Stop the Corporate Insurance Bailouts

Washington still doesn’t get it, or they are trying to deny it. America is tired of corporate giveaways. The Massachusetts election of Mr. Brown gave voters, 24% of the Democrat and 60% of the Independent voters, the opportunity to send a loud and clear message to Washington, they would not put up with another corporate handout; this time to the insurance and drug corporations. The pending ‘insurance bills’ passed by the Senate and the House are prime examples of another corporate giveaway by the Democrats on a scale that dwarfs the Wall Street bailout.
Both bills would give about half a trillion dollars of tax payer money to subsidize the private insurance companies to cover lower income families (according to Sen. Rockefeller); and there are no strings attached on the amount those companies can charge for that insurance. They are already trying to increasing some premiums by 39% in California and 24% here in Maine. Those subsidies go to the very corporations that have caused the current healthcare crisis; they are unconscionable and citizens resent it. And to add insult to injury, Washington wants to pay for this by taxing workers’ insurance benefits.
Because of President Obama, the current House and Senate bills also prevent Medicare from negotiating for lower prices; costing taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars for overpriced medicines. In addition, the President agreed to kill the measure that would allow the importation of drugs at reduced prices for private citizens. America is tired of sweetheart deals where they end up paying for the sweets but get none.
We all know that the bills would prevent insurance companies from denying coverage for people with pre-existing conditions, and cancelling their coverage once they get sick and make a claim (which should be against the law anyway), but that does not justify the hundreds of billions of dollars in corporate subsidies, and preventing the importation of discounted prescription drugs.
And to top it off, the pending House and Senate bills would make it mandatory (or be fined) that everyone purchase health insurance from the very insurance corporations that have been the primary contributor to America’s healthcare crisis. As a result, Washington will be handing an additional 30-45 million new customers (the current uninsured) over to the insurance companies on a silver platter.
If it isn’t completely obvious that Washington has done the bidding of the special interests, consider the fact that Senator Baucus hired Liz Fowler, VP for Public Policy and External Affairs at WellPoint (the country’s largest private health insurance corporation), to write the Senate Finance Committee bill (see the document’s ‘properties’, she’s listed as author) .
I will address the solution to the healthcare crisis in my next letter.