Corporations

Health Care Front Group Provides New Clothes for GOP Medicare Privatization Plan

Wolf in sheep's clothingIf you think Rep. Paul Ryan's plan to privatize Medicare is dead, think again.

Last week, the insurance industry and its allies began what I predict will be a massive campaign to sell the public and policymakers on the idea of moving forward with the Ryan plan -- albeit with a few tweaks and new a new sales pitch to make it seem more consumer-friendly.

An outfit called the Healthcare Leadership Council (HLC) announced in a press release a scheme that could be called Ryan-lite, but don't be fooled: the plan would -- to use a favorite industry term -- take us down the "slippery slope" toward a complete corporate takeover of the Medicare program. (Insurers and their allies for years have warned Americans that enacting sweeping health care reforms they don't like would lead us down the slippery slope toward socialism.)

Walgreens' "Million Hearts" HealthWashing Ploy

Submitted by Anne Landman on

smoking heartOn September 13, 2011, Walgreens announced it is partnering with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in a "new effort to fight heart disease" called the "Million Hearts Initiative." Walgreens says the goal is to help prevent one million heart attacks and strokes over the next five years by "finding ways to reduce the number of people who need treatment and improve the quality of treatment for those who need it." The chain's press release about the  Initiative says heart disease and stroke are the first and third leading causes of death, respectively. What Walgreens doesn't say is that while it searches for ways to prevent heart disease, the chain also continues to sell one of the nation's leading causes of heart disease and stroke: cigarettes. Not only that, but when the city of San Francisco passed an ordinance in 2008 banning pharmacies from selling cigarettes (based on the logic that as health-promoting businesses, pharmacies should not promote smoking) Walgreens fought the measure. The chain even issued an
action alert (pdf) saying it needed to keep selling cigarettes to help people quit
smoking. When that failed, Walgreens sued the city of San Francisco to try and block the ordinance. When the court threw out Walgreens' suit, the chain filed an appeal to continue the challenge.

No
Main Source: 
Walgreens Press Release, September 13, 2011
Topics: 
Corporations
Ethics
Health

Koch Lobbyist is ALEC State Co-Chair for Wisconsin; Scholarships Raise Ethics Concerns

A lobbyist for Koch Industries and energy interests serves with a lobbyist for Pfizer pharmaceuticals as the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) corporate co-chairs in Wisconsin, according to documents obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy at this year's ALEC Annual Meeting. For some, their fundraising for "scholarships" to benefit ALEC legislative members raises issues of legislative ethics.

Director of "Gasland" Wins Emmy; Film Fueling Activism

The dangers posed by the natural gas extraction method known as hydraulic fracturing or "fracking" to the nation's water supply and human health are slowly becoming a part of the mainstream dialogue. The 2010 documentary Gasland has played a key role in raising public awareness. Now the director of the film, Josh Fox, has won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for Nonfiction Programming.

Hiding the Sausage: How a Well-Funded Right-Wing Organization is Grinding Out State Laws

-- by Billy Manes

The Center for Media and Democracy is re-posting this article from Billy Manes at the Orlando Weekly as part of our efforts to expose the American Legislative Exchange Council. The original can be found here.

When Jeff Wright walked into the lobby of the New Orleans Marriott on Aug. 3, he wasn't sure what to expect. As the director of public policy advocacy for the Florida Education Association -- a prominent teachers' union that had been bearing the brunt of legislative attacks from Florida Republicans throughout the 2011 legislative session -- he wasn't there for your standard Mardi Gras-themed party. The American Legislative Exchange Council, a national nonprofit organization made up of elected officials and private interests who gather regularly to try to directly influence the substance of public policy, was holding its annual four-day meeting there, so any "partying" would probably be a little more conservative, and -- going by a recent glut of press coverage pointing out ALEC's clearinghouse mentality of privately linking big corporations with the state legislators willing to pursue their bottom-line agendas in the form of "model legislation" -- slightly more nefarious. Nevertheless, he wanted to see it for himself.

GOP Backs Insurance Industry-Friendly, Anti-Consumer Bills

House Republicans, unable to repeal President Obama's health care reform law outright, have decided to go after it piece by piece. If they are successful, what's likely to remain is the kind of reform the insurance industry dreamed of, but never really thought could be the law of the land.

Health insurance costsAlthough the Republican-controlled House passed legislation to repeal the Affordable Care Act several months ago, the Senate, controlled by Democrats, rejected it. Bills are now being considered in the House that would strip some of the most important consumer protections from the new law. If the bills' sponsors are successful, health insurers would be free to spend as little of our premium dollars on our health care as they want, and they would be able to continue setting lifetime limits on policies and cancel our coverage at the time we need it most -- when we get sick. Other important benefits to consumers would also disappear.

On Lehman Day, Elizabeth Warren Runs Against “Wall Street’s Favorite”

Consumer advocate Elizabeth Warren announced that she was running against Scott Brown for a U.S. Senate seat in Massachusetts on the eve of the anniversary of the Lehman Brothers collapse. For many, Lehman's unthinkable bankruptcy September 15th, 2008 marks the day when the wheels came off the bus and the U.S. economy went over a cliff.

With 30 million Americans unemployed and underemployed, Social Security, Medicare and public workers under attack, Warren's video announcement got straight to the point.

"Middle-class families have been chipped at, hacked at, squeezed and hammered for a generation now, and I don't think Washington gets it. Washington is rigged for big corporations that hire armies of lobbyists," she continued. "A big company like GE pays nothing in taxes and we're asking college students to take on even more debt to get an education, we're telling seniors they may have to learn to live on less? It isn't right, and it's the reason I'm running for the U.S. Senate."

Wisconsin GOP Uses Parliamentary Trick to Protect Secret Corporate Spending

Wisconsin Republicans, without going on-the-record with a vote, have used a legislative trick to block an election board rule that would have shed light on the corporate interests laundering election spending through front groups. The move echoes the American Legislative Exchange Council agenda and will likely ensure a flood of secret ads and robo-calls for Wisconsin's 2012 elections.

CMD and The Nation Magazine Win the Sidney Award for Investigative Journalism

The Sidney Hillman Foundation logoThe Sidney Hillman Foundation selected the Center for Media and Democracy and The Nation magazine for its prestigious "Sidney Award" this month.  The award recognizes our investigative journalism exposing the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which the Foundation called "an obscure but powerful conservative group that brings state legislators and corporations together to write laws."

ALEC Corporations Spend Big in Washington

On Monday, September 12, Brad Hooker of the Center for Responsive Politics' Open Secrets blog posted an exposé of the money that the corporate members of ALEC's "Private Enterprise" Board (including AT&T, Exxon Mobil, Kraft, Coca-Cola and Koch Industries) spent to lobby Washington and fill the campaign chests of ALEC alumni in Congress (as well as other Congressmembers). ALEC alumnus John Boehner received the most from ALEC Board corporations, a total of "$368,200 from the people and political action committees associated with the companies on ALEC's private enterprise board during the 2010 election cycle." Second place goes to another ALEC alumnus, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), who has been introducing ALEC's agenda to the House. He collected "$328,100 from people and PACs associated with 17 companies on the ALEC private enterprise board."

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