Evidence has come to light that casts doubt on the right-wing talking point that Aetna insurance pulled out of the Obamacare healthcare marketplace because it was losing money.

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Submitted on August 17th 2016 by montyHall with 36 comments and with 3 Related Links:

1. Aetna's Greed Proves That Medicare-for-All Is the Best Solution. By Lauren McCauley Added by AdelleChattre on August 19th 2016.

2. Link to the originating source Added by spaceghoti on August 17th 2016.

3. What Aetna forgot to mention about its Obamacare losses Added by spaceghoti on August 19th 2016.

While the coal lobby is often blamed for a lot of Washington’s foot-dragging on addressing climate change, two major coal industry groups may be losing some of their clout. A new report from the environmental group Climate Investigations Center looks at recent losses in the membership of two major coal lobbies: the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE) and the National Mining Association.

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Submitted on August 18th 2016 by aj0690

Banks, governments, credit card companies and fintech evangelists all want us to believe our cashless future is inevitable and good. But this isn't a frictionless utopia says Brett Scott, and it's time to fight back​. Several months ago I stayed in an offbeat Amsterdam hotel that brewed its own beer but refused to accept cash for it. Instead, they forced me to use the Visa payment card network to get my UK bank to transfer €4 to their Dutch bank via the elaborate international correspondent banking system.

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Submitted on August 21st 2016 by drunkenninja with 4 comments and with 1 Related Links:

1. Site is down for me: here is cached page from the internet Archive. Added by kxh on August 21st 2016.

More than 30 major technology and communication companies said on Friday they are joining the U.S. government to crack down on "robocalls," automated, prerecorded phone calls that regulators have labeled a "scourge." AT&T Inc (T.N), Google parent Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O), Apple Inc (AAPL.O), Verizon Communications Inc (VZ.N) and Comcast Corp (CMCSA.O) are among members of the "Robocall Strike Force" that held its first meeting with the U.S. Federal Communications Commission.

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Submitted on August 19th 2016 by darvinhg with 3 comments

Like clockwork, Sara and James Cook paid $452 a month for life insurance. That is, until a letter arrived last year telling the elderly Georgia couple the premiums on the policy they’d had for 25 years were rising sharply.

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Submitted on August 20th 2016 by LisMan with 1 comments

For the first half of the year, bookstore sales were 6.1% ahead of the comparable period in 2015. According to estimates released by the U.S. Census Bureau, bookstores totaled $5.44 billion in the January-June 2016 span, up from $5.13 billion a year ago. Bookstore sales in 2016 rose every month compared to 2015, including in June when sales increased 5.0% to $770 million. The bookstore sector performed better than the entire retail segment. Sales for all of retail rose 3.3% in June over the comparable month in 2015 and were up 3.1% for the first half of 2016.

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Submitted on August 16th 2016 by ppp

Top pay-TV operators lost 665,000 subscribers in Q2 2016.

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Submitted on August 16th 2016 by Appaloosa with 2 comments

The federal government can no longer prosecute state-compliant medical marijuana businesses. By Madison Margolin.

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Submitted on August 19th 2016 by AdelleChattre with 1 comments

Fur seems to be making a high fashion comeback, the September issue of National Geographic reports. “The current revival is a story of the fur trade responding to its critics and often outmaneuvering them, combined with increased demand from the newly wealthy in China, South Korea, and Russia,” writes Richard Conniff. After the animal welfare movement hit a high-water mark in the 1990s, the movement has lost some ground. Nearly two-thirds of women’s 2016 fall fashion collections featured fur, according to the International Fur Federation.

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Submitted on August 19th 2016 by ckshenn

Volkswagen owners in the United States will receive about $20,000 per car as compensation for the company’s diesel deception. Volkswagen owners in Europe at most get a software update and a short length of plastic tubing.

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Submitted on August 16th 2016 by LisMan

With almost $2 billion in losses this year, big insurance companies are pulling out of the health-care program.

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Submitted on August 18th 2016 by Appaloosa with 8 comments and with 2 Related Links:

1. Few choices to none for some Added by Appaloosa on August 18th 2016.

2. Where's Gruber now? Added by Appaloosa on August 18th 2016.

With a third of its citizens below the poverty line, Gabon urgently needs to diversify and is banking on palm oil production to create rural jobs

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Submitted on August 16th 2016 by lostwonder

Back in June, Steve Burke described what he called his Olympics “nightmare.” “We wake up someday and the ratings are down 20 percent,” the chief executive officer of NBCUniversal said at a conference. “If that happens, my prediction would be that millennials had been in a Facebook bubble or a Snapchat bubble and the Olympics have come, and they didn’t know it.” He has escaped that with the Rio games this year -- but not by much. Prime-time broadcast viewership has been down about 17 percent...

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Submitted on August 19th 2016 by socialiguana

Add to the list of Massachusetts’ odd laws. The Codfish State already forbids tomatoes in clam chowder, tattooing and body piercing, dueling to the death on Boston Common on Sundays unless the Governor is present, and playing the fiddle in Boston at any time, according to Only in Your State. The latest judiciary jaw-dropper requires that ride-hail companies subsidize taxi companies, according to Reuters. The new law, just inked by the Massachusetts governor, requires that Uber, Lyft, and other ride-hailing companies pay a 5-cent fee per ride to taxi companies.

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Submitted on August 21st 2016 by ppp with 1 comments

Oracle lawyers argued in federal court today that their copyright trial loss against Google should be thrown out because they were denied key evidence in discovery. Oracle attorney Annette Hurst said that the launch of Google Play on Chrome OS, which happened in the middle of the trial, showed that Google was trying to break into the market for Java SE on desktops. In her view, that move dramatically changes the amount of market harm that Oracle experienced, and the evidence should have been shared with the jury.

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Submitted on August 18th 2016 by geoleo

Environmentalists are urging the Ontario government against renewing one of Nestle’s water-taking permits in a southwestern Ontario town, saying “water should be for life, not for profit.” Wellington Water Watchers says the permit for Nestle Waters in Aberfoyle, Ont., expired on July 31, but the company has been allowed to keep extracting water from a local well even in the midst of a severe drought. The group says the Ministry of Environment did not post Nestle’s renewal application for the usual 30 days of public comment...

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Submitted on August 21st 2016 by wildcard

Reddit says it won't give Atlantic Records the IP address of a Reddit user who posted a link on the site of a single by Twenty One Pilots a week before the song's planned release. The song, "Heathens," was originally uploaded on June 15 to the file-sharing site Dropfile. That same day, the file landed on Reddit. According to a lawsuit (PDF) in New York State Supreme Court, the file was posted to the Twenty One Pilots subreddit with the title “[Leak] New Song – ‘Heathens' at...

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Submitted on August 17th 2016 by wetwilly87

Since the Olympics started earlier this month, its parent organization and broadcaster NBC have worked hard to smack down any unauthorized use (which basically amounts to any use) of its video...

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Submitted on August 18th 2016 by canuck

T-Mobile USA has announced a $70 unlimited data plan, but in reality the plan has a lot of limits. And T-Mobile said it will stop offering cheaper plans to new customers. The $70 unlimited "T-Mobile One" plan caps hotspot usage to 2G speeds, which T-Mobile defines as up to 128kbps. Normal-speed mobile hotspot usage will cost $15 for each 5GB allotment. The new unlimited plan also throttles video to 480p, similar to the carrier's Binge On promotion that throttles video and exempts it from data caps. On the new unlimited plan, customers who want HD video must pay an extra $25 a month per line.

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Submitted on August 18th 2016 by bkool

A Supreme Court decision slashes business-method filings.

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Submitted on August 21st 2016 by kxh