Yeah he should be worried. Momentum for him right now is pretty tenuous. You can't say he is the clear frontrunner. Only that he barely won the first two states' popular vote and just barely one NH outright. And he has no lead over Pete in the delegate count. Bernie I'm sure is happy to be clearly outpacing Biden so far in the race. But there is a reason why he is so on the defensive and attacking Buttigieg, that's his neck and neck competition. Looking forward to South Carolina and ultimately Super Tuesday to see how this all shakes out. I guess I expect Biden to come up much better in SC, but who knows at this point. Polling shows Biden with a sizable lead of 27.7% for SC vs Sanders at 17%, Steyer curiously enough at 10%, Warren at 7.9%, Bloomberg at 7.8% and Pete only at 6.6%. But these first two primaries could shift a lot of momentum in others directions. Is Steyer's home state SC or something? Why is he higher in that poll? Agree on the systemic racism conversation. That was probably the most interesting for me. But also Citizens United. I think all of them would try to overturn it if elected, mainly Bernie, Warren and Pete, in mostly that order. Thought everyone but Steyer and Warren had a good night. I feel like Warren is destined for 3rd place and she can't seem to rise above that at the moment. Yang was good but polling so low I'm not sure it matters. Biden stumbling over his words is still troubling to me, but he did come out strong with what he said, mostly. Bernie, Pete and Amy I think were the most coherent, on message and walked away potentially convincing the most people they can take on Trump. I watched but have to agree. Don't see that it accomplished $10 million+ of value for him. Perhaps he was sold on the idea early on that the NFL gun ad was going to blow up on social media and he wanted to gamble on the same happening for him. Not a bad gamble just didn't work out. Brave New World we are in.. yeah that's a good point you are making. Hopefully they are using logic. Like if it's a photo that's clearly date-able then you can use it against someone that is committing fraud. Say you are claiming an injury that you don't have and you are dumb enough to post a photo of you running in the latest city marathon or something, an event that clearly can be tracked down to a particular current date with photo evidence, then yeah, you deserve to be found out. And I think it would be 'in bounds' for the SSA to be able to use that info against you. But if it's just a random photo of you doing something active, without any way of knowing when it happened, then yeah that shouldn't be used against you. JaredS Wrote:Since President Trump has taken office, the advertising budget for Obamacare signup has been slashed by 90% from $100 million in 2016 to less than $10 million a year. Not just that, but the budget for "navigators," people who help people sign up for coverage, has been slashed nearly fifty percent. Wow. Had no idea. Thanks for the post. I do hope employers are at least alerting people. But what about self-employed people, all the workers that work non-conventional jobs, the gig economy, etc? I would consider using the my Social Security portal. You can check your application status in real time from there, without having to call in. And you should be able to see most everything you need about anything related to your Social Security and disability benefits once you create an account, which doesn't take long at all. And it'll save you from having to call in. Texas is trending purple. Could become the ultimate swing state in some years. For now, I think it stays red. But I think there will come a time fairly soon, an election cycle or two away perhaps, where it flips. More and more Texans live in the major cities, and those counties (Dallas in Dallas County, San Antonio in Bexar County, Houston in Harris County and Austin in Travis County) all went blue in 2016. Tarrant County did not, which has Arlington and Fort Worth. Neither did Collin County, which has Plano. Odd to think that 4/5 biggest counties went blue, and 6 of the 8 most populated counties went blue, but the state as a whole still went red by some 800k votes. A vast majority of the rural counties voted in a sea of red:
 If Dems want to flip Texas in 2020, they need to focus on maintaining the counties they won in 2016 first of all, which is no small feat. And then its really as simple as flipping a handful of other counties.. Denton would be huge. They have 859,939 residents as of 2018. Go after then non-deep red counties like Denton, Brazos, Galveston and Montgomery and they have a shot. A realistic shot, especially since the population of Hispanics is ever growing in the state. Interesting.. so what did they do before? Just any photo id or? Agree on Booker. Biden needed to be called out on his marijuana stance and Booker was the perfect candidate to do so, for all the reasons he brought up. Klobuchar did have some nice moments and its a little disappointing she doesn't get taken as a serious candidate for the most part. Hard to imagine her winning any primaries even though I think she is a pretty strong candidate in a lot of ways. And for Mayor Pete, agree he seriously lacks support outside of predominately white primary voting states. But it is still very early in the bigger picture. If he wins Iowa and New Hampshire, all eyes will be on him for Nevada and especially South Carolina, but we won't really know until all that kicks off in Feb. Jodyangel Wrote: Ok,so I'll be 66 in May. AS I understand, I could request my SS in may and still keep working? How much can I earn? I'm a nurse and made about $75,000this past year Gross....only about $48,000 after taxes? So I could cut down on hours but collect a salary and my SS? Or would my SS payment be lower because I worked less hours? If you are born between 1943 and 1954, full retirement age is 66 years. After 1954 you start adding months. But you will be able to file for full benefits on your 66th birthday, assuming your birth year is 1954. And you won't have to worry about an earnings cap of any kind; earnings caps are only for taking Social Security benefits early. Here's an exert from the official SSA page (which I recommend reading the whole page for full clarification). It explains what happens if you receive benefits from filing early only: How Much Can I Earn And Still Get Benefits? If you are younger than full retirement age and make more than the yearly earnings limit, your earnings may reduce your benefit amount. (Full retirement age is 66 for people born between 1943 and 1954. Beginning with 1955, two months are added for every birth year until the full retirement age reaches 67 for people born in 1960 or later.) If you are under full retirement age for the entire year, we deduct $1 from your benefit payments for every $2 you earn above the annual limit. For 2019, that limit is $17,640. In the year you reach full retirement age, we deduct $1 in benefits for every $3 you earn above a different limit. In 2019, the limit on your earnings is $46,920 but we only count earnings before the month you reach your full retirement age.
And once you reach full retirement age, you can continue to work and receive benefits AND there is no earnings cap. You will just have to continue to pay taxes on your earnings. Even better news for you is your benefits can get adjusted in your favor if you earn more in a given year after filing than you did earlier in your working life, as they take your best earnings years to determine your monthly payouts. When you reach full retirement age: - Beginning with the month you reach full retirement age, your earnings no longer reduce your benefits, no matter how much you earn.
- We will recalculate your benefit amount to leave out the months when we reduced or withheld benefits due to your excess earnings.
Hope that helps!
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