Cold day. Cold reception.
About 50 St. Louisans braved the cold wind blowing in front of Blue Cross/Anthem/Wellpoint (or whatever it’s called at the moment) building on Wednesday as part of the final push to get health care reform passed by Congress.
Looking up at the ceiling lights in the hundreds of offices, one couldn’t help but get the point. They really don’t give a shit about sick people. Row on row of cubicles filled with flunkies who figure out ways to deny paying claims from doctors and hospitals. The sidewalk and steps going down to a small city park in front of the building are covered in cigarette butts. Ironic, huh? I hope those flunkies have good health insurance because they’re going to need it when cancer catches up with them. Maybe so many of them smoke because they feel guilty knowing they are part of a huge conspiracy to deceive the American people.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sibelius called out Blue Cross of California for paying their CEO’s obscene salaries and raising premiums by up to 39%. She must have gotten their attention because BC out there in the Golden State (no pun intended) backed off that plan while Sibelius’ department takes a peek at their records. Nationally, the Blue Cross/Wellpoint conglomerate made $2.7 billion profit in the last quarter of 2009. And how did they make that money? By letting people die.
“Bastards” is too kind a word for these creeps.
And the obstructionist Repugs……..
President Obama is taking the Repugs up on their demand for public negotiations on health care/insurance reform. He’s invited them to a summit of sorts on Feb. 24, but now they are stalling again. Please spare me the theatrics and get your act together – yes, YOU Senator Bond.
One of the chants at the rally yesterday was “If the people lead, the leaders will follow.” In this case, it’s going to have to be millions of angry people if we’re going to get Harry Reid’s attention (hey, Harry, over here – look up from your notes !)
Those hearty enough to survive a 12 hour van ride to and from DC plus a mile or so of marching, contact Doug at (618) 578-1234 or email DLee4144@aol.com. Transporation is free. Motel will run about $50. Leaving St. Louis early morning on the 23rd, march on the 24th, return home the 25th. This is the final (I hope) BIG PUSH. We’ve carried this baby for nine months and survived some pretty scary attempts to abort it (from hypocrites who call themselves “pro-life.”) Now it’s time to deliver. YES WE CAN.
I just called Lacy Clay and McCaskill. Remember what Amy Smoucha said: our job is to keep the insurance goons from peeling off any of our yes votes.
McCaskill’s office (202-224-6154) tells me that she still has not decided whether or not to sign on to Bennett’s letter pledging to support passing a public option through reconciliation. She needs to be asked that question every day until she says yes.
Russ Carnahan needs to be getting lots of calls as well. He may be concerned about having a lot of Republican voters in the section of his district that’s in Jefferson County. Anyway, I know that he did not sign on to the letter Rep. Chellie Pingree sent to senators asking them to support passing the public option through reconciliation. 117 other reps did sign that letter, including Clay and Cleaver. Carnahan did not. Put some pressure on, folks. (The numbers are 202-225-2671 and 314-962-1523.)
LaDonna Applebaum announced at the Wednesday rally that she had attended a meeting Tuesday night where Clay spoke. Someone asked if he would join the marchers who’ll be arriving in DC the 24th. He said he would, and LaDonna was thrilled. I called his office to thank him, and his executive assistant told me that such a promise was made without him having his schedule in front of him. She put it in terms of him being with the marchers “in spirit” but she looked at his schedule and said he has two hearings to attend that day. It’s disappointing that he probably can’t attend after all, but he signed Pingree’s letter, and all his actions tell me he’s a strong supporter of reform, so I cut him slack.
Make those calls. That’s our job.
we already know that this baby relies heavily on chucking a large number of the uninsured in to state Medicaid programs; programs which are currently cutting services right and left b/c of lack of funding. Providers are deciding not to see these patients b/c of the losses they incur in providing their care. This can’t be considered a positive.
Don McCanne of the Physicians for a National Health Program adds this:
I recently read a very nice series on this platform by Blue Girl on her great Single Payer experience. She knows exactly what her baby looks like.
about our unborn babies than we know about this bill.
And, unfortunately we won’t be able to “immediately start to work on improving” whatever this bill provides, since it won’t go into real effect until 2013.
Yes, kudos to Amy for her hard work, but the PNHP has been at work for 25 years and they say that single payer is possible, in fact they say it is the only thing that will work.
I sometimes think that if all progressives would start saying that Single Payer is possible, rather than saying Single Payer is impossible ,and further if they had said this from the beginning of the reform debate what an impact that would have had on the American Psyche. Instead the towel was thrown in before the debate began and the chant that Single Payer was impossible made its way across the land.
The only way we will be able to “immediately go to work” on real reform will be if this bill fails passage.