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Bimonthly on election and health care reform. Unsubscribe instructions at the bottom.
eNewsletter #62
December 31, 2008
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In this issue:
1) Health Care
2) Campaign Reform
3) Asclepios
4) TCS on Farm Bill
5) Tidbits
6) Give me a Break!
7) Book Recommendations
8) Contact Information
9) Unsubscribe Instructions
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Health Care |
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Please answer our 10-point survey HERE Now vote for your favored "independent" presidential candidate HERE (from Unity08.com) Don't miss this video. It's the ugly side of Medicare Advantage. HERE California's Christmas Gift to the Big Insurers Christmas came one week early for California insurers Monday. In a present gift wrapped by the California Assembly with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger playing Santa, Assembly members passed a bill mislabeled as healthcare reform that will guarantee not health care but millions of new customers for the insurance industry, with California taxpayers paying the bill. Need more evidence. Look at the list of supporters. They include industry giants, Kaiser Permanente, Health Net, PacifiCare, Blue Shield, Cigna, and Molina Health Care -- all among the biggest and most profitable health plans in the state. It's not hard to see why they are on board. See the complete article HERE
Is Canadian health care right for Wisconsin? By Jack E. Lohman (Don't miss these links. They are all interesting) Depends on who you talk to. In a presentation at the Kaiser Foundation, Harvard professor Dr. David Himmelstein said “If you ask Americans what they want, 64 percent of us say we want national health insurance. If you ask Canadians… would they like a U.S. system, 3 percent would prefer it, which is [also] their illiteracy rate.” (This is a must-see video. Click on “Full version” and fast forward to 1 hr 45 min for his speech.) Could Canada do better? Absolutely. They have wait times for elective care, but according to Canadian James Clancy, president of the public employees union, they have none for urgent care. "And if Canada pulled one of every six people from our lines, as effectively occurs in the US, we’d not have wait times either." They could also eliminate their waits by increasing funding from 10% of GDP to 11% -- an increase of 10% -- and still be well under our 16% of GDP. And they cover 100% of Canadians versus our covering 85%.
But it isn’t working…. 85% of Canadians still support their own system (12% remain undecided). None of this matters unless you get sick. Or aren’t a jock and don’t play rough sports that put your body at risk. Or don’t have genetics that could create health problems. All of us are an accident or job loss away from being uninsured, and it doesn’t have to be that way. Canada isn’t perfect, and the Healthy Wisconsin proposal only mimics it’s structure. Not its lack of funding. In Canada, you go to the hospital or clinic and then you go home. You never stop at the cash register and you never get a bill. Your only burden is carrying a wallet-sized Medicare ID card. All Canadian hospitals are non-profit and receive a budget negotiated on the basis of their needs. They have no bad debt that must be cost-shifted because they get paid for all work. They have a billing department, but only for foreign patients. Canadian companies contribute $800 per employee per year and the taxpayers the rest. U.S. companies pay up to $6500 per year. Is it any surprise that the Big Three automakers now build more cars in Ontario than in Detroit? Is it any surprise that their dollar is now worth more than the American dollar, and their economy is growing and ours is in a downhill spiral? WE are heading in reverse! Instead of expanding Medicare, congressional Republicans want to bury it. They are currently fighting a bill the Democrats want to pass and Bush threatens to veto. The Dems want to stop the erosion of payments to physicians and to eliminate the 20% subsidy taxpayers are giving to “private Medicare HMOs” (of which 19% of seniors have opted for). Why do the R’s want to protect private Medicare providers? Because private companies can give campaign contributions and public entities can't. Every time we hear “privatization” of Medicare, Social Security or the army, translate that to a benefit for the industries that fund elections -- insurance, banking, Wall Street, and Halliburton -- and NOT for the benefit of taxpayers. So think about it. If the current regime succeeds in cutting Medicare payments to physicians by 50% over the next five years, as planned, physicians will quit taking Medicare patients, patients will be forced to join “private” Medicare, and the campaign contributions will continue to flow. And Medicare costs will go up by 20%. Bush calls that “dying on the vine,” I call it corruption and payola and every congressman is a part of it. |
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Campaign Reform |
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Check out this
investment opportunity: While you may
be familiar with stocks and bonds, currency speculation, IPOs
and all the rest, there's a new investment arena you should be
aware of: LEGISLATION. If a mutual
fund returns 20% a year, that's considered quite good, but in
the low-risk, high-return world of legislation, a 20% return is
positively lousy. There's no reason why your investment dollar
can't return 100,000% or more. Too good to be
true? Don't worry, it's completely legal. With the help of a
professional legislation broker (called a lobbyist), you place
your investment (called a Campaign Contribution) with a
carefully selected list of legislation manufacturers (called
Members of Congress). These manufacturers then go to work,
crafting industry-specific subsidies, inserting tax breaks into
the code, extending patents or giving away public property for
free. Just check out
these results. The Timber
Industry spent $8 million in campaign contributions to
preserve the logging road subsidy, worth $458 million the
return on their investment was 5,725%. Glaxo
Wellcome invested $1.2 million in campaign contributions to
get a 19-month patent extension on Zantac worth $1 billion -
their net return: 83,333%. The Tobacco
Industry spent $30 million in contributions for a tax break
worth $50 billion - the return on their investment:
167,000%. For a
paltry $5 million in campaign contributions, the
Broadcasting Industry was able to secure free digital TV
licenses, a give-away of public property worth $70 billion -
that's an incredible 1,400,000% return on their
investment. Just thought
you might like to know. Come to our next meeting and see the
rest of the story. Best regards, Dwayne Block
Crisis may make 1929
look a 'walk in the park' As the credit
paralysis stretches through its fifth month, a chorus of
economists has begun to warn that the world's central banks are
fighting the wrong war, and perhaps risk a policy error of
epochal proportions.
See the complete article
HERE
To those who
supported the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, I'd ask: How do you like it now?
It took a $300 billion budget surplus to a $600 billion
deficit and it's been downhill ever since. All thanks to our
corrupt political system.
Thanks to LD Rockwell, Burlington,
for help on the links below.
www.OpenSecrets.org*
www.Congress.org Profiles PAC Dollars
1st
Paul Ryan
(R)
Info Page
PAC Money
$192,750
2nd
Tammy Baldwin (D)
Info Page
PAC Money $82,456
3rd
Ron Kind (D)
Info Page
PAC Money
$165,200
4th
Gwen Moore (D) Info
Page
PAC Money $117,024
5th
F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R)
Info Page
PAC Money $ 44,170
6th
Tom Petri (R)
Info Page
PAC Money $138,550
7th
David R. Obey (D)
Info Page
PAC Money $267,025
8th
Steven Kagen (D)
Info Page
PAC Money $249,049
* At each of the OpenSecrets pages you can click on “Personal
Finances” (you will have to enter an anti-spam code)
* See all Congress.org WI Repos
HERE
Congress.org
Recent Senate Votes
United States-Peru Trade Promotion Agreement
Implementation Act - Vote Passed
(77-18, 5 Not Voting)
Temporary Tax Relief Act of 2007 - Vote
Passed (88-5, 7 Not Voting)
Improving Head Start Act - Vote Agreed
to (95-0, 5 Not Voting)
Motion to Invoke Cloture: Orderly and Responsible
Iraq Redeployment Appropriations Act, FY2008
- Vote Rejected (53-45, 2 Not Voting)
Recent House Votes
Creating Long-Term Energy Alternatives for the
Nation Act - Vote Passed (235-181, 16
Not Voting)
Improving Head Start Act - Vote Passed
(381-36, 15 Not Voting)
Rep. Paul Ryan
voted
YES......send
e-mail or see
bio
Orderly and Responsible Iraq Redeployment
Appropriations Act, FY2008 - Vote Passed
(218-203, 1 Present, 11 Not Voting)
Rep. Paul Ryan
voted
NO......send
e-mail or see
bio
Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act
- Vote Passed (291-127, 14 Not Voting)
Rep. Paul Ryan
voted
NO......send
e-mail or see
bio
Responsible Electronic Surveillance That is
Overseen, Reviewed, and Effective (RESTORE) Act
- Vote Passed (227-189, 16 Not Voting)
Overriding the Veto of the Labor/HHS/Education
Appropriations Act, FY2008 - Vote Failed
(277-141, 15 Not Voting) |
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Asclepios |
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Your Weekly Medicare Consumer Advocacy Update Wait Till Next Year -- December 20, 2007, Volume 7, Issue 49 The score card on health care for this session of Congress is pretty grim.
Of course, this is not the first year that Congress and the president have handed victories to special interests at the expense of the health care of the American people. It took 20 years, from President Truman's 1945 introduction of a plan to provide universal health care coverage to President Johnson signing the Medicare bill in 1965, for older adults to receive guaranteed health coverage under Medicare. It took another seven years, until 1972, for Medicare to cover people with disabilities (and they still have to wait two years for their coverage to begin). Still, the American people placed a lot of hope that the slate of lawmakers elected in 2006 would help stem the ever rising cost of health care and the ever expanding ranks of the uninsured. It's clear that the team has a few holes in it. We need more legislators in both chambers of Congress (including 60 senators) and a president who are all committed to addressing the health care crisis in this country and willing to stand up to the insurance industry, the pharmaceutical manufacturers and any other lobby that puts its self-interest above the health care of Americans. With a team like that, we can protect and improve Medicare and extend it so that every person in this county, young or old, can receive the health care he or she needs. Next year, we get to elect the players to that team and get rid of the bums that let us down this year. We need to make sure all the candidates know we are taking our responsibility seriously. * * * * Medical Record "The combined savings to the government and beneficiaries from having Medicare offer the drug benefit as an add-on to the traditional program, and to negotiate directly with the pharmaceutical industry, would be close to $30 billion in 2008. Even this figure is somewhat conservative since more beneficiaries would enroll in the program if it offered drugs at lower prices" (Celebrating Pork: The Dubious Success of the Medicare Drug Benefit (HERE), Center for Economic and Policy Research, March 2007). "[Medicare Advantage] overpayments significantly weaken Medicare's finances. The overpayments will total $54 billion over the next five years and $149 billion over ten years, according to CBO. That puts an added strain on Medicare, moving up by two years (from 2021 to 2019) the date when its trust fund will become insolvent, according to the chief actuary at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services" ("Curbing Medicare Advantage Overpayments Would Strengthen Medicare (HERE)," Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, December 5, 2007). "When Medicare and Medicaid were signed into law on July 30, 1965, former President Harry Truman received the first Medicare card. He would be shocked that 40 years later, more than 45 million Americans have no health coverage, half of all personal bankruptcies are health-related, and lack of universal insurance is increasingly hurting our economy as well as our health" ("Time for Health Care for All on Medicare's 40th Anniversary (HERE)," Holly Sklar, August 1, 2005). * * * * Medicare Part D Appeals Help for Advocates Is Here! MRC's new Medicare Part D Appeals: An advocate's manual to navigating the Medicare private drug plan appeals process offers an easy-to-understand, comprehensive overview of the entire appeals process, including real-life case examples, a glossary of important appeals terms, a sample protocol for advocates, and links to important resources. Register for a FREE copy (HERE) of this great resource. * * * * Medicare Private Health Plan Monitoring Project The Medicare Rights Center (MRC) would like to hear about your experience, or that of someone you know, enrolled in a private health plan. With information about what the issues are with Medicare Advantage plans, we will be able to demand that those problems be fixed. Submit your story at www.medicarerights.org/maplanstories.html (HERE). * * * * The Louder Our Voice, the Stronger Our Message Asclepios—named for the Greek and Roman god of medicine who, acclaimed for his healing abilities, was at one point the most worshipped god in Greece—is a weekly e-newsletter designed to keep you up-to-date with Medicare program and policy issues, and advance advocacy strategies to address them. Please help build awareness of key Medicare consumer issues by forwarding this action alert to your friends and encouraging them to subscribe today (HERE). * * * *
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TCS on Farm Bill |
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REFORMERS REBUFFED IN FARM BILL DEBATE
The farm bill drifted to its anti-climatic finale last week in
the seemingly rudderless Senate. We will have to wait for the
New Year to see what Congress actually sends to the President.
Essentially the Senate took the pile of manure it got from the
House, added a couple billion dollars and topped it with a new
permanent disaster slush fund that will be spent in just five or
six states, and called it a finished bill.
We say rudderless because it took a couple of eye-popping
agreements among Senate “leaders” to even get the bill done.
First, after two weeks of back and forth (longer if you include
the weeklong Thanksgiving vacation), Democrats and Republicans
agreed to limit amendments to twenty per side. Then, after
Rumpelstiltskin-esque foot-stamping by one Southern Democrat,
Senate leaders agreed that some amendments would require sixty
votes for passage, instead of a simple majority.
This wasn’t because the afore-mentioned Southern Democrat, Sen.
Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), actually took to the floor to
filibuster. Instead, she merely
threatened to filibuster and Congressional
leadership couldn’t be bothered to call her bluff. As a result,
a
bipartisan amendment to limit total subsidies received by a
single farm to $250,000, received majority approval (56-43) but
failed anyway.
Sen. Lincoln had plenty of support from Democrats and
Republicans alike, especially those from the South with their
big rice, cotton, and peanut farmers back home. Senators Saxby
Chambliss (R-GA) and John Cornyn (R-TX) made frequent
appearances on the Senate floor during the farm bill debate to
make the pitch for their particular commodity favorites.
A handful of other amendments that defenders of the status quo
feared might pass were also held to the same sixty-vote bar,
including one from Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) that would have
denied subsidies to farmers with an adjusted gross income (AGI)
of more than $750,000. For the rest of us who rely on an
accountant or Turbotax to do your taxes, “AGI” is your income
after deducting certain expenses. In the case of farm
income, the
IRS generously allows thirty such deductions.
One bright spot was acceptance of amendment from Sen. Tom Coburn
(R-OK) which restricts farm subsidy payments from going to
deceased farmers. Now that’s aggressive reform!
In the midst of record crop prices and farm incomes, sensible
reforms didn’t get a fair shake. As it all unfolded, dozens of
newspapers across the country editorialized in favor of many of
the proposed changes. Even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)
seemed to regret supporting the weak farm bill that she
arm-twisted through the House, commenting that she hoped the
Senate would pass stronger reforms in its version.
Adding fuel to the reform flame, the President threatened to
veto the farm bill if passed unchanged; former President and
peanut farmer
Jimmy Carter wrote an op-ed urging caps on farm subsidies;
and former Secretary of Agriculture and Republican National
Committee Chair
Clayton Yeutter sent a letter to Congress urging support of
reform amendments on the Senate floor.
But in the end, there was little in this bill in the way of
reform. Farm bill reformers won majority votes on critical
amendments that would save taxpayers money by preventing
millionaires from receiving subsidies. But like a home-town
referee, Senate leadership changed the rules mid-debate to get a
bad bill passed and everyone lost except for those throwing
tantrums on behalf of corporate farming.
Going on at Taxpayer.net This Week
Check out TCS's Complete Coverage of FY08 Spending Bills
Sen. Coburn Calls for Full Coconut Road Investigation
Omnibus Spending Bill Stuffed With Earmarks
TCS in the News |
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Tidbits |
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Uncle Jay
on Congress (video) The Ugly Side of MicrolendingHow big Mexican banks profit as many poor borrowers get trapped in a maze of debtIn a gleaming office tower in Mexico City secured with retinal scanners, bulletproof glass, and armed guards, dozens of workers in white lab coats dart around a large operations center monitoring long rows of computers. Along one wall, 54 enormous screens flicker dizzyingly with numbers, graphs, and fever charts: a relentless stream of data. You'd think the urgent mission involved tracking the trajectory of a spacecraft or the workings of a national power grid, not tiny amounts of cash and credit for Mexico's working poor. The transactions are so minuscule they hardly seem worth the bother. The average loan amounts to $257. But for Banco Azteca, a swiftly growing bank affiliated with Latin America's largest household retailer, the small sums represent a torrent of revenue that has caught even its founders by surprise. For three decades, micro-lending was seen as a tool of nonprofit economic development. Now poor people are turning into one of the world's least likely sources of untapped profit, primarily because they will pay interest rates most Americans would consider outrageous, if not usurious. With no legal limits on interest levels and little government oversight, for-profit banks in Mexico impose annual interest rates on poor borrowers that typically range from 50% to 120%. That compares with a worldwide average of 31% among nonprofit micro-lending institutions, and the 22% to 29% that Americans with bad credit histories incur on credit-card debt. Azteca's business model succeeds not only because it can charge credit-starved clients almost whatever it wants. Equally important is that low-income Mexicans anxious about maintaining their reputation tend to pay back what they owe, regardless of the hardship. Those who slip behind receive frequent visits from motorcycle-riding collection agents. Default rates are infinitesimal. "We lend to them as much as they can borrow," says Azteca Vice-Chairman Luis Niño de Rivera, "and they can borrow as much as they can pay." WHIFF OF PROFITSIn a Mexico that is modernizing economically even as most people still struggle to make ends meet, Azteca has discovered an improbable market for financial services. Much larger companies based in the U.S. and Europe also have picked up the whiff of profits. Wal-Mart Stores (WMT), which obtained a Mexican banking license a year ago, began offering loans for purchases at 16 of its 997 Mexican outlets in November. In the U.S., the retailer markets itself as a friend to the budget-conscious. In Mexico, it charges interest rates that might set off popular and political revolts back home, although Wal-Mart describes its terms as appropriate to the Mexican market. At one store west of Mexico City, a 32-inch LG plasma TV with a price tag of $957 can ultimately cost as much as $1,474, thanks to a 52-week payment plan that carries an annual percentage rate (APR) of 86%. Banamex (C), Mexico's second-largest bank and a wholly owned unit of Citigroup, is stepping up its pitches of personal loans to the working poor in 127 cities where it operates shops called Crédito Familiar, or Family Credit. HSBC Holdings (HSBC) last year bought a 20% stake in Financiera Independencia, a high-interest consumer lender that went public on Nov. 1. The Swiss insurer Zurich Financial Services (ZFSVY) is underwriting term life insurance policies that are sold along with small loans in Mexico. And homegrown nonprofit Compartamos morphed into a full-fledged commercial bank last year; it went public in April, reaping hundreds of millions of dollars for investors. All are examples of how financial players worldwide are pursuing profits by putting loans within reach of deprived borrowers. See the complete article HERE So? It’s called a corrupt government. Politicians who get paid off to keep hands off the regulations. Is it an different than the US? Huckabee's 50% Sales Tax (from www.ctj.org) Now that former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee has been climbing in the polls, reporters are suddenly inconvenienced by the need to read up on and explain the tax proposal Huckabee has been touting for months. His proposal is often described as a 23 percent national sales tax, but supporters prefer to call it the "Fair Tax," because they've apparently figured that the idea of a new sales tax is not inherently appealing to people. Actually the tax would be 30 cents on an item that costs a dollar, which most of us would call a 30 percent tax, but supporters argue that 30 cents is only 23 percent of $1.30. But that's not even half of the problem. Citizens for Tax Justice studied this proposal back in 2004 and found that to actually replace all the revenue collected by our current tax system, the national sales tax would actually have to be set at a rate of 50 percent. So to recap:
Bush Moves Toward Martial Law Thursday, 26 October 2006 In a stealth maneuver, President Bush has signed into law a provision which, according to Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), will actually encourage the President to declare federal martial law (1). It does so by revising the Insurrection Act, a set of laws that limits the President's ability to deploy troops within the United States. The Insurrection Act (10 U.S.C.331 -335) has historically, along with the Posse Comitatus Act (18 U.S.C.1385), helped to enforce strict prohibitions on military involvement in domestic law enforcement. With one cloaked swipe of his pen, Bush is seeking to undo those prohibitions. Public Law 109-364, or the "John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007" (H.R.5122) (2), which was signed by the commander in chief on October 17th, 2006, in a private Oval Office ceremony, allows the President to declare a "public emergency" and station troops anywhere in America and take control of state-based National Guard units without the consent of the governor or local authorities, in order to "suppress public disorder." See the complete article HERE
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Give me a Break! |
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Is it real? Find out
HERE.
The fastest way to resize
your pictures and images. Choose an image file, select
some resize options, and hit Resize it. Your image
will be uploaded to the server, resized and then your
resized image(s) will be provided in a single convenient
view. HERE
Most of
America 's populace think it improper to spank children, so I
have tried other methods to control my kids when they have one
of 'those moments.' |
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Book Recommendations |
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Contact information
Lohman is a retired business owner that volunteers’ time on the issues of Election reform and Universal health care -
Contact: Jack E. Lohman
jelohman@gmail.com
or
jelohman@charter.net
Phone 414-477-8686
(cell)
http://MoneyedPoliticians.net
(Blog)
www.ThrowTheRascalsOut.org
www.WiCleanElections.org
www.BusinessCoalition.net
www.MoneyedPoliticians.com (my book: Politicians - Owned and Operated by Corporate America)
www.SmokeFreeDining.net (A searchable restaurant database)
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If either fails please notify me directly at jelohman@gmail.com. Thanks.
Disclosure: I am a center-right Republican that (regrettably) voted for Bush twice. But the Republicans look worse here because they (are/were) in power and the party blocking reform. Next year it may be the Democrats taking center stage. Were I to have a political choice it would be for a strong third-party reform candidate in all seats. I do not like our very costly and ineffective duopoly. Jack Lohman
See Lohman's complete disclosure
HERE.
