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eridani
eridani's Journal
eridani's Journal
September 11, 2013
Personally, I’m somewhere between negligence and LIHOP, and highly skeptical about the theories presupposing controlled demolition. The reason for this is mainly living in Seattle, witnessing the controlled demolition of the Kingdome, and reading all of the related stories about it at the time. Most of the people reasoning about controlled demolition on 9-11 are working from strictly theoretical calculations—channeling Rene Descartes. Actual professionals who do controlled demolitions channel Francis Bacon; they can’t afford to rely solely on theoretical calculations because they don’t want to die in the process of doing their work. They know they need to do some empirical testing. Several weeks before the final implosion, the demolition crew did an extensive series of test blasts. There is no such thing as a demolition crew that would agree to skip this step, period. No amount of money is worth being killed or maimed.
As the articles widely available in the press at the time explained, the crew could not assume that the plans they were given on the structure of the Kingdome were completely correct. Just because a designer specifies a certain grade of rebar or concrete doesn’t mean that the actual building contains exactly what is specified. Do contractors never pull substitutions because they had a stash of something similar to what was specified on hand? Never make a guess that some less critical areas might get by with concrete to which extra sand was added to save a bit of money? That’s why demolition experts do test blasts—to check their assumptions about material strength in various areas of the building to be demolished.
MIHOP requires far too many things that would have had to go exactly right concurrently. LIHOP explains how foreknowledge doesn’t necessarily require complete information about operational details. This is in fact what the interrogation of Zubaydah (before the torture) indicated.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101030908-480226,00.html
The fact that I don’t necessarily agree with everyone in the 9-11 truth movement certainly doesn’t mean that I agree with the official stance, which is to deride anyone who suspects that our government hasn’t told us the truth about what they know. To criticize “conspiracy theorists” is to blame the victim instead of taking on the perpetrators. There is a reason why people come up with conspiracy theories—they happen to be a normal and healthy response to the experience of being forbidden access to relevant information and being constantly lied to by the people who do.
The radical therapist Claude Steiner once said that paranoia is actually a heightened state of awareness, in which the paranoid put together narratives that make sense of the only information they have available. He gave an example of a woman he treated who believed that her husband was engaged in several elaborate plots on her life. What Steiner did was to interview the husband, who was disturbed by his wife's narrative. The husband was in fact thinking of having her permanently committed to the funny farm, but he always responded to his wife's questions about what was wrong between them by saying “Nothing, honey.”
That was the crux of the problem. The wife was in a heightened state of awareness and knew only that “Nothing, honey” was a pile of steaming bullshit. Not having access to real information about what was going on in her husband's head, she invented it. Steiner's ultimately successful therapy was simply to convince the husband to stop lying and withholding information. In this case, the husband did not exactly lead the examined life, and was unaware of the harm that social “white lies” can sometimes cause. Being genuinely concerned about his wife, he agreed to try to be more introspective and commit to being honest about his feelings. The wife agreed to acknowledge this effort, and to be more persistent about asking for information instead of automatically assuming the worst. Of course members of our imperial government have no such commitment to making it all better for the rest of us—see the classic Ingrid Berman/Charles Boyer movie Gaslight for a psychological take on their game.
The bottom line here is that it is a basic requirement of sanity to be able to make sense of one's information environment, to be able to put it into a coherent and meaningful picture, and if those people who know what is going on behind closed doors constantly lie to the public and withhold information, the inevitable result is that people will naturally want to fill in the blanks by any means possible. This process is analogous to the effects of sensory deprivation—float in one of those tanks long enough to deprive your brain of sensory input, and it will quickly start inventing some.
Current official explanations of 9-11 are like a picture puzzle with half the pieces missing. Many people have been taking magic markers and extrapolating from what is visible to fill in the missing spaces in an attempt to put together the entire picture. They are constantly ridiculed for this, and opinion makers who wish to be taken seriously always bog the discussion down in disputes about whether or not the colored-in parts really look like the original pieces. Some will be closer approximations than others, of course; a few may well be wildly off. But the really important issue (which remains for the most part unaddressed) is “What in bleeding hell gives our government the right to hide the pieces in the first place?”
Attacking people who are trying to make sense of their information environments with limited data is highly unethical, no matter how nutty their theories may sometimes sound. It's exactly like putting a rape victim on trial for her previous sexual history instead of going after the rapist. Theories may fall anywhere on a continuum from plausible to seriously off-base, just as women's prior sexual histories may vary from none to very experienced. By any objective analysis, some unofficial theories of what happened on 9/11 are prim virgins in high-collared white lace blouses, and some are prancing around in tight red spandex streetwalker outfits. But either way, it just plain should not matter—critics should focus on calling rapists, liars and secret-keepers to account rather than slandering their victims.
“Conspiracy theorists” are commonly dismissed as irrational or unscientific. It's true that scientific training helps people to cope with not having certain and final answers, and that only a minority of the population has such training. However, one important part of scientific training is learning to avoid speculating beyond the data, but this requirement of the scientific process depends critically on the assumption (which is almost always valid) that scientists will present all relevant data and methodology to their research community as accurately and as completely as they can. Since this condition is not currently met by our government (and most certainly not by the 9/11 Commission), it is outrageous to attack as “unscientific” people who express concern about a government that insists on keeping secrets from them, especially when those secrets threaten the foundation of our democracy. The attacks should be directed instead toward those who are keeping what should be publicly available information from them.
How long will the official arbiters of “reality” continue to defend the rapists, the liars, the secret-keepers who conceal information that in a real democracy ought to be made available to the public? If we could spend $40 million investigating a blow job, surely we could spend more than $15 million on finding out what really happened on the day of the worst attack on our soil. I hope that more people will join with those who are demanding honesty and transparency in the public sphere. The urge to be accepted as a real member of the elite class of reality creators, those who claim the right to lie and withhold information on the grounds that they alone are entitled to decide what the public should know, can be very tempting. Any person who gives in to this temptation badly fails our democratic republic. What is tyranny but a system in which rulers assert the right to know everything about their subjects while keeping their own operations strictly undercover?
9/11 "alternative" theories and "conspiracies"
The various HOP levels are
--our government is behind 9-11, that is to say MIHOP=Made It Happen On Purpose.
--LIHOP= Let It Happen On Purpose.
--The third option is incompetent negligence due to having other priorities like the missile defense shield boondoggle, cutting taxes for the rich and planning the invasion of Iraq.
Personally, I’m somewhere between negligence and LIHOP, and highly skeptical about the theories presupposing controlled demolition. The reason for this is mainly living in Seattle, witnessing the controlled demolition of the Kingdome, and reading all of the related stories about it at the time. Most of the people reasoning about controlled demolition on 9-11 are working from strictly theoretical calculations—channeling Rene Descartes. Actual professionals who do controlled demolitions channel Francis Bacon; they can’t afford to rely solely on theoretical calculations because they don’t want to die in the process of doing their work. They know they need to do some empirical testing. Several weeks before the final implosion, the demolition crew did an extensive series of test blasts. There is no such thing as a demolition crew that would agree to skip this step, period. No amount of money is worth being killed or maimed.
As the articles widely available in the press at the time explained, the crew could not assume that the plans they were given on the structure of the Kingdome were completely correct. Just because a designer specifies a certain grade of rebar or concrete doesn’t mean that the actual building contains exactly what is specified. Do contractors never pull substitutions because they had a stash of something similar to what was specified on hand? Never make a guess that some less critical areas might get by with concrete to which extra sand was added to save a bit of money? That’s why demolition experts do test blasts—to check their assumptions about material strength in various areas of the building to be demolished.
MIHOP requires far too many things that would have had to go exactly right concurrently. LIHOP explains how foreknowledge doesn’t necessarily require complete information about operational details. This is in fact what the interrogation of Zubaydah (before the torture) indicated.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101030908-480226,00.html
Without charging any skullduggery (Posner told TIME they "may in fact be coincidences"
, the author notes that these deaths occurred after CIA officials passed along Zubaydah's accusations to Riyadh and Islamabad. Washington, reports Posner, was shocked when Zubaydah claimed that “9/11 changed nothing” about the clandestine marriage of terrorism and Saudi and Pakistani interests, “because both Prince Ahmed and Mir knew that an attack was scheduled for American soil on that day.” They couldn't stop it or warn the U.S. in advance, Zubaydah said, because they didn't know what or where the attack would be. And they couldn't turn on bin Laden afterward because he could expose their prior knowledge. Both capitals swiftly assured Washington that “they had thoroughly investigated the claims and they were false and malicious.” The Bush Administration, writes Posner, decided that “creating an international incident and straining relations with those regional allies when they were critical to the war in Afghanistan and the buildup for possible war with Iraq, was out of the question.”
, the author notes that these deaths occurred after CIA officials passed along Zubaydah's accusations to Riyadh and Islamabad. Washington, reports Posner, was shocked when Zubaydah claimed that “9/11 changed nothing” about the clandestine marriage of terrorism and Saudi and Pakistani interests, “because both Prince Ahmed and Mir knew that an attack was scheduled for American soil on that day.” They couldn't stop it or warn the U.S. in advance, Zubaydah said, because they didn't know what or where the attack would be. And they couldn't turn on bin Laden afterward because he could expose their prior knowledge. Both capitals swiftly assured Washington that “they had thoroughly investigated the claims and they were false and malicious.” The Bush Administration, writes Posner, decided that “creating an international incident and straining relations with those regional allies when they were critical to the war in Afghanistan and the buildup for possible war with Iraq, was out of the question.”The fact that I don’t necessarily agree with everyone in the 9-11 truth movement certainly doesn’t mean that I agree with the official stance, which is to deride anyone who suspects that our government hasn’t told us the truth about what they know. To criticize “conspiracy theorists” is to blame the victim instead of taking on the perpetrators. There is a reason why people come up with conspiracy theories—they happen to be a normal and healthy response to the experience of being forbidden access to relevant information and being constantly lied to by the people who do.
The radical therapist Claude Steiner once said that paranoia is actually a heightened state of awareness, in which the paranoid put together narratives that make sense of the only information they have available. He gave an example of a woman he treated who believed that her husband was engaged in several elaborate plots on her life. What Steiner did was to interview the husband, who was disturbed by his wife's narrative. The husband was in fact thinking of having her permanently committed to the funny farm, but he always responded to his wife's questions about what was wrong between them by saying “Nothing, honey.”
That was the crux of the problem. The wife was in a heightened state of awareness and knew only that “Nothing, honey” was a pile of steaming bullshit. Not having access to real information about what was going on in her husband's head, she invented it. Steiner's ultimately successful therapy was simply to convince the husband to stop lying and withholding information. In this case, the husband did not exactly lead the examined life, and was unaware of the harm that social “white lies” can sometimes cause. Being genuinely concerned about his wife, he agreed to try to be more introspective and commit to being honest about his feelings. The wife agreed to acknowledge this effort, and to be more persistent about asking for information instead of automatically assuming the worst. Of course members of our imperial government have no such commitment to making it all better for the rest of us—see the classic Ingrid Berman/Charles Boyer movie Gaslight for a psychological take on their game.
The bottom line here is that it is a basic requirement of sanity to be able to make sense of one's information environment, to be able to put it into a coherent and meaningful picture, and if those people who know what is going on behind closed doors constantly lie to the public and withhold information, the inevitable result is that people will naturally want to fill in the blanks by any means possible. This process is analogous to the effects of sensory deprivation—float in one of those tanks long enough to deprive your brain of sensory input, and it will quickly start inventing some.
Current official explanations of 9-11 are like a picture puzzle with half the pieces missing. Many people have been taking magic markers and extrapolating from what is visible to fill in the missing spaces in an attempt to put together the entire picture. They are constantly ridiculed for this, and opinion makers who wish to be taken seriously always bog the discussion down in disputes about whether or not the colored-in parts really look like the original pieces. Some will be closer approximations than others, of course; a few may well be wildly off. But the really important issue (which remains for the most part unaddressed) is “What in bleeding hell gives our government the right to hide the pieces in the first place?”
Attacking people who are trying to make sense of their information environments with limited data is highly unethical, no matter how nutty their theories may sometimes sound. It's exactly like putting a rape victim on trial for her previous sexual history instead of going after the rapist. Theories may fall anywhere on a continuum from plausible to seriously off-base, just as women's prior sexual histories may vary from none to very experienced. By any objective analysis, some unofficial theories of what happened on 9/11 are prim virgins in high-collared white lace blouses, and some are prancing around in tight red spandex streetwalker outfits. But either way, it just plain should not matter—critics should focus on calling rapists, liars and secret-keepers to account rather than slandering their victims.
“Conspiracy theorists” are commonly dismissed as irrational or unscientific. It's true that scientific training helps people to cope with not having certain and final answers, and that only a minority of the population has such training. However, one important part of scientific training is learning to avoid speculating beyond the data, but this requirement of the scientific process depends critically on the assumption (which is almost always valid) that scientists will present all relevant data and methodology to their research community as accurately and as completely as they can. Since this condition is not currently met by our government (and most certainly not by the 9/11 Commission), it is outrageous to attack as “unscientific” people who express concern about a government that insists on keeping secrets from them, especially when those secrets threaten the foundation of our democracy. The attacks should be directed instead toward those who are keeping what should be publicly available information from them.
How long will the official arbiters of “reality” continue to defend the rapists, the liars, the secret-keepers who conceal information that in a real democracy ought to be made available to the public? If we could spend $40 million investigating a blow job, surely we could spend more than $15 million on finding out what really happened on the day of the worst attack on our soil. I hope that more people will join with those who are demanding honesty and transparency in the public sphere. The urge to be accepted as a real member of the elite class of reality creators, those who claim the right to lie and withhold information on the grounds that they alone are entitled to decide what the public should know, can be very tempting. Any person who gives in to this temptation badly fails our democratic republic. What is tyranny but a system in which rulers assert the right to know everything about their subjects while keeping their own operations strictly undercover?
September 10, 2013
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: We already knew that employers were canceling retiree coverage in their company-administered health plans and switching to defined contribution approaches which place the risk of future health care increases onto the backs of their retirees. What is new is the acceleration of this shift by large employers who are taking the easy way out by using private insurance exchanges - a new intermediary that adds to the profound administrative waste already inherent in our health care system.
What is next? Sears Holdings and Darden have already adopted these defined contribution approaches for their active employees. When IBM, Time Warner, Caterpillar, DuPont, and the others that are sure to follow find that these new retiree programs are so successful in controlling the employers' costs, how soon will it take them to shift their active employees into these plans? Even the union-negotiated plans are at risk since unions have lost much of their negotiating clout.
Middle-income Americans are already feeling the crunch. They realize that juggling cost-of-living, education expenses, defined contribution retirement funds, housing and transportation, and other costs is becoming much more difficult as the American Dream is being slowly chiseled away. They know that it is happening, but their lack of taking an activist stance seems to suggest that they don't know what to blame it on.
Well, it's pretty obvious. We have a government of, by and for the one percent. Unless the ninety-nine percent wake up, we'll soon see virtual moats around their castles. In fact, just try to get close enough to knock on their doors today, and you'll see what a private police state for the one percent is like.
My comment: People close to retirement age can be charged three times as much for underinsurance with ACA plans.
Companies dumping retirees on defined benefit health plans to defined contribution.
Media-company Time Warner Inc. plans to move its U.S. retirees from company-administered health plans to private exchanges, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company will allocate funds in special accounts that retirees can use to go shop for coverage, the person said.
The news comes as International Business Machines Corp. also plans to move about 110,000 of its own retirees off its company-sponsored health plan to a Medicare insurance exchange.
President Barack Obama's health-care overhaul calls for such exchanges, which will go live next month, and employers are looking at similar, privately administered exchanges as an alternative to offering their own health plans.
<snip>
IBM retirees have a big incentive to pick insurance through plans offered by Extend Health: Retirees who are eligible but don't enroll in a plan through Extend Health won't receive the company contribution.
Extend Health said nearly 50 companies in the Fortune 500 have become clients, including Caterpillar Inc. and DuPont Co.
The approach was adopted for active employees last year by Sears Holdings Corp. and Darden Restaurants Inc.
The news comes as International Business Machines Corp. also plans to move about 110,000 of its own retirees off its company-sponsored health plan to a Medicare insurance exchange.
President Barack Obama's health-care overhaul calls for such exchanges, which will go live next month, and employers are looking at similar, privately administered exchanges as an alternative to offering their own health plans.
<snip>
IBM retirees have a big incentive to pick insurance through plans offered by Extend Health: Retirees who are eligible but don't enroll in a plan through Extend Health won't receive the company contribution.
Extend Health said nearly 50 companies in the Fortune 500 have become clients, including Caterpillar Inc. and DuPont Co.
The approach was adopted for active employees last year by Sears Holdings Corp. and Darden Restaurants Inc.
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: We already knew that employers were canceling retiree coverage in their company-administered health plans and switching to defined contribution approaches which place the risk of future health care increases onto the backs of their retirees. What is new is the acceleration of this shift by large employers who are taking the easy way out by using private insurance exchanges - a new intermediary that adds to the profound administrative waste already inherent in our health care system.
What is next? Sears Holdings and Darden have already adopted these defined contribution approaches for their active employees. When IBM, Time Warner, Caterpillar, DuPont, and the others that are sure to follow find that these new retiree programs are so successful in controlling the employers' costs, how soon will it take them to shift their active employees into these plans? Even the union-negotiated plans are at risk since unions have lost much of their negotiating clout.
Middle-income Americans are already feeling the crunch. They realize that juggling cost-of-living, education expenses, defined contribution retirement funds, housing and transportation, and other costs is becoming much more difficult as the American Dream is being slowly chiseled away. They know that it is happening, but their lack of taking an activist stance seems to suggest that they don't know what to blame it on.
Well, it's pretty obvious. We have a government of, by and for the one percent. Unless the ninety-nine percent wake up, we'll soon see virtual moats around their castles. In fact, just try to get close enough to knock on their doors today, and you'll see what a private police state for the one percent is like.
My comment: People close to retirement age can be charged three times as much for underinsurance with ACA plans.
September 8, 2013
Democratic Party Platform: July 4, 1900
There is a clunker in there approving the Chinese Exclusion Act, but they were pretty sharp in recommending throttling imperialism and corporatism at birth. Too bad they failed.
http://janda.org/politxts/PartyPlatforms/Democratic/dem.900.html
We declare again that all governments instituted among men derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that any government not based upon the consent of the governed is a tyranny, and that to impose upon any people a government of force is to substitute the methods of imperialism for those of a republic. We hold that the Constitution follows the flag, and denounce the doctrine that an Executive or Congress deriving their existence and their powers from the Constitution can exercise lawful authority beyond it or in violation of it. We assert that no nation can long endure half republic and half empire, and we warn the American people that imperialism abroad will lead quickly and inevitably to despotism at home.
<snip>
We are not opposed to territorial expansion when it takes in desirable territory which can be erected into States in the Union, and whose people are willing and fit to become American citizens. We favor trade expansion by every peaceful and legitimate means. But we are unalterably opposed to seizing or purchasing distant islands to be governed outside the Constitution, and whose people can never become citizens.
We are in favor of extending the Republic's influence among the nations, but we believe that that influence should be extended not by force and violence, but through the persuasive power of a high and honorable example.
The importance of other questions, now pending before the American people is no wise diminished and the Democratic party takes no backward step from its position on them, but the burning issue of imperialism growing out of the Spanish war involves the very existence of the Republic and the destruction of our free institutions. We regard it as the paramount issue of the campaign.
<snip>
We oppose militarism. It means conquest abroad and intimidation and oppression at home. It means the strong arm which has ever been fatal to free institutions. It is what millions of our citizens have fled from in Europe. It will impose upon our peace loving people a large standing army and unnecessary burden of taxation, and will be a constant menace to their liberties. A small standing army and a well-disciplined state militia are amply sufficient in time of peace. This republic has no place for a vast military establishment, a sure forerunner of compulsory military service and conscription. When the nation is in danger the volunteer soldier is his country's best defender. The National Guard of the United States should ever be cherished in the patriotic hearts of a free people. Such organizations are ever an element of strength and safety. For the first time in our history, and coeval with the Philippine conquest, has there been a wholesale departure from our time honored and approved system of volunteer organization. We denounce it as un-American, un-Democratic and un-Republican, and as a subversion of the ancient and fixed principles of a free people.
<snip>
Corporations should be protected in all their rights and their legitimate interests should be respected, but any attempt by corporations to interfere with the public affairs of the people or to control the sovereignty which creates them, should be forbidden under such penalties as will make such attempts impossible.
September 7, 2013
THEREFORE BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED that the ________ send electronic copies of this resolution to President Obama and to our Democratic congressional representatives.
A resolution against war on Syria--feel free to steal for your organization
If you're wondering where I got the information, it's 99% from DU and can be confirmed using Advanced Search.
WHEREAS in 2011 the US and its allies marginalized the Syrian National Council, a group formed with the principles of nonviolence; non-sectarianism; and no foreign military intervention, set up a government-in-exile in Turkey, and recruited, armed and trained violent armed groups to pursue regime change in Syria; and
WHEREAS the US, the UK, France, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar then began flying in fighters, weapons and equipment to turn the Syrian Spring into a bloody civil war; and
WHEREAS the Saudi-sponsored sectors of the Syrian opposition are advocating ethnic cleansing of Alawites and Christians (“Christians to Beirut; Alawites to the grave”) and have already attacked these minorities; and
WHEREAS during a recent hearing, Secretary of State Kerry was asked which rebel groups had specifically asked for our intervention, and Kerry could not or would not answer; and
WHEREAS a recent academic study of intrastate conflicts shows that attacks like the one being proposed in Syria typically increase civilian casualties by 40 percent; and
WHEREAS it is not entirely clear who was responsible for the use of sarin in Syria with the White House assessment being “the strongest position that the US Intelligence Community can take short of confirmation”; and
WHEREAS the US has no credibility whatsoever making moral assertions about the use of WMD, given its aid to Iraq’s use of chemical weapons against Iran in the 80s and its refusal to join worldwide bans on the use of cluster bombs and depleted uranium (both of which have caused far more casualties than chemical weapons); and
WHEREAS in 2012 the Pentagon estimated that it would take 75,000 ground troops to secure Syria's chemical weapons, and now has no confidence in the efficacy of military strikes against Syria; and
WHEREAS public opinion polling demonstrates that war against Syria is even less popular than Congress; and
WHEREAS neither the Assad regime nor any current dictatorship supported by the US (including Saudi Arabia, home to most of the 9/11 hijackers) has the capacity to make chemical weapons or other WMDs, so that this capacity is instead supplied by the US and other western countries;
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that ________ recommends that President Obama and Congress not approve any military action against Syria; and
THEREFORE BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that ________ recommends that President Obama and Congress instead embark upon positive solutions to Syria’s civil war, including but not limited to
• massive aid to help the neighboring countries handle the 2 million of Syria's refugees they have already taken in
• putting pressure on countries shipping weapons to either side of the civil war and using what leverage we have with those suppliers to start an arms embargo
• approaching that sector of the Iranian government strongly opposed to the use of chemical weapons due to their experience on the receiving end in the 80s, and encouraging them to put pressure on the Assad government; and
THEREFORE BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED that the ________ send electronic copies of this resolution to President Obama and to our Democratic congressional representatives.
September 6, 2013
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: UnitedHealthcare, Aetna, and Cigna - three of the largest private insurers in the nation - have decided to not participate in most of the state exchanges being established under Obamacare. Obama and his health care architects had told us that it was better to build on the system we had, expanding the prevalence of private insurance. With this gift of a ready-made market for the private insurers, why are they sneaking away?
America's private insurers have always welcomed the healthy and shunned the sick. The greatest example is the largest insurance market of all - America's workers and their families - not only the largest market in the nation but also the healthiest.
In contrast, the individual and small group markets exposed insurers to greater risks, so they countered by using underwriting to select only the healthy while rejecting those who needed health care. In turn, Obamacare now prohibits selective enrollment - cherry picking and lemon dropping. Insurers rightfully fear that those with greater health care needs will rush into the exchanges, creating high cost risk pools that would price premiums out of the market.
About 31 million people will remain uninsured. They are healthier than average since they will include young invincibles who would rather take a chance, hard working immigrants and their families, many of whom are prohibited from participating, lower-income workers who are exempt because of lack of affordable plans for them, and families with incomes high enough to disqualify them from subsidies yet low enough that they will find the premiums to be unaffordable, especially for plans that still leave them exposed to the out-of-pocket expenses of high deductibles and other cost sharing.
These big insurers aren't dumb. If they are going to sell plans in the exchanges, they want most of these low-cost individuals included in order to dilute the high costs of the sick who will enroll, thereby allowing the insurers to offer competitive premiums. Quite clearly, they are not convinced that will happen.
Will delaying a year result in an influx of some of these healthy individuals into the plans? Look at the list again. Likely some of the previously healthy who develop medical problems will want in. But that will increase the costs of the pools even more, causing the healthier to disenroll because the premiums are driven up further - the classic problem of the death spiral of skyrocketing health insurance premiums.
We should listen to UnitedHealthcare, Aetna, and Cigna. This is a highly flawed method of financing health care. It just doesn't make sense from a business perspective. But also we should give some thought to this ourselves. Does it really make sense to to insert an administratively wasteful insurance intermediary that has found great success in manipulating the markets so that they can welcome the healthy and shun the sick? Medicare Advantage has already proven to us that private insurers will always find a way around risk adjustment and other regulations in order to shift costs away from them and onto taxpayers.
Obama and friends crafted this program to take good care of the insurers while depriving us of a less costly, more efficient and more effective social insurance program - an improved Medicare for all - and yet the insurers are still not satisfied. It's too bad that we are going to have to wait until 2015 and 2016 to see premiums skyrocket and insurers bail out.
What will be our response then? Will we let the insurers continue to cover the healthy while accepting for the rest of us the fact that financial hardship is simply an inevitable consequence of facing serious illness? Based on the lack of public engagement to this date, it seems like that is where we are headed.
My comment: One thing to remember about the general public is that most of them will never get expensively sick. In every age demographic, 15% of its population accounts for 85% of the costs, and 5% for half the costs.
The largest health insurers are not participating in most state exchanges
Right. They are only "wary" of those parts that benefit patients.
Big US health insurers wary of "Obamacare" exchanges
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f17b5ea4-10a4-11e3-b291-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz2dwahA63N
Some big US health insurers, including Cigna, Aetna and UnitedHealthcare, are steering clear of most of the new state healthcare exchanges amid uncertainty about the kinds of customers they might attract: namely sick ones.
The three companies have said they are taking a cautious approach because they need to evaluate how the markets--set up under the 'Obamacare' reforms--will work. They add that they are specialised in providing insurance to big employers, not the individuals and small businesses that will be served by the exchanges.
An Obama administration official said risk adjustment and reinsurance programmes under the law were designed to offer incentives to health insurers to make sure they do not avoid enrolling customers with the greatest needs.
A spokesman for Cigna, which is participating in five of 50 new exchanges,agreed that the provisions would help the company manage risk.
UnitedHealthcare said it would participate in about 12 exchanges initially, but said the exchanges had the "potential to be a growth market" over time.
A spokesman for Aetna said it would participate in up to 14 exchanges. It emphasised that it planned to position itself "for the future."
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f17b5ea4-10a4-11e3-b291-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz2dwahA63N
Some big US health insurers, including Cigna, Aetna and UnitedHealthcare, are steering clear of most of the new state healthcare exchanges amid uncertainty about the kinds of customers they might attract: namely sick ones.
The three companies have said they are taking a cautious approach because they need to evaluate how the markets--set up under the 'Obamacare' reforms--will work. They add that they are specialised in providing insurance to big employers, not the individuals and small businesses that will be served by the exchanges.
An Obama administration official said risk adjustment and reinsurance programmes under the law were designed to offer incentives to health insurers to make sure they do not avoid enrolling customers with the greatest needs.
A spokesman for Cigna, which is participating in five of 50 new exchanges,agreed that the provisions would help the company manage risk.
UnitedHealthcare said it would participate in about 12 exchanges initially, but said the exchanges had the "potential to be a growth market" over time.
A spokesman for Aetna said it would participate in up to 14 exchanges. It emphasised that it planned to position itself "for the future."
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: UnitedHealthcare, Aetna, and Cigna - three of the largest private insurers in the nation - have decided to not participate in most of the state exchanges being established under Obamacare. Obama and his health care architects had told us that it was better to build on the system we had, expanding the prevalence of private insurance. With this gift of a ready-made market for the private insurers, why are they sneaking away?
America's private insurers have always welcomed the healthy and shunned the sick. The greatest example is the largest insurance market of all - America's workers and their families - not only the largest market in the nation but also the healthiest.
In contrast, the individual and small group markets exposed insurers to greater risks, so they countered by using underwriting to select only the healthy while rejecting those who needed health care. In turn, Obamacare now prohibits selective enrollment - cherry picking and lemon dropping. Insurers rightfully fear that those with greater health care needs will rush into the exchanges, creating high cost risk pools that would price premiums out of the market.
About 31 million people will remain uninsured. They are healthier than average since they will include young invincibles who would rather take a chance, hard working immigrants and their families, many of whom are prohibited from participating, lower-income workers who are exempt because of lack of affordable plans for them, and families with incomes high enough to disqualify them from subsidies yet low enough that they will find the premiums to be unaffordable, especially for plans that still leave them exposed to the out-of-pocket expenses of high deductibles and other cost sharing.
These big insurers aren't dumb. If they are going to sell plans in the exchanges, they want most of these low-cost individuals included in order to dilute the high costs of the sick who will enroll, thereby allowing the insurers to offer competitive premiums. Quite clearly, they are not convinced that will happen.
Will delaying a year result in an influx of some of these healthy individuals into the plans? Look at the list again. Likely some of the previously healthy who develop medical problems will want in. But that will increase the costs of the pools even more, causing the healthier to disenroll because the premiums are driven up further - the classic problem of the death spiral of skyrocketing health insurance premiums.
We should listen to UnitedHealthcare, Aetna, and Cigna. This is a highly flawed method of financing health care. It just doesn't make sense from a business perspective. But also we should give some thought to this ourselves. Does it really make sense to to insert an administratively wasteful insurance intermediary that has found great success in manipulating the markets so that they can welcome the healthy and shun the sick? Medicare Advantage has already proven to us that private insurers will always find a way around risk adjustment and other regulations in order to shift costs away from them and onto taxpayers.
Obama and friends crafted this program to take good care of the insurers while depriving us of a less costly, more efficient and more effective social insurance program - an improved Medicare for all - and yet the insurers are still not satisfied. It's too bad that we are going to have to wait until 2015 and 2016 to see premiums skyrocket and insurers bail out.
What will be our response then? Will we let the insurers continue to cover the healthy while accepting for the rest of us the fact that financial hardship is simply an inevitable consequence of facing serious illness? Based on the lack of public engagement to this date, it seems like that is where we are headed.
My comment: One thing to remember about the general public is that most of them will never get expensively sick. In every age demographic, 15% of its population accounts for 85% of the costs, and 5% for half the costs.
August 29, 2013
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: One of the most important changes in health care financing taking place today is the tremendous surge in the use of high-deductible health plans. This is yet one more study that shows that we should question the wisdom of this policy intervention.
Males whose employers switched them from a traditional HMO to high-deductible health plan reduced their use of emergency department high-severity visits by 34 percent. That is, they did not go to the emergency department when the severity of their condition clearly warranted it. That was followed a year later by a 30 percent increase in hospitalizations. Lead author Katy Kozhimannil stated, "The trends suggest that men might have put off needed care after their deductible went up, leading to more severe illness requiring hospital care later on" (American Medical News, Aug. 26).
High-deductible health plans not only cause financial hardship, they also maim and kill people. And they aren't even necessary as a means to control spending. We can control costs more effectively and far more humanely through a publicly-administered single payer program that provides first-dollar coverage.
High deductible heath plans maim and kill people
The Impact of High-deductible Health Plans on Men and Women: An Analysis of Emergency Department Care
http://journals.lww.com/lww-medicalcare/Abstract/2013/08000/The_Impact_of_High_deductible_Health_Plans_on_Men.2.aspx
Background: Prior studies show that men are more likely than women to defer essential care. Enrollment in high-deductible health plans (HDHPs) could exacerbate this tendency, but sex-specific responses to HDHPs have not been assessed. We measured the impact of an HDHP separately for men and women.
Methods: Controlled longitudinal difference-in-differences analysis of low, intermediate, and high severity emergency department (ED) visits and hospitalizations among 6007 men and 6530 women for 1 year before and up to
2 years after their employers mandated a switch from a traditional health maintenance organization plan to an HDHP, compared with contemporaneous controls (18,433 men and 19,178 women) who remained in an health maintenance organization plan.
Results: In the year following transition to an HDHP, men substantially reduced ED visits at all severity levels relative to controls (changes in low, intermediate, and high severity visits of -21.5% [-37.9 to -5.2],-21.6% [-37.4 to -5.7], and -34.4% [-62.1 to -6.7], respectively). Female HDHP members selectively reduced low severity emergency visits (-26.9% [-40.8 to -13.0]) while preserving intermediate and high severity visits. Male HDHP members also experienced a 24.2% [-45.3 to -3.1] relative decline in hospitalizations in year 1, followed by a 30.1% [2.1 to 58.1] relative increase in hospitalizations between years 1 and 2.
Conclusions: Initial across-the-board reductions in ED and hospital care followed by increased hospitalizations imply that men may have foregone needed care following an HDHP transition. Clinicians caring for patients with HDHPs should be aware of sex differences in response to benefit design.
http://journals.lww.com/lww-medicalcare/Abstract/2013/08000/The_Impact_of_High_deductible_Health_Plans_on_Men.2.aspx
Background: Prior studies show that men are more likely than women to defer essential care. Enrollment in high-deductible health plans (HDHPs) could exacerbate this tendency, but sex-specific responses to HDHPs have not been assessed. We measured the impact of an HDHP separately for men and women.
Methods: Controlled longitudinal difference-in-differences analysis of low, intermediate, and high severity emergency department (ED) visits and hospitalizations among 6007 men and 6530 women for 1 year before and up to
2 years after their employers mandated a switch from a traditional health maintenance organization plan to an HDHP, compared with contemporaneous controls (18,433 men and 19,178 women) who remained in an health maintenance organization plan.
Results: In the year following transition to an HDHP, men substantially reduced ED visits at all severity levels relative to controls (changes in low, intermediate, and high severity visits of -21.5% [-37.9 to -5.2],-21.6% [-37.4 to -5.7], and -34.4% [-62.1 to -6.7], respectively). Female HDHP members selectively reduced low severity emergency visits (-26.9% [-40.8 to -13.0]) while preserving intermediate and high severity visits. Male HDHP members also experienced a 24.2% [-45.3 to -3.1] relative decline in hospitalizations in year 1, followed by a 30.1% [2.1 to 58.1] relative increase in hospitalizations between years 1 and 2.
Conclusions: Initial across-the-board reductions in ED and hospital care followed by increased hospitalizations imply that men may have foregone needed care following an HDHP transition. Clinicians caring for patients with HDHPs should be aware of sex differences in response to benefit design.
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: One of the most important changes in health care financing taking place today is the tremendous surge in the use of high-deductible health plans. This is yet one more study that shows that we should question the wisdom of this policy intervention.
Males whose employers switched them from a traditional HMO to high-deductible health plan reduced their use of emergency department high-severity visits by 34 percent. That is, they did not go to the emergency department when the severity of their condition clearly warranted it. That was followed a year later by a 30 percent increase in hospitalizations. Lead author Katy Kozhimannil stated, "The trends suggest that men might have put off needed care after their deductible went up, leading to more severe illness requiring hospital care later on" (American Medical News, Aug. 26).
High-deductible health plans not only cause financial hardship, they also maim and kill people. And they aren't even necessary as a means to control spending. We can control costs more effectively and far more humanely through a publicly-administered single payer program that provides first-dollar coverage.
August 21, 2013
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: Insurer opposition to "any willing provider" clauses is yet one more example of why we should question leaving coverage decisions in the hands of the private insurance industry.
Any willing provider clauses allow care provided by any qualified physician to be covered even if that physician is not contracted by the insurer but is still willing to accept payment based on contracted rates. The advantage of such clauses is that patients may choose to continue to see their own physician as long as the physician agrees to the insurer's rates.
Why would insurers want to prohibit patients from having that right? It has to do with their current strategy of switching to narrow network plans - plans that have fewer choices of health care professionals. They say that they can extract even greater discounts from physicians who believe that they will have more patients referred to them by the insurer. Although it is questionable as to just how much further the insurers can ratchet down rates, these limited network plans have the advantage for the insurer of further impairing accessibility, thereby resulting in savings from forgone care, no matter how important that care might be.
Besides reducing the number of physicians in their networks, they also want to increase the number of nurse practitioners, presumably because they can negotiate even lower rates with them than they can with primary care physicians. That assumes that the current movement by nurse practitioners to gain equal pay for equal work will fizzle when the insurers offer the bait.
When they say this isn't about the money, but it's about quality? No, wait, they do say that this is about "stretching those dollars." But how should those dollars be stretched? Should we take away choices of physicians and substitute nurses unwillingly, or should we consider eliminating this egregiously wasteful industry with its unwelcome intrusions? The latter would not only produce immensely more savings, it would also be much more beneficial for patients.
Insurers seek limited insurance exchange plan networks
http://www.amednews.com/article/20130819/government/130819959/7
Health plans are focused on being ready "and doing what we need to do" as states set up their respective marketplaces, said Karen Ignagni, president and CEO of America's Health Insurance Plans.
But some policy concerns remain. Many states, for example, "still have restrictions on our ability to actually provide high-performing networks for individuals to be able to access high-performing doctors and hospitals to make sure again we're stretching those dollars. That will have to be looked at," she said.
Ignagni was referring to the ?any willing provider? clause, a mandate in some states that requires health plans to allow health care professionals to participate in a health plan's network if the professional agrees to a plan's contract terms, limits and conditions.
She also encouraged giving nurses a broader role, joining them with other professionals as part of health care teams, "so that we can try to customize health care and make it very patient-centered, and again stretch those dollars."
Health plans are focused on being ready "and doing what we need to do" as states set up their respective marketplaces, said Karen Ignagni, president and CEO of America's Health Insurance Plans.
But some policy concerns remain. Many states, for example, "still have restrictions on our ability to actually provide high-performing networks for individuals to be able to access high-performing doctors and hospitals to make sure again we're stretching those dollars. That will have to be looked at," she said.
Ignagni was referring to the ?any willing provider? clause, a mandate in some states that requires health plans to allow health care professionals to participate in a health plan's network if the professional agrees to a plan's contract terms, limits and conditions.
She also encouraged giving nurses a broader role, joining them with other professionals as part of health care teams, "so that we can try to customize health care and make it very patient-centered, and again stretch those dollars."
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: Insurer opposition to "any willing provider" clauses is yet one more example of why we should question leaving coverage decisions in the hands of the private insurance industry.
Any willing provider clauses allow care provided by any qualified physician to be covered even if that physician is not contracted by the insurer but is still willing to accept payment based on contracted rates. The advantage of such clauses is that patients may choose to continue to see their own physician as long as the physician agrees to the insurer's rates.
Why would insurers want to prohibit patients from having that right? It has to do with their current strategy of switching to narrow network plans - plans that have fewer choices of health care professionals. They say that they can extract even greater discounts from physicians who believe that they will have more patients referred to them by the insurer. Although it is questionable as to just how much further the insurers can ratchet down rates, these limited network plans have the advantage for the insurer of further impairing accessibility, thereby resulting in savings from forgone care, no matter how important that care might be.
Besides reducing the number of physicians in their networks, they also want to increase the number of nurse practitioners, presumably because they can negotiate even lower rates with them than they can with primary care physicians. That assumes that the current movement by nurse practitioners to gain equal pay for equal work will fizzle when the insurers offer the bait.
When they say this isn't about the money, but it's about quality? No, wait, they do say that this is about "stretching those dollars." But how should those dollars be stretched? Should we take away choices of physicians and substitute nurses unwillingly, or should we consider eliminating this egregiously wasteful industry with its unwelcome intrusions? The latter would not only produce immensely more savings, it would also be much more beneficial for patients.
August 21, 2013
If losing the House wasn’t enough for Democrats, a benefit-cutting “grand bargain” should finish the job. As Derek Thompson noted in April, the president’s budget cuts both Social Security and Medicare far more than the Republicans’ did. In fact, the GOP’s Ryan budget didn’t cut Social Security at all, and its radical dismantling of Medicare wasn’t scheduled to begin until 2023.
“Crazy Republicans,” said some Democratic cheerleaders, “We’ve given them way more than they even asked for!”
Yeah, crazy all right – like a fox. (Or a Fox Network.) This kind of deal would give them something they’ve always wanted, and let them blame it on the Democrats.
But the news isn’t all bad. There are some promising signs on the horizon, too, and they give us even more reason to seize this moment on behalf of Social Security.
Good news
A recent poll by the National Academy for Social Insurance (NASI) reinforced and expanded upon earlier poll findings when it showed that, by large majorities, Americans would rather raise taxes – including on themselves – in order to expand Social Security’s benefits.
That position was supported by Americans all across the political spectrum, including 74 percent of Republicans.
More politicians are signing on to the pro-Social Security team.
Probably as a result, politicians are getting the message. The “Grayson/Takano letter,” by Reps. Alan Grayson, D-Fla., and Mark Takano, D-Calif., calls on members of Congress to pledge that they’ll vote against any budget that contains cuts to Social Security. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, unlike House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi, has been unequivocal so far in his opposition to cuts.
Don’t Get Complacent About Social Security. They Still Want to Cut It
http://www.nationofchange.org/don-t-get-complacent-about-social-security-they-still-want-cut-it-1377005520If losing the House wasn’t enough for Democrats, a benefit-cutting “grand bargain” should finish the job. As Derek Thompson noted in April, the president’s budget cuts both Social Security and Medicare far more than the Republicans’ did. In fact, the GOP’s Ryan budget didn’t cut Social Security at all, and its radical dismantling of Medicare wasn’t scheduled to begin until 2023.
“Crazy Republicans,” said some Democratic cheerleaders, “We’ve given them way more than they even asked for!”
Yeah, crazy all right – like a fox. (Or a Fox Network.) This kind of deal would give them something they’ve always wanted, and let them blame it on the Democrats.
But the news isn’t all bad. There are some promising signs on the horizon, too, and they give us even more reason to seize this moment on behalf of Social Security.
Good news
A recent poll by the National Academy for Social Insurance (NASI) reinforced and expanded upon earlier poll findings when it showed that, by large majorities, Americans would rather raise taxes – including on themselves – in order to expand Social Security’s benefits.
That position was supported by Americans all across the political spectrum, including 74 percent of Republicans.
More politicians are signing on to the pro-Social Security team.
Probably as a result, politicians are getting the message. The “Grayson/Takano letter,” by Reps. Alan Grayson, D-Fla., and Mark Takano, D-Calif., calls on members of Congress to pledge that they’ll vote against any budget that contains cuts to Social Security. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, unlike House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi, has been unequivocal so far in his opposition to cuts.
August 16, 2013
Social media and elections: It's Not Just Anthony Weiner's Problem
This is from Englin Research, whose emails I get.
In light of Cory Booker’s victory in the NJ Senate Democratic Primary on Tuesday, we felt it appropriate to pay homage to the Twitter king of politics in this week’s 3 Things. Without a doubt, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc have rocked the political world, drastically changing the way candidates interact with voters, organizations attract supporters, and electeds communicate with their constituents. When it comes to social media’s influence in politics, we’ve seen the good, the bad, and the ugly:
1. The Good
Social media produces really neat data. Here at Englin Consulting, we’re just the type of people who love to dive into this treasure trove of numbers and trends. And we’re not alone.
This week, researchers at Indiana University presented a study http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2235423 at the American Sociological Association conference that “found election results could be predicted by the percentage of tweets mentioning those candidates, whether or not they were positive.” Politico http://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/twitter-votes-elections-95541.html?hp=l5 has a good summary of how the survey was conducted, but in short, “by examining the percentage of votes for political candidates in the 2010 House races, researchers said they were correctly able to predict the winner in almost all of the races they studied.”
As we noted on Facebook, we don’t think Twitter will replace traditional polling anytime soon. But our political and social media savvy friend Jon Stahl of ActionSprout pointed out that the interesting thing will be to see if predictive Twitter data becomes more prevalent in races where traditional data isn’t as readily available (think smaller, local races). We’re excited to watch what happens.
2. The Bad
The problem with social media is it does. not. stop. A simple mistake feeds the 24 hour news cycle, can become a viral sensation, and throw a campaign into turmoil in under a few hours (for help when you’re in trouble, see our recent 3 Things on Crisis Communications). Campaigns get off message and the public loses sight of the issues and what matters. So while gaffes provide entertainment for the rest of us, they can cause real headaches for campaign staff. That’s why we’re classifying the way social media amplifies the viral nature of gaffes as the “bad.”
In 2012, Mashable looked at how digital media affected elections in a series called Politics Transformed. While political pundits are split on the lasting effect a gaffe can have on a campaign, what Mashable notes is the way campaigns have had to shift in response to the prevalence of social media: “Now campaigns employ more communications teams than ever; digital directors — people who define the tone of candidates' websites, online presences and social media strategies — are necessities.” So we’ll consider this the silver lining of the bad, as we love all things digital and know a lot of smart people heading up digital strategy for campaigns.
P.S. American politicians aren’t the only ones who have social media problems. Apparently, politicians in Japan are having real trouble saving themselves from the pitfalls of Twitter.
3. The Ugly
We bet you were expecting to see us talk about Anthony Weiner here. So we’ll humor you for a moment: While his political demise (partly via social media) hasn’t failed to provide daily reading distractions, we kind of feel like we’re watching a car crash over and over in slow motion. Frankly, we’re tired of the spectacle he’s created in the NYC Mayor’s race and are excited for him to hopefully fade away after Primary Day.
But what Anthony Weiner’s fall from grace reminds us is that social media gives people a platform to to act stupidly, rashly, and ignorantly. Take for example Newt Gingrich, who tweeted that Justice Sonia Sotomayor was a racist the day after President Obama nominated her to the Supreme Court. People on our side do it too. A DNC staffer had some, um, choice words when SCOTUS ruled on health care earlier this summer. So our advice: keep your unfiltered anger and knee-jerk responses off of social media. Sure it’s fast and easy, and for many have very little repercussions, but a social media slip up in the political world can get ugly quickly. And if you thought no one was watching, head over to the Sunlight Foundation’s Politwoops site for a quick reality check. http://politwoops.sunlightfoundation.com/
[
b]Study: Tweets turn out to be votes
Researchers at Indiana University say they have found that more tweets gets you more votes on Election Day.
A study presented Monday at the American Sociological Association conference found election results could be predicted by the percentage of tweets mentioning those candidates, whether or not they were positive.
By examining the percentage of votes for political candidates in the 2010 House races, researchers said they were able to correctly predict the winner in almost all of the races they studied.
The study looked at a random sample of 537,231,508 tweets from Aug. 1 to Nov. 1, 2010, and data from 406 competitive congressional elections. The more competitive the race, the more accurate their predictions lead researcher Fabio Rojas told NPR.
“It tends to do very well when the race is very competitive. For example, there was one in Utah where, you know, somebody was getting about 47 percent of the vote and the Twitter share was about 45 percent of the vote. So a lot of the cases are within the margin of error of a traditional poll,” Rojas said.
But don’t expect Twitter to replace a traditional poll any time soon, Rojas said.
“I think political polls are going to remain useful. They’ve very valuable in specific cases. So, for example, if I’m interviewing a voter and I’d like to know more about them, a poll is a very good place to do that because we can ask the question directly, while we don’t have as much information about people from social media unless they reveal it themselves through what they write.”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/twitter-votes-elections-95541.html#ixzz2cAXHO8S9
Researchers at Indiana University say they have found that more tweets gets you more votes on Election Day.
A study presented Monday at the American Sociological Association conference found election results could be predicted by the percentage of tweets mentioning those candidates, whether or not they were positive.
By examining the percentage of votes for political candidates in the 2010 House races, researchers said they were able to correctly predict the winner in almost all of the races they studied.
The study looked at a random sample of 537,231,508 tweets from Aug. 1 to Nov. 1, 2010, and data from 406 competitive congressional elections. The more competitive the race, the more accurate their predictions lead researcher Fabio Rojas told NPR.
“It tends to do very well when the race is very competitive. For example, there was one in Utah where, you know, somebody was getting about 47 percent of the vote and the Twitter share was about 45 percent of the vote. So a lot of the cases are within the margin of error of a traditional poll,” Rojas said.
But don’t expect Twitter to replace a traditional poll any time soon, Rojas said.
“I think political polls are going to remain useful. They’ve very valuable in specific cases. So, for example, if I’m interviewing a voter and I’d like to know more about them, a poll is a very good place to do that because we can ask the question directly, while we don’t have as much information about people from social media unless they reveal it themselves through what they write.”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/twitter-votes-elections-95541.html#ixzz2cAXHO8S9
So Your Boss is a Canadian Mayor
http://englin.net/so-your-boss-is-a-canadian-mayor/
If you’ve been paying attention to the news lately, you may have noticed a rather odd pattern of mayors in Canada getting themselves in some odd situations. Like getting caught doing crack. Ok, that one wasn’t a mayor, but an Alberta councillor.
Scandals do not exclusively belong to The Great White North. Politicians across the world have been accused of soliciting sex from minors, tax fraud, corruption, bribery, and abuse of office. And that’s just former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
These stories got us thinking about the need for a good crisis communications plan. While you obviously hope that your CEO, Executive Director or candidate doesn’t get accused of doing anything terrible, it certainly doesn’t hurt to plan.
The three pillars of a successful crisis communications plan:
1. Admit It
Alright, you’ve done wrong. Now what?
If you said, “Deny it until I look ridiculous,” you might be Anthony Weiner. When Weiner got himself embroiled in a social media sex scandal back in 2011, he made matters worse for himself by not immediately apologizing for his lack of judgement. Instead, by denying that he sent pictures of himself from his own phone, he dragged the story out and managed to become a laughingstock.
When we screw up, the first thing we want to do isn’t run to a reporter and fess up. It’s to lie, hide or blame someone else. Don’t do this. By admitting wrongdoing and apologizing, you can possibly help yourself by getting out of the public eye a lot quicker.
This is true whether you’re a politician who’s too handy with your phone camera or an organization that takes a campaign communication too far. If you did wrong, the truth will likely come out and it’s much better if it comes from you.
2. Be Outraged
If someone in your organization, business, or political party has just managed to erase years of hard work within a community, you have every right to be angry. So, be angry right along with your public.
When BP’s CEO Tony Hayward said that, “he’d like his life back,” because he was really tired after his company spilled almost five million barrels of oil in the Gulf, BP promptly fired him. After everything that was happening to BP’s public image, the last thing they needed was the face of the company to appear whiny and apathetic.
Sometimes, you have to let the public know that you’re just as upset, if not more, than they are that something bad happened.
Your mea culpa presumably comes with genuine regret; don’t hide it.
3. Fix it
If you’re not going to try to win back the public’s trust, you might as well close up shop, right?
Describe what you’re doing to fix it, and do that. Ask credible people to stand up with you and note how you’re fixing it.
And, at the same time, it couldn’t hurt to do something awesome to demonstrate that you and your organization are still the rock stars you always were; you’re just human and made a mistake.
http://englin.net/so-your-boss-is-a-canadian-mayor/
If you’ve been paying attention to the news lately, you may have noticed a rather odd pattern of mayors in Canada getting themselves in some odd situations. Like getting caught doing crack. Ok, that one wasn’t a mayor, but an Alberta councillor.
Scandals do not exclusively belong to The Great White North. Politicians across the world have been accused of soliciting sex from minors, tax fraud, corruption, bribery, and abuse of office. And that’s just former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
These stories got us thinking about the need for a good crisis communications plan. While you obviously hope that your CEO, Executive Director or candidate doesn’t get accused of doing anything terrible, it certainly doesn’t hurt to plan.
The three pillars of a successful crisis communications plan:
1. Admit It
Alright, you’ve done wrong. Now what?
If you said, “Deny it until I look ridiculous,” you might be Anthony Weiner. When Weiner got himself embroiled in a social media sex scandal back in 2011, he made matters worse for himself by not immediately apologizing for his lack of judgement. Instead, by denying that he sent pictures of himself from his own phone, he dragged the story out and managed to become a laughingstock.
When we screw up, the first thing we want to do isn’t run to a reporter and fess up. It’s to lie, hide or blame someone else. Don’t do this. By admitting wrongdoing and apologizing, you can possibly help yourself by getting out of the public eye a lot quicker.
This is true whether you’re a politician who’s too handy with your phone camera or an organization that takes a campaign communication too far. If you did wrong, the truth will likely come out and it’s much better if it comes from you.
2. Be Outraged
If someone in your organization, business, or political party has just managed to erase years of hard work within a community, you have every right to be angry. So, be angry right along with your public.
When BP’s CEO Tony Hayward said that, “he’d like his life back,” because he was really tired after his company spilled almost five million barrels of oil in the Gulf, BP promptly fired him. After everything that was happening to BP’s public image, the last thing they needed was the face of the company to appear whiny and apathetic.
Sometimes, you have to let the public know that you’re just as upset, if not more, than they are that something bad happened.
Your mea culpa presumably comes with genuine regret; don’t hide it.
3. Fix it
If you’re not going to try to win back the public’s trust, you might as well close up shop, right?
Describe what you’re doing to fix it, and do that. Ask credible people to stand up with you and note how you’re fixing it.
And, at the same time, it couldn’t hurt to do something awesome to demonstrate that you and your organization are still the rock stars you always were; you’re just human and made a mistake.
Politics Transformed: The High Tech Battle for Your Vote
http://mashable.com/2012/10/02/social-media-gaffe/
Politics Transformed: The High Tech Battle for Your Vote is an in-depth look at how digital media is affecting elections. Mashable explores the trends changing politics in 2012 and beyond in these special reports.
Without digital, former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner's lewd photo may never have seen the light of day. Without social media, people needn't worry about controversial Twitpics or alleged "Facebook hacks." Without the pull of mobile, Romney would never have approved an app that misspelled "America," the country he was working to lead.
Social media is a politician's best dream and worst nightmare — it boasts unlimited access to his constituency, but necessitates 24/7 supervision.
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Reddit and a lengthening list of social networks afford the electorate a (somewhat) unfiltered lens with which to view its candidates. With the social web, political hopefuls enjoy a powerful tool for engagement — and just enough rope to do serious damage.
"The old adage used to be 'don't say anything you wouldn't want to see on the front page of a newspaper.' Now it might as well be 'don't say anything that can be boiled down into 140 characters,'" says James Davis, the former communications director of the 2012 Republican National Convention.
Chicken or Egg?
Does the media report on societal and political gaffes because the public is discussing them on social networks? Or do social networks react to information the media surfaces? Which comes first?
"The media is the 24/7 gaffe-o-meter," says U.S. Naval Academy professor of political science Steve Frantzich. "The media is looking for something out of the ordinary."
The author of the book OOPS: Observing Our Politicians Stumble, Frantzich explains that politicians have been spooked by the critical eye of the media, so they tend to be more "careful" and not as "newsworthy." Thus, when Republican presidential contender Rick Perry faltered and couldn't list the government agencies he wished to close, news organizations couldn't resist discussing it.
"One of the appeals of the gaffe is we presume it's a better measure of the real human being than [the candidate's] stock answer or speech," Frantzich says. "The unrehearsed is better. We feel like we've caught them off-guard."
George Washington University political science professor John Sides, author of the blog The Monkey Cage, says he believes it's the media organizations that are constantly influencing the extraordinary attention given to gaffes. Social media, he says, doesn't "supplant" the news organizations that drive daily conversation, but the social networks will "cannibalize" that information to generally increase the shelf life of the story.
"Social and digital has really held the fire to these candidates. There's no room today for misinformation."
It's not a novel concept that campaigns and the news surrounding them often fade to gaffes and mudslinging. Sides says that even John Adams and Thomas Jefferson fought over "superficial" topics.
The thing that has changed, though, is the ability to resurface old issues and comments. Saint Louis University political science professor Robert Cropf says social media has, in one way, shortened the shelf life of a gaffe story, rendering even one week of reporting an eternity. At the same time, digital has created a paradox where everything is archived -– old tweets, old speeches on YouTube, old voting records — can all be easily searched, validated and used against someone.
The things that surface may prove "good for the public but bad for the politician," Cropf says.
But the appeal to discuss gaffes in the media or the social media may simply be part of our human nature, Frantzich says. Society's obsession with blunders may be the voter's way of justifying her election decision, or simply a version of "celebrity envy."
"We come with a whole litany of shortcomings of the opposing candidate to justify our own candidate," he says. "It's psychologically comforting. Gaffes aren't real criteria, but it gives us ammunition when someone challenges our choice; we have an answer.
"We like tearing people down," Frantzich adds. "We love to see the great and powerful fall."
Blooper reels made news long before the advent of social media.
More than 30 years ago, incumbent Gerald Ford spoke what he believed to be true while debating Jimmy Carter. "There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe," he said. The comment sparked harsh reproach, and Ford's moment went down in history as a game-changer.
Even earlier, George Romney (Mitt Romney's father) effectively stilted his campaign for the 1968 Republican presidential candidacy. Romney Sr. commented that his earlier support for the Vietnam War was due to "brainwashing" by U.S. officials. Romney withdrew from the race after intense polling fluctuations following the statement.
Granted, we have no solid proof that such moments effectively ended these men's political careers, but they nonetheless garnered enough public and media attention to factor greatly into the final results.
In recent years, though, it seems that these "significant," "crucial," "game-changing" gaffes have become a dime a dozen. In a celebrity-obsessed, tabloid culture, it is as common to hear of a political faux pas as a pop culture rumor.
Dallas Lawrence, a former member of President George W. Bush's communications team and managing director of Burson-Marsteller's Proof Integrated Communications, believes the increasing attention to gaffes is a result of the social media vehicle. "Was social media the cause of the gaffes? No, but it is an accelerant of issues that puts something offline on mainstream," he says. "Social and digital has really held the fire to these candidates. Now even fact checkers are being fact-checked by social media. There's no room today for misinformation. Candidates are going to be held to a higher standard."
Those higher standards have pushed candidates to become more prepared. Now campaigns employ more communications teams than ever; digital directors — people who define the tone of candidates' websites, online presences and social media strategies — are necessities. While we can't administer a vaccine for human error, campaigns have come close to perfecting a treatment.
Lenny Alcivar is one of those Band-Aid men, someone who goes in after the fact to survey the damage, to clean and repair any self-inflicted wounds. He is the rapid response director for Romney's presidential campaign, a position fairly new to the field, but one that is quickly becoming one of the most powerful — and social-media savvy is a requirement.
He says the 2012 election will be made or broken by social media, an expected comment by a man whose job may not exist without the Twitterverse. Yet even amidst the powerful, constant and often uncontrollable churn of hashtags and retweets, Alcivar remains calm.
"We spend no time worrying about hashtag hijacks or gaffes," Alcivar says. "If campaigns spent all their time on the defense, you'd be afraid to go out and talk. We are not going to let our opponent set the tone and define the terms of this race."
"The public needs to learn to edit out things that are unimportant."
And Alcivar says sometimes the supporters come to the candidate's defense online, before the campaign even has to mobilize.
Nonetheless, when a gaffe spreads like wildfire, campaigns have no choice but to step in and attempt to squelch the flames. Just like with actual fires, the key in crisis communication is speed, Alcivar says. Though social media has put more matches in the hands of the public, the campaigns have a shot at extinguishing the story with the right strategy — and fast action.
"Waiting 24 hours can be lethal," says Lawrence. "If you let a story metastasize online, then you'll be fighting to reshape a narrative instead of just correcting it."
Alcivar thinks it's all about the follow-up. "If Twitter is today, then Facebook is tomorrow," he says. Campaigns must keep the conversation going in the direction they wish, and to do that they have to espouse different messages on the right platforms at the right times.
If a candidate's core message is continuously being "amplified," Alcivar says, then all is not lost because of a gaffe.
Do Gaffes Matter?
What Cropf calls the "big kahuna gaffe" is the one to fear. He defines it as "the single cataclysmic moment in a politician's career when what he/she says jeopardizes a whole political career in one fell swoop." He says it's definitely possible that one blunder, one wrong turn, one unexpected remark can "implode a campaign."
Political pundits are split on that concept, though.
Recently, Sides published a graph on his blog, exploring data that seemed to prove the fleeting nature of gaffes. He pointed to major gaffe moments of the 2012 campaign and compared those to polling data. The gaffe moments didn't seem to push or pull on the candidate's popularity in any significant way. To Sides, the data proves these moments don't have long-term implications.
Frantzich says because "gaffes are in the eye of the beholder," supporters will almost always disregard or defend the gaffe, and in turn, the same gaffe will solidify concerns for the opposing party.
For lesser-known candidates or those in local races, gaffes have the potential to cause more damage, says Sides. "In a presidential election, people have more defined attitudes about the candidates. In other kinds of races, in primaries, in the Senate or House, when candidates are lesser known, gaffes may have more potential to harm."
Cropf seems to agree somewhat, saying that if a gaffe isn't relevant to the job being done, then the public may attribute the mistake to the candidate being "tired or under pressure;" thus, the gaffe may not have a cataclysmic impact. But if a gaffe reinforces a persona or impression already surrounding the candidate, it can be dooming.
Social Media Is Still in Its Youth
Social media is powerful in its youth, but it hasn't completely settled — and neither has public sentiment toward it. Politics and social media have only begun to overlap in meaningful ways.
According to Cropf, in the years to come, the public and politicians will grow more accustomed to the access and publicity social media have created and adjust as necessary, even reaching a point of desensitization.
"The public needs to learn to edit out things that are unimportant," he says. "It's not a responsibility of the media, or Facebook or Twitter. It has to be the public that does it ... As younger generations of politicians emerge, since social media is part of their environment, they'll know how to adapt and deal with what they say and how things get out there."
For all the focus social media can place on the slip-ups, mistakes and distractions, most people seem to agree that it ultimately provides a net good for the voting public.
"It gives you an inside look at who your candidates are and what they stand for," says Davis. "And social media gives politicians an opportunity to engage with the public directly."
And that engagement, even if it's teeming with gaffes, is a good thing.
http://mashable.com/2012/10/02/social-media-gaffe/
Politics Transformed: The High Tech Battle for Your Vote is an in-depth look at how digital media is affecting elections. Mashable explores the trends changing politics in 2012 and beyond in these special reports.
Without digital, former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner's lewd photo may never have seen the light of day. Without social media, people needn't worry about controversial Twitpics or alleged "Facebook hacks." Without the pull of mobile, Romney would never have approved an app that misspelled "America," the country he was working to lead.
Social media is a politician's best dream and worst nightmare — it boasts unlimited access to his constituency, but necessitates 24/7 supervision.
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Reddit and a lengthening list of social networks afford the electorate a (somewhat) unfiltered lens with which to view its candidates. With the social web, political hopefuls enjoy a powerful tool for engagement — and just enough rope to do serious damage.
"The old adage used to be 'don't say anything you wouldn't want to see on the front page of a newspaper.' Now it might as well be 'don't say anything that can be boiled down into 140 characters,'" says James Davis, the former communications director of the 2012 Republican National Convention.
Chicken or Egg?
Does the media report on societal and political gaffes because the public is discussing them on social networks? Or do social networks react to information the media surfaces? Which comes first?
"The media is the 24/7 gaffe-o-meter," says U.S. Naval Academy professor of political science Steve Frantzich. "The media is looking for something out of the ordinary."
The author of the book OOPS: Observing Our Politicians Stumble, Frantzich explains that politicians have been spooked by the critical eye of the media, so they tend to be more "careful" and not as "newsworthy." Thus, when Republican presidential contender Rick Perry faltered and couldn't list the government agencies he wished to close, news organizations couldn't resist discussing it.
"One of the appeals of the gaffe is we presume it's a better measure of the real human being than [the candidate's] stock answer or speech," Frantzich says. "The unrehearsed is better. We feel like we've caught them off-guard."
George Washington University political science professor John Sides, author of the blog The Monkey Cage, says he believes it's the media organizations that are constantly influencing the extraordinary attention given to gaffes. Social media, he says, doesn't "supplant" the news organizations that drive daily conversation, but the social networks will "cannibalize" that information to generally increase the shelf life of the story.
"Social and digital has really held the fire to these candidates. There's no room today for misinformation."
It's not a novel concept that campaigns and the news surrounding them often fade to gaffes and mudslinging. Sides says that even John Adams and Thomas Jefferson fought over "superficial" topics.
The thing that has changed, though, is the ability to resurface old issues and comments. Saint Louis University political science professor Robert Cropf says social media has, in one way, shortened the shelf life of a gaffe story, rendering even one week of reporting an eternity. At the same time, digital has created a paradox where everything is archived -– old tweets, old speeches on YouTube, old voting records — can all be easily searched, validated and used against someone.
The things that surface may prove "good for the public but bad for the politician," Cropf says.
But the appeal to discuss gaffes in the media or the social media may simply be part of our human nature, Frantzich says. Society's obsession with blunders may be the voter's way of justifying her election decision, or simply a version of "celebrity envy."
"We come with a whole litany of shortcomings of the opposing candidate to justify our own candidate," he says. "It's psychologically comforting. Gaffes aren't real criteria, but it gives us ammunition when someone challenges our choice; we have an answer.
"We like tearing people down," Frantzich adds. "We love to see the great and powerful fall."
Blooper reels made news long before the advent of social media.
More than 30 years ago, incumbent Gerald Ford spoke what he believed to be true while debating Jimmy Carter. "There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe," he said. The comment sparked harsh reproach, and Ford's moment went down in history as a game-changer.
Even earlier, George Romney (Mitt Romney's father) effectively stilted his campaign for the 1968 Republican presidential candidacy. Romney Sr. commented that his earlier support for the Vietnam War was due to "brainwashing" by U.S. officials. Romney withdrew from the race after intense polling fluctuations following the statement.
Granted, we have no solid proof that such moments effectively ended these men's political careers, but they nonetheless garnered enough public and media attention to factor greatly into the final results.
In recent years, though, it seems that these "significant," "crucial," "game-changing" gaffes have become a dime a dozen. In a celebrity-obsessed, tabloid culture, it is as common to hear of a political faux pas as a pop culture rumor.
Dallas Lawrence, a former member of President George W. Bush's communications team and managing director of Burson-Marsteller's Proof Integrated Communications, believes the increasing attention to gaffes is a result of the social media vehicle. "Was social media the cause of the gaffes? No, but it is an accelerant of issues that puts something offline on mainstream," he says. "Social and digital has really held the fire to these candidates. Now even fact checkers are being fact-checked by social media. There's no room today for misinformation. Candidates are going to be held to a higher standard."
Those higher standards have pushed candidates to become more prepared. Now campaigns employ more communications teams than ever; digital directors — people who define the tone of candidates' websites, online presences and social media strategies — are necessities. While we can't administer a vaccine for human error, campaigns have come close to perfecting a treatment.
Lenny Alcivar is one of those Band-Aid men, someone who goes in after the fact to survey the damage, to clean and repair any self-inflicted wounds. He is the rapid response director for Romney's presidential campaign, a position fairly new to the field, but one that is quickly becoming one of the most powerful — and social-media savvy is a requirement.
He says the 2012 election will be made or broken by social media, an expected comment by a man whose job may not exist without the Twitterverse. Yet even amidst the powerful, constant and often uncontrollable churn of hashtags and retweets, Alcivar remains calm.
"We spend no time worrying about hashtag hijacks or gaffes," Alcivar says. "If campaigns spent all their time on the defense, you'd be afraid to go out and talk. We are not going to let our opponent set the tone and define the terms of this race."
"The public needs to learn to edit out things that are unimportant."
And Alcivar says sometimes the supporters come to the candidate's defense online, before the campaign even has to mobilize.
Nonetheless, when a gaffe spreads like wildfire, campaigns have no choice but to step in and attempt to squelch the flames. Just like with actual fires, the key in crisis communication is speed, Alcivar says. Though social media has put more matches in the hands of the public, the campaigns have a shot at extinguishing the story with the right strategy — and fast action.
"Waiting 24 hours can be lethal," says Lawrence. "If you let a story metastasize online, then you'll be fighting to reshape a narrative instead of just correcting it."
Alcivar thinks it's all about the follow-up. "If Twitter is today, then Facebook is tomorrow," he says. Campaigns must keep the conversation going in the direction they wish, and to do that they have to espouse different messages on the right platforms at the right times.
If a candidate's core message is continuously being "amplified," Alcivar says, then all is not lost because of a gaffe.
Do Gaffes Matter?
What Cropf calls the "big kahuna gaffe" is the one to fear. He defines it as "the single cataclysmic moment in a politician's career when what he/she says jeopardizes a whole political career in one fell swoop." He says it's definitely possible that one blunder, one wrong turn, one unexpected remark can "implode a campaign."
Political pundits are split on that concept, though.
Recently, Sides published a graph on his blog, exploring data that seemed to prove the fleeting nature of gaffes. He pointed to major gaffe moments of the 2012 campaign and compared those to polling data. The gaffe moments didn't seem to push or pull on the candidate's popularity in any significant way. To Sides, the data proves these moments don't have long-term implications.
Frantzich says because "gaffes are in the eye of the beholder," supporters will almost always disregard or defend the gaffe, and in turn, the same gaffe will solidify concerns for the opposing party.
For lesser-known candidates or those in local races, gaffes have the potential to cause more damage, says Sides. "In a presidential election, people have more defined attitudes about the candidates. In other kinds of races, in primaries, in the Senate or House, when candidates are lesser known, gaffes may have more potential to harm."
Cropf seems to agree somewhat, saying that if a gaffe isn't relevant to the job being done, then the public may attribute the mistake to the candidate being "tired or under pressure;" thus, the gaffe may not have a cataclysmic impact. But if a gaffe reinforces a persona or impression already surrounding the candidate, it can be dooming.
Social Media Is Still in Its Youth
Social media is powerful in its youth, but it hasn't completely settled — and neither has public sentiment toward it. Politics and social media have only begun to overlap in meaningful ways.
According to Cropf, in the years to come, the public and politicians will grow more accustomed to the access and publicity social media have created and adjust as necessary, even reaching a point of desensitization.
"The public needs to learn to edit out things that are unimportant," he says. "It's not a responsibility of the media, or Facebook or Twitter. It has to be the public that does it ... As younger generations of politicians emerge, since social media is part of their environment, they'll know how to adapt and deal with what they say and how things get out there."
For all the focus social media can place on the slip-ups, mistakes and distractions, most people seem to agree that it ultimately provides a net good for the voting public.
"It gives you an inside look at who your candidates are and what they stand for," says Davis. "And social media gives politicians an opportunity to engage with the public directly."
And that engagement, even if it's teeming with gaffes, is a good thing.
Social Is the Secret Weapon in Local Politics
http://mashable.com/2012/10/02/social-media-and-local-politics/
Social media first took the national spotlight in the 2008 elections, and it continues to expand its influence at every level of American politics. And just as a youthful John F. Kennedy benefited from his grasp of television in the 1960 elections, a new generation of local politicians is using its tactical advantage as digital natives to woo the electorate and launch open government initiatives.
Consider Alex Torpey, the 25-year-old mayor of South Orange, N.J. (official title, "Village President" . Torpey's Twitter profile describes him as "Mayor of @southorangenj; philosopher; grad student; founder/partner @veracitymedia; OpenGov advocate; volunteer EMT; writer; musician; person."
Unlike older public officials, Torpey's social media involvement preceded his political career, as an undergraduate at Hampshire College. "I started using Facebook in college in 2005," he says. "There's an interesting thing happening with people under 25 or 30 who started using social media personally and now start using it professionally."
Torpey has found a surprising amount of support in South Orange, a prosperous New York suburb of population 20,000. When he ran for office in 2011, he saw his social media platforms as an alternative to paid ads and has continued to experiment on multiple networks. "I have both a Facebook personal page and a fan page. I started the fan page during the election, but found it didn't meet my needs. People were basically split between the two, and I had to choose between them -– I wanted to be able to send messages."
However, Torpey feels that Facebook has been slow to adapt to the needs of the political process. "You're not supposed to friend people you don't know. But if I'm mayor of a town and sending a message out to the people in the town, it's counted as spam."
Torpey has gotten better responses on Facebook than on Twitter because, he believes, "it's easier to see other people commenting on something. Last year when we had all these crazy storms, there were some residents who had power out for a week, and my Facebook page became a hub of information for people who had power out."
Torpey is on a fast (and well-informed) learning curve. For example, he is unusual among local politicians in having his own YouTube channel. "People really like videos," he reports. "People will turn the video on and start making dinner."
Torpey also deploys Instagram to promote local events and Foursquare to announce his whereabouts to constituents. He's exploring crisis mapping platforms to initiate SeeClickFix for municipal services, and he's interested in trying Localocracy.com, a means to promote voter registration and engagement among the young.
He's most excited about his township's open data initiatives. Whereas the town was accustomed to five or seven people showing up for budget meetings, Torpey says, "We've had a couple hundred people take a look at our budget online." This allows him to answer direct questions about how tax money is being spent. "When I sent the explanation of how things fit together, they said 'I want to get involved and make the town better.'"
Torpey's findings are born out by a recent study from Brock University analyzing the use of social media in the 2010 Niagara (Ontario) municipal election. Although the local candidates used an array of social media in their campaigns, most of it had a billboard function (as in "Support Me" from the candidate and "I Support You" from the voters). Most candidates failed to stimulate genuine interaction. The study concluded that "social media did not have a significant impact on the electoral success of the candidates," adding that candidates will need to realize how social media differs from the "news-release, one-directional type of communication used in mass media, flyers and most websites."
In the past, people would have resisted the idea of an elected official founding a news organization that covers himself. But the brave new world of political social media has blurred many of these lines. (Think Michael Bloomberg, Bloomberg news and Bloomberg Government.)
One analyst who is watching this space closely is Micah Sifry, co-founder and editor of the Personal Democracy Forum. But he admits that the social media usage of local officials is difficult to track. "We've got 100,000 elected local offices, without the resources to look at them." One issue he signals is the problem of "the campaign feed morphing into the official." Many candidates create Facebook and Twitter feeds for their campaigns. Once these are established and the candidates are elected, they often segue straight into platforms to address constituents. This would not have been a possibility in the days of old media, when there was no way for paid political advertisements to morph into platforms for office holders. "There are rules against this," Sifry points out. "You're not supposed to use campaign resources for office resources. But no one is monitoring it."
Sifry believes that most local office holders have rapidly learned how to use social media with more sophistication, out of necessity. "You don't have as many interns managing the feeds any more. Lots of local officials like being in charge of their accounts –- there's a freedom and directness they enjoy." He sees most local officials focusing on the trifecta of Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, although "some are toying with Pinterest, since you have greater reach to women with it."
At the same time, local politicians have also become aware of social media's risks. This became apparent with New York Congressman Anthony Weiner's 2011 "sexting" scandal, when Weiner tweeted suggestive comments and pictures of himself to a female constituent, costing him his office.
The Anthony Weiner case made people a tiny bit smarter about being careful, but not as much as you would think," Sifry notes. "You still see staffers accidentally tweeting from their boss's account. That's not as bad as what Anthony Weiner did, but you definitely have slippage. No media seems to stop the ability of politicians to be complete idiots."
Tweeting politicians were dismayed to learn that the Sunlight Foundation hosts a tool called Politwoops to display deleted tweets, ranging from minor misspellings to many forms of "awkward."
University of Washington professor Philip Howard (currently a fellow at Princeton) notes some new research on how different politicians approach digital media. "Republicans tend to use digital media for coordinating their message, broadcasting out content that has been drafted from senior campaign officials, and policing each other's political values," he observes. "Democrats tend to use digital media for engagement, conversations, and sometimes slip up because they debate and don't stay on message as well. Professional campaign managers at all levels dislike social media because using it results in some loss of message control."
No one should assume that the U.S. has the last word in social media and local politics. A number of new ideas are emerging abroad. In Berlin, the Pirate Party has developed an open source platform called Liquid Democracy, which allows party members to directly collaborate with local officeholders on shaping the party platform. (Alex Torpey is interested in adapting the model for New Jersey.) In Mexico, visitors to the country's biggest news portal, Animal Politico, can use a feature called Diputuits, pronounced "dipu-tweets," an interactive map of the House of Representatives with links to individuals' Twitter feeds. (U.S. Congress tweet aggregator Tweet Congress pales by comparison.)
Even Wikipedia looked beyond the U.S. to engage local government with its first hyper-local project. In Monmouth, Wales, the local city council provided early and essential support for the development of their city as the "world's first Wikipedia town."
As the 2012 elections approach, it's useful to recall that it's still the early days of this movement. None of the most influential social networks in question –- Facebook, Twitter or YouTube — have reached their tenth birthdays, while Pinterest and Foursquare are still in their infancies. As digital natives make their way in the world, social media will continue to overhaul American democracy in new and unexpected ways.
http://mashable.com/2012/10/02/social-media-and-local-politics/
Social media first took the national spotlight in the 2008 elections, and it continues to expand its influence at every level of American politics. And just as a youthful John F. Kennedy benefited from his grasp of television in the 1960 elections, a new generation of local politicians is using its tactical advantage as digital natives to woo the electorate and launch open government initiatives.
Consider Alex Torpey, the 25-year-old mayor of South Orange, N.J. (official title, "Village President"
. Torpey's Twitter profile describes him as "Mayor of @southorangenj; philosopher; grad student; founder/partner @veracitymedia; OpenGov advocate; volunteer EMT; writer; musician; person."
Unlike older public officials, Torpey's social media involvement preceded his political career, as an undergraduate at Hampshire College. "I started using Facebook in college in 2005," he says. "There's an interesting thing happening with people under 25 or 30 who started using social media personally and now start using it professionally."
Torpey has found a surprising amount of support in South Orange, a prosperous New York suburb of population 20,000. When he ran for office in 2011, he saw his social media platforms as an alternative to paid ads and has continued to experiment on multiple networks. "I have both a Facebook personal page and a fan page. I started the fan page during the election, but found it didn't meet my needs. People were basically split between the two, and I had to choose between them -– I wanted to be able to send messages."
However, Torpey feels that Facebook has been slow to adapt to the needs of the political process. "You're not supposed to friend people you don't know. But if I'm mayor of a town and sending a message out to the people in the town, it's counted as spam."
Torpey has gotten better responses on Facebook than on Twitter because, he believes, "it's easier to see other people commenting on something. Last year when we had all these crazy storms, there were some residents who had power out for a week, and my Facebook page became a hub of information for people who had power out."
Torpey is on a fast (and well-informed) learning curve. For example, he is unusual among local politicians in having his own YouTube channel. "People really like videos," he reports. "People will turn the video on and start making dinner."
Torpey also deploys Instagram to promote local events and Foursquare to announce his whereabouts to constituents. He's exploring crisis mapping platforms to initiate SeeClickFix for municipal services, and he's interested in trying Localocracy.com, a means to promote voter registration and engagement among the young.
He's most excited about his township's open data initiatives. Whereas the town was accustomed to five or seven people showing up for budget meetings, Torpey says, "We've had a couple hundred people take a look at our budget online." This allows him to answer direct questions about how tax money is being spent. "When I sent the explanation of how things fit together, they said 'I want to get involved and make the town better.'"
Torpey's findings are born out by a recent study from Brock University analyzing the use of social media in the 2010 Niagara (Ontario) municipal election. Although the local candidates used an array of social media in their campaigns, most of it had a billboard function (as in "Support Me" from the candidate and "I Support You" from the voters). Most candidates failed to stimulate genuine interaction. The study concluded that "social media did not have a significant impact on the electoral success of the candidates," adding that candidates will need to realize how social media differs from the "news-release, one-directional type of communication used in mass media, flyers and most websites."
In the past, people would have resisted the idea of an elected official founding a news organization that covers himself. But the brave new world of political social media has blurred many of these lines. (Think Michael Bloomberg, Bloomberg news and Bloomberg Government.)
One analyst who is watching this space closely is Micah Sifry, co-founder and editor of the Personal Democracy Forum. But he admits that the social media usage of local officials is difficult to track. "We've got 100,000 elected local offices, without the resources to look at them." One issue he signals is the problem of "the campaign feed morphing into the official." Many candidates create Facebook and Twitter feeds for their campaigns. Once these are established and the candidates are elected, they often segue straight into platforms to address constituents. This would not have been a possibility in the days of old media, when there was no way for paid political advertisements to morph into platforms for office holders. "There are rules against this," Sifry points out. "You're not supposed to use campaign resources for office resources. But no one is monitoring it."
Sifry believes that most local office holders have rapidly learned how to use social media with more sophistication, out of necessity. "You don't have as many interns managing the feeds any more. Lots of local officials like being in charge of their accounts –- there's a freedom and directness they enjoy." He sees most local officials focusing on the trifecta of Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, although "some are toying with Pinterest, since you have greater reach to women with it."
At the same time, local politicians have also become aware of social media's risks. This became apparent with New York Congressman Anthony Weiner's 2011 "sexting" scandal, when Weiner tweeted suggestive comments and pictures of himself to a female constituent, costing him his office.
The Anthony Weiner case made people a tiny bit smarter about being careful, but not as much as you would think," Sifry notes. "You still see staffers accidentally tweeting from their boss's account. That's not as bad as what Anthony Weiner did, but you definitely have slippage. No media seems to stop the ability of politicians to be complete idiots."
Tweeting politicians were dismayed to learn that the Sunlight Foundation hosts a tool called Politwoops to display deleted tweets, ranging from minor misspellings to many forms of "awkward."
University of Washington professor Philip Howard (currently a fellow at Princeton) notes some new research on how different politicians approach digital media. "Republicans tend to use digital media for coordinating their message, broadcasting out content that has been drafted from senior campaign officials, and policing each other's political values," he observes. "Democrats tend to use digital media for engagement, conversations, and sometimes slip up because they debate and don't stay on message as well. Professional campaign managers at all levels dislike social media because using it results in some loss of message control."
No one should assume that the U.S. has the last word in social media and local politics. A number of new ideas are emerging abroad. In Berlin, the Pirate Party has developed an open source platform called Liquid Democracy, which allows party members to directly collaborate with local officeholders on shaping the party platform. (Alex Torpey is interested in adapting the model for New Jersey.) In Mexico, visitors to the country's biggest news portal, Animal Politico, can use a feature called Diputuits, pronounced "dipu-tweets," an interactive map of the House of Representatives with links to individuals' Twitter feeds. (U.S. Congress tweet aggregator Tweet Congress pales by comparison.)
Even Wikipedia looked beyond the U.S. to engage local government with its first hyper-local project. In Monmouth, Wales, the local city council provided early and essential support for the development of their city as the "world's first Wikipedia town."
As the 2012 elections approach, it's useful to recall that it's still the early days of this movement. None of the most influential social networks in question –- Facebook, Twitter or YouTube — have reached their tenth birthdays, while Pinterest and Foursquare are still in their infancies. As digital natives make their way in the world, social media will continue to overhaul American democracy in new and unexpected ways.
August 10, 2013
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: Since the beginning of Medicare, we have heard stories that doctors weren't going to take it anymore; they were going to drop out of Medicare. Some have, but it's a negligible number. Those who say that Obamacare is forcing more doctors to drop out of Medicare will have to explain to us how that computes with the fact that the numbers of physicians agreeing to accept Medicare has increased by almost 30,000 this year alone, for an all-time high of over 735,000.
What is more reassuring is the result of California Healthline's very small informal survey of physicians. They found out what most of us who have been in the profession for a few decades already knew - physicians feel ethically obligated to stick with Medicare. What do you think their ethicalsense would be under an improved Medicare program that covered everyone?
My comment: Well duh! Given the ageing of the population, not accepting Medicare would mean cutting yourself off from millions of patients over 65 who are only going to get more numerous.
More Doctors Are Quitting Medicare. True, but more doctors are also accepting Medicare
http://www.californiahealthline.org/road-to-reform/2013/more-doctors-are-quitting-medicare-is-obamacare-really-to-blame
The Wall Street Journal last month portrayed physician unhappiness with Medicare as a burning issue, with a cover story that detailed why many more doctors are opting out of the program.
And yes, the number of doctors saying no to Medicare has proportionately risen quite a bit -- from 3,700 doctors in 2009 to 9,539 in 2012. (And in some cases, Obamacare has been a convenient scapegoat.)
But that's only part of the story.
What the Journal didn't report is that, per CMS, the number of physicians who agreed to accept Medicare patients continues to grow year-over-year, from 705,568 in 2012 to 735,041 in 2013.
The Wall Street Journal last month portrayed physician unhappiness with Medicare as a burning issue, with a cover story that detailed why many more doctors are opting out of the program.
And yes, the number of doctors saying no to Medicare has proportionately risen quite a bit -- from 3,700 doctors in 2009 to 9,539 in 2012. (And in some cases, Obamacare has been a convenient scapegoat.)
But that's only part of the story.
What the Journal didn't report is that, per CMS, the number of physicians who agreed to accept Medicare patients continues to grow year-over-year, from 705,568 in 2012 to 735,041 in 2013.
Comment by Don McCanne of PNHP: Since the beginning of Medicare, we have heard stories that doctors weren't going to take it anymore; they were going to drop out of Medicare. Some have, but it's a negligible number. Those who say that Obamacare is forcing more doctors to drop out of Medicare will have to explain to us how that computes with the fact that the numbers of physicians agreeing to accept Medicare has increased by almost 30,000 this year alone, for an all-time high of over 735,000.
What is more reassuring is the result of California Healthline's very small informal survey of physicians. They found out what most of us who have been in the profession for a few decades already knew - physicians feel ethically obligated to stick with Medicare. What do you think their ethicalsense would be under an improved Medicare program that covered everyone?
My comment: Well duh! Given the ageing of the population, not accepting Medicare would mean cutting yourself off from millions of patients over 65 who are only going to get more numerous.
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