Society's ChildS


Dollars

How nonprofit hospitals scam the under and uninsured

Lena H. Sun
Washington Post
Fri, 13 Nov 2015 15:37 UTC
hospital
A lot of people who don't have health insurance worry about getting hit with huge bills if they go to the hospital. Most consumers probably don't realize that many hospitals are supposed to let you know if you qualify for free or reduced-price care--and charge you fairly, even if you don't have insurance.

But a recent study found that less than half of nonprofit hospitals surveyed were telling patients they could be eligible for charity care.

There are nearly 3,000 community hospitals in the United States that qualify for tax-free nonprofit status. In return for that tax break—worth $25 billion in 2011 —hospitals are supposed tell the Internal Revenue Service each year how much care they write off for those who can't pay.

Under the Affordable Care Act, hospitals are supposed to follow several rules, which take full effect next year.

Comment:

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Heart

Colorado to vote on single-payer state health-care system

David Olinger
Denver Post
Mon, 09 Nov 2015 14:49 UTC
Image
Colorado state Senator Dr. Irene Aguilar, right, who is a physician at Denver Health, helps deliver more than 156,000 signatures to put the ColoradoCare health care question on the 2016 ballot,
Colorado voters will decide next year whether this state should be the first to pay for comprehensive health care for residents.

Proponents of a single-payer state system gathered enough signatures to put ColoradoCare on the ballot, the secretary of state's office announced Monday.

They needed 98,492 valid signatures to put a state-governed health care system to a vote. After reviewing a 5 percent sample of the 158,831 signatures submitted, the secretary of state projected that the valid total would be 110 percent of the number required — and certified that Initiative 20, the "State Health Care System," will be on the 2016 ballot.

Residents would choose their own health care providers, but ColoradoCare would pay the bills.
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Shopping Bag

US agrees to EU labeling guidelines for Israeli goods from illegal settlements


Press TV
Fri, 13 Nov 2015 01:25 UTC
tag
© muslimvillage.com
The United States has backed a decision made by the European Union to label goods from the illegal Israeli settlements on the occupied Palestinian land.

The US State Department on Thursday [said] it doesn't consider the new EU rule banning "Made in Israel" tags on goods produced in the occupied West Bank as a boycott of the Zionist regime.

The European Commission "adopted this morning the Interpretative Notice on indication of origin of goods from the territories occupied by Israel since June 1967," Reuters quoted an EU official as saying on Wednesday. The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) welcomed the EU rule. PLO Secretary General Saeb Erekat referred to the decision as a "significant move toward a total boycott of Israeli settlements, which are built illegally on occupied Palestinian lands."

protest Israeli products
© www.popularresistance.orgResistance may not be so futile.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry called the labeling "a politically motivated and unusual and discriminatory step, that [the European Union] learned from the world of boycotts," referring to the international movement of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel, known as BDS.

US State Department spokesman Mark Toner said on Thursday that American officials "do not believe that labeling the origin of products is equivalent to a boycott. And as you know, we do not consider settlements to be part of Israel. We do not view labeling the origin of products as being from the settlements as a boycott of Israel," Toner added.

Comment: So here's the deal. If the settlements are not legitimately Israeli, then any labeling decision does not imply a boycott of Israel...sneaky semantics. US gets a half point for threading a needle. Unfortunately, this thimble-full message is about as leverage-flimsy as it gets, more a solidarity ploy for the EU and other Palestinian sympathizers. In turn, Israel will demand more US subsidy. Oh yeah, it just did...

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Bizarro Earth

Seven babies' bodies found in German town


The Local
Fri, 13 Nov 2015 13:47 UTC
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© Agency France Presse/GettyGerman police have so far been unable to question the previous resident of the apartment where the bodies were found.
The house where the bodies were found in the small town of Wallenfels in northern Bavaria is unremarkable in every way. A home-made butterfly is stuck to a window, reports The Süddesutche Zeitung (SZ).

But the picture of tranquillity is deceptive.

Comment:

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Laptop

Russia may launch probe into Facebook after Belgium surveillance disclosure


RT
Fri, 13 Nov 2015 13:20 UTC
Image
© © Dado Ruvic / Reuters
A Russian nationalist MP has asked prosecutors to launch a probe into Facebook and other major social networks after a court in Brussels ruled Facebook must pay a daily fine of €250,000 for its cookie policy tracking non-users.

On Monday, the Belgian court gave Facebook 48 hours to stop tracking the online activities of non-users in Belgium unless they have their explicit consent, or face a daily fine of €250,000. "If a surfer doesn't have their own Facebook account, Facebook from now on will have to explicitly solicit consent and provide the needed explanations," the Brussels court of first instance said.

Facebook lawyers said they would appeal the ruling.

Comment: Belgium gives Facebook 48 hours to stop tracking non-users or pay €250K per day

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Fire

Massive fire engulfs building site in heart of London's tech district

Dina Spector
Business Insider, UK
Thu, 12 Nov 2015 09:48 UTC
Old Street fire
© Kieran Ball A building site has caught fire in Old Street, sending huge plumes of black smoke into the air near London's financial district.
A massive fire that broke out Thursday morning in the heart of London's Tech district is now under control, according to the London Fire brigade.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

The fire, which broke out before 9 a.m, occurred in a six-storey building that's under demolition on Old Street, the fire department said.

"Crews worked hard to contain this blaze and to stop it from spreading. The main fire was concentrated around the building's central lift shaft. This created a chimney effect, which is why smoke could be seen for miles around during the early stages of the incident," Station Manager Gareth Cook said in a statement.

The blaze was under control by 10:15 a.m., after the first emergency calls started rolling in around 8:44 a.m. Eight fire engines and 58 firefighters were on the scene.

Comment: There was another huge fire in London the previous day: Blaze on London's Fleet Street near Goldman Sachs offices

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Cell Phone

Daughter gets 18 years for killing mom, texting corpse photo to dad

Margaret Matray
The Virginian-Pilot
Tue, 10 Nov 2015 04:03 UTC
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Susan Lee Hutson
Susan Lee Hutson didn't think her daughter was serious when she lifted the shotgun.

She told Rachel she was crazy, that she would tell her dad about this when he got home, Rachel Hutson testified.

Then Hutson pulled the trigger.
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Stormtrooper

Bizarre behaviour: Cop attacks woman in parked car, drags her by hair and punches her

Jackson Marciana
Counter Current
Thu, 12 Nov 2015 20:20 UTC
yukon police
© KOKO
Police officials in Oklahoma just acknowledged what eye-witnesses have said since Saturday morning: that a police officer attacked a woman inside of a parked car, brutally beating her.

The Oklahoma City police say that now they are considering recommending charges against a Yukon police officer as a result of the assault.

The police report, obtained by KOKO states that the innocent woman had reported the attack early on Saturday morning.

The report tells us that witnesses observed 29-year-old Zachary Dean Bradford dragging the woman from her car. He was observed dragging her by her hair and then punching her.

Strangely enough, Bradford then took off his shirt and tucked it in his pants. Right after that he left the scene of the attack.

As for the woman, she told the responding officers that she did not know Bradford before being attacked by him.

She was simply sitting in a vehicle and was talking to one of the witnesses of the attack. That's when Bradford came from a nearby home.

Comment: Police are walking time-bombs. No one can predict when they are going to go off.

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Newspaper

Media graveyard: Newspapers, magazines in death spiral - report

Paul Bedard
Washington Examiner
Wed, 11 Nov 2015 17:25 UTC
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© gilesbowkett.blogspot.com
Hard news faces the same kind of extinction as newspapers and magazines, the result of a dramatic death spiral of reporting jobs and ads and the rise of the type of opinion journalism popular two and three centuries ago, according to a new report and analysis.

"Hard news is in danger," said a new report from the Brookings Institution.

The report detailed a fall-off in advertising revenues and employment and raised the question that without editorial employees filtering the news, credibility will be undermined.

"These trends have left many people wondering who will collect hard news for the general public. While the Internet world has made it possible for everyone to express their opinion widely — whether they know anything or not — it has also confused readers. In the absence of supposedly neutral intermediaries such as reporters, fact-checkers, and editors, readers are having a hard time judging the credibility of what they read," said the report.

Filling in the hard news gap appears to be more opinion journalism. At a conference to discuss the report, for example, Emma Green, managing editor of TheAtlantic.com, said that the media is shifting to more opinion news. In digital journalism, which is exploding, she said, "there's a slide that is going on where we're in a golden age of opinion journalism, and there's greater analysis, and sort of more interesting analytical gray zone that's happening in the way that news is presented."

Comment: Today, the media's job is to tell people what to think and what the facts are regardless of what the truth is. They are not reporting the most heinous crimes going on in government and society-at-large. Maybe folks are confused, maybe they are tired of being brain-washed, propagandized and stupefied by MSM news organizations in the U.S. who constantly feed them lies and charge them for it? Maybe they are looking to fill the deficit and seek fresher sources with more truth in them?

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Black Cat

Secret Service officer arrested after texting naked photos to a police officer posing as a teenage girl

Eric Beech
Busniess Insider
Fri, 13 Nov 2015 01:16 UTC
Image
A U.S. Secret Service officer assigned to the White House was arrested this week after he sent naked pictures of himself to someone he thought was a 14-year-old girl, according to a criminal complaint.

Lee Robert Moore, 37, of Church Hill, Maryland, turned himself in to Maryland State Police on Monday and faces charges including solicitation of a minor, according to the complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Delaware.

The complaint details a series of pornographic online chats starting in late August between Moore and a Delaware State Police detective posing as a 14-year-old girl.
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