Hundreds Of Former Lawmakers And Congressional Staffers Hired To Lobby On Health Care

Washington Post:

The nation's largest insurers, hospitals and medical groups have hired more than 350 former government staff members and retired members of Congress in hopes of influencing their old bosses and colleagues, according to an analysis of lobbying disclosures and other records.

Read the whole story: Washington Post

Comments

[BeasleysMom]

People need to pay close attention to this. It is given very little attention by the MSM. Why would an industry spend this kind of money to defeat an act by congress that 75 percent of the American people want? Because the dis honest and crimin al health insurance companies know that eventually they will rightly be put out of business by a public plan that will benefit all Americans. And, yet the gop whole heartedly supports these companies by spreading l ies and innuendos about a public plan and an eventually single payer system.

Gop voters and tro//s: Why do you wish big business to control your life? Why do you deny a choice of health insurance to 50 million Americans? We know why big business does it. but why does the average person?

[layman]

Because they are inarticulae, undereducated and lack of common sense. It's all very sad.

[nancytheragingliberal]

I have an answer to the 350 lobbyists, making a zillion dollars, keep it up and no member of congress in either party will get one thin dime from me.......e­ver, and that includes O., if I do not see top notch, meaningful health care reform and a reduction in my payments. BC BS just raised my rates 33, yes, 33 percent. I am now going to pay $16,000.00 per year and am ripsh** b/c my co-pay doubled and things that were covered are no longer covered. How's that for a bend over, Nancy? Americans have the answer to these thieves, do not give another dime to any member of congress, send your comments to all of them and close your pockets books and wallets. I called all of the bought and paid for members of Congress and delivered the "Not another dime" message to them. I suggest that my fellow, weary, ripped off bloggers do the same.

[BeasleysMom]

I call my senators (and other people's!) on a regular basis. I even have my senators programmed into my phone so anytime I see that they have made statements that could assist to defeat a bill with a public plan, I can call and them know I will fight their reelection. Every single senator and rep who votes against it needs to find another job because they do not represent the will of the majority of Americans.

I, too, am a "raging liberal" and I am proud of it. I am tired of health insurance company execs getting rich off of my lack of health care. With me, it will end soon. Either we get an affordable public plan, or I will have to drop my current BC BS and become one of the the millions of uninsured in ths country.

[SinfullySublime]

Good for you, Mom but, they can (and do) ignore our calls and letters. They wouldn't be able to ignore it if we collectively cut off their supply of ill-gotten dollars, though.

[Kassandra]

You know what shocks ME most? Is that we're even HEARING about this! During Bush lots of "laws" got passed that we didn't even stand a chance of influencin­g....I guess that's some change right there...no­t enuff, but some.

[mjtaylor22]

If the industry is so much against reform, we must really need it, People these are your premiums going toward lobbying to keep the status quo system in place,
You know the system where they are for your insurance card before they ask where does it hurt, they system where patients dies in the hospital waiting room as the security guard and the nurses ignore their circumstances.
Yes think about it really, a less expensive govt option would force these for profit insurers to tighten their belts, to actually provide services instead of just collecting our money and taking trips
Think about it, how much of your monthly premium is being spent to keep you a hostage to for profit healthcare
Which has accomplished the great feat of making Americans the Fattest in the world
We're Number 1, in obesity and that is all.......­.....

[ResistanceisFutile]

Obscene!

[PiscesPrincess]

I have a very very funny feeling that this all-out push by lobbyists may be the final blow to their efforts.
Think about it.
remember when we all used to be inundated with phone calls at dinner time ?
and we all got so sick and tired of it we finally pressured for regulation of commercial pressure from that type of marketing?
betcha that happens with our beloved U.S. Congress this year. already there are 6 to every one congressperson in DC.
Hopefully they will regulate the number of lobbyists allowed in DC for any particular issue in future years.

[Kassandra]

Would be nice to think so. However, whatever would the Congress DO without those vacation homes and trips they get form these sellouts?

[graciella]

Problem is, the phone calls at dinner did not send big checks. We are witnessing a moral test of our government. Like "to catch a Predator", or driving by a brothel (no disrespect to prostitutes intended). Like President Obama stated in regard to the Iran situation, :"The world is watching". Sometimes it matters and sometimes the greed and denial are too powerful. We shall see what kind of people are representing the good of the people.

[Firbolg]

Nice idea, but if every time we answered an unsolicited call at dinner time we got a fat check and an invite to a "seminar" in the Bahamas with a companion of our choice we might still be taking the calls and even skipping dinner.

[frappe]

Ex Gov. Blagojavich of Illinois, who was recently impeached for participating and encouraging various "pay to play" schemes, should have started his political career by running for office in the U.S. Congress. That, by all that we see and hear, is the major league of "pay to play", with special interests free to run amok, sabotaging the democratic process for their own personal profit.

[Grunty1]

And then we wonder why our insurance premiums keep going up. This is $1.4 million a day that COULD be going to patients.

[VotingPresent]

Are these the new jobs BHO is talking about?

[BeasleysMom]

If you do not like President Obama, why don't you spend your time constructively within the system to reelect gops instead of making sn arky comments on line? Or are you one of the army of commentors being paid by the insurance companies?

[BeasleysMom]

Being paid by the insurance companies to sr#w over your fellow Ameicans?

[keepemhonest]

I wish there was a way that "we the people" could DEMAND that NO member of Congress is allowed to have one more day of THEIR taxpayer-paid healthcare --- after all "we" can't afford to GIVE them healthcare.

[thinkagain2]

I am at a loss as to how anyone can spend 1.4 million in a day. And if the healthcare industry can afford THIS, they sure as hell can make health insurance a LOT less expensive without any gov't influence at all. It would be called 'doing the right thing'.

[Cambridge9]

I forgot which Health Insurance company it was that boasted that in 2008 it had a PROFIT of $22 Billion. That's just not right.

[layman]

Legal public looting working beautifully !

[thinkagain2]

Which we pay for it twice...in our premiums and in the government programs that have to step in to make health care even marginally available to most Americans. Wholeheartedly support a single payer system so we only have to pay our share once.

[Dan311]

I'm afraid that the 'right thing' doesn't occur to an industry whose unofficial motto is:

Walk It Off, America.

[dagnew]

As long as they are 'for-profit,' they aren't going to do the right thing. Greed rules.

[mjtaylor22]

uM OUR INSURANCE INSUSTRY IS PROFIT DRIVEN, it has nto been about keepign americans healthy for a long long time.
get it, it si abotu the wallet of the CEO, not the premuim paying suckas

[PATina]

This is why we have to continue to push against those in Congress..­. particularly those Conservadems who are all too willing to take corporate funds to preserve the status quo. We want CHANGE !!!! And we want it now!!! No more sitting back and "trusting" politicians to do the right thing. We must stay vigilant to make sure they do what we elected them to do !

[exoevolution]

Americans have the best government that money can buy!

President Obama is this "change we can believe in"?

President Obama when does "yes we can" become "yes we did"?

President Obama when will votes be the currency of government instead of "corporate money"?

[Grunty1]

I see that you are failing to notice the "WE" in those statements.

[NWNHNM]

July 6th, 2009
9:09 am

We need single payer. We cannot trust the insurance companies to have any part of our health care system. They have proved (and admitted) that they are out for profit, not to insure care.

We all complain about the big companies controlling Congress. But the only reason that they have money to buy Congress is because we spend our money with these big companies.

If we want health care for all, namely a single payer plan, we the consumers of America must boycott all the big players until they tell Congress to pass a single payer plan. (Congress has fully announced that they will not do the people's business and Obama is just a step behind - he just still makes pretty speeches saying it's all about us.)

A boycott for health care would look like this: all non-essential spending would stop. No McDonald's, no Wal-Mart, no cable, no movies. Only essential spending and that with local businesses to the extent possible. If sufficient numbers of the American people boycotted for a week, the powers that be would lose enough money that they would get the message. If a week is not enough, go 2 or a month.

We don't need most of that junk anyway.

We need to quit shoveling money to these corporations who use our government to do their business and to leave the American people hanging by a thread.

They only hear money. Let our money talk.

[OurKoan]

Its the last real vote we actually have in our "democracy"--our wallets. Sad.

[SinfullySublime]

"A boycott for health care would look like this: all non-essential spending would stop. No McDonald's, no Wal-Mart, no cable, no movies. Only essential spending and that with local businesses to the extent possible"

Right on! My family is already doing this and, it's not as difficult as we expected it to be. It's really liberating to realize how little a person really needs -- consume.

[SinfullySublime]

It's really liberating to realize how little a person needs TO consume, that is.

[lastams]

Besides the actual debate on health care reform, what does this say about our system
that Congress can be thus influenced; that there are former "representatives" working
as shills for the same special interests that put them in office?
We elected Obama as someone outside the realm of bought and sold politics, or so we thought,
and this isn't an issue that someone can be middle of the road on;
Either you believe in a democracy answerable to the People, or an Oligarchy run by
a handful of Corporations answerable only to their own bottom line.
If Obama, our last best hope at real change, doesn't stand up and absolutely refuse to compromise on this issue, then it will truly be time to look to a third party for change.
The first candidate that states on day one he will install publicly financed elections, make it illegal for any Congressman to work for anyone who contributed to his campaign EVER, and
promise to jail any lobbyist within a quarter mile of the capital,
will have my vote.
If nothing else, this issue is shedding light on just how corrupt the system has become.
Perhaps it will finally rally the American people to demand real change.