Believing the lie, drink that koolaid!

The Huffington Post said:
We Cared About Numbers, Not People: Former CIGNA PR Chief Comes Clean

Alison Rose Levy
Posted: July 13, 2009 12:00 PM

"When you're in the executive offices... you don't think about individual people. You think about the numbers and whether or not you're going to meet Wall Street's expectations... That enables you to stay there, if you don't really think that you're talking about and dealing with real human beings, " Wendell Potter, former head of Corporate Communications for health insurance giant told Bill Moyers in his recently aired program.

Potter, who voluntarily left a life of corporate jets and managing media information, got a wakeup call when he attended a so-called health fair on a trip back home to the South.

"What I saw were doctors who were set up to provide care in animal stalls. Or they'd erected tents, to care for people. I mean, there was no privacy. In some cases -- and I've got some pictures of people being treated on gurneys, on rain-soaked pavement.

And I saw people lined up, standing in line or sitting in these long, long lines, waiting to get care. People drove from South Carolina and Georgia and Kentucky, Tennessee -- all over the region, because they knew that this was being done. A lot of them heard about it from word of mouth.

There could have been people and probably were people that I had grown up with. They could have been people who grew up at the house down the road, in the house down the road from me. And that made it real to me."

In his conversation with Moyers, Potter also revealed how health insurance PR execs sought to marginalize Michael Moore's film Sicko, dissuade Democratic legislators from addressing the concerns the film raised about the quality of American health care and the uninsured, and defeat health reform under Clinton.

Currently, these same insurance PR folks are "working relentlessly to kill off efforts to include a public insurance plan in the health care bill. Although three quarters of Americans polled support a public option, the industry is spending more than 1.4 million dollars a day to make sure it doesn't happen," said Moyers.


In the show Porter details the kinds of messages that that daily dose of $1.4 million will buy, recounting in the past how the industry sought to discredit Moore by characterizing him as a "radical" and "Hollywood film-maker."

WENDELL POTTER: They don't want you to think that it was a documentary that had some truth. They would want you to see this as just some fantasy that a Hollywood filmmaker had come up with. That's part of the strategy.

BILL MOYERS: So you would actually hear politicians mouth the talking points that had been circulated by the industry to discredit Michael Moore.

WENDELL POTTER: Absolutely.

The insurance industry's "war on Sicko" reveals the kinds of tactics and disinformation in use now to discredit a public option in health insurance reform -- and to line up Congressional support to defeat it.

Moyers asked about how the industry acts to influence Congress.

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 also addressed the underlying PR goals:

WENDELL POTTER: The industry has always tried to make Americans think that government-run systems are the worst thing that could possibly happen to them, that if you even consider that, you're heading down on the slippery slope towards socialism. So they have used scare tactics for years and years and years, to keep that from happening.

Source

So I know it will change nothing, that an insider tells you the truth about the insurance industry....

Have another cup of koolaid, that shit cost 1.4 million to make! Its got to be in your best interest, right?

:rolleyes:
 

Frodo

Member
Oh, thank God the government is here to protect from the big bad corporation!!! Only they can protect me from the big scary world!!! Who ever shall I get to wipe my ass?? Obama of course!!

sheep3.jpg
 
MSNBC said:
Nothing funny about ‘Sicko’ state of health care
Gitmo prisoners get better medical treatment than Sept. 11 rescue workers

COMMENTARY
By Arthur Caplan, Ph.D.
msnbc.com contributor
updated 5:09 a.m. PT, Thurs., June 28, 2007

A number of reviewers have described "Sicko," Michael Moore’s new documentary film about health care in the United States, as funny. It isn’t.

Sure there is a chuckle or two to be had. You have to smile when Moore uses '50s-style anti-communist film clips to mock the fear-mongering American politicians engage in whenever the subject turns to "socialized" medicine, or when he is bellowing through a bullhorn while bobbing in a boat in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, begging for the same level of health care for workers injured in Sept. 11 rescue efforts as we afford the evildoers locked up in maximum security at Gitmo.

But "Sicko," which opens nationwide Friday, is not funny. It is tragic. You should not come out of the movie theater smiling. You should leave angry. "Sicko" is right on target about the mess that is American health care.

Moore's critics would like you to believe "Sicko" is slicko. Those with vested interests in preserving the current status quo in health care have already activated their lobbyists, media flacks, think-tank mouthpieces and trade organizations to go after Moore and his movie. There are nearly $2 trillion worth of vested interests out there in insurance, managed care, hospitals, doctors, advertisers and salespeople looking to keep their share of the health care pot of gold.

But there's no disputing the key flaws in our system that "Sicko" makes abundantly clear: Nearly one in five Americans doesn't have health insurance. And even those with insurance often face incredible and sometimes lethal hurdles to adequate health care — from crushing out-of-pocket expenses and co-payments to snail-like bureaucracies unresponsive to the needs of their clients (usually by design in the hope that they simply go away).

As if that's not trouble enough, your doctor may be motivated to deny medical care as he climbs the corporate ladder. Your employer could go bankrupt and leave retirees high and dry. Insurance companies may deny your claim and drop coverage for pre-existing conditions.

And when insurance payments dry up, hospitals have literally tossed patients onto the street. "Sicko" tells these stories irrefutably and grimly.

Paying more for less
Worse, if that is possible, Americans pay more for this mess than anyone else in the world for health care — and we get less for our money. Despite our love of the free market, the rest of the industrialized world delivers care to more of its populations with much more economic efficiency than we do. The only parts of the U.S. health system that approximate the efficiencies of Canada, Germany, Singapore, Australia, France, the Netherlands and Sweden are Medicare and the Veterans Affairs hospital system. Moore goes so far as to visit Cuba to show that even those under Fidel’s dictatorial thumb have easier to access health care than many Americans.

Why do we put up with a broken, bloated, bureaucratic and increasingly barbaric health system? Because your politicians are in the thrall of the people who profit from it. And just enough of us have access to a fairly decent level of care that the misery of the uninsured, underinsured and tapped out does not move us to care.

And Moore doesn't get into this, but even if you have great health insurance, don’t get comfortable. You, too, could be getting the runaround or finding yourself on the outside looking in unless reform comes to American health care.

Will boomers bankrupt the system?
Baby boomers are getting older. And while it is chic to babble on about 50 being the new 40 and for 60-year-old women to grab the headlines by having babies, the fact remains that this group is entering into old age, a time of heavy reliance on health care.

A system that barely can get by dealing with chronic illnesses and the demand for long-term care will soon be tipped over by an entire cohort of geezers who, no matter how religiously they jog and or how much pomegranate juice they drink, will use health care to a degree never seen anywhere in the world at a price that, if nothing is done, will bankrupt the country.

The boomers are partly to blame. They built a health care system to suit their medical needs when they were middle-aged. We have some of the finest acute care hospitals in the world for treating heart attacks and transplanting organs. But we are not prepared to deal with long-term care, home care or hospice, a lack of health care personnel willing to work in these settings and the complete absence of insurance to pay for most of what you need when you are old, disabled or both.

Not only will the ranks of the elderly be exploding but we'll also soon see a rise in genetic testing. More and more of us will find out that we are at risk of various ailments. This means your insurance company and HMO will have even more tools to use to figure out how to chop the risky off their rolls.

Yeah I know its all socialist nonsense right?

I've seen three of Moore's films. I'd be inclined to agree he goes to some extremes with Fahrenheit 9-11 and Bowling for Colombine, but this one not so much. It's real people, and real issues and its everywhere. I'd say open your damn mind and have a look if I thought you were capable of it, but I know different.

Relax, have another cup of koolaid!

:banghead:
 

Gonz

molṑn labé
Staff member
We Cared About Numbers, Not People

Do you really see a problem here? A corporation, whose entire existence is to make money for its shareholders, provides a service.
Read your contract. It doesn't say they must be your friend. They only are required to provide the services under contract & you paid for.

As for sicko..I tried watching it. I couldn't. Wanna bet there can be as many harrowing stories about state run care. Look for the exceptions,
they're always there.
 

catocom

Well-Known Member
meh, I'll just stick with my ice tea, thanks.

The real truth lies in between, and depends on location, and other variables.
 
meh, I'll just stick with my ice tea, thanks.

The real truth lies in between, and depends on location, and other variables.

The reason why the first article is disturbing isn't about profit, its that, as in Moore's film that he refers to, they have teams of people whose job it is, as soon as you make an expensive claim for a treatment, research every possible way the company can deny you the treatment. They hire detectives to find out about any hint of a prior condition. No matter about being profitable. These jackals are preying on you for your money and then denying you what you paid for. That's wrong no matter how you slice it. The film has some insiders from the insurance companies or "whistle blowers", and this guy in the article is an insider telling you the truth whether you like it or not.
 

Professur

Well-Known Member
rj, noone's in the slightest surprised to hear that the insurance industry is a bunch of vultures. noone's in the slightest surprise to learn that the gov't wants to join the flock. The real question is, do you really want to give the insurance industry the power of taxation? I've posted in the past what our gov't did when they were allowed to "insure" the taxpayer. You were insured at the point of a gun, with no option, and jailed if you miss a payment.

Why not simply empower Joe Q to hold the existing insurance companies to their contracts honestly?
 
Well there has been some talk of nonprofit insurance companies. I have heard arguments both ways but if they were to go that way it would require tougher laws for insurance for profit to work, but it is something to think about.
 

Cerise

Well-Known Member
Mr. Moyers, former trustee of Soros' Open Society Institute, a self-serving, sanctimonious, sycophant of the Ministry Of Truth, interviews a librul whistleblower about those eeeeevil capitalists!

Hmmmm. His description of the free heath care fair sounds like the prediction of 0bamacare:

What I saw were doctors who were set up to provide care in animal stalls. Or they'd erected tents, to care for people. I mean, there was no privacy. In some cases -- and I've got some pictures of people being treated on gurneys, on rain-soaked pavement.

And I saw people lined up, standing in line or sitting in these long, long lines, waiting to get care.

What do you expect when it's free?

The Government shouldn't control health care. They shouldn't have unprecedented access to your private personal information. They shouldn't be able to decide whether or not you need a medical service, or how long you will have to wait to get it.

Oh, yeah, and aside from the blatant unconstitutionality of it, don't you want to embrace the idea of being free and independent? Do you need the government to tell you how to live? Do you want to see the free market and traditional America destroyed? Talk about your koolaid drinkers....
 

Gonz

molṑn labé
Staff member

Oh look, GOVERNMENT interference.

My wife worked for an insurer in California. My son had a quarter million dollar claim. I've seen both sides. It's up to you to read your contract know the limitations. Or, as a free man in America, to not pay for insurance. You are not required to pay the vultures. It's a choice.
 

Frodo

Member
It's up to you to read your contract know the limitations.

Gonz, Gonz, Gonz....Have you not seen the change. Do you not understand the true light that is OBAMA. Contracts are no longer binding. They are a mere tapestry in the great halls of the new age justice, waiting to be rearranged at the wims of the all knowing OZ. Just ask the poor slobs that made GM possible through their investments. They had a contract that said that they were first in line to recover the assets should the company fold. But the great one saw folly in such contracts, knowing that it is only right to allow the UAW to feast upon the carcass of the golden goose which they slaughtered.
 

Frodo

Member
they have teams of people whose job it is, as soon as you make an expensive claim for a treatment, research every possible way the company can deny you the treatment.

Kind of like Obama setting up a task force to decide what will be considered a "practical" use of medical care given the illness at hand and the demographic of the patient. The difference is, the insurance company can't deny you treatment, only reimbursement. The government will deny treatment.
 

Gonz

molṑn labé
Staff member
Gonz, Gonz, Gonz....Have you not seen the change. Do you not understand the true light that is OBAMA. Contracts are no longer binding. They are a mere tapestry in the great halls of the new age justice, waiting to be rearranged at the wims of the all knowing OZ. Just ask the poor slobs that made GM possible through their investments. They had a contract that said that they were first in line to recover the assets should the company fold. But the great one saw folly in such contracts, knowing that it is only right to allow the UAW to feast upon the carcass of the golden goose which they slaughtered.

You're right, forgive me. I am too old fashioned for this brave new world. Taking people at face value & thinking a contract was worth the paper it's printed on...silly me
 

spike

New Member
Do you really see a problem here? A corporation, whose entire existence is to make money for its shareholders

Big problem there if their existence is to make money and not cure people. That would lead to them often not insuring people that need the most care.

That's a dumb model for effective healthcare.
 

Professur

Well-Known Member
Big problem there if their existence is to make money and not cure people. That would lead to them often not insuring people that need the most care.

That's a dumb model for effective healthcare.


It's also called discriminatory business practices, and you already have laws about that. You just need to enforce them
 
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