Good news, everyone: our FCC has ruled that AI-generated robocalls are illegal, using authority granted by the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, which prohibits (among other evils) using artificial voices in solicitations. An AI-generated voice surely is artificial no matter how much it sounds like your mother, or Joe Biden. But every silver lining has a dark cloud: our FCC has assessed over $200 million in TCPA-related fines since 2015, but as of 2019 (when the Wall Street Journal looked into the matter) had collected less than $7,000 of that amount.
Also good news: our Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (or CMS) has told Medicare Advantage insurers they can’t use AI or algorithms to deny coverage to seniors. You’ll read the article and you’ll understand exactly how bad this problem is, but here’s another problem: that Medicare Advantage exists at all! It’s part of right-wingers’ plans to privatize everything, when you’re much better off dealing with your government than you are dealing with a private health insurance corporation that makes money mainly by denying coverage.
Our Congressional Budget Office (or CBO) now estimates that expanded IRS funding will bring in even more tax revenue; they previously predicted our IRS would bring in another $18 billion annually, but now they say the number could be as high as $81 billion, if Congress doesn’t slash their funding (even more) before then. Both numbers would improve matters in America, but please, right-wingers, keep making “defunding the police” your only aim. (Yes, “defunding the police” describes the Republican stance on IRS funding accurately. IRS agents are law enforcement, after all, and anyone who says they’re afraid of them but not regular cops is just lying to you.)
Actual climate scientist wins over $1 million in defamation suit against two right-wingers. The first compared him to Jerry Sandusky, “except for instead of molesting children, he has molested and tortured data” – I wonder how many times he delivered that line to his friends and family before he got a laugh – while the second merely called his research “fraudulent,” which I guess is why the second is on the hook for almost all of the money. It’s a good thing scientists can actually prove their research isn't fraudulent – although sooner or later a right-wing judge will just come out and say that facts don’t matter anymore.
FactCheck.org gamely tries to “unravel() misinformation” about the now dead-in-the-water immigration bill. You remember when Sen. Rick Scott (E-FL) misrepresented Medicare drug price negotiation as a benefit cut? Republican objections to the immigration bill are about that stupid. And they’ve made Sen. James Lankford (E-OK) look like a moderate, which he is most definitely not. On the plus side, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ) finally said some mean things about Republicans on TV. Gosh, she might be running for re-election after all.
Finally, ex-Republican Stuart Stevens at the New Republic says Democrats should “Just Say” that “Biden Has Been a Great President, and while he is the best President of my lifetime, “great” is a bridge too far for me. I did notice him turning questions about his memory around in order to trumpet his achievements, and I’d like to see him do more of that. As I said long ago, dumping on Trump only takes you so far – and, sadly, I think this remains true even after he tried to overthrow our government. (As an aside, could it be that Joe Biden wanted the special counsel investigating his handling of classified documents to think he was a “sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory”? Hey, pretending to be stupid always works for Republicans, so why not for him?)
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