NewsTrust - Insurance - Most Recent Stories: Opinion (Independent)

The Declaration of Insurance Independence

Sun, 03 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

TechCrunch - By Dave Chase - Jul. 03 (Opinion) - Healthcare’s perverse incentives and an accompanying stifling bureaucracy driven by encumbering day-to-day healthcare with insurance has caused hyperinflation that is crushing family, employer and government budgets and holding back job growth. This must be stopped. Citizens and healthcare providers are doing exactly that, however counter-productive insurance regulations are impairing the ability to expand upon health plans shown to reduce costs by 40% or more. We, therefore, declare that: the United States are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent of insurance and self-sufficient in accessing day-to-day healthcare; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to insurance bureaucracy; and that all insurance connections involving the purchase of day-to-day healthcare, are and ought to be totally dissolved; as Free and Independent States they have full Power to explore the range of more effective ways of accessing day-to-day healthcare, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.

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"Deadly Spin: An Insurance Company Insider Speaks Out on How Corporate PR is Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans"

Tue, 16 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Democracy Now - By Wendell Potter, Amy Goodman - Nov. 16 (Interview) - In the wake of the midterm elections, Republican lawmakers are vowing to repeal or defund the Democrats’ landmark healthcare reform bill that President Obama signed into law earlier this year. A health insurance insider-turned-whistleblower argues that, instead of repealing the law altogether, Republicans will ultimately settle for gutting the law of its provisions that protect consumers. That’s because the insurance industry is a major beneficiary of healthcare reform and they’re also a major contributor to Republican campaigns.

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Hatch to President Obama: Health Law Rhetoric Doesn't Match Policies

Mon, 14 Jun 2010 00:00:00 -0700

hatch.senate.gov - By Orrin G. Hatch - Jun. 14 (Opinion) - Almost 60 percent of our entire population – or more than 170 million Americans – access their health care through their employers. Despite your pledge that “if you like your plan, you can keep your plan,” it is more clear than ever that the employer mandate included in the health law will act as an incentive for employers to drop their coverage and will further serve to increase federal health spending at a time of unsustainable budget deficits.

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Medicare and the New Health Care Law: What It Means to You

Sat, 01 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services - May. 01 (Advocacy) - The Affordable Care Act passed by Congress and signed by President Obama this year will provide you and your family greater savings and increased quality health care. It will also ensure accountability throughout the health care system so that you, your family, and your doctor—not insurance companies—have greater control over your care.

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Healthcare Bill "A Victory for Capitalism"

Tue, 23 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Michael Moore, Sharif Abdel Kouddous, Amy Goodman - Mar. 23 (Interview) - President Barack Obama is signing the main healthcare overhaul bill this morning at a White House ceremony. We speak with Academy Award-winning filmmaker Michael Moore. "The healthcare bill that was passed ultimately will be seen as a victory for capitalism," Moore says. "It protected the capitalist model of providing healthcare for people -- in other words, we are not to help unless there is money to be made from it."

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Industry Interests are Not in Their "Twilight"

Sun, 21 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Salon - By Glenn Greenwald - Mar. 21 (Opinion) - ... to pretend that this bill represents the "Twilight of the Interest Groups," that special interests have been "neutralized," that this bill is some sort of great victory over the health insurance and drug lobbies, is just hagiography and propaganda. Being able to force the Government to bribe and accommodate you is not a reflection of your powerlessness; quite the opposite. Everyone would love to be forced into a "twilight" like that. It's one thing for the Obama administration and the DNC to issue self-serving claims like this (we've stood up to the insurance and drug companies!), but those who hold themselves out as independent commentators ought to keep their feet on their ground.

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Be Not Afraid

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0800

The New England Journal of Medicine - By Len M. Nichols, Ph.D. - Mar. 11 (Opinion) - Aside from the stunningly effective misinformation campaign, the substantive issue that has stalled health care reform is economic: Can we afford this new promise to ourselves, now?

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The National Health Care Anthem

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Robert Reich's Blog - By Robert Reich - Feb. 10 (Opinion) - Now, Anthem Blue Cross is going a step further. It's raising rates for individual policyholders by as much as 39 percent. That's fifteen times faster than inflation. So far, my group policy hasn't been affected but I'm expecting the worst.

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Right & Left Agree: Mandates are the Road to Neofeudalism

Wed, 30 Dec 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Firedoglake - By Jane Hamsher - Dec. 30 (Opinion) - There is tremendous fear rising on both the right and the left that the announced intention of Congress — to force every American to pay tribute to private corporations, with no government alternative — sets a dangerous and frightening precedent with implications far outside the scope of health care.

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How a Few Private Health Insurers Are on the Way to Controlling Health Care

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Robert Reich's Blog - By Robert Reich - Dec. 10 (Opinion) - we still end up with a system that's based on private insurers that have no incentive whatsoever to control their costs or the costs of pharmaceutical companies and medical providers. If you think the federal employee benefit plan is an answer to this, think again. Its premiums increased nearly 9 percent this year. And if you think an expanded Medicare is the answer, you're smoking medical marijuana. The Senate bill allows an independent commission to hold back Medicare costs only if Medicare spending is rising faster than total health spending. So if health spending is soaring because private insurers have no incentive to control it, we're all out of luck. Medicare explodes as well.

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Unhappy Thanksgiving

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

TruthOut - By William Rivers Pitt - Nov. 26 (Opinion) - Ten months after the inauguration of Barack Obama, those "Yes We Can" and "Hope" slogans have begun to ring more than a little hollow. Of course, the man inherited a vast array of ongoing catastrophes from his predecessor, and it is a dead-bang certainty that ten months under a McCain administration would have left us in far worse shape than we find ourselves in today, but the realization that matters are only slightly better than they would have been under the worst-case scenario doesn't go very far anymore.

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Easy Choices

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

OurFuture.org - By Terrance Heath - Nov. 20 (Opinion) - I'll say it again. Whether it's Sarah Palin's self-serving contradictions, or Democrats' and Republicans' cynical political compromises, in the realm of politics, the choices we make for others are the truly easy choices.

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Harry Reid, and What Happened to the Public Option

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Robert Reich's Blog - By Robert Reich - Nov. 19 (Opinion) - Our private, for-profit health insurance system, designed to fatten the profits of private health insurers and Big Pharma, is about to be turned over to ... our private, for-profit health care system. Except that now private health insurers and Big Pharma will be getting some 30 million additional customers, paid for by the rest of us.

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Corporations Win Again - This Time It's Healthcare

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

seekingalpha.com - By Jason Kelly - Nov. 09 (Opinion) - Health insurance companies are surely laughing themselves silly as the bill would force people to buy insurance from them. The remnant of the public insurance option is pretty barebones, so those unable to pay for insurance won't be well covered.

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S-Word, Dr. Kevorkian, Medical Loss Ratio, MLR

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

TruthOut - By Greg Palast - Oct. 15 (Review) - The industries' slice is growing to nearly a quarter of your insurance bill. All of it just paperwork and profiteering. President Obama is never going to pull the insurance company piggies from a trough this big, especially when the industry has made room for Congressional snouts.

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The Bright Side of Death

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

SickOfBlueCross.com - Oct. 09 (Advocacy) - Always look on the bright side of death. Yes the sustem may seem rotten, but there's something you've forgotten when you start to think of calling for reform: we've got more cash than you. Still, always look on the bright side of death.

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A Time Bomb We Await

Sat, 01 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

tehelka.net - By Nityanand Jayaraman - Aug. 01 (Opinion) - THE FALLOUT of Hillary Clinton’s recent visit to India could be dangerously nuclear, literally. Clinton’s India visit had an important agenda – to urge India to pass a law to ensure that a Bhopallike disaster does not trouble its victims for as long as the 25-year-old tragedy has. There is one twist, though. Bhopalis are not the subject of this proposed legislation. Rather, the ‘victims’ that the two Governments are committed to helping are US multinationals like GE that are champing at the bit to supply nuclear equipment and lure India’s $175 billion nuclear market.

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The Ultimate Irony: Health Care Industry Adopts Big Tobacco's PR Tactics

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Center for Media and Democracy - By Wendell Potter - Jul. 09 (Opinion) - At first look, one might not think that the health insurance industry has much in common with the tobacco industry. After all, one sells a product that kills people and the other sells a product nominally aimed at putting people back together. But when it comes to deceitful public relations techniques, the health insurance industry has been learning well from Big Tobacco, which employed a panoply of shady but highly successful public relations tactics to fend off changes to its business for generations. One of things I said in my testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee on June 24 is that the health insurance industry engages in duplicitous public relations campaigns to influence public opinion and the debate on health care reform. By that I mean there are campaigns they want you to you know about, and those they don’t. When you hear insurance company executives talk about how much they support health care reform and can be counted on by the President and Congress to be there for them, that's the campaign they want you to be aware of. I call it their PR charm offensive.

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Kennedy Bill Makes Headway for Health Reform

Tue, 09 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Womenstake.org - By Marcia D. Greenberger - Jun. 09 (Statement) - “One of the exciting aspects of the bill is that it confronts many of the particular obstacles faced by women in our current health care system, and eliminates many insurance industry practices that are especially harmful to women.

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Blue Cross Millionaires Are Scared to Compete With a Public Plan

Mon, 25 May 2009 00:00:00 -0700

TruthOut - By Dean Baker - May. 25 (Opinion) - Blue Cross of North Carolina decided to jump the gun on President Obama and Congress and start running television ads telling people how awful a public health care plan would be. According to the ads, people enrolled in the public health care plan wouldn't have a choice of doctors, would face long waiting periods for appointments and procedures and would not even be able to get a clerk to answer questions on billing. That sounds pretty awful, but if it were true, you have to wonder why Blue Cross of North Carolina is so worried.

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The Health Care Industry and their Capitol Hill Protectors Are Sabotaging Our Chance for True Reform

Sun, 26 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - By Marie Cocco - Apr. 26 (Opinion) - Maintaining what amounts to a monopoly on insurance for the working-age population has become a central goal of the insurance industry, which rightly fears that the government will provide more comprehensive coverage at a lower cost. This is, of course, the whole point of overhauling the insurance system. But never mind.

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Doctors to Candidates: Enact Single-Payer Health Reform

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Common Dreams - By Steffie Woolhandler, M.D. - Oct. 06 (Advocacy) - Over 5,000 U.S. physicians have signed an open letter calling on the candidates for president and Congress "to stand up for the health of the American people and implement a nonprofit, single-payer national health insurance system." Noting that the nation's private-insurance-based model is failing by denying needed medical care to millions, wasting resources and driving up costs, the doctors say that a publicly financed system is "the sole hope for affordable, comprehensive coverage."

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Barack Obama And Joe Biden's Plan To Lower Health Care Costs And Ensure Affordable, Accessible Health Coverage For All

Fri, 03 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

barackobama.com - By Obama for America - Oct. 03 (Advocacy) - Barack Obama and Joe Biden believe we must redesign our health system to reduce inefficiency and waste and improve health care quality, which will drive down costs for families and individuals. The Obama-Biden plan will improve efficiency and lower costs in the health care system by: (1) adopting state-of-the-art health information technology systems; (2) ensuring that patients receive and providers deliver the best possible care, including prevention and chronic disease management services; (3) reforming our market structure to increase competition; and offering federal reinsurance to employers to help ensure that unexpected or catastrophic illnesses do not make health insurance unaffordable or out of reach for businesses and their employees.

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