Free Republic

"Obamacare Enrollment Teams" give presentations on health insurance options and the Affordable Care Act, but are not actually affiliated with the government.Thirty or so attendees at St. Mary Primitive Baptist Church in Tallahassee, Fla., gathered on a recent evening to hear a presentation by the Obamacare Enrollment Team on their options to get insurance under the Affordable Care Act. "If anybody is interested in getting enrolled, we can get you enrolled tonight," they were told. Signs outside the church looked official: A familiar, large "O" with a blue outline, white center and three red stripes. But the presenters, Pastor H.B....

Soaring demand, a shortage of doctors and "toxic" overcrowding on hospital warns could make this the "worst winter yet" for NHS accident and emergency departments, a senior consultant has warned. Bernadette Garrihy, a member of the board of the College of Emergency Medicine, said doctors were concerned about their ability to provide "a safe and quality service" this winter and advised patients to only attend casualty departments "as a last resort." She said Government measures to ease the pressure on A&E amounted to "a drop in the ocean" and called for all parts of the NHS and social services to...

On Florida’s Atlantic Coast, some 200 or more local parents and activists have announced plans to show up at Tuesday’s Volusia County school board meeting to protest the public school use of a world history textbook that devotes a whole chapter to Islam but exactly zero chapters to any other religions.The textbook, called simply “World History,” contains a 32-page chapter fondly devoted to “Muslim Civilizations.” Sections include descriptions of the Koran, the growth of the Muslim empire and the Five Pillars of Islam.The planned protest will include a demand that students rip out the 32 pages of the Islam chapter...

Last night, working from an article in Politico called “Obamacare losers could pack political punch,” I wrote about the political backlash that likely will stem from millions of people losing their privately purchased health insurance plans thanks to Obamacare. Today, the Washington Post has a front page article on the same subject.The Politico piece is more informative because it presents survey data about those who purchase their own health insurance. But the Post article points to a huge looming problem with Obamacare — the fact that millions will not only lose their insurance, but may very well lose their doctor[s]...

Belafonte Called Koch Brothers 'White Supremacists' At De Blasio Event Voters in New York City will head to the polls Tuesday to elect the next mayor, and the contest has become heated with a new controversy on the eve of the election. Democrat Public Advocate Bill de Blasio has a nearly 40-point lead in the polls over Republican Joe Lhota. If de Blasio is elected, he would be the first Democrat elected mayor since 1989. As CBS 2 Political Reporter Marcia Kramer reported, the controversy stemmed from a speech on Sunday by activist, actor and musician Harry Belafonte at a...

A group of state senators will host three public meetings this week, including one in North Charleston, on proposed legislation that would nullify Obamacare in South Carolina. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that the Affordable Care Act is constitutional, but S.C. House Bill 3101, also called the “Freedom of Health Care Protection Act,” would make enforcing parts of it illegal in South Carolina regardless of the high court’s decision. The proposed bill argues that the Affordable Care Act has exceeded the scope of powers granted to the federal government by the Constitution. It would establish criminal and civil...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Haven't we been told, ladies and gentlemen, for years that Obamacare is literally a matter of life and death? It was. And yet it wasn't important enough to even test the website, not even once. It wasn't important enough to make sure they got it right. Isn't that peculiar? I mentioned Rahm Emanuel's brother, Ezekiel Emanuel. He was on Fox News Sunday yesterday. He said the individual insurance market is going away. Meaning, it's okay that Obamacare has made it impossible for insurance companies to continue to provide coverage for individuals, 'cause they're drying up anyway. But...

In a heartbreaking Wall Street Journal editorial, Edie Littlefield Sunby, a stage-four cancer survivor, details how ObamaCare cost her the health insurance Obama repeatedly promised she could keep, and how ObamaCare's alternative plans don't cover the doctors and facilities that have kept her alive. In response to her story, White House spokesman Dan Pfeiffer fired off a dismissive tweet that basically blames her for picking the wrong insurance: Dan Pfeiffer ✔ @pfeiffer44 The Real Reason That The Cancer Patient Writing In Today’s Wall Street Journal Lost Her Insurance http://thkpr.gs/1hHgZjp via @TPHealth The Real Reason That The Cancer Patient Writing In...

It’s a welfare fraud scheme costing U.S. taxpayers $750 million a year. People are illegally selling their electronic food stamp cards on Craigslist and other social media sites for cash. CBS13 found two people here in Sacramento, both with the same idea, using Craigslist as free advertising to blatantly and illegally sell their state benefits. Our hidden cameras were rolling as a woman, who we’ll call Lorie, told our undercover producer about her brilliant idea to game the system for a quick buck. “Everyone said I was crazy, but I thought they’d say, ‘that’s freaking brilliant, man,’ ” she said....

http://www.lp.org/candidates/liberty-candidates-13/ken-kaplan Ken Kaplan for Governor of New Jersey

CBS News) WASHINGTON -- The health care website went down again Monday for an hour and a half, and no one is sure why. It's being taken offline on purpose every night from 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. for repairs. Millions are still having trouble buying insurance on it, and it turns out that even when the website works, it may not be secure enough to protect privacy. As HealthCare.gov was being developed, crucial tests to ensure the security and privacy of customer information fell behind schedule. CBS News analysis found that the deadline for final security plans slipped three...

Nov 4 (Reuters) - A retired top U.S. Air Force general on Monday said South Korea will need Boeing Co F-15 fighter jets in the short term since Lockheed Martin Corp's F-35 will not be able to carry a full load of weapons until after South Korea needs to replace its aging F-4 and F-5 fighters. Ron Fogleman, who works as a consultant to Boeing and also heads the board of Alliant Techsystems Inc, a big F-35 supplier, said South Korea would eventually need some F-35s, with their greater "stealth" or ability to evade enemy radar. But Boeing's F-15 offered...

Three years ago, wooden toy wholesaler Yutaka Katayama picked up a camera and started taking pictures of ordinary life in Kyōto, Japan. Since then photography has become an obsession. "It's my life's work," he wrote over email. Katayama has taken thousands of pictures of the legendary ancient city that once was the imperial capital of Japan. He has also found a favorite theme: the stray cats that are found all over Kyoto. "I feel the strength to live from a stray cat," Katayama wrote. "They seem to live a quiet life always looking for food and a place to live...

Disasters happen. From Hurricane Sandy, Irene, Andrew and Katrina to the devastating Japanese earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown, disasters strike without warning and the aftermath can be as devastating as the event. During an emergency, water supplies are often contaminated and disrupted, sometimes for an extended period of time. Without a safe supply of drinking water, healthy people who could otherwise provide for their family can become severely ill within days. At greater risk are children and infants. People take safe drinking water for granted. They don’t think about their water supplies, nor do they think about the vulnerability of...

November 5, 2013 Tuesday of the Thirty-first Week in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Rom 12:5-16ab Brothers and sisters:We, though many, are one Body in Christand individually parts of one another.Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us,let us exercise them:if prophecy, in proportion to the faith;if ministry, in ministering;if one is a teacher, in teaching;if one exhorts, in exhortation;if one contributes, in generosity;if one is over others, with diligence;if one does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness. Let love be sincere;hate what is evil,hold on to what is good;love one another with mutual affection;anticipate one...

The chill seemed to begin to thaw for some in 2004 when Mouw introduced Ravi Zacharias at the LDS Church's Salt Lake Tabernacle. Mouw spoke for seven minutes and apologized for evangelicals who had "misrepresented the faith and belief of Latter-day Saints." "Let me state it clearly," Mouw said. "We evangelicals have sinned against you." Mouw didn't flinch despite criticism of the apology by other evangelicals and published a book last year titled "Talking with Mormons: An Invitation to Evangelicals." He practices “convicted civility,” which he says is different from what he calls the “ ‘anything-goes’ compromised relativism so popular...

Chutzpah. I believe that's the word for it. Just days after learning the Americans have been tapping her phones and taping her conversations, Angela Merkel has been publicly upbraided by the U.S. Treasury for being a bad global citizen. What did she do to deserve this? Merkel just won a third term as chancellor with a record vote and has an approval rating near 80 percent. But she is a bad global citizen because Germany is running the world's largest trade surplus. The Washington Post thinks the Treasury's tongue-lashing is overdue, as does Paul Krugman of the New York Times:...

[Video link]While most funerals are a sad event, some choose to celebrate the end of their loved one’s life and accomplishments, with music and dance. In most countries, a funeral is a somber affair. People are sad about the loss of their loved one, and nobody likes to say goodbye to their friends and loved ones for the last time.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which runs the federal government’s major health-care programs as well as the Obamacare insurance exchange, spent $1,113,178,000,000 in fiscal 2013, according to the Monthly Treasury Statement for September, which was released last week. That sets a record for the most money ever spent by a federal agency or department in a single year. It also means CMS spent more in inflation-adjusted dollars than the entire federal government spent in 1965, when President Lyndon Johnson signed the legislation creating the Medicaid and Medicare programs. …

Meet Yolanda Vestal – average conservative American single mom… Yolanda’s un-thank you note to Barack Hussein Obama has gone viral and made her an overnight champion of America’s middle class and working poor. Ms. Vestal told Obama she believes his push for Obamacare and countless lavish taxpayer-funded vacations reveal just how distant he really is from the people he campaigned to help. Here’s the letter millions of Americans are reading right now: Dear President Obama, I wanted to take a moment to say thank you for all you have done and are doing. You see, I am a single Mom...