So, what do you think about those Medicare numbers? What, you havenāt heard about them? Well, they havenāt been front-page news. But something remarkable has been happening on the health-spending front, and it should (but probably wonāt) transform a lot of our political debate.
ā¦.. Health spending has slowed sharply, and itās already well below projections made just a few years ago. The falloff has been especially pronounced in Medicare, which is spending $1,000 less per beneficiary than the Congressional Budget Office projected just four years ago.
ā¦. Whatās the moral here? For years, pundits and politicians have insisted that guaranteed health care is an impossible dream, even though every other advanced country has it. Covering the uninsured was supposed to be unaffordable; Medicare as we know it was supposed to be unsustainable. But it turns out that incremental steps to improve incentives and reduce costs can achieve a lot, and covering the uninsured isnāt hard at all.
When it comes to ensuring that Americans have access to health care, the message of the data is simple: Yes, we can.
Washington Post: U.S. airstrikes help Iraqi forces break Islamic Stateās siege
Iraqi troops and militias aided by U.S. airstrikes broke through a two-month siege of the town of Amerli on Sunday, opening up a humanitarian corridor to thousands of Shiite Turkmen who had been trapped by Sunni militants and deprived of food, water, and medicine.
āAmerli has been liberated,ā said Mahdi Taqi, a local official who spoke by phone from inside the town after the army had entered. āThere is so much joy and people are cheering in the streets.ā
Sunni militants from the Islamic State group, which seized much of northern Iraq in June, had surrounded Amerli, cutting off access to supplies and electricity.
Carol Anderson (Washington Post): Ferguson isnāt about black rage against cops. Itās white rage against progress
When we look back on what happened in Ferguson, Mo., during the summer of 2014, it will be easy to think of it as yet one more episode of black rage ignited by yet another police killing of an unarmed African American male. But that has it precisely backward. What weāve actually seen is the latest outbreak of white rage. Sure, it is cloaked in the niceties of law and order, but it is rage nonetheless.
Protests and looting naturally capture attention. But the real rage smolders in meetings where officials redraw precincts to dilute African American voting strength or seek to slash the government payrolls that have long served as sources of black employment. It goes virtually unnoticed, however, because white rage doesnāt have to take to the streets and face rubber bullets to be heard. Instead, white rage carries an aura of respectability and has access to the courts, police, legislatures and governors, who cast its efforts as noble, though they are actually driven by the most ignoble motivations.
Pete Souza: “Prior to the start of their working dinner during the Middle East negotiations, President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel check their watches to see if it is officially sunset. During Ramadan, fasting continues throughout the day until after sunset.” Sept. 1, 2010 (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
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President Obama in Sioux City, IA, September 1, 2012
President Obama in Des Moines, September 1, 2012 (Photo by Scout Tufankjian)
On This Day: President Barack Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, and their daughters, Sasha and Malia, sit for a family portrait in the Green Room of the White House, Sept. 1, 2009
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