Obamacare has been Renamed to RobertScare

Call it SCOTUScare or any other name than Constitutional, but there is no mistake the very branch of government that represents the people after today’s Supreme Court decision, the legislative branch is fundamentally inert. Let that sink in. ONLY Democrats voted for this law, let that sink in. Only Congress can approve money for subsidies and they did not approve the money for state exchanges so Treasury finessed law and funded the exchanges anyway. Let that sink in. Can Obamacare be repealed in 2017, sure, but is it likely? Not so much given the handful of SCOTUS decisions.  Everything you need to know leading up to today is found here.

Simply stated are read below:

SUPREME COURT SAVES OBAMACARE

The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a key provision of the Affordable Care Act, handing a major victory to the Obama administration.

The decision was 6-3, with Chief Justice John Roberts delivering the court’s majority opinion. Roberts and Justice Anthony Kennedy joined the court’s liberals.

It’s the second time in four terms the court has prevented the law from a major obstruction that would threaten its existence. Instead, the Affordable Care Act again survives as the largest expansion of healthcare in half a century.

“Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them,” Roberts wrote in his opinion.

The key question in the case centered on whether the federal government had the ability to provide subsidies to help low-income Americans buy health insurance.

The challengers in the case argued the way the law was written does not allow for subsidized insurance in states where the federal government had set up insurance exchanges. Instead, the challengers argued, insurance subsidies are allowed only in states that have set up their own exchanges. They pointed to a clause that they argued meant exchanges should be “established by the state,” but members of Congress who were involved in writing the law disputed characterization. Thirty-four states currently rely on the federal marketplace.

Justice Antonin Scalia wrote the dissent and was joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. In a scathing dissent, he appeared to take a shot at Roberts.

“We should start calling this law SCOTUScare,” Scalia wrote.

obamacare mapWashington Center for Equitable GrowthThe states and counties that will be affected by a ruling against the Obama administration

If the court had invalidated that portion of the law, Obama and Congress would have had to scramble as more than 6 million people could have lost their subsidies — and potentially their coverage. It would have been left to congressional Republicans to come up with either a quick fix or to use the ruling as an opportunity to start moving away from the law known as Obamacare. But Republicans were, overall, disjointed in how they planned to fix the problem.

“Today Democrats, and my guess is Republicans, are breathing one gigantic sigh of relief,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-New York).

“The Supreme Court decision ensures 6.4 million people will keep their coverage; it was legally the right decision and substantively the right outcome. Hopefully, our Republicans colleagues will now give up their quest to repeal Obamacare and move on to more productive activities for the middle class.”

With the decision in the Obama administration’s favor, court observers and health watchers said it would cement the Affordable Care Act as a key pillar of the president’s legacy.

“If the Court sides with the government, more people will continue to enroll and the ACA will likely ultimately be seen as a signature domestic achievement of historic proportions,” Larry Levitt, senior vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation, told Business Insider before the ruling was handed down.

“Obamacare will remain controversial and no doubt feature in the election, but it’s hard to see it getting repealed outright at this point.”

Republican presidential candidates were quick to criticize the law, and they continued to pledge they would work toward repealing it.

“I disagree with the Court’s ruling and believe they have once again erred in trying to correct the mistakes made by President Obama and Congress in forcing ObamaCare on the American people,” US Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Florida) tweeted.

“I remain committed to repealing this bad law and replacing it,” he added.

Three years ago, Roberts joined with the court’s liberals to uphold the heart of the Affordable Care Act — the law’s mandate that individuals buy health insurance or pay a penalty.

If you want to read the Roberts decision today on Obamacare:

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Meanwhile the back-up tapes of Lois Lerner’s emails were erased after the subpoena and the two NY prison escapees are happy as they had insider help. A dark day for America.

The Lost Tea Party Invitation to Dinner at WH

Do you ever ask yourself where the invitation is inviting the Tea Party to the White House for dinner? How about the invitation for Family Security Matters or the Center for Security Policy to attend a State dinner? Will the Concerned Veterans for America organization be invited to the White House anytime soon?

Nah….but look who did just have dinner at the White House.

Expected Attendees at the White House Iftar Dinner

This evening, President Obama will continue a White House tradition by hosting an Iftar in observance of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in the East Room. This is the seventh Iftar, the traditional breaking of the fast at sunset, hosted by the President. This year’s dinner will have a special focus on young leaders and women, some of whom will be seated at the President’s table this evening.

Below is a list of some of the expected attendees at tonight’s White House dinner recognizing Ramadan:

Guests Seated at the President’s Table

  •          Ms. Batoul Abuharb, Houston, TX
  •          Mr. Ziad Ahmed, Princeton, NJ
  •          Ms. Samantha Elauf, Tulsa, OK
  •          Ms. Munira Khalif, Fridley, MN
  •          Ms. Kadra Mohamed, Saint Paul, MN
  •          Ms. Riham Osman, Houston, TX
  •          Mr. Wayne Rucker, Philadelphia, PA
  •          Ms. Wai Wai Nu, Rangoon, Burma

Members of Congress:

  •          The Honorable Andre Carson, United States Representative, Indiana
  •          The Honorable Richard Durbin, United States Senator, Illinois
  •          The Honorable Keith Ellison, United States Representative, Minnesota

Diplomatic Corps:

  •          His Excellency Michael Moussa Adamo, Ambassador of the Gabonese Republic
  •          His Excellency Lukman Al Faily, Ambassador of the Republic of Iraq
  •          Her Excellency Hunaina Al Mughairy, Ambassador of the Sultanate of Oman
  •          His Excellency Yousif Mana Saeed Al Otaiba, Ambassador of the United Arab Emirates
  •          Mr. Sami Alsadhan, Deputy Chief of Mission and Charge d’Affaires a.i., Embassy of Saudi Arabia (Guest of His Excellency Adel Ahmed Al-Jubeir)
  •          His Excellency Sheikh Salem Al-Sabah, Ambassador of the State of Kuwait
  •          Her Excellency Hassana Alidou, Ambassador of the Republic of Niger
  •          His Excellency Abudlla Mohamed Alkhalifa, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Bahrain
  •          Mr. Adel Ali Ahmed Alsunaini, Charge d’Affaires a.i., Embassy of Yemen
  •          Chief Representative Maen Areikat, PLO Delegation to the United States
  •          His Excellency Madjid Bouguerra, Ambassador of People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria
  •          His Excellency Rachad Bouhlal, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco
  •          Her Excellency Alia Bouran, Ambassador of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan
  •          His Excellency Budi Bowoleksono, Ambassador of the Republic of Indonesia
  •          Her Excellency Wafa Bughaighis, Charge d’Affaires, Embassy of Libya
  •          His Excellency Antoine Chedid, Ambassador of the Lebanese Republic
  •          His Excellency Tiena Coulibaly, Ambassador of the Republic of Mali
  •          His Excellency Daouda Diabate, Ambassador of the Republic of Cote d’Ivoire
  •          His Excellency Mohamed El Haycen, Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania
  •          Her Excellency Floreta Faber, Ambassador of the Republic of Albania
  •          The Honorable Sheikh Faye, Ambassador of the Republic of The Gambia
  •          His Excellency Ufuk Gokcen, Ambassador and Permanent Observer of the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation to the United Nations
  •          His Excellency Faycal Gouia, Ambassador of the Republic of Tunisia
  •          His Excellency Bakhtiyar Gulyamov, Ambassador of the Republic of Uzbekistan
  •          His Excellency Mahamat Hassane, Ambassador of the Republic of Chad
  •          His Excellency Awang Adek Bin Hussin, Ambassador of Malaysia
  •          His Excellency Akan Ismaili, Ambassador of the Republic of Kosovo
  •          His Excellency Jalil Abbas Jilani, Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan
  •          His Excellency Serdar Kilic, Ambassador of the Republic of Turkey
  •          His Excellency Subhas Mungra, Ambassador of the Republic of Suriname
  •          Her Excellency Jadranka Negodic, Ambassador of Bosnia and Herzegovina
  •          His Excellency Meret Orazov, Ambassador of Turkmenistan
  •          His Excellency Farhod Salim, Ambassador of the Republic of Tajikistan
  •          His Excellency Ahmed Sareer, Ambassador of the Republic of Maldives
  •          Mr. Seydou Sinka, Charge d’Affaires a.i., Embassy of Burkina Faso
  •          His Excellency Bockari Stevens, Ambassador of the Republic of Sierra Leone
  •          His Excellency Elin Emin Oglu Suleymanov, Ambassador of the Republic of Azerbaijan
  •          Her Excellency Amelia Sumbana, Ambassador of the Republic of Mozambique
  •          His Excellency Mohamed Mostafa Mohamed Tawfik, Ambassador of the Arab Republic of Egypt
  •          His Excellency Kadyr Toktogulov, Ambassador of the Kyrgyz Republic
  •          His Excellency Kairat Umarov, Ambassador of the Republic of Kazakhstan
  •          His Excellency Mohammad Ziauddin, Bangladesh – Ambassador of Bangladesh

Cyber Security on the Skids, Blinking RED

Recorded Future is a real time open source intelligence collection company that determines trends and predictions of emerging threats.

Recorded Future identified the possible exposures of login credentials for 47 United States government agencies across 89 unique domains.

As of early 2015, 12 of these agencies, including the Departments of State and Energy, allowed some of their users access to computer networks with no form of two-factor authentication. The presence of these credentials on the open Web leaves these agencies vulnerable to espionage, socially engineered attacks, and tailored spear-phishing attacks against their workforce.

The damage has yet to be fully realized and cannot be overstated. Where is the White House? Where are the protections? Where is a policy? Major alarm bells as you read on.

From Associated Press:

Tech company finds stolen government log-ins all over Web

WASHINGTON (AP) — A CIA-backed technology company has found logins and passwords for 47 government agencies strewn across the Web – available for hackers, spies and thieves.

Recorded Future, a social media data mining firm backed by the CIA’s venture capital arm, says in a report that login credentials for nearly every federal agency have been posted on open Internet sites for those who know where to look.

According to the company, at least 12 agencies don’t require authentication beyond passwords to access their networks, so those agencies are vulnerable to espionage and cyberattacks.

The company says logins and passwords were found connected with the departments of Defense, Justice, Treasury and Energy, as well as the CIA and the Director of National Intelligence.

From the WSJ: Obama’s Cyber Meltdown

“While Russia and Islamic State are advancing abroad, the Obama Administration may have allowed a cyber 9/11 at home.”

If you thought Edward Snowden damaged U.S. security, evidence is building that the hack of federal Office of Personnel Management (OPM) files may be even worse.

When the Administration disclosed the OPM hack in early June, they said Chinese hackers had stolen the personal information of up to four million current and former federal employees. The suspicion was that this was another case of hackers (presumably sanctioned by China’s government) stealing data to use in identity theft and financial fraud. Which is bad enough.

Yet in recent days Obama officials have quietly acknowledged to Congress that the hack was far bigger, and far more devastating. It appears OPM was subject to two breaches of its system in mid-to-late 2014, and the hackers appear to have made off with millions of security-clearance background check files.

These include reports on Americans who work for, did work for, or attempted to work for the Administration, the military and intelligence agencies. They even include Congressional staffers who left government—since their files are also sent to OPM.

This means the Chinese now possess sensitive information on everyone from current cabinet officials to U.S. spies. Background checks are specifically done to report personal histories that might put federal employees at risk for blackmail. The Chinese now hold a blackmail instruction manual for millions of targets.

These background checks are also a treasure trove of names, containing sensitive information on an applicant’s spouse, children, extended family, friends, neighbors, employers, landlords. Each of those people is also now a target, and in ways they may not contemplate. In many instances the files contain reports on applicants compiled by federal investigators, and thus may contain information that the applicant isn’t aware of.

Of particular concern are federal contractors and subcontractors, who rarely get the same security training as federal employees, and in some scenarios don’t even know for what agency they are working. These employees are particularly ripe targets for highly sophisticated phishing emails that attempt to elicit sensitive corporate or government information.

The volume of data also allows the Chinese to do what the intell pros call “exclusionary analysis.” We’re told, for instance, that some highly sensitive agencies don’t send their background checks to OPM. So imagine a scenario in which the Chinese look through the names of 30 State Department employees in a U.S. embassy. Thanks to their hack, they’ve got information on 27 of them. The other three they can now assume are working, undercover, for a sensitive agency. Say, the CIA.

Or imagine a scenario in which the Chinese cross-match databases, running the names of hacked U.S. officials against, say, hotel logs. They discover that four Americans on whom they have background data all met at a hotel on a certain day in Cairo, along with a fifth American for whom they don’t have data. The point here is that China now has more than enough information to harass U.S. agents around the world.

And not only Americans. Background checks require Americans to list their contacts with foreign nationals. So the Chinese may now have the names of thousands of dissidents and foreigners who have interacted with the U.S. government. China’s rogue allies would no doubt also like this list.

This is a failure of extraordinary proportions, yet even Congress doesn’t know its extent. The Administration is still refusing to say, even in classified briefings, which systems were compromised, which files were taken, or how much data was at risk.

***
While little noticed, the IRS admitted this spring it was also the subject of a Russian hack, in which thieves grabbed 100,000 tax returns and requested 15,000 fraudulent refunds. Officials have figured out that the hackers used names and Social Security data to pretend to be the taxpayers and break through weak IRS cyber-barriers. As Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson has noted, the Health and Human Services Department and Social Security Administration use the same weak security wall to guard ObamaCare files and retirement information. Yet the Administration is hardly rushing to fix the problem.

Way back in March 2014, OPM knew that Chinese hackers had accessed its system without having downloaded files. So the agency was on notice as a target. It nonetheless failed to stop the two subsequent successful breaches. If this were a private federal contractor that had lost sensitive data, the Justice Department might be contemplating indictments.

Yet OPM director Katherine Archuleta and chief information officer Donna Seymour are still on the job. Mr. Obama has defended Ms. Archuleta, and the Administration is trying to change the subject by faulting Congress for not passing a cybersecurity bill. But that legislation concerns information sharing between business and government. It has nothing to do with OPM and the Administration’s failure to protect itself from cyber attack.

Ms. Archuleta appears before Congress this week, and she ought to remain seated until she explains the extent of this breach. While Russia and Islamic State are advancing abroad, the Obama Administration may have allowed a cyber 9/11 at home.

Truck Hijacked in Mexico, Visas Stolen

Sheesh, can it get worse?

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The U.S. Embassy in Mexico says a truck carrying visas was hijacked in northern Mexico and the visas stolen.

The embassy says in a statement Wednesday that the theft occurred on June 7 “in northern Mexico,” without specifying where.

The truck was making a trip from the United States to U.S. Consulates in the cities of Monterrey and Guadalajara.

Some approved border crossing cards also were stolen. An electronic alert has been issued so that the stolen cards cannot be used to cross the border.

The cards were re-issued for the intended holders, but they have also been advised of the robbery in case the cards are used in attempts at identity theft.

***

The Vice Admiral of the Coast Guard delivered testimony on drug interdiction on the waterways. In part:

Emerging Threats: Transnational Organized Crime, Violence, and Instability
One of the goals of the Coast Guard’s drug interdiction program is to interdict illicit traffic as close to the source zone1 as possible. This helps to keep the drugs from reaching the shores of Central America where it is transported over land into Mexico, and then to the United States, where the proceeds from the sale of drugs fuel TOC networks. These nefarious organizations operate with impunity throughout Central America while vying for power through drug-fueled violence and corruption of government officials; in fact, eight out of the ten most violent nations in the world are along these trafficking routes in the Western Hemisphere. Traffickers have also increasingly moved product through the Central and Eastern Caribbean vector. Corresponding with this movement, the homicide rate in Puerto Rico is five times that of the rest of the United States. Drug trafficking has destabilized regional states, undermined the rule of law, terrorized citizens, and driven both families and unaccompanied children to migrate to the United States. To be clear, the flow of illicit drugs funds TOC networks which pose a significant and growing threat to national and international security.

Then Border Patrol has their terrifying summary. Yes, it can get worse and Border Patrol is telling the media just how bad it is, but who is really listening, who will address the issues and how is this breaking national security policy? The clarion call is being made, but is there a busy signal?

From the LA Times in full:

Rank-and-file Border Patrol agents are furious that they have lost some of their favorite enforcement tools and say that intense public criticism of border shootings has led to a morale crisis.

“We lack the political will to enforce the law and allow our agency to be effective,” said National Border Patrol Council spokesman Shawn Moran in a conference call with reporters Wednesday. The call was coordinated by the union that represents the agents.

Among the most far-reaching and damning accusations from agents working entry points in Arizona, Texas and California was that the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol administration in Washington does not want agents to make drug busts and has taken away their ability to do so.

Shane Gallagher, an agent in the San Diego sector, said roving interdiction patrols — in which agents would stop suspicious vehicles north of the border — were extraordinarily successful at nabbing border crossers with drugs. But those patrols would then create uncomfortable questions for the ports through which the vehicles had just passed, he said.

“Now the port of entry has to explain who was in the primary lane, what actions were taken, if the vehicle was inspected, so you can see there’s a whole host of implications,” he said.

Though rank-and-file agents saw the value in drug interdictions, Gallagher said, agency leadership did not and drastically reduced the number of agents doing such work.

“There was a lot of pressure for us to get out of the [drug] interdiction game,” Gallagher said.

The decision to speak with reporters comes as rank-and-file agents have come under intense criticism for their involvement in fatal cross-border shootings – including the slaying of a 15-year-old boy who was walking home from a basketball game in Nogales, Mexico, when he was hit by a bullet fired by an agent on the Arizona side of the border.

According to records released last month, only 13 out of 809 abuse complaints sent to Customs and Border Protection’s office of internal affairs between January 2009 and January 2012 led to disciplinary action, and last week, the agency’s head of internal affairs was removed from his post.

A Customs and Border Protection spokesman declined to comment Wednesday when reached by the Los Angeles Times.

The agency also handcuffed agents by instituting civil liberties protections for potential targets of investigations at public transit stations or on agricultural land, colloquially known as a “farm and ranch check,” Moran said.

For such checks, Moran said, agents are required to create an “operations plan” and be able to show supervisors some kind of intelligence that connects targets of investigations to potential criminal activity. No longer, he said, can Border Patrol agents simply question random people.

Amid a flood of women and children turning themselves in at the border, agents also criticized administration directives to lend help to neighboring agencies.

The Border Patrol “grew but other agencies didn’t grow,” said Tucson sector Agent Art Del Cueto. “They’ve been butchering our agency to assist other agencies.”

According to Agent Chris Cabrera of the Rio Grande Valley sector in southern Texas, in one hour last week, 80 people, mostly women and children, turned themselves in to the Border Patrol in the Rincon Village area of his sector.

Overall, the agency finds itself holding 500 people in the Rio Grande Valley sector each day, he said, down from 700 people each day last year, when a flood of women and children from Central America overwhelmed the U.S. immigration sector.

Typically, one or two agents are stationed near Rincon Village to get people into a shelter and check them for weapons. Those agents can handle 10 or 15 people at once, Cabrera said. But when scores arrive, the agency must call on other agents to respond.

“You’re leaving large swaths of the area unprotected,” Cabrera said. “You take a few agents from the field, then you take a few more, and before you know it, you’re down to five agents covering a 53-mile stretch of river.”

Agents criticized the Border Patrol as top-heavy, with a ratio of four or five agents per each supervisor, a ratio that the agents said should be closer to 10 agents per supervisor.

Cabrera said the issue isn’t a lack of resources, but the way in which they’re used.

“We do not have what we need,” he said, “to do the job we need done.”

Obama has Synchronized Iran’s Nuclear Program

Consider the stated position of the Supreme leader of Iran:

Reuters and AFP – Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has stated his country’s red lines for a nuclear deal with six world powers.

“Freezing Iran’s research and development for a long time like 10 or 12 years is not acceptable,” Khamenei said in a speech broadcast live on June 23.

Khamenei, who has the final say for Iran on any deal, added that all financial and economic sanctions “should be lifted immediately” if an agreement is signed.

Britain, France, Germany, China, Russia, and the United States want Tehran to commit to a verifiable halt of at least 10 years on sensitive nuclear development work as part of a deal they aim to reach by a June 30 deadline. In exchange, they are offering relief from economic sanctions.

Khamenei reiterated that Iran would not give international inspectors access to its military sites and accused the United States of wanting to destroy Iran’s nuclear industry.

The six powers want limits on Tehran’s programs that could have a military use.

Tehran denies it is pursuing nuclear weapons.

***

When the NYT finally prints an explosive fantasy piece on what the White House and John Kerry at the State Department are doing with Iran, one needs to take notice. The New York Times calls this Iran agreement a ‘fatal flaw’.

The Iran Deal’s Fatal Flaw

PRESIDENT OBAMA’S main pitch for the pending nuclear deal with Iran is that it would extend the “breakout time” necessary for Iran to produce enough enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon. In a recent interview with NPR, he said that the current breakout time is “about two to three months by our intelligence estimates.” By contrast, he claimed, the pending deal would shrink Iran’s nuclear program, so that if Iran later “decided to break the deal, kick out all the inspectors, break the seals and go for a bomb, we’d have over a year to respond.”

Unfortunately, that claim is false, as can be demonstrated with basic science and math.  Most important, in the event of an overt attempt by Iran to build a bomb, Mr. Obama’s argument assumes that Iran would employ only the 5,060 centrifuges that the deal would allow for uranium enrichment, not the roughly 14,000 additional centrifuges that Iran would be permitted to keep mainly for spare parts. Such an assumption is laughable. In a real-world breakout, Iran would race, not crawl, to the bomb.  Iran stands to gain enormously. The deal would lift nuclear-related sanctions, thereby infusing Iran’s economy with billions of dollars annually. In addition, the deal could release frozen Iranian assets, reportedly giving Tehran a $30 billion to $50 billion “signing bonus.”

Showering Iran with rewards for making illusory concessions poses grave risks. It would entrench the ruling mullahs, who could claim credit for Iran’s economic resurgence. The extra resources would also enable Iran to amplify the havoc it is fostering in neighboring countries like Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen.

Worst of all, lifting sanctions would facilitate a huge expansion of Iran’s nuclear program. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, says that he wants 190,000 centrifuges eventually, or 10 times the current amount, as would appear to be permissible under the deal after just 10 years. Such enormous enrichment capacity would shrink the breakout time to mere days, so that Iran could produce enough weapons-grade uranium for a bomb before we even knew it was trying — thus eliminating any hope of our taking preventive action.

Nothing in the pending deal is worth such risks. Read the full article in context here.

*** But is getting worse as new documents demonstrate.

Reported by Fox News via Associated Press:

The United States and its allies are willing to offer Iran state-of-the-art nuclear equipment if Tehran agrees to pare down its atomic weapons program as part of a final nuclear agreement, a draft document has revealed.

The confidential paper, obtained by the Associated Press, has dozens of bracketed text where disagreements remain. Technical cooperation is the least controversial issue at the talks, and the number of brackets suggest the sides have a ways to go, not only on that topic but also more contentious disputes, with less than a week until the June 30 deadline for a deal.

However, the scope of the help now being offered in the draft may displease U.S. congressional critics who already argue that Washington has offered too many concessions at the negotiations.

The draft, titled “Civil Nuclear Cooperation,” promises to supply Iran with light-water nuclear reactors instead of its nearly completed heavy-water facility at Arak, which would produce enough plutonium for several bombs a year if completed as planned. The full details are here.

Civil Nuclear Cooperation platform is not new.

Chilling are the following facts:

Russia and Saudi Arabia have signed a nuclear cooperation agreement. The U.S. has done the same with Korea. Then comes Pakistan learning from U.S. and India where pacts could lead to even more proliferation globally.

For a more detailed summary of the Nuclear Cooperation agreements, take a look at a surface review on equipment, supply and banks in the matter of Korea.