Wednesday, November 30, 2016

Democrats back to their roots: Republicans want to push wheelchair bound grandma's off a cliff. These folk live in a static mindset

Schumer: Republicans Are 'Plotting a War on Seniors'

By Susan Jones | November 30, 2016 | 5:45 AM EST 

Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) speak to reporters on Capitol Hill. (AP File Photo)
(CNSNews.com) - During the presidential campaign, Republican Donald Trump said he would not cut Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid, but no matter.

Sen. Chuck Schumer, the next Senate minority leader, on Tuesday warned that Republicans are "plotting a war on seniors."

The New York Democrat said he was "so disappointed" that Trump has nominated Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.) to be his Health and Human Services secretary. "When it comes to issues like Medicare, the Affordable Care Act and Planned Parenthood, Congressman Price and the average American couldn't be further apart," Schumer told a news conference on Capitol Hill.


"Between this nomination of an avowed Medicare opponent and Republicans here in Washington threatening to privatize Medicare, it's clear that Washington Republicans are plotting a war on seniors next year. Every senior, every American should hear this loudly and clearly Democrats will not let them win that fight."

Schumer said Republicans tried to privatize Social Security after the 2004 elections: "And now, after the 2016 elections, it seems that they're intent on trying the same trick on Medicare. Just as their efforts failed then, they will fail now. We say to our Republicans that want to privatize Medicare -- go try it, make our day.

"Democrats from blue states, purple states, red states are going to link arm in arm to protect Medicare for our seniors and ensure that Republicans don't succeed in putting our senior's healthcare at risk. As we have said many times, there will be issues where we can work with the President-elect and his party, but privatizing Medicare is not -- certainly not -- one of those issues.

"We're going to fight tooth and nail any attempt to privatize, voucherize or any other "ize" you can think of when it comes to Medicare. To Republicans considering going down this path, my advice is simple, turn back."

Although Trump has said he will not cut Medicare, he did campaign on a promise to repeal and replace Obamacare, and on that topic, Trump and Price see eye to eye.
Price, an orthopedic surgeon, has sponsored legislation called the Empowering Patients First Act, which calls for individual health insurance pools, expanded health savings accounts, tax credits for the purchase of coverage and lawsuit abuse reforms.

Price also has called the current Medicare system "broken and unsustainable." He advocates a voucher-type system that would provide subsidies for older Americans who choose to purchase private health insurance. He also would raise the Medicare eligibility age from the current 65 to 67.

Tim Kaine proves he's an ideological idiot. Blames OSU terror attack on guns.

Greg Gutfeld blasts Tim Kaine for calling for gun control after OSU terrorist attack

 
Greg Gutfeld blasts Tim Kaine for calling for gun control after OSU terrorist attack
Image source: Fox News 

Fox News host Greg Gutfeld roasted Virginia Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine on “The Five” Tuesday for his “thoughtless” comments about Monday’s attack at Ohio State University.
The attack, which was perpetrated by an 18-year-old Somali refugee student, was carried out with a knife and car, but that didn’t stop the former Democratic vice-presidential candidate and many other liberals from blaming it on “gun violence.”
“Deeply saddened by the senseless act of gun violence at Ohio State this morning. Praying for the injured and the entire Buckeye community,” Kaine tweeted.
But in fact, the only person who discharged a firearm on Monday on the OSU campus was the hero officer who quickly stopped the terrorist before he was able to injure more or take any lives.
“So let me get this straight. A man tries to kill with a car and a knife, but the villain is a gun — a gun that was used to shoot and kill the guy who was using the car and a knife to kill people,” Gutfeld began. “For Kaine, I say it’s the thought that counts, but what he said was thoughtless.”
“There’s nothing senseless about this ‘gun violence.’ Hell, it may be the most sensible thing ever,” he added. “What’s thoughtless is the knee-jerk response you get from the left over guns.”
Gutfeld went on to explain that Kaine later corrected his tweet, but his point remained: that many on the anti-gun left have used Monday’s attack — which again was not perpetrated by a gun and was only stopped by a police officer using a firearm — to advocate for more gun control.
But according to Gutfeld, terrorists will wage their jihad by any means necessary — which is therefore an “argument for more, not less guns.”
The Islamic State has since claimed responsibility for the attack.

When a system upgrade gets you arrested.

When a system upgrade gets you arrested

Brendon Woods and 'Andrew'
Image captionPublic defender Brendon Woods is taking on clients affected by the software problems
People's jobs and freedom are being jeopardised by the roll-out of new software by California's courts.
Take the example of Andrew.
It was Saturday and he was woken up with a start by his mother. There were four officers at the front door and he was about to be arrested. 
"I’d only had four hours sleep and I’m only wearing gym shorts,” he recalled. 
“I’m thinking, what happened? I was completely confused.” 
Unbeknown to his parents, 24-year-old Andrew - not his real name - had recently finished a six-month drug programme after he was caught in possession of marijuana and ecstasy. 
Which is why he was so confused. It was his first offence and he had done the course as asked. A judge had then told him the case had been dismissed. 
“I did what I was supposed to."
But the court’s new computer system had other ideas and Andrew was put into a police car and driven off to jail. 

‘Absolutely terrible'

Andrew’s story is just one of many relating to Odyssey, the new system being rolled out across much of California to deal with case file management. 
So far, the problems have seen people wrongfully arrested, held in prison longer than required and in several cases mistakenly told they must register as sex offenders. 
The software, created by Texas-based Tyler Technologies, costs about $5m (£4m) and is set to gradually replace a decades-old e-filing system that looks like something a hacker would use in a Hollywood movie. 
Tyler Technologies acknowledged in a statement that the upgrade process had been “challenging” - but said poor training was to blame for bad inputting of data and integration with third-party applications that often introduce glitches into the system.
One of the state's early adopters of the new technology is Alameda County, an area which covers around 1.5 million people in the San Francisco Bay Area, though not San Francisco itself. 
The county’s public defender, Brendon Woods, is now supporting many clients who have been affected by the issues. 
He said a cumbersome user interface was causing the time taken to update a record to jump from around one minute to as much as 30 minutes per entry. 
As well as wrongful arrests and incorrectly extended custody, Mr Woods has seen several cases of misdemeanour offenses incorrectly appearing on the system as serious felony charges. 
He sees the continued use of the software as a threat to the constitutional rights of many people living in the county. 
“It’s something that shouldn’t happen,” Mr Woods told the BBC. 
“When you could be out in the community, working, providing for your family, seeing your kids… and then one minute you are in jail - due to no fault of your own? 
“That is absolutely terrible.” 

A missed Thanksgiving

Mr Woods has filed a motion to compel the court to either keep accurate same-day records or completely abandon the new system, which he described as being unfit for purpose. 
The initial judge in the case chose not to hear the motion, instead referring it to a more senior judge to be heard in mid-January. 
That is too long to wait, Mr Woods argued -  and so he has appealed against that decision to Alameda County’s Superior Court. 
Until it is resolved, he said his inbox is steadily filling up with incidents in Alameda County and beyond. 
Judge looks at computer in Tyler Technologies promotional photoImage copyrightTYLER TECHNOLOGIES
Image captionThe software is being successfully used in other parts of the country, Tyler Technologies told the BBC
“I got an email yesterday,” he says. 
“We had a client who took a [plea] deal and he was supposed to be released the day before Thanksgiving. The system wasn’t inputted properly. He was held an extra four days.” 
Minor driving offences were incorrectly appearing as serious felonies,  meaning if an affected person applied for a job, they are likely to be flagged as having a serious criminal record. 
Mr Woods added: “We’ve had clients who were supposed to register as drug offenders, the system shows them as registering as sex offenders.” 

‘Inevitable headwinds’

Tyler Technologies provided a statement to the BBC in which it defended its software, and shifted blame back to Alameda County’s staff. 
It said many factors could impact the software’s usefulness, among them training of those who use the technology. 
“We are confident that we have the experience to help our client navigate those inevitable headwinds, just as we have done many times before with other complex implementations,” spokesman Tony Katsulos said. 
“However, this must be a co-operative process. A project’s success is contingent on both parties  -  the jurisdiction and the software provider - working co-operatively together. 
“We have reiterated our commitment to this approach to Alameda and continue to make ourselves available to them.” 
Alameda County is not the only area to have struggled with Odyssey. Similar problems have been reported in Tennessee and also in Indiana - where prosecutors have had a perhaps more troubling issue of inmates being mistakenly released early. 
But Tyler Technologies said the problems only amounted to a handful of issues given the software is used in over 600 counties across 21 US states. 

‘No justification'

The plea for patience angered Andrew, who said were it not for a supportive family, his life could have spiralled as a result of the wrongful arrest. 
He said he expected some people to have less concern about the issue given that those being mistakenly arrested were involved in a crime of some nature. 
“If you don’t sympathise with me, I don’t really care at this point. What happened to me was definitely not fair. There’s no justification for that. 
“I paid my dues, I’m better for it. 
“But that was not right.”

Socialized medicine and ambulance service puts your life at risk: slow service, long waits and queues.

Ambulances 'too slow to reach 999 calls'

  • 1 hour ago
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  • From the section Health
Ambulance and patientImage copyrightISTOCK
Ambulance services are struggling to reach seriously ill and injured patients quickly enough after rising demand has left the system over-stretched, a BBC investigation has found.
Patients with life-threatening conditions - like cardiac arrests - are meant to be reached in eight minutes. 
But only one of the UK's 13 ambulance trusts is currently meeting its target.
Ambulance bosses are blaming rising demand and pressure in the system.
Freedom of information requests by the BBC to ambulance trusts showed over 500,000 hours of ambulance crews' time in England, Wales and Northern Ireland was lost last year waiting for A&E staff to be free to hand over their patients to - a rise of 52% in two years.
This is the equivalent of 286 crews being taken out of the system for a whole year or enough to increase the number of ambulance journeys by 10%.
Senior paramedics said the situation had become so critical that it was not uncommon to run out of ambulances at peak times.
Datapic
ParamedicsImage copyrightEMMA LOUISE SATCHELL
Image captionQueues inside Aintree Hospital as paramedics line up to hand over their patients to A&E staff
The Welsh ambulance service is the only one that is hitting its targets to respond to life-threatening calls - and that is only after it reduced the number of cases it classed as an emergency from a third to about 5% so it could prioritise the most critical calls.
Last week Scotland adopted a similar system to help it cope, while services in Northern Ireland and England are also looking to follow suit.

Read more:

It comes after average response times for life-threatening calls topped 10 minutes in Northern Ireland - a rise of nearly three minutes in two years.
Figures provided by two trusts in England also showed average times topping eight minutes for the second highest priority calls, including strokes and fits.
In the East Midlands patients waited 1 minute 42 seconds longer for a crew to arrive in 2015-16 than they did in 2013-14, while in the East of England the waits were 1 minute 11 seconds longer. 
Ambulance performance
NationType of callsTargetLatest performance
England red 1Most immediately life-threatening (2% of calls)75% in eight minutes68.3% (Sept 2016)
England red 2Other serious (30% of calls)75% in eight minutes62% (Sept 2016)
Northern IrelandAll life-threatening (third of calls)72.5% in eight minutes51.2% (Aug 2016)
ScotlandAll life-threatening (third of calls)75% in eight minutes66.4% (Aug 2016)
WalesMost immediately life-threatening (5% of calls)65% in eight minutes79.5% (Sept 2016)
College of Paramedics chair Andrew Newton said the situation was of "great concern".
"Talking to colleagues around the country, it's not uncommon to find there are no resources to respond at all at a given time, particularly at nights and weekends. I was talking to one colleague recently who was explaining to me that the nearest ambulances were probably in France."

Case study: The father and son ambulance team

Osian and Aron Roberts
Osian Roberts has a unique perspective on the ambulance service. He has been working in Llandudno, Wales, for the past 25 years and is now a team leader - in charge of his son.
Mr Roberts believes the job has "changed a great deal" during his career. 
"When I started over 25 years ago we dealt with life or limb emergencies - but now we're doing more and more calls to patients with chronic illnesses for example, more call-outs, the work we do is so much more diverse."
His son Aron, who has been working as an ambulance technician for two years, agrees. He says the work is non-stop. "We can start the shift at 7am - get 10 minutes to check the vehicle then we can be straight out the door. We might not get back until 2pm then get a break of just half an hour. Then it'll be straight out of the door to another call."
His father believes the public needs to be educated about how to use the 999 service. "There are other pathways - pharmacy, minor injuries units, GPs and GP out of hours. What we try to say is think wisely before you call an emergency ambulance," Mr Roberts adds.

Prof Jonathan Benger, the ambulance lead at NHS England, said delays at hospitals were causing "big problems" for ambulance crews as it meant they were taken out of the system and could not answer 999 calls.
But he also said a crucial factor was the increasing number of calls being handled - they hit 9.4m last year, nearly treble the number a decade ago. 
"In the face of rising demand it is not surprising we are having difficulty meeting these targets. It is time to look at the system," he added

Two days of rioting in Charlotte were caused by another made up BLM protect a criminal narrative. Are certain people to be allowed to point a gun at police?

Charlotte police officer will not face charges in shooting death of Keith Lamont Scott, family’s lawyer saysWARNING GRAPHIC 

CONTENT: The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department released the full-length dash camera video of the fatal police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott. Scott's family asked the police to release the video to the public. CMPD

City’s reaction

Gun is key fact

Legal boundaries

Put on leave

Account of shooting

Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/special-reports/charlotte-shooting-protests/article117921218.html#storylink=cpymore here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/special-reports/charlotte-shooting-protests/article117921218.html#storylink=cpy