts to harass reporters trying to cover the Occupy movement and the police raids of Occupy encampments.  [...]