Latest news with #Leader
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Missouri struggles to administer safety net programs. Congress is proposing more red tape
Courtney Leader, who spoke at a Capitol press conference on Monday, worries that her daughter's Medicaid coverage would be at risk under proposed federal cuts (Clara Bates/Missouri Independent). When Courtney Leader gets the letter from the state each year telling her it's time to recertify her daughter's Medicaid eligibility, she scrambles to make sure the paperwork gets to the right place. Leader, of Ash Grove, considers herself adept at navigating her 8-year-old daughter's complex medical needs and appointments, but even she has fallen through the cracks of Missouri's safety net thanks to the state's red tape. Without Medicaid for her daughter, who has complex medical needs and developmental disabilities, Leader's family wouldn't be able to afford the thousands of dollars in monthly costs for her feeding tube and formula, specialty appointments and at-home nurses. Yet despite Leader's diligence, her daughter was once kicked off Medicaid after the state lost her paperwork. Even when the paperwork makes it through, she says it takes days to confirm. She has waited hours on the phone for help, just to be automatically disconnected, and has refreshed the online chat again and again trying to get answers — knowing any delay could cost her daughter coverage. Now, as Congress proposes changes to Medicaid that promise to add even more bureaucratic hurdles for families like hers, Leader worries about what's in store for her daughter's health care coverage. 'I'm terrified that further red tape throughout the system will disrupt my daughter's care and put her health in jeopardy,' she said. '…Medicaid is a lifesaver, but I've seen the challenges of an overburdened system firsthand, and felt the panic when my paperwork was lost.' 'Perfect storm': Missouri advocates decry Medicaid application delays, coverage losses Leader spoke on Monday alongside the heads of several advocacy organizations gathered at the Missouri Capitol to sound the alarm on the potential ramifications of Congress' planned changes to Medicaid. The federal reconciliation bill aims to extend President Donald Trump's 2017 tax cuts, in part by cutting at least $600 billion nationally from Medicaid over a decade. Proposed Medicaid changes include work requirements estimated to potentially kick over 100,000 people off in Missouri — many of whom would be still eligible but could lose coverage anyway due to procedural issues. Co-pays would be added for some patients, eligibility checks would increase to twice a year and thousands of adults would need to confirm their work status each month. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, would also face enormous reductions under the proposed budget, potentially cutting thousands of recipients in the state. Missouri would be in an especially vulnerable spot, advocates said, because the state Department of Social Services has struggled for years to administer safety net programs. The Family Support Division, which oversees benefits administration for the state, is understaffed: The agency's request to fund 220 new staff this year was not granted by the legislature. And failures in the administration of Medicaid and food assistance programs have earned rebukes from the federal government and possible sanctions from a St. Louis judge. Emily Kalmer, Missouri government relations director for the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, said the Department of Social Services' struggles to administer these programs could be exacerbated by the proposed federal changes to Medicaid and SNAP. 'With all the challenges they already have, and then this timeframe,' she said, referring the Family Support Division and the proposed implementation of work requirements at the end of 2026 '…we're just going to have a lot of things happening at the same time, and how the legislature decides they want to use their limited budget to deal with that — it's going to be kind of the perfect storm.' One in five Missourians is on Medicaid, or over 1.2 million people. Missouri's Medicaid program covers 39% of all children in the state and pays for two-thirds of nursing home care. A single low-income adult has to make under $20,814 annually to qualify for Medicaid. At various points in recent years, the state has had the worst, or among the worst in the nation processing times for Medicaid applications, prompting federal scrutiny last year. Missouri is also being sued over its administration of SNAP, with a judge concluding the state violated federal SNAP law and the Americans with Disabilities Act for the way it runs its call center eligibility interviews. The average wait time for the general call line, which includes Medicaid queries, was just over one hour in March, It was 49 minutes for the line specific to SNAP interviews. 'Broken system': Call center backlogs impede Missouri families seeking food assistance Thousands of callers are automatically disconnected before getting through to a person: Over 50,000 calls were automatically ended for the SNAP interview call line in March and nearly 16,000 for the general call line. The work requirements being considered by Congress mandate 80 hours of work per month, or various exemptions, including for caregivers and those with disabilities. Most adults on Medicaid are already working or would qualify for an exemption. But in the states that have tried work requirements, including Arkansas, thousands lost coverage even though they were eligible. It's estimated that over 100,000 Missourians could lose coverage due to work requirements. Kalmer shared the story of one cancer patient who struggled to get on Medicaid because of the state's hurdles, but wouldn't have gotten on at all under the proposed federal changes. The woman had been working when she fell and had spinal surgery, and then found out she had thyroid cancer. Her private insurance wasn't going to cover anything, so she applied for Medicaid and 'didn't hear anything,' so couldn't go to the doctor for care. She reached out to Kalmer who was finally able to get her coverage. During the course of her treatment for cancer, the woman wasn't able to work, and didn't qualify for Social Security. That means under the work requirements proposed by Congress, she wouldn't have qualified for Medicaid. Kalmer said to qualify as disabled and exempt, you must be officially declared disabled by Social Security, a process that can take months or years. 'This entire time that she's been going through this cancer journey, she would not be necessarily qualified for the exemptions that are in the bill,' Kalmer said. Congress also wants to require Medicaid recipients to pay copays of up to $35, which could discourage very low-income patients from seeking care. 'All of this is really just creating more and more roadblocks for the valuable health insurance that cancer patients need and rely on to get the treatment that they need,' Kalmer said. Traci Gleason, vice president of external affairs for the progressive Missouri Budget Project, said the changes will create significant 'barriers to care' for Missourians. 'There is simply no way that they can make those kinds of cuts to Medicaid without slashing health care for Americans, slashing health care for Missourians,' she said. 'And I want to be clear that the consequences to Missourians, both on Medicaid and those who are not, really, can't be overstated.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
New Statesman
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- New Statesman
The epic of James Joyce
To attempt a biography of a biography is a fresh venture. James Joyce, a life of the innovative Irish novelist who died in 1941, was published to international acclaim in 1959. The validity of its findings, and the prestige of its author, Richard Ellmann, have lasted. In Ellmann's Joyce, Zachary Leader follows the making of James Joyce with empathy for Ellmann, as well as his book and its subject. Above all, Leader, himself the biographer of Saul Bellow, does justice to Ellmann's feats of research, most strikingly by persuading a Joyce contact, Maria Jolas, not to divulge her suitcase of papers to Joyce's son, Giorgio, who would have taken possession and shut the door. Leader devotes the second half of the book to the 'masterpiece' itself, with chapters on tracking material, the trials of publication, and rivals who raced Ellmann to his finish line. The first half of the book is the run-up: the life of the biographer up to the time he took on Joyce. 'Dick' was born in 1918 in Highland Park, Michigan, north of Detroit, to Jewish immigrants. His father, James, from Romania, was a successful lawyer. His wife, Jean Barsook, came from Kyiv. She loved books and learning, and was a prolific writer of reviews and talks for Jewish organisations. Leader captures Ellmann's personal qualities, his gentleness and unassertive tact, especially in his relations with Mrs Yeats, while gathering vital material for an earlier book on an Irish writer, Yeats: The Man and the Masks. As a biographer, Leader is as unobtrusive and faithful as Ellmann himself, moving step by step through Ellmann's awards as a student at Yale, his wartime naval service in Charleston, South Carolina, his academic rise at Northwestern in Chicago, and in 1949 his elopement to Paris to marry Mary Donahue, a highly intelligent woman from an Irish-American background. They settled in Evanston, Illinois. Ellmann said that he first became keen on writing a biography of Joyce in 1952 when invited by a local lawyer, James F Spoerri, to look at his collection of 900 Joyce items. At that time, the only biography available was a lifeless one by Herbert Gorman from 1939, with restricted access to material. It was Mary Ellmann's lot to mind small children at home while her husband prolonged his weeks in Europe, chasing up Joyce papers and numerous contacts. Her touching letters cry out that her life has shut down. Pregnant with a third child in April 1956, she writes, 'I live in a constant horrified contemplation of my own life… alone and burdened with stupid, monotonous work.' For the seven years between 1952 and 1959, there's the research Ellmann put first. His success ensured the dominance of monumental biography for the rest of the century and well into ours. The most intriguing aspect of writers' lives is the link between life and work: to what extent are sources in what might appear a mundane life changed by the imagination? In Ulysses (1922), Joyce transforms an ordinary Dublin Jew into a modern-day hero, conferring on Leopold Bloom something of himself: his tolerance for weakness, vulgarity, obscenity and lust. Nothing the body does – guzzling, smelling, defecating – is too gross to include in the novel's 'yes' to the human condition. Ellmann, in turn, draws out in Joyce something of his own siding with the life of the mind against violence and prejudice. Joyce felt an affinity for Jews as thinkers, fathers, wanderers, outsiders, people of the Word. In the 'Aeolus' episode of Ulysses, Leopold Bloom visits a newspaper office, filled with inflated verbiage and literal 'windbags'. But then comes notice of an orator whose voice lifts above the headlines to speak for Joyce himself. In a torrent of inspired words, Moses comes down from Sinai, radiant from his encounter with the Eternal, and in his hands, the tablets of the law 'graven in the language of the outlaw'. Joyce, too, is devising a language of his own, delivered to readers from on high. In some ways, Ellmann was different from Joyce: not a drinker nor a cadger of loans and, as Leader puts it, 'emollient' – not given to confrontation. All the more curious, then, to find three scenes in Leader's biography which bring out unwonted heat. One happened during the war when Ellmann had an administrative post in the US Navy. 'Where's that Jew?' a senior officer asked. Ellmann, enraged, grabbed him and had to be pulled away with a warning that he could be court-marshalled. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe Another drama was Ellmann's attraction to non-Jewish women. Furious letters from his father had pressed him in vain not to marry outside the faith. Ellmann hoped to placate his parents with his wife's second name, 'Joan', instead of 'Mary'. Finally, Leader reports that when Ellmann was close to death in 1987, a nurse asked for his religion. 'Jewish,' his daughter, Lucy, suggested. 'None,' Ellmann said firmly. He was buried not in, but outside, the Jewish cemetery at Wolvercote in Oxford. The funeral ceremony was at New College, where he'd been Goldsmith's professor of English since 1970. Yet though Ellmann, like Joyce, did not hold with a deity, his James Joyce brings out the 'god' in Leopold Bloom. 'The divine part,' as Ellmann put it, 'is simply his humanity.' Ellmann was kind, quietly courteous, and diplomatic, yet Leader presents a man whose mildness masked boldness. In the late 1950s, it was daring to upend modernist orthodoxy (led by Joyce fans, Ezra Pound and TS Eliot) that Bloom presents a come-down in human nature as he wanders around Dublin on 16 June 1904, undergoing mock-heroic parallels with the adventures of Homer's hero, Odysseus, wandering around the Mediterranean after the fall of Troy. Ellmann is more tolerant, more attuned to Joyce's feeling for warped fellow beings, when he contends that Joyce ennobled the mock-heroic by making it pacifist. Like Ellmann reporting on Joyce, Leader is careful about truth, its complexity and gaps. One gap is the part played by Joyce's wife in their so-called dirty letters. Joyce teased Nora that one of her letters was 'worse' than his own. Leader has reason to assume that Ellmann did read Nora's letters, but he did not mention them in the biography nor did he publish them in his edition of Joyce's Selected Letters (1975). Nora's biographer, Brenda Maddox, protested that Ellmann's omission diminished Nora. Leader explains this would have been contrary to Ellmann's intention which, it's implied, was protective. Leader grants that Ellmann might have been 'squeamish'. It's this kind of care for nuanced truth that makes for trust in Ellmann's Joyce. Part of truth-telling, as Ellmann saw it, is to maintain detachment, and this position was in line with the modernist virtue of 'impersonality', laid down by Eliot in an influential essay of 1919. Though Joyce did pose as impersonal when he gave out that a writer should detach from his material like a god 'paring his fingernails', he himself did not practise impersonality. As Ellmann's research made abundantly clear, 'nothing has been admitted into the book [Ulysses] which is not in some way personal and attached' to Dublin life – Bloom, for instance, derives from a Hungarian Jew known in the city, and Bloom's wife, Molly, derives partly from Nora Joyce – but what makes for art is Joyce's will to find the uncommon in what is common. Does the accuracy vital to biography preclude art? Is this a limited, documentary genre or might imaginative truth co-exist with factual truth? Can biography lend itself to narrative, selection, even subjectivity? The writer Ann Wroe, reconceiving the obituary, believes that the soul is not to be found in lists of achievements but in fleeting intimate moments – 'that unreachable thing'. It's not unlike the 'epiphanies' distilled by Joyce in Dubliners. One of Ellmann's Oxford colleagues, Bernard Richards, recalls that, in the 1980s, when he asked Ellmann how he was getting on with his biography of Oscar Wilde, 'he said something like 'I am up to 1882.'' How studiedly chronological this is. The line withholds a figure in the carpet (a defining pattern to be discerned in the oeuvre of a great writer, a challenge put forward by Henry James in his tale, 'The Figure in the Carpet'). I say 'withholds' because Ellmann did, at one stage, contemplate a shorter biography and assured his editor that he had a 'coherent' idea of Joyce. The editor vetoed this and Ellmann complied. Leader is a backer of Ellmann's model of biography as 'record'. The fullest record, it's implied, outdoes other forms of the genre. For him, there's no end to material, no bar to quantity. In the final paragraph of Leader's biography, an agenda comes to the surface: 'This book has been an attempt to show how and why long biographies ought to be written.' It's a strange conclusion. Does it mean that since Richard Ellmann excelled, all future biography should conform to the outsized model? Surprised though I am, given the fertile diversity of the genre across the ages, I do still affirm, in the words of Molly Bloom, 'yes I will Yes' to Ellmann's determination to put the writer's work at the centre of the life. His subtle readings point to the autobiographical veins in Ulysses, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and 'The Dead'. And an admiring 'yes' also to Ellmann's integrity when he told me – sitting in a corner over coffee at an Oxford lunch – that he was turning down an opportunity to write the authorised biography of TS Eliot, because this did not come with freedom to state truth. A revised edition of Lyndall Gordon's 'The Imperfect Life of TS Eliot' is published by Virago Ellmann's Joyce: The Biography of a Masterpiece and Its Maker Zachary Leader Harvard University Press, 464pp, £29.95 Purchasing a book may earn the NS a commission from who support independent bookshops [See also: Neo-Nazi safari] Related
Irish Examiner
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Examiner
Book review: Biography of a biography is an onerous read
First released in 1959, Richard Ellmann's James Joyce has long been venerated as a supreme example of literary biography. Now, Zachary Leader book has written an account of Ellmann's life and the making his most famous book. Many readers and critics will, no doubt, question the purpose of writing a biography of a biography. This is a question that Leader appears to anticipate in his introduction when he states, rather baldly, that biography is considered a lesser form by most readers. He attempts to counter this by quoting Claire Tomalin (another literary biographer) as saying that biography 'can be as interesting as fiction'. Well, she would say that. An author using an introduction to try to justify a book's very existence is an uninspiring start to proceedings. The book itself, which Leader describes as 'neither a conventional biography nor a conventional analytical study', is divided into two sections. The first deals with Ellmann's life up to the late 1950s and the second addresses the making of James Joyce. This is logical on one level but it gives the narrative a strangely broken feel. In the first section, we're offered a staggering level of detail on Ellmann's life including brief youthful romances, courses he studied, academics he encountered and an endless series of disagreements with his parents (who Leader portrays as a pair of colourful but overbearing divas). This all comes to an abrupt halt at the end of section one when we leave Ellman in middle age and move into section two, the biography of Ellmann's biography of Joyce. Leader only returns to Ellmann's life 'away from the desk' in the final chapter when we're given a whistle-stop tour of the last three decades of his life. 'Ellmann's Joyce' by Zachary Leader is mostly focused on Ellmann's approach to his research. Some interesting aspects of Ellmann's character are revealed in the second section such as his ability to charm reluctant gatekeepers into allowing him access to previously unseen materials, his obsession with status academic jobs and his ever-present paranoia that someone else would release a book on Joyce before his 'definitive' version. Beyond these nuggets, this part of the book is mostly focused on Ellmann's approach to his research, people he interviewed, places he travelled to and correspondence with his publisher. Such academic details make these chapters difficult to digest for even the most committed reader. Ellmann's life, Leader says, 'revolved around strong, clever women'. He appears to have struck up a close relationship with George Yeats (widow of the poet), to the point of writing to her to seek advice on his love life. The greatest contribution to his work was made, unsurprisingly, by his wife, Mary. She was his editor and critic, and her domestic labour enabled him to travel and write. Their son Stephen has said that, of his two parents, Mary 'was the genius'. At one point, Ellmann was travelling around Europe for weeks at a time while Mary remained in the family home in Illinois. Pregnant, she looked after two children, a lodger and a dog. Her letters to Ellmann during this period are caustic and hilarious. We're only given snippets but they're more interesting than any of the other correspondence that Leader quotes at length throughout the volume. The book's biggest issue is, perhaps, Ellmann himself. He was born into a wealthy family, studied at Yale, worked in well paid academic positions and generally lived a comfortable life. This is all very well but it doesn't lend itself to an interesting biography. Leader is an earnest admirer of his subject and the book is thoroughly researched but there is little here to interest the general reader. Read More Book review: Gripping tale of right v wrong
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Achievers Strengthens Customer Leadership with Sixteen Total Accolades in G2's Spring 2025 Reports
The recognition category leader with the highest usage in the industry also received three Regional Leader badges in major global regions, including Canada, Europe, and Asia Pacific TORONTO, May 30, 2025--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Achievers, the world's most utilized recognition and reward software, announced today it has earned 16 badges across multiple categories in G2's Spring 2025 Grid® Reports. These accolades reinforce Achievers' unmatched ability to boost employee engagement and retention, fuel culture and business transformation through behavior change, and deliver measurable business results. Known and trusted for its enterprise-grade recognition platform anchored in workforce science, Achievers empowers over 4 million users across nearly 190 countries. One of Achievers' standout differentiators is its unmatched adoption and usage – employees using Achievers receive 13 recognitions annually on average, twice the rate of other recognition platforms. The level of user engagement was solidified by G2: Achievers earned a coveted Leader spot in G2's Spring 2025 Enterprise Grid® for Employee Recognition Software report, fueled by exceptional user feedback and market momentum. With over 1,600 five-star reviews, users consistently highlight Achievers' ability to recognize both everyday efforts and major milestones, integrate seamlessly into daily workflows, and provide robust reporting and insights. Customers also benefit from exceptional support and innovative, consistent recognition and reward experiences. "At Achievers, our customers aren't just recognizing more, they're recognizing moments that matter seamlessly with science-backed strategies," said David Bator, Managing Director, Achievers Workforce Institute. "The impact is clear: they're doubling productivity and engagement rates, shaping resilient cultures, delivering better service, and witnessing stronger ROI. With 16 G2 badges and over 1,600 five-star reviews, our customers aren't just seeing results, they're helping 90 million G2 users understand what makes our approach to recognition so unique and effective. We're incredibly grateful for our passionate, vocal, and loyal user community." In addition to earning a spot as a Leader on the Enterprise Grid® for Employee Recognition, Achievers ranked as a Leader on G2's Spring 2025 Enterprise Grid® for Employee Experience and a Leader on the Mid-Market Grid® Report for Employee Engagement. Achievers was also named on the Enterprise Canada Regional Grid® Reports for Employee Recognition, Employee Engagement, and Employee Experience. Additional G2 accolades Achievers received this spring include badges for Momentum Leader for Employee Engagement and Employee Recognition, High Performer in Canada for both Employee Engagement and Employee Experience, as well as High Performer Enterprise for Employee Recognition. Achievers also earned the title of Regional Leader in Canada, Asia Pacific, and Europe for the same areas – bringing the total to 16 G2 badges earned in Spring 2025. Achievers' exceptional rankings in G2's Spring 2025 Grid Reports build on a milestone year for the recognition category leader. Achievers recently unveiled an AI assistant, a recognition toolkit, and new reward features, equipping customers with sophisticated tools to address the $438 billion management disengagement crisis. Its unwavering commitment to innovation and global excellence continues to earn industry acclaim. In April 2025, Achievers announced that it ranked as a Leader in Everest Group's Rewards and Recognition (R&R) Solutions PEAK Matrix® Assessment for the third consecutive time, also securing the #1 spot for vision and capability. Earlier in the year, Achievers and its customer Seattle Children's Hospital were honored in the Brandon Hall Group Excellence Awards for their work empowering patients and families to recognize their healthcare providers, an initiative that set a new standard for employee appreciation in the healthcare industry. G2 is the world's largest and most trusted online software marketplace. Every year, over 90 million people, including those working at major companies, use G2 to help them choose the best software based on real feedback from other users. G2 scores products and vendors based on reviews gathered from its user community and aggregated data from online sources and social networks. The G2 Star Rating is calculated by aggregating reviewers' answers to its "Likely to Recommend" question (1–10 scale) and dividing the average in half. Its software scoring system leverages two proprietary scoring components, Satisfaction and Market Performance to determine overall G2 score and Grid placement. For more information about G2's methodology, visit To demo the Achievers recognition and rewards platform, visit our website. About Achievers Achievers recognition and reward software provides powerful tools to help business leaders shape employee behaviors and drive real business results. Visit us at View source version on Contacts Media Contact Audrey SurettePAN Communicationsachievers@
Leader Live
6 days ago
- General
- Leader Live
Wrexham and Flintshire chip shops aiming to the title
Make no bones about it, we know people are particular about where they get their fish and chips from. Whether it's the perfect batter (almost always a secret recipe) to those extras of mushy peas and gravy that secured a nomination, we narrowed them down to the top 10 across Wrexham and Flintshire. Read more: 'We're humbled' - Meet the winner of best deli, butchers, farm shop 2025 Susan Perry, Regional Editor for North Wales said: "It's Fry-day so time to announce the top 10 fish and chips shops chosen by you, our readers. "Who's going to be the catch of day? Who is batter than the rest? Puns aside, we need you to vote for the area's best fish and chip shop. "So make your choice and let us know who is the only fish in the sea for you!" Voting slips will run in print in the Leader from Monday, June 2 to Friday, June 13. Here are the top 10 hoping to get your vote: • Bellevue Grill and Fish Bar, Wrexham • Borras Park Fish Bar, Wrexham • Chipodee, Wrexham • Crystals Fast Food, Mold • Gwersyllt Fish Bar, Wrexham • Jones' Fish and Chip Shop, Wrexham • Josie's Chip Shop, Rhosymedre • Kingsley Fish Bar, Wrexham • Stubby's Fish Bar, Llay • The Big Fish, Mold Good luck everyone!
