Serving the Flathead Valley & Montana since 2006. A reality based independent journal of observation & analysis. © James Conner.
Montana Cowgirl has an astute analysis of the impact of today’s federal appeals court decision on the Affordable Care Act. The Fourth Circuit upheld the ACA, but a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit ruled that premium subsidies for polices purchased through the federal exchange were illegal.
Montana is in the Ninth Circuit, so neither decision affects Montanans who obtained health insurance through the federal exchange. At least not yet. If an en banc hearing by the D.C. Circuit upholds today’s ruling, the issue goes to the Supreme Court where good things might not happen.
At The Western Word, Mike Brown analyzes the PPP poll that reports Steve Daines’ lead over John Walsh went from 18 points in June to seven points last week. Brown thinks Daines’ swiftboat attacks on Walsh’s military record are backfiring, and I think he’s right. I also think Daines’ help the rich and hurt the poor voting record has not endeared him to the people — the 99 percent — who are not rich.
At Intelligent Discontent, Don Pogreba, recharged by a vacation in the Dakota Badlands, is really churning out blue ribbon posts. Today he reviews MT Attorney General Tim Fox’s praise for Missoula County Attorney Fred Van Valkenburg’s truculence on investigations of his office’s prosecution of rape cases, and Steve Daines “Orwellian” policy on ensuring access to health care by taking it away. Good reads, both, well reasoned, well written, and well worth your time.
At 4and20blackbirds, comments on the who shot down Flight 17 have sort of petered out, but the thread is interesting and in some ways a bit disturbing to me due to the apparent belief by some that the United States might somehow be complicit in the shootdown. That’s hogwash, of course. We still don’t know for sure who launched the missile that blew the Boeing 777 out of the sky, but as Pete Talbot observed, the preponderance of evidence (circumstantial) thus far suggests the Ukrainian separatists, not the brightest bunch who ever pulled a trigger, were responsible. I think in time the truth will come out. I’m sure there at satellite images of the missile launchers in rebel territory and possession, and possibly other aerial surveillance images. Moreover, people will talk. In the meantime, if the United States is smart, it will give Putin room to extricate Russia via some variant of “the DPR patriots [the stone brained separatists] didn’t do it, and they won’t do it again.”