Scoring the 6 Major Provisions of ObamaCare

There are literally hundreds of provision contained within the ten titles that make up the 2700 plus pages of President Obama’s namesake healthcare law, most of which nobody has ever heard of or even read, including many of the Democratic Lawmakers responsible for the law’s passage.

Of the many provisions that make up the ObamaCare law, there are six that specifically pertain to the delivery of healthcare to new, as in the pool of this nation’s long term uninsured, customers which of course is the primary objective of ObamaCare.  So let’s take a look at these six provision and see just how much of a bang we the people are getting for all our bucks that are finances this behemoth healthcare legislation. 

Following is a short description of each of the provisions and a brief look at the effectiveness of each compared to the goals they were set to achieve.  From this we will score each provision as either a success or a failure.


#1 Guaranteed Issue

Guaranteed issue is the provision in the ObamaCare law which prevents insurers from discriminating against an individual who suffers from a high risk/high cost medical condition.  No longer are insurers able to ask for a person’s medical history and use that information to rate a plan or deny coverage.

The guaranteed issue provision went in to effect shortly after ObamaCare was passed in to law.  It would not be until 2014 however, that individuals would be able to purchase a qualified healthcare plan through one of the health insurance exchanges.  As a stop gap, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) put the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan (PCIP) provision in place.

In the creation of the PCIP stop gap provision HHS projected that 375,000 individuals, suffering from a high risk/high cost pre-existing condition, would enroll on the plan.  But sadly, at its peak, only 135,000 chose to participate.  One of the primary reasons for the low enrollment was cost!  Over the next two years PCIP rates were reduced by 20% yet there was a continued decline in the programs enrollment.  By the time the health insurance exchanges rolled out, PCIP participation had dropped to roughly 108,000.

Low enrollment was not the only issue the PCIP provision faced.  The cost to operate the program also became a major issued as HHS grossly underestimated the make-up of the risk pool which consisted mainly of those with very costly conditions such as advanced heart disease and cancer.  The low enrollment issue in many was the saving grace for the PCIP provision as the 240,000 enrollment shortfall helped to offset the 250% error on cost projection and funding for the program.  In fear of running the plan out of money, in February of 2013 HHS terminated new PCIP enrollment however, this was likely an unnecessary precaution as participation was well on the decline.  At about the same time, HHS shifted more of the cost back to the customer in the way of higher premiums and out-of-pocket responsibilities.

And last, when it came time for those participated on the PCIP program to select a qualified healthcare plan and transfer over to the health insurance exchanges, only 80,000 did so over the 6 month initial open enrollment period and three granted extension periods.

When the closing bell ran, ending the PCIP program, there was a 41% loss in participation from the provisions peak to the number of those that transfer to a qualified healthcare plan through the health insurance exchanges.  That’s right, for a large percentage of those with a high risk/high cost pre-existing healthcare issue, they still found insurance too costly to purchase.  And with the price of the insurance plans having increased in 2015 and will again in 2016, it is not likely that the number of those with a pre-existing condition and still without healthcare insurance will improved any.

Considering all the shortcomings of the PCIP stop gap provision, (the low transfer rate to the health insurance exchanges and the continued rise in program cost) I don't think anyone can argue against the fact that the Guaranteed Issue provision of the ObamaCare law has fallen grossly short of its intended goal of bringing healthcare to those with a high cost/high risk pre-existing medical condition.  It is because of these factors that we can, without hesitation, score the Guaranteed Issue provision as a complete and utter FAILURE.


#2 Minimum Standard

The minimum standard is the provision of ObamaCare to which without, the law could not exist. 

Each and every healthcare plan sold, be it through an employer provided group plan; an individual plan purchased through the health insurance exchanges or a plan purchased directly from the private insurance marketplace must meet a certain minimum standard of coverage.  Labeled as the “essential health benefits” (EHB) package, the answer as to what the purpose is of this package depends on who you ask.

For those who crafted the law and its staunch proponents, the story goes that the EHB brings a higher quality of healthcare to each individual, this by making it mandatory for healthcare providers to give FREE care away as well as being sure that every form of care that could ever be needed is included in your healthcare plan.

Of course, there is a cost associated with all those “extras” in a healthcare plan which often raises the question as to why a male adult would need child dental coverage or why a women of post-child baring age would need pre-natal care coverage.  The list of unusable essential benefits goes on and on and leads us to the real purpose of minimum standard and EHB.

It would be wonderful to think that the crafters of ObamaCare bundled all the EHBs together in the best interest of all Americans but the reality is the EHB package, created to meet the minimum standard, only exists as a means to create the revenue stream needed to cover other obligations of the healthcare law, primarily the guaranteed issue.  Now that insurers are no longer able to discriminate nor charge more for those with a pre-exiting condition, they needed a new revenue stream to pick up these costs. 

The administration’s idea was to model individual healthcare plans similar to those offered to employer based, large group plans which already bundled most if not all of what was now being mandated in the EHB packages.  The problem with this approach was however, the fact that the employer based plans cover a pool nearly six times as large as the pool which participated on the individual market, thus giving the employer based plans a significantly larger universe to spread costs over.  Prior to ObamaCare, it was the insurer’s ability to offer an individual a plan, more tailored to their specific needs, that leveled the playing field and kept individual and employer provided policy costs on a parallel with one another.  With this leveling mechanism taken away from insurers, the cost of individual plans had no place to go but up and up they went, substantially.

The minimum standard provision does accomplish it objective.  However, it cannot be ignored that the Obama Administration’s intentional misrepresentation this provision as being a consumer benefit rather than the new revenue stream it actually is and for this we will have to score the Minimum Standard provision a FAILURE.


#3 Individual Mandate

With the potential to affect 25 million uninsured individuals, some would say that the individual mandate is the single most important provision of ObamaCare.

Under the individual mandate provision, everyone is now required to have healthcare insurance, with few exceptions.  For those who are not provided healthcare insurance through their employer or through a government program, they are now required to purchase their own healthcare insurance or pay a tax penalty each year which they are not in compliance of the mandate.

The logic behind the individual mandate is simple and maybe a bit naive.  The hope is that the bulk of those 25 million long term uninsured will be incented to obtain healthcare insurance now that it is federally mandated to do so and also to avoid facing a subsequent tax penalty they would incur for non-compliance.

As it turns out, the federal mandate to have healthcare insurance nor the tax penalty for non-compliance seem to have had much of an effect in incenting those 25 million uninsured to purchase a healthcare plan.  After two open enrollment periods, totaling nine months in length, the number of American’s non-elderly, long term uninsured decrease by a mere 3 million.  This equates to about a 70% shortfall from the administrations 2015 enrollment projection.

There are several reason for the lack of participation by these 25 million uninsured Americans, the largest continuing to be cost.  Despite all the campaign rhetoric and promises of lower premiums, the cost of healthcare insurance for individuals is significantly higher now than prior to the passage of ObamaCare.  Individual plan rates increased between 40 and 100 percent even before the mandate kicked in in January of 2014.  Since that time premiums have continued to rise, pricing many more out of healthcare insurance before they ever obtained it.  For the young and healthy this was especially true as, in the structuring of the insurance rates, they were burdened with the lion’s share of the load.

Even with subsidies (which we will discuss in a moment), most of the uninsured seem to find the cost of purchasing healthcare insurance too great a burden on their household finances.  For other, the cost still remains too high to make healthcare insurance obtainable.

There is a bit of irony to the individual mandate as well.  For those that followed the 2008 battle for the Democratic presidential nomination, you may recall the bitter swipes between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama over the differences in their healthcare plans.  Then Senator Obama strongly opposed the individual mandate, a key component of HillaryCare 2.0.  Obama made many public statements condemning the mandate, calling it a government overreach that it takes away American freedoms.  It was not until after now President Obama was told by his team that without the individual mandate they would never gain enough democratic support to pass a healthcare bill that the president fell head over heals in love with the idea of the individual mandate.

It is for this telling bit of irony and the failure to incent the uninsured into purchasing healthcare insurance that the Individual Mandate provision scores a DOUBLE FAILURE!


#4 Healthcare Insurance Exchanges

The concept of healthcare insurance exchanges is not new as several states have, in the past, tried the concept, all with less than desirable outcomes.  The success of healthcare insurance exchanges is a delicate balance that relies on the creation of strong competition amongst participating insurers which in turn will create a large and stable risk pool thus minimizing adverse selection.  This is by no means an easy feat to accomplish.

From the layman’s perspective, the healthcare insurance exchanges are little more than a portal to which customers can conveniently shop the variety of insurance plans private insurers are offering in their particular region.  It is not mandatory for individuals to purchase healthcare plans through the exchanges however, to take advantage of any tax subsidies that may be available to them, the only way to do so is through the exchanges.

For HHS and the private insurers, the exchanges play a critical role in marketing and creating competition in the small-group and individual markets.  The exchanges oversee the standardization of plan benefits and cost-sharing and also bear the burden of restraining premium growth.

On the surface, the ObamaCare healthcare insurance exchanges look quite successful with close to 12 million plans purchased through them during the 2015 open enrollment period.  Unfortunately, only about 25% of those enrollments came from the 25 million in the pool of the long term uninsured, those in which the entirety of the law is premised.   The make-up of the enrollees does not fall in favor of the healthcare insurance exchanges either with only 24% of those enrolled coming from the pool of young and healthy adults.  To avoid the perils of adverse selection, target enrollment of the young and healthy was 39%, as stated by the HHS.

Politically, the saving grace for the exchanges has been the 75% of enrollees who transferred over from the individual marketplace, most of which were recipients of policy cancelation for non-ACA compliant plans, you know, those folks that did not get to keep their plan even though they liked their plan!  Proponents of the law have used these 9 million policy transfers to claim a faux victory for the healthcare insurance exchanges.  Insurers and opponents of the law see things quit differently however.

For insurers, there incentive to participate on the healthcare insurance exchanges was the prospect of as many as 25 million new customers, 10 million of which were projected to have signed up by the close of the 2015 open enrollment period, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO).  But with new customer enrollment currently around 3 million, insurers are not liking what they are seeing. 

To protect themselves from loses, insurers are imposing significant rate hikes for 2016 thus dashing any hopes of the massive new enrollment surge needed to make future participation in this new insurance scheme possible.  Also, insurers soon lose their protection from losses incurred on the exchanges as the risk corridors provision expires at the end of 2016.

Opponents see a moral responsibility attached to the healthcare insurance exchanges.  Through the partisan deal brokered by Democrats, 16 million Americans are expected to have purchased a healthcare plan through the exchanges by the close of the 2016 open enrollment period.  But the exchanges thus far have fallen far short of expectations and it looks as though they will struggle to insure even half of the intended uninsured population.  This will leave millions of Americans, whom the law was intended to help, out in the cold.  Opponents believe that the American people deserve better than to settle for the significant enrollment shortcomings being experience through the healthcare insurance exchanges.

It will take nothing short of a miracle for new enrollment to achieve even half of what was projected when ObamaCare was passed in to law.  So for failing to control costs, adverse selection and most of all, leaving millions of uninsured Americans out on the cold, the Healthcare Insurance Exchange provision is scored as a FAILURE!


#5 Low Income Subsidies

Low income subsidies are an essential provision of the ObamaCare law.  They are used to drive affordability into healthcare insurance plans for those that meet the low and middle income criteria established in the law.  Distributed based on a calculation with which only the number of family members and income level are considered, the low income subsidies is not the kind of provision that can be scored as a success or failure.  As to whether or not the low income subsidies are making healthcare insurance affordable, that’s a whole other story.

Unfortunately, due to a number of missteps by the administration to accurately anticipate the physical cost of a healthcare plans that would be offered on the healthcare insurance marketplace {the Gruber affect}, even with low income subsidies millions have still found it impossible to afford healthcare insurance.  And in a sad but true bit of irony, many of those who had, for years prior to ObamaCare, purchased and paid in full for their healthcare plans, they are now paying even more despite receiving low income subsidies to offset the cost of their new healthcare plan.

Another unfortunate event tied to the low income subsidies provision is a misleading statements, made by the administration, as to how the cost associated with low income subsidies are far less than originally projected.  This statement stemmed from the release of a cost projections update report by the CBO this past March.  And while it is true that in the CBO report it stated that the low income subsidies cost 20% less than earlier projections indicated, the administration’s claim failed to include the qualifiers stated in the CBO report, the most significant being that the costs were lower due to low enrollment i.e. fewer subsidies being paid out. 

So again, by the nature of the provision, the Low Income Subsidies provision cannot be scored as a success or failure.  However, the administration’s success in creating mandates which drove the cost of healthcare insurance plans out of the reach of millions, even with subsidies, scores them one big giant FAILURE.  And the administration also scores a FAILURE for their misrepresentation of the CBOs revised cost projections for the low income subsidies, labeling them a “cost savings”.


#6  Medicaid Expansion

And last, the Medicaid Expansion provision.   The Medicaid Expansion is a provision in ObamaCare which increases the income threshold used to determine an individual’s Medicaid eligibility.  In its original form, the expansion was projected to expand healthcare access to roughly 17 million low income adults and children across all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

The success of the Medicaid Expansion having brought access of healthcare to millions of low income individuals and children is indisputable.  But does this mean the provision itself is a success?  Let’s look a little deeper into the provision to see if it is meeting its intended goals before we make that determination.

Dating back to the infancy stages of the ObamaCare bill, many viewed the early language of the Medicaid Expansion provision as overreaching, challenging that the Federal Government did not have the authority to force individual states to comply with such a mandate.  Those challenges fell on deaf ears and when ObamaCare was signed in to law the federal mandate for all states to expand Medicaid remained. 

The administration was adamant about having the Medicaid Expansion be a federal mandate despite the clear overreach of Federal Government authority over the States, an overreach which was of course quickly challenged.  And in June of 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional for the Federal Government to coerce states into compliance with the Medicaid Expansion.  The Supreme Court did however leave the Medicaid Expansion intact, making its compliance optional by the states.

Some Democratic lawmakers may have believed that there was a slim chance that the federally mandated Medicaid Expansion would go unchallenged while most of those crafting the law not only knew the expansion would be challenged but also expected it to be overturned.  None the less they went forward with the federal mandate for all states to expand Medicaid, and for good reason.  The crafters of the expansion knew that they would lose the support of several key Democrats if they left the expansion to the discretion of the States which would have likely doomed the bill from being passed.  As it was, it took every single Democratic vote that was received to pass a filibuster proof bill.

The administration also underestimated the number of individuals who would take advantage of the Medicaid expansion.  They failed to recognize that the awareness campaigns, urging individuals to take advantage of the expansion, would also draw out thousands of individuals who were already eligible but were not taking advantage of Medicaid.  As a result, Medicaid enrollment has far exceeded projections which now has the states participating in the expansion scrambling to figure out how they are going to pay for it.  With few choices, expansion states will either have to cut something out of their budget or raise taxes, maybe both.  The failure to accurately project new Medicaid participation can be attributed to little more than gross incompetence by those studying the numbers and those who signed off on them.

So, is the Medicaid Expansion provision a success of failure?  From an enrollment standpoint, of course the expansion is a success, how could it not be.  The states participating in the expansion are giving away FREE healthcare to those who qualify, this is not a real hard sell.  As for the crafting of the Medicaid expansion, we cannot be so generous. 

The approach taken by Democratic Lawmakers to sell the Medicaid Expansion was a dishonest one, both in its doomed but intentional federal overreach and in pushing bad enrollment numbers.  If the crafters of the Medicaid Expansion did not intentionally provide the states with bad enrollment projections, it was their gross incompetence that missed the figures by such a large margin which now has expansion states scrambling to figure out how to pay for it.  Lawmakers intentionally sold us a bad can of fish and it is for this reason that the Medicaid Expansion provision as scored as a FAILURE.


Adding Up the Scorecard

So, there you have it, of the six major provisions in the ObamaCare law, that specifically target the delivery of healthcare to the long term uninsured population of our nation, each has failed to achieve its intended goal.  A shortsightedness of the administration to set achievable goals can be attributed to several of the provision failures, for others it is simply a matter of the administration failing to be an honest broker. 

Regardless of reason, the results are the same and despite all the failures, the Obama Administration continues to try to convince every American that ObamaCare is one of the greatest successes stories of our time.

We Have Lost Sight as to the True Importance of Hillary’s Emails

This whole “classified email” mess that Hillary has gotten herself in to is entertaining enough and of course quite serious but it has for some time now monopolized the news cycle and taken our sights away from what got us here in the first place.

This all started back on September 11, 2012 at 10:07pm EST when, just after getting off of the phone with President Obama, then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released a press brief stating that the attack on the US Consulate was spurred by an internet video.  The attack was still underway at the time of this press brief release and intelligence was still being gathered however, word on the ground that the Secretary had received indicated that it was an organized attack.   It is also important to note the phone call exchange between the President and the Secretary was originally buried but later revealed, on accident, through a slip of the tongue by then White House Press Secretary Jay Carney.  The Secretary had previously been questioned as to if she had spoken with the President during that attack and her answer was no.

The story as to what happened that night in Benghazi has spiraled out of control from that point forward.  Hillary’s blaming the attack on an internet video came under immediate attack and rightly so.  Nobody could provide anyone with an explanation as to what lead the State Dept. to believe the video was the case and nobody was talking. The circumstances surrounding the press brief (the secret phone call shared with the president moments before) would not be learned until sometime later and again, only because of a slip of the tongue by Jay Carney.

The Sunday following the Benghazi tragedy was the definitive moment/day as Susan Rice made the rounds on all the Sunday morning news shows repeating a highly scripted set of talking points that backed the internet video claim.  The story simply did not add up and left many scratching their heads and wondering what really happened.

As is always is the case with any such tragedy, congressional oversight automatically kicks in and does its part by investigating the actions and activities of the various agencies to which they are responsible for.  Congressional oversight had their hands full on the Benghazi investigations however, as pieces were not fitting right from the beginning.  There were conflicts in reporting, conflicts in statements and most of all the blaming of the internet video and subsequent Sunday morning news show rounds by Susan Rice doing so just did not fit.


Let the Feet Dragging and Obstructionism Began

Some of the very first documents requested by congressional oversight were the string of emails that were used to craft the talking points used by Susan Rice that Sunday morning.  Oversight got the run around and in fact it took a letter directly to the President, and signed by a number of the oversight chairpersons to finally get this string of emails released.

The final release of these emails created more questions than answers which led to the eventual request for ANY AND ALL DOCUMENTS, from the State Department pertaining to Benghazi to be released to congressional oversight.  This request took place while Hillary was still in office and was never complied with.

The failure of the State Department to release requested documents is well documented in several of the oversightcommittees final reports on Benghazi and it is this failure, on the part of the State Department, to turn over Benghazi related documents that prompted the formulation of the Select Committee on Benghazi, a committee that has more tools in its bag to force parties and departments to comply than the standard congressional oversight committees do.  But even at that, this committee is at the mercy of the DOJ if legal action that would lead to some type of enforcement or criminal investigation were needed, such actions are outside the authority of the Select Committee.   But I digress.

Hillary’s emails became an issue when, from the few documents they were able to pry from the State Department, congressional oversight discovered that there were no emails addressed to or from Hillary Clinton.  Of course members of the committee were looking for a { .gov} email address at the time but her personal email address was not surfacing either.  But eventually a few documents passed through the hands of the oversight committee and the discovery was made that Hillary was using a private email account.  Now the State Department had no choice but to compel Hillary to turn over her email record, which up until that point she had sole custody of.


So here we are Today

While the talking point of “classified emails” on Hillary’s server is consuming all the news room discussions, the real reason we are here and digging into Hillary’s emails is because of Benghazi.

Hillary and her team have done an excellent job of hiding and obstruction anyone from getting their hands on her email record.  I’m sorry, correction, “the peoples” email record.  For two years after her departure from the State Department she held her email record in secrecy and only turned it over after being compelled to do so by the State Department which was facing legal action if it did not start producing documents requested through the FOIA and subpoena.

But Hillary did not turn over her record to the State Department, she turned over some 50,000 pages of emails to which she claims to be the full record but there is no way to verify this as she, at the time, refused to turn over the email server to which they resided.  We have no way of knowing if in fact these 50,000 pages represents her full record and Hillary has given us every reason to believe they are not.  She did conceal the record from the public for two full years before being forced to turn it over right?  As well, email documents have surfaced that are clearly part of Hillary’s record yet were not provided in the 50,000 pages that were turned over to the State Department {or the State Department did not provide them to oversite}.  So there is little confidence that Hillary is being forthcoming to her claim that she has turned over her record in full.

Hillary is without a doubt hiding something and that something may not even be related to Benghazi.  Remember, the unique email arrangement she set up for herself took place right at the start of her tenure as Secretary of State.  In regards to Benghazi, her email arrangement became a convenience which potentially has allowed her to hide troublesome documents.  But the only way we will ever know this is if her email records can be recovered from the hard drive of the email server she deliberately had scrubbed of its contents, yet another action that points to an intentional cover-up.

This is why we are here people, this is why the Select Committee pushed so hard to have her email server put in the hands of an independent 3^rd party and made available for forensic analysis so that an attempt cold be made to recover any documents that may not have been included in Hillary’s interpretation of the complete record.   

As it turns out, other entities have now gotten involved and are attempting to restore the record as well, for other reasons mind you, but the end result will be the same.  If the record is able to be restored and there are more documents related to Benghazi, they will be turned over to the Select Committee.  These documents, if any, are the final step in the Benghazi investigation and will either conclude that there is no there there or that something very bad has been covered up by senior members of our government.   We as Americans should want the answer either way.

Regarding the issue of classified information on Hillary’s email server, that’s a whole other issue and looks as though it is being dealt with accordingly. 

And let us not forget, the record of all senior level government officials should be archived for a number or reasons but if for no other, so that we have a historical account of what has gone on in our government that we can always refer back to.

California’s Solar Energy Fiasco

While President Obama is out gallivanting around, trying to convince everyone that climate change is going to be the death of us all unless the Unite States converts to green energy, I wonder if he is mentioning how bad the Federal Government’s massive push to move to solar power is failing in my fine state of California.

An ill-conceived and unproven solution to a problem manifested by a liberal ideology, the idea of constructing massive solar fields on public lands of California, mostly in the southern desert region were the sun shines virtually every day of the year, has not panned out so well for the administration and certainly not for the taxpayer subsidizing this flawed idea.

Solar farms are by no means a new, especially to the Southern California desert.  There were several of these facilities built in the early 1980’s however, the allure did not last long mostly due to their fiscal restraints. 

The Solar farms of the 80’s pale in comparison to the facilities that are being proposed today, a handful of which are already on-line.  These utility-scale solar plants were nowhere to be found just a few years ago but largely due to the offering of large parcels of public land; federally guaranteed loans and significant tax breaks, developers saw the potential to make money on these once risky ventures.  But as it turns out, even with free land, fast track permitting and billions of dollars in federal stimulus money, the large number of challenges these utility-scale solar plants still face has kept developers away.

Ironically, some of the greatest challenges these utility-scale solar plants encounter are environmental in nature, the largest being the damage they do to the desert landscape and those creatures that inhabit that landscape.  A solar field with an output of 250 megawatts requires a parcel of scraped land roughly 2,000 acers in size, a 500 megawatt field as much as 4,000 acres.  To put this in to perspective, a natural gas burning, 300 megawatt combined cycle combustion turbine power plant requires as few as 15 acres. 

The remote locations of these utility-scale solar plants almost always requires the construction of power transmission infrastructure, which again disrupts the landscape and natural desert habitat whereas the perspective combustion turbine type plant can be located in the middle of town, right where the power is needed, and adjacent to transmission lines thus disrupting little more than the flow of street traffic at shift change.  That is not to say all of these large facilities destroy desert habitat as some have been built on former agricultural land.  This repurposed land has already been disturbed and therefor poses no threat to any endangered species.

Capacity is another factor.  Obviously, solar plants only generate when the skies are clear and the sun is shining.  In residential and the 9 to 5 business environment, this is not much of an issue however, at the utility-scale, such plants are what keeps the grid energized for the nighttime energy consumers.  Nighttime energy usage is something that pure solar facilities are unable to accommodate.

And there is a new obstacle these large solar projects face, the calendar.  The clock is running out as the large tax breaks that are being offered to developers scale back significantly in 2016 and eventually will vanish altogether.

So where does California stand in its effort to effect global climate change?  Let’s take a look.  Following is a brief description and status of the large utility-type solar projects (100 megawatts and above) that have been approved for construction, by the California Public Utility Commission’s (CPUC), and that the developer’s commitment to move forward was enough to make a public announcement of their forthcoming construction.

 

Desert Sunlight Solar
Located near Desert Center, California, the 8.8 million photovoltaic (PV) panels generate 550 megawatts of power and cover 3,800 acres of land made available through the BLM.  The plant went into full scale operation this year.

 

Topaz Solar
Similar in physical size, output and technology of the Desert Sunlight Solar plant, Topaz went in to full commercial operation in late 2014.

 

Genesis Solar
Located east of Blyth, California, Genesis is an operational 500 megawatt solar project built on 2,000 acres of BLM land.

 

Mount Signal Solar
Originally slated as a utility-scale 600 megawatt solar field, the first phase of the project comprised of a 206 megawatt PV solar field.  Located on 2,700 acres of land on California’s southern-most boarder, near the town of Calexico, the first phase went in to commercial operation in mid-2014.  The plans were to expand the generating capacity of the Mount Signal Solar field to 600 megawatts in two additional phases but it does not appear that the expansion will happen.
 

Antelope Valley Solar Project (Solar Star)
Currently the largest solar project in California the Antelope Valley Solar Project (AVSP) is rated at 579 megawatts.  Located near Lancaster, California, AVSP is comprised of two independent solar fields located adjacent to one another.  Covering 3,200 acres of reclaimed agricultural land, the AVSP went in to commercial operation in June of this year. 

The Antelope Valley Solar Project is not to be confused with the much smaller Antelope Valley Solar Ranch, also located near Lancaster, California.

 

Ivanpah Solar
The 392 megawatt rated Ivanpah Solar Farm has suffered its share of problems.  First the desert tortoise, and then clouds (in the desert?) and even con trails from commercial jet travel.  

The 4,000 acre Ivanpah Solar plant is located on in a remote desert area on the California/Nevada border and is home to the largest Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) plant in the world.  However, the facility has yet to operating at its rated capacity, in fact it falls roughly 40% short of the electrical output it was designed to produce.  The California Energy Commission released a statement which blamed clouds, jet contrails and the weather for the facilities shortfall (see link).

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/nov/17/huge-solar-plant-lags-early-production/?page=all

The desert tortoise has also played its part in the plants reduction of capacity.  Ivanpah Solar was originally slated as a 440 megawatt facility however, due to the discovery of the desert tortoise’s habitat on a portion of federal land being granted to the developer, the size of the facility had to be scaled back.

Natural gas usage has also become an issue at this solar generating facility.  That’s right, natural gas.  Ivanpah is classified as a solar/thermal plant whereas solar energy is captured and used to generate the steam needed to drive a steam turbine generator set.  Steam needs to be at a certain pressure and temperature before it can be injected into a steam turbine.  To maximize the use of the daylight hours, it is desirable to have the steam plant at operating conditions when the solar component become available.  This means a natural gas fired boiler must be put in to play.  At the Ivanpah facility, natural gas usage is quadruple that what was expected, driving the operating cost of the facility up considerably.

And the last bit of troubling news for the Ivanpah facility, to the taxpayers anyway, is that the investors applied for a $539 million federal grant to help pay off the $1.6 billion federal loan provided to the investors to build the facility.


Antelope Valley Solar Ranch One
The first of what was slated as a pair of 266 megawatt solar farms, Antelope Valley Solar Ranch One went into commercial operation in April of 2014.  The solar field is made up of 3.8 million panels covering 2,100 acres of land.  ITs sister plant has been canceled.

The Antelope Valley Solar Ranch One is not to be confused with the much larger Antelope Valley Solar Project, also located near Lancaster, California.


Imperial Valley Solar Farm
Located in close proximity to the Mount Signal Solar farm, the Imperial Valley Solar Farm (IVSF) went in to commercial operation in late 2013.  IVSF has a generating capacity of 99 megawatts.

 

Soda Mountain Solar
Still in development this 350 megawatt solar field just cleared a major environment hurdle having completed a three year environmental impact study.  A new problem as transpired however, which may cause the project to be abandon.  The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) has backed out of it agreement to purchase the power generated by Soda Mountain, stating that to do so would be too costly and damaging to the Big Horn Sheep in the area.  The developers are now scrambling to find new customers for their power.

http://www.basinandrangewatch.org/SodaMountain.htm

 

Mojave Solar Project
Located adjacent to one of the early solar facilities build just outside Hinkley, California back in the 80’s, the Mojave Solar Project is a 250 megawatt facility utilizing Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) technology to capture the suns energy and generate steam.  The project is located on an 1,800 acre parcel of land and was funded through a $1.2 billion loan guarantee from the US government.  The facility went in to commercial operation in late 2014.

Palan Solar
Proposed 500 megawatt solar field.  This project has been CANCALED!

Calico Solar
Proposed 618 megawatt solar field to rest on a 4.600 acres of land made available through the BLM.  This project has been CANCALED!

 

Fort Irwin Solar
The original proposal to develop a 500 megawatt solar project was scrapped.  The project now consists of a single “behind the fence” 2.4 megawatt solar array servicing an on-base facility.

Hidden Hills Solar
This project is comprised of a pair of 250 megawatt solar farms to be located in Inyo County.  This project has been CANCALED!

Rio Mesa Solar
To be located on 4,000 acres near the town of Blyth, the 500 megawatt solar project has been CANCALED!

 
Antelope Valley Solar Ranch Two
Meant to be a sister plant to the 266 megawatt Antelope Valley Solar Ranch One, which went in to commercial operation in early 2014, this project has been CANCALED!


There you have it, a picture of what utility-scale solar energy development looks like in sunny Southern California, the land of nearly 300 clear and sunny days each and every year.  The conditions could not be more perfect for large scale solar energy to thrive and with granted land, large tax incentives and guaranteed loans, how could any power developer pass up on such a great deal?

Of the 16 large scale solar projects listed above, five projects have been canceled; one is in jeopardy of being canceled; one has been reduced to a small “inside the fence” project; one project has been reduced in capacity by two thirds and one final project is suffering from so many performance issues that it is struggling to survive.  That leaves seven of the 16 solar farms in-tact and operational, not a real good batting average.  And the likelihood of any new utility-scale solar plants being developed in California any time in the immediate future is pretty slim as the door that led to the most attractive development opportunities is about to slam closed.

Small, “behind the fence” solar projects have achieved much greater success.  These little power packages are well fitted for large commercial spaces, they have a palatable capital investment and typically have favorable paybacks.  By no means a new idea however, with the advancement of low cost PV panel technology, these “behind the fence” projects have finally come in to their own, especially in the very green conscious state of California.  These solar projects are driven more by favorable economics than their environmental benefits, as even in mass and in their typical application, they have a very small impact on the overall carbon footprint of our nation and the world.  But as the saying goes, every little bit counts.

Residential solar is all the rage across the nation, just as it was back in the 70’s and early 80’s.  And just as residential solar did back then, the rage will be short lived.  It all looks good theory but history is destine to repeat itself.  Small companies peddling residential solar installation and maintenance will go out of business soon after the new installation surge ends.  Once federal incentives have expired, the replacement costs of these panels will not make economic sense and, just as they did 30 years ago, the neighbors will soon start complaining about those unsightly rooftop black panels that are driving the home prices down in their neighborhood.  It’s all just a matter of time.

And so, despite all of President Obama’s claims, based on what we have seen here in California, new solar energy development in the United States is not going to affect global climate change, it’s not even going to put a minor dent in it.

Global Warming - A Cause in Search of a Problem

In real science, when something is discovered that is not understood real scientists set in motion to seek out an explanation.  Unlike real scientists, environmental extremists create an agenda driven cause and then diligently seek out a problem to tie it to, no matter how scientifically unsupported it might be.

So is the case with Global Warming a cause that was set ablaze back in 2007 when the prediction was made by the now infamous climate scientist Wieslaw Maslowski and echoed by Al Gore during his 2007 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech where he stated that, due to global warming, the arctic ice would melt by 2013.  Of course this did not happen and as a result Maslowski’s team revised their model which then predicted that the arctic ice would be gone by 2016.  This despite the fact that the in 2013 the summer ice in the arctic increased from the year prior.  But a little extra ice can’t stop the environmental whack jobs who cling to any modicum of scientific data that they can force fit into their argument while at the same time eagerly discard any real science that contradicts their claim.

Certainly our mother earth is being inundated by the use of fossil fuels, nobody denies this but this does not mean the end of the world as we know. 

The doomsday scenario of global warming, constantly being projected by environmental extremists, is without scientific merit.  This however, does not stop these environmental loons from flooding their misinformation throughout social media and main stream platforms.  There hope in doing so is to gain the attention of any like minded zealot willing to ignore facts and help perpetuate their fiction.  While environmental activists are quick to claim human caused CO2 as the source of global warming they repeatedly fail to provide verifiable scientific proof as to the effect human caused CO2 is actually having on the environment, if any. 

The hypocrisy behind the global warming claim is astounding.  Typically, the argument against Republicans is that they are driven by greed {let us not forget that the left constantly claims that the right starts wars over oil}.  So why is this not the case with global warming?  If driven by greed then why are Republicans not taking a ride on the global warming bandwagon that would yield them billions upon billions of dollars by pushing green energy technologies, technologies that come without the hassles and the astronomical cost of fighting the mountains of environmental regulation and legal challenges that fossil fuels face?   The answer is simple, doing so would be irresponsible. 

If you want to get down to the science of it all, which the global warming extremists do not, the earth’s atmosphere has been in a cycle of heating and cooling for millions and millions of years.  These cycles are largely driven by the earth’s volcanic activity and is currently at the peak of one of its cooling cycles.  With roughly 150 volcanoes currently active on earth, the natural occurring CO2 emissions are at a very low cycle.  Tens of thousands of years from now the earth’s volcanic activity may be 3 or 4 or maybe 100 times greater than it is today and the natural occurring CO2 emissions will increase just has it has thousands of times before, to a level I might add that will be exponentially higher than that of our current human CO2 emissions activity.  When this happens the atmosphere will warm up ever so slightly, as it has thousands of times before, but life on earth will not come to an end nor will the ice caps melt and flood the lands.  If history repeats itself, as it has like clockwork for millions of years, what will happen is that the volcanic activity on earth will again subside, the natural occurring CO2 emissions will go down and the planet will go into another cooling cycle just as it has thousands of times before.  Of course, none of this really matters if you are buying votes through the sale of snake oil and vowing to derail the apocalyptic end of life as we know it by terminating the use of fossil fuels.

The global warming scheme serves two purposes for the left.  It of course gives them a platform by which they can demonize rational thinking Republicans and second, it ensures them the vote of the majority of environmentalist who selfishly pledge their allegiance to any candidate that sides with their cause while ignoring ever other significant national issue as well as the qualifications of the person they are backing.

Doomsdayers, such as Maslowski and our friend Al Gore, have been proven wrong in there extremist claims while the more realistic environmental scientist state that the overall negative effects on the environment, as a result of human interaction, are difficult to quantify.  The current environmental changes are fractionally small and are effected by so many naturally occurring factors, not just human interaction alone.

This by no means gives us a free pass to continue to spew toxic poisons into our earth’s atmosphere but it does mean that a more responsible and cautious approach should be taken, one driven by scientific fact rather than by extremist hoo-ha that the left leverages for political gain.

The global warming rhetoric being spewed by the large activist groups and supported by the vote seeking agenda of the political left remains to have little scientific merit.  Until there is solid proof otherwise, the responsible development of clean burning fossil fuels is the most efficient and cost effective way to meet the global energy challenges of today.

How many of the Uninsured will ObamaCare Really Insure?

“I don’t have to explain to you that nearly 46 million Americans don’t have health insurance coverage today.  In the wealthiest nation on Earth, 46 million of our fellow citizens have no coverage.”  -  President Obama, August 2009

That same year, the Census Bureau reported that 48 million Americans lacked health insurance.

While the issue of affordability can be argued, the fact that ObamaCare did and continues to provide “access” to healthcare for those 48 million uninsured Americans remains true.  However, it was, is and will continue to be unrealistic to believe that the majority of those 48 million will ever actually gain any form of healthcare insurance coverage simply because it is mandated by law.

Yes, there has long been a group of Americans who have been denied or could not afford wanted healthcare insurance but this group makes up small fraction of the 48 million who were uninsured prior to the passage of ObamaCare.  The larger portion of that 48 million uninsured choose to opt-out of purchasing healthcare insurance on their own accord and have since shown to be just as unlikely to purchase healthcare insurance under mandate of law as the were prior to ObamaCare being enacted.

 

The Financially Secure “Opt-Outs”

Roughly 20% of the 48 million who have, in the past, chosen to “opt out” of purchasing healthcare insurance come from a group of hard-working, tax paying Americans who are financially secure.  This group of the uninsured has never been denied affordable healthcare insurance nor do they place a financial burden on the healthcare system.  This group “chooses” to pay for their healthcare needs “out of pocket” and, as a result, do not find themselves running to the doctor’s office every time they have a sniffle or a headache, a common abuse by those who have healthcare insurance.

Numbering nearly 10 million, the financially secure opt-outs have taken a much more cost effective approach to manage their own healthcare needs and, as we have experienced over the past two open enrollment periods, continue to opt-out of purchasing a traditional healthcare plan despite the federal mandate to do so.

 

The Young Invincibles

Numbering around 19 million, the young invincibles make up about 40% of the 48 million, as reported by the Kaiser Family Foundation.  While a significant portion of the uninsured, they are in large very healthy thus finding little need for healthcare insurance prior to the implementation of the new healthcare law.  Little has changed in the age of ObamaCare as this group has shown little desire to bear the bulk of the burden for the older and less healthy, by paying a disproportionate amount for healthcare insurance, a key component of the ObamaCare law. 

Like the financially secure opt-outs, this large group of the uninsured has never been denied affordable healthcare insurance.  Their insured counterparts, including hundreds of thousands of college and university students, typically took advantage of low cost “bare-bones” insurance plans that were both affordable and well suited to their particular need.  However, under ObamaCare, these well suited bare-bones healthcare plans are a thing of the past.

For those under the age of 26, the problem ObamaCare created by putting an end to the well suited catastrophic plans was mitigated though a provision in the law that allows these sub-26ers to remain on their parents insurance plans.  This provision in the law is said to have increased the number of insured sub-26ers by about 3 million, according to HHS.  For the balance of the uninsured young invincibles, they were left to purchased healthcare either from the private marketplace or though one of the state and federal healthcare exchanges.  To date, very few have done so.  They are still young, invincible and see little need to spend a large portion of their meager income on insurance that they do not believe they need.

 

Those Living in the Shadows

The homeless, addicts and other small groups of American’s that sadly live in the shadows of our society make up about 15% or roughly 7 million of the uninsured.  Most of these individuals have long been eligible for some form of healthcare assistance but for whatever reason most have chosen not to or have been unable to capitalize on these offerings.  However, since the HealthCare.gov website was launched about half of those living in the shadows have come out of the “woodwork” and have enrolled on to Medicaid.
 

Pre-Existing Conditions

Amongst the 48 million there are those that have, in the past, been denied insurance due to a pre-existing condition.  The Obama Administration did a masterful job at misleading the American people into believing that their numbers ran into the millions when in fact the number is actually quite low. 

In lieu of the “guaranteed issue” that went into effect on January 1, 2014 which no longer allows insurers to discriminate against a person having a pre-existing condition, the Pre-existing Conditions Insurance Plan (PCIP) provision was put in place.  The PCIP was a stop gap that made insurance available to high risk individuals with a pre-existing condition almost immediately after ObamaCare was passed in to law back in 2010. 

When the PCIP was being crafted, it was estimated that no more than 375,000 high risk individuals that would seek enrollment.  This, in addition to roughly 200,000 that were actively participating on 35 state operated High Risk Pools (HRP), brought the number of individuals in the pool of those with a pre-existing condition and possibly seeking healthcare insurance to 575,000.  Yet, of the 375,000 estimated to participate in the PCIP, less than one third or about 1/4 of 1% of the 48 million, enrolled on to the PCIP bringing the number of individuals with a pre-existing condition and seeking healthcare insurance to just over 300,000.  That’s a far cry from the millions the president had been touting.

 

The Semi-Low Income “Opt-Outs”

The balance of the 48 million are made up of the semi-low income “opt-outs”.  Prior to the passage of ObamaCare, this pool of about 12 million fell in to a grey area where their income was too high to qualify for Medicaid yet two low to be able to afford healthcare insurance without giving up basic necessities to live.  This created a forced healthcare insurance opt-out situation.

The expansion of Medicaid eligibility criteria has opened the door for these 12 million people, most all of which have or are expected to take advantage of the Medicaid Expansion.
 

The Numbers Fit

Of the 48 million who were uninsured when ObamaCare was passed in to law it looks as though as many as 18.5 million have or will eventually seek out healthcare insurance, mostly through the Medicaid Expansion.  The remaining 29.5 million look as though they will continue to opt-out of purchasing a qualified healthcare plan for a variety of reasons.

As for those who will continue to opt-out of purchasing a qualified healthcare plan, just as they have done in the past, the majority of the financially secure opt-outs will remain responsible for their own healthcare costs.  As well, the bulk of the young invincibles will remain healthy and without the need of costly healthcare insurance.  Those living in the shadows who remain uninsured of course will continue to be a financial burden on the healthcare system.

 

What about those Uninsured with a Pre-existing Medical Condition?

The question remains unanswered as to exactly how successful ObamaCare has been in insuring the pool of people with a high cost/high risk pre-existing medical condition and if the performance of the PCIP is any indication, the law is not helping near as much as is being claimed.

The PCIP attracted only 36% of the 375,000 participants as originally projected and over its short lifespan lost 23% of its 135,000 peak enrollment in its final year, despite rate reductions of 20%.  Additionally, 20% of PCIP enrollees failed to transfer to one of the state and federal healthcare exchanges before the PCIP provision expired, even after three extensions were granted for them to do so.

It’s hard to imagine HHS over projecting, by nearly 300%, the number of individuals with a pre-existing condition that were in need of healthcare insurance.  Even if the over projection was only 200%, this would still mean that 135,000 individuals with a pre-existing condition opted-out of the PCIP provision, this in addition to the 31,000 documented attrition and the additional 20,000 that did not transfer over to the healthcare exchanges. 

But there is no real way in knowing exactly how well those with a pre-existing condition are currently being treated by the ObamaCare law.  First, we are unsure as to exactly the number of individuals with a pre-existing condition that ObamaCare could have effected and second, there is no mechanism in place to determine a person enrolling on the healthcare exchanges was one of those individuals.  And what about the states that ended their HRP programs, how many of their enrollees found their way and purchased a healthcare plan through the healthcare exchanges?  There is no way of knowing for sure.

Eventually some group will do a study to try and determine just how many of those with a pre-existing condition ObamaCare is actually helping but for now, it looks as though far fewer are being helped that the Obama Administration would like us to believe.

 

The 2016 Open Enrollment Period Will Soon Be Upon Us

The third ObamaCare open enrollment period is just around the corner and this is a make or break for ObamaCare.

Over the 9 months that made up the first two open enrollment periods the healthcare exchanges managed to attract only about 3 million customers from the nation’s pool of the non-elderly, long term uninsured, a 70% shortfall from projection.  This leaves a lot of ground to make up in addition to another 6 million uninsured that were projected to enroll through the exchanges in 2016. 

Reaching the laws 2016 goal of reducing the number of uninsured by 16 million, through the purchase of a qualified healthcare plan, is a virtually insurmountable task, achieving even 50% of the goal looks to be out of reach.  But we must go through the motions and after the open enrollment period ends endure the countless ways the Obama Administration will try and defend an unpopular law that continues to fail to meet one of its primary objectives by a significant margin.

The FACTS of the Hillary Email Scandal

The Clinton email scandal may have broken just this past March but the facts surrounding the scandal date back to Hillary’s confirmation as Secretary of State.  Since that time a slow but steady drip of facts, which build a telling case in regards to the inappropriate use of Mrs. Clinton’s private email account and handling of the public record, has amassed.  Here are those facts!

FACT:    Facing certain confirmation as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton had a private email server set up in her home to which her private email account would reside on, an email account which she used exclusively to conduct official State Department business throughout her tenure at the State Department.  This meant that no agency within the Federal Government, or anywhere else for that matter, had access to her record and her record was not being archived.

 

FACT:    Hillary Clinton was sworn in as Secretary of State on January 21, 2009.

 

FACT:    In December of 2009 the National Archives and Records Administration issue regulations requiring agencies which allowed employees to conduct official business on nonofficial email accounts to ensure those records were preserved “in the appropriate agency recordkeeping system.”

 

FACT:    On the evening of September 11, 2012, the US consulate and CIA annex in Benghazi, Libya was attacked.  4 Americans lost their lives in the 8 hour attack and many more were injured.

 

FACT:    On September 20, 2012 chairman of the House Oversight Committee's Subcommittee on National Security, Homeland Defense and Foreign Operations, Rep. Jason Chaffetz sent a letter to then-Secretary of State Clinton asking for "all information … related to the attack on the consulate {in Benghazi}."

 

FACT:    Just prior to Hillary’s departure as Secretary of State, officials at the National Archives and Records Administration were in communications with the State Department regarding plans on how they were going to go about preserving Hillary’s record during her tenure as Secretary of State.

 

FACT:    In a letter dated December 13, 2012, to Hillary Clinton, from Representative Darrell Issa, the Republican chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, he asks “Have you or any senior agency official ever used a personal email account to conduct official business?”  In the letter he also asked, “If so, please identify the account used.”  Hillary Clinton never responded to Issa’s letter.

 

FACT:    Hillary Clinton’s final day as Secretary of State was February 1, 2013

 

FACT:    Upon Hillary’s departure from the State Department, she willfully and consciously did NOT turn over any form of her record to the department or the National Archive, which is required by all senior officials in government.

 

FACT:    On March 27, 2013 the State Department responded to Darrell Issa’s December 13, 2012 letter to Hillary Clinton, which asked several questions pertaining to whether Hillary Clinton had a private email account and Department policies on the subject.  The State Department did not respond to any questions pertaining to private email accounts and gave only general answers to policy related questions.

 

FACT:    On March 29, 2013, in a letter addressed to Darrell Issa {then Chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee}, from State official Thomas Gibbons, Gibbons addressed the Chairman’s frustration with the State Department’s failure to provide access to requested documents.  Gibbons wrote that the Stated Department had "provided Congress with access to documents, comprising over 25,000 pages to date, including communications of senior Department officials regarding the security situation in Benghazi,".  The documents Gibbons was referring to where those that oversight was provided only “camera review” access to in a supervised environment.

 

FACT:    On August 1, 2013 congressional oversight committee investigating the attack on Benghazi issued a subpoena to the State Department {addressed to Sec of State John Kerry} demanding that all documents that had previously been made available to oversight only in “camera review” as well as others relating to Benghazi be turned over to oversight so that they could be properly reviewed.

 

FACT:    On September 29, 2013 the House Committee on Foreign Affairs releases its report on Benghazi in which it stated:

“The State Department has refused to provide copies of critical documents to the Committee, including emails and memoranda between key officials. For over a year, it has permitted Committee staff to review them only in camera, which means that the Committee cannot maintain possession of the documents and is not allowed to make photocopies. The Department has further insisted that one of its own employees be present during limited review periods, which constrains the ability of staff to speak openly about the information. These circumstances are unique to the Benghazi investigation, and the Department has refused to offer a legal justification for its behavior.”

 

FACT:    On January 15, 2014 the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence releases its report on Benghazi in which it stated:

                “Disturbing Lack of Cooperation by the State Department  -  As the Committee attempted to piece together key events before, during, and after the attacks, we faced the most significant and sustained resistance from the State Department in obtaining documents, access to witnesses, and responses to questions.”

and

“While the Committee has completed its report, important questions remain unanswered as a direct result of the Obama Administration's failure to provide the Committee with access to necessary documents and witnesses. We believe the Administration's lack of cooperation is directly contrary to its statutory obligation to keep the congressional intelligence committees fully and currently informed and has effectively obstructed the Committee's efforts to get to the ground truth with respect to these remaining questions. Too often, providing timely and complete information to Congress is viewed by the Administration as optional or an accommodation, rather than compliance with a statutory requirement.”

 

FACT:    On October 28, 2014, the State Department, for the first time, asked Hillary Clinton to return her public record to the State Department.

 

FACT:    Sometime after October 2014, but not before scrutinizing and printing out what she and her lawyer(s) determent to be the public record, Hillary Clinton made the decision to have the hard drive of her email server wiped clean thus deleting the only known and complete public record of her time served at the State Department.

 

FACT:    On December 5, 2014, attorneys of Hillary Clinton delivered dozens of boxes containing 50,000 pages of printed emails to the State Department, roughly 900 pages {about 300 emails} of which the State Department later claimed were related to Benghazi.

 

FACT:    On February 13, 2015, from the 50,000 pages provided to the department on December 5, 2014, the State Department turned over approximately 300 of Hillary Clinton’s emails {roughly 900 pages} the department deemed related to Benghazi.

 

FACT:    Sometime in mid-February, while reviewing a group of about 300 emails the State Department turned over to the Select Committee on Benghazi, investigators discovered the private email address that Hillary Clinton had been using while serving as Secretary of State.

 

FACT:    On March 2, 2015 New York Times reporter Michael Schmidt broke the story of Hillary Clinton’s home brewed email server.

 

FACT:    On March 10, 2015, while attending a UN Conference, Hillary held a press brief where she for the first time spoke publically on the matter of her private email account and private server arrangement.  Hillary stated “I feel like I've taken unprecedented steps for these emails to be in the public domain", "I went above and beyond what I was requested to do."  Hillary also stated that she did not use the server to send any classified information, and only emailed one foreign leader {from the United Kingdom} during her time at State.  Hillary also stated that her email server would remain private.

 

FACT:    In a letter from Hillary’s lawyer David Kendall to Chairman Trey Gowdy, dated March 27, 2015, in response to Gowdy’s earlier request that the Clinton email server be turned over to an independent 3^rd party, Kendall informed Gowdy that the hard drive had been erased of all emails “Thus, there are no hdr22@clintonemail.com emails from Secretary Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state on the server for any review, even if such review were appropriate or legally authorized,”

 

FACT:    On June 22, 2015, the Select Committee on Benghazi released emails to/from Hillary, it had obtained during the course of its investigation, that should have but were not included in the documents turned over to the committee from the State Department thus discrediting any claim that the State Department obtains or has turned over the complete record of Benghazi related documents to the committee.

 

FACT:    On July 24, 2015 government investigators release the news that they found classified information on the private email account Hillary Clinton used during her tenure as Secretary of State.

 

FACT:    On August 11, 2015 it was revealed, by investigators, identified two emails, from Hillary’s private email account, which contained “Top Secret” information.

 
These are the facts and nothing but the facts.  What do they tell us?  We’ll that all depends on what a particular person’s interpretation of the fact are and/or, how much fiction is injected in between the facts and how politically motivated one might be to alter the facts to best suit their agenda and how many of the facts are simply ignored.

Jobs Recovery Worsens

The latest jobs numbers are in and while they came in below earlier projections, they do not look too bad, at least on the surface.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released on Friday that 215,000 jobs were added to the economy in the month of July, down considerably from the previous 12 month average of 246,000 jobs per month.  The BLS also revised up, just slightly, the jobs numbers for the months of May and June.  Unemployment still holds steady at 5.3%.  And in other mediocre news, the “total” or U-6 unemployment rate ticked down one tenth of a percent from last month and is now at 10.3%.

So where does this put us in our quest to recover all the jobs that were lost during the recession as well as the economy’s ability to keep up with population growth, a figure I like to refer to as “jobs equilibrium”?  The news for this month's quest of jobs equilibrium is not so good. 

For the past several months our number crunching told us that we would reach a jobs equilibrium {we would have recovered all the lost jobs as well as jobs needed to have kept pace with population growth} in October of 2020.  This month however, with July having falling far short of the previous 12 month job growth average, the numbers show that the date we will reach jobs equilibrium has been extended out another five months, to March of 2021.

How did we reach this conclusion? 

Quite simply actually.  Using the BLM’s own downloadable Excel file for monthly jobs count, we established that for the 16 month period that the economy was falling into recession, prior to Obama taking office, the economy shed some 4.4 million jobs.  As well, the economy experienced an additional 2 million jobs shortfall of jobs needed to accommodate population growth over the same period.  This means that on the day that President Obama took office, there was a 6.2 million jobs deficit, as a result of the recession.

Going forward we assumed that for each month following an additional 125,000 jobs needed to be created to accommodate the continued population growth, a figure we added to each of the following month’s jobs number extracted from the same BLS Excel file.  Using this very simple methodology, we are able to keep tabs on the jobs deficit as the new jobs numbers come in each month.

To project forward we use the average jobs number of the most recent 12 months and of course we continue to consider that there will be an additional 125,000 jobs needed each month to keep pace with population growth.

What does this all mean?

It means simply that there are not enough jobs being created nor are they being created fast enough to achieve jobs equilibrium any time soon.

For the first time ever, more than 93 million Americans, the age of 16 and older, are not participating in the labor force.  This has pushed the labor force participation rate to a 37 year low of 62.7%.  And as we have just experienced this past July, where the number of jobs created fell well below the past years monthly average, the overall jobs recovery situation has worsened.

In order to achieve jobs equilibrium while President Obama is still in office, starting immediately, the average monthly jobs growth would have to jump to 525,000, which is well more than double the current average.  This pace would have to be maintained through Obama’s final month in office to achieve this goal.  This of course can never happen.  But for the next president, whomever he or she may be, if they wish to reach jobs equilibrium during their first term in office, they are really going to have to step up jobs creation considerably.