Portland Needs Leaders to Take-On Police

Below are a couple videos I meant to post months ago. I was at both scenes, beginning with Rev. Jesse Jackson's appearance in response to the police killing of Aaron Campbell, the unarmed black man shot in the back by Portland police.

Jackson said in his speech that night that if Officer Frashour, the cop who shot him, went back to duty on the streets the next day as he was planned to do, that we would march at high noon. And that's exactly what we did. Not only that but we stormed city hall with two hundred people and did it orderly and peaceful. The crowd shouted down the mayor, of course.

Since this incident, Portland police killed another mentally distraught homeless man and local anarchist tried to spark riots. More to come later on the ongoing civil rights struggle in Portland, Oregon against police brutality.

I mention this now because Portland has a city council election at hand and this would be the perfect time to replace inept leadership. For more on the issue visit the Albina Ministerial Alliance on Facebook.

What Everyone's Missing About Arizona's Immigration Bill

With all the media attention into the racist and facsist law recently passed by the Arizona legislature, which requires police to enforce immigration law, it's astounding how few journalists have written about the serious public safety concerns this law should raise.

After all, it was only a year ago when the East Valley Tribune -- a paper I formely interned at in college by the way -- won a pulitzer prize for reporting on the effects of Sherriff Joe Arpaio's focus on immigration.

The paper showed 911 response times rose dramatically, tensions rose and the police were neglecting to prosecute a series of crimes that were way more dangerous to the community than illegal immigration.

It only takes common sense to know that if police are enforcing immigration violations for anyone they come into contact with, this is going to seriously impair community policing. Victims will no longer report crimes, witness will be afraid to come forward and lawlessness against undocumented immigrants will increase leading to further crime in our communities.

For those who support this law, ask yourself whether put in the position of needing important testimony from an undocument immigrant -- say if you're daughter was murdered and a hardworking gardener happened to see it while he was mowing your lawn -- and he refused to testify because he would be deported. Would you still think this was a good idea?

BP CEO Lying About Safety Measures

BP CEO Tony Hayward is clearly lying to the press when told NBC, "What has failed here is the ultimate safety device on a drilling rig. There are many barriers of protection that you have to go to before you get to this. It isn't designed to not fail."

Clearly and reported widely now, the oil rig that has now created the worst environmental disaster in our nation's history lacked an acoustic shutoff switch. This WSJ story details how Norway and Brazil require the devices, but US regulators do not.

Portland PD Struggle to Take Down 12-year-old

Here in the progressive haven that's Portland, Oregon we have a growing disturbance in our community coming from our local police departments. The latest involves Officer Christopher Humphreys, one of the officers who contributed to the death of homeless man James Chasse who died in 2006 from blunt force trauma by Portland police officers who suspected him of peeing on a tree.

In this latest case, Humphreys and two other burly tough officers can't control a 12-year-old girl. I don't normally do this, but I'm going to turn it now to FOX 12, our local affiliate, for the video surveillance and a rundown of the case.

Although 60 percent of respondents to the network's poll say the force is warranted, I think these people must either be blinded or the poll is skewed by the police union, which for some mysterious reason think it's in their best interest to support an out-of-control officer. The only conclusion to make is that the whole department is out of control. Chief Rosie Sizer wants to slap these guys on the wrist.

Watch for yourself how the officers are itching to use their new beanbag toys. Why are they carrying beanbag guns on a MAX platform anyway? And see how buff they are, but can't restrain a GIRL! See how they pick her up off the ground then throw her back to the ground to her knees, then her chest, much the same way probably that James Chasse died. And all this girl did was ride the MAX when she wasn't supposed to.

This Officer Humphreys needs to lose his badge.

Kucinich to Congress: Is this the best we can do?

This occurred yesterday, October 29, on the floor of the House. I really like his final take at the end there for emphasis. Kind of reminds me of his flourish at the DNC last year with his stunner Wake Up America! And I swear he had the same energy at a small rally I reported on KBOO in front of the White House a few weeks ago.

Healthcare Compromise Bills Exclude Free Choice

Sen. Harry Reid and House Speaker Pelosi made thousands of headlines this week when they announced that their respective health reform bills would include a public option.

But equally newsworthy, which has garnered very little press, is that under both the House and Senate versions of the bill, roughly 90 percent of Americans won’t have the option of buying into the so-called public option.

So what if polls consistently show the majority of Americans want a public option, as Reid indicated in his press conference yesterday? The majority of Americans won’t get it. Neither will they have the choice, which Democrats talk so much about lately, to choose their own health plan just like the choice members of Congress and all federal employees have.

Under the most liberal analysis by the Congressional Budget Office over HR 3200, the health insurance exchange – of which the public option would be available – would cover 30 million people by 2019 compared to 164 million that would still be covered by their employer with no choice at all.

The new House version cuts the number likely headed to the exchange to 21 million.

That’s because the bills only open the health insurance exchange and the public option to individuals or those in small employer groups and phasing in up groups up to 100 people in the third year under the House proposal.

A recent article in The Hill sites the business-led Committee for Economic Development, that supports Sen. Ron Wyden's Free Choice Amendment, which would truly expand choice. But the more powerful American Benefits Council opposed it in a widely circulated letter to members of Congress and Sen. Max Baucus nixed the idea in committee. It may be that Wyden introduces the amendment on the Senate floor.

Wyden, who's become the most vocal proponent of opening the exchange to every American, had this to say yesterday in an official statement:

“I agree with Senator Reid that health reform should give Americans more options. Now, I want to work with him to ensure that all Americans can choose those options. The bottom line is that the public option can’t really hold private insurers accountable if it is only competing for 10 percent of the insurance market, because private insurance companies aren’t going to change their business practices if 90 percent of their customers can’t take their business elsewhere. Real reform means empowering Americans to choose insurance that works well for them and their family, while rejecting plans that don’t. Including a public option is a step in the right direction, now let’s remove the firewalls in this bill that prevent Americans from choosing it.”

So despite the symbolic nod from Sen. Max Baucus, his Free Choice Amendment hasn’t made it into the bill.

Watch Sen. Wyden on MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow show below:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and t-decoration:none !important; border-bottom: 1px dotted #999 !important; font-weight:normal !important; height: 13px; color:#5799DB !important;">News about the Economy

Protect Insurance Executives...Really

Protect Insurance Companies PSA from Will Ferrell

Extent of Massive Afghan Election Fraud by Karzai Barely Explained in MSM

The mainstream media, backed by a United Nations panel, just in the past few days began getting around to reporting on massive fraud in the Afghan elections on August 20.

I've heard numerous reports such as this one at Reuters about the UN Panel annulling ballots in several districts and conducting a recount. But hardly any are reporting the full extent of the fraud detailed by the New York Times several days ago.

First on the scene, just five days after the election, Democracy Now! was about the only outlet I could find with a detailed description of allegations, many of which were caught on videotape, by President Hamid Karzai's main opponent Abdullah Abdullah.

Most press reports continued stories claiming fraud was committed on both sides.

Then came the New York Times with a bombshell that just about every other mainstream news outlet is missing: As many as 800 fake polling sites existed only on paper and another 800 were likely taken over by President Karzai's supporters. Roughly 325,000 ballots were fraudulently filled out and submitted in Kandahar Province where just 25,000 people are said to have voted.

Can you imagine what effort it would take to fill out hundreds of thousands of ballots? That's definitely a lot more effort than clicking a button on a computer that's possible in the US. My guess is that if Rove and company had to tediously fill out a million ballots to steel the 2004 election, there's no way Bush would have won reelection.

Here's more from the NY Times. Kudos to Dexter Filkins, a journalist I've admired since his reporting early on in the Iraq war, unembedded with US troops.

By DEXTER FILKINS and CARLOTTA GALL

KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghans loyal to President Hamid Karzai set up hundreds of fictitious polling sites where no one voted but where hundreds of thousands of ballots were still recorded toward the president’s re-election, according to senior Western and Afghan officials here.

The fake sites, as many as 800, existed only on paper, said a senior Western diplomat in Afghanistan, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the political delicacy of the vote. Local workers reported that hundreds, and in some cases thousands, of votes for Mr. Karzai in the election last month came from each of those places. That pattern was confirmed by another Western official based in Afghanistan.

“We think that about 15 percent of the polling sites never opened on Election Day,” the senior Western diplomat said. “But they still managed to report thousands of ballots for Karzai.”

Besides creating the fake sites, Mr. Karzai’s supporters also took over approximately 800 legitimate polling centers and used them to fraudulently report tens of thousands of additional ballots for Mr. Karzai, the officials said.

The result, the officials said, is that in some provinces, the pro-Karzai ballots may exceed the people who actually voted by a factor of 10. “We are talking about orders of magnitude,” the senior Western diplomat said.

Read more at NY Times >>

Obama Throws Good Taxpayer Money After Bad; Just Like He Said He Wouldn't

Chalk another one up on the list of Obama rhetoric that sounds nice, but doesn't turn out to be, well, truthful. Here's what he said in February in Phoenix, Arizona about the newly created homeowner assistance plan that aims to modify 4 million home loans.

But I want to be very clear about what this plan will not do. It will not rescue the unscrupulous or irresponsible by throwing good taxpayer money after bad loans. It will not help speculators—it will not help speculators who took risky bets on a rising market and bought homes, not to live in, but to sell. It will not help dishonest lenders who acted irresponsibly, distorting the facts—distorting the facts and dismissing the fine print at the expense of buyers who didn’t know better. And it will not reward folks who bought homes they knew from the beginning they would never be able to afford.

Funny thing: According to a new report by the Center for Public Integrity, these well meaning statements didn't exactly pan out on the truth meter.

According to the report, "The list of the top 10 recipients is like a walk down subprime memory lane. Here are the leading HAMP participants, with the amount of taxpayer-funded incentives they are slated to receive:"

Countrywide Home Loan Servicing (which doesn't even exist in its previous form) received $5.2 billion.

JP Morgan Chase $2.7 billion

Wells Fargo Bank, another defunct institution, nonetheless received $2.4 billion.

American Home Mortgage Servicing $1.3 billion

CitiMortgage$1.1 billion.

Watch this Democracy Now! report with an interview with one of the CPI researchers.

This from the Huffington Post:

Countrywide Financial, formerly considered the nation's largest subprime lender, thus far is eligible to receive about $5.2 billion, according to Treasury Department data. The firm originated at least $97.2 billion in high-interest loans from 2005 to 2007, CPI reports.

Other companies eligible include subsidiaries of AIG, Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch. At least $70 billion in taxpayer money has been committed to helping AIG, according to figures compiled by ProPublica, a nonprofit investigative news organization. Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy last September, and Merrill Lynch was bought Bank of America last year.

The payouts are part of the Obama Administration's Making Home Affordable program, a $75 billion effort to reduce mortgage payments for struggling borrowers by providing mortgage servicers, lenders and investors with taxpayer subsidies. The plan commits to helping three to four million homeowners avoid foreclosure, provided they meet certain conditions. As of July 31, less than 9 percent of eligible delinquent borrowers had been helped. The Administration has asked mortgage servicers to double the number of home mortgage modifications by Nov. 1.

Up to $50 billion of the program's funds comes from TARP; the rest is provided by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. To put that into context, since the financial crisis began the government has committed a total of more than $172 billion in bailout funds to AIG, Bank of America and Citigroup.

Earlier this year CPI, a nonprofit investigative news organization, analyzed federal home mortgage data and produced a list of the 25 financial firms that originated the most high-interest mortgages from 2005 to 2007. For various data-related reasons, those mortgages are not technically "subprime", though many researchers - including CPI - use high-cost mortgages as a proxy for calculating subprime figures.

Comparing that list to the one produced by the Treasury Department, CPI noted that of the top 25 participants in the Making Home Affordable program, "at least 21 were heavily involved in the subprime lending industry."

Adding insult to injury, 60 Minutes replayed a piece last night that details the obscure world of credit default swaps, largely responsible for the economic meltdown. Even while the country spiraled toward what looked to become the second great depression, certain hedge fund managers were getting rich off credit default swaps. The practice had been made illegal in 1907 for obvious reasons because it contributed to a stock market collapse in those early days on Wall Street. But when it was ushered in again in 2000, under the Clinton administration, these assholes had a field day.

Consider John Paulson, the 76th richest man in America, pictured above, who earned for his clients a 600 percent return on investment last year through his Paulson's Credit Opportunities Fund, while netting him personally $3.7 billion. Here's how he did it. And take a look at his mansion here. Check out a video of his testimony before in Congress in November and that of other hedge fund managers here.

Another is Bill Ackman, hedge fund manager of Pershing Square Capitol Management, who made hundreds of millions on subprime defaults. Check out his palacial estates in Velatie, New York. And watch the below interview with Charlie Rose where he explains credit default swaps. Keep in mind that before 2000, betting on credit defaults would have made Ackman a felon.

Health Care Charges Under the Knife

Originally at Miller-McCune.com
By David Rosenfeld

If you paid sticker price on the last new car you bought, you might expect to pay about 15 percent more than you would with some negotiating.

If you paid full price on a recent knee surgery, you could pay 500 percent more than market rate. And who knew you could even negotiate?

Such is the nature of health care pricing where charges are determined by hidden costs and who’s paying.

Facing the brunt of reform efforts in Congress, health insurance companies pointed the finger at doctors recently with a survey by America’s Health Insurance Plans, an industry trade group, which detailed a series of exorbitant physician charges. The survey examined out-of-network bills where — as opposed to in-network services — contracts do not exist between the provider and insurer. Also known as full-billed charges, it’s what the uninsured face every time they see a doctor.

In some cases, patients received charges 34 times what Medicare pays for the same procedure in the same location, the AHIP survey found.

For example, one doctor billed $4,500 for an office visit when Medicare would have paid just $134. Another doctor billed $14,400 for removal of a gallbladder when Medicare would have paid $656. And a hip replacement cost $40,000 when Medicare would have paid $1,558.

Out-of-network charges typically represent less than 10 percent of overall health care bills, said Dr. Jeffrey Rice, a former health insurance president who created the Web site Healthcarebluebook.com to help consumers determine average market rates.

“For historical reasons, providers make their billed charges really high because they expect to get paid a reduced amount,” Rice said. “You could even get a lower rate than in-network if you negotiate. But you have to do it on the front end and before you get treatment, because otherwise when you get a bill you’re legally obligated to pay, and they don’t have an obligation to reduce it.”

Read more at Miller-McCune.com

Billionaires For Wealthcare

Get the facts:

Factcheck.org

Established by the Annenberg Center for Public Policy, this is a key resource for anyone checking on claims made in the media or by politicians.

Kaiser Family Foundation

This page on Health Reform and its related Kaiser Health News offer detailed, non-partisan explanations of key concepts in the healthcare reform debate. See this excellent side by side comparisan of each reform bill drafted so far in Congress. Also see Kaiser's ad audit here to peruse the latest advertising on airwaves across America.

PolitiFact.org

Run by the St. Petersburg Times, the only non-profit newspaper in America, PolitiFact.org puts out this truth-o-meter and tracks Obama's campaign promises.

SickforProfit.com

This site, put out by Brave New Films, details executive compensation for the nation's largest insurers along with horror stories of claims they denied.

Bill Moyer's Journal

In a recent interview with former Cigna executive Wendell Potter, Bill Moyer's explores lobbying expenditures along with this useful internet resource.

Agression at Oregon Town Hall Mirrors National Debate

My first taste of the town hall meeting crowd that everyone's been talking about:

From my own reporting at TheLundReport.org with audio at KBOO.fm Portland's community radio 90.7 FM

August 11, 2009 -- Protesters outside the town hall meeting in McMinnville with Rep. David Wu on Monday (August 10) were not as aggressive as those in St. Louis or other cities where town halls turned violent.

But the clashes in this rural Oregon town between opponents and supporters of measures pushed by Democrats in Congress were extremely heated at times.

{For an audio version of this story that aired on KBOO radio 90.7 FM click here.}

More than 100 people packed the meeting room to pepper Wu with questions, but the action outside – where several hundred gathered – revealed far more about the tenor of civil discourse swirling across the country.

When this reporter first arrived, he found someone red in the face pointing his finger at another man with long gray hair and a beard, who was holding a “Health Care for All” sign.

“I think the Democratic Party needs to be called what it is: the Socialist Party,” said the man doing most of the yelling who declined to give his name.

Several hundred of those shut out of the meeting because of room constraints gathered outside the McMinnville Police Station where the meeting took place.

Opponents outnumbered supporters of Rep. Wu by about three to two. Health Care for America Now organized carpools from Beaverton to counter outreach efforts by Conservative Friends of Yamhill County. Both sides engaged in hand-to-hand verbal combat, mirroring the rancor of the national debate.

Opponents argued that the healthcare plan would cover undocumented immigrants, would lead to a government takeover and would increase taxes. Some claimed the plans in Congress would eliminate Medicare or force seniors to accept euthanasia.

Standing amongst this angry crowd, this reporter found Audrey Keeland, a McMinnville grandmother who came to support Rep. Wu.

“Everyone should be entitled to health insurance one way or other,” said Keeland, a Medicare recipient. “I’ll probably keep my plan. He [Obama]said you could keep it if you have a plan you like. My husband was sick for six years, and it cost us $300 above our insurance.”

Debbie Welyczko from Aloha also came to support Rep. Wu even though her husband opposed him in the primary last year. She likes Wu because he supports a public health plan option.

“It’s interesting talking to people out here and finding out what it’s all about for them, at least on the opposition side," Welyczko said. "There’s a lot of abortion issues and hatred toward Obama. I’m finding at least so far, they don’t want to know the truth. That’s how it seems."

Here’s an example of an exchange she had with a protester:

“Did you read page eight where it says it doesn’t matter if someone’s a dope addict? I’m going to go ahead and paraphrase it. Someone who eats like a pig and is a dope addict gets the same amount of healthcare coverage as I do. Why should I supplement some loser?”

“We’re here to show our opposition to Obama’s healthcare proposal,” said Dale Rath. "The spending is going to bankrupt the country.”

Rath believes half of the uninsured voluntarily go without insurance and the other half are undocumented immigrants. “I’m very much opposed to supporting anybody who’s in this country illegally,” he said.

At a town hall on Tuesday, Wu repeatedly told one heckler that none of the healthcare bills had any plans to cover undocumented immigrants.

Lyndon LaRouche supporters displayed a poster that portrayed President Obama as Hitler. Dylan Weaver, an 18-year-old from McMinnville took issue with the poster.

“I think it’s utterly sickening and second of all has no basis as well as just being completely inappropriate,” Weaver said. “Some people compared Obama to a socialist. Now we have a Nazi. The things that Hitler has represented in the world were so terrible that we cannot compare anyone almost to Hitler.”

For related stories click here.

For an audio version of this story that aired on KBOO radio 90.7 FM click here.

Take Action

Contact your representive and senator through an online tool by Onward Oregon.

For a continually updated list of upcoming town hall meetings including Sen. Wyden's on Friday in Seaside, click here.

For a good source of non-partisan summaries and explanations of major healthcare reform bills consider the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Americans Dying for Profit Makes Me Sick

I'll take a government bureaucrat any day over Stephen Hemsley, CEO of United Healthcare, who makes more than $3 million per year, now with three quarters of a billion dollars in stock options. United previous CEO Bill McGuire walked away with $1.6 billion in stock options just a few years ago. United is the nation's largest commercial health insurer, for-profit and publicly traded.

Town Hall Fights Show Right-Wing Brainwashing, Failure to Consider Facts

I went out of town for a few days -- turned off the radio, stopped using the internet and reading newspapers -- and I come back to see this:

Town Hall Meetings Turn Violent

And it wasn't for the victims of the thousands of people who die every year for lack of care. It wasn't from the millions who lost everything to pay their medical bills, had their entire life savings wiped away because of an illness. The anger and venom instead was coming from the anti-reformers.

I couldn't believe it. The brainwashed minority had flared up ruder, more aggressive than ever, sparking fights at town hall meetings and intense confrontations elsewhere.. and because people want to reform healthcare of all things. Where are they when thousands die from our broken healthcare system? They even shouted down the most conservative Democrats, hanging the leader of the Blue Dogs, Rep. Mike Ross, in effigy.

They got it all it wrong, I shouted. Ross and his gang are killing reform.

We've seen it before: Republicans who ignorantly support policies against their own interest. But this is something else. They're being fed an ultimate pack of lies and misinformation, incited primarily by Limbaugh, Hannity and Beck: the three morons. There are so many things wrong with their logic.

Number one: It's by no mean's a government takeover. Far from it, allowing insurers far too much freedom in my opinion.

Number two: If you like your health insurance, you can keep it. So sit down and shut up.

Number three: Do you want Americans to continue to die?

It's this month, that the true movement must begin. This is the change we voted for. But this now is the ultimate test, whether an industry that profits off the deaths of Americans (18,000 per year) will be confronted. That's why I'll be reporting for KBOO radio and TheLundReport.org from numerous town hall meetings this month throughout Oregon. And on September 29, I head for Washington DC for five days, straight into the heart of the beast.

Here's what I wrote yesterday at TheLundReport.org

August 7, 2009 -- In the first week of the August Congressional recess, right-wing conservative groups appear to have mobilized -- if not more people -- louder, more aggressive voices against healthcare reform than progressive groups in favor of a healthcare overhaul.

The battle played out in town hall meetings held by members of Congress throughout the country, including those in Oregon. Several erupted into violence including events in Florida and Missouri caught on video.

When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi held a town hall in Colorado, a child in a stroller held a sign that said No To Fascism. Meanwhile, Democrats face pressure from both sides.

In Oregon, Sen. Jeff Merkley got an earful from conservative constituents in Madras last weekend.

Sen. Ron Wyden, who's been dogged by progressives for refusing to strongly support a national public option, has yet to announce a schedule for town hall meetings.

A town hall in McMinnville with Rep. David Wu this coming Monday, Aug. 10, plans to be contentious. The group Conservative Friends of Yamhill County plans to mobilize more than 300 people, according to Oregonian columnist Jeff Mapes. Wu faced a rowdy crowd in Washington County two weeks ago.

Back in Washington D.C., White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel reportedly told progressive groups to stop running ads against Democrats. Such ads against Wyden, Sen. Max Baucus, and others in recent weeks attack Democrats for taking millions in campaign contributions from the healthcare industry and for their failure to support a national public health plan option.

Also at the White House, a key strategy meeting advised Democrats to punch back stronger against lies and distortions coming from the right.

And finally, just who’s behind these so-called grassroots protesters? Multiple reports, such as this one, indicate Conservatives for Patients Rights, the industry-backed anti-reform group led by former hospital executive Rick Scott is playing a major role. Incidentally, the same PR firm that formed the group, CRC Communications, also created the “swift boat attacks” against presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry in 2004.

Take Action

Join Health Care for America Now in carpooling to the Rep. David Wu town hall in McMinnville. They plan to meet at the Beaverton Transit center at 3:30 on Monday. For more information contact Betsy Dillner 971-634-0005 c: 503-702-2626 betsy@nwfco.org

For a full list of Sen. Merkley’s upcoming town hall meetings click here.

For a complete list of town hall meetings by Oregon’s Congressional delegation click here.

Stay tuned for Sen. Ron Wyden's town hall meeting announcement. Visit Wyden's Web site to find contact information.

For related stories on Sen. Wyden click here.

To see a list of advocacy groups with which you might want to join or stay in touch click here.

Tom the Dancing Bug

Courtesy Salon.com

Headzup on Public Option, Sen. Ben Nelson

Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Nebraska) has said he's against the public option flat out. Our own Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) will only go so far to say he's "very open" to the idea, but he won't support it. Instead, he wants optional state-based public plans with a trigger. For greater clarity see related coverage at MediaMethadone here.

Bank Bonuses Exceed Profits While Congress Throws Americans a Bone for Clunkers

Remember those huge record-breaking profits bailed out banks reported last quarter? Well... according to a recently released report by NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, those same banks dished out more in bonuses than they did in profits last year.

I ask you this: Are you freakin' kidding me?

From a synopsis by CBS News:

• Goldman Sachs, which earned $2.3 billion last year and received $10 billion in TARP funding, paid out $4.8 billion in bonuses in 2008 - more than double their net income.

• Morgan Stanley, which earned $1.7 billion last year and received $10 billion in bailout funds, handed out $4.475 billion in bonuses, nearly three times their net income.

• JPMorgan Chase, which earned $5.6 billion in 2008 and received $25 billion from the government, paid out $8.69 billion in bonus money.

• Citigroup and Merrill Lynch lost a combined $54 billion last year. They received a total of $55 billion in bailouts and paid out $9 billion in combined bonuses. ($5.33 billion for Citigroup; $3.6 billion for Merrill Lynch, which was subsequently acquired by Bank of America.)

While we gave $700 billion to bail out banks, Americans are still getting the shaft when it comes to asking their banks for a small bailout of their own. Here at MediaMethadone we've covered this before. A new report by the NY Times on Wednesday offers yet another account of the perverse incentives to work with homeowners to modify loans or refinance and avoid foreclosure.

On a related note, we've given more than $70 billion to bail out car companies, yet we tossed just $1 billion to boost auto sales. Americans are clambering for the Cash for Clunkers program, which offers up to $4,500 for trade-ins. In just four days, Americans went through $1 billion, with 200,000 people on a waiting list. Today the House authorized another $2 billion.

Even though the program sets low standards for fuel efficiency, it's still about the closest thing we've had to a consumer bailout. And rightly so.

Democrats Continue Cave In on Healthcare

Another day and more reports come out about Democrats caving to the healthcare industry in weakening the public health plan option. See my earlier post here.

At the rate this plan is headed for demise, we'll be more screwed than we are today. Without meaningful reform and a strong public option to give insurers real competition, we're giving the industry everything it wants. We might have less uninsured but we'll still be getting ripped off, maybe even worse, because we'll be forced to continue buying products from these leaches.

Check out the latest on negotiations with the Blue Dogs at Politico.com here.

And this one also at Politico on stalled negotiations in the Senate Finance Committee, where you can bet the argument isn't about strengthening the public option, but whether to have weaker state-based co-ops at all.

Makes you want to scream. They should listen to Sen. Lindsay Graham. Elections matter.

Blue Dogs, Gang of Six Concede to Industry; More Americans to Die

Today marks another milestone in the quest of Congressional Democrats to equivocate and concede on healthcare reform. Make no mistake about it: This is about Democrats caving to a healthcare industry that is literally killing Americans in order to profit.

Let's be clear: According to the Institute of Medicine, roughly 18,000 Americans die per year for lack of access to medical care. That's six times more than 9/11 and nearly four times as many soldiers killed in the war in Iraq, each and every year.

Two committees -- one in the House, the other in the Senate -- already passed versions of reform bills. Both have a public option, gaining support from progressives, though they favor the House bill in part because it taxes the wealthy to pay for subsidies.

But for some unexplained reason known only to the meager and weak-kneed Democrats among them, attention continues to fall on the Senate Finance Committee made up of the king equivocators and stonewalling sellouts. Chief among them is a group of six -- three centrist Democrats, three conservative Republicans -- from some of the least populated states in the country. Why on earth Democrats can't stick together and be bold after a landmark election I have no idea.

You may have seen last week how a group of centrists, the Huffington Post dubbed the Gang of Six (though different from the first) including Sen. Wyden of Oregon, sparked the whole "wait until after the recess" idea. Well today, the Post came out with another piece, this one on Blue Dog Democrats and how they've been bought and sold by big name healthcare dealers. Seven of these woof woof bow wows are holding up a bill in the House Energy and Commerce Committee, prompting MSNBC to write its a Blue Dog World. You'd think they slept through the Obama election.

To top it off, Baucus and party in Senate Finance indicated today they will release a bill absent a public option (despite a dozen polls showing 70 percent support here and here). Instead the bill calls for state-based co-ops, which industry favors. Then would you believe, after weeks of pressing for a public option, White House spokesman Jake Biggs waffled, suggesting the president didn't have a preference between a federal public option or state-based co-ops ruled by doctors. A preference? We've got a preference. It's public option NOW! Make your voices heard when Senators come home in August.

The Senate Finance version also doesn't have an employer mandate, but with an individual mandate. An employer mandate, if there's going to be a mandate to buy health insurance at all, was one of the key things protecting middle class workers worried they will lose their employer coverage. And it's another halmark of the insurance industry's demands.

Don't get me wrong, the bill still does a lot of good things -- such as ending rejections for pre-existing conditions -- but doesn't go nearly as far enough. The one shining light is a tax on health plans worth more than $25,000.

But by the way, none of the bills take on hospitals, drug companies and entrepreneurial doctors much beyond what they're own trade groups have pledged. And beyond what the health insurers have offered, they haven't gone after them much more either. (You may have noticed that during Obama's press conference last week, a sign read Health Insurance Reform, not Hospital Reform, or Drug Company Reform.)

Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight.com has a good piece on Baucus' fuzzy math and what, if anything, Senate Finance was possibly thinking with the bill it announced yesterday. Silver makes the point that this version is about the same as the original House bill, which cost $1 trillion, but only extended coverage to 16 million people. In contrast, the new House version costs the same and covers 37 million, though more burden would get placed on businesses. Whether that's okay is a fine debate to have, but it will invariably turn into the kind of tax debates we had between McCain and Obama where the other side just refuses to listen.

My only explanation for why these otherwise meaningless Democrats are choosing to hold up healthcare reform is this: Power and influence. Who ever heard of Ron Wyden meeting with the president? Who ever heard of Kent Conrad or Mike Ross or you name any of these Blue Pansies?

Nobody.

Until next time, here's some worthwhile reading.

A good story about proposed subsidies in the NY Times.

This NY Times magazine called Why We Must Ration Health Care, which gets to the point I've been making recently that more attention needs to be spent on cost, particularly over utilization fueled by greedy doctors, hospitals, drug companies and device makers.

This piece in the Wall Street Journal, The Myth of Prevention, gained resumed attention this week as well.

Virginia Health Expo Makes Case for Reform Undeniable

For all the wonk-talk over healthcare reform, nothing makes the case for change better than stories such as the one on NPR yesterday about Remote Area Medical and one of its Expeditions in Virginia.

I had heard of the group before from this 60 minutes piece, Lifeline with Scott Pelley, embedded below. Founded to provide medical care to third world nations, the group started setting up events in the United States 10 years ago to treat the uninsured and under-insured. And what they found wasn't much different than developing countries.

In Virginia this weekend, 2,700 people lined up at the county fairgrounds, some three days early, so they could see a doctor or a dentist.

This is the story we need to share with our friends and newspapers. This is the story our representatives need to hear because they are certainly hearing from the industry, having spent more than $3 billion last year on lobbying. The New York Times has a good rundown of the details of industry/GOP ad campaigns against health reform.

Take part in the grassroots ad campaign fueled by people power and call your Senator and Congressman today and write a letter to your local newspaper.

Also, don't miss Bill Moyers conversation with Wendell Potter, who presents one of the best, well spoken and easy to understand descriptions of how corporations have taken over our healthcare system.

To see what it's done to the people of our country listen to the audio and watch the video below. This is the United States of America. We can do better.




Watch CBS Videos Online

Sen. Wyden on Healthcare Sounding More Republican Everyday

When it comes to healthcare, our esteemed senior Senator Ron Wyden is sounding more and more like a Republican every day. Is that the same Ron Wyden who voted against the Iraq war authorization and who refused to support a funding bill without a time frame for withdrawal?

On Friday, Wyden signed onto a letter along with five other "centrist" Democrats -- including "Independent-I-mean-Republican" Joe Lieberman urging the president and other Congressional leaders to "slow down" on healthcare reform. Such an important task is moving too fast, they say.

In an article today on Huffington Post, Obama chief budget guru Peter Orszag says Republicans' attempts to slow down healthcare reform is an effort to kill the plan altogether. Could this be because the healthcare industrial complex is spending $1.4 million per day on lobbying, having hired 350 former government staffers including lawmakers such as former Democratic House Speaker Richard Gephardt? See which current Senators received the most healthcare lobby contributions here. According to OpenSecrets.org, Wyden has received more than $50,000 from Blue Cross Blue Shield in this current election cycle.

Wyden insists he wants to slow down for a day or two, not months or years. But really, the impetus here is that key provisions in Wyden's own plan -- The Healthy Americans Act -- are being blocked.

For one thing, Wyden does not support a federal public health plan option, that is, unless he absolutely has to. This, despite the fact that multiple recent polls showed vast support, roughly 70 percent -- for such an idea. But of course the media latched on to the one Rasmussen poll in recent days that showed waning support for the public option, clearly an outlier. Let alone another CBS/New York Times poll reported yesterday corroborated again the more than 70 percent figure.

Instead Wyden wants to rely on private insurers with a trigger for state-based public options, viewed as a weak alternative in the eyes of most reformers. Wyden also supports taxing employer-sponsored health plans, which isn't a bad idea as long as we have a protective individual health plan market, which we currently do not. The best idea and proudest moment for Democrats so far this year is a proposal by the House to raise taxes on the rich for healthcare.

The most infuriating position Wyden has taken recently is one again that echoes the Republican playbook when he told the Washington Post a few weeks ago that "people don't want the government in the driver's seat . . . They don't want the decisions (about their treatment) made in Capitol hearing rooms with a bunch of legislators in dark suits."

Do we instead want to continue having an insurance executive making those decisions behind closed doors without any recourse? I don't think so Mr. Wyden.

In the same interview, Wyden makes the case for bipartisan support. I just don't get this either. Where were Republicans looking for bipartisan support when they passed so many infuriating policies over the past eight years?

To be sure, any plan likely to pass Congress will include landmark reforms such as an end to individual rejections based on pre-existing conditions, but whether Democrats will establish a system where health insurance charges are based on income and not health status or age is still up in the air.

So far the plan has focused entirely on how to pay for a program to expand coverage. The Congressional Budget Office report was correct in their analysis that the plans do virtually nothing to control costs. Paying for prevention, chronic disease management and electronic health records, no matter how many times Obama claims it, just isn't enough.

The same was found of Massachusetts reform plan, now operational for several years, that even though it covered virtually everyone, people were still paying an arm and a leg. As I've said all along, what good is universal coverage if we don't control costs? That said, pessimistic journalists shouldn't be so quick to pound nails in the coffin of health reform.

One way to control costs would be to take on entrepreneurial doctors by ending the loopholes in physician self referral and anti-kickback laws, which I wrote about last week at Miller-McCune.com.

At the same time, Congress should order insurers and Medicare to stop paying for individual procedures, called fee-for-service and device a plan that pays fixed costs based on enrollment.

Huge Profits for Bailed Out Banks; Are you freakin' kidding me?

That rescued banks posted multibillion dollar profits in the second quarter this year wasn't nearly as much of an insult as the notion that the average salary for a Goldman Sachs employee topped $700,000.

The evidence has been vast that the supposed "trickle-down" affects of the $700 billion TARP bailout program isn't working to do anything for average Americans, those unemployed or struggling to make their home loan payments. Because we all know in our hearts that nothing trickles down but hardship.

The number of Americans poised to lose their homes rose 15 percent up to 1.5 million this year. Meanwhile, the Obama administration's attempts to encourage banks to modify more home loans has fallen flat with just 160,000 homeowners receiving trial modifications since the program began earlier this year, a senior Treasury official told Congress last week. The program aims to modify between 3 and 4 million loans in four years.

At the same time unemployment figures have barely started to taper off, which some have interpreted as good news.

So when the rescued banks reported a combined $13.6 billion profit in the second quarter alone, we were supposed to be happy for "our" economy? Our inevitable outrage we're told by some mainstream media apologists is supposedly misguided. We should be thankful to the banks, they say, because their renewed vigor is a good sign for our struggling economy, and anyway, they're not THAT well off.

Excuse me? Bank of America posted earnings of $3.22 billion for the second quarter, down from $3.41 billion in the period last year. Citigroup reported a $4.3 billion profit, reversing a loss during the comparable period last year of $2.5 billion. Goldman Sachs posted a $3.5 billion profit. And JP Morgan Chase $2.7 billion.

In the flood of disgust that justly followed, journalists such as those at the Associated Press and Washington Post editorial sought to apologize or explain away the bank's remarkable comeback. Some reminded readers that they lost $20.8 billion not long ago. True enough, but the bailout was supposed to help Americans, not just wealthy bankers who got us into this mess to begin with.

And those pesky credit cards banks offer to anybody with the hopes that they default are, believe it or not, weighing the banks down. Oh how sad. So it's empathy we should feel.

According to the AP:

That the banks managed to turn a profit at all is remarkable. Just 10 months ago, many of them looked to be on the verge of collapse. The stock market staged a huge rally this week, driven by the signs of health in banking.

I can't tell you how happy I am for them and all their stock holders. My sincerest congratulations.

China Uighur Repression Based on War on Terror

Here's a short documentary, about 20 minutes long, that provides the background to the conflict in Xinjiang regarding the Uighurs. China has used the War on Terror to repress these Islamic separatists.

For this Journeyman Pictures film click here.

Here's an account of the latest roundups -- about 160 have died.

Iran Protest Footage

The Week it Unravelled on Obama

When it's all said and done, when we look back at history to try and pinpoint when the tide turned on Obama, we should remember this week.

Sure he may have delivered a game-changing speech to the middle east today, but things are not going well.

It's this week when GM and Chrysler worked through bankruptcy, laying off thousands and defaulting on millions of debts after accepting billions in bailouts, all with the government's consent.

It's this week when the failures of the banking bailout became even clearer, when report after report tell of Americans unable to get anywhere with their banks while they're still getting gouged on credit cards and other collections.

And it's this week in healthcare we may remember as the week when Obama and the Democrats caved, refusing to stand up to an industry that's abused and destroyed our country for too long.

Not to mention Congress reauthorized the war in Afghanistan. See RethinkAfghanistan.com for how the U.S. is killing innocent civilians with errant bombs.

The underlying theme: Failure to stand up to industry. In each case, we're throwing good money after bad why refusing to get tough.

While auto companies are shedding dealerships faster than an Alpaca in a sweater factory, very few voices have questioned whether shutting thousands of dealerships is even necessary. Chrysler and GM insist they need to consolidate, but the dealerships represent very little of their responsibility.

Greg Remensperger, executive president of the oregon Auto Dealers Association, told the AP in an article yesterday said dealerships own the inventory after it's shipped from factories.

"Less competition between dealers only means that the surviving dealers will be able to charge more for vehicles," he said. "There will be no cost savings fro manufactuers. The big losers will be consumers."

On healthcare, reports are swirling that Democrats are considering not enacting a public health plan option unless certain "triggers" are met in the future, such as failures to control costs and bring down premiums. Excuse me? I'd say 47 million uninsured, half of all bankruptcies from health expenses and a failing economy on the backs of healthcare is a pretty big trigger.

According to press reports, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) who just recently luke-warmly supported the public health plan option at all, also supports this trigger idea. In another ominous twist in the healthcare debate, the top staffer for Sen. Max Baucus (D-Montana) has become a lobbyist for GE Healthcare. The company makes medical devices and electronic medical record software.

Even a jelly fish has more backbone.

Mortgage Meltdown Madness: The mess behind the financial crisis

Here's the fundamental question of our time: When banks should be doing anything to keep more people in their homes, why are they making it so difficult to do that? The answer is more complicated than Greed, but that's certainly getting warm.

Considering their multi-billion-dollar bailouts, you would think banks and their servicing agents would be happy to extend some of those tax dollars to the people who paid them.

But across America, journalists echo a similar story about what people actually have to go through to try and modify their mortgage and save their house. It's an absolute mess full of rip-off agents and bureaucratic nightmares.

In comes The Nation with the best account I've seen yet, called Mortgage Madness, with the most likely reason why it's so difficult to get a loan modified: It's not in the loan servicer's interest.

Loan agents, operating as private firms contracted by banks, get paid when they collect payments. Wasting time dealing with people's personal issues just isn't part of their bare bones operations they've been running for years. And banks don't offer them much incentive to do so despite federal incentives that the Obama administration offers banks. The Nation story documents well the harassment homeowners face and the utter incompetence among the mortgage industry.

I wrote about this in part at Miller-McCune.com in March, featuring Horatio Bernard in Baltimore, Maryland. Bernard found himself scammed by a home loan modification scheme and some shoddy communication skills by his local Chase Home Financing branch. The explanation I got at the time from a researcher was that the task to modify so many loans is just too great.

Later I put out a couple stories for KBOO radio in Portland, one about distressed homeowners at a home preservation event and the other about direct action at home foreclosure auctions at the county courthouse. One homeowner said how he had to destroy his credit in order to renogiate his mortgage. Another man told me about how difficult it was to reach a mortgage agent. In the piece on the auctions, I got a feel for the vultures in the back end of this whole process.

The overriding question remained: Why aren't banks and servicers easier to deal with at a time when saving a house is clearly a much better deal than going into foreclosure.

National Public Radio is doing a pretty good job documenting this story, both during its morning and evening news hours and through Chicago Public Radio's This American Life. This morning's story on trying to buy homes on short sales is another good example.

But this piece, Are there more foreclosures than necessary?, part of Planet Money, comes closest to addressing the question. His answer is this: Refinancing or dropping the principle of a loan reflects on the bank's balance sheets immediately, but foreclosure today won't reflect on the bottom line for another year. And banks are only concerned with the here and now.

Healthcare Lobby Turns on Obama, Mounts Attack

In the two weeks following a so-called landmark agreement that healthcare industry leaders would trim their own growth by 1.5 percent per year, industry lobby groups behind the scenes were mounting million-dollar advertising campaigns against key planks in the Obama plan, reports the Washington Post.

Hospitals and insurers came out just a few days after the White House photo op last week to say Obama had the story wrong. He overstated their agreement. They had not pledged steady cuts -- $2 trillion over 10 years, according to the New York Times.

Health care leaders who attended the meeting have a different interpretation. They say they agreed to slow health spending in a more gradual way and did not pledge specific year-by-year cuts.

“There’s been a lot of misunderstanding that has caused a lot of consternation among our members,” said Richard J. Umbdenstock, the president of the American Hospital Association. “I’ve spent the better part of the last three days trying to deal with it.” Read more >>

A week after the White House photo op, the Washington Post reported that Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina was planning ads in direct opposition to a public health plan option.

As part of what it calls an "informational website," the company has hired an outside PR company to make a series of videos sounding the alarm about a government-sponsored health insurance option, known as the public plan. Obama has consistently maintained that a government-run plan, absent high-paid executives and the need for profits, could be a more affordable option for Americans who have trouble purchasing private insurance. The industry argues that creating a public insurance program will undermine the marketplace and eventually lead to a single-payer style system.

In three 30-second videos, the insurer paints a picture of a future system in which patients wait months for appointments and can't choose their own doctors, according to storyboards of the videos obtained by the Washington Post. Read more >>

The ads resemble “Harry and Louise” type ads that helped defeat Hillary Clinton’s plan in the mid-90s. New York Times columnist Paul Krugman recalled what Obama said about such attacks during the campaign:

Back during the Democratic primary campaign, Mr. Obama argued that the Clintons had failed in their 1993 attempt to reform health care because they had been insufficiently inclusive. He promised instead to gather all the stakeholders, including the insurance companies, around a “big table.” And that May 11 event was, of course, intended precisely to show this big-table strategy in action.

But what if interest groups showed up at the big table, then blocked reform? Back then, Mr. Obama assured voters that he would get tough: “If those insurance companies and drug companies start trying to run ads with Harry and Louise, I’ll run my own ads as president. I’ll get on television and say ‘Harry and Louise are lying.’ ”

The question now is whether he really meant it. Read more >>

Healthcare Industry's Public Desperation

The healthcare industry must really be getting desperate now, digging down into the bottom of the barrell for concessions when millions are spent in opposition.

This weekend, industry leaders announced plans to cut the rate of cost growth by 1.5 percent per year, amounting to $2 trillion in savings over 10 years. Some compromise when insurance rates go up 15 percent per year.

It's all theoretical. Once again, the industry offers as a concession to stop screwing us over, just a little. "We'll stop overcharging you by 1 percent," they say. "Aren't you happy?"

Make no mistake about it. This is a desperate attempt to thwart any true reform. Here's a good piece of skeptical journalism from Robert Pear at the NY Times that appeared yesterday:

If history is a guide, their commitments may not produce the promised savings. Their proposals are vague — promising, for example, to reduce both “overuse and underuse of health care.” None of the proposals are enforceable, and none of the savings are guaranteed. Without such a guarantee, budget rules would normally prevent Congress from using the savings to pay for new initiatives to cover the uninsured. At this point, cost control is little more than a shared aspiration.

The piece goes on to describe past promises during the Carter and Clinton administrations of similar cost saving measures only to have past practices resume.

Henry J. Aaron, a health economist at the Brookings Institution, said that when he heard the industry’s promises on Monday, “I had a Rip van Winkle moment, as if I had fallen asleep in 1977 and woke up again this morning.”

Mr. Aaron served in the administration of President Jimmy Carter, whose proposal for hospital cost controls prompted the industry to undertake a short-lived “voluntary effort.”

After President Bill Clinton proposed an overhaul of the health care system in 1993 and 1994, the growth of health spending slowed, only to surge a few years later.

Today, while the healthcare industry says they can cut costs, they are also arguing not to reduce wasteful, over payments to Medicare Advantage plans. And they're spending millions of dollars to defeat healthcare reform. Doesn't that strike you as contradictory?

Wealthy healthcare industry leaders have enlisted swift-boaters CRC Public Relations to oppose Obama's health reform plan. CRC hired Rick Scott, a former hospital CEO with a history of fraud to head the newly formed Conservatives for Patients' Rights. Scott is spending $5 million of his own money and $15 million in donations, according to the Washington Post. The ads commonly bring up long lines and waiting lists in Britain and Canada, which really is nothing compared to the horrors we have going on in our country right now.

Conservatives for Patients' Rights spent about $600,000 a month on ads in March and April but is ratcheting up its buy for May to more than $1 million, CRC representatives said. Scott has also spent recent weeks meeting with lawmakers on Capitol Hill and addressing conservative groups in Washington, including the influential weekly breakfast organized by anti-tax activist Grover Norquist.

Meanwhile, Health Care for America Now! has about $600,000 all total to spend on media ads, some of which it spent this week calling out key Democrats such as Oregon Senator Ron Wyden.