Private lobby dictates terms in health-care reform -- Billy Wharton, SF Examiner

[Dems2002]

This is a good article...

The frequently imbibing comedian W. C. Fields once proudly declared: "Everything I do is either illegal, immoral, or fattening." The adjectives used by Fields perfectly characterize the role of the private health insurance industry in the debate about health care reform. As the debate intensifies more and more private health care profits are being recycled into the political decision-making process -- framing debates, shaping legislation, padding election war chests, and marginalizing increasingly popular attempts at the abolition of private health insurance...

...The corporate hand directing legislation is so thorough that, in Indiana at least, it even extends to the dinner table. Here Evan Bayh, House Representative from Indiana, and Susan Bayh, member of the Board of Directors of Wellpoint Health, sit down for nightly meals to discuss the events of the day. Evan could mention the latest proposal for health care legislation while Susan might offer details of a recent diatribe against the role of the public sector in health care. This power couple has profited mightily from their relationship. February 3, 2006 was a particularly good day. Evan had just passed legislation which allowed seniors to extend long-term medical care offered by private companies, while Susan exercised stock options to buy 20,001 shares of Wellpoint stock. Joyous dinner table talk indeed...

...What passes for democracy in America these days feels like little more than one facet in a well-financed public relations campaign. This is why the struggle over health care is no longer just about this or that reform; it is about the expression of public will inside a democratic system. The question now is how, or even whether, this will can be expressed. Industry pressure, media silence, and politicians on the payroll have managed to effectively marginalize the only proposal for real health care reform -- a single-payer system. Americans should recognize that every day the private health insurance companies are allowed to exist is one day more of illegal, immoral, and fattening acts. One more day without health care. One more step away from an increasingly distant notion of democracy.

http://www.examiner.com/x-23544-Bronx-County-Independent-Examiner~y2009m9d12-Private-Health-Care-Lobby-Dictates-Terms-in-Health-Care-Reform

[joeycola]

1. K and R for the thruth.

[JohnWxy]

2. What passes for democracy in America these days feels like Well financed public relations campaign.

RECOMMENDED.

This slide we are on into no real representative government was started when the Right started buying up M$M a couple of decades ago. Now, the Right for the most part owns M$M and it shows. There is very little actual informative news reporting on televised M$M and little in the printed press either (struggling to just survive). It just exists now to further conning the public. Unless people have the time and inclination to search out the truth on the internet the only thing they have is the Right's mythologies dutifully served up by the Corporate media. It's not unlike the 'journalism' the U.S. had back around the early 1900's (e.g. the Hurst papers).

[Dems2002]

3. I'm getting scared

Let's just say I'm getting scared, and if we end up with the Baucus bill, then that means we have no effective government of and for the people. There are too many truths available for the media to see and to follow if they were at all interested in explaining this to the American people.

I'm hopeful that they may have just tipped their hand a bit too prematurely and that may cause some of the worst ideas to be taken off the table for fear of true criminal prosecution...we'll just have to wait and see. (Charges of bribery, and Quid pro Quo come immediately to my mind)

But...I'm happy that this is happening because if Obama had just softened his approach a bit, we would not be aware of how horrible things really are.I became a bit disillusioned when he chose his economic team and then Glenn Greenwald's reporting on his Civil Liberties stances have truly surprised me. This is simply par for that course, but I think they may have overextended without fear of the inevitable backlash.

I think that we need to use Michael Moore's movie as a rallying cry for Populism of the people. There's a market for it, people are rightly angry. I know people laugh at the teabaggers, but that is definitely the wrong approach. These people are angry and motivated, and while they've focused on liberals, all polling data shows the country ripe for a backlash against corporations.

We all know that attacking the insurance companies over the summer would have worked with some of these folks. Our blue dogs have admitted as much. Heck, the ads practically write themselves. Republicans refuse to raise the minimum wage, but if a wage increase appears on a ballot, the voters always vote for it.

We just need some more populists willing to articulate our message and fight for it to the bitter end. That's going to come from without the system, not within. We're going to have to come up with a better way to fund campaigns and some type of ban against lobbyists. I'm sure that we can do this by working together.

The best quote that explains our situation is that, "In France, the government fears the people, in America, the people fear their government." If only our initial revolution had cut off a few heads maybe things would be different. As it stands, we must work with the government that we have and change it from the inside out. This may be a 20-year approach, but we can do it.

Dems