Michigan Disability Resistance

http://bit.ly/2JpA3EU

Reevaluate This!

Disabled folks dread that perpetually recurring time of the year. It’s when those of us who avail ourselves of certain public support programs have to be reevaluated to make sure we are still eligible. In other words, we must prove we are still crippled.

In my case, reevaluation day takes the form of an annual (more or less) home visit from a social worker from the Illinois Department of Human Services. DHS pays the wages of the members of my pit crew, which is what I call the people I hire to come to my home every day and help me put on my pants, take a shower, et cetera.

During these visits, the DHS social worker asks me if I still have the same disability I had the last time I was reevaluated. I say yes. She asks me if I still need help putting on my pants, taking a shower, et cetera. I say yes again. She asks me to spell the word “world” backward. I say d-l-r-o-w. I’m suspicious of that question. I guess it’s some kind of cognitive test. But how much weight does it carry? What if I choked under pressure and spelled it wrong? Would that make me too incompetent to qualify? Or does spelling it right make me too competent to qualify? I don’t know.

Hey, I know some sort of reevaluation process is necessary. Sometimes, people are temporarily crippled and may no longer qualify. I just think people like me, who are always going to be at least as crippled as we are now, ought to be grandfathered in somehow. It’s like making an older person prove every year that they’re still over sixty-five.

http://bit.ly/2JnwaAk

In a frenzied bid for higher profits in the decade following the 2008 financial crisis, Wall Street pension fund managers have siphoned as much as $624 billion from Americans’ retirement savings — and, as a direct result, taxpayer coffers — through a vicious combination of high fees and foolish investment strategies, according to an analysispublished Thursday by Yahoo Finance.

The steepest costs to taxpayers have stemmed from Wall Street pension managers’ commitment to so-called alternative funds, which invest in private equity and hedge funds rather than traditional stocks and bonds.

“The total amount pension funds could have saved by simply investing in index funds could be more than $1 trillion,” notes Yahoo Finance reporter Dion Rabouin. “Because pensions are guaranteed, the underperformance has hit taxpayers in the form of budget cuts for schools, hospitals, and libraries and decreased spending on infrastructure, healthcare, and other public projects.”

Responding to Yahoo’s analysis in a series of tweets on Thursday, Capital & Main journalist David Sirota observed that in five years of reporting on Wall Street’s investment tactics, he has found that “most people (including policymakers) still have no idea that skimming fees off public employees’ retirement savings has become one of the largest sources of profits for Wall Street moguls.

Just how difficult is it to check pay records to see if they match staffing records? It's easy, and the failure to do so is evidence of supporting corrupt practice....

http://bit.ly/2LkOPOX

Most nursing homes had fewer nurses and caretaking staff than they had reported to the government, according to new federal data, bolstering the long-held suspicions of many families that staffing levels were often inadequate.

The records for the first time reveal frequent and significant fluctuations in day-to-day staffing, with particularly large shortfalls on weekends. On the worst-staffed days at an average facility, the new data show, on-duty personnel cared for nearly twice as many residents as they did when the staffing roster was fullest.

The data, analyzed by Kaiser Health News, come from daily payroll records Medicare only recently began gathering and publishing from more than 14,000 nursing homes, as required by the Affordable Care Act of 2010. Medicare previously had been rating each facility’s staffing levels based on the homes’ own unverified reports, making it possible to game the system.

The payroll records provide the strongest evidence that, over the past decade, the government’s five-star rating system for nursing homes often exaggerated staffing levels and rarely identified the periods of thin staffing that were common. Medicare is now relying on the new data to evaluate staffing, but the revamped star ratings still mask the erratic levels of people working from day to day.

ALJ's have been under pressure to rule against clearly eligible persons in SSI and SSDI application since the early 80's.  Now, there will be no need for pressure since securing the job will be contingent on agreeing to corrupt practice....

http://bit.ly/2Jo5sYl

Previously, appointments to the position of ALJ have been made through competitive examination and competitive service selection procedures.  The role of ALJs, however, has increased over time and ALJ decisions have, with increasing frequency, become the final word of the agencies they serve.  Given this expanding responsibility for important agency adjudications, and as recognized by the Supreme Court in Lucia, at least some ‑‑ and perhaps all ‑‑ ALJs are “Officers of the United States” and thus subject to the Constitution’s Appointments Clause, which governs who may appoint such officials.

Pursuant to my authority under section 3302(1) of title 5, United States Code, I find that conditions of good administration make necessary an exception to the competitive hiring rules and examinations for the position of ALJ.  These conditions include the need to provide agency heads with additional flexibility to assess prospective appointees without the limitations imposed by competitive examination and competitive service selection procedures.  Placing the position of ALJ in the excepted service will mitigate concerns about undue limitations on the selection of ALJs, reduce the likelihood of successful Appointments Clause challenges, and forestall litigation in which such concerns have been or might be raised.  This action will also give agencies greater ability and discretion to assess critical qualities in ALJ candidates, such as work ethic, judgment (code word for political beliefs), and ability to meet the particular needs of the agency (including the prosecution of a specific political ideology). 

The less information people have, the sooner they die......

http://bit.ly/2NPykft

On July 10, 2018, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released a new funding opportunity announcement for the navigator program for 2019, as well as a series of frequently asked questions and an overview of the application process. This funding is for navigators in the 34 states with a federally facilitated marketplace; states with their own marketplaces or partnership marketplaces can invest additional resources in navigator and other outreach and education programs.

Consistent with press reports, CMS will cut navigator funding to only $10 million for 2019. This is down from $36.8 million for the 2018 plan year (which was, itself, cut from about $63 million for the 2017 plan year). Since the Trump administration took office in January 2017, the navigator program has been cut by about 84 percent. CMS is scaling back the navigator program due to what it believes is heightened public awareness of the marketplace and new coverage options.

Navigators will be required to prioritize assistance to uninsured individuals who are unaware of their coverage options through the marketplace, or through association health plans or short-term plans. CMS repeatedly emphasizes the need for navigators to reach this community, which it refers to as the “left behind” population.

Applications are due quickly, on August 9th. CMS expects to award 25 to 50 grants that will range from $100,000 to up to $1.25 million per state. Grant awards will be announced on September 12th.