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Doctors, Single Payer Activists Arrested
Doctors and other single payer activists were handcuffed and went to jail today speaking up for single payer to be at the table in the Senate finance Committee's roundtable discussion on healthcare access and coverage. In stark contrast, Karen Ignagni, head of the industry lobby group American Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) was escorted into the room like royalty by staff members of the Senate committee. Clearly, the position of the United States Senate is not with the majority of Americans who support a national, public insurance system.
It made me physically ill to see Maryland pediatrician Margaret Flowers cuffed like a criminal and pushed out the door as the Senators waited to begin their staged roundtable discussion. It made me want to scream. It made me proud of them for being bold but ashamed that not one Senator spoke up for their own citizen-protestors and asked that they at least be allowed to speak. But the insistence that the citizens rising in protest be arrested continued from the chair with each incident.
Simply asking to have single payer be included and fully vetted is a crime. Profiting as the for-profit health insurance companies do at the expense of 22,000 American lives every year, however, gets you a run of the table in this healthcare reform discussion. Just ask the Senators who are drafting what this nation's health system will look like - and watch their behavior today - if you want evidence of how your voice will be heard in the process.
The protestors were stoic and respectful but direct. One by one they stood. One by one they asked why single payer reform was not "at the table" of 15 witnesses Senator Max Baucus and his finance Committee gathered to map out what sort of coverage Americans might expect in the Senate reform bill now being crafted.
Sen. Baucus eventually spoke and indicated that he was respectful of those who believe in single payer - as he acknowledged many of his constituents in Montana do - but he made no attempt to explain why no single payer voice has been included in any Senate discussion to date. He urged any others in the audience who might have any designs on speaking up like the protestors did to not do so, and then he moved on to his roundtable discussion.
The press seated comfortably at the press table first looked amused and then puzzled by the procession of protest in the chamber. The C-SPAN cameras fixed on both the Committee's table at the front of the room and the witness table directly across from them could have easily picked up the protests but the network chose to keep their cameras fixed only on Chairman Baucus - though the protestors' words could be heard in the audience. Only two reporters of the 20 or so assembled were curious enough or industrious enough to rise and exit the room to see the arrests being carried out in the hallway.
While neither the Finance Committee or the press allowed their proceedings to be disrupted for very long, the air in the room and the atmosphere had changed -- the giddy and gleeful assembly of industry lobbyists who had been chattering in rapt anticipation of the coming of their carefully chosen witnesses could not deny that some brave and patriotic fellow citizens had just been hauled out for arrest for nothing more than demanding that a point of view held by a majority of patients, nurses, physicians and other healthcare providers be included in the national discussion.
While this Congress may pass something very different than single payer reform, it will not do so without hearing the cries of the people left so openly exposed to personal health and financial ruin by the corrupt system that celebrates only profit. The citizens who stood for the thousands and thousands of dead today will not let this democracy give itself completely over to the big money interests in healthcare. Not without a fight. Not on their lives or yours or mine.
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107 Comments so far
Show AllOregoncharles
Kudos to the California Nurses Association and Healthcare Not Warfare campaign! By the way, just why is it you are still Democrats?
This is what you can do NOW: call Senator Baucus's office--number is 202-224-2651.
The first time I called, I got a message saying the office is closed, and to leave a message. Then they gave a phone number for emergencies, which I missed. So I left the message on the tape, and then called back to get the emergency number (healthcare IS an emergency!!!!), This time, the office answered, so I left a message with the person who answers the phone.
CALL NOW!!!
If there are enough calls, maybe we can get their attention.
Also, go here: http://finance.senate.gov/sitepages/committee.htm to find the Senators on the committee, and you can contact them.
I called long distance. I was put on hold until I suspected they had no intention of getting around to my call.
They are the masters. We are the slaves. On the one hand they don't want us to forget that. On the other hand, they want us to pretend that nothing is wrong with this system.
1-800-828-0498 Free Call, White House Switchboard.
Simply tell the operator to connect you with any member of congress.
Call as many times as you like.
Thanks. I've been on the phone for the last hour.
Just got off the phone with a nice aide to Sen. Baucus. I let him know that I agree with the views of the activists at the hearing today and respectfully recommended that Sen. Baucus consider taking some of the insurance and pharma lobbying money and "buy some guts" and do what the majority of the American people, physicians and nurses want, which is single payer.
Wouldn't you be more likely to hire employees minus the hassle of paying their health care?
Just another burden off the employer.
This is something I have argued for years. I don't understand why employers are not on-board with single payer. It might be that they fear being labeled "socialist" and god knows thats a blot on your record you can ill afford to have.
Without anarchy there will be no change
Agree -0- but at the moment they still have control over the employee and
are constantly reducing benefits.
"According to all myth, the female - not the male -- gives life"
"The C-SPAN cameras fixed on both the Committee's table at the front of the room and the witness table directly across from them could have easily picked up the protests but the network chose to keep their cameras fixed only on Chairman Baucus - though the protestors' words could be heard in the audience."
The only difference between C-SPAN and outlets like Fox or PBS is commercials. C-SPAN is state-worshiping propaganda just like any other mainstream media outlet.
--
Eric Patton
Cincinnati, OH
ebpatton@yahoo.com
C-SPAN must have the same policy that major league sports broadcasting has regarding disruptive activity that interferes with the game; they don't televise the offenders because they think that only rewards and encourages them.
As far as Congress is concerned, there's no distinction between principled activism and dissent and a drunken streaker.
ยท Yr Obd't Servant
Keeping the cameras on Senator Baucus just rewarded and encouraged his bad behavior that serves to interrupt legitimate debate.
"As far as Congress is concerned, there's no distinction between principled activism and dissent and a drunken streaker."
Exactly. Even MLK or Ghandi would be dismissed by politicians and the media, as just some nutty cranks nowadays.
Of course, they secretly hope that we will someday get so angry that we resort to breaking a few things, then we will be "violent terrorists!" And they can really clamp down.
It's all a completely rigged setup - there is no nonviolent way of winning that I can see, and any kind of armed action would be suicidal to both us and the cause. We are helpless against these vile political filth.
Sioux Rose
I can't help but notice a parallel between the way these conscientious protestors were treated, and the same basic disrespect for those who were against the ILLEGAL, case-fixed-for-war Iraqi invasion, too. And then, too, guns are the holy of holies in this land of too many under thrall to Mars rules, and as a result many deaths result. And road rage is a given with 40,000 or more highway fatalities a year, but courtesy is all too rare. Alcohol is everywhere sold, though it configures in all kinds of violent reactions in too many. But pot, the peace pipe, any talk of peace or including society's members in practices that reflect kindness, compassion, or consideration (in this case health care extended to all) get targeted as UNLAWFUL.
If anyone was reading about these priorities from a different space and time, they would see how INSANE the nation has become, how departed from its own founding ideals and intended government design. Many improvements were made in the l960's & l970's to include more voices at the table; but since the l980's, it's as if those agents bound and determined to consign this nation's citizens (and many others around the world) to a new Dark Age, an era where the condemned must subsist on crumbs and when they become ill from the exposures to Goddess knows how many chemical effluents, have made enormous progress. Washington has become a moral sewer. I remember freak floods there a few years ago that nearly drowned our Constitution and Bill or Rights. It's all washing away the voices of the nature spirits echoed. The representatives turn from genuine justice to conduct the business of state as it rapes the treasury and mistreats citizens. These interlopers are setting themselves up for quite the karmic boomerang. With these items taken in sum, once their full force is felt we are quite likely to see massive citizen unrest. I think the lid is still on because so many are bamboozled into thinking things are better than they are, or are thus convinced they are lucky to have their personal privileges and best not rock the boat (or they will lose those benefits). Something is going to turn over the tables of the moneychangers who have made Wall St their new temple of Mammon. The suffering induced by those with a marked depraved indifference to basic humanism is reverberating like a silent earthquake. The center cannot hold.
Sioux Rose: "...it's as if those agents bound and determined to consign this nation's citizens (and many others around the world) to a new Dark Age..." Like the Pope of Rome, the only place Oligarchies feel safe is in a 12th century feudalism with a locked down, diseased, short-lived, illiterate general population. THAT is what they're creating. Human die-back IS part of their equation ("lucky" to be alive for the 46 years allotted). And yes, I look forward to a time when we are "likely to see massive citizen unrest." The "nice" people (Drs. and Health Professionals) who were arrested today were not shackled, maced, and beaten while forced to sit on the floor to "teach them their place". Not quite ready to fully degrade them yet, buit they will. WE, ordinary folk are a different matter entirely. And of course, nothing stands still. That means the folks who involve themselves in massive citizen unrest will be first degraded and then shot.
I did attempt with people in Health Care, in the Anti-War movement, and Organized Labor to bring about a General Strike-Sick Out for Single Payer Now, EFCA Now, and Out of Iraq/Af/Pak Now. Don't misunderstand. I simply wanted to bring them to the table and let them do their stuff. I'm nobody's "Ace Face".
Ms. Smith and Dave Swanson were both quite polite and patient with my apparent naivety. The boys at ILWU pushed me to the PR guy who told me there was not a snowball's chance in Hell (not his words but the intent). PNHP responded with total silence. Today a couple of them got handcuffed and politely taken away. They can frame the picture for the grand kids. The day grandad was "wild". I wonder their response had one of them been killed and a few others hospitalized with cranial damage? Would their Life Insurance pay off for the deader? Would their Health Insurance pay for blunt instrument trauma incurred in a civil protest and inflicted by officers of the State? Now that would be a claims nightmare, wouldn't it.
The purpose of that sequential event was to unite each of those constituencies for a tripartite goal by shutting down the country on several successive days in mid-week - without giving the animals a target to degrade and kill. Never gonna happen. They won't work together so they hang separately. No single payer ever. No unions ever again. War forever. 12 century feudalistic America. Nothing else to be said. The silence is deafening.
Peace.
I fully share your frustration.
Organized left-activism is completely in shambles or retreated to their "facebook" sites. I keep wondering how bad is it going to have to get before we all can unite and rise up.
The established unions - even the ILWU or UE - hell, even the Wobs (mostly just a historical society) are useless.
Siouxrose: Wise words of things to come.
Once the general public finally realizes we have less "real" representation by the politicians, who cater to the rich and the corporate lobbyists, the sooner they will unite, ready to "storm the Bastille."
Not only road rage, but frustration over money problems and job loses is so pandemic, some folks don't know how to cope with it and are murdering their family members and then taking their own lives.
Several days ago, the San Francisco Chronicle published a list of schools being closed. Education and health care are low on the priority list of these political prostitutes. But for the "Mars" budget, (not the candy company, folks), the sky is the limit.
I told a Protestant minister several weeks ago, that if the great Master Teacher took the whip to the money changers back then, he'd probably let loose with a machine-gun on the Wall Street swindlers and shysters of today, for ALL the harm they have created around the world, not just in the US. I was politely admonished for my remark.
Lamenting on computer is fine, but produces no viable results. Direct action by the citizenry does.
Sioux Rose
While I don't think Jesus would lose it with a machine gun; yet as for the citizen action you crave and encourage, I hardly think our uniformed guards, loyal to Mammon & Mars would hesitate to use such force or tasers. Tough times to seriously protest and assemble given the weaponry amassed to potentially aim at a justifiably upset citizenry.
The created reality is falling apart, cspan, fox, etc. are collapsing with them. we won.
there will be no socialized healthcare, mainstreet is becoming a ghost town, the rhetoric is just whistling through the graveyard. FORTRESS AMERIKKKA is here.
The only question is why is the left and the right SO sad about the passing away of the "middle class"? And not outraged for the women and children of all classes? Why is this fantasy middle group so important?
Everyone knows and has known for a very long time that there is no "middle". Just the top 2% and everyone else, hustling like crazy to stay alive.
We are a third world dystopia, Keep protesting, get arrested, resist, struggle is our art.
Bear in mind,These corporate swine CANNOT be shamed, they will not give up their perceived advantage.
They can only be physically removed, like these protesters.
This is a job for Dawg the bounty hunter.
There is no "Left" or "Right" there are only the Plutocrats. The notion that
Democrats or Republicans actually give the American people a choice is a hoax
an illusion. There is no political opposition and hasn't been for at least 40
years. Has foreign policy, domestic policy, monetary policy or the penal system
really changed over the last 4 decades?? No of course it hasn't. They throw us
bones every once in a while like abortion or some public works pork barrel project
to show one side against and one side for, but they don't mean anything, it's just
theater. The ballot boxes are useless because the politicians are no longer
elected, they are installed. I fear the only solution we may have left is the one the French seized in 1789
Ms Smith,
I will be writing a scathing letter to my two Senators Bond and Mcaskill now that my blood is boiling after hearing about the uncalled for arrest of Dr. Flowers. And I won't be alone. Surprisingly, most of my neighbors, especially the older ones, have been crying for single payer healthcare even if some of them were rabid social conservatives. They are definitely going to be up in arms when they read this article that I am passing to them.
I would strongly urge others to do the same and especially the good folks in Montana who are being misrepresented by a corporatist Baucus.
Thank you...
I cannot believe I saw and felt this today. Brave people should not need to do this.
Donna Smith, American SiCKO
I think the good folks in Montana are catching on that Baucus doesn't represent them. About 90% of his money came from out of state, with the top contributor state being New York. He continues to claim he doesn't sell himself, but mentions that he won't unilaterally disarm, i.e., if he doesn't take the money someone else will. The financial crisis and health care are two peas in a pod.
snip>
Baucus, a top negotiator on the recent $700 billion bailout legislation for the financial industry, received more money from individuals employed by securities and investment firms than any other area, according to the group. Those donors have given him almost $775,000 since he was last re-elected in 2002.
Other top donors are lawyers and law firms, insurance companies and health professionals.
Employees for drug maker Schering-Plough Corp. and New York Life Insurance Co. gave more money to Baucus than employees of any other company. Employees for investment bank Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and financially troubled insurance company American International Group were also top donors.
I hope so. That weasel has served at least 5 terms and I cannot understand what the state has gained from him anyway. I saw his voting record and even on NAFTA and CAFTA where he voted yes, Conrad Burns had at least some decency to vote no against it despite him being the typical corporate Republican. I once looked up Baucus's record in Washington last year and wondered how many Republicans in MT look "liberal" in pale comparison. And where's Jon Tester these days?
Jennifer,
I do admire your enthusiasm for truth, justice, peace and equality, but your "scathing letter" to your two senators (they only deserve small d's) will be filed with my scathing letters and thousands of other scathing letters from our fellow citizens across the land in the same depository...the trash bin. The so-called liberal from Wisconsin, Russ Feingold, was interviewed by Amy Goodman today on her program, 'Democracy Now!' and Russ said he was for single payer, but it isn't going to happen. When Amy questioned him, he said the Senate won't go for it. On another topic about torture, Feingold was very polite regarding the former Vice-Coward, Dick Cheney.
Short of work stoppages and general strikes, in order to get the "change" we want, the Democrats as well as the Republicans, cater to the rich and super-rich.
The Dems throw us a few crumbs once in awhile. If you have audio streaming on your computer, I highly recommend listening to www.kpfa.org, out of Berkeley, Ca. They don't play patsys with the Democrats as some other stations do. And if you can donate any money, they started their spring drive today. Bu if you can't donate, listen anyway. The programs are first-rate, and you'll learn something valuable every day.
Yeah, that it will be filed in the trash bin is true. I'll still see who can be found to replace Bond next year and a good one I would add. If there's one thing I love about Berkeley, CA, it's the home of George Lakoff whose books on framing I strongly admire. On Feingold, I'm beginning to see why he allowed the Swiss cheese Mccain-Feingold CFR to actually pass.
Lakoff is good, but there are other things to like about Berkeley, a very progressive community, as well. When you have time, listen to the station I recommended. I think you'll like it.
Most of my life I was a zealous Democrat, but switched to the Green Party. After awhile, some of us liberal/progressives got tired of the broken campaign promises and changed party affiliations. You have to start somewhere if you want "change" (for the better) and "hope" others may join you.
Listen to a few programs and I'd like to get your take on them.
I have been getting a few good progressive programs to listen to on the radio while sitting through the bloody traffic on the highways. Some sites, I can listen to the audio and video but some other ones are hard to get, probably the company firewall so I'll have to listen at home. I will be happy to relate to them in future discussions. I'd live in Berkeley but with what I'm earning, I'd probably be homeless. I would love to visit Berkeley though sometime this summer.
At very least, send a fax not a letter. The Anthrax restrictions on mail to the US Congress is still in effect.
What's it cost to send a fax? As for the mail restrictions...I wonder where that PB&J sandwitch that I sent to Bush to put on his family went to. Still in a warehouse making Penicillin?
Assuming you have a PC with a phone modem (most come with one installed) and use Windows 98 or later, you simply send the fax from your PC. The only charge is for the long-distance phone call.
While your blood is already boiling, I want to get everyones boiling.There is a story I feel would make tax payers as mad about Health Insurance Executives as they are about Banker bonus's. Dr. William McGuire who was the CEO of United Health Care until he was forced to leave in 2006 because of a scandal involving the backdating of stock options. Were not talking a few bucks here. The options given to Dr. McGuire in 2006 were at one time valued at over $1.7 billion. Yes Billion! The largest amount ever given to anyone anywhere and he still felt the need to cheat. This is just one man in the company. Is anyone worth that much? Business people would say he was worth it because of how much money he made for other stockholders. My reaction is, oh yeah? How much money did the company pass on to stockholders? At a time when Health Insurance Premiums are sky high, where is all this money coming from? Are people's claims being denied, or are they just gouging their customers? There is a story here. Google Dr. William McGuire and go back to the 2006 stories as well as the more recent ones. If people knew about this one incident, they would be as mad as I am.
What really pisses me off about this whole charade is that ever fucking person on that Senate committee has the very best solid gold health care paid for by all of us. Does anyone believe they'd ever turn it down because it's taxpayer supported. The truth is they NEVER would. But, these same hypocrites will go on and on about how it's to expensive for the rest of us.
Impeachment is off the table. Single payer health care is off the table. The only thing that Congress seems to care about is what is under the table.
I hate that damn table.
Joe
Sioux Rose
JCLIENTELLE: Torture is ON the table, as is 2.2 million incarcerated, many over trifles. Lock-down America... each day's events more incredulous that the prior one. Is the necessary critical mass encountering a "bubble" effect too? When IT pops, get out of the way...
Siouxrose:
You got that right!
I am very surprised at the anger and leftist interpretations I hear during chance conversations on the subway, waiting in lines etc. But it is like unharnassed energy - lightning or a raging river. All of the energy is dissipated without moving anything. Things may happen, with organization.
Joe
Here's what's on the table.
1. More bombing out of sweetheart civilians in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and possibly Iraq.
2. More phoney "stimulus" packages filled with Dubya style tax cuts for the wealthy/corporate elite glop with limited funding to repair our broken public infrastructure.
3. More BIG BROTHERING of the country, farming, media and possibly the Internet.
4. More bailouts to Corporate America.
5. Continuing the War on Drugs.
With Democrats like these, who the hell needs the Rethugs ?!?!? That's why I'm angry at them. I won't be surprised if the GOP even campaigns for those frauds !
Well said. For me it all goes back to public financing of campaigns. Without public financing we will keep getting the corporate shills put before us by the DNC and RNC.
As it stands now it is almost impossible for a green, independent or any candidate except Democrat or Republican to run a competitive campaign. We have in Obama another politician who is always so ready to compromise his soul to the corporate master,
Without anarchy there will be no change
I think we need to DECENTRALIZE our protesting and go beyond DC. Maybe if we hit our pols in the districts or at least on the state levels, the chances of them paying attention to their voters would increase. I could be wrong though.
jclientelle: You're "rockin'" Joe! Very funny post! Hey, we need a little humor in these dark days. Thanks!
Jeevee
We have become The United States of Narcissism!!! What will "realistically" get us off this addiction to greed and other forms of self-interest?
Joe...GREAT COMMENT !!!
It used to be said - during the civil rights era - that by filling the jails you could effect change. That making the state incarcerate people would force the state to change the way it did things. Too bad the usa has become a police state that is more than willing to lock up more and more people. Expanding medicare to cover all yanks is a no-brainer, no wonder it's something the congress and house can't understand it.
The treatment of these activists - Baucus shouting "more police!" is not only an assault on the right to healthcare, but it is also an assault on Democracy itself and is vile.
HR 676 was re-introduced on Jan. 26, 2009, and has been referred to the House Natural Resources, House Ways and Means, and House Energy and Commerece Committees. It can be researched at: www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-676. You can find out who sits on those committees, and contact them if you'd like, particularly if they happen to be from you're district. What I don't understand is that if a bill has been introduced in congress, (for the second time-this is a re-introduction)and there is a Presidentially mandated task force looking for solutions to the problem that the bill addresses, how the fuck is it not included in the debate? Where is the outcry from the House. Where is Conyers? He wrote it. Where is Kucinich? He pushed it hard during the 2008 Primary. WTF. Is that legislation just to appease, not meant to pass, or be taken seriously by even the author? It reminds me of the Impeach Bush/Cheney legislation introduced twice by Kucinich. No one took it seriously, and nothing was done, except Kucinich appeared to be the hero of Congress, from my stand point. I really like him as an outspoken congressman. I'd really hate to find out that he, too, is a shill.
I really miss Paul Wellstone.
They killed Paul. Ice on the wings? Didn't effect any other plane. Surprised they didn't use the single crazed gun man we see so often when anyone stands up to the bankers.
Yes, 2 great important posts. now, there are media assholes
defending the atrocicity. How can we send those baststards into ,oblivion!!!
You can bet that is has come down from the White House that single payer is NOT going to get through the Senate and the President is not going to lobby for it. Why?, because it will be labeled "socialist" and when that happens in america you can kiss it goodbye. The public has been brainwashed to have a negative reflex to the word and if the label sticks only the poor, old and sick will plead for it, why hell they don't even need a modern day Joe McCarthy. Remember all that self-reliance speak that was so prevalent not all that long ago? It's part of the same american reflex.
Without anarchy there will be no change