As you've probably noticed, I've been very upset with the way the health-care debate is headed. Kathleen Sibelius did a good job defending the public option and of exposing some of the lies being used the medical industry and their cohorts in Congress.
I think we can all agree that single payer is the way to go, but since it was never made a priority by our representatives, we are left to fight for a solid and robust public option. We know that the obstructionist Republican Party will never get behind any meaningful reforms so Blue America has to go after members of the Democratic Party in the Senate and call them out for selling Americans health care down the drain.
For weeks I've been working on an action so we could get busy defending the best option we have and I think we've come up with a great idea. We are going to target Blanche Lincoln first with TV ads, with the help of Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films, and expose her actions to her constituents in Arkansas. This will be the first play because she is up for re-election in 2010 and has already received the second most money from the HIC of any Senator.
Watching the health care debate unfold is frustrating and predictably enervating. These kinds of debates are often followed by a deepening of public apathy and a sense that government can't help solve the big problems. And this plays into conservative hands since they are the ones who want to stoke that belief so that the citizens don't get it into their heads that they can get an equal shake with those who think they own this country.
We can't let that happen with health care. It is just too important on every level, for individuals, business and the country at large. It's time to get involved. To that end Blue America is launching a campaign to raise money to run some television ads. We've got to get these wavering Democrats off the fence about a public plan choice or this thing is going to fall completely apart before it even starts.
Perhaps it's not surprising that Lincoln is showing so much compassion for the poor insurance companies. She's taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from them over the years. In fact, she's already received $14,500 from insurance companies for her 2010 campaign, the second highest of any senator up for re-election next year. And the only reform they support is reform that will get the taxpayers to pay the overpriced premiums for the 47 million uninsured without having to change their ways. The fact is that insurance companies are not in any danger of going out of business because of the public plan choice unless they continue the kind of practices that have brought us to this crisis.
Please go to our Blue America Act Blue Page a to give what you can
Digby's been writing TV scripts for a whole week to try to salvage health care reform from the tender mercies of Democrats who have grown worthless to working families after millions and millions of dollars in legalized bribes from the Medical-Industrial Complex and the Insurance Giants. Robert Greenwald is standing by with a camera crew ready to start shooting. The first batch of ads are going up on TV in Arkansas and, man, do we need help. We have a new Blue America Page that I want to urge you to visit today.
Perhaps it's not surprising that Lincoln is showing so much compassion for the poor insurance companies. She's taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from them over the years. In fact, she's already received $14,500 from insurance companies for her 2010 campaign, the second highest of any senator up for re-election next year. And the only reform they support is reform that will get the taxpayers to pay the overpriced premiums for the 47 million uninsured without having to change their ways. The fact is that insurance companies are not in any danger of going out of business because of the public plan choice unless they continue the kind of practices that have brought us to this crisis.
Digby has finished several excellent scripts and we've begun the casting process. Please join us and support Blue America in its fight to save the public option. Idiots like Joe Lieberman are saying the fight over health insurance is for "universal access," but that's a lie.
Access doesn't do anything if the health care sucks. Lieberman should have said the fight is for universal health care for all if he was a human being instead of a shill for the HIC. We will not let them get away with this garbage.
Blanche Lincoln is the first one up on our radar, but we're sending a signal to the rest of the cowardly, corporate influenced Democrats that we are coming. Please help us save health care.
A 'solid and robust public option'?
It is a sham, you are fighting for a sham and calling it solid and robust.
Ergo, a solid and robust sham.
That is the Democratic Party that I know and love… TO SCORN.
The somewhat younger Obama was for single payer here.
You call your site Crooks & Liars.
Just tell it like it is.
The public option is a cow patty but the Democrats know how to shine cow patties. Most certainly they know how to try.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Iranian's have a better chance of overthrowing Khomeini than a bunch of bloggers have in taking on big Pharma, the AMA and health insurance. It's 17% of our economy, for Christ's sake! And its the most profitable sector. I always tell my university students that nothing could be more inefficient or ineffective than college education, but health care puts even that to shame. You can get a college degree for the cost of a few days in the hospital or a single operation. How much of that is profit and excess income? Nearly all of it. Physicians make many times more here than anywhere else in the world. Prescription drugs cost less than 1 cent on the dollar to manufacture. Health insurance cream skims and cherry picks coverage only for those least likely to need care.
So you and Hillary all talked single payer, i.e., 100%. Now it looks like you'll get slightly less. Like 0%. And the same is gonna happen with cutting carbon emissions. Anyone willing to risk their career or life to alter those outcomes? I didn't think so. But the Iranians are.
Nader always talked nothing BUT single payer.
Where did Hillary ever talk single payer.
Here is where Obama talked about it, but by the campaign he denied it.
As for the Iranians, whatever they THINK they are marching for, they have a duopoly similar to ours.
Instead of our Corporatocracy with two arms, they have a Theocracy with two arms.
I agree as far a carbon emissions, we should immediately cut our carbon footprint to a third.
Here is my comment on energy.
I sit with one fluorescent light, a computer in the cold in Michigan.
While you are at it Mr EconProf, please talk about the vast Welfare for the Wall Street Mafia.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
I'm speechless ..
When will government of the people, by the politicians, for the corporations perish from this Earth?
Not soon enough!
'Public Option' Pales Next to Single Payer
When will government of the people, by the politicians, for the corporations perish from this Earth?
Not soon enough!
most popular President with high popular support for change, and yet...failure to launch?
The dems can be far weaker and floundering, regardless of their role, than the GOPers can ever dream of being.
At least with the GOP, evil as they are, we know what we are getting. With the Dems, we still get the same thing... but the buildup is such, that the eventual let down... makes things a tad worse, since we have to deal with the same shit as the GOP AND the letdown...
Oh, well...
If you believe for one minute that President Obama was serious about change in medical insurance then you missed a key part to his talk today to the AMA. The joke is that he does not think that any tort reform is needed. I guess when you get as much money as he did from the trial lawyers for your campaign it comes with a couple of strings attached.
No dice on that one...
the cost of health care due to lawsuits is so minimal that it hardly registers.
As a Canadian I am amazed that grown elected men can lie about another countries healthcare plan. I have lived under a nationalized healthcare plan since it's inception in 1968. I have a choice of doctors, any doctor that I care to make an appointment with. I see him or her as often as I need to. I have surgery or medical procedures on a timely basis. That means that if I need a hip replacement, but am not suffering or unable to walk, I might have to wait a few months for others to be served.
Our doctors are just as rich as American doctors, if not more so. We do not need tort reform as we do not sue our doctors on a regular basis. Our doctors get paid by invoicing the insurer (the government agency) for the services he has performed. He can expect ot charge the fee's that the Canadian Medical association or the Provincial Associations have bargained for.
There is no Socialism in this except that all Canadians pay into this insurance program. and just so that detractors don't go off on a rant, I pay 164 Canadian dollars a month for my family.
There is no refusal to treat cancers or pre-diagnosed anything. We all get fixed. As far as equipment, not all hospitals are equipped the same, meaning that a town of 30,000 will not have all of the same services as a major city, however, a major city or care centre is only hours away.
Any questions. Come on up North of the 49th, and see for yourself. I am sponsoring two Cubans to visit in August, and the insurance for them to be covered is 120 dollars a month per person. Tell me where in the US you can beat that. You guys politize and make for profit something that Canadians believe is a tenet of society.......i.e. the welfare of the society in which one lives. A healthy population is a healthy economy.
your family. $164 is very reasonable even for 2 persons.
Yes, there are two in our family, but there is a maximum premium no matter how many members are under the plan. I checked my premiums just so that I am not chastised by conflicting information. I actually pay 48 dollars a month, and the rest of the $120 is picked up by my retirement plan. But get this, in some provinces you do not have to pay a monthly premium. You see, although we are constantly under attack by the conservatives, we generally believe that most of the country belongs to the people. So that when resources are sold, the royalties, or the money we make in revenue, is used for the benefit of the people.
Those that call that socialism, as is in the US of late, I challenge them to opt out of all forms of socialism by paying for the pavement in front of their street, paying their actual share of the military, pay for their individual share of fire and police protection. Most of this money comes from revenue earned by the country, state, county or city. Yes, a large portion is taxes, but not necessarily from your neck of the woods.
If you live in a community, you are in a social climate........i.e. socialism.
For those interested in questions about our plan, here's the government web site that deals with the issues:
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/hcs-sss/medi-assur/res...
I will use your link to inform my congresspersons and other bloggers here. It looks like everyone else left this thread to chase a scandal.
Great post.
Yes it is sad, unfair & wrong about Irans stolen presidential election & the violence & suppression they are putting peaceful protestors there through because of their leadership deceipt. There is no point in Irans people looking to Obama for help though, as not only shouldn't he interfer with another country's presidential election, but Obama is a hypocrit himself & deceiving America & Americans to. His words in the article he said were "that When I see's violence directed at peaceful protesters, when I see peaceful dissent being suppressed, wherever that takes place, it is of concern to me and of concern to the American people," he said. "My hope is that the Iranian people will take the right steps in order for them to be able to express their voices, express their aspirations."
Obama is lying to Americans saying claiming he & Congress are not attempting a Government Takeover, one of their Government takeover radical extremist leftist & in too much a rush which should be a HUGE Red Flag Alert to Americans that Obama & Congress plans is Americas health care & insurance Reform Obama lies & says they are not trying to nationalize & put under government control while at the same time Obama says no one is allowed to say anything against his Government takeover Health Reform. What do you think Federal Health Reform is? Why do you think they manipulated GM, etc. into their hands & ownership? Why do you think they're doing away with the Industrial Evolution? Etc. Is Obama a natural born Citizen, or was he born in Kenya? What about all the forged votes discovered on his behalf after he won presidential election & took office? Radical leftist Democratic Extremists President Obama, his administration & all the Democrates have been suppressing & literally putting down & smearing & dismissing Americas right side Replicans as the Right side Republicans have been peacefully protesting and/or just trying to make their voices of concern heard, respected & given mature fair inteligent equal weight by the right steps the Republican right side has been doing as in Obamas own words of expressing their voices & aspirations while being put down & dismissed by the Left side as deceiving wrongful unfair strategies are being orchestrated in Congress, etc. with the Left side Democratic party. We are all, Left & Right being lied to & deceived & taken over. Deceipt & takeover is & has been going on right in front of our eyes, so wake up America! Also, if Obama would quit giving all our money to other countries like Pakistan, etc. and spending it all on war there & on the rest of his BS agendas like closing Guantanamo Bay & Bringing a bunch of terrrorists we don't want here & spending our money trying and supporting them here & then we'd have plenty of money to cover our current private health care plans we want. Let's see if my rightful peaceful expressing of my voice & aspirations get to be heard & published just on this website, or will I too be supressed & deleted?
Catching HIV, etc. from Veteran Clinics is another reason why we don't want Obamas Federal Health Care Reform. The majority has said no, many times now and we would like Obama & his administration to quit forcing it on us Americans now, like a preditor who won't take NO for an answer. That's wrong. We would also like Obama to quit telling Americans we cannot and are not allowed to voice our opinion or say anything negative or against his Federal Health Care Reform to the public, in essence warning the public. That is suppressing our peaceful voices & aspirations! see link: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAG...
WorldNUTSdaily. Hell of a source. Ranks right up there with FOX 'News,' The
WashingtonMoonie Times, The TattlerThx 4 teh laff...
me-oww!
From Arkansas: we've been following the health care escapades of REPUBLICAN Blanche Lincoln. Yeah, I know, she was elected as a Democrat but she's pretty much been a Republican on health care. And, yes, she's bought and paid for by the insurance companies. I guess you have to admire a bought Senator remaining true to the buyers.
We're with you guys all the way: Sen. Blanche Lincoln, Arkansas Republican?!
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