As detailed in the former first lady’s autobiography, then-Secret Service director William H. Moran actually compelled her to become a handgun owner during the first year of her husband’s presidency, because she insisted on driving her own car around the country alone, and spurned attempts to provide her with an armed chauffeur or bodyguard. “He went one day to [FDR adviser] Louis Howe, plunked down a revolver on the table and said, ‘Well, all right, if Mrs. Roosevelt is going to drive around the country alone, at least ask her to carry this in the car.” She wrote that she complied and that summer asked one of her husband’s former bodyguards from his tenure as New York governor to teach her how to use the weapon.

“After considerable practice, I finally learned to hit a target,” Mrs Roosevelt recalled in her book. “I would never have used it on a human being, but I thought that I ought to know how to handle a revolver if I had one in my possession.” (Here’s a picture of her practicing her shooting.)

A 1976 Associated Press article reported that while she kept the revolver in the glove compartment of her car, officials at the FDR Library didn’t know what became of the weapon. Mrs. Roosevelt made no other references to her revolver in her autobiography, so it’s unclear whether she continued to carry it through the remainder of her husband’s presidency or afterward. Her friends told the New York Times in 1972 that she had obtained the New York State permit but hadn’t actually carried a firearm with her. However, according to biographer Allida Black, when Mrs. Roosevelt defied death threats by the Ku Klux Klan to travel  to Tennessee in 1958 to attend a civil rights workshop, she and the woman who picked her up at the Nashville airport drove to the conference with “a loaded pistol on the front seat between them.”

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If you’re a fan of orchestral music, opera, jazz or musical theater, there’s The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Should you prefer a more intimate venue, there’s Blues Alley. But would you ever think of the U.S. Supreme Court? Highly doubtful, to say the least.

As it turns out, however, the court’s nine justices aren’t so completely consumed with weighty matters that they can’t take an occasional afternoon break to enjoy some live music. On May 16, for example, they played host to Broadway legend Barbara Cook, 85, who won a Tony Award back in 1957 for her portrayal of Marian the Librarian in the original production of The Music Man. Cook was accompanied by a band that included jazz guitarist John Pizzarelli as she performed old standards such as “Bye Bye Blackbird,” “Let’s Fall in Love,” “I’ve Got Rhythm,” and “Makin’ Whoopie,” according to Legal Times.  

Cook’s choice for her final number, though, was a bit surprising: ”Imagine,” John Lennon’s quasi-anarchist anthem to the abolition of private property, religion and national governments. As the Wall Street Journal noted, the song’s sentiments were “strikingly at odds with court precedents granting privileges to religious institutions, enshrining property rights and limiting the reach of international law.” Nevertheless, Cook’s emotion-packed rendition apparently pleased the justices, who reportedly responded with an standing ovation.

The master of ceremonies was Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who in 2002 took over running the recital series that was started in 1988 by the late Justice Harry Blackmun, a music lover who brought such performers as singer and pianist Bobby Short to the court. Other performers who’ve appeared before the court include piano legend Marian McPartland and opera superstar Renee Fleming.

If you missed Cook’s performance at the court, as we did, here she is at the Tony Awards back in 1987.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Photo: Cook in 2009 by David Shankbone (via Wikipedia)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — A former intensive care nurse with a businesslike approach to a politically divisive public policy area won Senate approval May 15 to run Medicare and other major health insurance programs.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The House and Senate Agriculture Committees have laid the groundwork this week for reducing the size of the federal food stamp program, approving farm bills that would shrink the food aid and alter the way people qualify for it.

Had it all happened after rather than before Watergate, in fact, no doubt the scandal would have been dubbed Estesgate.

Estes, who died on May 14 at age 88 in DeCordova, Texas, had a life story with so many bizarre twists that a Hollywood screenwriter would have hesitated to make them up, for fear of seeming far-fetched. He was born to a West Texas family so impoverished that it paid the obstetrician by giving him two hound dogs. Estes grew up plowing fields barefoot while he dreamed of becoming a business tycoon. He became a cotton farmer, and by age 28, was so successful that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce named him one of the nation’s 10 most outstanding young businessmen in 1953. According to a 1962 Time cover story on him, when he received the award, he uttered some prophetic words: “You have to walk out on a limb to the far end — that’s where the fruit is.”

For Estes, that meant the ammonia fertilizer business. He concocted a scheme that enabled him to steal $24 million from finance companies by getting them to write mortgages on nonexistent fertilizer tanks on farms, and a second cabal to swindle farmers out of federal cotton subsidies. Eventually, in 1965, he was convicted on federal mail fraud and conspiracy charges and sentenced to prison, but not before the Kennedy administration was scandalized by his connections with Agriculture Department officials and then-Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson, to whom he claimed to have slipped vast amounts of cash — though the allegation was never proven.

Other weird details of the Estes affair made most of today’s political scandals look bland by comparison. A sampling:

• He claimed that then-Sen. Lyndon Johnson once called him at 5 a.m. to demand a half-million dollars. “The first thing I said was, ‘Lyndon, do you know what time it is?’” Estes told a reporter for the Houston Chronicle in 1996. ”He says, ‘I didn’t call you to find out what time it is. I called about that money.’” In exchange, he claimed, Johnson helped him to get lucrative federal contracts.  He never quite backed up those allegations with proof, just as he failed to substantiate a subsequent claim, made in a 2003 book, that Johnson had plotted JFK’s assassination.

• People connected with the case had an unfortunate habit of turning up dead under mysterious circumstances. They included USDA investigator Henry Marshall, who began looking into Estes’ affairs in 1961 and soon afterward was found shot to death on his farm. After Estes’ arrest in 1962, his accountant was found dead in an apparent suicide, in a car with the windows closed and a hose leading from the exhaust pipe — but with no carbon monoxide in his lungs. Both deaths, oddly, were ruled suicides, according to a Washington Post article on Estes.

• He had songs written about him. Phil Ochs sang “The Ballad of Billie Sol,” while in ”The Ides of Texas,” the Chad Mitchell Trio warbled the memorable line: “Here’s to a fella who couldn’t think small/Here’s to the biggest embezzler of all.”

  Click here to view the embedded video.

• He lived in the biggest house in Pecos, Texas. According to a 1989 Texas Monthly article, Estes and his family lived on an estate that took up an entire city block and included a 7,000-square-foot mansion, two tennis courts, a large swimming pool, palm trees imported from Florida and a barbecue pit big enough to accommodate two entire steers at the same time.

• His case caused a feline exhumation. The federal government believed Estes had stashed millions of dollars in ill-gotten gains, though they never were able to put their hands on the money. But it wasn’t for lack of trying. After learning that Estes had buried a friend’s cat in the early 1970s, government agents dug it up, in hopes that he had concealed money in the grave, according to the Chronicle article.

• After his release from prison, he became a T-shirt peddler. According to the 1989 Texas Monthly profile, after his release from prison in the late 1970s, Estes went into business with his daughter Pam, selling T-shirts and goods from the back of a station wagon at West Texas truck stops and barbecue-stand parking lots. “I have to watch him,” she told the magazine. “If he tells me he’s sold 200 t-shirts, it’s more like 20.”

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AARP Arkansas volunteers rally on the state Capitol steps in support of expanding access to affordable health care coverage.

Nine states have passed Medicaid expansion this year, with another 15 on the brink of extending health coverage to more hard-working citizens. Why is Medicaid expansion, which would extend Medicaid health coverage to people who earn about $15,000 a year (138% of the federal poverty level), so important? Here are the top 5 reasons:

1. 50- to 64-year olds: Medicaid expansion will provide health care coverage to tens of thousands of hard-working Americans between the ages of 50 to 64. Many of these citizens have lost their jobs or are struggling in jobs without health benefits but don’t qualify for Medicaid health coverage — and won’t be eligible for Medicare, the federal health insurance program for older Americans, until they turn 65. How many of us know someone in this situation?

2. Adults without children (or with grown children): Medicaid expansion will provide health coverage for adults who don’t have children — or whose children are 18 years of age or older. Currently, in most states, Medicaid only provides coverage for children — and adults with children.

3. Preventive care: Medicaid expansion will give many more Americans access to critical, life-saving (not to mention, less expensive) preventive care — and treatment for chronic diseases like cancer, heart disease and stroke.

4. ER care:  Medicaid expansion will ease the emergency room overcrowding that threatens us all, because tens of thousands of Americans will no longer need to use the ER as their only point of access to health care.

5. The economy:  Medicaid expansion will pump money into states’ economies, create jobs, and help hospitals keep their doors open without losing the doctors and nurses we all depend on — at no cost to the states.

Long-time AARP volunteer and former county director of McKenzie County social services Michon Sax testifies on behalf of AARP North Dakota during a hearing of the House Human Services Committee.

So what is AARP doing? We’re fighting for Medicaid expansion in more than 40 states, with early wins in Arkansas, North Dakota and New Mexico which extended affordable health coverage to more of their residents due to strong cooperation and bipartisan agreement among their governors and legislators. We also witnessed victory in Kentucky last week, when Gov. Steve Beshear expanded Medicaid through executive order, and noted our strong support during his announcement.

States to watch: Arizona, Illinois, Maine and Washington. Stay tuned for updates in these and other states, as well as ways to get involved in the fight. We can’t do it without your help!

Hipsters — the sometimes grungy young adults with countercultural attitudes and an artistic bent — are looked at favorably by just 16 percent of the public, according a new survey from Public Policy Polling.

(Not sure exactly what a hipster is? Here’s a full definition. And here’s a recent New York Times report of a pilgrim to Brooklyn from Manhattan, who discovers hipster life in the “outer” borough.)

The pollsters had some fun with the survey, asking voters whether hipsters should be subject to a special tax on account of being annoying. More than one in four of the respondents (27 percent) said yes.

The pollsters didn’t ask whether justices on the Supreme Court should be subject to an annoyance tax.

They did, however, find huge differences in name recognition, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor topping the list at 74 percent name recognition, followed by Clarence Thomas at 68 percent, Ruth Bader Ginsburg at 64 percent, Antonin Scalia at 58 percent, Elena Kagan at 55 percent, Chief Justice John Roberts at 48 percent, Samuel Alito at 47 percent, Anthony Kennedy at 41 percent and Stephen Breyer at 35 percent.

Supreme Court justices don’t have to worry about being popular, as they have their jobs for as long as they want them. And hipsters? Well, being popular would be radically uncool.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Nearly 100 people, including 14 doctors and nurses, were charged for their roles in separate Medicare scams that collectively billed the taxpayer-funded program for roughly $223 million in bogus charges in a massive bust spanning eight cities, federal authorities said Tuesday.

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Attorney General Eric Holder

It was the latest in a string of similar announcements by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Attorney General Eric Holder as federal authorities crack down on fraud that’s believed to cost the program between $60 billion and $90 billion each year. Stopping Medicare’s budget from hemorrhaging that money will be key to paying for President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul. Sebelius and Holder partnered in 2009 to increase enforcement by allocating more money and staff and creating strike forces in fraud hot spots around the country.

Miami, long known as ground zero for the complex scams, was again at the center of Tuesday’s busts with 25 people charged for their role in various schemes. Authorities allege five defendants in one scheme bribed Medicare patients for their ID numbers, allowing them to bill for $51 million in home health services that were never given or were not medically necessary.

Nearly 20 people, including two doctors, a physician’s assistant and two therapists, were charged in various scams in Detroit. In one case, three posed as licensed physicians and wrote bogus prescriptions for drugs and psychotherapy services totaling $12 million, the Health and Human Services and Justice departments said in a statement.

In Los Angeles, 13 people were charged in various scams totaling $23 million. In one case, authorities said three people hired workers to recruit Medicare patients. Once the defendants received the patient’s Medicare ID numbers, they worked with doctors and medical clinics to get prescriptions for power wheelchairs, which they sold for kickbacks, authorities said in a statement.

Roughly 400 agents fanned out across the country as part of Tuesday’s arrests raiding businesses, seizing documents and charging 89 suspects in Miami, Los Angeles, Houston, Brooklyn, Detroit, Chicago, Tampa, Fla., and Baton Rouge, La.

Four doctors were charged in various scams in Chicago and Brooklyn.

Sebelius hailed the Affordable Care Act as one of the best tools we have to “preserve Medicare and protect the tens of millions of Americans who rely on it each day.”

The law makes it harder for criminals to submit fraudulent Medicare claims and allows the government to suspend payments once they’re caught.

Medicare fraud has adapted into complex schemes over the years, moving from medical equipment and HIV infusion fraud to ambulance scams, as crooks try to stay one step ahead of authorities. The scams have also grown more sophisticated using recruiters who are paid kickbacks for finding patients, while doctors, nurses and company owners coordinate to appear to deliver medical services that they are not.

For decades, Medicare has operated under a pay-and-chase system, paying providers first and investigating suspicious claims later. The system worked when the agency was paying hospitals and institutions that couldn’t close up shop and flee the country if they’d been overpaid. Federal authorities are using new technology designed to flag suspicious claims before they are paid, but the system is still in its infancy.

Tuesday’s bust marks the sixth national Medicare fraud takedown under the strike force teams. Nearly 600 individuals have been charged in schemes involving almost $2 billion, the Health and Human Services and Justice department said.

“Taxpayers expect us to work harder and smarter, and that is exactly what happened across the nation today,” said Health and Human Services inspector general Daniel R. Levinson.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Photo: By David Adame, courtesy of HHS, from July 2010 Medicare Fraud Prevention Summit in Florida

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WASHINGTON (AP) — House and Senate Republican leaders told President Barack Obama Thursday that they will refuse to nominate candidates to serve on an advisory board that is to play a role in holding down Medicare costs under the new health care act.

House Speaker John Boehner, who joined Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell in boycotting the Independent Payment Advisory Board, also said that the House next week will vote again to repeal the health care act. According to a Democratic count, the House has tried some 36 times to repeal or defund all or part of Obama’s landmark health care overhaul since it became law in 2010.

The 15-member advisory board, known as IPAB, would have the power to force payment cuts on insurers, drug companies and other service providers if Medicare costs rise beyond certain levels.

The health care law explicitly forbids the board from rationing care, shifting costs to seniors or cutting their benefits, but Republicans have insisted that it will be a vehicle to deny care to seniors. Former GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin referred to “death panels” that would allow the government to withhold life-saving care from the elderly while campaigning in 2008.

While Boehner and McConnell did not go that far, they said in their letter to Obama that reduced payments “will force providers to stop seeing Medicare patients” and “this will lead to access problems, waiting lists and denied care for seniors.”

Boehner, at a news conference Thursday, said this “is a board with 15 unelected, unaccountable individuals who have the authority to deny seniors access to care. The American people don’t want the federal government making decisions that doctors and patients should be making.”

The members of the board, to consist of people nominated by both parties, would be subject to Senate confirmation. Economists have predicted that the board’s services might not be needed in the near future because Medicare cost increases appear to be manageable.

Asked why the House was voting a 37th time to repeal all or part of what Republicans call “Obamacare,” even though GOP leaders know the Democratic-controlled Senate will again ignore the vote, Boehner said there were about 70 new members of the House this year. “Frankly they have been asking for an opportunity to vote on it, and we are going to give it to them.”

He said he supports total repeal of the law rather than efforts to amend it as it goes into effect over the next year. “I don’t believe there is a way to fix this and make it acceptable to the American people.”

Republicans say there have been only two previous votes to eliminate the health care law in its entirety. They say there have been more than 30 votes to partially repeal or defund the law, and several have been signed into law, including one eliminating an unpopular tax-filing requirement that would have affected millions of businesses.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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“It’s a slowly developing crisis,” Martha Roherty, executive director of the National Association of States United for Aging, told CNNMoney.

Here’s how the Huffington Post detailed a Virginia program’s situation:

“Michele Daley, director of nutrition services at the Local Office on Aging, which serves Roanoke, Alleghany, Botetourt and Craig counties in Virginia, said the agency expects to receive $95,000 less in federal funds this year (it has an operating budget of $1 million). They’re gradually reducing the number of people receiving daily meals from 650 to 600 as a result of the budget cuts. Already, the office has planned to stop handing out most emergency meals — bags of shelf-stable items like canned beans distributed in advance of snowstorms and holidays. And they’ve instituted a waiting list.

Such lists aren’t unusual elsewhere, but “We’ve never had a waiting list,” Daley said. “This is the first time ever, and it’s a direct result of sequestration.”

In the suburban San Francisco Bay area, Meals on Wheels of Costa Contra recently launched an urgent appeal for more donations to avert dropping 200 people from its roster of 1,200. Program director Paul Kraintz told CBS San Francisco that the organization has been wrestling with budget issues for several reasons, including increased demand and reduced donations since the recession.

But the loss of $100,000 of federal funding dealt a crucial blow. “The sequestration was a bridge way too far,” he said.

Other local programs will begin delivering frozen meals instead of hot ones or cut the number of days hot meals are served at senior centers. All in all, estimates the White House, 4 million fewer meals will be delivered because of sequestration. The Meals on Wheels Association of America sets the number much higher at 19 million.

AARP Foundation’s Drive to End Hunger program hears about the impact from local partners. “In communities across the nation there continues to be a growing number of older people in crisis everyday,” said Patricia Shannon, senior vice president and chief financial officer, AARP Foundation. “And programs like Meals on Wheels and others often are the lifeline for struggling seniors. We believe that sequestration could be devastating, perhaps-life threatening to frail and vulnerable seniors who rely on these programs to get nutritious meals that maintain health and independence while also providing daily social contact.”

Travelers whined when the cuts in air traffic control staffing caused flight delays. Why aren’t low-income seniors expected to get the same reprieve? “They don’t have high-priced lobbyists,” Alan Winstead, the executive director of Meals on Wheels of Wake County in Raleigh, N.C., told CNN.

Photo: Dwight Burdette via Wikimedia

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