...I wouldn't fun you, their training war ship was sized in Africa well before this NY Court Ruling:

Full Story at NYT here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/19/world/americas/seizure-of-argentine-sh...

The Libertad, a three-mast tall ship with 330 navy cadets and crew aboard, was seized at Tema, an industrial port east of Ghana’s capital, Accra, on Oct. 2 through a court order obtained by N.M.L. Capital, a holdout creditor from Argentina’s default a decade ago that says it is owed more than $370 million. The creditor is among a few remaining holdouts to refuse debt restructuring agreements in 2005 and 2010. It had tracked the vessel through the Libertad’s Web site. 

Best Wishes, Traveller

Sure Ezra didn't seem to think that through and do a good job, but do you think you can do better than Ezra?

Are you misreading the quotes perhaps? The second quote refers to the prices workers pay for products at Walmart, not what they're paid to work at Walmart.

thanks manish

I'm not an IDM connoisseur or anything but I love me some Boards of Canada.  I don't think they really qualify as IDM, though.

...was preparing the groundwork so that other Republicans would have cover when then voted to raise taxes.

However, Norquist today said:

(CNN) - Anti-tax activist Grover Norquist said Monday that his group, Americans for Tax Reform, would work to unseat Republicans who break their pledge to never vote for higher taxes.

So I think we are going over the cliff...which will be a good thing.

Traveller

adopted by Obama.

Unfortunately Bill Clinton also bought into this, and I'm reminded that nearly all the leading economic thinkers who are left of center have puzzlingly little influence on the Democratic party's positions. I can't think of a single prominent economist in a major University or think tank who leans left and who believes Obama's 4 trillion Hooverism goal is a good idea.

There's less consensus about Obama prioritizing a "free" trade pact in Asia. This isn't blatantly conservative, as these trade deals aren't opposed by every single left of center economist, but prominent left-leaning think tanks like CEPR and EPI argue that these trade pacts depress wages, increase outsourcing, and expand draconian IP laws.

It speaks volumes that Hooverism and the Trans-Pacific Partnership are Obama's most immediate 2nd term priorities. Jobs and the housing crisis don't appear to be on the radar.

To round out the centrist-to-conservative Obama activities I've been keeping track of, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is busy this week pursuing his usual agenda of privatizing public schools and speaking at Jeb Bush's pro-charter education organization. 

The only good news I've read since the re-election on matters economic is that the Obama admin. is taking some of its right wing agenda items off the table in the deficit negotiations, most significantly cuts to social security. And they've dismissed raising the eligibility age. 

Overall, I'm waiting for some opportunity to support the president I just voted for but am wondering if I'll be given one.

All it took was less than 3 seconds, Chrome translated the Korean headline into:

"satirical media " Kim Jung-eun, this year, the best goat cheese . " ' The Onion"

they cover important economic issues in detail and do a good job explaining all the stuff the regular press never does. But yeah, they seem to have caught the firebagger syndrome over the last year.

For instance, Yves claims there's a "giant loophole" in the PPACA's ban on rescissions, because insurers will still be able to rescind policies "in the case of fraud or intentional misrepresentation." And the bar for fraud, he huffs, per established case law, he handwaves, is remarkably low. That's all the detail he offers on this claim.

You find this stuff convincing? I don't. If you look at the actual text of the law on rescissions (pdf), and the federal guidelines issued so far, you'll find that the law imposes the following guidelines on retroactive rescissions: they are allowed only in cases where the insured person has committed fraud, or intentional misrepresentation of material fact. Also, the type of fraud or misrepresentation must be prohibited explicitly in the terms of coverage, and finally insurers are required to give 30 days' notice to the insured person before rescinding coverage. These requirements impose a new federal floor on rescissions: the law explicitly allows states to provide even more stringent guidelines.

Yves strongly implies that these guidelines are the same as current guidelines, but that is exactly incorrect. Under current federal case law, and most state laws (exceptions include Oklahoma), insurers can rescind coverage if the insured makes an accidental misrepresentation. They can rescind if the misrepresentation is made by someone other than the insured person (an agent, or a physician, etc.).  It doesn't have to be material (i.e. doesn't have to potentially affect current coverage: just has to be inaccurate information above a signature). And finally, there's no requirement of timely notice. Insurers can yank your coverage in the middle of open heart surgery if they want to. 

All of which is to say that when Yves writes 

insurers can continue to cancel policies in the case of “fraud or intentional misrepresentation” as they do now.

he's being highly disingenuous. True enough, insurers can under current law go to the trouble of proving criminal fraud and/or the intent to deceive to a court of law in order to rescind coverage. But the point is that right now they don't have to. Rescissions owing to inadvertent mistakes are all too common...and they involve a far lower standard of proof. Yves makes it sound like the law changes nothing, when in fact the changes are quite substantial.

Yves also complains that coverage rules are leaving people stuck with large bills, that his own insurer is playing new games to avoid claims, the "out of network problem"...in none of these complaints does he seem aware that the PPACA provisions that would regulate those practices haven't kicked in yet.

I can't find backup on the claim that MLRs averaged 95% across all policies back in the 1990's. If anyone can substantiate Wendell Potter's claim, I'd like to see the details behind it. I'd understood that 85% has been closer to the average for private policies for the past several decades.

do I have to do everything around here?

... but it makes a couple of good points:

First, Hiltzik points out what some commenters here (i.e., me) have noticed as one of the most glaring anomalies in Hostess' 2004-09 bankruptcy workthrough:

But the firm emerged from bankruptcy with more debt than when it went in — in with $575 million, out with $774 million, all secured by company assets. That's pretty much the opposite of what's supposed to happen in bankruptcy. By the end, there was barely a spare distributor cap in the motor pool that wasn't mortgaged to the private equity firms and hedge funds holding the notes (and also appointing management).

and secondly, puts a finger right on the fundamental problem:

As management experts such as Peter Drucker have observed, the goal of a successful business must be to find and serve customers. Do that, and the numbers take care of themselves. The Hostess approach was entirely backward — meeting the numbers became Job One, and figuring out how to grow the business became Job None.