Here's a thing that I love: Michelle Obama was wearing something she already had last night: [link]

as always, do not read the comments, although they are at least a bit balanced.

K-Bug wouldn't have health care without ACA as she falls into the post-college but under 26 bucket.

Just got our open enrollment information at work and the HMO employee cost is going up by over a third. I may have to go back to a PPO. While the family is basically healthy these days, K-Bug does have a watch and see issue. If that becomes an Issue, then I'll probably wish I had stayed with the HMO option. Gah. Need to thinky think on this. I have a week before I have to decide.

I suspect that the transition to full-on ACA is going to be difficult for a lot of people, not just companies. But when it settles out, if the exchanges are established, I should hope we'll all be better off, like Massachusetts.

I just did Open enrollment here! A sky-is-falling co-worker went on some rambling thing about with this election costs were going to go up and no one was talking about it when doing the open enrollment walk throughs and I was all WHUH?!? So I did mine and my health coverage contribution GOES DOWN for next year, so I email her that info (the fact based arguments you all touted above). What she was going on about was the expiration of the payroll tax deductions that will hit in December. !! Those tax cuts were going to expire no matter who won this election. The AARP wanted them to expire, House and Senate wanted them to expire - NO ONE - save the employeed who do NOT GET IT - wanted them to stay in effect. Jesusita chica. also - as a single woman that amounts to about $30 per pay period for her. We are paid well here, that should not be an even noticable blip if she is living within her means.

I keep panicking and think I've missed Open Enrollment, but mine hasn't started yet. And even if I miss it, I'll just have the same health insurance next year that I did this year, which is what I want, so absolutely no need to panic. I think I'll blame my adrenal gland, it gets bored.

I only start to panic because I would lose out on FSA and that ends up being over $5K pre-tax for me.

WTF?!?!?!?

UK surgeon accused of misdiagnosing cancer to perform unnecessary surgeries on women - Boing Boing

So-called "rogue surgeon" Ian Paterson has been suspended by Britain's General Medical Council after accusations he performed "unnecessary or inappropriate" breast operations on over a thousand women in the UK. Investigators claim he misdiagnosed at least 450 of those women with breast cancer when they were in fact cancer-free, performing unnecessary mastectomies and lumpectomies, and placing them on brutal treatment regimens when they had no cancer to treat. There are testimonies from some of the women here. One of the falsely diagnosed women even planned her own funeral, believing she had advanced metastatic disease. Some of the women are suing the hospitals that allowed this to happen. Going through surgery, chemo, radiation, and drug treatment for breast cancer was, for me, a living nightmare. It has left me feeling violated, damaged, and broken. I can't even begin to imagine what it's like for these women, who didn't even have the disease in the first place. Words truly fail me.

That is horrifying. It is hard to believe that that could happen.

I didn't mean to denigrate your appropriate leap into action, msbelle, just reminding myself that there is still no need for me to panic.

Oh, last night Scott Brown said something about defeat being temporary -- word on the street in my office is that John Kerry is going to be the next Secretary of State, and Brown can run in that special election.