Rep. Kucinich on the Ed Show: Health Care bill a sellout or a bailout?

Rep. Dennis Kucinich talks about getting the state single payer amendment into the final House reform bill, and some big-time flaws with the bill.

Read more...

Keep the promise on Weiner Amendment, include Kucinich Amendment in reform bill.

On Thursday, the House of Representatives introduced its healthcare bill. And threw us all under the bus.

No Kucinich Amendment. This amendment would have eliminated a legal hurdle that currently can be used to prevent states from creating their own single payer systems. But this amendment is nowhere in the final bill.

And now the Weiner Amendment may never come to the floor for a vote, despite Nancy Pelosi's promise last summer.

But there's one last chance for the Kucinich Amendment: House leaders can call for a "Manager's Amendment" even when a bill--like this health reform bill--is closed to any other amendments. A Manager's Amendment is a package of individual amendments agreed to by "the managers", the majority and minority member of the House who manage their side's debate on a bill.

Here are the House members to call, with Washington and district office numbers--demand that the Kucinich Amendment be included in the House bill.

• Speaker Nancy Pelosi: Washington, DC, office (202) 225-4965; San Francisco office (415) 556-4862
• Majority Leader Steny Hoyer: Washington, DC, office (202) 225-4131; Greenbelt office (301) 474-0119; Waldorf office (301) 843-1577
• Rep. Henry Waxman: Washington, DC, office (202) 225-3976; Los Angeles office (323) 651-1040
• Rep. Charles Rangel: Washington, DC, office (202) 225-4365; New York office (212) 663-3900
• Rep. George Miller: Washington, DC, office (202) 225-2095; Concord office (925) 602-1880; Richmond office (510) 262-6500; Vallejo office (707) 645-1888

And remind Nancy Pelosi to honor her word and allow the Weiner Amendment to go to a floor for debate and vote.

We've come a long way in this fight, and regardless of what happens in the next few weeks in Washington, it will continue--both on the state level for single payer and across the country as we continue to take back our government from corporate rule. We thank you for taking action and urge you to spread the word to friends, family and fellow activists: Make the call today for a Manager's Amendment and for a vote on the Weiner Amendment.

Read more...

What If, Instead of Fox, Team Obama Tackled Insurance Profiteers

This article begs the question of just which insurance company is the worst, and why.

by John Nichols. Posted October 26 on The Nation October 26

Suppose President Obama and his aides had decided to take on the worst offender among the big insurance companies this fall.

Suppose the White House had highlighted the failure of the company to provide quality care, the abuses in which it has engaged and the behind-the-scenes campaigning by a self-interested corporation to influence the health-care debate in a manner that helps it while harming Americans.

Suppose presidential aides highlighted the initiative in broadcast and cable interviews and reinforced the message with carefully crafted talking points that said the insurance company's top officers were not helping Americans to get medical care but rather engaging in self-interested profiteering.

Suppose activist groups such as MoveOn.org leapt in to help advance the cause by urging Democratic members of Congress to denounce and boycott the insurance company and its products.

There would, undoubtedly, be complaints from those who make it their business to defend the indefensible.

But there would, as well, be cheering from Americans who would finally have a sense that the Obama administration was ready to fight as hard as was necessary to change a system that leaves tens of millions of Americans without the insurance they need and tens of millions more with inadequate insurance.

And the administration would not have to peddle a scheme that allows states to opt out of reform--by rejecting the option--as some kind of victory for what was supposed to be national health care.

By any measure, time spent assaulting the worst of the insurance companies would be well spent.

Unfortunately, the Obama administration has not chosen to wage a fight that might matter.

Rather, the president's aides continue to wrangle with Fox News, griping about the network's Republican-friendly reporting and commentary. MoveOn is urging members of Congress to join in the charade. And Obama himself is getting dragged into the discussion, telling NBC that: "I think what our advisers have simply said is that we are going to take media as it comes. And if media is operating basically as a talk radio format then that's one thing, and if it's operating as a news outlet that's another but it's not something I'm losing sleep over."

Obama should be "losing sleep" over the fact that he is engaged in this absurd diversion of resources and attention from the real fights his administration ought to be engaged in.

There's no question that Fox commentators can and will continue to be ridiculous in their Republicanism.

But not all Fox personalities are cut from the same cloth as Glenn Beck.
More significantly, the network has a significant viewership and surveys show that a good many of those viewers are independent-minded Americans who tune in as much for the entertainment value of particular shows as for conservative cheerleading.

Obama and his Cabinet members don't have to do the network any favors. But they should recognize the value of appearing on Fox programs that they are responsible (or, at the least, tolerable). And, above all, they should stop making statements that only help Fox run up its ratings as the networks most dim-witted hosts claim they are under attack for "asking the tough questions."

Helen Thomas, http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/63659-thomas-to-white-house-stay-out-of-fox-news-fight the veteran White House reporter who knows a thing or two about the relationships between presidents and the press, counsels that the administration should "stay out of these fights."

Just as when she courageously challenges the excesses of the Bush-Cheney administration – a fight that put her on the wrong side of the Fox blowhards – Thomas is right to challenge this administration's wrongheaded approach to the media.

Thomas is not alone.

ABC News Senior White House correspondent Jake Tapper challenged Obama administration spokesman Robert Gibbs on the issue last week.

It was a telling exchange:

Tapper: It's escaped none of our notice that the White House has decided in the last few weeks to declare one of our sister organizations "not a news organization" and to tell the rest of us not to treat them like a news organization. Can you explain why it's appropriate for the White House to decide that a news organization is not one -

(Crosstalk)

Gibbs: Jake, we render, we render an opinion based on some of their coverage and the fairness that, the fairness of that coverage.

Tapper: But that's a pretty sweeping declaration that they are "not a news organization." How are they any different from, say -

Gibbs: ABC -

Tapper: ABC. MSNBC. Univision. I mean how are they any different?

Gibbs: You and I should watch sometime around 9 o'clock tonight. Or 5 o'clock this afternoon.

Tapper: I'm not talking about their opinion programming or issues you have with certain reports. I'm talking about saying thousands of individuals who work for a media organization, do not work for a "news organization" -- why is that appropriate for the White House to say?

Gibbs: That's our opinion.

Of course, Gibbs has a right to that opinion – as do other members of the administration's communications team.

But they really might want to ponder Washington Post writer Ruth Marcus' observation http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postpartisan/2009/10/obamas_dumb_war_with_fox_news.html?hpid=opinionsbox1 that the fight with Fox – which Marcus "has a distinct Nixonian -Agnewesque?--aroma at worst"..."distracts attention from the Obama administration's substantive message."

That ought to be what concerns the White House – not whether Glenn Beck throwing tantrums.

When presidential aides are going to other networks to talk about Fox, when press briefings focus on the question of whether the White House is trying to define what is and what is not news, the Obama administration is off message – way off message.

And it is wasting time that could be better spent.

Seriously, just imagine if all this energy from the Fox fight was going into a discussion about insurance company profiteering.

Then, Obama and his aides would be steering the debate in a direction that would dramatically enhance the prorspects of securing a robust public option--without "trigger" and "opt-out" gimmickry. (And, despite what Majority Leader Harry Reid may say: The Senate compromise that allows states to reject the public option--via an opt-out clause--is a politically and morally flawed approach.)

As it is, the president and his team still sound whiny when they should be projecting an image of focused and functional strength as they enter the most critical stage of the fight over health care reform where the unanswered question remains: Will the administration and the Congress really call the insurance industry to account?

The answer to that question is going to matter a lot more than the resolution of the wrangling with conservative media outlets that may or may not deserve a few minutes of the president's time – but which certainly do not deserve the attention that comes from being targeted for condemnation by the White House.

Read more...

People Power Matters: The Public Option Lives!

Strong poll numbers and consistent pressure from the grassroots kept the idea of a public option alive, and if that pressure continues, a good plan will become law and be improved on over time. The same pressure can force reform on other issues, despite the counter-pressures from a corporate elite. Watch out, Wall Street!

by Dean Baker. Posted on Truthout October 26

In spite of the best efforts of the insurance industry and their followers in Congress and the media, it is still very possible that the health reform bill passed by Congress will include a robust public plan. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/24/AR2009102401194.html This is a case where the simple facts and persistent grassroots pressure may overcome the political power of a major industry.

If the bill passes with a serious public plan, it could make an enormous difference for the future of health care in the United States. However, the fact that the public option is even on the table at this point, after all the political experts had counted it out, shows the enormous potential for popular pressure to influence policy debates in this country.

The basic story is that President Obama and the Democratic leadership in Congress had always been lukewarm in their support of a public plan. President Obama had included it in his original proposal, but has made it clear on numerous occasions that he did not view it as an essential part of his health care plan.

Of course, that is not the way that presidents get measures passed that they really want. President Clinton never said that he didn't view NAFTA as being a big part of his trade policy. President Bush didn't say that Congressional authorization of the Iraq war was a relatively small matter in his larger foreign policy agenda. President Obama's statements, that a public option was not essential, were an invitation to Congress to give him a bill that did not include a public plan.

This could have been the end of the story for a public plan, except for the determined efforts of progressive activists to insist that Congress include a public plan. While the plan's opponents argued that the leadership did not have the 60 votes needed in the Senate to end a filibuster, public plan supporters pointed out that public plan opponents did not have the 218 votes needed in the House to get a health care plan approved without a public option. The logic was simple, if progressive members in the House refused to back a health care bill without a public plan, then any health care bill that passes Congress would have to include a public option. A large coalition of progressive groups kept up the pressure, insisting that Democrats in the House insist that any bill include a public option. They bombarded members with phone calls, faxes, emails and staged protests and organized petitions. This coalition was helped by polls that consistently show a large majority of the public support giving people the option to join a Medicare-type public plan. In fact, a recent New York Times poll showed people supporting a public option by a margin of 65 to 26 percent. The same poll showed that overall health care reform package losing by a small margin.

Supporters of a public plan have also been helped by the facts. The Congressional Budget Office's analysis shows that a robust public plan, with rates tied to Medicare rates, can save $100 billion over the next decade. This is a substantial portion of the money needed to cover the cost of the health care bill. Given the popular support for a public plan and the evidence that it could save substantial amounts of money, it is clear that opponents of a public option are not responding to constituents or concerns over costs.

The sustained pressure from progressives seems to have firmed support for a public plan in the House, but there is still the issue of getting 60 votes in the Senate. Here, it is important to make a distinction that the media and political pundits have tried to hide. It is not necessary to get 60 senators who will support a public plan. It is necessary to get 60 senators who will allow the Senate to vote on a public plan. This is very different.
Until recently, filibusters were unusual. It was standard practice for a senator to support cloture - allowing a piece of legislation to come up for a vote - but then to vote against the bill itself. Filibusters were reserved for extraordinary issues that members of the Senate felt were especially important.

Currently, Democrats have 60 seats in the Senate. This means that the party just needs its members to allow the central piece of its president's legislative agenda to come to a vote. That should not require too much party discipline; after all, the senators could still vote against the bill itself.

It's too early to know if this "no filibuster" path will succeed, but the fact that a public plan is still in the mix is a testament to the ability of grassroots activists to move the national political agenda. The political insiders will do their best to deny it, but political pressure from the masses can and does make a difference. It has made a difference in the debate over health care and it can make a difference in other areas. Let's see what a little grassroots activism can do for the Wall Street banks.

Read more...

A Simpleton Tries to Understand the Health Care Debate

There's your doctor, there's you, and in the middle, the health insurance companies--profiting by fixing fees and kicking the sick off the rolls. If better laws can change the system, we need to demand their passage. Speak out now for single payer or take your chances--will you come first, or will industry profits?

by William Fisher. Posted on Truthout October 25

Now, the first thing I want you to know is that I'm no health care policy expert. Far from it.

But, like the rest of us, I have a body and a mind that can get sick. So, I'm a participant in the debate whether or not I want to be.

And being about to mark my 81st birthday gives me a shorter time to participate but, arguably, a heightened motivation.

Over these past months, I have been drowning in seas of data and analysis and opinions and lies and spin about health. But very little of it has actually been about health. A lot of it has been about process, such as the process in the sausage factory through which legislation gets crafted. But mostly it has been about money - money headed for so-called health insurance companies.

Now, maybe I have a simplistic mind, but frankly I don't understand why health care and insurance companies keep appearing in the same sentences.

After all, these two things are not the same. Insurance companies are not in the health care business. They are in the risk business. They assess risk and then charge you a fee - it's called a premium - to protect you against that risk. Just like your car or your home insurance. If your car gets wrecked, the insurance company doesn't make it better; it gives you money so that you can make it better. Same with home insurance; if a storm tears your roof off, your insurance company will send a contractor to fix it.

So it is with health insurance. Health insurance companies don't do a thing to make you well if you're sick. That's the work that's done by physicians, nurses, hospitals and clinics. And these two groups - health care professionals and health insurance companies - are far from buddies. In fact, they're pretty intense enemies.

The reason is that the health insurance companies, being in the risk business, do whatever they can to reduce their risk. So, they are more than likely to deny all or parts of the care your doctor is prescribing to make you better. Their loyalties are to their shareholders. Shareholders who've seen a run of great profits, based on ever-rising premiums, based in turn on generous government subsidies and an almost total lack of competition among all these companies.

Oh, I forgot to mention that our Congress, in its infinite wisdom, gave these health insurance companies the same antitrust exemption enjoyed by major league baseball. This means they can fix prices with impunity. Trouble is, they haven't been staying fixed for long; premiums have been increasing exponentially year after year. And there's been no noticeable improvement in our health; in fact, our health has gotten steadily worse.

These companies go still further to reduce their risk. For example, if you get sick your insurance is quite likely to be dropped - an action the insurance companies antiseptically call "rescission." They rescind a lot. In other words, just when you're sick and need coverage the most, that's when they tell you "you're out!"

Then there's the "pre-existing condition" gambit. I just read about three denials that seem really gross. One was refusing coverage to a victim of domestic violence, which the company ruled was a pre-existing condition. The second refusal involved a newborn, who the insurance company claimed was too fat. And that was followed by a third refusal - because the infant was too skinny.

Maybe, like me, you've been reading Karen Tumulty's pieces in TIME on the health care issue. She captures the facts as well as anyone I've read. And she has assembled one hell of a chamber of horrors - about people with serious but treatable illnesses who were told, essentially, to find a charity to help because we, the insurance company you've been paying to reduce your risk, have been too busy reducing our own. Very few happy endings here: patients have died as a result.

Same thing happens if you get health insurance at work, but lose your job. You can buy something called COBRA - if you can afford to pay three or four times what you were paying when you had a job.

Gee, it must be wonderful to run a company set up to take risks on people getting sick - but which has only healthy customers!

Now, here's another wrinkle to think about. How'd we get to this place where employers provide health insurance to their employees? And take it away when they fire you. Well, I'm told this practice started back in World War II when the US had wage and price controls. Your wages couldn't be increased, so along came health insurance to make up the difference - and give employers even more economic power over those who work for them.

Seems downright un-American to me.

In fact, seems to me this whole health care debate is struggling to reconcile two contradictory narratives we Americans invented to help us understand ourselves and our history. One is the narrative of rugged individualism. In this bit of mythology, everyone is John Wayne and nobody needs anyone's help to meet tough challenges - least of all the government's help.

Then there's that other bit of American mythology, the part that talks about how, when the going gets rough for our fellow citizens, we all rally round and share our energy and our wisdom and our compassion to make things right again.

Neither of these narratives is true, but we like to believe both of them anyway, even if they are myths and contradictory myths at that.

Now, it seems to me there's a third bit of American mythology that's getting overlooked. That's the bit that talks about certain inalienable rights we all have, among which are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That's from our Declaration of Independence, written by our founding fathers.

I like to think of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness not as states of being, but as goals. That's because we've never achieved 100 percent of any of these three freedoms. So they - and we - are works in progress.

But it's pretty hard to imagine pursuing much happiness if you happen to get sick, get cut off by your health insurance company and find yourself on your way to medical bankruptcy. Isn't that the point where we invoke that other piece of great American mythology - the one that says now we circle the wagons, pool our resources and find a way for all of us to help all our fellow citizens?

Well, there's only one way to do that and that way is to use our government. The government is us; we pay for it; we own it. We need to make it work for us.

Sure, there are a lot of folks out there who are telling us we can't go down this road because it will lead us into the dreaded socialized medicine: A government takeover of health care.

So what? Forget the labels; that's propaganda. It's the same sleazy accusation that was used against FDR's New Deal in the '30s and again in the 1960s in the right-wing efforts to demolish LBJ's Great Society.

But, in fact, it's exactly what we're already doing for our seniors under Medicare, for our men and women in uniform, for our veterans through the VA - and for every member of Congress. Seems to work just fine for these folks.

So, why is it going to be such a disaster for the rest of us?

When you think about how much we pay for health care and health insurance in America - many times more than the most advanced countries in the rest of the world - and understand that we get substantially worse results, one has to conclude we must be doing something wrong.

We need to fix a bunch of things beyond predatory, uncompetitive, profit-centered health insurance companies. But neutering these vultures would be a start.

Maybe it's time to tell our Congresspersons how we feel.

Read more...

Inspiration for your letter to Congress

Dan Isaacson of Boca Raton, Florida, plans to fax this letter to President Obama and fifty members of Congress today. Thanks to Floridians for Health Care for passing this on. Short and sweet--be inspired--speak out!

Dear President Obama and Congresspeople,

Shortly, you will have a decision to make on health care legislation.

How many Americans will your decision kill in the next 12 months?

“Research released this week in the American Journal of Public Health estimates that 45,000 deaths per year in the United States are associated with the lack of health insurance. If a person is uninsured, "it means you're at mortal risk," said one of the authors, Dr. David Himmelstein, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.” (from CNN)

How many Americans will remain uninsured by your decision? How many Americans will your decision place one illness away from death because they have no health insurance?

The proposed legislation in Congress will still leave many millions uninsured. If millions are left uninsured, whatever legislation you end up passing, you have failed the American people. I, for one, will take note of your vote and act accordingly at the next election cycle.

Sincerely,
Dan Isaacson

p.s. A politician thinks of the next election. A statesman, of the next generation. Which are you?

Read more...

The Public Option goes Broadway!

Take this one on the road!

Read more...

Almost free stuff!

We are moving from one office to another down the hall, and we're looking to clean out some cabinets and shelves. We have spare copies of the following books, so if you would like one, please email us at afd@thealliancefordemocracy.org.

All we ask is that you refund us the cost of mailing your book to you. We're sending the books media mail; they usually arrive in a week.

Please put "book request" in the subject line of your email. One book per person, please, except as noted below:

We have:
Imperial Overstretch: George W. Bush and the Hubris of Empire, by Roger Burbach and Jim Tarbell. Zed Books, 2004. The politics and attitudes that drew this country into two seemingly endless wars, and a good review as a new administration commits itself to some of the faults of the old. "Essential reading for those wishing to understand the rise of the neo-cons," says Medea Benjamin. Some copies have faded covers.

The Populist Moment: A Short History of the Agrarian Revolt in America, by Lawrence Goodwyn. Oxford University Press, 1978. The condensed version of Goodwyn's definitive history of American populism's rise, ebb, weaknesses, and strengths. Goodwyn's focus on what was new about the Populists' thinking, speech, and organizing makes this still-relevant reading for activists today. A classic.

The People's Business: Controlling Corporations and Restoring Democracy, by Lee Drutman and Charlie Cray. Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2004. The report of the Citizen Works Corporate Reform Commission. An outline of corporist practice and its social failings, this book considers a range of options for controlling corporate power. With a foreword by Ralph Nader. Some copies signed by Charlie Cray. Some have scuffed covers.

The Great Limbaugh Con, and Other Right-Wing Assaults on Common Sense, by Charles M. Kelly. Fithian Press, 1994. Rush Limbaugh has been around for a long time, and he's spawned imitators who run the gamut from pseudo-intellectual to outright delusional. Give a copy of this book to anyone who describes himself as a populist but insists Limbaugh's free speech rights were abrogated when he wasn't allowed to be part-owner of the Rams.

Addicted to War: Why the US Can't Kick Militarism. An illustrated exposé by Joel Andreas. An accessible guide to the social harms caused by bloated defense budgets and disdain for diplomacy. Great for middle and high schoolers who like alternative history and/or who are considering enlisting. We have a few dozen copies on hand, so if you would like a few extra, please contact the office and we can negotiate an appropriate donation.

Read more...

Too good to be true? Must be the Yes Men

Yesterday a US Chamber of Commerce spokesman delivered a surprising about-face from the climate-change-denying organization.

"There is only one way to do business and that is to pass a climate bill quickly so this December President Obama can go to Copenhagen and negotiate with a strong position," said the speaker, whose name, given in the release announcing the press conference, was remarkably similar to the official ringleader of the organization, Tom Donohue.

As it happens, the speaker at the podium was one of the Yes Men, a loose-knit gang of impersonators, "who take on big-time criminals in order to publicly humiliate them. Targets are leaders and big corporations who put profits ahead of everything else." (This is from their site, which is worth checking out. They also have a movie in the works.)

Here's the press conference, interrupted in mid-performance by a shill for the real Chamber. If the embedded video won't load here, try this page at the Gawker.

Read more...

Update on sit-ins at insurers; one protester still in custody

From Mobilization for Health Care for All; next set of sit-ins will be held Wednesday, October 28. Register at their website if you would like to be involved.

We knew October 15th was going to be a special day. But we never imagined we would see Americans stand up to the insurance company death panels with such amazing courage in as many cities as we saw on Thursday. From Boston to Palm Beach, Washington DC to Portland everyday people risked arrest and went to jail in nine cities across the country. 54 people were arrested, those in New York endured a difficult night in jail, and one arrestee--Sam Pullen--is still in jail in Los Angeles today.

Sam has decided to remain in police custody until Blue Cross agrees to immediately approve all doctor-requested care for its members with life-threatening conditions. His mother was denied critical care for cancer until she staged a sit-in at a Blue Cross office years ago, and Sam is carrying on her struggle to make sure no one else in our country suffers the same injustice ever again. Bail for Sam has been set at $5000 dollars. Please donate today to support Sam when he decides to seek release.

The courageous people who risked arrest and went to jail on Thursday were simply trying to save the lives of those who are being denied life-saving treatment by these profit-obsessed insurance companies. And for that they were shut out, dismissed, and arrested. In Phoenix and Reno the companies locked their offices down to avoid any possibility of talking with us. In Washington and Cleveland police refused to arrest anyone as we sat outside the offices. But in every city, across our country, we showed how far the real death panels will go to protect their obscene profits - and put a spotlight on the real problem in our health care system. The national media is starting to take notice and more and more people are learning that we don't have to take the abuse of the insurance companies any more. See below for links to examples of media coverage of Thursday's sit-ins.

Thursday was just the beginning. The 78 people who have gone to jail in this campaign in the last 18 days set an example of leadership for us all to follow. Now we have to take all the energy and inspiration their sacrifice created and channel it into even stronger action in even more cities. October 28th can be a day of national nonviolent action that will make it impossible for our country to ignore how fed up the American people are with the insurance companies and how determined we are to free our country from their deadly grip once and for all. New organizers are joining our team this weekend to get to work supporting local leaders who want to organize sit-ins in dozens of cities. If you haven't stepped up yet, now is the time to let us know that you're ready to make it happen in your city. Email organize@mobilizeforhealthcare.org with "10/28 Leader" in the subject line and an organizer will contact you.

For too long, the insurance companies have stood between us and the health care that is our right. No longer. We want Medicare for All and we're going to sit in until they can't stop us from getting it.

We're so proud of everything you've done so far - and incredibly excited to see what we all can do now. Thanks so much.

- Katie, Kevin, Kai, Julia, and the Mobilization team

Press Coverage links:

• Huffington Post
• Democracy Now!
• Wall Street Journal
• Associated Press (New York)
• Boston Globe
• La Opinion (Los Angeles)
• WPBF (Palm Beach)
• CBS/KOIN (Portland)
• News Channel 8 (Washington DC)

Read more...

Democrats risk electoral disaster if they drop the public option

The public option can be set up fast and benefit voters by by 2010 and 2012. Contrast that with what the insurance industry wants: individual mandates, penalties for non-enrollment, and government tracking down the scofflaws. Will Dems fight to be seen as protectors of the middle class, or cop out and be tabbed 21st century "revenuers"?.

by Robert Parry, Consortium News. Posted October 19 on Alternet
From the start, the health-reform debate has been about money – who will get the best break and who may have to pay more. That is why the issue of the public option, a less expensive government-run insurance plan, has been so central to both the policy and political debates.

Indeed, if the Democrats abandon the public option for the sake of passing a bill like the one that came out of the Senate Finance Committee, they may be courting electoral disaster once voters grasp that they will have to wait years for the law to be implemented and then that it could lead to higher costs for much the same unpopular private insurance plans.

The public option offers the only means for a reform to be quickly implemented and to demonstrate a beneficial effect for the people by 2010 and 2012. It has the potential for reducing costs, especially for small businesses and individuals who are now being soaked by private insurers or denied coverage.

After assessing the five pieces of legislation that have cleared different committees of Congress, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office found that the nation would get the most savings on health-care costs from a public option tied to Medicare rates. Such a version, which is included in two of the House bills, would save an estimated $110 billion over 10 years.

A more modest public option in another House bill, which de-links the rates from Medicare and would require negotiations with health-care providers, would save an estimated $25 billion, the CBO says. By contrast, the co-op idea in Sen. Max Baucus’s Finance Committee bill would cost $6 billion to set up and would garner few if any savings.

Since the co-op would offer minimal competition, the health-insurance industry doesn’t object to it but is dead set against the public option. The reason is obvious: many of those projected savings would come out of the industry’s bottom line.

What the industry does want is a bill that forces nearly 50 million uninsured Americans, including healthy young people, to buy private insurance, many with government subsidies, a potential bonanza. The industry also wants the federal government to act as the enforcer to coerce these people by hitting them with stiff fines if they don’t sign up.

The level of government coercion is important to the industry. This week, America’s Health Insurance Plans, the industry’s lobbying arm, broke with the industry-friendly Baucus bill because of its relatively weak penalties of only a few hundred dollars a year assessed against people who don’t buy insurance.

AHIP feared that the fines wouldn’t be coercive enough to force young people to buy insurance. Therefore, the industry worries that many of the new sign-ups would be customers the industry doesn’t want, people who actually need medical attention.

So, industry lobbyists warned that if Congress didn’t raise the fines on the uninsured, the industry would jack up its premiums across the board. "The consequences of this would be an upward spiral; rate shock to everyone who stays in," AHIP president Karen Ignagni said. [Washington Post, Oct. 9, 2009]

Risking a Backlash

In firing that shot across the bow of Congress, the industry did risk a backlash, the possible revival of the public option, the industry’s biggest worry since the debate began last spring.

Early in the congressional battle, Republicans cited an industry-sponsored study by the Lewin Group, projecting that the inclusion of a public option could lead to the defection of 119 million Americans from private insurance to the government-run plan.

"As many as 119 million Americans would shift from private coverage to the government plan," Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, wrote in a column for Politico.com. That migration, Grassley said, would "put America on the path toward a completely government-run health care system....Eventually, the government plan would overtake the entire market."

So, to protect the interests of the insurance industry, congressional Republicans--and some conservative Democrats--went to work killing the public option. Behind the scenes, the industry even helped organize angry protests at "town hall" meetings to pressure members of Congress to back away from the government-run alternative.

In essence, President Barack Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress must now decide whether they will take on the industry (and a Republican Senate filibuster) or whether they will take on the role of arm-twisters for the for-profit insurers.

If the Democrats bend to the demands of the industry and the Republicans, Obama and congressional Democrats could find themselves in several years explaining how they enacted "reforms" that bully moderate-income Americans into buying over-priced health insurance, fatten the industry’s profits and fail to achieve any meaningful cost controls.

Such an outcome could be catastrophic to the Democratic Party’s future and to the concept of progressive governance. Yet, some members of the Senate Democratic leadership appear to heading in that direction, wanting to portray pushing through some bill – even one without a public option – as a victory.

As the legislation stands now, many of the key features that hold some promise of helping consumers--such as the "exchange" where individuals and small business would shop for the best product--won’t even take effect until 2013. That means that Americans now facing the crisis of no health insurance won’t get much help for another four years, if then.

After the long political fight over health care, many of these hard-pressed Americans will suddenly realize that they have been left to the tender mercies of the health insurance industry until after the next presidential election when another person, possibly a Republican, could be in the White House.

By contrast to the four-year phase-in for these relatively modest reforms, the Medicare single-payer program for senior citizens was signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson on July 30, 1965, and was up and running less than a year later.

Republican Attacks

The implementing delays mean that in both 2010 and 2012, Republicans will be free to make the truthful case that the Democrats--despite their promises--had accomplished little to help the American people on health care.

Already, Republican senators are using the talking point that the four-year delay is part of a budgetary trick to make the bill appear cheaper over 10 years than it would be if its key features took effect quickly.

Even when those new features do appear, Americans may find themselves coerced by the government into buying unsatisfactory plans from the same small group of giant insurance companies--essentially a cartel--that have little incentive to undercut one another on prices. It will be the Democrats who will be blamed for the fines on the uninsured.

The Democrats would not be much better off if Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine, the one Republican who voted for the Baucus bill in the Senate Finance Committee, has her way. She wants the public option included only as a standby provision with a trigger if "affordable" plans do not materialize.

But the insurance exchanges won't open until 2013, so it may take years before any trigger would be pulled. At minimum, the industry would have earned a lengthy reprieve.

And by the time, the exchanges have a chance to be tested, Congress and the White House could be in Republican hands. If that's the case, the Republicans might well undo even the triggered public option. Unlike the Democrats, the Republicans would surely not worry about ramming their preferred policy through the Congress.

On the other hand, if Congress enacts a public option now, it presumably could be implemented at least as fast as Medicare, especially if it were piggybacked onto the existing Medicare bureaucracy. That would enable Democrats to show they had accomplished something beneficial for the public before voters go to the polls in November 2010.

By 2012, if the CBO predictions of substantial savings prove true, Obama could campaign for reelection on the basis that he had improved the welfare of the American people--and the budget outlooks for government and business.

The loser in that scenario would be the insurance companies. Their plight might not be as dire as the Lewin Group predicted, but they probably would not be celebrating the windfall profits from the combination of coerced consumers and government subsidies.

Given those prospects, it’s hard to understand where Democratic leaders see the political or policy upside of selling out the public option.

Robert Parry's new book is Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq.

Read more...

New date and events for Portland regional convention

There's a new date for the Portland (OR) AfD Regional Convention. The convention will take place Saturday, November 7, at the First Unitarian Church, SW 12th and Salmon Sts., Portland, with the starting time TBA.

Presenters will include Nancy Matela on water privatization, Cascade Locks and Nestlé; Barbara Dudley on the economic crisis, and Margaret Butler of Jobs with Justice on single payer health care. Elections and politics will feature public interest lawyer Dan Meek on Citizens United v. FEC and Janice Thompson of Common Cause on the upcoming vote on Portland's Voter-Owned Elections.

The convention is co-sponsored by the First Unitarian Church's Economic Justice Action Group.

Also, at 7 p.m., at the First Unitarian Church, there will be a screening of Tapped, the new documentary exposing the environmental, social and health harms done by the bottled water industry. Doors open at 6:30.

Read more...

Sit-in wrap-ups

More than 54 people were arrested at rallies across the country yesterday, as activists focused on insurance companies and the damage they do to our nation's health care and democracy. Lots of video and media reports are up at Mobilization for Health Care for All. You can also pledge to join single payer and strong public option supporters at future rallies, either doing nonviolent civil disobedience, or legal protest.

The Mobilization is looking for 1,000 pledges of support, and has more than 750 individuals signed up so far. You can also follow the group on Facebook here.

Protests were covered in local media and the headlines section of Democracy Now!, and Prosperity Agenda’s Executive Director Kevin Zeese was interviewed by MSNBC. In Portland, OR, 12 people were arrested for trespass at the doors of Regence Blue Cross Blue Shield. Protesters shared stories about denial and delay of care, and noted that this "non-profit" insurer paid its CEO close to $900,000 in salary and bonus, making him the highest paid health care executive in the state. And in Massachusetts, purportedly a model for health care reform, 11 were arrested outside CIGNA's Newton office while more than 70 protesters supported them from the street below.

Read more...

David Sirota: I don't get the Democrats

There's no point to conciliation. By weakening health care reform measures in an attempt to court unneeded GOP support, the Democrats are setting themselves up for a tear-down by the right.

by David Sirota. Published in the Bennington Banner, October 15
I don’t get it. I know that’s the simplistic refrain of every 10-year-old, but I’m 33 and I mean it: I just don’t get it.

Specifically,I don’t get why Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe (R) -- or any Republican senator, for that matter -- is attracting so much attention.

In the last few months, Democratic senators eliminated the public option and substantially weakened their health care proposals in order to buy insurance industry acquiescence and, thus, Snowe’s vote. Now, based on the deafening media noise, all of American politics is focused on this unaccomplished backbencher and whether or not she will endorse the final bill. It is as if Republicans control Congress -- as if Snowe, not Barack Obama, won the biggest presidential landslide since Ronald Reagan.

This is bizarre for what should be obvious reasons. First of all, Snowe’s much-celebrated initial vote this week for an embarrassingly flaccid health care initiative wasn’t necessary to pass the bill -- Democrats had enough votes to move the legislation out of the Senate Finance Committee without her approval.

That’s a mathematical fact, as is the fact that Democrats control the 60 votes to overcome a filibuster with or without Snowe; as is the fact that Democrats have the 51 votes to enact health care reform through a parliamentary procedure called reconciliation -- again, with or without Snowe.

So the notion that Snowe’s vote -- or any GOP vote -- is inherently pivotal to health care reform is a fantasy created by the Beltway media and the Democratic congressional leadership. The former is desperately trying to manufacture headline-grabbing drama; the latter is looking for a Republican excuse to water down the bill and protect corporate interests -- all while absolving Democrats of legislative responsibility.

Second, the idea that Snowe’s support will result in the final legislation being called "bipartisan" -- and that such billing will politically protect Democrats -- is absurd. How do we know this? Because Democrats themselves taught us that via the Iraq War. Recall that with solid Democratic and Republican backing, the 2002 Iraq resolution was far more "bipartisan" than any health care bill will ever be. Yet, Democrats turned right around and used the Iraq War to criticize Republicans -- and because the conflict was so wildly unpopular, Americans in 2006 and 2008 were willing to overlook the contradiction and vote for the only major party echoing any semblance of an anti-war message.

On health care, it will be the same in reverse: The GOP will invariably attempt to turn any bill into an electoral cudgel against Democrats -- regardless of how many Republicans end up voting for it.

The lesson, then, is simple: If Democrats hypocritical Iraq criticism only worked because the war was such a disaster, then the GOP’s inevitable health care attacks -- however hypocritical -- can only be thwarted by making health care reform the opposite of Iraq (i.e., a major success). For Democrats, in other words, good health care policy is great politics, and bad policy is the worst politics.

Whether passed by one congressional vote or 50, real reform that improves the system (i.e., a bill with a public option, tough insurance regulation and universal coverage) will transform the Democratic Party into an election-winning force forever known as "the generous protector of middle-class interests," as GOP strategist William Kristol admits.

Conversely, even if passed unanimously, bad legislation that makes the system worse (i.e., a bill empowering insurance companies, preventing a public option and leaving millions uncovered) will make GOP criticism of Democrats extremely effective. That’s a truism, no matter if Snowe or any other Republicans add their support to a health care bill that doesn’t actually need it in the first place.

David Sirota is the author of the best-selling books "Hostile Takeover" and "The Uprising." He blogs at OpenLeft.com. E-mail him at ds@davidsirota.com.

Read more...

Stop the Chamber: Online action calls for investigation, limits on US Chamber of Commerce

from www.StopTheChamber.com, a VelvetRevolution.us Campaign

The Chamber of Commerce, under the leadership of Tom Donahue, has gone from a well respected trade organization to an extremist political organization dedicated to corrupting American democracy by elevating the profits of big corporations over the well being of the citizens they serve. The most recent example of this corrupt behavior is the Chamber's announcement that it is spending more than $100 million to defeat initiatives to protect the environment and provide affordable health care to everyone.

The Chamber is the biggest lobbying operation in the United States, spending billions of dollars on behalf of big business over the past decade to corrupt the political system. Polluters like Big Coal, Big Asbestos, and Big Oil only need call the Chamber to stop any accountability for their toxic destruction. Wall Street banks and CEOs need only make sure that they have paid their Chamber dues to ensure that they can continue to rip off the taxpayers. And killers like Big Tobacco need only form a partnership with the Chamber to ensure that they will be given immunity from lawsuits that seek accountability for the death and sickness of millions of Americans.

Click here to sign on.

Tom Donahue has turned the once respected and even-handed Chamber into an extremist organization, bragging that the Chamber gutted the Clinton tobacco settlement, killed the Clinton health care plan, and scuttled previous oversight of Wall Street and the banking system. Now the Chamber is spending tens of millions on ads and lobbyists to stop health care for all, protect polluters from accountability, and shield the financial industry from government regulation.

Not only is the Chamber lobbying and advertising against the interests of Americans, it is also committing fraud and violating campaign finance laws by creating fake astroturfing front groups, with patriotic names like Citizens for a Strong Ohio, and then illegally funneling millions of anonymous dollars into those groups to attack candidates and judges who won't do their bidding. While this corrupts the electoral system, the Chamber persists, even when it is caught, fined and required to disclose its "anonymous" donors.

We have had enough and it is time to Stop The Chamber. Therefore, we demand the following:

1. Fire Tom Donohue. Mr. Donohue is the Chamber's corrupter in chief who single handedly turned the Chamber "into a pay-to-play vehicle for right-wing causes and corporate dishonesty. As Eliot Spitzer put it, "Tom Donohue has never once found a crime that he couldn't justify, as long as it was committed by one of his dues-paying members."

2. Drop Corporate Support for the Chamber. Over the past month, several large companies have abandoned the Chamber because of its anti-science stance on global warming. These include, Apple, Exelon Energy, Pacific Gas & Electric, Nike, and Public Service Company of New Mexico. As Nike put it, "We fundamentally disagree with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on the issue of climate change, and their recent action challenging the E.P.A. is inconsistent with our view that climate change is an issue in need of urgent action." We will target companies with exposure and boycotts if they remain with the Chamber.

3. Launch A Criminal Investigation Against The Chamber For Fraud, False Tax Filings And Campaign Finance Violations. Former Alliance for Democracy co-chair Cliff Arnebeck led the charge against the Chamber in Ohio, where it was found to have committed fraud and campaign finance violations by creating a front group called Citizens for a Strong Ohio and funneling millions of dollars through it to defeat Supreme Court Justice Alice Resnick. This Chamber practice is widespread and was also used against Karl Rove-targeted Mississippi Justice Oliver Diaz, and in Indiana, Pennsylvania, Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Michigan, West Virginia, and Arkansas. We are asking the Department of Justice to investigate these illegal practices under RICO and to review whether the Chamber is actually a political action committee rather than a trade association. See our letter to DOJ here.

4. Ask Congress To Investigate The Chamber. In addition to a criminal investigation, we want Congress to investigate the activities of the Chamber to include astroturfing and election manipulation as outlined by Public Citizen. Read U.S. Chamber of Commerce Failed to Report Electioneering Spending and Grants, Public Citizen Asks IRS to Investigate. Send a letter to Congress here.

5. Reorganize The Chamber. The Board of the Chamber should shut down the Chamber's lobbying arm and legal reform arm, and return to being a respected trade organization rather than a partisan PAC.

6. Speak Out Against The Chamber. We ask companies, politicians and others that do not agree with the flat earth, anti science, partisan, anti people approach of the Chamber to speak out publicly against the Chamber.

Click here to Send A Letter Asking Congress To Investigate The Chamber.

Read more...

Chamber of horrors

It's fudged its membership figures and lost some high profile companies. Not enough. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce must be stopped, and it is investors who need to do stop it.

by Eliot Spitzer. Posted on Slate.com; updated October 15
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce--the self-proclaimed voice of business in Washington--has been wrong on virtually every major public-policy issue of the past decade: financial deregulation, tax and fiscal policy, global warming and environmental enforcement, consumer protection, health care reform...

The chamber remains an unabashed voice for the libertarian worldview that caused the most catastrophic economic meltdown since the Great Depression. And the chamber's view of social justice would warm Scrooge's heart. It is the chamber's right to be wrong, and its right to argue its preposterous ideas aggressively, as it does through vast expenditures on lobbyists and litigation. Last year alone, the chamber spent more than $91 million on lobbying, and, according to lobby tracker Opensecrets.org, it has spent more than twice as much on lobbying during the past 12 years as any other corporation or group.

The problem is, the chamber is doing all this with our money. The chamber survives financially on the dues and support of its members, which are most of America's major corporations listed on the stock exchange. The chamber derives its political clout from the fact that its membership includes these corporations. Yet we--you and I--own the companies that support the chamber and permit it to propagate its views. Our passive, permissive attitude toward the management of the companies we own has enabled the chamber to be one of the primary impediments to the reform of markets, health care, energy policy, and politics that we have all been calling for. It is time for that to change.

How, you might ask, do we own these companies? Public pension funds and mutual funds are the largest owners of equities in the market. They are the institutional shareholders that have the capacity to push management--and the boards of the corporations. Yet the mutual funds and pension funds have failed to do so. They have failed to control the management of the companies they own because the actual owners of those mutual funds and pension funds--you and I--have failed to raise our voices. We haven't even asked questions.

Mutual funds, until recently, didn't even disclose how they voted the proxies of shares they owned. When asked why not at a forum I was part of several years ago, the general counsel of one of the largest mutual fund companies tried to explain that it would be too expensive to make such disclosure. The answer was patently ridiculous, and it hid the much more important reason for nondisclosure: Mutual funds rarely if ever want to vote in opposition to management because mutual funds want to be included among the list of 401(k) options the company chooses for its employees. Mutual funds make money by increasing the size of the portfolios they manage, and if management knocks them off the 401(k) list, they will lose that revenue stream. This basic conflict of interest has neutered mutual funds. They are not meaningful checks on corporate mismanagement.

The comptrollers and treasurers who run public pension funds (often elected officials), have also failed to flex their political muscles. The passivity of the publicly elected officials who have the capacity to raise these issues has been a bit surprising.

So what should be done? The issue of passive institutional ownership is one of the most vexing and serious problems in American business. Expecting CEOs and boards to run companies properly without our input is a prescription for failure. But at least on the one issue of corporations playing politics with our money through support of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, there is an easy answer.

The elected comptrollers and treasurers who agree--as a vast majority will--that the Chamber of Commerce has a distorted view of both economic and political policy should demand that each company in which they own stock drop its membership in the chamber. If the CEO doesn't agree, the public pension funds should pressure the board to drop the chamber membership. If one activist state comptroller begins to build this coalition, the other state pension funds will follow.

In recent weeks, Apple and two energy companies--PG&E and Exelon--have defected from the chamber, objecting to its environmental policies. The Wall Street Journal editorial page of course views this bit of wisdom as heresy and counter to shareholder interest.

If elected comptrollers and treasurers do take a stand against the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, expect a hue and cry from the typical voices. They will complain that elected comptrollers and treasurers are injecting politics into corporate management. To which the answer should be: No, they are trying to take politics out of it! It is corporate leadership, through its support of the chamber, that has injected politics into the corporations that we own. We are reminding corporate leaders that they are our fiduciaries. As long as the chamber and the CEOs who are supposed to be our representatives are using our money to be overtly political, it is our duty to respond. If we are passive, we permit the chamber to hijack our funds and companies to support positions antithetical to our own views. Waking pension funds and mutual funds from their slumber on this relatively easy issue might finally begin the necessary process of fixing mismanaged corporations.

Eliot Spitzer is the former governor of the state of New York.

Read more...

Call your Senators to support the Health Insurance Antitrust Enforcement Act

Here's a quick action: Call your senators to support the Health Insurance Antitrust Enforcement Act. This act revokes health insurance exemption from Federal antitrust laws, an exemption that's stood since 1945.

Senators Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT) are leading the fight to revoke this exemption. They support the “Health Insurance Antitrust Enforcement Act” which Sen. Schumer is working to include in the final Senate health insurance reform bill or as an amendment on the Senate floor.

Watch the Judiciary committee hearings or read the statements of Senators Leahy and Reid here and listen to Sen. Schumer on MSNBC October 14 on lack of competition and monopolization in the insurance market.

Read more...

Today's sit-ins; next round scheduled for October 28

A national round of sit-ins and non-violent civil disobedience has been scheduled for today, to follow actions two weeks ago in New York and last week in Chicago. The actions are organized by Mobilize For Healthcare.

The date for the next round of sit-ins is October 28th.

If you’re close enough to attend one of these actions, please do! Contact the local coordinator. Local leaders in these cities have worked tremendously hard to pull these actions together with very little lead time. We need to do everything we can to support them and make each one as big and strong as possible. If you don’t want to be arrested, then holds signs, take pictures, or give interviews to the local media, but be present!

Read more...

Last call for single payer?

The Weiner Amendment for Single Payer is expected to go to a floor vote in the House of Representatives on Thursday, October 15.

Please--get busy, get to the phone, and call on your Representative to support single payer. Thanks for all you've done to date... now, we are coming down to the wire!

The Weiner Amendment substitutes a single payer bill for the complicated and fiscally unsustainable legislation being considered by the House. For information on the current single payer bill, HR 676, see this page on Rep. John Conyers's website. Rep. Conyers is the primary sponsor of HR 676, which currently has 88 co-sponsors. Rep. Joe Baca (CA-43) signed up last week, so it is not too late to ask your representative to co-sponsor too!

Don't just get mad that the health [sic] care industry has spent $380 million-plus on lobbying and advertising in just the last few months.... or that the Senate Finance Committee bill was written by a former Wellpoint V.P., now Baucus' principle staffer on health care reform... or that a recent study documented that
more than 44,000 Americans die each year for lack of insurance.

Get busy!

• Call your representative and ask that he or she vote to support the Weiner Amendment.


• Ask your rep to also support the Kucinich amendment so state governments can create their own single payer programs.
• On the Senate side, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) will introduce two single-payer amendments to the Senate health care bill. One to create a national single-payer plan, the other to allow states to adopt single-payer. Your senators need to hear from you as well. Call them now!


• Finally, tell everyone you know to let their voices be heard before it's too late.

As Leonard Rodberg has written, we're being presented with a false choice. Some Democrats and pundits claim we need to pass a plan--any plan--to avoid a Gingrich-style House takeover next year. But the plan, he writes, "is a DOG... Relatively few people will benefit from it, while everyone who has to use health care will continue to experience the mess that is, and will continue to be, the American health care system.

As long as money drives politics, politicians will follow the lead of donors, not voters. As long as health care is a for-profit business for investors, premiums will rise and insurers will cherry-pick the healthiest and wealthiest subscribers.

We say health care is a right and our government should respond to our call for a health care system that respects the people's right to decent, affordable care. We demand single payer, the real cure for ailing health care and a damaged democracy.

Make your call today! Thank you!

Read more...

AB 1242 sponsors blast Schwarzenegger's water priorities following veto

Governor Schwarzenegger revealed his flawed priorities for water in California when he vetoed the Human Right to Water Bill late Sunday night. The bill would have made it the explicit policy of the state of California to ensure that all people have access to safe affordable water for basic human needs, including drinking water. Reflecting the broad-based support for the bill, AB 1242, authored by Assembly Member Ira Ruskin, was co-sponsored by seven organizations including Alliance for Democracy, Community Water Center, Environmental Justice Coalition for Water, Food and Water Watch, San Jerardo Cooperative, Inc., Unitarian Universalist Legislative Ministry Action Network, California Unitarian Universalist Service Committee and Urban Semillas.

Many communities and youth across the state came together to work in support of this bill and were able to gather over 10,000 support letters, postcards, and phone calls sent to the Governor’s office to make sure he knew how important this bill was for California. “When it came down to deciding to sign the bill, he ignored the voices of thousands of Californians. Making this bill a law would have been a much-needed step for us here in the Valley. We have suffered for years and no one has paid attention to our drinking water issues. We thought maybe this time our Governor would, but apparently it does not matter that we drink toxic water - I guess he has clean water so he doesn’t care that we don’t,” said Rebecca Quintana from Seville . The drinking water in Seville is contaminated from agricultural fertilizers.

“The Governor had an opportunity to make a statement on the fundamental values of the state of California: that we, as a state, support the right of all people to have clean drinking water,” said bill co-sponsor and Co-Executive Director of the Community Water Center Susana De Anda. The Community Water Center works with people in California’s Central Valley who do not have clean, affordable drinking water. “It is the state’s responsibility to invest the time and money to meet this basic necessity, but Schwarzenegger is basically saying he won’t send that message.”

"Access to water for basic human needs should be recognized as a fundamental human right. At a time when the state legislature and Governor are focused on water issues, the Governor has chosen to ignore the needs of the over 150,000 Californians who lack access to clean, affordable water," said bill co-sponsor Mark Schlosberg, Western Regional Director of Food & Water Watch.

In his veto message, Governor Schwarzenegger cited concerns over “costly and constant litigation” as one of the reasons he did not sign the bill. He also stated that California’s state agencies are already committed to the principle of providing safe drinking water, and it is simply a lack of funding that prohibits this goal from being achieved.

Debbie Davis, Policy Director for the Environmental Justice Coalition for Water countered saying, “Communities without safe drinking water should have some recourse. The courts are not ideal, but water is such a basic necessity to human life that people should be given every possible recourse to gain access.” Ms. Davis further suggested, “California voters have allocated more than $13 billion toward bond funded water projects since 1975, more than $10 billion of that since 2000. That is many times more than the estimated cost to address the known need. Money poorly invested will not get every Californian access to safe, affordable water!”

As Ms. De Anda says, “The Governor is calling for business as usual. Here in the Valley we know business as usual doesn’t work. Despite what the Governor would have you believe, the current programs are exposing residents across the state to life-threatening contaminants on a regular basis. It’s not so simple as just getting more money for clean drinking water.”

Despite Schwarzenegger’s proposed solution of “more funding” for existing programs, he has failed to prioritize such funding within his own water proposals. The Governor concluded his veto message by stating the need for a water bond. The last version of the bond contained $3 billion for water storage projects that will not likely get a single drop of safe water to the communities that need it most. The bond did not include the estimated $2 billion needed to address known, existing drinking water and sanitation issues throughout the state.

“The Governor is poised to ask California voters to pass another multi-billion dollar water bond, but his veto of AB 1242 says he is not willing to make sure that everyone in California gets an equitable share,” said Ms. Davis.

As Mrs. Quintana stated, “The Governor claims that California’s water needs are his priority, but this just shows that he means the water needs of special interests, not the people of California. If water was really his priority, he would be addressing the real issue: clean and safe drinking water for California’s families. Stop asking us to wait; we need it now.”

Read more...

A leveraged buyout of democracy

A spotlight on Baucus's staff and the "revolving door" between the health care industry and Washington congressional staff.

by Bill Moyers and Michael Winship. Posted on Truthout October 11
On Tuesday, October 13, the Senate Finance Committee finally is scheduled to vote on its version of health care insurance reform. And therein lies yet another story in the endless saga of money and politics.

In most polls, the majority of Americans favor a non-profit alternative - like Medicare - that would give the private health industry some competition. So if so many of us, including President Obama himself, want that public option, how come we're not getting one?

Because the medicine that could cure our health care nightmare has been poisoned from Day One - fatally adulterated, thanks to the infamous, Washington revolving door. Movers and shakers rotate between government and the private sector at a speed so dizzying they forget for whom they're supposed to be working.

If you've been watching the Senate Finance Committee's markup sessions, maybe you've noticed a woman sitting behind Committee Chairman Max Baucus. Her name is Liz Fowler.

Fowler used to work for Wellpoint, the largest health insurer in the country. She was its vice president of public policy. Baucus' office failed to mention this in the press release announcing her appointment as senior counsel in February 2008, even though it went on at length about her expertise in "health care policy."

Now she's working for the very committee with the most power to give her old company and the entire industry exactly what they want - higher profits - and no competition from alternative non-profit coverage that could lower costs and premiums.

A veteran of the revolving door, Fowler had a previous stint working for Senator Baucus - before her time at Wellpoint. But wait, there's more. The person who was Baucus top health advisor before he brought back Liz Fowler? Her name is Michelle Easton. And why did she leave the staff of the committee? To go to work - surprise - at a firm representing the same company for which Liz Fowler worked - Wellpoint. As a lobbyist.

You can't tell the players without a scorecard in the old Washington shell game. Lobbyist out, lobbyist in. It's why they always win. They've been plowing this ground for years, but with the broad legislative agenda of the Obama White House - health care, energy, financial reform, the Employee Free Choice Act and more - the soil has never been so fertile.

The health care industry alone has six lobbyists for every member of Congress and more than 500 of them are former Congressional staff members, according to the Public Accountability Initiative's LittleSis database.

They want a public option about as much as you want the swine flu, and just to be certain Congress sticks with the program, the industry has been showering megabucks all over Capitol Hill. From the beginning, they wanted to make sure that whatever bill comes out of the Finance Committee puts for-profit insurance companies first - by forcing the uninsured to buy medical policies from them. Money not only talks, it writes the prescriptions.

In just the last few months, the health care industry has spent $380 million on lobbying, advertising and campaign contributions. And - don't bother holding onto your socks - a million and a half of it went to Finance Committee Chairman Baucus, the man who said he saw "a lot to like" in the two public option amendments proposed by Senators Rockefeller and Schumer, but voted no anyway.

The people in favor of a public alternative can't scrape up the millions of dollars Baucus has received from the health sector during his political career. In fact, over the last two decades, the current members of the entire finance committee have collected nearly $50 million from the health sector, a long-term investment that's now paying off like a busted slot machine.

Not that we should be surprised. A century ago, muckraking journalists reported that large corporations and other wealthy interests virtually owned the United States Senate - using bribery, fraud and sometimes blackmail to get their way. Jokes were made about "the Senator from Union Pacific" or "the Senator from Standard Oil."

One reporter in particular was out to break their grip. His name was David Graham Phillips. One day in 1906, readers of Cosmopolitan Magazine opened its March issue to discover the first of nine articles by Phillips titled, "The Treason of the Senate."

He wrote, "Treason is a strong word, but not too strong, rather too weak, to characterize the situation which the Senate is the eager, resourceful, indefatigable agent of interests as hostile to the American people as any invading army could be, and vastly more dangerous: interests that manipulate the prosperity produced by all, so that it heaps up riches for the few: interests whose growth and power can only mean the degradation of the people, of the educated into sycophants, of the masses toward serfdom."

The public outrage provoked by Phillips and other muckrakers contributed to the ratification of the 17th amendment to the Constitution, providing for the direct popular election of senators, who until then were elected by easily bought-off state legislators.

Of course, like water seeking its own level, big money finds its way around every obstacle, and was soon up to its old tricks, filling the pockets of sympathetic and grateful politicians.

Today, none dare call it treason. So why not call it what it is - a friendly takeover of government, a leveraged buyout of democracy.

Outrageous? You bet. But don't just get mad. Get busy.

Bill Moyers is managing editor and Michael Winship is senior writer of the weekly public affairs program Bill Moyers Journal, which airs Friday night on PBS. Comment at The Moyers Blog. Research provided by producer Gail Ablow and associate producer Julia Conley.

Read more...

LA City Council passes resolution in support of AB 1242

On October 9, the Los Angeles City Council unanimously passed a resolution endorsing AB 1242 the Human Right to Water Act of 2009. This video by one of the bill's co-sponsors, Urban Semillas, features supporting comments from two City Council members and representatives of some of the grassroots groups that are working toward passage.

The resolution was introduced by 1st District Councilmember Ed P. Reyes, who is also chair of the city's Planning and Land Use Management Committee and the LA River Ad Hoc.

Alliance for Democracy is one of the co-sponsors, with AfD co-chair Nancy Price working with a coalition of groups to pass this historic act. A thank you to all California members who responded to our action alerts. Californians--it's not too late to call or fax Governor Schwarzenegger in support of this bill--see our latest alert here.

Read more...

Is there any way out for Obama?

It's far too easy for the right to poke holes in current health care reform legislation--the danger is not "doing nothing" but in passing reform that leaves most Americans no better off than before.

by Leonard Rodberg. Forwarded by AfD secretary Dr. Peter Mott.
Progressives worry that, if Obama's health reform plan (hereafter called the "Plan") fails to pass, a latter-day right-wing Gingrich movement will take over the Congress in 2010 and the White House in 2012. What I have not heard, but what I am increasingly coming to believe, is that, if the Plan passes in any of its current forms, things will go just as badly for him! Why is that?

The general reason is that the Plan is a DOG. It is a terrible, complex plan that will accomplish almost nothing. Relatively few people will benefit from it, while everyone who has to use health care will continue to experience the mess that is, and will continue to be, the American health care system. And, because of the new requirements built into the Plan, health care finance will become even more complex and confusing.

More specifically:

1. The large majority of people, who receive their insurance from their employer, will see no benefit whatsoever from the Plan. Most will, in fact, find their premiums rising as new requirements imposed by the Plan (e.g., the elimination of lifetime limits) raise the cost of insurance. And, of course, to their undoubted surprise, most of them will not have access to the public option, even if there is one.

2. Most provisions of the Plan will not become effective until 2013. This gives four years for Republicans to criticize the Plan, including (1) its use of cuts in Medicare reimbursements and Medicare Advantage premiums as principal sources of funding, (2) its lack of any real or believable mechanism for containing costs, and (3) its bureaucratic complexity.

3. The taxes on high-cost insurance plans, the other principal source of funding, will cause those who now have good insurance (called, pejoratively, "Cadillac" plans) to find these plans heavily taxed and their employers given a strong incentive to cut back on their benefits. Instead of reducing underinsurance, this part of the Plan will increase it! (And the rest of the plan does little about underinsurance at all.)

4. During the four years of waiting for the Plan to take effect, costs will continue to rise. By the time the Plan takes effect, costs are likely to be at least 25% greater than now. Even more people will find insurance and health care unaffordable. People will ask "What was health reform about?" The disillusionment will be great.

5. The complexity of the plan, including (1) federal rules regarding what kinds of employer-based insurance plans are "qualified," (2) new income tax forms that will be needed to implement the individual mandate, and (3) the process of determining income eligibility for everyone, will all lend themselves to criticism and even ridicule.

Is there a way out? Not, in my view, as long as Obama sticks with this worthless and unworkable Plan. Only if we were to adopt a much simpler plan that would benefit everyone -- a Medicare for All plan -- would he be seen as actually addressing the problem and really offering a workable solution. Short of that, he, and all of us, are in real trouble.

(Leonard Rodberg, Ph.D. is Professor and Chair, Urban Studies Department, Queens College/CUNY.)

Read more...

Last best push for single payer? Do your bit!

Some time in the next two weeks there will be a House floor vote on single payer health care. This is our last, best chance to push for real universal, equitable coverage--"everybody in, nobody out."

Please join with hundreds of thousands of Americans--doctors, nurses and health care professionals, union members and municipal employees and managers, elected officials and regular citizens, in this push to make the strongest case possible for single payer health care. We need to reach every legislator, Republican and Democrat, to get the broadest support possible both for the Weiner Amendment, on single payer health care, and the Kucinich Amendment to HR 3200, which would allow states to establish their own single payer systems if a national bill fails.

Even if your Representative is a co-sponsor of HR 676 (check here) make the call to let him or her know you expect support for these vital reforms.

In the last year we've seen, heard, and shared stories of coverage denied and delayed by insurance companies, and learned about the immense tolls taken in lives and family security, all in the name of industry profit. It's time for us to demand that our legislators put the public's health before private wealth.

Please call your representative today, and urge him or her to support the Weiner Amendment for single-payer health care, and the Kucinich Amendment, to remove legal impediments to state single payer programs. You can call the Capitol switchboard at (202) 224–3121, or look up your representative's direct line here and here.

And please call House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at (202) 225-0100; Majority Leader Steny Hoyer at (202) 225-3130, and key committee chair Henry Waxman at (202) 225-3976, to ensure their continued support for the Kucinich amendment.

Corporate lobbyists are making their case every day for lukewarm reforms that benefit private insurers and for-profit health care and pharmaceutial interests. They have the money, but we have the voices, and the votes. Make your voice heard now!

Read more...