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Former Top Insurance Exec Blows The Whistle On Health Insurance Companies’ Plot Against Reform In an interview with PBS’ Bill Moyers on Friday, former health insurance executive Wendell Potter revealed that health insurance companies had developed a concerted strategy to discredit Michael Moore’s movie SiCKO:
BILL MOYERS: And there was a political strategy. “Position Sicko as a threat to Democrats’ larger agenda.” What does that mean?
WENDELL POTTER: That means that part of the effort to discredit this film was to use lobbyists and their own staff to go onto Capitol Hill and say, “Look, you don’t want to believe this movie. You don’t want to talk about it. You don’t want to endorse it. And if you do, we can make things tough for you.”
BILL MOYERS: How?
WENDELL POTTER: By running ads, commercials in your home district when you’re running for reelection, not contributing to your campaigns again, or contributing to your competitor.
Potter, the former head of Corporate Communications at CIGNA, said he thought Moore “hit the nail on the head with his movie,” which advocated that the government-run systems of other western democracies produce better health care outcomes. The health insurance companies “don’t want you to think that it was a documentary that had some truth,” Potter said.
The companies “biggest concern” is that the United States might adopt “a broader program like our Medicare program” which “could potentially reduce the profits of these big companies.” He added that “we shouldn’t fear government involvement in our health care system. That there is an appropriate role for government, and it’s been proven in the countries that were in that movie.
Potter said he was driven to speak out when “it became really clear to me that the industry is resorting to the same tactics they’ve used over the years, and particularly back in the early ’90s, when they were leading the effort to kill the Clinton plan.”
UpdateMichael Moore’s newest documentary, “Capitalism: A Love Story," is set for an October release. "It will be the perfect date movie. It's got it all -- lust, passion, romance, and 14,000 jobs being eliminated every day. It's a forbidden love, one that dare not speak its name. Heck, let's just say it: It's capitalism," he said.
-------------------- Wise men learn more from fools than fools from the wise.
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The Democrats response? Make successful Americans pay higher taxes for other peoples health care:
House Democrats on Tuesday unveiled their proposal for a sweeping health care bill that would require all Americans to buy affordable insurance. The cost of the proposed legislation would be paid for by taxes on wealthy Americans.
The bill would impose a 5.4 percent surtax on couples earning more than $1 million annually and a 1.5 percent tax on couples earning between $500,000 and $1 million. Households earning more than $350,000 would get hit with a 1 percent tax.
House Democrats want to require individuals and employers to get health insurance -- or pay a penalty.
For individuals, the penalty would be 2.5 percent of income -- but it could go no higher than the average cost of health insurance.
-------------------- It isn't so much that liberals are ignorant. It's just that they know so many things that aren't so.
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private insurance cannot cover every body something has to be done. If I were in that money bracket I would not mind paying a a little extra. I am getting close but still not thier.
Republicans a usual represent this high end bracket which is 2% of the population so screw them. Most of them quit being Americans anyway a long time ago.
-------------------- Wise men learn more from fools than fools from the wise.
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