Three Pages Of Rand Paul’s Book Were Plagiarized From Think Tan

Andrew Kaczynski/Buzz Feed

An entire section of Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul’s 2013 book Government Bullies was copied wholesale from a 2003 case study by the Heritage Foundation, BuzzFeed has learned. The copied section, 1,318 words, is by far the most significant instance reported so far of Paul borrowing language from other published material.

The new cut-and-paste job follows reports by BuzzFeed, Politico, and MSNBC that Paul had plagiarized speeches either from Wikipedia or news reports. The book was published in August 2013 by Center Street, a division of Hachette Book Group.

In this case, Paul included a link to the Heritage case study in the book’s footnotes, though he made no effort to indicate that not just the source, but the words themselves, had been taken from Heritage.

A Paul aide defended the senator, saying he makes clear in the book’s “notes and sources” that he didn’t individually research each case.

“In the book Government Bullies all the information… was sourced by end notes. In the two cases described, the end notes clearly define the sourcing for the book. In no case has the senator used information without attribution,” said Doug Stafford, an advisor to Sen. Paul who co-wrote the book. “There were 150 endnotes and cites including The Heritage Foundation and Cato Institute. This is a witch hunt and grasping at straws.”

The copied text relates to the 2003 case of David McNab, a Honduran businessman who, along with three American businesspeople, was convicted of multiple felony counts related to the illegal harvest and importation of Caribbean spiny lobster tails in violation of the 1900 Lacey Act. The Lacey Act prohibits the trafficking of illegal wildlife.

According to the Justice Department indictment, McNab and his employees “[h]arvested lobster that were under the legal size limit set by Honduras. They also harvested egg-bearing lobsters in violation of Honduran regulations and harvested lobster and shrimp during the closed seasons set by Honduras. To conceal the catch of egg-bearing lobsters, the parts of the lobster tails to which the eggs were attached were clipped off.”

Paul argued in his book the case was outrageous based on the fact no charges were brought in Honduras, McNabb lacked criminal intent, and the Honduran law was invalid.

Here’s what the Heritage Foundation writes on its website, Overcriminalized.com:

This prosecution also reveals the risks of federalizing criminal law. Observers have long warned against allowing the federal government to encroach on the traditional state function of enacting and enforcing general criminal laws. Here, the federal government, through the Lacey Act, claims to enforce foreign laws against foreign and U.S. citizens. These regulations were not made by the U.S. Congress or by some executive agency, but by a foreign government with unfamiliar procedures. If the government of Honduras had actually believed these regulations to be valid, they were free to bring charges. Instead, the U.S. government prosecuted a case on what turned out to be bad law.

Here’s the nearly identical section of Paul’s book:

This prosecution also reveals the risks of federalizing criminal law. Observers have long warned against allowing the federal government to encroach on the traditional state function of enacting and enforcing general criminal laws. Here, the federal government, through the Lacey Act, claims to enforce foreign laws against foreign and U.S. citizens. These regulations were not made by the U.S. Congress or by some executive agency, but by a foreign government with unfamiliar procedures. If the government of Honduras had actually believed these regulations to be valid, they were free to bring charges. Instead, the U.S. government prosecuted a case on what turned out to be bad law.

The similarities don’t end there. The highlighted excerpts of Paul’s book embedded below appear verbatim in the Heritage Foundation case study. It runs just more than three pages.

Asked about the copied text Mike Gonzalez, vice president of communications for the Heritage Foundation, said, “We like when people cite our work. We wish more progressives would cite our work, maybe then they wouldn’t be so progressively wrong.”

Later, after this story went live, the Heritage spokesman called BuzzFeed back to say “we don’t care” about the copy job.

The books “notes and sources” reads:

“This book is not an investigative book. Many of the stories told and information reported represent work already done by others. Rather than endlessly noting multiple sourced items mixed in with personal conversations and research, we have included here other sources of information for the stories presented. Some are activist websites. Some are blogs. Some are reporters. Some are government websites with official releases of information. All of these sources contributed in one way or another to the finished material in this book, and I am grateful for the work many individuals have done in various fields to help expose these government bullies.”

Attempts to contact the book’s publisher were not successful. Messages sent to two different contacts were not returned.

In another instance in the book, several sentences appeared similar to a report by a senior fellow at the Cato Institute Mark Moller in the National Wetlands Newsletter. Moller said he had not given anyone permission to reprint any parts of his article.

The text was once again cited in the footnotes but the words were passed off as Sen. Paul’s.

“Our ideas got in the book, we got credited in the notes. So that seems like a good thing for a think tank,” David Boaz, the executive VP of the Cato Institute said after BuzzFeed was asked to call him by Paul’s office.

After BuzzFeed pointed out the article ran in a the National Wetlands Newsletterand only the PDF was pasted on Cato Boaz said “from his point of view he was researching using Cato.”

MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow discovered last Monday that Paul had plagarized a section of his speech at Liberty University about the movie Gattica from Wikipedia. A follow up report by BuzzFeed the next day found a June 12, 2013 speech on immigration plagiarized a section the Wikipedia article on the movie Stand and Deliver.

Paul defended himself in an interview with Fusion’s Jorge Ramos on Thursday, arguing that it was simply a matter of citation practices and that he didn’t plagiarize the movie’s plot.

“It’s a disagreement over how you footnote things, and I think people footnote things different in an academic paper than they do in a public speech, but if we were going to present any of these speeches for publication they’d have footnotes in.”

The speeches appear on Paul’s website, without footnotes.

On Thursday night, a senior advisor to Sen. Paul pledged the Kentucky senator would be “more cautious in presenting and attributing sources” in the future after Politico confronted the office with two more instances of plagiarism.

Politico found Paul copied language in his 2013 speech responding to President Obama’s State of the Union address from the Associated Press and a 2010 passage from the magazine of the social conservative group Focus on the Family in a speech at Howard University.

The following three pages are the text that is similar to the Heritage case study:

The following is the text similar to the article by the Cato scholar:

The following is the text similar to the article by the Cato scholar:

The following is the text similar to the article by the Cato scholar:

How Paul cites the work:

Zucker's CNN hits ratings low

By DYLAN BYERS/Politico

CNN drew its lowest ratings in over a year last week, averaging just 385,000 total viewers and only 95,000 viewers in the coveted 25-to-54 demo -- a miniscule viewership, even by cable news standards.

At the N.Y. Times, Bill Carter attributes the fall to the heavy healthcare coverage and notes that ratings were buoyed on Friday by the shooting at Los Angeles International Airport. That will hardly reassure network president Jeff Zucker, who is coming up on one year at the helm.

CNN's ratings diagnosis has always been: strong in times of crisis, weak in times of calm. As one CNN employee told the Times last year, "Maybe CNN is like an emergency room" --  you go there when there's an emergency, but you don't stay any longer than you have to.

Zucker's mission was to fix that by creating strong, personality driven programming that's compelling even when there isn't a shooting, or an explosion, or a hurricane. Fine, healthcare isn't great for ratings. That didn't hurt MSNBC as hard as it hurt CNN, and there's a reason for that.

For Zucker, last week's ratings -- the lowest in his tenure -- are certainly a blow. Obviously, righting a tanker takes time, and Zucker has moved systematically through CNN's programming: a new morning show, Jake Tapper's late-afternoon program, the relaunched "Crossfire" at 6:30 p.m. But the biggest ratings come in primetime, and with the exception of "AC360 Later," Zucker hasn't made any dramatic moves there.

The recent hire of Bill Weir from ABC suggests Zucker is set to put some primetime changes in place. If he wants to boost ratings, that change -- whatever it is -- couldn't come soon enough.

Poverty in America Is Mainstream

By MARK R. RANK/New York Times

Few topics in American society have more myths and stereotypes surrounding them than poverty, misconceptions that distort both our politics and our domestic policy making.

They include the notion that poverty affects a relatively small number of Americans, that the poor are impoverished for years at a time, that most of those in poverty live in inner cities, that too much welfare assistance is provided and that poverty is ultimately a result of not working hard enough. Although pervasive, each assumption is flat-out wrong.

Contrary to popular belief, the percentage of the population that directly encounters poverty is exceedingly high. My research indicates that nearly 40 percent of Americans between the ages of 25 and 60 will experience at least one year below the official poverty line during that period ($23,492 for a family of four), and 54 percent will spend a year in poverty or near poverty (below 150 percent of the poverty line).

Even more astounding, if we add in related conditions like welfare use, near-poverty and unemployment, four out of five Americans will encounter one or more of these events.

In addition, half of all American children will at some point during their childhood reside in a household that uses food stamps for a period of time.

Put simply, poverty is a mainstream event experienced by a majority of Americans. For most of us, the question is not whether we will experience poverty, but when.

But while poverty strikes a majority of the population, the average time most people spend in poverty is relatively short. The standard image of the poor has been that of an entrenched underclass, impoverished for years at a time. While this captures a small and important slice of poverty, it is also a highly misleading picture of its more widespread and dynamic nature.

The typical pattern is for an individual to experience poverty for a year or two, get above the poverty line for an extended period of time, and then perhaps encounter another spell at some later point. Events like losing a job, having work hours cut back, experiencing a family split or developing a serious medical problem all have the potential to throw households into poverty.

Just as poverty is widely dispersed with respect to time, it is also widely dispersed with respect to place. Only approximately 10 percent of those in poverty live in extremely poor urban neighborhoods. Households in poverty can be found throughout a variety of urban and suburban landscapes, as well as in small towns and communities across rural America. This dispersion of poverty has been increasing over the past 20 years, particularly within suburban areas.

Along with the image of inner-city poverty, there is also a widespread perception that most individuals in poverty are nonwhite. This is another myth: According to the latest Census Bureau numbers, two-thirds of those below the poverty line identified themselves as white — a number that has held rather steady over the past several decades.

What about the generous assistance we provide to the poor? Contrary to political rhetoric, the American social safety net is extremely weak and filled with gaping holes. Furthermore, it has become even weaker over the past 40 years because of various welfare reform and budget cutting measures.

We currently expend among the fewest resources within the industrialized countries in terms of pulling families out of poverty and protecting them from falling into it. And the United States is one of the few developed nations that does not provide universal health care, affordable child care, or reasonably priced low-income housing. As a result, our poverty rate is approximately twice the European average.

Whether we examine childhood poverty, poverty among working-age adults, poverty within single-parent families or overall rates of poverty, the story is much the same — the United States has exceedingly high levels of impoverishment. The many who find themselves in poverty are often shocked at how little assistance the government actually provides to help them through tough times.

Finally, the common explanation for poverty has emphasized a lack of motivation, the failure to work hard enough and poor decision making in life.

Yet my research and that of others has consistently found that the behaviors and attitudes of those in poverty basically mirror those of mainstream America. Likewise, a vast majority of the poor have worked extensively and will do so again. Poverty is ultimately a result of failings at economic and political levels rather than individual shortcomings.

The solutions to poverty are to be found in what is important for the health of any family — having a job that pays a decent wage, having the support of good health and child care and having access to a first-rate education. Yet these policies will become a reality only when we begin to truly understand that poverty is an issue of us, rather than an issue of them.

Support For Gun Regulation Helps McAuliffe, Opposition Hurts Cuccinelli In Virginia Race

BY REBECCA LEBER/Think Progress

Even in a state that has seen heavy campaign cash from the National Rifle Association, the gubernatorial candidate with the stronger stand against gun violence has a 7 point advantage, according to a new Public Policy Polling pollcommissioned by the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

When asked if Democratic nominee Terry McAuliffe’s position to ban guns on college campuses helps or hurts him, a plurality of 40 percent said they were more likely to back him while 29 percent said they were less likely. Asked similarly about Republican opponent Ken Cuccinelli’s position against background checks, 47 percent of likely voters said they were less likely to back him and only 18 percent said they were more likely.

According to the NRA’s own measure of the candidates’ gun positions, McAuliffe and Cuccinelli rank “F” and “A,” respectively. Cuccinelli has made no attempt to hide his NRA credentials during his campaign for governor, either, boasting at the site of a mass shooting that he is against expanding background checks.

Rand Paul: People Who Accuse Me Of Plagiarism Are ‘Hacks And Haters’

BY CARIMAH TOWNES/Think Progress

Under fire this week for plagiarizing some of his speeches, Paul shrugged off the allegations and proclaimed that he’s being “unfairly targeted by hacks and haters.”

During a speech on the Cuccinelli campaign trail, Paul directly quoted a Wikipedia page about the movie ‘Gattaca.’ Comparing abortion to eugenics, Paul said, “In the movie ‘Gattaca’ in the not-too-distant future, eugenics is common, and DNA plays a primary role in determining your social class.” The Wikipedia article in question reads: In ‘the not-too-distant future,’ eugenics is common, and DNA plays the primary role in determining social class.

While MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow first broke the story on Monday night, additional allegations have come out this week. According to Buzzfeed author Andrew Kaczynski, an entire portion of Paul’s book, Government Bullies, was taken directly from a Heritage Foundation case study, and another Wikipedia page for the film ‘Stand and Deliver’ was quoted in an immigration speech.

On Stephanopolous’ show, Paul defended himself, arguing that he’s written “scientific papers” and knows how to quote sources. However, he admitted that he’s never footnoted thousands of his speeches, and went on to say that those accusing him, including Maddow, are “hacks and haters.”

“The spoken word shouldn’t be held to the same, sort-of, standard that you have if you’re giving a scientific paper.”

UPDATE

Paul also said he would like to challenge Rachel Maddow and other critics to a duel “if dueling were legal in Kentucky, if they keep it up, you know, it would be a duel challenge. But I can’t do that, because I can’t hold office in Kentucky then.”

The Real Reason That The Cancer Patient Writing In Today’s Wall Street Journal Lost Her Insurance

BY IGOR VOLSKY/Think Progress

Monday’s Wall Street Journalfeatures an op-ed from Edie Littlefield Sundby, a stage-4 gallbladder cancer survivor who won’t be able to keep the coverage she currently has. Her insurer, United Healthcare, is pulling out of the individual health care market, forcing Sundby to find new coverage in California’s health care exchange.

But the plans available through Cover California don’t offer in-network coverage for all of the care Sundby needs. As a result, she has to choose between her two health care providers if she wishes to remain in-network. “Stanford has kept me alive—but UCSD has provided emergency and local treatment support during wretched periods of this disease, and it is where my primary-care doctors are,” she writes:

What happened to the president’s promise, “You can keep your health plan”? Or to the promise that “You can keep your doctor”? Thanks to the law, I have been forced to give up a world-class health plan. The exchange would force me to give up a world-class physician.

But Sundby shouldn’t blame reform — United Healthcare dropped her coverage because they’ve struggled to compete in California’s individual health care market for years and didn’t want to pay for sicker patients like Sundby.

The company, which only had 8,000 individual policy holders in California out of the two million who participate in the market, announced (along with a second insurer, Aetna) that it would be pulling out of the individual market in May. The company could not compete with Anthem Blue Cross, Blue Shield of California and Kaiser Permanente, who control more than 80 percent of the individual market. “Over the years, it has become more difficult to administer these plans in a cost-effective way for our members,” UnitedHealth spokeswoman Cheryl Randolph explained. “We will continue to keep a major presence in California, focusing instead on large and small employers.”

The two insurers were also operating at a tax disadvantage in the state. As California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones explained, “One of the factors I believe contributed to this decision….is the special tax break that California law gives to Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, which has allowed and continues to allow those two companies to avoid paying $100 million in state taxes a year.” “Aetna and United Healthcare don’t get the special tax break provided to Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, and so they faced a major competitive disadvantage in California.”

And then there is the company’s own justification for leaving. “The company’s plans reflect its concern that the first wave of newly insured customers under the law may be the costliest,” UHC Chief Executive Officer Stephen Helmsleytold investors last October. “UnitedHealth will watch and see how the exchanges evolve and expects the first enrollees will have ‘a pent-up appetite’ for medical care. We are approaching them with some degree of caution because of that.”

Get that? The company packed its bags and dumped its beneficiaries because it wants its competitors to swallow the first wave of sicker enrollees only to re-enter the market later and profit from the healthy people who still haven’t signed up for coverage.

Sundby is losing her coverage and her doctors because of a business decision her insurer made within the competitive dynamics of California’s health care market. She’ll now have to enroll in a new plan that offers tighter networks of providers as a way to control health care costs and offer lower premiums.Eleven insurers are participating in Covered California and for the first time they won’t be able to deny coverage to Sundby or any other cancer patients

Holly Jolly Friday:Burl Ives - A Holly Jolly Christmas

The D.C. Press Yawns While Republicans Return To Radically Obstructionist Ways

ERIC BOEHLERT/Media Matters For America:

Republicans in the U.S. Senate made history this week when they successfully filibustered the nomination of Rep. Melvin Watt (R-N.C.) to become director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency. Watt received 56 Senate votes, four short of the 60 necessary to end the filibuster.  

The move represented the latest round of raw, extremist obstructionism that Republicans have proudly practiced for the last five years, particularly when it comes to mounting extraordinary efforts to block presidential appointments that in the past were considered to be routine.

The historic element of the Watt rejection was that throughout American history it has been virtually unheard for a sitting member of Congress to be filibustered -- to be denied the courtesy of a final vote -- when selected by the president to fill an administration position. Prior to this week's partisan blockade of Watt, a Congressional rejection like his hadn't happened since before the Civil War, in 1843.

That important historical context should have been included in every story about the Watt filibuster, but it wasn't. That's not surprising considering the Beltway press corps seems to have made a conscious decision during the Obama presidency to omit virtually all context with regards to the Republicans' continued radical behavior as they cling to filibusters to methodically block, stall and reject most White House policy proposals, as well as countless nominations.

The pliant coverage over the years has likely only enabled Republicans to push ahead with their corrosive strategy, knowing there's certainly no downside with regards to adverse media attention. After all, Republican moved to recently shut down the government, yet lots of journalists suggested the radical, destructive move was because "both sides" just couldn't agree, essentially blaming Democrats for Republican extremism.

Note that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) recently announced he was going to block all Obama nominations until he got more answers about the 2012 terror attack in Benghazi. Although as CNN's Jeffrey Toobin noted, Republicans block Obama picks as a matter of general principle, so it's not like Graham even needs a stated reason for the obstruction.

Watt wasn't the only presidential pick rejected by Republicans on October 31. They also blocked Patricia Millett, who was nominated to fill one of three vacancies on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Despite the fact Millett had previously served as an assistant solicitor general, and represented the administration before the Supreme Court 32 times, under both Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, Republicans denied her the right to an up or down vote.

It's telling that Republicans barely even bother to give reasons for the filibusters any more, and that the press doesn't find that odd. 

Republicans claim Watt is too "partisan" and not "qualified"; vague allegations that can be leveled against virtually any presidential pick. As for Millett, Republicans didn't even pretend to care about her judicial record. They simply want to make sure the vacancy on the D.C. Court of Appeals she was picked to fill remains permanently empty, so that the court will remain split evenly between Democratic and Republican appointed "active" judges, while the balance of senior judges -- who still hear cases -- remains overwhelmingly Republican.

The Millett and Watt votes were remarkable in many ways, although they didn't generate much coverage, especially not on television. None of the network newscasts mentioned the votes last night, and Watt and Millett have received just a handful of cable news mentions, according to Nexis.

Of the filibuster coverage that does exist, the tell-tale shortcomings that have defined the media's work on GOP obstructionism are on display. For instance, the Associated Press categorized the filibusters as "a setback for the president," which is precisely how Republicans want the story to be portrayed: They embrace extremist tactics, reject the president's picks, and the press chalks it up as a White House failure, or "setback." (If you're a Republican, why stop?)

The Washington Post pointed to the filibusters as examples of "partisan rancor," suggesting Democrats were partially, or equally, to blame.

Meanwhile, the New York Times reported that while judicial nominations remain an issue of deep contention, "Among senators of both parties, there is agreement that a president should be granted deference in picking members of his cabinet and top executive branch positions."

But that just completely ignores recent history. Last November Republicans launched an unprecedented, preemptive smear campaign to make sure Susan Rice was not picked as Obama's next Secretary of State. (It succeeded.) Then they engineered an unprecedented campaign to try to stop Republican Chuck Hagel from becoming Secretary of Defense. (It failed.)

And as late as July, two of Obama's nominated cabinet picks still hadn't received votes in the Senate, thanks to determined obstruction. 

Note to the Times: Republicans now absolutely do reject the idea that "presidents should be granted deference in picking members of his cabinet." If the president is a Democrat.

Acknowledging that simple fact is an important first step towards accurately reporting the story of GOP obstructionism.  

The sabotage plan

Report: Benghazi witness was nowhere near diplomatic compound during terrorist attack

By Travis Gettys/Raw Story

A security subcontractor who gave his account to CBS “60 Minutes” of the events leading up to the fatal attack at Benghazi had previously told his employers he was nowhere near the diplomatic compound at the time, according to a Washington Postreport.

The Oct. 27 television report was based on a yearlong investigation by reporter Lara Logan and producer Max McCellan and featured an interview with a man identified by the pseudonym “Morgan Jones,” who was described as “a security officer who witnessed the attack.”

A Fox News correspondent said the following day that the network had been working on a story with the same security officer, but those efforts ended when he asked for money in exchange for his participation.

Threshold Editions, which specializes in “conservative non-fiction,” published a bookTuesday by the same source, called The Embassy House: The Explosive Eyewitness Account of the Libyan Embassy Siege by the Soldier Who Was There.

The Washington Post report, published Thursday, said the book largely backs up the account provided to “60 Minutes,” but the newspaper says the source provided a written account to his employers three days after the attack that he’d spent the night of the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attack at his own beachside villa in Benghazi.

“We could not get anywhere near (the diplomatic compound) as roadblocks had been set up,” said the security contractor, whose real name was confirmed as Dylan Davies by officials who’d worked with him in Libya.

The newspaper reported that Davies provided a 2 ½-page incident report to his employer, Blue Mountain, the British contractor hired by the State Department to guard the compound’s perimeter.

Davies said he learned U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens had been killed in the raid showed him a cell phone photo of the diplomat’s charred remains, and the security officer visited the still-smoking compound the following day to photograph what was left.

The “60 Minutes” report claimed the security officer had scaled a 12-foot wall while it was still overrun with Al Qaeda forces, and Davies said on the program that he’d personally struck one of the terrorists in the face with the butt of his rifle.

He also told “60 Minutes” that he’d gone to the hospital and seen Stevens’ body.
Davies told CBS that he and a Foreign Service officer had been worried about security at the compound.

The security officer’s co-author told The Washington Post that Davies may have been dishonest in his incident report because his employer had asked him to stay away from the compound after he was told of the attack by telephone.

A CBS spokesman told the newspaper that the network stands firmly behind its story as it aired Sunday.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) used the “60 Minutes” report to justify calling Monday for additional hearings into Benghazi and threatened to block Senate appointments until lawmakers had heard from all the surviving witnesses to the attack.

However, Graham conceded Wednesday that witnesses have already been questioned by members of Congress, but their testimony hasn’t been publicly released because the investigations are still ongoing.

David Brock, chairman of Media Matters, has called on CBS to retract its Benghazi report based on the security officer’s comments.

North Carolina Republican switches party affiliation: ‘I guess being American just isn’t good enough’ for the GOP anymore

By Scott Kaufman/Raw Story

Yesterday, a North Carolina Republican congressional candidate switched his party affiliation to Democrat, saying that he “refuse[s] to be part of an extremist movement in the GOP that only appears to thrive on fear and hate mongering of anyone and everyone who doesn’t walk their line.”

In a statement posted on his website, Jason Thigpen criticized the establishment candidate, Walter Jones, saying “[t]he GOP leadership has such little regard and faith in the more than 1 Million people whom live in NC’s 3rd Congressional District that they don’t believe even one of us are good enough to represent OUR District. So they sent a lobbyist who’s lived in Washington, D.C. for the last 15 or more years. What an insult.”

Earlier this year, Thigpen attacked the strict new North Carolina voting law, writing that “[y]ou can paint a turd and sell it as art, but it’s still a turd.”

Thigpen is a six-year Army veteran and,according to his website, a recipient of the Purple Heart. “I didn’t go to war to defend the liberties and freedoms of one party, race, sex, or one income class of Americans,” he writes of the Republican attempt to suppress the vote.

“So, to come home from serving our country and see North Carolina legislators using their super-majority status to gerrymander districts and pass a law to deliberately suppress and oppress the voting rights of Democrats but more specifically minorities and college students, is absolutely deplorable.”

Thigpen is challenging Walter Jones in the 3rd Congressional District. Jones, a Republican, is also facing a far-right challenger with Tea Party affiliations.

Texas Attorney General Almost Disenfranchised By His Own Voter ID Law

BY AVIVA SHEN/Think Progress

As early voting begins in Texas, the state’s new, strict voter ID law has thus far flagged a judge, gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis, and another state senator as potentially illegitimate voters. Attorney General Greg Abbott (R), voter ID’s most strident defender, was also flagged as a suspicious voter under his own law’s strict criteria.

Abbott was flagged because his license lists his name as “Gregory Wayne Abbott” while his voter registration record simply calls him “Greg Abbott.”

Longtime voters, particularly married women who have taken a spouse’s name, are being stopped at the polls because their names on their drivers’ licenses differ from their voter registration forms. Thanks to an amendment added by Wendy Davis, voters who clearly have “substantially similar” names can still cast a regular ballot by signing an affidavit affirming their identity. If the law had gone through unmodified as Abbott originally supported, he would have disenfranchised himself.

Though Davis’ amendment will allow many legitimate voters to vote, the process to determine “substantial similarity” and organize affidavit-signing will inevitably clog up Texas electoral processes with unnecessary confusion. Come November 5, Texas’ polling places may resemble Florida’s in 2012, where Republicans’ election law changes created marathon lines and pollworker confusion.

The law has also affected countless ordinary Texans who do not attract as much media coverage as Davis or Abbott. People of color, low-income voters, seniors, and students are most likely to lack the required ID and may not have their votes counted as a result. While Texas officials claim it is easy for these people to get a free voter ID, just 41 out of 1.4 million eligible Texas voters have received one as of the middle of last month. ThinkProgress interviewed one 84-year-old woman who was denied the ID three times despite providing extensive proof of her identity.

How To Spot A Fake Obamacare Horror Story

BY IGOR VOLSKY/Think Progress

Since insurers have begun informing beneficiaries that their health care plans do not meet the new federal requirements of Obamacare, and will be either cancelled or significantly altered, the media has profiled countless middle class Americans who claim that the new health care law will force them to pay more for coverage.

Deborah Cavallaro, for instance, a real estate agent from Los Angeles, was enrolled in an individual plan that cost her just $293 per month. Under Obamacare, Cavallaro says she’ll have to pay over $400 for coverage she doesn’t need or want. But a higher premium doesn’t tell the whole story: while Cavallaro may spend more each month, she’ll be buying more comprehensive insurance with fewer out-of-pocket costs, better benefits that will cover more and cost her less if she actually falls ill, and much more robust consumer protections.

So before you buy into the sticker shock hysteria, here are four questions you should ask:

1. What does the old plan actually cover? Most of the policies in the existing individual health care market — which are currently issuing notices — offer low premiums, but also come with skimpy benefits and high out-of-pocket costs. These plans often have low limits for outpatient treatment, hospitalization or don’t offer any benefits for procedures like colonoscopy, chemotherapy or mental health treatment. Insurers market these policies to young and healthy people who don’t use their coverage — and never know the true extent of their benefits. (The market is also fairly mobile, with just 17 percent of individual subscribers purchasing the same plan for two years or longer.)

Under the Affordable Care Act, insurers cover 10 essential categories of benefits, offering far more comprehensive coverage than what’s available in most individual insurance plans.

2. Did this person go to the exchanges? Insurers informing policy holders that their health care costs will go up, often direct beneficiaries to their other brand products without telling them about competitive options and prices available through the exchanges. Cavallaro, for instance, got a quote from a broker, but did not explore the available options on her own.

Prices are lowest in areas with the most insurer competition. An analysis from the McKinsey Center for U.S. Health System Reform found that “new entrants into the market make up 26 percent of all insurers,” and “tend to price their plans lower than the median premiums in their market.” The average premium in the exchanges is 16 percent lower than previously projected.

3. Yes, the premium is low, but what are the co-pays and deductibles? This coverage often forces individuals who do use care to meet high deductibles — the amount you pay out-of-pocket before your insurance kicks in — pay high co-pays and co-insurance or limit the number of doctor visits that are allowed. Cavallaro, for instance, must meet a deductible of $5,000 a year and has an out-of-pocket cap of $8,500 a year. The plan covers just two doctors’ visits and each include a $40 co-pay.

As the LA Times’ Michael Hiltzik points out in California, Cavallaro could sign-up for a Silver level plan with a $2,000 deductible, maximum out-of-pocket cost of $6,350, pay $45 for a primary care visit and $65 for a specialty visit — “but all visits would be covered, not just two.”

The health law sets exchange enrollees’ maximum annual out-of-pocket costs at $6,350, and silver plans have deductibles ranging from $1,500 to $5,000.

4. Does this person qualify for subsidies? Americans between 100 and 400 percent of the federal poverty line ($46,000 for an individual, or about $78,000 for a family of three) qualify for tax credits under the law. Six of the 7 millionindividuals who are expected to sign up for insurance through the exchange will receive an average tax credit of $5,290 per year.

Cavallaro “qualifies her for a hefty federal premium subsidy,” Hiltzik reports and can purchase a silver plan for $333, $40 more than she’s paying now. A cheaper bronze plan would be in the $200s.

Conservative Judge Who Just Ruled Against Birth Control

BY IAN MILLHISER/Think Progress

Nine years ago, the California Supreme Court upheld a state law similar to the Affordable Care Act’s rules requiring most employers to include birth control coverage in their employee health plans. The sole dissent in that case was Justice Janice Rogers Brown. Nearly a decade later, Brown got her revenge. Though no longer a member of California’s highest court — President George W. Bush appointed her to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit over the strenuous objections of Democrats — Judge Brown is now the author of a 2-1 opinion holding that religious employers can ignore the federal birth control rules. What was once a fringe view held by a lone holdout is now the law in the second most powerful court in the country.

Judge Brown’s opinion barely conceals her contempt for progressive legislation. Prior to her nomination to the D.C. Circuit, Brown labeled the New Deal a “socialist revolution,” and she likened Social Security to a kind of intergenerational cannibalism — “[t]oday’s senior citizens blithely cannibalize their grandchildren because they have a right to get as much ‘free’ stuff as the political system will permit them to extract.” Since joining the federal bench, she authored a concurring opinion suggesting that all labor, business or Wall Street regulation is constitutionally suspect. The very first sentence of her birth control opinion labels the Affordable Care Act a “behemoth.”

So there was never any doubt how Brown would vote on this particular challenge to women’s access to birth control. Her opinion was joined by Judge A. Raymond Randolph, a conservative George H.W. Bush appointee. Carter-appointed Judge Harry Edwards dissented.

Coincidentally, Brown’s opinion comes just one day after Senate Republicans reignited the filibuster wars by filibustering the first of three Obama nominees to her court. Currently, the D.C. Circuit is evenly divided between Democratic and Republican active judges, but a large number of Republican judges in partial retirement allow the GOP to dominate the court. Senate Minority Whip John Cornyn wrote in a Fox News op-ed that Republicans should prevent any of Obama’s nominees from being confirmed to this court to prevent Democrats from gaining a majority. Although federal appeals courts typically hear cases via randomly drawn three-judge panels, the court’s rules permit a majority of the court’s active judges to displace any decision reached by a three-judge panel.

Senate Democrats waged an unsuccessful effort to filibuster Judge Brown’s nomination during the Bush Administration — largely because of her strident opposition to programs such as Social Security — but that filibuster was eventually defeated after Republicans threatened to invoke the so-called “nuclear option” to eliminate filibusters of judicial nominees. The deal that allowed Judge Brown to be confirmed also paved the way for Judge Priscilla Owen’s nomination. Yesterday evening, Judge Owen authored an opinionreinstating a Texas anti-abortion law blocked by a lower court judge.

There is a lesson here for Democrats trying to decide whether to invoke the nuclear opinion in the D.C. Circuit fight that Senate Republicans started this week. When Republicans had the courage to demand what they wanted and put a serious threat behind it, they got two of the most conservative judges in the country. If Senate Democrats follow suit — either by forcing Republicans to cave or by carrying through on a threat to nuke the filibuster — they will also win their fight to get President Obama’s nominees confirmed.

Conservative Judge Who Just Ruled Against Birth Control

BY IAN MILLHISER/Think Progress

Nine years ago, the California Supreme Court upheld a state law similar to the Affordable Care Act’s rules requiring most employers to include birth control coverage in their employee health plans. The sole dissent in that case was Justice Janice Rogers Brown. Nearly a decade later, Brown got her revenge. Though no longer a member of California’s highest court — President George W. Bush appointed her to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit over the strenuous objections of Democrats — Judge Brown is now the author of a 2-1 opinion holding that religious employers can ignore the federal birth control rules. What was once a fringe view held by a lone holdout is now the law in the second most powerful court in the country.

Judge Brown’s opinion barely conceals her contempt for progressive legislation. Prior to her nomination to the D.C. Circuit, Brown labeled the New Deal a “socialist revolution,” and she likened Social Security to a kind of intergenerational cannibalism — “[t]oday’s senior citizens blithely cannibalize their grandchildren because they have a right to get as much ‘free’ stuff as the political system will permit them to extract.” Since joining the federal bench, she authored a concurring opinion suggesting that all labor, business or Wall Street regulation is constitutionally suspect. The very first sentence of her birth control opinion labels the Affordable Care Act a “behemoth.”

So there was never any doubt how Brown would vote on this particular challenge to women’s access to birth control. Her opinion was joined by Judge A. Raymond Randolph, a conservative George H.W. Bush appointee. Carter-appointed Judge Harry Edwards dissented.

Coincidentally, Brown’s opinion comes just one day after Senate Republicans reignited the filibuster wars by filibustering the first of three Obama nominees to her court. Currently, the D.C. Circuit is evenly divided between Democratic and Republican active judges, but a large number of Republican judges in partial retirement allow the GOP to dominate the court. Senate Minority Whip John Cornyn wrote in a Fox News op-ed that Republicans should prevent any of Obama’s nominees from being confirmed to this court to prevent Democrats from gaining a majority. Although federal appeals courts typically hear cases via randomly drawn three-judge panels, the court’s rules permit a majority of the court’s active judges to displace any decision reached by a three-judge panel.

Senate Democrats waged an unsuccessful effort to filibuster Judge Brown’s nomination during the Bush Administration — largely because of her strident opposition to programs such as Social Security — but that filibuster was eventually defeated after Republicans threatened to invoke the so-called “nuclear option” to eliminate filibusters of judicial nominees. The deal that allowed Judge Brown to be confirmed also paved the way for Judge Priscilla Owen’s nomination. Yesterday evening, Judge Owen authored an opinionreinstating a Texas anti-abortion law blocked by a lower court judge.

There is a lesson here for Democrats trying to decide whether to invoke the nuclear opinion in the D.C. Circuit fight that Senate Republicans started this week. When Republicans had the courage to demand what they wanted and put a serious threat behind it, they got two of the most conservative judges in the country. If Senate Democrats follow suit — either by forcing Republicans to cave or by carrying through on a threat to nuke the filibuster — they will also win their fight to get President Obama’s nominees confirmed.