Q and AAAAA

A friend tipped me off to The Hill Blog's "Big Question" because this week's was about Obama and health care:

Are President Obama’s healthcare plans realistic?

We weighed in. So did many of our allies and coalition partners. Here are some of the excellent answers:

Richard Kirsch, national campaign manager for Health Care for America Now, said:

President Obama’s healthcare plan is not out of the blue. It’s realistic because he created the mandate for his plan when he ran for President. It was a central part of his campaign. Remember, 86 percent of his advertising in October talked about healthcare. Now he’s laid out a plan to pay for it, and Congressional leadership is lining up behind him. All the pieces are in place. It’s happening, and it’s happening this year.

Gerald McEntee, president of AFSCME, said:

President Obama’s healthcare plan is realistic and demonstrates that he understands what is needed to get America on the road to economic recovery. We need to expand healthcare coverage and lower costs for families and businesses. Working families stand ready to work with President Obama to make his plan a reality.

Jeff Blum, executive director of USAction, said:

The United States spends 6 percent more of GDP on healthcare than the next most expensive country, and yet we are less healthy than many countries and health care causes more tsuris than in many countries. President Obama is making a tremendous down payment on helping us – our health, our families, our economy. What’s unrealistic is pretending that we don’t need big progress, now.

Bertha Lewis, CEO and Chief Organizer, ACORN, said:

Not only is President Obama’s healthcare plan realistic, it is also urgently needed for both the physical well being of the American people and the economic well being of our economy. The plan is good. The time is right. Let’s address this challenge squarely, the way Americans know how, and create a stronger, healthier nation.

Maura Pond, web communications specialist, UFCW, said:

President Obama’s plan for healthcare is not only realistic but absolutely necessary. Our current system is too expensive and unreliable to be sustainable in our time of economic crisis. As the greatest country on earth, America has not only the capacity but the obligation to provide quality, affordable healthcare to every citizen. We can’t afford to wait any longer — not having a plan would be truly unrealistic.

Blogging is Exhausting

Obstruction as Strategy

Bill Kristol is at it again. Today in the WaPo:

Conservatives can't win politically right now. But they can raise doubts, they can point out other issues that we can't ignore (especially in national security and foreign policy), they can pick other fights -- and they can try in any way possible to break Obama's momentum. Only if this happens will conservatives be able to get a hearing for their (compelling, in my view) arguments against big-government, liberal-nanny-state social engineering -- and for their preferred alternatives.

Bill Kristol in 1993:

December 2, 1993 - Leading conservative operative William Kristol privately circulates a strategy document to Republicans in Congress. Kristol writes that congressional Republicans should work to "kill" -- not amend -- the Clinton plan because it presents a real danger to the Republican future: Its passage will give the Democrats a lock on the crucial middle-class vote and revive the reputation of the party. Nearly a full year before Republicans will unite behind the "Contract With America," Kristol has provided the rationale and the steel for them to achieve their aims of winning control of Congress and becoming America's majority party. Killing health care will serve both ends. The timing of the memo dovetails with a growing private consensus among Republicans that all-out opposition to the Clinton plan is in their best political interest. Until the memo surfaces, most opponents prefer behind-the-scenes warfare largely shielded from public view. The boldness of Kristol's strategy signals a new turn in the battle.

ReRetreat

Posting's bound to be slower than usual the next couple of days as I am off to another retreat. This one's closer and less demanding of my personal involvement, but I'll still be away from my computer more often than not.

If there's something totally significant and/or juicy that pops up, I'll weigh in from the road. Otherwise, expect crickets until the weekend.

It's Too Easy

I'm not a big 30 Rock fan, but Gawker nails it this morning with the Bobby Jindal/Kenneth the Page comparison.

Also, Think Progress has got the lowlights of Jindal's speech married with the Fox News panel's less-than-glowing review:

Did You Catch That?

ADDRESS BY THE PRESIDENT

TO THE JOINT SESSION OF CONGRESS

...And for that same reason, we must also address the crushing cost of health care.



This is a cost that now causes a bankruptcy in America every 30 seconds. By the end of the year, it could cause 1.5 million Americans to lose their homes. In the last eight years, premiums have grown four times faster than wages. And in each of these years, 1 million more Americans have lost their health insurance. It is one of the major reasons why small businesses close their doors and corporations ship jobs overseas. And it's one of the largest and fastest-growing parts of our budget.



Given these facts, we can no longer afford to put health care reform on hold. We can't afford to do it. It's time. (Applause.)



Already, we've done more to advance the cause of health care reform in the last 30 days than we've done in the last decade. When it was days old, this Congress passed a law to provide and protect health insurance for 11 million American children whose parents work full-time. (Applause.) Our recovery plan will invest in electronic health records and new technology that will reduce errors, bring down costs, ensure privacy, and save lives. It will launch a new effort to conquer a disease that has touched the life of nearly every American, including me, by seeking a cure for cancer in our time. (Applause.) And -- and it makes the largest investment ever in preventive care, because that's one of the best ways to keep our people healthy and our costs under control.



This budget builds on these reforms. It includes a historic commitment to comprehensive health care reform -- a down payment on the principle that we must have quality, affordable health care for every American. (Applause.) It's a commitment -- it's a commitment that's paid for in part by efficiencies in our system that are long overdue. And it's a step we must take if we hope to bring down our deficit in the years to come.



Now, there will be many different opinions and ideas about how to achieve reform, and that's why I'm bringing together businesses and workers, doctors and health care providers, Democrats and Republicans to begin work on this issue next week.



I suffer no illusions that this will be an easy process. Once again, it will be hard. But I also know that nearly a century after Teddy Roosevelt first called for reform, the cost of our health care has weighed down our economy and our conscience long enough. So let there be no doubt: Health care reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year. (Applause)...

Speech! Speech!

I'm working right now so I can't really liveblog the Presidential Address, but I couldn't resist the urge to share that I think Speaker Pelosi looks like a giant pea.

About Tonight

We're looking forward to President Obama talking about health care reform tonight, and we expect to be able to say the issue's no longer if we're doing health care but how we're doing health care - meaning what kind of health care reform we're going to get. Do we keep letting private health insurance companies dominate the landscape and operate to minimize coverage and maximize profit, or do we create a new public health insurance option that forces private insurance to compete, controls costs, and guarantees quality?

Assuming the speech goes as expected, this is also where the game changes and the make-nice coalitions start to bicker about the details.

Game on.

Elevating the Issue

Our local HCAN partners released reports across the country yesterday, and a couple are still trickling out today. The reports are all pretty much the same (just with state-specific notes and numbers) because the message is uniform nationwide:

We must do health care next, and we can't fix our economy without fixing health care. It's just too big and just too broken.

Here's a small handful of press hits so far:

Arkansas: Fox CBS Arkansas News Bureau

Delaware: Talk radio

Tennessee: Nashville Business Journal Nashville Public Radio

Nevada: Fox

Michigan: NBC ABC

Ohio: ABC

Oregon: CBS

Seek and Destroy

Here's why Find and Replace is a dangerous Microsoft Word function when you are trying to release a report to the press on a very tight deadline:

Last I checked, Obama is not the President of the United NewJerseys.

Why It Matters

Jay Newton-Small wrote an article for Time today about Eric Cantor and claimed one of "the large areas of agreement on upcoming legislation between Dems and Republicans" is "the expansion of employer-provided health care insurance rather than single payer government health care."

That prompted me to send her the following email:

Hey Jay -

So I caught this line in your Cantor write:

“the expansion of employer-provided health care insurance rather than single payer government health care”

Single-payer government health care is actually NOT the opposing view. President Obama has stated very clearly - and 73% of voters support – everyone having the CHOICE of keeping private insurance or joining a new public health insurance plan.

It’s actually problematic to say that the alternative to more private insurance is government health care. The alternative to the status quo – or more private insurance - is a public health insurance plan option that would help control costs, ensure quality, and finally force private insurers to compete - not a single-payer, government-run health care system.

Please feel free to call or email me if you have questions. But I just wanted to make sure to bring this to your attention now and for future reference.

Thanks!

Jacki

Her response was that she was saying Cantor and Obama agree that "neither want[sic] a single payer plan." I couldn't let it go so I wrote back:

I hear ya. It’s just that Obama doesn’t want the expansion of private insurance versus single payer.

There’s another alternative – the actual Obama plan - and it’s not in line with what Republicans want.

Just because they both don’t want a single-payer plan doesn’t mean they agree on what they DO want. It’s going to be an especially important detail as the health care convo heats up.

-Jacki

Her response (paraphrased): Stop nitpicking. You'll just frustrate yourself.

Did I mention I'm not good at letting it go? Me again:

Not nitpicking. Clarifying. If the last go-around (‘93/’94) taught us anything, it’s that frame and counter-frame actually matter a lot.

...And you better believe Republicans are already planning to stick Obama’s plan with the “government-run health care” label – even though it’s not. They already came out swinging against Health IT and CER – and pretty much everyone rational knows those are both really good things.

Then as if on cue, this turns up from Politico:

Forget change: GOP eyes retro strategy

The write points out this isn't the same political environment as 1994, and Obama's facing better starting odds than Clinton did, but it also reminds us the Republican party's themes are to "unite against Democrats’ economic policy, block and counter health care reform and tar them with spending scandals." Plus, there's this:

Republicans are banking on the more liberal House to push the health care legislation even further from the center, making it unpalatable to moderate Democrats as well as Republicans.

As he did years ago, Gingrich is urging his old colleagues to “come up with a positive solution that is inclusive of everybody and that is capable of being implemented and to try to do it in a bipartisan way.”

In the House, Boehner recently appointed a GOP health care task force to begin crafting a response to the Obama plan.

It's the first step to painting Obama and his allies as farther left then they really are. The sooner the media stops inadvertently arguing the right wing case with inaccurate juxtapositions, the better.

And if that means I have to "nitpick" to make it happen, then so be it. This is too important to let slide, roll down hill, pick up speed, and tumble out of control.

Enough Already

It's only the first award of Oscar night, and I'm already exhausted. What's with the weird mini-speeches recapping each nominee's role?

Thank goodness for the Interwebs. I'll catch the highlights online in snippets tomorrow.

Then again, at the rate this ceremony's going, it will still be live tomorrow.

Like Right Out Of A Movie

I went to the movies for the first time in a long time last night, and as we were waiting for The Wrestler to start, one of my friends turned to me and said, "My mom's crazy. She said be careful because three people have passed out watching this film. She's nuts."

I didn't know much about the plot going in, but we both laughed thinking that was highly unlikely.

Then sure enough, about 30 minutes into our screening, someone in the rear of the theater started to yell, "Someone call a doctor! Call 911!" There was a commotion, and it was hard to tell what was going on, but once the lights came up you could make out a small crowd tending to a very pale man. We guessed he'd passed out.

That's when the second - and stranger - thing happened. Another friend leaned over and said, "Oh wow. That's Rahm."

And it was. Rahm Emanuel was one of several people who came to the man's rescue.

We waited a while with the movie off and the lights on - watching Rahm and co - until the paramedics showed up. They got the sick guy up and walking so I'm guessing he's going to be alright.

As for my friend...she's totally calling her mom tomorrow to apologize.

Serial Killer

We are having a very important debate in the office this morning. My boss is trying to kill the serial comma. Several of us have come out in defense of its survival. According to the uber-professional Rules for Comma Usage (aka the first result that pops up when you Google "comma rules"):

Use a comma to separate the elements in a series (three or more things), including the last two. "He hit the ball, dropped the bat, and ran to first base." You may have learned that the comma before the "and" is unnecessary, which is fine if you're in control of things. However, there are situations in which, if you don't use this comma (especially when the list is complex or lengthy), these last two items in the list will try to glom together (like macaroni and cheese). Using a comma between all the items in a series, including the last two, avoids this problem. This last comma—the one between the word "and" and the preceding word—is often called the serial comma or the Oxford comma. In newspaper writing, incidentally, you will seldom find a serial comma, but that is not necessarily a sign that it should be omitted in academic prose.

My boss is trying to argue the comma before the "and" is not only unnecessary but incorrect, and he's trying to shift the blame onto some elusive elementary educator named Mrs. Goldsmith.

Not only are we onto him, but we have a secret weapon.

Sister Marie.

See, she's the nun that taught me 12th grade English in 5th and 6th grade, and I'm not exaggerating when I say I haven't had to pick up a grammar book since.

Busy-ness

There's more than a little chatter out there on the health care front today. Late last night, Sebelius for HHS popped up in a couple of spots. NYT:

Gov. Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas, an early Obama ally with a record of working across party lines, is emerging as the president’s top choice for secretary of health and human services, advisers said Wednesday.

From Greg Sargent on next week's speech:

President Obama may make health care a theme of the big prime-time speech he’s making next Tuesday about the major challenges facing this country, Obama aides confirm to me.

This could be a big deal, particularly if Obama uses the high-visibility speech (which will be made before Congress) to press the case that health care reform is essential to righting our economy...

Ben Smith weighed in on OMB Director Peter Orszag and the budget:

Now Orszag is preparing for the biggest week of his career, with a "fiscal responsibility" summit Monday and the release of Obama's first budget Thursday. He's signaling that the moves in the stimulus package are just a hint of what's to come in a budget that will begin in earnest the arduous process of health care reform.

CAPAF released a report showing 14,000 Americans are losing health coverage daily:

The unemployment rate grew by 0.8 percentage points in December and January alone, implying that nearly 900,000 people became uninsured in these two months. That’s about 100,000 people a week, or 14,000 people a day. The rapid growth in the number of uninsured Americans will continue as long as the job market remains in a free fall.

The Talk Radio News Service covered the CAPAF report release:

The Center for American Progress Action Fund and Health Care for
America Now, held a teleconference to release new reports which
stated that health care is the biggest component of our economy and
it is necessary to restore the nation’s prosperity. “About 14,000 people lose health insurance everyday, and this is what we can expect as long as the job market remains in crisis,” said Judy Feder with the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Richard Kirsch, National Campaign Director for Health Care for America Now, said that the public shouldn’t be scared by the fear-marketing which the insurance industry and drug companies are using to protect their profits. “We’re quiet[sic] sure that the public will understand that they can’t continue to rely on private health insurance’s ability to charge them whatever they want and to raise premiums four times as much as wages and that they need the government to be a rule maker and offer them a choice for a public plan as an alternative for private
insurance,” Kirsch said.

And finally, Richard's got a new oped up on HuffPo. Here's a snippet:

President Obama's budget release will be the first formal step in the legislative dance that the President hopes will result in the passage of health care reform - including quality, affordable coverage for all - by the end of 2009. While opponents of reform will use every argument in their arsenal, one of the biggest obstacles will be Congressional reluctance to make any upfront investment that would add to the federal budget deficit in the short term.

However, leading economists and policy experts agree that the only way to bring health care costs under control is to make big, comprehensive changes. We need to shift the focus of our health care system from maximizing revenue for health care providers and insurers to maximizing the health status of Americans.

UPDATE: More CAPAF report coverage just popped up. From MSNBC:

STUDY: 14K LOSING H.C. INSURANCE A DAY
From NBC's Jade Taenzler

According to a report released today by the liberal Center for American Progress and also the group Health Care for America Now, 14,000 Americans are losing health-care insurance every day during this economic crisis...

(...)

Michael J. Wilson, legislative director for the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, sees the rising number of uninsured Americans impact other parts of the economy. “With 14,000 people losing health care every day, even people who still have health care are affected,” said Wilson. “If people are desperately saving their money to pay for health care, they will not be able to spend money on food or other goods, which adds to the recent turmoil in the market.”

Got Breakfast?

Not new online but timeless and a good morning mood setter. From a friend via Cute Overload:

Same Old Strategy

Howard Dean weighs in on the right wing attacks on CER and how they are all about Republicans putting politics before people. Via HuffPo:

This claptrap is really about the far right laying the ground work for a far greater and more sustained attack on the Democrats' attempt to fix our health care system. As we move forward with the American people to finally fulfill the promise of Harry Truman, who over sixty years ago suggested that every American ought to have a reasonable health care plan, we will rely on the voters to remind the right wing that change is what we promised, and change is what we will deliver.

Their opposition is about politics asure[sic] that the new administration and the Congress do not get a "win."

When Richard and I made the rounds talking to reporters at the start of the campaign, he always mentioned how Newt and his colleagues set out to stop health care reform in the 90s because it would be detrimental to the Republican party. Not that it would be good or bad for the people they represented. It would be bad for the Republican party to have a Democratic President succeed.

Unfortunately, Newt won that fight. We didn't get health care reform. And look where we are now.

So now would be an excellent time not to let that happen again.

Photo Finished

Via The White House website, the story of the economic recovery package in pictures.

Morning Breath

Strange bedfellow coalitions are never as attractive in the light of day as they were the night before. AP:

Labor unions and business groups have teamed up in a multimillion-dollar national lobbying campaign to pressure President Barack Obama and Congress for big changes in the nation's health care system. But as they get down to the specifics, their strange-bedfellows alliance is quietly at odds.

After spending two years and more than $20 million to promote the idea, collaborators in the Divided We Fail coalition — a project of the seniors lobby AARP, the service workers' union, and groups representing small business and the Fortune 500 — are indeed divided over key elements of how to fix health care.

Welcome Back

Miles has started his own blog.

I'm thrilled to see him using the Interwebs to put himself back out there and share his expertise.

Feel The Love

I have mixed feelings about Valentine's Day. Ok, that's a lie. I kind of think it's silly all around.

If you're in a relationship - a good relationship - then you don't need a designated day to tell your partner you love and appreciate him/her. And if you're single, you don't need a designated day to watch other people overreact to being paired up.

I think we'll spend ours going to a movie and consuming some food.

Anyway, since I slacked in the usual links yesterday, I'm making up for it now. The poem of the week is here, and John's column will be new tomorrow here.

Since it's a long weekend, I'm sure I'll be back to weigh in on something or other in the next few days. Until then, have a good one.

In Case You Missed It

Countdown dissects the McCaughey smear campaign:

I Don't Get It

Why partner with PhRMA?

Money?

Lest we forget:

SiCKO: Fourteen Congressional aides went to work for the industry; Billy Tauzin left Congress to become CEO of PhRMA for a $2 million annual salary.

See, e.g., The Medicare Drug War: An Army of Nearly 1,000 Lobbyists Pushes a Medicare Law that Puts Drug Company and HMO Profits Ahead of Patients and Taxpayers, Public Citizen Congress Watch, June 2004,
http://www.citizen.org/documents/Medicare_Drug_War%20_Report_2004.pdf

"Retiring Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La., who stepped down earlier this year as chairman of the House committee that regulates the pharmaceutical industry, will become the new president and CEO of the drug industry's top lobbying group…Public Citizen, a non-profit consumer advocacy group, called Tauzin's hiring 'yet another example of how public service is leading to private riches.' Tauzin gets a pay package reportedly worth at least $2 million a year, making him one of the highest-paid lobbyists in Washington." "Tauzin switches sides from drug industry overseer to lobbyist," USA Today, December 15, 2004.. http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/health/drugs/2004-12-
15-drugs-usat_x.htm

Lying Still

UPDATE: I'm giving this its own post because it's that good. Ezra's got an excellent write up about Betsy McCaughey and her history of disinformation:

McCaughey is simply lying, much as she did in 1990s. And, like in the 1990s, her lies are convenient, and they're being amplified by opportunistic rightwing outlets. But this isn't the 90s. And the thing about nostalgia tours is they never last very long, and they're never as effective as the original.

Read the whole thing. It's genius.

James Fallows is weighing in too:

Seriously, every one of McCaughey's statements about public policy from this day forward should be subjected to the "Oh yes, and how did it turn out last time?" test... Stop this new claim before it gets real traction.

And Jonathan Cohn's got even more:

As far as I'm concerned, McCaughey has forfeited her right to be taken seriously as a public intellectual, particularly on the issue of health care.

By the way, the other definitive demolition of McCaughey's aritcles was written by Mickey Kaus and, as it happens, also appeared in this magazine. You can now read Kaus's article here.

UPDATE II: One more and then I'm done for now. Ezra's put up a second post to explain comparative effectiveness, who's going to oppose it, and why:

Health care, we know, is too expensive, and it's too expensive in part because we pay for lots of treatments that don't work. But every dollar of medical waste if also a dollar of manufacturer profit. And they -- and their allies on the Right -- will work very hard to keep those dollars... [T]he lobbying attack against a higher-value, evidence-based system will come from industry. McCaughey and her anti-government hysteria is a sideshow here. The main opposition to a higher value, higher performing system will be the companies that stand to lose billions if we actually do cut down on waste and improper treatment.

In Previews

This is what's to come in the attack on health care reform:



Drudge linked to a "commentary" posted on Bloomberg that intentionally lied about what was in the economic recovery bill. The author knew no one had really read the bill so she slapped on her own "scary" interpretation and wrote a "scary" essay. Then Rush and Drudge amplified it, and next thing you know, seniors are calling Congress worried they're going to get screwed.

Let's be smarter than that this time around. Please.

Health IT means putting your records online in a secure, safe manner (like banking) so that all your medical history can be taken into account when you go to a new doctor and so that there are less errors when you receive treatment or medication. Can you read your doctor's handwriting? Me neither.

And comparative effectiveness means figuring out what works and what doesn't so we stop spending time and money on treatments that don't actually make you well and just drain you and the system of cash.

It's that simple. Don't let anyone make it more complicated - or scarier - than that.

Fixing the Economy Means Fixing Health Care

Obama today on health care reform (emphases mine):

QUESTION: Welcome to southwest Florida. In light of the fact that you’ve inherited an economic crisis, where does your priority lie with health care reform?

OBAMA: Well, it’s a great question.

And I think it is -- there are some people who are making the argument that, well, you can’t do anything about health care because the economy comes first. They don’t understand that health care is the biggest component of our economy and, when it’s broken, that affects everything.

I mean, we’ve got a system right now where the average person has seen -- even if they’ve got health insurance, the average family has seen their premiums double over the last eight years. Folks are paying twice as much. Co-payments have gotten higher; deductibles have gotten higher. And now, with people losing their jobs, they’re also losing their health care.

Businesses are also less competitive because of the fact that, here in the United States, we spend more than anybody else does. Any other nation on Earth per capita we spend more on health care, but we don’t get better results, and companies are paying for that.

So when they’re competing against -- you know, if a U.S. carmaker is competing against a foreign carmaker, they’ve got all these extra health care costs that they’ve got to deal with.

And, finally, Medicare and Medicare -- or Medicare and Medicaid are draining state budgets and federal budgets in a way that’s unsustainable over the long term. So health care has to be part of the solution.

Now, in the recovery package, there are a couple of things that we do immediately. Number one, we’re providing some help to Governor Crist and the state, because now they are getting more Medicaid claims and we’ve got to make sure that they can just meet the basic needs of citizens here in Florida.

Number two is, what we have in this bill is a mechanism so that we will subsidize people to keep their health care even if they lose their job. How many people here know what COBRA is?

All right, now, COBRA is the law that says that, if you lose your job, you can keep your health care and you go through COBRA. Here’s the only problem: If you’ve lost your job, who can afford $1,000 a month or $1,200 a month for health care? You can’t afford it.

(APPLAUSE) So part of this plan says we will subsidize a significant portion of what your health insurance costs so that you can actually afford to keep your health care. That’s number two.

Number three -- and this is an example of using a crisis and converting it into an opportunity. One of the problems with our health care system, it is so inefficient, you go into the hospital, and what’s the first thing you’ve got to do? You’ve got to -- even if you’ve got insurance, what do you have to do? You’ve got to fill out so many forms, and there’s paperwork, and there’s this, there’s that.

Then you go and you get your examination, and they’ve got a clipboard with all this paper on it. And then the doctor’s writing out something and the nurse can’t read it.

And, you know, the fact is, is that it causes huge amounts of medical errors. We’ve got all this bureaucracy. One of the simplest, most effective things that we could do is to convert from a paper system to an electronic data system.

Now, think about it. Health care’s the only area where we still use paper. I mean, the banks, that’s all computerized. So if you’ve got a credit card, that’s all on a computer so they can find you any time you don’t make a payment, and that computer’s calculating every dime of interest you’ve got to pay and -- right? It’s all very efficient.

But when it comes to health care, it’s a disaster. So what we did is -- in this plan, in the House bill that -- that passed, one of the things that we do is we say we are going to computerize our health care system, institute health I.T. That creates jobs right now for people to convert from a paper system to a computer system, but it also pays a long-term dividend by making the health care system more efficient.

So, now, those are things that we’re doing immediately. We are also then -- got to deal with the long-term problem of both cost and coverage. You’ve got over 45 million people who don’t have health insurance and people who do have health insurance are seeing their costs rise too fast.

OBAMA: And so, in addition to -- to computerizing the health care system, we’ve got to emphasize prevention. We’ve got to make sure that people have regular checkups.

We made a down payment on it this week -- and I did it, by the way, with the help of a lot of these members of Congress -- by passing a new SCHIP -- that’s the children’s health insurance bill -- that provides millions of children, who didn’t have health insurance, health insurance.

(APPLAUSE)

My hope is, over the course of the year, I’m going to be able to work with Congress to move forward a bill that gets us on track to every single person in America being able to get affordable, decent health care coverage.

We are a wealthy enough country to do it, and that’s going to be one of my top priorities as president of the United States.

Keep Him Out of DC and Health Care Reform

"Anybody who's got some real scars and experience is going to have their detractors," the governor said Monday in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. "People at the White House are smart enough to be able to assess that." And he took a swipe at his opponents, saying that "advocacy groups don't matter nearly as much as the pharmaceutical groups, the hospitals, the doctors' groups. There's a lot of very powerful interest groups that will play in this thing."

- TN Governor Phil Bredesen - who has taken hundreds of thousands of dollars in contributions from these very powerful interest groups - as quoted by the WSJ today

UPDATE: In case you're still unclear as to why Bredesen is dangerous, Ezra explains.

Paying It Forward

Our friends at PSA made a new video:

Snow Job

While we wait and see what emerges from the Senate and falls into conference re: economic recovery, here's a little reminder of the bullet we dodged back in November. Chris Kelly on Todd Palin's uncanny snow machine riding prowess:

While you read this, Alaska's First Dude, Todd Palin, is riding a snowmobile -- I'm sorry, snow machine -- 1971 miles from Big Lake to Fairbanks. In the course of performing this awesome feat, his Arctic Cat's powerful two-stroke engine will emit the same amount of hydrocarbons as an automobile driving from Chicago to San Francisco and back 150 times.

A small price for the rest of us to pay to honor the indomitability of the human spirit and one man's ability to sit and hold on.

It's not just a blaze of glory and aromatic hydrocarbon. A conventional two-stroke engine emits as much as a quarter of its fuel unburned, directly into the air. This week, as a participant in the Iron Dog™ snow machine race, Todd Palin will release as many cancer-causing and smog-forming pollutants as a Chevy Malibu driven around the Earth at its equator 28 times.

Seems like a lot of work, just to get away from Sarah Palin.

But Todd's not just doing it because he hates his home life and likes things that make loud noises and emit benzene. He does it because it's there. And for hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and gifts from corporations who do business with the Governor's office.

For riding a snowmobile.

Something you could train a bear to do.

The Emperor Nero used to clean up at the Olympic games. It was eerie. He won everything. According to Suetonius, he once won a chariot race despite falling off and not finishing the course. That's how good he was. He also never wore the same clothes twice. So he would have fit right in with the Palins there also.

I'm not insinuating anything. I'm just saying.

The total purse value of this year's Iron Dog™ is $159,050. The sponsors include the petroleum giants Tesoro and Conoco-Phillips; State Farm, Wells Fargo, Frontier Airlines, Alaska Airlines and the Alaska First National Bank.

The Iron Dog™ has fewer than 40 entrants a year, and one of them is always Todd.

Does this smell? I'm probably the wrong person to ask. I hate the cold and I think motor sports is an oxymoron. But he is Alaska's First Lady, and Tesoro is an oil company.

Let's say this was Louisiana in the '30s. If Texaco sponsored a pancake-eating contest, and Huey Long's wife kept winning it, there would have been talk.

To be fair, Todd can't win the whole purse. There are lots of little door prizes just for rookies and women and steak dinners for Cutest Hat. Just like in Jack London days.

And, to be fair, Todd doesn't always walk away from the camping trip with the hundred grand first prize. He's only won four times.

Once after Sarah was elected to the Wasilla City Council, once after she was elected mayor, the year she was appointed to the Alaska Oil and Gas Commission, and the year she was elected governor.

Just Say No

I just finished up a quick phone interview with an NBC affiliate in TN. There's a lot of buzz about the possibility of their governor - Phil Bredesen - being considered as Daschle's replacement as the HHS nominee.

Here is the statement we made yesterday when reporters asked what we thought of the possibility:

“A lot of elected officials are in bed with the insurance industry, but Phil Bredesen doesn’t stop there. He let them pay to redecorate his mansion. We can’t think of anyone more wrong for health care reform or more wrong for America. This is a guy whose single greatest health care achievement is stripping 200,000 people of health care coverage in Tennessee – a move that was not only bad policy but an unconscionable act.”

You can read a little more about Bredesen's despicable health care record here.

Meanwhile, Politico, Bloomberg, and the AP all picked up our reaction to Bredesen. That's how I keep getting calls from the local media. It's also why I keep checking to see how others are reacting, including Bredesen himself who said this:

[H]e said that “whatever happens in the end, I don’t think it (their criticisms) will be terribly meaningful. I think there’s also lots of other groups, professional health care groups and the like, who are very admiring of what we did with TennCare. And I think ultimately, if it were to be an issue their views would carry more weight.”

Did you catch that? The health insurance companies and folks like them ADMIRE what he did with TennCare. These are the people he thinks knows will back him in the health care reform fight. You know who else backs Bredesen? Dr. "I can diagnose a woman via video tape" Frist:

But former U.S. Senate majority leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., defended both Gov. Bredesen and Rep. Cooper, saying he has “tremendous respect for Gov. Bredesen.”

Dr. Frist, a physician, cited the gubernatorial experience of Gov. Bredesen and alluded to his management and administrative experience as a former HMO entrepreneur.

We've let HMO entrepreneurs and other private insurance corporate interests steer health care in this country for too long.

Let's all say, No More!

Last Call

I'm getting ready to officially welcome in the weekend which will consist of comfy clothes, a cold beverage in a glass with a stem, and sleep - not necessarily in that order.

But before I depart, I leave you with the gift of links. One for the poem of the week which has not been updated yet but will probably be soon, and another for John's Sunday column which you will definitely want to read. It's an interesting take on law enforcement.

Have a great weekend.

UPDATE: I've just been informed the poem of the week has been updated. As usual, the editor's pretty funny.

Love In The Afternoon

It's so hard to find true love. When two people do, it's a real gift. Via Joe, Courage Campaign's got a new video everyone should watch:

There IS A Better Way

From CBS Evening News tonight:

Whether snowshoeing or hiking in the New Hampshire woods, [Keith] Blessington always felt great. Then he was laid off. And just as his health care benefits were about to run out, he was diagnosed with stomach cancer.

"They said, 'Well we can't insure you, it's as simple as that,'" Blessington said.

Blessington did find coverage - for double what he had been paying.

Insurance covered most of his medical bills, which totaled more than $200,000. But he still ended up more than $70,000 in debt, and no longer able to afford the home he shares with his ailing mother.

(...)

"I'm afraid I'll die," said Denise Prosser. The 39-year-old can no longer afford to treat her thyroid cancer, since her husband lost his job and health insurance.

She doesn't qualify for Medicare ("not disabled enough") or Medicaid (her husband makes too much in unemployment). She's not sick enough for the emergency room - yet.

The Prossers are scrambling to find charitable care.

You know what the answer is for these people?

The choice of a public health insurance plan.

CBS won't let me embed the video so you have to go to their website to see it. But the whole time I was watching Dr. Jon LaPook's report I was thinking, this is why we need comprehensive heath care reform with the choice of a public health insurance plan. This is why everyone should be signing on with HCAN and helping us help Obama win this fight. It's about having a guarantee of quality, affordable health care we all can count on. It's about having coverage when you need it most no matter what.

Evasion of Privacy

Quite the spin the health insurance lobby's got on this one:

Proposals within the economic stimulus bill to expand HIPAA privacy rule provisions would have unintended consequences that could impede progress in using health information technology, according to Karen Ignagni, president and CEO of America's Health Insurance Plans in Washington.

(...)

The potential in the bill to require patient consent before use of any information would adversely affect disease management programs, result in incomplete medical records and impede emergency care, she added.

Requiring covered entities to account for all disclosures of personal health information would discourage use of electronic health records systems because all disclosures of electronic data would have to be documented, Ignagni contended.

Further, giving state attorneys general the authority to enforce the privacy rule "creates a 50-state approach to interpreting federal law," she said.

AHIP: Your health care is not really about you.

Seriously. Don't you want to have to give your consent before anyone shares your medical information? Don't you want to know every single time your medical information changes hands for any reason whatsoever? I know I do.

Intense

First off, there's content in here that's neither suitable for work nor for underage eyes/ears. Consider yourself forewarned.

Second, my friend Cal is in here a couple of times, and since he passed away last summer, not a day has gone by that I haven't thought of him and all he accomplished and still had left to achieve in this world and the world of art and Internet exploration. It's good to see his smiling face again but also a little sad.

Finally, an old friend sent me the link because we both worked at Pseudo and knew what this was really all about. It was years ahead of its time, and nothing I've seen come out of the current world of online innovation captures or even comes close to replicating the spirit of Pseudo. "We Live In Public" was a whole other animal, and I only know what I know from the gossip I heard through the NYC grapevine. But Josh was onto something. There's no denying that. Take a look:



One last note. The director of this movie grew up three doors down from me in Miami and graduated a year ahead of me in high school. It's a small small teeny little world.

It's Too Easy

CNN: Asking all the right questions.

McCain Fail

Then:

"The issue of economics is not something I’ve understood as well as I should." - John McCain, 12/18/07

Now:

Ugh

Daschle's withdrawn his nomination:

He said he's withdrawing because he's not a leader who has the full faith of Congress and will be a distraction.

Crap.

UPDATE: Rumor coming from some inside news circles is that today's NYT editorial had something to do with Daschle's decision:

Mr. Daschle is another in a long line of politicians who move cozily between government and industry. We don’t know that his industry ties would influence his judgments on health issues, but they could potentially throw a cloud over health care reform. Mr. Daschle could clear the atmosphere by withdrawing his name.

I'd be disinclined to give any write such credit, but hey, you never know.

UPDATE: I stand corrected. According to HuffPo:

Moments after the news was announced, Andrea Mitchell of NBC News said she had just spoken to Daschle, who told her, "I read the New York Times this morning and I realized that I can't pass health care if I am too much of a distraction ... I called the president this morning." Mitchell described the call as emotional, and said Daschle was near tears.

Conflicts of Interest

My personal opinion on the Daschle situation is not appropriate to post at this point.

However, I do feel comfortable saying that I would very much like to see what he said to AHIP and other health care groups in those speeches:

In addition to his work as an adviser to a Washington law firm and as chairman of the board for a private equity firm, Daschle has been paid $195,000 to give speeches to health care industry groups -- the very sector President Obama has designated him to overhaul.