Proposes $250 monthly prescription drug cap
Clinton proposes a $250 monthly cap on out-of-pocket prescription drug costs as well as a plan to encourage the development and use of generic drugs and to end pharmaceutical companies’ ability to write off consumer-directed advertising as a business expense. The monthly cap would limit what insurance companies could ask patients to pay for drugs that treat chronic or serious medical conditions. She also wants Medicare to be able to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies over drug prices and require more generous rebates. Consumers would also be allowed to purchase drugs from other countries, where medicine is often less expensive, so long as sufficient safety standards are in place.
We need to protect hard-working Americans here at home from excessive costs. Too often these drugs cost a fortune…That is bad actors making a fortune off people’s misfortune.
Dances with seven-year-old fan
Barnes and Swift have a Shake It Off dance party.
https://instagram.com/p/76-loRDvL-/
Taylor Swift mashup
Swift comments on Hall’s 4 Taylor by Todrick Hall mashup, which features her hits Blank Space, Style, Shake It Off, Love Story, and You Belong With Me.
https://twitter.com/taylorswift13/status/646216022148583426/
Boycotts Fox News
After a series of tweets criticizing the network, Trump says he is not going to appear on any Fox News shows “for the foreseeable future.”
.@FoxNews has been treating me very unfairly & I have therefore decided that I won't be doing any more Fox shows for the foreseeable future.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 23, 2015
Rescinds honorary degree
In a letter to students, alumni and staff, the university announces that the University Board of Trustees voted unanimously in favor on President McShae’s motion to revoke the honorary degree the university awarded Cosby in 2001.
The University has taken this extraordinary step in light of Mr. Cosby’s now-public court depositions that confirm many of the allegations made against him by numerous women…Fordham has never before rescinded an honorary degree. A recipient’s actions would have to be both unambiguously dishonorable and have a deep impact. By his own admission, Mr. Cosby’s sexual exploitation of women was premeditated and ongoing. Equally appalling is his longtime strategy of denigrating the reputations of women who accused him of such actions…That Mr. Cosby was willing to drug and rape women for his sexual gratification, and further damage those same women’s reputations and careers to obscure his guilt, hurt not only his victims, but all women, and is beyond the pale.
Approved Abedin’s special status
Documents obtained by Judical Watch say that despite denials, Clinton approved paperwork that changed her top aide Huma Abedin’s job status to “special government employee” — a classification that allowed Abedin to work for an outside consulting firm and the Clinton Foundation at the same time she was advising Clinton at State. The Clinton Campaign says the document wasn’t the actual approval of the SGE status but only approved the title change that came with Abedin’s transition. Abedin’s lawyers have maintained that she did nothing wrong, noting that government workers have moved to SGE status before. Clinton, in an interview with MSNBC on Sept. 4, said she “was not directly involved” with Abedin’s job arrangement.
Reporter: Do you think [Donald Trump] had a point in raising the question of whether it was appropriate for her to be taking a State Department salary and also be paid by an outside company closely associated with your husband, by you?
Clinton: Well, I was not directly involved in that, but everything that she did was approved under the rules as they existed by the State Department.
Putin calls for real
Putin phones John for real and the two agree a face-to-face meeting if their schedules allow it. A Kremlin spokesperson says it took some convincing from the Russian side for John to believe it was really Putin who wanted to talk to him.
He (Elton John) was in doubt for a period of time.
Putin tells John he was aware of the prank on Elton John and asked him “not to hold grudges” against the pranksters. Spokesperson:
If their schedules match accordingly, he’s ready to meet and discuss any issue which interests [the musician].
Family retains legal counsel
Mohamed’s parents say they have retained legal counsel, and aim to recover his clock from the police. Statement:
The family says that Ahmed has been severely traumatized. The family wants justice and to ensure no family will ever have to experience what Ahmed went through again,
Criticizes Cook
Sorkin criticizes Cook’s recent assertion that filmmakers are being “opportunistic” in making films about Steve Jobs.
Nobody did this movie to get rich. Secondly, Tim Cook should really see the movie before he decides what it is. Third, if you’ve got a factory full of children in China assembling phones for 17 cents an hour you’ve got a lot of nerve calling someone else opportunistic.
Pluto hi-resolution images
NASA releases high resolution New Horizons images of Pluto’s surface that show rippling terrain that stretches many hundreds of km. Team member:
It looks more like tree bark or dragon scales than geology. This’ll really take time to figure out; maybe it’s some combination of internal tectonic forces and ice sublimation driven by Pluto’s faint sunlight.
The ripples are part of a 70MB image (link) that combines images from the probe’s Ralph/Multispectral Visual Imaging Camera, that combines blue, red and near infrared (NIR) images.
Tens of millions of Pluto pixels, in color. The highest-res enhanced-color view of Pluto yet. http://t.co/jSZ2Fqyo6q pic.twitter.com/VJUsoZwMlM
— Dr. Alex Parker (@Alex_Parker) September 24, 2015
Visits 9/11 memorial
After a minute’s prayer, Francis leaves a white rose along the edge of the 9/11 memorial in New York, where names of the Sept. 11 dead are etched in bronze. He also meets with the relatives of some of the first responders killed in the attack, and takes part in an interfaith service with leaders from the Jewish, Muslim, Greek Orthodox, Hindu and other faiths.
Here grief is palpable. The water we see flowing toward that empty pit reminds us of all those lives which fell prey to those who think that destruction, tearing down, is the only way to settle conflicts…This place of death became a place of life, too. A place of saved lives, a hymn to the triumph of life over the prophets of destruction and death, to goodness over evil, to reconciliation and unity over hatred and division.
More emails found
Despite Clinton saying she had provided all work emails from her time as secretary of state, the Department of Defense uncovers a chain of emails between Clinton and General Petraeus. The exchange of ten emails, which mainly covers personnel issues, starts shortly before Clinton enters office and continues during her first days as the top U.S. diplomat in January and February of 2009. The Petraeus exchange also shows she started using the clintonemail.com account by January 2009, contradiciting her campaign’s claim that she used a private BlackBerry email account for her first two months at the department before setting up her clintonemail.com account in March 2009. The campaign gave her use of the Blackberry as the reason for not handing over any emails from those two months to the State Department.
Calls for universal internet access
Zuckerberg calls for universal internet access in partnership with the the ONE campaign.
When people have access to the tools and knowledge of the internet, they have access to opportunities that make life better for us all.
Retweets Martin’s dead body image
Zimmerman retweets a photo of Martin’s dead body alongside a message from a follower saying: ‘Z-Man is a one man army.’ He later removes the tweet.
Meets church child abuse victims
Francis meets with five victims of child sexual abuse and tells them he is “deeply sorry” for the times they came forward to tell their stories and weren’t believed. He assures them that he believes them and that bishops who covered up for abusers will be made to answer for what they did.
I pledge to you that we will follow the path of truth wherever it may lead. Clergy and bishops will be held accountable when they abuse or fail to protect children.
Soon after he tells a meeting of bishops from the U.S. and around the world the same thing.
God weeps [over what was done to the youngsters].
The pope has agreed to create a new Vatican tribunal to prosecute bishops who failed to protect their flock, and he has accepted the resignations of three U.S. bishops accused of mishandling abuse cases.
Compares LGBT community to KKK
Banks compares the LGBT community to the Ku Klux Klan.
LGBT community are like the gay white KKK’s. Get some pink hoods and unicorns and rally down rodeo drive.
Philadelphia open air mass
Francis conducts an open-air mass in Philadelphia. Crowds fill Benjamin Franklin Parkway for the Pope’s last official event before he returns to Italy.
[Your presence is] a kind of miracle in today’s world. Would that all of us could be open to miracles of love for the sake of all the families of the world.
He talks about little gestures of kindness:
These little gestures are those we learn at home, in the family; they get lost amid all the other things we do, yet they do make each day different. They are the quiet things done by mothers and grandmothers, by fathers and grandfathers, by children. They are little signs of tenderness, affection and compassion.
And ends with:
I ask you to pray for me. Don’t forget!
Flowing water found on Mars
NASA says ‘dark finger-style’ marks that change with the seasons and were first spotted in 2011 by Ojha, using images taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, are signs of water flowing under the surface of Mars. Ojha investigated the composition of these seasonal flows by studying their infrared wavelengths. In each location researchers found the presence of hydrated salts during the times when the flows are most extensive – suggesting a link between the two. In particular, evidence was found for sodium perchlorate, magnesium perchlorate and magnesium chlorate which are thought to be left behind when brine evaporates. Ohta:
The only thing we can really assert is that the places we’re finding are probably more habitable than the rest of the planet, which is bone dry.
Releases tax plan
Trump releases his tax plan, which reduces rates for corporations and the middle class, while eliminating tax deductions for the country’s wealthiest earners. The tax code will be simplified into four levels – 25 percent, 20 percent, 10 percent and zero. Single individuals making $25,000 or less a year and couples filing jointly who have a combined annual income of $50,000 or less would pay no federal income taxes while those making more would graduate up the scale base on their earnings. People who fall under the no tax bracket will get to send a one-page letter to the IRS that says “I Win”. The plan eliminates many tax loopholes, with the notable exceptions of the mortgage interest and charitable deductions, and will end tax breaks on carried interest. No business would pay more than 15 percent of its business income in taxes under Trump’s proposed plan.
There will be a major tax reduction, it will simplify the tax code, it will grow the American economy in ways we have not seen for decades…No, I’m not a populist. I’d say I’m a man of great common sense.
Norquist endorses tax plan
Norquist endorses Trump’s tax plan. However, Norquist’s American’s for Tax Reform has some concerns:
Trump’s plan is certainly consistent with the Taxpayer Protection Pledge. Trump has said he opposes net tax hikes and has made clear that the real problem is spending. This plan is a reform, not a tax hike…The most disappointing part of the Trump plan is that the tax system would move no closer to full expensing of business fixed investment. Businesses would still be saddled with the complex, distorting, and growth-inhibiting ‘depreciation’ regime where an asset is deducted over several or even many years.
.The @realDonaldTrump tax plan cuts business tax from 35% to 15%. This makes us competitive worldwide. Jobs. Jobs. Jobs.
— Grover Norquist (@GroverNorquist) September 28, 2015