Health

Wendell Potter in Arkansas: Real World Fears v. the Boogeyman

This Thanksgiving season, I am thankful for so many things: my life, family, friends, freedoms, and new job at the Center for Media and Democracy. I feel lucky to be working with a team devoted to making a real difference in people's lives as we out spin and press for change. And, with the broken health insurance system, I am thankful to work at CMD with a real-life hero, Wendell Potter, who is fighting tirelessly for families across the country so that parents and children and grandparents and grandchildren can have real access to needed health care to save their lives and thrive.

Because Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) is a key swing vote on health care reform, CMD's Wendell was in Arkansas Thanksgiving week. As noted in Thanksgiving Day's Arkansas News:

Tobacco Companies Blow Smoke in Washington's Face -- Again!

Submitted by Anne Landman on

Cigarettes laying on top of moneyLast spring, President Obama signed a bill into law that raised the tax on roll-your-own cigarette tobacco from $1.10 per pound to a whopping $24.78 per pound. The revenue from the tax was to be put towards expanding children’s health insurance programs.

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Main Source: 
New York Times, November 21, 2009
Topics: 
Health
Tobacco
U.S. Government

And, Now for Something French (Wendell Takes on "The World")

Wendell Potter is featured in this week's Le Monde for his work on behalf of the Center for Media and Democracy. It's in French, of course, and in the article he talks about the influence of the insurance industry lobbyists on elected politicians and candidates. I'd translate it for you, but even as a former tutor in French the verb tenses still elude me. However, for those of you who are fluent in the language of love, here is the feature:

"Americans for Quality and Affordable Healthcare": Yet Another Health Insurance Industry Front?

Submitted by Anne Landman on

According to the Associated Press, "Americans for Quality and Affordable Healthcare" (AQAH) is a "secretive" group that organizes "below-the-radar" activities to drum up opposition to health care reform. AQAH is opposed to a government-run public health insurance option, but supports a mandate to require all citizens to purchase health insurance -- views that happen to exactly match those of the health insurance industry.

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Main Source: 
Associated Press, November 15, 2009
Topics: 
Front Groups
Health
Lobbying

Berman's Serious Secrecy

Submitted by Bob Burton on

The Employment Policies Institute (EPI), a front group created by veteran lobbyist Richard Berman, is planning an advertising blitz claiming that healthcare reform is too costly. The ads will run in Nebraska, North Dakota, Arkansas, Louisiana, Connecticut and Maine. “We’re putting some serious money behind it,” said Berman.

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Main Source: 
Roll Call (U.S.), November 16, 2009
Topics: 
Astroturf
U.S. Congress
Health

Genentech's Ghostwriting Animates Congressional Speeches on Health Reform

In Sunday's New York Times, Robert Pear reports that biotech industry lobbyists were especially successful in getting their spin mouthed by House Members during the health care reform debate. He notes:

Statements by more than a dozen lawmakers were ghostwritten, in whole or in part, by Washington lobbyists working for Genentech, one of the world's largest biotechnology companies. E-mail messages obtained by The New York Times show that the lobbyists drafted one statement for Democrats and another for Republicans. The lobbyists, employed by Genentech and by two Washington law firms, were remarkably successful in getting the statements printed in the Congressional Record under the names of different members of Congress.

Wendell Headlines Triple Bottom Line Conference

The Center for Media Democracy's Wendell Potter was invited to be the keynote speaker at the Triple Bottom Line Investment (TBLI) conference in Amsterdam this past week. This year's TBLI conference focused on worldwide "health insurance and related human rights issues, the Credit Crunch and its effects on investment ethics values and investment, and the Copenhagen Climate Council and its consequences for investment portfolios," according to their statement about the event.

UnitedHealth Presses its Employees to Oppose Public Option

Submitted by Anne Landman on

The country's largest private health insurer, UnitedHealth Group, is urging its 75,000 employees to phone their senators and write letters-to-the-editor to protest the inclusion of a public health insurance option in health reform legislation.

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Main Source: 
Washington Post, November 13, 2009
Topics: 
Corporate Campaigns
Health
Lobbying

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