Former Health Insurance Exec Comes Clean About Industry Efforts To Discredit "Sicko"

On Friday's edition of "Bill Moyers Journal" the PBS host sat down Wendell Potter, a former Head of Corporate Communications at health insurance giant CIGNA, to talk about how the industry crafted its plan of attack for discrediting Michael Moore and his film "Sicko" back in 2007. Potter says the health insurance industry was genuinely afraid that "people would believe Michael Moore." Part of the industry's strategy, according to documents obtained by Moyers was to "highlight horror stories of government-run systems" and other such scare tactics.

Potter said that he feels Moore's film "hit the nail on the head" about the failures of our health care system when compared to those found in other countries.

Comments

[imsosure]

Can't be done without lying buddy so, good luck with that.

[soggypolitics]

Oh awesome... I sent over this link I'm really happy to see they posted it. (I'm sure I wasn't the only one!)

[Harrier]

It shows that Insurance companies are taking 30% profit for doing nothing. The 30% profit comes out of providing 30% better medical care. This is something insurance companies have known forever. They are cutting more benefits for the sole purpose increasing their profits. Their problem is their greed has inflated rates so much they have taken away their ability to fill the market. They are imploding

[Davwbaird]

GUD, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men." POWER OF LIVE AND DEATH.

[cozen]

Sicko: the Michael Moore Healthcare Documentary: http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/sicko/

[socalgal38]

Thank you for posting this link, I wish everyone would view this film documentary.
It is hard to think of ourselves as world leader when we put profits ahead of human life. The greed in this country is a disgrace.

[robbep]

So your plan worked? Absolutely.

[robbep]

Ah corporate jets and gold rimmed dinner plates now that is hlth care for you. For the rest of you stand in line and wait your turn to see a doctor in the hoss stall. When will the yokels understand that the insurance executives cld give a rats tail about hlth insurance they are about squeezing profits . We need to get this interview out there.

[Frank Smith]

“The more healthy people that we can bring in, the lower will be the average cost in that risk pool.” - health care economist Linda Blumberg, a former advisor to President Bill Clinton who is now at the non-partisan Urban Institute in Washington.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31782553/ns/politics-capitol_hill/

I don't like the sound of healthy me subsidizing people who eat like pigs, drink like fish and smoke like chimneys. Hopefully something decent gets hashed out. I fully understand how insurance companies make money - collect premiums and refuse to pay claims. ;O)

[babyboomerorig]

So, how do you feel about insurance companies refusing cancer treatments to those who have never smoked, eaten healthy, good weight and mentally fit. Right now, there are millions of us who can't even get insurance because of pre-existing conditions that may never again rear their ugly heads...do we get to participate in an insurance program or just go off in the woods and die?

How do you feel about the money we spend annually on treating prisoners?

[Davwbaird]

GOOD POINT I have medicare why should I care? Basically I see it as a right and necessary for the common good' I once thought that was what we all were striving for. Right? Or was the weekly reader a propaganda tool? Ah.

[lisakaz2]

How do you feel about "subsidizing" those who get into car accidents or those who get bitten by a Lyme-infested tick? Is there a moral component to all illness disease?

[Steve Magruder]

But think about this: What if you end up with a disease that has nothing to do with your personal habits? It happens, you know.

[robbep]

The sad thing is how they sit around the board rooms and openly discuss how they are going to manipulate the yokels and buy the centrist dems and it works. This clip wld make a great political advertisement.

[up2uamerica]

How much pain must WE endure before WE DEMAND change?
Get out your pitch forks folks, it's time!!!

[FearlessFraz]

Every Congress person should see the entire broadcast. Ben Nelson, did you see it??

[craneman]

Yeah, I'm sure Nelson saw it as did other Pols in the tank for The Insurance-AMA Lobby---So What America, Suck it up. Some things will never change!!!

[OneTop]

The full interview can be viewed here.

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/07102009/watch2.html

[flurryup]

I saw Sicko awhile back and I believed every word. These insurance companies are going down!!! Be afraid Insurance companies, be ver effin g afraid.

[BadHaBritt]

Afraid of what?

Both parties are fully paid for, the administration is all talk, albeit as slick as a snake oil salesman.
The earlier post had it right. go get your pitch forks. It's past time.

[Samalabear]

Actually, they are afraid. The money spent on lobbying this year so far has been astronomical. More than enough to cover the uninsured and the underinsured.

But I agree with you about Obama. He's the one who really needs to see this, but I don't think it would move him one bit. He wants the private insurers to continue front and center. I don't know if he's seen Sicko. It's a question somebody should have the cajones to ask him. I'm pretty sure that Michael Moore isn't anymore welcome in this Administration than he was in the last one.

[up2uamerica]

You have to watch this whole video! Huff Post needs to feature this and Ed Shultz needs to
get this guy on his show. WAKE UP AMERICA! This is what we have been dealing with. Hats off to Wendaell Potter for speaking out. He needs a bigger platform to speak about this.

[000Jade000]

I thought about e-mailing Ed, too. (On Sat. I went to Michael Moore's site to see if he had anything up about Potter, and sure enough, he did.) Potter should be getting some more interviews for sure.

Yes, the entire Journal was good. I enjoyed Bill Moyers' monologue after the Potter interview as well as the supplemental info. on his blog:

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/blog/2009/07/bill_moyers_michael_winship_so.html

Moyers has been doing an incredible job with his show in getting real news out. It's too bad that the rest of our media is so lousy.

[SeriousBlack]

I'd like to see our friend Saysaysay watch this whole video (the whole thing, mind you) and then provide us with his incredibly intelligent insights on it.

[underoath]

I watched this earlier huff po should put this closer to the top.

[callmeslice23]

Agreed but they won't. There will be something far more sensationalist put there while real news like this gets thrown under the bus.

[robbep]

We will prbly get to see sara catching salmon tomorrow. Sorry Ed,Rachel, and keith but you know it is true.

[smchp]

That space is reserved for MJ stories and the latest Sarah Gump Palin story about her shooting a moose and critisizing someone over it.