18 thoughts on “Monday Open Thread”

1. This is interesting:

   Despite an espionage and surveillance effort unparalleled in history, the US NSA has been unable to produce any convincing evidence of stopping even one domestic terror plot. Its best case was someone alleged to have sent a few thousand dollars to Al Shabab in Somalia. The NSA not only missed actual terror plotters like those in Boston, but also performed poorly relative to ordinary police methods which have produced numerous convictions (many of them admittedly, by methods that verge on entrapment).

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   1. Linkie? Would like to know the source. 

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      1. The "this is interesting" is the link

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         1. Oops. I should have caught that. Was looking in the body of the comment or below. thanks.

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   2. Yes. However, I believe nothing about, of or from the NSA.  Even their "budget."  It's all misinformation and misdirection.  Well intentioned, mostly, I am sure. But still never really true.

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   3. It's always been the case that pretty much everybody with the capacity spies on everybody else, including allies, and everybody knows it. When spying on friends is publicized the "injured" party is forced to do the I'm shocked and outraged dance for domestic public consumption even though they know perfectly well that it's a matter of routine and they do it too. I've always thought it would be a lot cheaper and less potentially embarrassing if allied governments just sent each other the info and cut out the expensive spy agency middlemen. 

      But it's such a huge part of how diplomacy works; maintaining polite face saving fictions that all parties know to be fictitious. Look at all those years international officials were supposed to pretend that nobody knew Israel had the bomb when it was such common knowledge everybody knew about it. Israeli tour guides and American tourists were joking about it to each other back in the early 70s. 

       

      I suppose we still don't "officially" know but nobody even bothers to pretend not to know anymore.  In the age of the internet these polite fictions are so much more blatantly pointless the old dances hardly seem worth the bother. Maybe it's time diplomacy dropped conventions that have been out-dated since long before the close of the 20th century.

       

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2. Tried to post about Obamacare but got an error each time. Interesting…

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   1. What's the error? As of now, we are not censoring any comments about Obamacare, or for that matter any subject.

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      1. False Flag op leftist collectivists trying to squelch freedom-lovin' DavidThi to censor tepid commentary… 

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      2. Still fails. I emailed it to askalva.

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         1. Still fails. I emailed it to askalva.

            doesn't matter, David….

            God is on our side…..

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   2. Here I am posting something about ACA:

      CNN has a very interesting new poll that not only debunks the notion that Americans have already decided Obamacare is a failure, but also reveals that Americans overwhelmingly oppose the GOP's conservative critique of the health care law.

      According to the poll (pdf), which surveyed American adults between Nov. 18-20 with a margin of error of ±3.5 points:

      1. Most Americans believe Obamacare's current problems will be solved. 54 percent say they believe current problems will be fixed, compared with 43 percent who say they won't be.
      2. Most Americans believe it's too early to judge whether Obamacare is a success or failure. A total of 53 percent think it is too early to say whether Obamacare is a success or failure. A total of 39 percent think it's a failure and 8 percent already think it is a success.
      3. Most Americans do not support conservative critiques of Obamacare. According to the poll, 41 percent of Americans think Obamacare is too liberal, slightly more than 40 percent who support Obamacare. But 14 percent think it's not liberal enough.

      As you might expect, the poll's crosstabs show that most Republicans are certain Obamacare can't be fixed and has already failed, but outside of the GOP universe, people aren't merely open to Obamacare, they are optimistic about its prospects and want it to work.

       http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/11/27/1258749/-New-poll-Americans-optimistic-about-Obamacare-overwhelmingly-oppose-GOP-position?detail=email#

      They include the caveat that if the site continues to fail them, people's attitude's will almost certainly change.

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3. Testing. 

   What's up with Obamacare and the site improvements?

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   1. Go ahead and try again, David. 

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4. Great…now I'm going to get some personhood supporters throwing this quote back at me. 🙁

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   1. poor Elliot, doesn't understand that these are long hard slogs. When dealing with tea baggers and Republicans who create disunity and disharmony only in effort to gain power it is even worse than if there is a genuine controversy

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5. After a lot of attempts (10 at least) I finally was able to successfully navigate the circlejerk of Connectforhealth and on Thanksgiving day enrolled. Just confirmed with the 855 #. They inform me that I will not receive anything fro my new insurer uintil mid-month but confirmed that I am enrolled. This though upon enrollment the website said I'd receive an email "shortly"

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   1. It sees ipossible to compare apples in the new health care coverage because mush of what one had to pay for prevviously is now mine at no additional cost. Premium 48% less though deductible higher and co-pay higher. But, 2/3 of my  Dr visits will have NO co-pay because they are preventative. Thank you Dems of the '09 Congress and President Obama

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