Jobs Up, Website Down

Jobs: The unemployment rate dipped only slightly as the US economy added 148,000 jobs in September. The jobless rate fell from 7.3% in August to 7.2%, but the numbers were collected before the government shutdown. Stocks shot up this morning because the market believes the soft jobs report will delay a rise in interest rates.

Tech Surge: President Obama yesterday kicked his own healthcare website while it’s down, but praised healthcare reform. The President said the problems with the Healthcare.gov website are unacceptable, but the administration is getting the best tech help from all over the country. He said, “Nobody is madder than me about the fact that the website isn’t working as well as it should, which means it’s going to get fixed.”

  A report from the Associated Press says computer programmers knew the site was headed for trouble before its rollout. Obama said the insurance coverage is worth the trouble of getting it.

Dear Valued Customer: Kaiser Health News reports that insurance companies are dumping hundreds of thousands of costly individual customers into the Obamacare health market. KHN says Florida Blue, for example, is cancelling 300,000 policies, about 80% of its individually sold business. Some of the dumped customers are people with pre-existing conditions. Theoretically they might be able to get equal or better coverage through Obamacare, but this development is an unintended consequence of healthcare reform.

World: Following the case of a little blonde girl found last week in the custody of a Roma couple in Greece, Irish police have removed a blonde girl from a Roma family in Dublin.

  In Greece, the case of a girl named “Maria” has put a spotlight on trafficking in children, and heightened scrutiny of the nomadic European population known as Gypsies.  Maria has no biological relation to her custodians and police don’t know where she came from. Greek police discovered the girl during a search for drugs and weapons at a Roma camp in central Greece. The couple faces charges while police try to find the girl’s identity.

The Shooting Gallery: A math teacher at a Sparks, Nev. middle school was shot to death yesterday protecting other students from a boy with a gun. Two 12-year-old boys were wounded before the13-year-old shooter killed himself, police say.

>A patron at Drai’s nightclub in Las Vegas was killed at dawn yesterday while he was helping two security guards wrestle a gun from a man who had wounded the club manager. The shooter had been part of a fight inside the club and was asked to leave. When he was denied a refund of his cover charge he shot the club manager in the arm before the two security guards and another patron wrestled for the gun, with fatal results.

BART: San Francisco’s rail strike ended and trains went back into service early this morning.

Attention Shoppers: Thanksgiving is quickly becoming just another shopping day as Kohl’s department stores announced they will open in competition with the day’s football schedule. Macy’s and JC Penney already announced they will open Thanksgiving night, which means Christmas ads will start on the 4th of July.

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Thursday, March 28, 2024

Page Two

The Most Corrupt Justice

Monday, October 2, 2023

Democracy and Video in the Dark

Sunday, February 26, 2023

Page Two: Do the Right Thing

Tuesday, February 1, 2022

Page Two: Sound Recall

Monday, September 13, 2021

Page Two: Cuomo Must Go

Friday, August 13, 2021

Trump and the Truth

Tuesday, November 3, 2020

The “Great” President

Monday, March 30, 2020

The Wright Stuff

Saturday, February 29, 2020

It's Been Said

"In my mind, I’ve never crossed the line with anyone, but I didn’t realize the extent to which the line has been redrawn. There are generational and cultural shifts that I just didn’t fully appreciate, and I should have, no excuses."

-Andrew Cuomo, resigning as governor of New York after accusations of sexual harassment

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