DL Open Thread: Saturday, March 25, 2023
‘The Second Amendment Grants You The Right To Have Your Gun Stolen’. Because you have the freedom to not lock your car and/or your glove gun compartment:
In a country awash with guns, with more firearms than people, the parked car, or in many cases the parked pickup truck, has become a new flashpoint in the debates over how and whether to regulate gun safety.
There is little question about the scope of the problem. A report issued in May by the gun-control group Everytown for Gun Safety analyzed FBI crime data in 271 American cities, large and small, from 2020 and found that guns stolen from vehicles have become the nation’s largest source of stolen firearms — with an estimated 40,000 guns stolen from cars in those cities alone.
In some cities, organized groups of young people have swept through neighborhoods and areas around sports arenas, looking for weapons left under car seats or in unlocked center consoles or glove compartments. Their work is occasionally made easier by motorists who advertise their right to bear arms with car window stickers promoting favored gun brands, or that declare “molon labe” — a defiant message from ancient Sparta, which roughly translates as “come and take them.”
Increasingly, thieves are doing just that. The Everytown researchers found that a decade ago, less than a quarter of all gun thefts were from cars; in 2020, over half of them were. The researchers say more study is needed to understand the shift, which has occurred as more states have adopted permitless carry laws and messages in gun-industry marketing have encouraged Americans to take their weapons with them for personal protection.
‘Mitch Is Alive’. I’m sure he is. Alive, that is. But the reassurances sound a lot like the push-back we received when we wrote that Beau Biden was not fine, and that he wouldn’t be able to run for Governor:
While health updates on presidents often come from their doctors or medical experts, no such custom exists in Congress, where lawmakers more commonly issue vague statements from spokespeople following medical incidents.
McConnell has a recent history of being less than forthcoming about his health. In October 2020, just a couple of weeks before asking Kentucky voters for a seventh six-year term, he was seen around the Capitol with severely bruised hands and a puffed-up lip that he declined to explain.
“I’m just fine. And I can’t believe y’all have played with that all week long,” he said, complaining about media coverage in an interview at the time.
When he fell in his driveway in Louisville in August 2019, McConnell suffered a fractured shoulder that kept him out of public for more than a month while the Senate was on its annual late summer recess.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) said McConnell sounded “eager” to get back.
“He sounded very sharp,” Cornyn said. “I think just frustrated, as you might imagine, having to go through all this.”
CW: DeSantis Is Done. Really done. Meaning he isn’t. Pack-mentality ‘journalism’:
A number of the Florida governor’s donors and allies are worried his recent stumbles suggest he may not be ready for a brutal fight against Donald Trump. Some feel DeSantis needs to accelerate his timeline to run for the GOP presidential nomination and begin directly confronting Trump if he’s to have any chance of thwarting the former president’s momentum. Others believe DeSantis should sidestep Trump altogether and wait until 2028 to run.
The fears of some of his own supporters, along with a growing sentiment among GOP operatives that Trump may be impossible to defeat — even with a possible indictment looming over him — present DeSantis with the conundrum of trying to demonstrate that he is a viable presidential candidate before he even launches his anticipated campaign.
The polling dip and subsequent angst radiating from some allies are the first measurable dents to the enthusiasm for DeSantis as a viable alternative to Trump. They follow weeks of attacks by the former president, from fanning unfounded rumors about the governor’s personal life to criticizing his past votes in Congress. DeSantis’ responses have been largely restrained, mild criticisms often delivered with his disclaimer that he doesn’t want to attack fellow Republicans.
So, Trump could well have multiple indictments hampering him in 2024, but he’s unbeatable in a Rethug primary? Not buying it. Which reminds me: Is Trump’s rally here a coincidence? Rhetorical question. No.
CIGNA Automatically Rejects Claims. I’ll say it again: Get insurance companies out of health insurance. Spend the savings on health care. Sure beats this alternative:
The rejection of van Terheyden’s claim was typical for Cigna, one of the country’s largest insurers. The company has built a system that allows its doctors to instantly reject a claim on medical grounds without opening the patient file, leaving people with unexpected bills, according to corporate documents and interviews with former Cigna officials. Over a period of two months last year, Cigna doctors denied over 300,000 requests for payments using this method, spending an average of 1.2 seconds on each case, the documents show. The company has reported it covers or administers health care plans for 18 million people.
Before health insurers reject claims for medical reasons, company doctors must review them, according to insurance laws and regulations in many states. Medical directors are expected to examine patient records, review coverage policies and use their expertise to decide whether to approve or deny claims, regulators said. This process helps avoid unfair denials.
But the Cigna review system that blocked van Terheyden’s claim bypasses those steps. Medical directors do not see any patient records or put their medical judgment to use, said former company employees familiar with the system. Instead, a computer does the work. A Cigna algorithm flags mismatches between diagnoses and what the company considers acceptable tests and procedures for those ailments. Company doctors then sign off on the denials in batches, according to interviews with former employees who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“We literally click and submit,” one former Cigna doctor said. “It takes all of 10 seconds to do 50 at a time.”
Betcha they have a Medicare Advantage plan to sell you.
The DuPont Family Propaganda Industry Proceeds Apace. At Hagley:
According to Library Curator Kevin Martin, Hagley began to work with the du Pont Family and the Pete du Pont Freedom Foundation a few years ago on the collection.
“Hagley has a long history with the du Pont family, the du Pont company, and it just seemed a very logical place for the collection to land,” Martin said. “His time as governor made a huge impact on the state, and also national politics.”
Ted Nugent, a guy who literally shit his pants to get out of Vietnam, introduced Trump in WACO calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a ‘Homosexual Weirdo’
https://www.thedailybeast.com/ted-nugent-calls-zelensky-a-homosexual-weirdo-in-unhinged-trump-rally-tirade
Trump is beatable, but not by a guy radiating Fred Thompson energy.
Josh Marshall makes a good point about this: DeSantis’ support is mostly the never-Trump crowd in the GOP, and they’ve coalesced around him because he’s the only MAGAt who doesn’t show total obeisance to Trump. But that’s an impossible needle to thread. You saw what happened when he tried to ape Trump on Ukraine — Senate Republicans savaged him and he backed down almost immediately.
He’s a charisma-free lightweight, and it’s only the sports-journalism mentality of the political press that makes him as “popular” as he seems.
I don’t know where you get the idea that indictments will hamper Trump’s run for the nomination. Nothing in the polling reflects that.
When head-to-head polling shows that a, say, thrice-indicted candidate is trailing miserably, which I think they will, some ‘realists’, if they exist will look elsewhere, even if they’ve been Trump supporters.
Until he’s indicted, we won’t know what polling impact, if any, that will have.
I don’t know, but I know which way I’d bet. What makes you think a cult would abandon its leader, rather than rally behind what they’ll view as his persecution?
It’s possible your scenario will play out, but only if a whole bunch of elected Republicans decide to call him out and abandon him publicly. If they’re not going to do it over his selling out to Russia, why would they do it when a government they despise indicts him?
One other consideration: trump will need a running mate, and pence isn’t having a second go. Having DeSantis teed up as Vp could be the insurance policy trump wants and the National platform desantis need to rehabilitate himself in the eyes of the trumpist cult
DeSantis already shut that door. Trump could never stand to have anyone that seemed like a possible rival.
Even Taylor Greene who desperately wants it is probably out of the running.
Good point. I figured that the same manic energy he’s used to destroy Florida would be reflected in his personality. Kinda like Jim Jordan, for example.
It isn’t.
As a vocalist can assure DeSantis ain’t got “it”, neither in body language or his sad mousy voice as he stares at his written out speech. If there’s manic energy in DeSantis I have yet to detect it, that and he has all the charisma of soggy cardboard. Notice the far right is slowly coming to terms with what DeSantis is, not a world beater and certainly not the new Der Fuhrer that they yearn for. Mastriano struck out in magnificent fashion, but others are coming. And they won’t all be clowns playing a part.
“CW: DeSantis Is Done. Really done. Meaning he isn’t.”
OK. I lol’ed
…organized groups have swept through neighborhoods looking for weapons…Their work made easier by stickers that declare “molon labe” — a defiant message from ancient Sparta, which roughly translates as “come and take them.”
I’m cracking up.
I wonder if they can plead not guilty on the grounds that they were invited to take them.