• Heath Hendrickson,  Trooth.Com

    Trooth.Com – The Billboard

    October 16, 2012 /

    The Trooth.Com Billboard

    In the photo above you see the Trooth.Com billboard that Utah oral surgeons have erected in their “public awareness” campaign or what I call a “Turf War” with Dr. Wisdom Teeth, general dentist, Heath Hendrickson, D.D.S..

    I will have another installment of my interview with oral surgeon, David Nicholls, D.D.S. tomorrow. The first installment is here.

    In a telephone conversation with Dr. Hendrickson this afternoon, I will have his response after Dr. Nicholl’s posts are completed.

    Stay tuned…..

  • CA-26,  Julia Brownley,  Tony Strickland

    CA-26: Stalking Continues To Plague Tony Strickland

    October 16, 2012 /

    Congressional candidate Tony Strickland

    California State Senator and CA-26 Congressional candidate Tony Strickland

    Photo from Facebook

    Republican Congressional candidate Tony Strickland continues to be plagued by either the Democratic Party, Democratic candidate Julia Brownley’s campaign or a SuperPAC aligned with Julia Brownley and the Democratic Party.

    You remember the FLAP from before.

    Well, it continued this Sunday at a campaign event: Celebracion de la Hispanidad

    Here are some photos that were sent to me (note the children playing at the event):

    Tony Strickland Stalker

    Tony Strickland event stalkerAnybody know who this fellow is?

    The police went out and had a few words to say with this guy.

    Tony Strickland event stalkerThis photo stalking has been a recurring issue for the Stricklands and Tony’s Congressional campaign.

    I mean, this really is NOT how we run campaigns in Ventura County – stalking candidates like Paparazzi and intimidating them. You remember the female who was virtually tripping over Tony earlier this summer?

    Strickland Stalker Updated and Confirmed: CA 26: Who is Stalking Tony Strickland?

    With three weeks before the election, does the opposition campaign really need the footage for ads. No, it looks just like harassment and intimidation to me.

    Democrat Julia Brownley should call off the dogs….

  • David Nicholls,  Heath Hendrickson,  Trooth.Com

    Trooth.Com – The David Nicholls DDS Interview Part One

    October 16, 2012 /

    Trooth Website Trooth.Com Board Member Interview Tomorrow

    You remember the FLAP.

    Yesterday afternoon, I had the opportunity to speak with David Nicholls, D.D.S., one of the oral and maxillofacial surgeons who comprise the Board of Trooth.Com.

    While I characterize this “Public Awareness Campaign” as a Turf War between Utah oral surgeons and general dentist, Heath Hendrickson, D.D.S., Dr. Nicholls takes exception with this terminology. But, more on this later.

    I have now reached out and left messages (either via e-mail or web form) with most, if not all, of the oral and maxillofacial surgeons on the Trooth.Com Board. Dr. Nicholls is, so far, the only one, who has contacted me. I welcome the other Board members to contact me for an interview or to comment below, if they wish.

    Yesterday, I, also, had e-mail correspondence with Heath Hendrickson, D.D.S.. He told me that he would get back to me today since he was accompanying his wife, who is pregnant with twins to her doctor. She is due this week. I, certainly understand, and wish them both well – as everyone does.

    On to the interview, which I will break down into a number of parts:

    Who is David W. Nicholls, D.D.S.?

    The graphic below is from Dr. Nicholl’s website:

    Screencap of David Nicholls DDS WebsiteFlap: Why Trooth.Com?

    Nicholls:

    Well, in Utah, there seems to be a growing problem with individuals who are not specialty trained taking on specialty care and they are entitled to do that under the state’s Dental Practice Act. But, the state Dental Practice Act clearly states that if a general dentist is going to provide specialty care and advertise that he is providing specialty care that his advertisements must say that the services are performed by a general dentist. And, supposedly that font of the disclaimer is supposed to be of the same size as the largest font that he uses in his advertisements.

    Additionally, the state Dental Practice Act states that a general dentist, providing specialty services, cannot make claims of superiority or advanced training when he has not gone through formal training – in terms as to how he represents himself to the public. And, in this case, Dr. Hendrickson, is a general dentist who has limited his practice to the surgical removal of wisdom teeth. And, he advertises very heavily. He has several billboards up and down the state, placards all over the community and multiple websites, all of which do not comply with that regulation. Meaning that he promotes himself as one who takes out wisdom teeth, that is all he does – you don’t need to see the oral surgeon because I can do it for you for whatever he is advertising.

    The problem with that is that when people go to see him (Hendrickson) they don’t realize he is not an oral surgeon. He does provide the same level of care as an oral surgeon, but he is not trained. He graduated from Creighton in about 2003, as I understand it.

    He uses a nurse anesthetist as the anesthetic, which is OK. But, we, as oral surgeons in the community around him have seen patients who come from his practice who develop post-operative complications, the way of infection, that is the most common one. And, so what happens is the patient either loses confidence in his practice and come and see the oral surgeon to treat the complication or the complication is beyond his ability to treat.

    So, this creates a dynamic, where people are going to his practice because of the advertisement, but they do not know, until after the fact, that he is not an oral surgeon. And, that is the part we take issue with.

    Any dentist can perform, any kind of treatment within the realm of his training under the Dental Practice Act. But, if he is going to advertise himself as doing that exclusively as a specialty then he is bound by the Dental Practice Act to state that to the public, so the public knows what they are getting, when they go to see that practitioner.

    And, what happened is, we as his colleagues in the community have asked him several times to make that clear because as we have researched the circumstances we realize the public doesn’t know that and many of them feel that it has been misrepresented to them. And, he has not been responsive to that.

    And, the professional regulation, in Utah run by the Department of Public Licensing (DOPL) which also covers physicians and other kinds of professionals who are licensed – and, so their main concerns are drug abuse and inappropriate contact with patients and that kind of thing. So, when DOPL was advised regarding these Dental Practice Act infractions, they just haven’t acted. They have too much else to do.

    So, because Dr. Hendrickson did not respond and we got no support from DOPL, we felt the only thing left to do was, in the interests of truthful rendering of specialty care in our area, was to undertake a public education campaign.

    And, that is our interest. And, that is our interest only.

    Later in the interview, I asked in follow up, what kind of formal contact from the Trooth.Com Board or individual oral surgeons was made to Dr. Hendrickson. Dr. Nicholls replied that the Board had sent him a letter.

    I requested a copy of the letter and Dr. Nicholls said that he would have to check with their legal counsel before he could supply the document. I will try to get the letter from the Board, Dr. Nicholls or from Dr. Hendrickson.

    In Part Two of the interview, I will delve more into the issues of why the Board has seemingly taken the enforcement of the Utah Dental Practice Act into their own hands and what impact Dr. Nicholls sees in their public awareness campaign.

    We will also discuss why some may see this awareness campaign, simply, as a Turf War, between specialty trained dentists who want to protect their own business interests from Dr. Hendrickson.

    Stay tuned….

  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: October 16, 2012

    October 16, 2012 /

    Drudge Screencap of Obama and cut out model

    These are my links for October 15th through October 16th:

    • Poll: Romney, narrows gap with women, leads Obama in the swing states– Mitt Romney leads President Obama by four percentage points among likely voters in the nation’s top battlegrounds, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds, and he has growing enthusiasm among women to thank.As the presidential campaign heads into its final weeks, the survey of voters in 12 crucial swing states finds female voters much more engaged in the election and increasingly concerned about the deficit and debt issues that favor Romney. The Republican nominee has pulled within one point of the president among women who are likely voters, 48%-49%, and leads by 8 points among men.The battle for women, which was apparent in the speakers spotlighted at both political conventions this summer, is likely to help define messages the candidates deliver at the presidential debate Tuesday night and in the TV ads they air during the final 21 days of the campaign. As a group, women tend to start paying attention to election contests later and remain more open to persuasion by the candidates and their ads.

      That makes women, especially blue-collar “waitress moms” whose families have been hard-hit by the nation’s economic woes, the quintessential swing voters in 2012’s close race.

      “In every poll, we’ve seen a major surge among women in favorability for Romney” since his strong performance in the first debate, veteran Democratic pollster Celinda Lake says. “Women went into the debate actively disliking Romney, and they came out thinking he might understand their lives and might be able to get something done for them.”

      While Lake believes Obama retains an edge among women voters, the changed views of Romney could be “a precursor to movement” to the Republican candidate, she says. “It opens them up to take a second look, and that’s the danger for Obama.”

    • THE NAYS HAVE IT: When Public Sector Unions Win in California – This November, California voters must decide two policy questions of great concern to public-sector unions. One is a tax hike to stave off further cuts to state spending (there are two versions on the ballot with a chance of passing). The other is a “paycheck protection” measure that would ban the practice of unions’ deducting money from member paychecks to spend on political activism. Public-sector union members stand to benefit from the tax increase, and they are campaigning heavily for one version, Proposition 30, which is being promoted by Governor Jerry Brown. Conversely, the unions stand to lose money and power if paycheck protection passes, and they are working hard to defeat it.
    • Unions dominate California ballot propositions– Unions representing public workers in California have remarkable success achieving their desired outcomes for California ballot propositions—call it success by defeat. In some instances unions have outspent adversaries in California’s initiative process 8 to 1. This may come as no shock for those of us who live in the Golden State especially considering the well-entrenched power of unions here, but the rate of success unions have had in the initiative process is not only surprising, but staggering.Reviewing more than 30 years of data, a new study conducted by Daniel DiSalvo for the Manhattan Institute found that since 1980, public employee unions have been successful in defeating 75 percent of the ballot initiatives they opposed and have won in 50 percent of the initiatives they supported. That means unions possess an uncanny record when it comes to playing defense, “using initiative campaigns to block proposals that threaten their interests.” And when on offense they get what they want half of the time, a record that would make any special interest group in the country envious.The Manhattan Institute study release is well timed as public employee unions in California have invested heavily in the passage of Prop 30, Governor Jerry Brown’s initiative that would increase the state’s sales tax and also the state income tax for some earners. Conversely, unions are actively opposing Prop 32, which would stop unions and corporations from making direct contributions to legislators and change the way they would collect money for political spending.
    • Romney Holds Advantage Tonight, Regardless of Format– The first thing to know about a “town-hall-style” presidential debate is that it bears as much resemblance to an actual campaign town-hall event as a marble statue does to its animated subject.Real town halls are usually unscripted and unpredictable and often raucous events. Town-hall debates are orderly, with the questions from the audience screened — selected to represent questions the moderator would ask if they were doing the questioning. Moderators are likely to reframe some questions and ask their own follow-ups in the language of Sunday morning talk shows. The candidates’ answers are subject to short time limits. The venue is disconcertingly quiet, as the audience is instructed to be unresponsive, with none of the cheers, boos, laughs and groans that are the soundtrack of real town halls.
    • As Swing State Races Narrow, Debate Looms Large– The election cycle has reached the stage where there is such a torrent of polls released each day that the flipping leads could give many poll watchers whiplash. And Tuesday night’s presidential debate at Hofstra University could make the race even more volatile.On Monday morning, the RealClearPolitics Average of national polls found President Obama and Mitt Romney tied at 47.3 percent apiece; by the afternoon, Romney had ticked up a tenth of a point. And that’s after Romney had wrested the lead from Obama last Tuesday for the first time in more than a year.But the real movement has been in the battleground states. RCP currently counts 11 such battlegrounds (amounting to 146 electoral votes) as true tossups; Obama leads the electoral vote count in the other states, 201-191.

      Those numbers are significant because at this point in the 2008 election, candidate Barack Obama was leading John McCain in every single one of those battlegrounds, including conservative-leaning North Carolina. In many of them, he was ahead by double digits, whereas his biggest battleground-state lead now is just 4.8 percentage points, according to the RCP Average — and that is in the usually reliable Democratic state of Pennsylvania.

    • Our Awful Economy, In One Chart – Michelle Obama says we are “in the midst of a huge recovery.” That claim is laughable to anyone who has lived through the last four years; this simple chart from the Senate Budget Committee highlights one of the central failings of Obamanomics: people are leaving the labor force faster than they are entering it. Since Obama became president ten times as many people have been added to the roster of those not in the labor force, than have been added to the labor force:

    Labor Force Employment chart

  • Twitter

    Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-15

    October 16, 2012 /
  • Barack Obama,  Mitt Romney,  Polling

    The USA Today / Gallup Poll Has Romney Leading Obama by 4 Points

    October 15, 2012 /

    USA Today Gallup Presidential Poll for October 15, 2012

    According to the latest USA Today / Gallup Presidential Poll.

    Mitt Romney leads President Obama by four percentage points among likely voters in the nation’s top battlegrounds, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds, and he has growing enthusiasm among women to thank.

    As the presidential campaign heads into its final weeks, the survey of voters in 12 crucial swing states finds female voters much more engaged in the election and increasingly concerned about the deficit and debt issues that favor Romney. The Republican nominee now ties the president among women who are likely voters, 48%-48%, while he leads by 12 points among men.

    The battle for women, which was apparent in the speakers spotlighted at both political conventions this summer, is likely to help define messages the candidates deliver at the presidential debate Tuesday night and in the TV ads they air during the final 21 days of the campaign. As a group, women tend to start paying attention to election contests later and remain more open to persuasion by the candidates and their ads.

    That makes women, especially blue-collar “waitress moms” whose families have been hard-hit by the nation’s economic woes, the quintessential swing voters in 2012’s close race.

    The conventional wisdom is that President Obama will be the aggressor at tomorrow night’s town-hall style Presidential debate. But, there is risk to that approach, especially with women.

    In any case, Mitt Romney is in far better shape on the eve of the second Presidential debate than he was before the first.

    Stay tuned…..

  • California Proposition 37

    California Proposition 37 – The Food Labeling Initiative is Promoted By “JUNK” Science?

    October 15, 2012 /

    No on 37 radio ad No on California Proposition 37 Say Three Southern California Newspapers

    No on California Proposition 37

    The Los Angeles Times has an interesting piece out today discussing how “JUNK” science is being used to support and promote California Proposition 37, the food labeling initiative on the November ballot.

    Proposition 37, the ballot measure mandating the labeling of genetically modified food that is also known as the “right to know” initiative, is narrowly running ahead of the opposition, according to the latest opinion polls.

    But even if the measure goes down — and it’s the target of a $35-million publicity attack by agricultural and food industry interests — the campaign behind it will mark an important milestone in politics: the deployment of weapons-grade junk science.

    Of course, ignorance and anti-intellectualism are not new phenomena in our elections, nor in the political processes of other lands, dictatorships and democracies alike. Pseudoscience is part and parcel of corporate advertising in every medium. (“I’m not a doctor, but I play one on TV.”)

    But where science is at the heart of a campaign, as it is for Proposition 37, the promotion of manifestly shoddy research is especially shameful. That goes double where multibillion-dollar industries, tens of thousands of jobs, and the health and well-being of millions of consumers are at stake.

    Read all of the rest of Hiltzik’s piece.

    The fact is that laws that so affect Californians are best handled through the legislative process rather than the initiative – unless there is a clear and purposeful obstruction by the California Legislature.

    Testimony and evidence gathered in legislative committees lead to better laws – most of the time.

    Proposition 37 goes out of its way to use confusing scientific terms and scare tactics to make its argument for passage of special interest legislation. Legislation that would not otherwise, pass the California Legislature, nor probably be signed by even the most liberal of governors, Jerry Brown.

    California Proposition 37 is more than a “right to know” issue. The supporters know this and this is why they are using this method to get their special interests codified into California law.

    Here is a video clip with some physician views on genetic engineering and food production and Proposition 37:

    [youtube]http://youtu.be/dRpWywQVAzY[/youtube]

    Remember, Vote NO on 37.

  • Day By Day,  President 2012

    Day By Day October 14, 2012 – Pattern

    October 15, 2012 /

    Day By Day cartoon for October 14, 2012

    Day By Day by Chris Muir

    Chris, you mean the “Lame Stream” media might actually have some bias? Have family members or themselves working for the POLS before and subsequent to their media assignments?

    Fancy that!

    Now, there is a brewing kerfuffle over CNN’s Candy Crowley and tomorrow night’s Presidential debate.

    In a rare example of political unity, both the Romney and Obama campaigns have expressed concern to the Commission on Presidential Debates about how the moderator of this Tuesday’s town hall has publicly described her role, TIME has learned.

    While an early-October memorandum of understanding between the Obama and Romney campaigns suggests that CNN’s Candy Crowley would play a limited role in the Tuesday-night session, Crowley, who is not a party to that agreement, has done a series of interviews on her network in which she has suggested that she will assume a broader set of responsibilities. As Crowley put it last week, “Once the table is kind of set by the town-hall questioner, there is then time for me to say, ‘Hey, wait a second, what about X, Y, Z?’”

    In the view of the two campaigns and the commission, those and other recent comments by Crowley conflict with the language the campaigns agreed to, which delineates a more limited role for the debate moderator. The questioning of the two candidates is supposed to be driven by the audience members — likely voters selected by the Gallup Organization. Crowley’s assignment differs from those of the three other debate moderators, who in the more standard format are supposed to lead the questioning and follow up when appropriate. The town-hall debate is planned for Oct. 16 at 9 p.m. E.T. at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y.

    Should Crowley be replaced?

    If she doesn’t agree with the rules of the format, she should step down.

    Oh, by the way, the “Lame Stream” media needs to prop up Obama so he has already won this debate.

  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: October 15, 2012

    October 15, 2012 /

    The Man Who Fell to Earth

    The Man Who Fell to Earth

    These are my links for October 11th through October 15th:

    • The Unraveling of Affirmative Action– For more than 40 years, the debate over affirmative action in admissions has focused on whether it amounts to unfair and unconstitutional reverse discrimination against whites (and now Asians). The implicit premise for most people on both sides has been that racial preferences bring only benefits and no costs, apart from the possible stigma of being deemed “affirmative-action admits,” to their black and Hispanic recipients. This premise was enough to make the two of us uncritical supporters of racial preferences until we began to examine the underlying facts.Key to nurturing the myth that racial preferences can only help their recipients has been a strong norm among college administrators to play down both the size of preferences they use and the difficulties these students encounter down the road. This concealment has had the unfortunate effect of misleading students and shielding preference policies from close scrutiny.
    • Elizabeth Warren obtained federal fee waivers despite high 6-figure income and 8-figure net worth– Elizabeth Warren has built her progressive rock star image and her campaign by attacking the wealthy factory owners and others who supposedly do not pay their “fair share” and take advantage of loopholes to live off of infrastructure paid for by others.Yet Warren appears to be one of those people who takes advantage.Warren falsely and without any legitimate legal basis claimed to be Cherokee for employment purposes. Warren also chintzed by failing to register for the Massachusetts Bar despite an active practice of law in Cambridge since the mid-1990s, thereby evading Bar registration dues. Howie Carr has a great column today about Warren’s class warfare phoniness.

      Add another example to the long list: Warren obtained fee waivers from at least 50 federal bankruptcy courts so she would not have to pay for access to the federal PACER system, even in years when she had a high 6-figure income and an 8-figure net worth.

    • PPP caught doing advocacy polling on race– PPP, a Democratic polling outfit, has long been viewed by suspicion by not only conservatives but by independent, credible pollsters. Now there is all the more reason to discount its “polling” as shoddy partisanship.I spoke by phone today with Wisconsin voter Dave Summers, who lives in the Madison area. He told me, “I got a survey. I don’t normally answer these calls, but I did [this time]. I started out pretty normal — President, Senate.” However, he said it then got weirder. The automatic survey asked if he had a favorable or unfavorable impression of Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson. He said he was greatly disturbed when the automated call then asked, “Do you believe conservative media want white people to think Barack Obama hates them?” He said, “That bugged me.”I called Tom Jensen of PPP. He said that it was his poll. I asked whether this wasn’t a classic advocacy poll designed to get a specific answer. He demurred, “Well, we were asking a series of questions about conservative media.” He said that this call followed the posting on Drudge of the 2007 video in which then-Sen. Barack Obama (D- Ill.) talks about Hurricane Katrina and denying aid to residents. He claimed that since conservative media were trying to make an issue of this (in fact most conservative outlets downplayed or ignored the issue), it was important to see whether that effort (to poison the thinking of white voters, I suppose) was “successful.”

      The questions on conservative media and on white people were asked at the very end of the poll.

    • The 3 states that may decide the election– With less than a month until Election Day, the primary battlefields for the presidential campaign can be found in just three states: Ohio, Florida and Virginia.In these big three, home to a combined 60 electoral votes, President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are spending both the most money and the most time. Over the past two weeks, the candidates and their allies have aired the most TV ads in Ohio, Florida and Virginia, in that order. And over the same period, Obama and Romney have held more than three times as many campaign events in the Big Three than they have in the other six swing states combined.
    • In second debate, Obama faces challenges on key issues– Losing ground to Republican Mitt Romney on a host of issues, President Barack Obama faces a serious challenge to put his re-election bid back on track when the two men face off on Tuesday in their second debate.Obama’s passive performance in their first debate two weeks ago and Romney’s subsequent surge have raised expectations for a more fiery encounter at New York’s Hofstra University.The Democratic president’s team has been encouraged by the feisty performance of Vice President Joe Biden last week in his debate against Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan.

      Now, with Romney having virtually erased Obama’s lead in national polls just three weeks before the November 6 election, Obama is hoping to take advantage of the town hall-style format in Tuesday’s debate to make a direct pitch to voters

    • Axelrod Refuses to Say Whether Obama Met with Nat’l Security Team Before Heading to Las Vegas– After David Axelrod’s repeated assurances this morning on Fox News Sunday that “there isn’t anybody on this planet” who feels a greater sense of responsibility for our diplomats than this President, Chris Wallace asked how soon after the Benghazi attacks the President actually met with his national security team.Wallace followed up on Axelrod’s non-answer by asking whether the President managed to squeeze in a meeting with the National Security Council before jetting off to Las Vegas for a campaign rally. Given Axelrod’s inability to produce a straightforward answer to the questions, it’s pretty clear the answer is “no.”Amusing in this exchange is Axelrod’s contention that “anybody” would have said what the administration and Ambassador Rice said after the attack.
    • Axelrod bobs and weaves over Obama’s level of engagement the day of the Benghazi attack – Today on Fox News Sunday, Chris Wallace pressed David Axelrod on the question of how soon, and in what ways, President Obama tried to get to the bottom of the nature of the attack in Benghazi. As a predicate for the question, Wallace pointed out that on the day of the attack, the State Department and the intelligence community were presenting conflicting views about whether the attack was spontaneous or planned. An engaged president would immediately have tried to sort this matter out so he would know what the U.S. was dealing with.
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-10-14 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-10-14
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-14 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-14 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-14 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-14
    • GetGlue – Your app for TV, Movies, and Sports – I unlocked the FOX MLB: Giants vs. Cardinals sticker on #GetGlue!
    • GetGlue – Your app for TV, Movies, and Sports – Go Cards.. #GetGlue #MajorLeagueBaseballOnFOX
    • NRCC Launches More Than $6 Million Worth of Ads | At the Races – RT @rollcall: NRCC launches $6M worth of TV ads in more than a dozen race, via @jm_dc
    • GetGlue – Your app for TV, Movies, and Sports – I unlocked the Hollywood Extra sticker on #GetGlue! @intel
    • GetGlue – Your app for TV, Movies, and Sports – Brody becomes the terrorist errand boy… #GetGlue @SHO_homeland
    • Wisdom Teeth Turf War Erupts in Utah – Flap’s Blog – Wisdom Teeth Turf War Erupts in Utah #tcot
    • Destinations / The space shuttle Endeavour moves north on Bill Robertson Lane in front of the Coliseum in Los Angeles Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012. In thousands of Earth orbits, the space shuttle Endeavour traveled 123 million miles. But the last few miles of it – The space shuttle Endeavour moves north on Bill Robertson Lane in front of the Coliseum in LA Sunday. via @pinterest
    • Dilbert for October 14, 2012 – Scoot Over – Flap’s California Blog – Dilbert for October 14, 2012 – Scoot Over
    • GetGlue – Your app for TV, Movies, and Sports – Enjoying the Sunday NFL action… #GetGlue #NFLRedZone
    • Many Dentists Violating Child Abuse Reporting Laws? – Flap’s Blog – Many Dentists Violating Child Abuse Reporting Laws? #tcot
    • Sprint reportedly agrees to sell 70 percent stake to Softbank– Sprint Nextel has reportedly reached an agreement to sell 70 percent of the wireless carrier to Japanese mobile carrier Softbank for $20 billion.Both companies’ respective boards have approved the deal, which is expected to be announced tomorrow, sources tell CNBC. Under the deal, Softbank will buy $8 billion in stock directly from Sprint, with another $12 billion purchased from existing stockholders.The tender offer’s price per share is reportedly $7.30, a 27 percent premium over the carrier’s closing stock price Friday of $5.73.

      CNET has contacted Sprint for comment and will update this report when we lean more.

      Sprint had previously confirmed that it was in discussions with Softbank regarding a “substantial investment ” by the Japanese mobile carrier.

    • Humor / Alice is mocking you….. – Today’s Dilbert:Alice is mocking you….. via @pinterest
    • ObamaCare is bad for small business– By January 2014, the states and the District must either establish their own health insurance exchanges under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), combine with other states to form a regional exchange or have the federal government set up an exchange for them.The District has opted for the first option, and this month it moved ahead with a model unlike anything pursued by any state in the nation, with the exception of Vermont: On Oct. 3, the D.C. Health Exchange Authority’s executive board unanimously approved a plan that would abolish the marketplace as we know it for firms with 50 employees or fewer and force them to obtain health insurance for their workers from the government-run exchange. Companies and associations with 100 employees or fewer would have to do so by 2016.If virtually everyone else is choosing a more cautious approach, I am compelled to ask: Is the District so much smarter than everyone else?
    • Election May Well Come Down to Colorado– Exactly 270 electoral votes are needed to win the presidency. And that win may well come down to Colorado — specifically, Jefferson and Arapahoe counties.Both are at the center of the 7th Congressional District race between incumbent Ed Perlmutter, a Democrat, and challenger Joe Coors, a Republican.If businessman Coors has a good night on Nov. 6, so will Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, likely not only in Colorado but nationwide.
    • Live Broadcast | Red Bull Stratos – RT @NASA Congratulations to Felix Baumgartner and @RedBullStratos on a record-breaking leap from the edge of space!
    • News from The Associated Press – RT @AP #Skydiver Felix #Baumgartner lands safely after 24-mile leap to Earth in bid to break sound barrier: -MM
    • Untitled (http://www.vcstar.com/news/2012/oct/14/longtime-gop-senate-moderate-arlen-specter-dies/) – R. I. P. RT @vcstar Longtime GOP Senate moderate Arlen Specter dies
    • @ Flap Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-12 – Flap’s California Blog – @ Flap Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-12
    • @ Flap Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-13 – Flap’s California Blog – @ Flap Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-13
    • @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-13 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-13 #tcot
    • Day By Day October 13, 2012 – Liar, Liar – Flap’s Blog – Day By Day October 13, 2012 – Liar, Liar #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-13 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-13
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-12 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-10-12
    • @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-12 to 2012-10-12 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-12 to 2012-10-12 #tcot
    • @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-11 to 2012-10-11 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-10-11 to 2012-10-11 #tcot
    • Why Dems Loved Biden’s Boorish Behavior– The morning after the vice presidential debate, Democrats are delighted. Vice President Joe Biden’s obnoxious display was exactly what was needed to cheer them up after a week of morose speculation about why President Obama was so passive and uninspired at last week’s first presidential debate with Mitt Romney. Indeed, the more Biden giggled, smirked and interrupted Paul Ryan, the better they liked it. While his condescending and bullying behavior contradicted liberal doctrine about conservatives being the ones guilty of polluting the public square with political incivility, it embodied their complete contempt for both Republicans and their ideas. Biden’s nastiness may have re-invigorated a Democratic base that wanted nothing so much as to tell their opponents to shut up, even if it may have also alienated a great many independents. But with the main focus of the election still on the remaining two presidential debates, it’s not clear that President Obama can profit from Biden’s example.The reason for this is not very complicated. The Democrats cheering on Biden’s bullying, while ignoring the fact that he had nothing to offer on the future of entitlements and his disgraceful alibis about Libya, did so because at bottom they really do not feel Republicans or conservatives are worthy of respect or decency. Though they rarely own up to it, they don’t think Republicans are so much wrong as they are bad. By contrast, most Republicans think Democrats are wrong, not evil. Ryan, whose polite behavior was entirely proper but was made to appear passive and even weak when compared to his bloviating opponent, demonstrated this paradigm by patiently trying to explain his positions even when he was constantly interrupted.
    • Political Cartoons / What is so funny, “Slow” Joe Plagiarizing Biden? – What is so funny, “Slow” Joe Plagiarizing Biden? via @pinterest
    • Day By Day October 12, 2012 – Joker – Flap’s Blog – Day By Day October 12, 2012 – Joker #tcot
    • White House defends Biden on Libya– The White House is defending Vice President Biden over his debate statement that “we weren’t told” about requests for more security at a U.S. Consulate in Libya before the Sept. 11 attack that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three others.White House press secretary Jay Carney said Biden was referring to President Obama, the White House and himself, as opposed to the State Department and other parts of the government.Biden “was speaking directly for himself and the president,” Carney said. “He meant the White House.”
    • Poll: Romney Opens 7-Point Lead in Florida– Mitt Romney’s 7-point lead in the TBT/Herald/Mason-Dixon poll is the latest sign of a Florida surge:The survey conducted this week found 51 percent of likely Florida voters supporting Romney, 44 percent backing Obama and 4 percent undecided. That’s a major shift from a month ago when the same poll showed Obama leading 48 percent to 47 percent — and a direct result of what Obama himself called a “bad night” at the first debate.The debate prompted 5 percent of previously undecided voters and 2 percent of Obama backers to move to Romney. Another 2 percent of Obama supporters said they are now undecided because of the debate.
    • Biden’s Benghazi Gaffe Makes Admin Scramble to Duck Responsibility – Was there an embarrassing gaffe in Thursday night’s debate? Vice President Biden gave a bungled and misleading answer about the situation in Benghazi in which he stated that “we” did not know security requests had been made. Biden’s statement is being artfully spun this morning in a way that rescues the vice president from himself at the expense of the State Department and, quite possibly, the truth.
    • Introducing the 2012 Cook Political Report Partisan Voter Index – RT @philipaklein: Here’s a link to the Cook Report’s new partisan voting index of all the congressional districts
    • Romney takes seven-point lead in new Florida poll – RT @cmarinucci: RT @FixAaron: Romney takes seven-point lead in new Florida poll – The Fix
    • Capitol Alert: Molly Munger says Jerry Brown using ‘impostor strategy’ to win votes – Molly Munger Vs. Jerry Brown – says Governor using an “impostor strategy” #tcot #catcot
    • Twitter / dannysullivan: Bored in the dentist’s chair … – Better bored than…RT @dannysullivan: Bored in the dentist’s chair 🙂
    • Montana poll shows Montana senate race a remains tight; Fox leads in attorney general’s race – Montana Sen: Denny Rehberg (R) 43% Vs. Sen. Jon Tester (D) 40% #tcot
    • Poll Watch: California Proposition 37 in Free Fall – Flap’s Blog – Poll Watch: California Proposition 37 in Free Fall #tcot
    • Pre-Debate Poll Watch: Ryan and Biden Both With Lackluster Favorability – Pre-Debate Poll Watch: Ryan and Biden Both With Lackluster Favorability #tcot