I have two stories from our local paper today
First of all, since it's the last day to sign up for ObamaCare I'd like to let you know what I read today about it in my local paper. Our local paper has some local news but then uses national writers to fill out the rest of it's whopping six pages.
The article was written by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar of the Associated Press and titled " "Health law legacy eludes Obama as changes sink in." (I used to respect the AP, but no longer once it became just another corporate hack news organization.)
Before I write about what Ricardo said, I'd like to bring up two points regarding ObamaCare I heard over the weekend.
1) Rick Scott, the Governor of Florida who won't allow Medicaid expansion in his state said, "300,000 people lost health insurance under ObamaCare." Is that right? How many millions of low-income and impoverished people are not being allowed to get Medicaid Rick? Rick Scott is an ass BTW.
2) Rick Santorum said people who signed up for ObamaCare are lazy dead beats. Is that right? He also said in the not too distant past that ObamaCare is like Apartheid. Is that right? Rick Santorum is an ass BTW.
OK, Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar (hummm, all these guys are named Rick or Ricardo) made these points about ObamaCare in his article:
1) Major elements of the Affordable Care Act face an uncertain future because "consumers are unaccustomed to dealing with insurance jargon." (this is a super weak made-up point which proves absolutely nothing). Man, folks must be stupid then because when you go to Healthcare.gov you are asked easy to answer questions about yourself and your yearly income. How does this create an uncertain future for ObamaCare?
2) "The new insurance markets are anything but customer friendly" What the hell is he talking about? Getting a health insurance policy via ObamaCare was far, far easier than getting any policy I bought before. Frankly it was so super easy to do that I was concerned I missed something. Perhaps he was alluding to the problems month's ago with the interface.
3) "Nearly half the states are opposed to ObamaCare or won't expand Medicaid" Ricardo then goes on to say "all these low-income people would otherwise have insurance" if not for ObamaCare (No Ricardo, you are a liar. These people did not have insurance because they didn't qualify before. Now they can't get insurance, even though they qualify, because the politicians in the states they live in won't expand Medicaid. Like that has anything to do with the ACA. It has to do with Republican legislatures and Governors period).
4) "It is not known how many people who got ObamaCare were not insured before." (What does this made-up point of contention have to do with ObamaCare being some sort of disaster?)
BTW, this chart below shows you what we now have. Our prior yearly deductible was $11,000. And does anyone have any problem NOT understanding all the "insurance jargon" in the chart below? I didn't think so. That's all the "insurance jargon" there is anymore. No longer do you have to figure out what is covered, what isn't covered or what's kinda covered sorta because there are no more restrictions or pre-existing conditions on health insurance policies!
OK, when I read articles that are negative about ObamaCare, the writer always seems to come up with silly, weak, meaningless points or just kinda lie. I'm certain there will be tons more made-up reasons attacking ObamaCare being a total failure and disaster as we move into the fall voting season.
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The second article I want to bring up is about the water shortage in California. It centered on farmers in the central valley who are having to drill wells deeper into the aquafers to get water. It turns out California aquafers have experienced a net loss of 800,000,000,000 gallons of water each year for the past 3 years. Farmers in the southern part of the state have gotten rid of annual crops because the law says "permanent crops" get water before annual crops. So they plant almond trees and the like which then need to be watered year round. These farmers planting stuff that requires tons of water year round obviously has made matters worse.
The chart below shows the California drought. The red areas are classified as "Extreme Drought" areas. The dark red areas are classified as "Exceptional Drought" areas, which is the worst possible designation.
To grow one single almond takes over 1 gallon of water (that's nucking futs!) But wait, that's up here in Butte County where I live. To grow one single almond in the San Joaquin Valley takes over 4 gallons of water (that's even nucking futsier!)
So the ground water gets sucked from underground and the land sinks by as much as more than a foot each year. Why is that bad? Because aquafers are layers of water between layers of clay. As the land sinks the clay layers become compacted down. When that happens new water can't get down through the clay to replenish the aquafer when it does rain. The article states the aquifers at these points is then done for good. So the farmers sucking out more and more water at higher and higher rates just exasperates the problem.
All rather intense stuff. The richest farmers are drilling down as much as 1,200 feet to get water (one well of that depth can cost $600,000). They admit by doing so they are harming farmers nearby by sucking their water away from them (I drink your milkshake), but they don't care because "it's a dog eat dog world." There will be more and more farms that go bust do to having no more water caused by the actions of the richest farmers.
This situation is being made worse and worse by farmers drilling deeper into the aquafer which is 500 feet lower than it was a few years ago. This is known as a "positive feedback loop." All positive feedback loops are destructive as they always make the problem worse and worse.
Of course the real problem according to the farmers in the article is "environmentalists, people in cites and fish." They blame the government and regulations (though these wells aren't regulated currently at all. Right now the law says, "well-drilling is a private property right.") A fifth generation farmer, who's great, great granddad had the largest cattle farm in all of California at the end of the 1800's says he hates regulation but he's becoming more pissed off at his neighbors drilling wells deeper because it is sinking his land which breaks his pipes that brings irrigation water to his ranch.
I think we will have fights in the near future between farmers for water. Up until now they have been fighting against anyone who isn't a farmer for water. The latest report says that Climate Change has affected every single continent. Here in California things are certainly showing this to be true. I wonder how long it will be before food shortages become a significant problem?
What would you like to talk about? Got any local news?
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