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It wasn't the British penchant for talking about the weather, or for apologizing when someone else steps on your toes.

It was that Londoners often eat while walking down the street.

"Devouring a Niçoise salad and dodging pedestrians at the same time is not a sign of civilization," my friend concluded, with Gallic hauteur. "It's a sign that you need to slow down."

You can say that again. In our fast-forward culture, we have lost the art of eating well.

Food is often little more than fuel to pour down the hatch while doing other stuff -- surfing the Web, driving, walking along the street. Dining al desko is now the norm in many workplaces.

All of this speed takes a toll. Obesity, eating disorders and poor nutrition are rife. We are also missing out on the sensual pleasure and social connection that come from eating good food together.

The bright news is that people all over the world are taking a slower approach to food -- and eating better as a result.

The Italian-based Slow Food movement now has 100,000 members in 132 countries, including the fast-food-loving US. The search for a kinder, gentler relationship with food is reflected in other trends, too: the renaissance of the farmers' market; the rise of school gardens; the growing popularity of cooking classes; the organic, fairtrade and eat-local movements; the thriving artisanal production of everything from cheese and chocolate to bread and beer.

The recession may also be helping. To cut back on restaurant bills, people are eating at home more. But unlike in the last downturn, when sales of frozen meals soared, more of us are taking the time to cook from scratch. The US is now racking up the highest levels of homecooking since 1992.

There is so much to be gained from investing more time in what we eat.

Buying fresh ingredients means knowing where your food comes from and what's in it. In a world where so much happens through computer screens, making a meal by hand, touching the raw materials, feeling your way through a recipe, tasting, adjusting, engaging all the senses, can be a soothing release.

Eating more slowly, chewing every mouthful, pays dividends, too. It helps digestion and guards against gluttony by giving the stomach time to tell the brain that it is full.

It also allows you to savor what you put in your mouth. Of course, this works better with Slow food, which is packed with natural flavors, textures and aromas that linger on the palate and in the mind. By contrast, processed food is designed to be eaten quickly: Pay it too much attention and you start to realize how vile it tastes.

Sharing a slow, convivial meal can also bring people together. It is no accident that the word "companion" is derived from the Latin words meaning "with bread." As Oscar Wilde noted, breaking bread together can even help us bond with those we find hardest to stomach: "After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one's own relations."

At the same time, studies from around the world show that children who have regular family meals are more likely to do well at school, enjoy good mental health, and eat nutritious food; they are also less likely to engage in underage sex or use drugs and alcohol.

Yet Slow food need not be a luxury for the rich. As Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, the 19th century French gastronome, put it: "The pleasures of the table are for every man, of every land, of every place in history or society."

In other words, a Slow meal does not have to be a five-course banquet of handmade delicacies. Small, affordable and simple works, too. You can prepare a fresh tomato pasta or vegetable soup in less time and for less money than it takes to order in pizza or sushi.

Start by fencing off time in your schedule for cooking and eating. Then get reacquainted with your kitchen. Grow a few herbs, like mint, rosemary or thyme, in the garden or on the windowsill. Buy your own fresh ingredients and cook with them. Turn the preparing of food into a communal affair by enlisting others to help with the chopping, grating, stirring, simmering, tasting and seasoning.

When the cooking is finished, eat together round the table with the electronic gadgets switched off so you can savor the food and let the conversation flow.

But, hey, don't beat yourself up if you fall short of the Slow Food ideal. Nobody's perfect. And I mean nobody:

The last time I bumped into my French friend, she was racing down a London street munching on a sandwich.


When was your last slow meal, and aren't you due another one soon?
]]> Sun, 08 Nov 2009 07:13:10 -0500
Under Democratic-authored health care reform, Camp insisted, if people defied the individual mandate and refused to purchase insurance, they could potentially be imprisoned for up to five years. The charge was picked up by a host of fellow Republican lawmakers during speeches on the floor and was played up by conservative media.

The problem is, there's simply no evidence that it's true. In fact, just the opposite.

As Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office noted in a press release of its own, only people "truly capable" of purchasing health insurance (i.e., not lower-income Americans and those facing financial hardship) would face fees for not buying it. The penalty would be enforced (or issue litigated) in civil court, much like the majority of cases that deal with tax policy and the IRS.

If Republicans don't believe Pelosi, they could look at the reforms instituted by one of their own.

Under Massachusetts' health care policy, implemented by former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, the state also has an individual mandate for insurance coverage -- and not one individual has been arrested for not purchasing insurance since the reforms were implemented, an official says.

"Absolutely not one single person," said Celia Wcislo, who serves on the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Board, when asked how many people have suffered such a fate.]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 20:15:02 -0500
Unemployment reaches 10.2 percent: Do we need a bigger stimulus? What do the GOP victories in Virginia and New Jersey mean for both parties? Finally, the House's historic health care bill: will it pass and if so, why wait until 2013 to implement it?

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A security guard urged them not to try ("You can't do that sir, you can't do that.") but King was determined. King and his partner Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.) don't appear to have made it all the way around the Capitol, but they did climb the steps and create a giant mess of paper.

Below, view their attempts to "wrap" the building.

]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 17:05:09 -0500
I ran from La Bastille to the College de France on Rue des Ecoles and up the steps to knock on his door. He opened it, saw the sweat running down my face and, asked rather coldly: "Monsieur, que'est-ce que je peux faire pour vous?" I said I was an anthropology student from America and had a bunch of questions for him. He was gracious but distant and said, "Ask two."

First, I asked him why he believed binary operators to be one of the fundamental structures of the human mind. He shrugged and sighed and then replied:
When I started there was still no science of mind.


Saussure, Marx, Mauss and music were my guides. Since then things have changed. Psychology now has something to say.

Then, I asked him why he became an anthropologist and he said:

I wanted to be a musician but having no talent I read philosophy and wanted to find out how different one human being's thoughts could be from another and how much of that difference is truly the same. In Brazil, an opportunity came to try to find out, and I am still trying.

He dabbed his nose with a handkerchief, rose from his chair in that regal, crane-like manner of his, thanked me for coming and started walking me back to the door, when I turned to him and said. "Margaret Mead te dit bonjour." His dour demeanor turned into a child's joy. "Would you like to come home to dinner with now?" he asked, with a lightness that belonged to another person, another time. I declined with some idiot excuse because I still stank from running. But I asked him if he would join the discussion with Chomsky, Piaget and the others that I had forgotten to tell him about until then. "Yes," he said kindly, "just tell me when."

At the discussion, which took place over the course of a few days at the Abbaye de Royaumont outside Paris, Lévi-Strauss sat patiently, said nothing as others spoke their piece or pontificated, or pleaded and shouted their oppositions. But his doodles of cats and other real and fantastical animals were stunning, and those he left behind were the objects of a fierce competition among some of the conference's participants, including myself. On the way to our last lunch, Noam Chomsky ─ who had dominated this conference of Nobel-prize winning biologists and world-famous mathematicians, philosophers, psychologists and anthropologists as I have never seen anyone do before or after ─ walked up to Lévi-Strauss and said in a shy sort of way: "Perhaps you remember me, when I sat in on your class at Harvard with Roman Jakobson?" Lévi-Strauss looked at Chomsky and said: "I'm sorry, but no." Those were the only words he would utter in the conference room.

In an interview the following year, Levi-Strauss was asked what recent intellectual developments he considered to be important. He said that what had transpired at Royaumont was the most significant intellectual event he had thus far encountered in the second half of the twentieth century. He also implied that his time was over: "I imagine myself in the New World with Columbus for the first time," he mused, "a symphony of sounds, of colors, of smells, of desires, and of hopes. Then I imagine myself on the moon with the astronauts, and all I see is gray, dust and barren rocks, and the earth I long for is far out of reach."]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 15:13:21 -0500
Instead of celebrating the news, she and her husband are terrified about how they will afford all of her pre-natal and maternity care bills without any health care coverage. I support health insurance reform because, in a great nation like ours, this should never happen.

Over the past eight months, I've spoken and met with thousands of constituents - doctors, patients, small business owners, folks with insurance and those without - about this bill. After hearing their thoughts and after careful consideration of the bill, I am proud to support this historic and crucial piece of legislation.

First, this bill prohibits insurance companies from denying coverage because of a pre-existing condition. What does this mean? If your job offers insurance, you can get coverage regardless of your health status. But if you lose your job, aren't offered coverage through work, or are unemployed and need to buy your own insurance, you can be denied coverage because you're pregnant or have high blood pressure, cancer, or diabetes. An insurer can charge higher rates because of those conditions, or for a host of other reasons, including being female or a victim of domestic violence. Reform would put a stop to this.

Many folks who have insurance report that they are happy with it, but too often that coverage is taken away just when it is needed most. Today, an insurer can look for any excuse to kick you off your plan if you become "too expensive." For example, an insurer could comb through your records, find a bout of acne that you forgot to report, and terminate your plan. Reform eliminates this practice, known as rescission, giving Americans security knowing their coverage cannot be taken away.

What about folks on Medicare? AARP has endorsed the bill, stating that after careful consideration, they are confident that this bill expands and protects benefits provided for seniors and retirees.

Opponents of reform have aimed their worst scare tactics at seniors, claiming that the bill includes everything from death panels to euthanasia. In fact, reform provides the help that Medicare needs to continue providing health care for seniors today and for generations to come. We will finally close the Medicare "donut hole" that leaves seniors paying thousands of dollars out-of-pocket for prescription drugs. Seniors will have access to lower cost drugs, too, as the government will be allowed to negotiate with manufacturers to get better deals on medications. And, seniors will have free preventive care services to help them stay healthy and active.

Finally, as a member of the fiscally conservative Blue Dogs, I believe this is an opportunity our nation cannot afford to miss. Everyone has heard the statistics on our health care spending, but I believe a few bear repeating. The American people and their government spend a staggering amount of money on health care - over 17% of our country's entire economic output. Small businesses have seen their health care costs rise 130% in the last decade, cutting into profits and stifling their ability to grow and hire new workers. And premiums for American families have more than doubled in that time, rising four times faster than wages.

This bill lowers health insurance costs for families, individuals, and small businesses and puts our spending on a fiscally sustainable path. As the MIT economist Jonathan Gruber pointed out, premiums will be lower for families and individuals, not just for those who qualify for federal subsidies, but even for those who do not. According to Mr. Gruber, a family making $93,000 would make too much to qualify for financial assistance, but their premiums would still be $1260 - or 12% - less than under current law.

Further, the bill meets a fundamental requirement I stated at the beginning of this debate: that the bill does not add a dime to our federal deficit. In fact, H.R. 3962 actually goes beyond deficit-neutrality, reducing the deficit by $129 billion. Pharmaceutical companies and hospitals, which will see millions of new paying customers, have committed to contribute hundreds of billions in savings toward the cost of reform. And a large portion of the bill is paid for with a surcharge on income over one million dollars, a provision which would impact 1/3 of one percent of households.

It has been 64 years since President Truman declared before Congress that "[m]illions of our citizens do not now have a full measure of opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health...[t]he time has arrived for action to help them attain that opportunity and that protection." It has been 16 years since Congress' last attempt to attain those goals. Since then, over 700,000 people have died because they lacked access to affordable health care coverage. Every day, 500 Pennsylvanians - and 14,000 people across America - lose their health insurance. We simply cannot afford to fail again.

For these reasons, I stand with the AARP, the American Medical Association, and the American Nurses Association in strong support of this crucial, fiscally responsible and long-overdue legislation. ]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 14:46:12 -0500
Shortly after the birth of my daughter Victoria, she was diagnosed with pneumonia. The second time that she got severely sick, Sandra and I immediately took her to the emergency room at St. Vincent's Hospital in New York City. After a preliminary examination the intern on duty told us that it looked like PCP, the AIDS pneumonia. He was right. Over the next days we discovered that Sandra, Victoria, and our older son Reed had HIV. My life changed dramatically on that fall day in 1988.

In Mukono Health Clinic #4, we sat in a cleared out maternity ward. The walls of the ward were pealing and the small windows were cracked. I shared my story with the small group that had assembled, and numerous people in the room offered us a window into their lives as well. They stood up, one after another, and in soft, broken English talked about their lives. I could relate to their stories: a tall, elegant woman in a green, tribal pattern outfit spoke about her fear of revealing her HIV status to her own family; a seventeen-year-old girl in a white and navy blue school uniform talked poignantly about choosing to change schools to avoid the social pressure and stigma that she was faced with once her classmates discovered her diagnosis; an inhibited, college-age man wearing glasses shared that he had been near death several times and that he struggled to be consistent taking his medication; a social worker talked to the group about trying to find the words to help a teenager discuss his HIV status with his girlfriend.

At the clinic I also heard the stories of those who were not able to readily express them: I saw a stunned mother, standing over her day-old twin daughters--they had just been told that they had HIV; I heard the story of a child who was caring for his mother as she was suffering from repeated cases of PCP and numerous opportunistic infections. They stood up one at a time. Most were able to speak in English, while others needed to be translated from their native tongue. Even though they were likely invited by the clinic's organizers to share with the group, I could tell from their expressions that they did not expect to be speaking to people who had actually lived very similar stories.

The stories and medical realities in these poor African Hospitals today are not so different from my first experiences in the Pediatric AIDS clinics at New York Hospital and Bellevue Hospital in the late '80s. At that time the only medicine available were capsules of AZT, and they were not yet available in children's dosages or in a child-friendly format. PCP was still a death warrant for most children. No one knew how long anyone with the virus was going to live, but we knew lists of people who were either about to pass away or had already left us.

My time in Uganda made me extremely proud of what the Foundation is doing. I can still remember attending a board meeting in the late '90s when it was announced that a research project, in part funded by the Foundation, had discovered that Nevirapine had been found to block the transmission of HIV from mother to child in about fifty percent of cases. The board embarked upon an entirely new facet of our mission. With funds from the Gates Foundation, we started to implement the treatment in the countries with the greatest need.

My concern at the time was that helping to block transmission during birth was only one small part of what we needed to do to combat the virus. It seemed inhuman to me to diagnose a mother's HIV status, help her have an HIV-free baby, and then walk away. She probably had a husband and other children who were living with HIV. They surely needed medicine, most probably counseling, and possibly even a little help to keep their kids in school.

Well today, the Foundation's program in Uganda is helping with all these issues and many more. They are confronting the complexities of this illness and bringing help to afflicted families, partly by giving families tools to help themselves.

In 1993, Alexander Vreeland founded Kids for Kids, an annual fund-raiser for the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric Aids Foundation, which over the years has raised over twenty-two million dollars for HIV treatment and research. He first served on the Foundation's Advisory Board, and then joined the Board of Directors of the Foundation between 1998 and 2003. He currently lives in Paris, France with his wife, Lisa, and their seven-year-old daughter, Olivia.
]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 14:41:51 -0500
The president, according to a senior Democratic aide who attended his discussion, told House Dems that newly-elected Rep. Bill Owens proved that members could run on a platform of comprehensive reform and still be elected to Congress.

"He said to look at Bill Owens," the aide recalled. "There is a House seat that's been in Republican hands for more than one hundred years. But Owens didn't run away from reform. He campaigned on it. And he still got elected."

The remarks were part of a broader political push on the president's behalf to buck up recalcitrant Democrats nervous about backing health care legislation. Obama also told members that they shouldn't expect simply not to be attacked by Republicans if they voted against the reform package.

"He certainly talked about the politics and he said that the Republicans want us to fail and no one should feel if they as a Democrat helped us to fail that they would be [free of their attacks]," said Rep. Henry Waxman, chair of the powerful Ways and Means Committee.

House aides said they believe the president helped persuade a handful of fence-sitting Democrats to support the bill. Though they cautioned that the whip count was fluid, especially as the House considers an amendment to tighten restrictions on the coverage of abortion by insurers.

One strategist off the Hill, who is plugged into the debate, proclaimed at 1:15 p.m. that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi did now have the votes for passage. The number of yeas, the source said, was roughly 220 - just two more than is needed for passage.

"The caveat," the source said, "is that Pelosi isn't going to let it get higher than that. She's whipping enough to win the vote but going to release the rest of the caucus to vote no."]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:30:20 -0500
The president, according multiple attendees, played the role of political prognosticator during his roughly 30 minute address before Democratic caucus members on Capitol Hill. Addressing, implicitly, those conservative Democrats who are worried about voting for a nearly trillion dollar health care overhaul, he insisted that they would not be safe from partisan attacks even if they opposed the bill.

"He certainly talked about the politics and he said that the Republicans want us to fail and no one should feel if they as a Democrat helped us to fail that they would be [free of their attacks]," said Rep. Henry Waxman, chair of the powerful Energy and Commerce Committee.

"None of you can expect the Republicans not to go after you if you vote against this bill," Waxman continued, channeling the president. "They want this bill to go down for their own partisan reasons."

Another high-ranking Democratic Hill staffer briefed on the meeting put it this way: "Obama's main message was that the GOP won't go any easier on you if you vote against the bill. It's a tough vote, yes, but they're going to take heat either way."

While politics took up much of the discussion, policy took up very little. Obama, according to several lawmakers, did not talk about the public option or the controversial amendment to make abortion restrictions much tighter. He discussed, primarily, the momentous nature of the vote and the need for the party to be on history's right side.

"This is the moment," said Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) That this is what we all went into politics for, that this was a historic moment, that seven presidents have tried to pass health care and haven't done it, and that this was a moment like civil rights or Social Security or Medicare."

In particular, Obama singled out Rep. John Dingell -- the longest serving member of the House -- who, on Saturday, presided over chamber for first time since the 1965 House vote to pass Medicare.

"He thanked all the chairs [of the committees involved in developing the health care bill]," said Rep. Joe Crowley (D-N.Y). "He thanked all leadership and he mentioned specifically John Dingell."

By the meeting's end, the vast majority of the attending lawmakers seemed confident of health care reform's passage -- though certainly there is the potential for flare-ups as the abortion amendment introduced by Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) comes to consideration.

"We are feeling pretty optimistic that we can defeat this," said Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), a primary opponent of the amendment.

"Democracy is not pretty but it works," said Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), another opponent of the Stupak amendment. "I was here in 1993 when the ship went down," she said, referencing the Clinton administration's failed attempt to pass health reform. "This thing isn't going down."]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:02:23 -0500
For children, it can be challenging to communicate their grief and their behavior becomes their vocabulary. In fact, behavioral problems in children are a common response to grieving. This creates a catch 22: at the very time children need the most reassurance, acceptance and love is at the very time their behavior receives condemnation, criticism and rejection.

So, how can we help? Here are some basic suggestions to help children through their grieving process:

LISTEN

It's important to recognize that a child's life has been dramatically changed. There isn't any amount of preparation that readies them to have their parents gone from their lives. Allow them to talk about their parent who is no longer here. Sometimes, just talking about the parent is a way for the child to keep his parent close to him. As one six year old girl asked, "If I'm not suppose to talk about Mommy anymore, how can I remember what she looks like?" Some children find it difficult to begin the conversation or aren't able yet to talk about their loss. You can help by sharing stories about her parent who is no longer here. For young children, you can turn it into a game of, " I remember" and share a special memory. Encourage them to share a memory either by telling a story or by drawing a favorite memory.

ANSWER QUESTIONS IN WAYS THEY CAN UNDERSTAND

Death is complex and overwhelming at any age. It can be even more so in this era of TV where a child can see his favorite actor die only to reappear in another TV show days later.

Try to avoid terms that can be confusing or even frightening to a child. For instance, telling a child death is like going to sleep and never waking up can cause a child to become afraid of going to sleep. An adult may be comforted by the idea that a loved one has been called home to God. A child, on the other hand, has a hard time understanding how God could be so cruel as to take her Mommy away.


ANTICIPATE GRIEF

As a parent's illness becomes more advanced, the ability to cope with the needs and demands of parenting diminish. This often leads to the child taking on responsibilities and carrying emotional weight that is far beyond their years. These significant changes produce intense emotions including, fear, worry, sadness, resentment and anger. Acting out and becoming difficult to control, withdrawal, tears are all indications of the grief process at work. Talk to the child or use activities to help the child understand what is happening. Children are often baffled and frightened by their change of behavior, too. Provide opportunities for the child to be a child by arranging activities that the child will enjoy.

PROVIDE REASSURANCES ABOUT THE FUTURE BUT DON'T MAKE PROMISES THAT CAN'T BE KEPT

Children need to know they are going to be cared for and that there will be someone there for them. There is an overwhelming desire to want to make "it all better." Sometimes "all better" turns out to be far from perfect. Yet, it's better to be honest than to create unrealistic expectations. As one young man remembering what is childhood was like after the loss of his parents said, "people promised me I would stay with them forever. But forever turned out to be a short time. My childhood was about moving from one relative to another, constantly changing schools, and having to get use to a different life with every move."

REASSURE THEM THE DEATH WASN'T THEIR FAULT

Young children often feel responsible when bad things happen. Reassure them the death wasn't their fault. I was with a young boy who was devastated after his Mom died. He refused to talk about her and had become a problem at school. As we sat together, he finally whispered, "I've got a secret." It took him a few minutes before he continued. He finally said, "I think it was all my fault that she got sick and passed away. I fought with my brothers all of the time and it would make her head hurt and that made her sick. When I would stop fighting, her headache would get better but then I would start fighting again and she would get sick again."

GATHER FAMILY PICTURES AND PLACE THEM IN A SCRAPBOOK TOGETHER

This provides the opportunity for the child to share memories of her parent(s) in a non-threatening way. It also gives her something to keep close and look through when she feels especially lonely.


Rose Winters has extensive nonprofit experience, and currently works with the Gladys Taylor McGarey Medical Foundation working to create a more responsive healthcare system. She serves on the board of the Elisabeth Kübler-Ross Foundation and addresses end of life issue and provides support to those who are grieving. She has had extensive experience working with individuals with a terminal diagnosis and their families. She is also a documentary film producer. Her film, "Finding Hearts at Peace," was recently purchased for broadcast in the Middle East. She continues as a consultant to governmental and nonprofit agencies addressing the concerns of children and youth.]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 07:00:00 -0500
"It tells you something about our country," remarked one distressed member of Congress, who didn't want to be named speaking ill of this fine land.

What it tells isn't pretty: The ranks of the uninsured are steadily being filled, with the number approaching 50 million. Health care costs are rising at a rate several times that of inflation, eating into the take-home income of the majority of the American people and threatening to break the federal budget in less than a decade.

Yet the talk is of abortion and immigration.

All day on Friday, House leaders struggled to reconcile the pro-life and pro-choice wings of the Democratic Party. Over the last several weeks, the pro-choice bloc, consisting of nearly 200 Democrats, had gradually come to terms with an amendment authored by Rep. Lois Capps (D-Calif.).

The intent of the amendment was to keep the debate about health care rather than abortion and it would make clear that -- as is current law -- no federal funds would be used for abortion. "Our hope was that we could continue the current ban on federal funding for abortion so the issue wouldn't bog down the overall health reform legislation," wrote Capps at the time.

But that wasn't enough for pro-life Democrats. On November 3, Rep. Brad Ellsworth (D-Ind.) offered a more conservative compromise, one that restricted abortion in a bunch of extra ways and would require at least one private plan in the exchange not to cover abortion.

In reality, most insurance plans -- even using pro-life numbers -- already do not cover abortion.

Still, pro-choice Democrats swallowed the compromise -- while saying they'd go no further. Health care reform, said Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.), a staunch pro-choicer and co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, should not be a vehicle to drive a pro-life social agenda.

That's when Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) re-entered the debate. Stupak is a longtime pro-life advocate and had been pressing his concerns upon House leadership. On Friday, Ellsworth withdrew his compromise language from negotiations, according to several House sources, sending the debate back to the starting line, where Stupak was waiting.

Stupak, in meetings with Pelosi and other members of leadership, pressed to include, instead, his own amendment that would ban the public health insurance option from funding abortion and also ban any private plan operating within the exchange from funding abortions. Under Stupak's plan, a woman buying private insurance from within the exchange with her own money would not have a choice of a plan that covered abortion.

During the early afternoon, Pelosi was leaning toward including some more moderately blended version of Stupak and Ellsworth's amendment's as part of the health care bill that would be sent to the floor, several aides told HuffPost. Just before 5:00 PM, Stupak and Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), who battled over abortion while the bill moved through Waxman's Energy and Commerce Committee, huddled on the House floor. Leaving the floor, the generally talkative Waxman gruffly brushed off reporters, asserting his alleged right "not to be swarmed."

Tempers flared. A Democratic congressman told House Republicans, who then told the Huffington Post, that Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) was asked to leave a leadership meeting where the pro-life agreement was being considered. DeGette is firmly pro-choice and it was thought, the source said, that she would not agree to the deal. "False," said a leadership aide, saying that "she had to leave to attend another meeting. Other pro-choice members [were] in there with leadership, as well as Waxman."

Either way, the question came down to who had the votes. Stupak's driving argument was that he had more than the 40 members he needed to "take down the rule" -- legislative lingo for defeating a bill on the House floor before it comes for a final vote. No one was sure whether Stupak actually had the 40 votes, but pro-choice Democrats were skeptical.

As the night and the meetings wore on, Pelosi shifted, multiple aides said, and was leaning toward allowing a floor vote on the Stupak-Ellsworth amendment rather than inserting it into the bill. The logical conclusion is that Pelosi determined she would lose too many pro-choice and progressive votes in the process of harnessing pro-life Democrats.

Shortly after midnight, Stupak addressed the Rules Committee and requested a floor vote on the amendment, ending a day of drama, but leaving open questions that will be answered Saturday: Does his amendment have enough votes to pass? If it does, will pro-choice Democrats flee and sink the bill?

The thinking among leadership is that allowing a vote -- regardless of the outcome -- helps win votes for final passage. If it passes, then pro-lifers line up behind health care reform. If it fails, at least they had their vote. For pro-choicers, if the amendment passes they can still fight to remove it during negotiations with the Senate -- which rejected tough abortion restrictions.

Meanwhile, aides from both parties say, the GOP is planning out how it will game the language in its motion to recommit -- an alternative measure aimed at stamping out the bill that the minority is entitled to introduce. The GOP could include language supporting Democrat-backed proposals, such as single-payer health care or a robust public option -- and then vote present, allowing a majority of Democrats to carry the vote to victory and complicate things for leadership.

Or the GOP could toss out anti-immigration language. That effort could garner the support of a big enough bloc of Democrats to give Pelosi genuine concern that it could prevail. Here we wander further from reality: undocumented workers currently get free medical care at great expense to the American people at emergency rooms across the country. The GOP's alternative approach, as it's been described in the past, denies that reality while simultaneously turning businesses into immigration-enforcement arms. People here illegally, however, would still be able to go to the emergency room for free.

Lost in the back and forth are the tens of millions without insurance and the nation's broken health care system. More surprising than the behavior of Congress, perhaps, is the fact that it has gotten as far as it has.
]]> Sat, 07 Nov 2009 00:13:59 -0500
Certainly I took time to work though the grief with my family and friends, but I also felt the need to help others just as Joan had done with her book. I'm not the type to hide my head under the blankets. Cancer is unfair and brutal. I wanted to get back at the deadly disease that robbed me of my soul mate.

Years ago when I first met Peter in Los Angeles, Joan Didion and her late husband John Gregory Dunne invited us to dinner at their Malibu home. While she chopped vegetables, I told her that I was bored with being a rock'n'roll writer but didn't know what I wanted to do next. She said take a break, do something else, learn to cook. You'll figure it out.

So I did take cooking lessons in Italy with the amazing Marcella Hazan. Hanging out at rock clubs and interviewing musicians became a thing of the past. Peter and I settled down and had two beautiful daughters. But I had to do something more and that something was being active in my local community and at my daughter's schools. I focused my energy on running fund-raisers and serving on boards in my local New York community.

When Peter and I first heard his diagnosis of myeloma in 2002 we didn't even know what it was. A relatively rare blood cancer, it's on the rise due in part to our exposure to environmental toxins. Firefighters, for example, have some of the highest incidence of the disease as do people living in the smog filled Los Angeles basin. In the past the disease affected older people but now myeloma is showing up in a younger ones.

When Peter finally lost his fight, I believed that I had to keep up the battle against myeloma. The International Myeloma Foundation's president Susie Novis had sustained us with her knowledge and compassion throughout the course of the dread disease. Its chairman, renowned researcher, Dr. Brian Durie treated Peter. Myeloma killed Susie's first husband so she became my sister in sorrow. When she asked, I accepted her challenge to help the IMF find a new way to raise money for research and patient support.

We decided to replace the usual boring rubber chicken benefit dinner with something in keeping with Peter's spirit, a comedy show. Although Peter played monsters and villains in many movies, his roots were in improvisational comedy. Laughter to fight disease made sense. Peter's old friends, colleagues and admirers volunteered to perform onstage at the Wilshire Ebell Club and Theatre in Los Angeles. This November 7 as always our dear friend Ray Romano takes up hosting duties. The 3rd Annual Comedy Celebration for the Peter Boyle Memorial Fund of the IMF has a spectacular line up: Jason Alexander, Dana Carvey, Brad Garrett, Jimmy Kimmel, Doris Roberts, Bob Saget , Fred Willard and a special musical performance by Tenacious D with Jack Black and Kyle Gass. Seeing these great performers supporting Peter's memory makes life a little easier for me and my family.

In life we do have a choice to either deal with what's given us in a positive way or else let it undermine the rest of our lives. The first way pays tribute to those whom we loved and the second leads to despair.

After you become a widow, people don't quite know what to say. The worst question anyone can ask me is "How are you doing?" How can you be "doing" after such a profound blow. But I learned that I can and have to be doing something positive. Our private feelings are just that -- private -- so sharing them with well-meaning people isn't my way. But I have learned that turning those feelings into a positive plan of action is the way towards healing. So now I can answer, with what not how I'm doing and that's working towards finding a cure for the currently incurable myeloma.]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 23:27:54 -0500
Under current New York law, lesbian and gay couples are denied the basic protections provided to heterosexual couples. In such areas as property ownership, inheritance, health care, hospital visitation, taxation, insurance coverage, child custody, pension benefits and testimonial privileges, married couples have a host of important rights and protections. Denying gays and lesbians access to those benefits - as well as the many responsibilities which come with civil marriage - is a violation of the basic principle of equal protection.

Those who argue against marriage equality usually base their arguments either on 1) religious grounds or 2) on their belief that marriage should be reserved for relationships centered around procreation and child rearing. The first argument fails to recognize both the separation of church and state and the fact that many denominations do in fact already recognize same sex marriages. The second argument is just plain silly.

Legalizing same-sex marriage would not and could not force any religious officials to do anything - religious institutions already choose who can or cannot get married within their denominations for both same and opposite sex marriages and they would continue to do so. It would not require any change of religious teachings or actions. The only institution which would be required to recognize same-sex marriages would be the State.

Similarly, family- and procreation-based arguments fail to recognize how many same-sex couples are in fact raising children, as well as how many opposite-sex married couples are not. Marriage equality would benefit same-sex couples, but it would also provide huge benefits to their children, who would gain many protections by having their parents' relationship legally recognized.

Denying couples marriage recognition by the State serves to discriminate not only against the individuals wishing to enter into those marriages, but also harms all of us who remain living in a society where we know that we are allowing family, friends and neighbors to be discriminated against by their government.

New York has a reputation for being at the forefront in the fight to eliminate the vestiges of discrimination, but we have not kept up with many of our neighboring states when it comes to ensuring basic equality for lesbian and gay New Yorkers. In the last year, Connecticut, Iowa, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine (which unfortunately recently voted to reverse recognition of same sex marriages) have joined Massachusetts by acting to legalize same-sex marriage. Joining these states will serve to demonstrate the ability of our institution to act on critical issues at a time when many doubt that we have that capacity.

I do not know that this legislation will pass, although I am optimistic. But whether we have the votes to pass marriage equality legislation or not, it will be a credit to the Senate and a vindication of the rules changes we made this summer, if leadership brings the bill up for a vote. It will demonstrate that we are becoming more democratic as an institution, and that we are willing and able to discuss and vote on issues critical to our State without requiring that the outcome be predetermined. A vote on marriage equality would thus also be a significant step toward fulfillment of efforts to reform the institution of the Senate.

The Governor has called us back for a special session on November 9th and 10th, and I believe this is the perfect opportunity for us to act on marriage equality legislation. Doing so will be a basic step toward creating equality for all before the law and in demonstrating our ability as a legislative body to take action on critical issues impacting so many New Yorkers. ]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:13:50 -0500
We are not so different from elephants. Science shows that we share comparable brains sufficient to make the gentle giants vulnerable to Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Elephant and humans minds both falter in the face of life-threatening violence. But the real lesson goes deeper. What veterans have learned and elephants know makes them formidable allies in helping solve what has become a problem of epidemic proportions.

War trauma afflicts 20% of our soldiers in Iraq and a staggering 40% of National Guard and reservists. Moreover, the trauma of war extends to soldier's families and healthcare professionals who are exposed vicariously to battlefield violence: a topic of concern in discussions surrounding the recent Fort Hood shootings.

In response to this debilitating condition, the U.S. Army has cast aside its historical unease with psychological injury and boldly launched a Comprehensive Soldier Fitness program. Increasing emotional resilience will do much to help soldiers on and off duty with the barrage of everyday stressors. However, warding off war trauma is more complex than achieving mental fitness or implementing a regime of anti-depressants. Veterans reveal that the mind cannot always be readied for the challenges war brings.

Veteran John Fisher confessed, "I never wanted to hurt anyone. Not even in the war. My nature is to give service for health and healing. . . [but] I was given a rifle and the training in how to use it. Then I used it--a lot." Body and mind may have been fit for duty, but Fisher's decades-long battle with PTSD began when his nature collided with military nurture.

Further, survivors and psychiatrists maintain that causes and treatment of PTSD cannot rest on the shoulders of soldiers alone. Former Green Beret Lee Burkins' PTSD derived as much from "society's acceptance of war" as from his own acts, and Fisher's restoration only started when he returned to Vietnam, where, in the "land of my nightmares," he used his skills as a chiropractor to heal broken bodies of former Viet Cong and re-build a sense of community.

How then is war's PTSD to be addressed? If, as often is the case, we look to nature for understanding, we find more questions before answers. For example, if healing requires community, how is it that elephants, our psychological kin renown for family values and cohesive herds, succumb to PTSD? And isn't some psychological fallout the inevitable cost of natural aggression and the Army's fitness program making the best out of a bad situation?

Not according to science. Modern warfare is not natural; our bellicose human habits violate long-evolved prosocial norms shared by animals everywhere, including the mighty, brainy elephant. Elephant society only fell victim to "soldier's heart" when culls, poaching, and habitat destruction shattered social structures that provided young elephants inoculation against trauma. Human culture, not elephant nature, is responsible for the onset of wildlife mental breakdown. Our aggressive excesses are no longer justified by saying, "nature made me do it." Human trauma is organic to human society.

Consequently, when the gunner wept as elephants fell, he might have recognized something more than commonality in deed. Perhaps, genetic memory stirred recollection of a time before economics and exigencies of industrial hostilities made war culture; when elephants and humanity put right before might and chose to live in peaceful co-existence. In this light, soldiers' PTSD emerges as a natural response to an unnatural violation of values we hold in common with the rest of the animal kingdom.

To stem widespread PTSD, we are advised by listening to the veterans who served, survived, and suffer from the ravages of PTSD, and the elephants who never raised arms. An Iraq veteran maintains that: "the only way to help us is to end war." Lee Burkins speaks of veterans' search for a reality that does not require trauma to justify its existence, "As damaged in soul as we were, each one of us wanted never to do violence again. . . many of the men passed on because of their frustration they experienced at not knowing how to bring an end to the ongoing violence in the world."

Their vision and lessons, and those of the elephant, must be used to shape concrete social programs that actively partner the military, public, and nature. The path is clear. It just takes thinking like an elephant.


G.A. Bradshaw is a psychologist and author of Elephants on the Edge: What Animals Teach Us About Humanity, Yale University Press. Ed Tick is a practicing psychotherapist specializing in veterans with PTSD and author of War and the Soul: Healing Our Nation's Veterans from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. ]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:37:39 -0500 That renovates the World.
--Emily Dickinson


Just a few months ago, the space station orbiting the earth reported three near misses with junk in space. What is, and should be, a stunning advance of modern technology, a man-made satellite in search of new knowledge, is repeatedly being threatened with damage and possibly, destruction by a blind spot in our material conception of life. That blind spot is Nothing, a necessary and essential component, of our everyday lives.

Nothing exists. Nothing is an essential presence in our lives. Paradoxical? Yes. Illogical and irrational? Yes.

Yet to ignore Nothing is to deny our road to renewal. Just look at the world around us: wars, weapons of mass destruction, pollution, the leftover junk of the backend of doing, with the planet spinning ever closer to self-destruction, even as it increases its access to knowledge to solve those problems. Yet we deny that paradox exists. We deny the irrational exists, although mounting evidence for both is reported daily in the media in the events and behavior of our times, including by the media. We of the Age of Reason the scientific method, of technology that works, yet we violate the very core of creation, the "'Nothing' that Renovates the world," as Emily Dickinson wrote. The evidence for symmetry and paradox, equal and opposite, is present in Nature and human nature. Nature intends its unintended consequences. Duality is Oneness, as represented in the symbol of the Tao.

Nothing is. Nothing exists. Although Nature abhors a vacuum, Nature would have nowhere to rush in to fill it, if a vacuum didn't exist. Where would something happen? Stars disappearing. Novas appearing. Leaves falling. New leaves growing. One generation dying, another being born. That vacuum, that Nothing, is with us all the time, everywhere, rushing in and out of existence in an instant. Nothing is the still center of the wheel of life. In the dark evanescence between equal and opposite, the Universe ignites.

Eastern sages have accepted the existence of Nothing for millennia. In Nothing -- aka Emptiness, Nirvana, and Bliss -- Eastern traditions have found a wellspring of culture, harmony, and wisdom. Deep thinkers in the West -- philosophers, poets, artists, scientists, mathematicians, playwrights, musicians -- have also written about Nothing for millennia, some with fascination, many with dread. Years ago Einstein observed: "If I allow things to vanish according to Newton, the Galilean inertial space remains; following my interpretation, however, nothing remains." (See Ch. Science Sutra, P 147.) Heedless, Western materialist culture, caught in a vise of logic and reason, has ignored the presence of Nothing in our everyday lives. Like Sorcerer's Apprentices toiling and boiling over, our days are drowned in doing and the inescapable consequences of so doing, weighted by waste and lacking renewal.

You Don't Have to be Buddhist to Know Nothing is sound bite journalism. The book takes a playful approach to a difficult, profound, even absurd, idea. It is a verbal collage to intrigue, tickle and tease the mind and to preserve insights for a culture too densely packed with timely distractions. Each quote becomes a timeless meditation.

Why does Nothing matter? If where, when, and from whom we are born are Destiny, then Nothing is our Free Will. Nothing is the locus of individual choice and possibility. If we deny our Nothing, we shrink our possibilities like a dying ocean. We deny ourselves the silence and the clearing which hold the seeds of creation. What we make of our Nothing is what we make of our life.

WATCH:



For more video click here.]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:32:03 -0500
The rumor had been spread, and confirmed by local authorities, that the enemy -- let's just call them Tribe 1 for now -- had killed our friend and was coming to shoot more people. They were declaring war. Immediately, people in the room started telling stories -- most from many years ago -- about how Tribe 1 do this. They kill people. They kill friends and loved ones and children over nothing. The fear led to anger. People in the room who had influence with Tribe 2 said it would be hard to stop the tribe from protecting itself. If Tribe 2 saw Tribe 1 people anywhere, they may shoot. If the authorities saw anyone from either tribe, guns would be drawn immediately.

Killing people now made sense.

How does this war story end? Actually, very well.

As it turns out, the rumor about Tribe 1 declaring war was false; a very common thing in the streets. We were on the brink of war because of... nothing; a false rumor combined with memories of past violence. If not for the relationships in the room working out the tension, many friends, children, and loved ones would have ended up dead, even more people traumatized. And forget about getting good schools, health care, jobs and quality of life in a war zone.

The room was not in Afghanistan, but Los Angeles. The "Tribes" were gangs. The people in the room were not wearing camouflage, but clean-cut jeans and t-shirts. They are good, hard working leaders who have turned their lives around. They are rational, thoughtful and courageous. They work with and befriend police officers, even though it's not politically correct in their neighborhood. They, too, fell temporarily in the grips of fear, but found a way to convince their tribes -- the neighborhoods and gangs they used to be part of -- to ignore the rumors and maintain calm and peace. For the first time anyone could remember, the leaders created peace, not through a truce, but through respect and friendship.

These leaders came together because of a mutual desire for a strong community, as well as training and funding from A Better LA. Stopping violence is only about 5 percent of what they do. The rest of their time is spent mentoring kids, working to improve kids' education, access to sports and health services. But they know that comprehensive change and community building starts with ending violence. We call them Outreach Workers but haven't really come up with a great title for them yet. Sometimes I say they are the social workers of our forgotten neighborhoods. They don't want to be known as ex-gang members, but as fathers and husbands and community leaders. To me, they are heroes.

I want you to know that this is a unique time in history, when law enforcement, politicians, business leaders and former gang members have come together to change the way we approach the violence and dysfunction that grip our cities. That the work going on in Los Angeles is a model for breaking down barriers of fear, isolation, and ignorance everywhere. That problems that seem intractable are actually solvable. That this is the beginning of a movement that will impact almost all major issues of our time - violence, poverty, terrorism, war, health. That my boss, founder and Board chair and USC football coach Pete Carroll, is an extraordinary person and leader in this movement.

I want you to know that if you get involved, it will matter. You will help save lives through efforts similar to the story above. You will help at-risk children rise from isolation and neglect to attaining their potential in life. To start, sign up to receive our newsletter at www.abetterla.org. This will start the process of breaking down the barrier of fear. The Outreach Workers see that outsiders care enough to engage. They transmit that hope to the kids, who trust them. It is a crucial first step to change that has always been missing in the past, when outsiders have either tried to crush our most isolated kids or win them over without any relationship or trust.

The rest of the story must be saved for future blogs. The first piece has to be the story above. About the violence. About the extraordinary, gritty and courageous work that few know about. So much violence comes not from organized crime orchestrated by monsters, but from real people with really dysfunctional attitudes. The solution to that violence is not crushing people with law enforcement, or throwing money mindlessly at feel-good programs. The solution comes from building healthy relationships with those causing the violence. That is what stops wars. That is what creates hope and the opportunity for real change.

If it is so easy, why doesn't everyone do it? Because everyone in the past has been too afraid to sit in that room. To engage in a healthy, open-minded, fearless manner with former and current gang members. To get involved in situations of life and death. Pete Carroll, a number of law enforcement officers, and other leaders in Los Angeles have engaged. The result is a historic shift.

We need you to engage too. To build on a trend. To demonstrate a simple yet revolutionary point -- that if someone in our community is struggling and causing problems -- whether they are our child or someone else's -- they are still part of our community, and we will not demonize, throw away, fear, crush or coddle them. We will engage with them until we fix the problem. ]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:05:37 -0500
Cantor's office sent over a write-up of the congressman's interview with Bloomberg News, in which he praised Limbaugh as a voice of the conservative movement but condemned his use of Nazi imagery and analogies to chastise the president.

"Do I condone the mention of Hitler in any discussion about politics?" Cantor said. "No, I don't, because obviously that is something that conjures up images that frankly are not, I think, very helpful."

Speaking out against the Hitler comparisons -- even when they are made by conservative voices -- would seem like an utterly non-controversial posture for a Republican leader (and a Jewish one at that) to make. But Cantor and his colleagues in the House have, to this point, walked a fine line in rebuking Rush -- fretting about the pushback they might receive from his listeners. The Congressman is the lone Jewish Republican in the House. And aides stress that he has consistently lamented any use of Hitler or Nazism to make a political point.

The issue, nevertheless, emerged once again on Thursday after a tea party protest that Cantor attended featured several signs equating health care reform with the Holocaust. Democrats jumped on the imagery -- alongside Cantor's presence -- by insisting that the extremist elements of the party had taken over the event.

On a more emotional and honest level, decorated writer and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel tweeted (yes, he's on Twitter) that the signs at the Capital Hill protests were an "indecent and disgusting" form of "political hatred."

Cantor, of course, can't be held responsible for the actions of a widely attended health care protest. But clearly, both he and his advisers saw the need to demonstrate some distance.

"The Republican Party in its roots is a party of inclusion and we ought to be promoting that and making sure that voices are heard," Cantor said in his interview with Bloomberg Television.


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[NAME REMOVED] --


This is it -- the House of Representatives will vote on health insurance reform tomorrow. All signs point to it being incredibly close, possibly even coming down to a single vote.

With the clock ticking, insurance company lobbyists are going all out to stop reform. Please call Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton at 202-225-8050 now.

Today, President Obama is visiting the House to call for reform, and I hope you'll add your voice to his. If you haven't called before, now is the time. And if you have recently called, thank you -- now please ask friends, family members, and co-workers in your district to join you.

http://my.barackobama.com/HouseVote

Everything we're fighting for comes down to moments like this -- and every second counts.

Thanks for stepping up,

Mitch

Well, I have to say, if the House health reform bill does come down to a single vote, reform proponents better hope like hell that single vote doesn't have to come from Eleanor Holmes Norton! This is not because Norton isn't an awesome lady -- she is, as evidenced by her many appearances on the Colbert Report. But while Norton is an ally of the White House and supports the larger effort to expand health care coverage, as the duly sworn representative of the District, she does not enjoy voting privileges. So, as far as her vote goes, she would vote if she could vote but she can't vote so she won't vote.

Anyway, thanks, Mitch Stewart, for reminding the residents of the District of Columbia that they enjoy second-class status and their hopes are largely tied to other people's representatives.

[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here.]
]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:49:49 -0500
On July 4, 2009, I lost my brother and my only sibling Eric Alexander De La Cruz. He passed away while awaiting a heart transplant. Five years ago, he was diagnosed with severe dilated cardiomyopathy, a weakening of the heart that prevents it from pumping normally. Since then, we had tried to get Eric insurance coverage that would allow him to get the treatment he needed, but no private insurer would offer him insurance because of this preexisting condition.



My brother and I grew up in Northern California and, though we were a couple years apart, we were always very close.

As kids, we spent all our time on the ice at the local rink. Eric played hockey, while I trained as a figure skater.

As adults, we remained best friends, talking and joking on the phone or over e-mail. We loved trading music and would always keep each other up to date on what was happening in the world of hockey or figure skating. Eric loved the Ducks, and it would crush him if they didn't win. He was a talented artist, music producer, and designer. Most of all, my brother Eric made me see that there is more to life than work.

When Eric's heart condition was diagnosed, our lives changed forever. This past May, his kidneys began to fail and doctors told me only a heart transplant would save his life. Since he was young and otherwise healthy, I thought our chances were excellent.

But Eric did not have the luxury of insurance coverage provided through his employer. His only insurer, state Medicaid, wouldn't cover the out-of-state operation Eric needed. He was denied federal Medicare - twice.

Eventually, when we finally did get federal coverage for Eric, the hospital still demanded private supplemental insurance to help cover the huge expenses. Again, Eric's preexisting condition became a factor in trying to secure that supplemental policy. We were told we might still have to come up with nearly a million dollars.

Medical bills have bankrupted our family. My mother even shared her own heart medication with Eric when he couldn't afford it. With Eric's health deteriorating, and feeling desperate, I began relying on the kindness of strangers.

In May, I started talking about Eric on the social media network Twitter. To my amazement, complete strangers started to come together in support. Within a week, hundreds of donors had raised $6,000 and Eric's cause was being promoted by celebrities like Demi Moore, Alyssa Milano and P. Diddy. Those willing to champion Eric's fight for his life soon numbered in the thousands. Popular bands Nine Inch Nails and Jane's Addiction, as well as professional skateboarder Tony Hawk, helped put fundraising into overdrive. Altogether, "Eric's Twitter Army" raised nearly $1 million in a matter of weeks.

In June, Eric was moved to a California hospital, where he was put at the top of the heart transplant list. It was a happy time for us and we were busy planning for the future. We were looking forward to doing normal things together, like walking his dog Chance and finally getting on the ice again. And every day, I took time to assure him that everything was going to be okay.

But sadly enough, doctors informed me the fight would be hard. In fact, they pulled me aside to say, "You guys got here two years too late." They explained that Eric's battle for a heart should have started two years earlier -- back when we were trying to secure insurance coverage and one by one each insurance company was saying no. The day my brother passed away I promised him I would do two things: take care of Mom and his dog, and try my hardest to change the health care system. I sat by his bedside crying, promising that I would do everything within my own power to make sure that no one suffered again needlessly, the way he did.




Still deeply mourning my brother, I've been trying to fulfill those promises. In August, I flew to Washington, D.C. to lobby Congress for health care reform, arguing that coverage must be available to all, even to those with preexisting conditions, and that insurance companies must be prohibited from dropping sick patients.

At private meetings with lawmakers, I detailed every painful step of Eric's battle. It was emotionally draining, but I wanted every single member of Congress to hear his story. I'm also starting a foundation to raise more funds to help others in Eric's situation, and my mission is to mobilize as many people as possible to help prevent other tragedies like his from happening.

My brother's inability to get adequate health insurance has had a devastating impact on my life. It's broken my mother's heart and has sent the lives of other friends and family members into a tailspin. Being excluded from the health care system because of a preexisting condition robbed my only sibling of his fair chance at life, and it robbed all of us of his gifts, talents and love.

Health care reform may come too late for Eric, but I hope it will come in time to help thousands of other families who may otherwise also lose loved ones simply because private insurance companies choose to turn away the sick, leaving them with no other options. Helping to bring about the day when everyone has the right to health insurance will be my brother Eric's greatest gift, so please, do your part.

The House is set to vote tomorrow on this historic and important legislation. Call your Representative to voice your support. Health care is a basic human right, and should no longer be looked at as a privilege.

Veronica De La Cruz is a former CNN TV journalist currently focusing her efforts on the fight for health care reform in memory of her late brother Eric.]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:41:55 -0500
You've got to be able to deliver a message to your customers, prospects, employees, investors and the media in a powerful and persuasive way. And if they don't get it, it's your job to make sure that they do.

With that in mind, I've come up with a list of ten ways to be a great communicator.

1. It's never about you, it's always about them. People need to feel that they are being listened to carefully and you understand what they want. Therefore, you need to focus on their dreams, aspirations, fears and goals. This empathetic approach helps you craft a message that resonates. When people believe you get where they are coming from, you get the business.

2. What are their explicit and implicit needs? J.P. Morgan once said that people have two reasons for everything they do: the good reasons and the real reasons. For example, someone might say that they are going to buy a Lexus instead of a Toyota because the Lexus is safe and well made. This is the "good" reason, but in reality both cars are fairly comparable in these areas. The "real" reason may be that the Lexus is more expensive and prestigious than the Toyota and therefore makes them feel good about themselves. It tells the world that they are important or affluent. When they reach their destination in a Lexus, they have really arrived. Ultimately, both the explicit and implicit answers are valid.

3. Listen between the lines. Be an intuitive listener. What are these people's real needs--not just the presenting ones? People will tell you just about everything you need to know if you just stop talking and listen. Really, really listen.

4. Tell great stories. Stories build an emotional connection between you and your listener's imagination. Facts are important, but stories stay with us long after the factual details are forgotten. What's the bible? It's a series of great stories designed to teach valuable lessons.

5. Feelings count. People often don't remember what you said, but they always remember how you made them feel. Those who make others feel valued, respected, and good about themselves win people's confidence and business.

6. Ask good questions then keep quiet and listen. People often reveal more than they realize. What you learn may be the extra information you need to better communicate your message.

7. Differentiate. How does your product, service or idea differ from everything else out there? Fox News Channel chose not to compete with the already established and popular all news network CNN. Fox distinguished itself be becoming the conservative alternative to its rival. In this way, Fox established a whole new category.

8. It's not what you say, but how you say it. You have to answer the listeners' question: What's in it for me? You have to make compelling arguments for your case and their interests. In other words, make it relevant to their lives.

9. Be aspirational. Connect to the listener's desire for something better. Our imagination goes beyond our self limiting beliefs. A client of ours is running for re-election as prime minister of his country. We've counseled him to not only talk about what his party has done or is doing for the benefit of his country, but to speak about his exciting plans for the future. People want a sense of hope. They want to believe that there is a better tomorrow.

10. Be brief. Brevity is not only the soul of wit, but of good communications. People today have the attention span of a three year old. They are half listening to you while they are cruising through their BlackBerrys. Get to the point. Get their attention. And keep it simple.]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:26:28 -0500
One theory is that what we're seeing is Obama's background as a community organizer coming to the foreground. And as many critics have pointed out, with plenty of justification, the community organizer tendency to seek consensus can look pretty darn naïve and ineffective when one of the parties simply has no interest in compromise -- and indeed sees obstruction as its primary goal.

But there's another part of the community organizing analogy that's been widely overlooked.

Community organizers take strength from the community.

They are able to bring recalcitrant parties to the negotiating table by threatening community action. They can force the hands, say, of tight-fisted landlords, by threatening rent strikes. They can bring inflexible company executives to the table by threatening, say, a picket line or a boycott.

Obama is of course no longer a community organizer. As president, there are plenty of things he can and should achieve unilaterally. And he should mostly if not entirely abandon his attempts at compromise with those who have repeatedly shown that they have no taste for it.

But some of Obama's lack of boldness may stem from the fact that when he looks behind him, there's essentially nobody there.

His legion of supporters, after rising up and sweeping him into office a year ago, basically sat their butts back down. They stood up again to cheer and cry on Inauguration Day. But then it was back to the recumbent position.

Some change -- considerable change -- came simply by virtue of Obama holding the office. There's almost no way of understating the staggering impact of his simply not being George W. Bush. That alone entitles him the thanks of a grateful nation -- not to mention the Nobel Peace Prize. Reason and facts, although not always heeded, are at least taken into consideration in this White House. We now take for granted there's a black family living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. And there are a fair number of genuine accomplishments Obama can point to.

But on some key issues such as jobs, the bank bailout, the war in Afghanistan and a whole slew of executive-power related issues, Obama has fallen way short of expectations. He surrounded himself with too many people who represent politics-as-usual, and he has buckled under to pressure from the national security establishment that Bush put on steroids.

How much of that would be different, however, if the people who voted for Obama had remained politically active? If they were visibly and energetically not just supporting him, but pushing him to be bolder?

But Obama's supporters aren't giving him even rudimentary political cover.

Almost forgotten these days is the fact that in Obama's first address to Congress. In February, the new president served up a pretty darn bold agenda, backed up by a respectably progressive budget proposal. So what was the reaction? Obama looked over his shoulder and saw -- no one.

The talking heads on TV and in the newspapers tut-tutted about what a big gamble he was taking. And without any palpable expression of public support to worry about, the moneyed interests and their congressional lackeys in both parties went about nibbling everything to death.

Imagine if today Obama announced a bold and expensive new jobs program, to put America to work, build a green infrastructure, and rebuild our cities and highways. What would the reaction be? Journalists would call it radical and risky, the brayers of conventional wisdom inside the Beltway would express horror at the effects on the deficit, and the Glenn Becks of the world would work themselves into froth ranting about how Obama was building a private army of socialist storm troopers or something.

Needless to say, the overriding message wouldn't be that this was a move that had great popular support. Which it would have.

In the absence of any legitimate expression of the public will, Obama would be forced to slink back to the Oval Office, defeated and demoralized.

This is supposed to be a participatory democracy, but we've all gotten used to non-participation. And the cost is enormous.

So is there any chance of a public uprising of sorts? Any chance that the next time Obama does something bold, someone will have his back? Practically speaking, very little. For a variety of reasons, the American people have gotten out of the habit of taking public political action. And of course now we've lost nine months, during which many of Obama's most ardent supporters have become genuinely disillusioned, and many of those caught up in the enthusiasm of his campaign have simply drifted back to their traditional comfort zones.

I'll have more on this topic in the coming weeks, including what Obama could do to encourage a progressive populist movement, what areas of policy are the most likely to inspire public action, and the role of the media in narcotizing the citizenry. Stay tuned.


* * * * * * * * * * * *
A message from Dan about how to find me: I'm not writing every day anymore -- I've now also Washington Bureau Chief for the Huffington Post. But there are lots of ways to keep track of me.


You can find my latest posts on this page, or you can subscribe to this RSS feed. You can also get an e-mail alert as soon as I post by creating a HuffPost Account (or logging in, if you have one already) and becoming one of my "fans". Make sure you also click on "Get Email Alerts from this Reporter" -- so that on this page, the little box next to "Notify me when a blogger I'm a fan of writes a new post" is checked. You can also follow me on Twitter, or Facebook. And I always welcome your emails at froomkin@huffingtonpost.com.



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Chuck DeVore, a Republican member of the California State Assembly, is positioning himself as the ideologically pure alternative to Republican Carly Fiorina in the party's effort to take Sen. Barbara Boxer's Senate seat in 2010. This past week, he got the seal of approval from the party base: an endorsement by the Senate Conservative Fund and the explicit backing of conservative darling Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.). Among the right-wing netroots, his race against Fiorina has been elevated to top-tier importance: alongside Marco Rubio's primary bid against Florida Governor Charlie Crist.

But who, exactly, is he? Not many people beyond Republican devotees and California political watchers know the guy. The Washington Post's Chris Cillizza -- who is more plugged into local politics than most D.C.-based reporters -- copped to not really having a clue about DeVore just last week.

The assemblyman does check off the majority of boxes on the conservative purity test. He has a full pro-life record, opposed the stimulus package and the bank bailout, and has never met a tax cut he didn't like. His most famous moment in office may, in fact, have occurred when he resigned from his position as Chief Republican Whip out of anger over a tax increase agreed to by California's Republican leadership.

"We need to shake up the Republican Party," DeMint said, when announcing his endorsement. "He's gonna join the country, and not the club."

In addition to fiscal discipline, however, DeVore's closet includes some weird and potentially damaging associations. As pointed out by a Republican source, the assemblyman is connected to noted birther Floyd Brown. Brown, who is famous for creating the 1988 Willie Horton ad and, more recently, pushing an effort to impeach Barack Obama, was supported by DeVore in his efforts to attack Democratic candidates in the 2008 presidential primary.

"Poll after poll shows it works," DeVore said of Brown's deeply controversial product.

All of which is not to say that associations like these -- and his relative obscurity -- will trip DeVore up in a primary race. Indeed, he likely relishes his current frame as a man of the conservative fringe.

Eight Senate Republicans announced on Thursday that they would be backing Fiorina's bid for the nomination. The next day, the assemblyman put out a web advertisement that contained a direct dig at one of Fiorina's endorsers -- Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) -- for his ghastly efforts at working with a Democrat on climate change legislation. ]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:53:10 -0500




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Yesterday morning, Glenn Beck communicated with the world, in his patented Pidgin Twitter, saying:

Nvr a gdnight sleep in the hospital but always easier w/family, prayers and AMAZING drs/nurses. They didn't even cut off my feet!!

Amazing nurses, eh? Amazingly anti-American, maybe! Alexander Zaitchik is RAISING SUSPICIONS:

The quality of care he is receiving should not have come as a surprise. When Beck complained of acute abdominal pain during his radio program on Wednesday, he was rushed to a nearby hospital. The security-conscious Beck has not disclosed the name of the facility, but it's a safe bet that it is staffed by proud members of a storied union: New York's Local 1199, aka United Healthcare Workers East, which belongs to the Service Employees International Union. The SEIU has organized all of Manhattan's major hospitals, including every facility to which Beck could have conceivably been sent.


It probably has not occurred to Beck to link his kind, efficient nurses to something as dastardly as the SEIU. As recently as Wednesday, he was busy smearing the union with his usual verbal feces. For the past several months, on radio and television, Beck has cast the SEIU, the country's largest union, as a Toxic Avenger-looking bogeyman in his conspiratorial fantasyland. In the progressive plot of Beck's imagination, the "radical, Marxist" SEIU is conspiring with ACORN "thugs" to destroy the freedoms guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and turn this country into North Korea--or worse.

Now, I don't know if the "amazing nurses" that tended to Glenn Beck were SEIU members or not. But the following infotaining factoid simply can not be ignored! No one has been inside the Obama White House more than SEIU prexy Andy Stern. Now, Andy Stern has, through Marxist nurse proxies, gained access inside Glenn Beck's body! WHAT DOES ACORN WANT WITH GLENN BECK'S PRECIOUS BODILY FLUIDS?

Later that same morning, Beck tweeted: "I just realized my tonsils are missing. Man, I wish I were as rich as M. Moore i could've had some of that sweet Castro Care he loves." But, Glenn Beck is as rich as Michael Moore! Or at least he was, before he received sweet Castro Care, from Maoist nurses that he now refers to as -- AND I QUOTE -- "AMAZING."

All right, here's the kicker. Do you know the name of the planet on which all of this occurred? Give up? IT WAS EARTH!!

[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here.]]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:35:15 -0500
Here in Chicago, recent examples of youth violence include the grisly videotaped murder of Derrion Albert. It also includes last month's on-field brawl between the North Chicago High School and Simeon High School football teams, which canceled the game in the first quarter and led to a one-game suspension/forfeit for North Chicago and an apologetic press conference by North Chicago coach and former Chicago Bears player Glen Kozlowski.

Nationally, last week a youth football coach outside Boston was charged with aggravated assault and battery stemming from an altercation with a player's father. The dad brought his 12-year-old son to practice 10 minutes late. When the coach ordered the player to run laps, the dad objected and his argument with the coach turned physical, leaving the dad with a fractured eye socket, broken nose, and torn rotator cuff. Another dispute between parent and coach over playing time for a Davis, California high school field hockey player also ended in fisticuffs and bloodshed.

It is a shame and a horror when anyone suffers from violence. As a high school athletic director, it is especially galling when violence occurs in the context of sports, because sports, perhaps more than any other activity, actually lends itself to character education.

No activity impassions more Americans than sports. Sport so enraptures the public that our youth and high school athletes are a captive audience -- perhaps more captive than in a classroom or house of worship -- for life lessons in persistence, teamwork, courage, compassion and many other traits that mark contributing members of our society.

Yet those opportunities are too often squandered by individuals and institutions that care so little for youth that their environment allows for the murder of a Derrion Albert. Just as problematic, are the too many coaches who are ideally positioned to aid youth through the magical character education properties of sport, but instead succumb to ego and a win-at-all-cost mentality.

In September, we at Niles North High School had a problem. In the week before our football game against Evanston Township High School, an ETHS student named Dashaun Davy was stabbed to death in Skokie. We changed the date of the game to allow Dashaun's classmates to mourn him in dignity, rather than facing the incongruity of a funeral followed by a football game.

Amid these events, Niles North last month won an Honoring the Game Award from Positive Coaching Alliance, a national non-profit founded at Stanford University with the mission to "transform youth sports so sports can transform youth." Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) gives these awards to schools and youth sports organizations throughout the U.S. that most effectively use sports to teach life lessons.

As part of our effort to revitalize Niles North athletics, we partnered two years ago with PCA to host workshops for our coaches, players' parents and school leadership. The partnership galvanized Niles North's buy-in to the PCA precepts of educational-athletic excellence. Our scoreboards do not always display athletic dominance, but our hallways are home to players, parents, teachers, administrators and coaches who are mostly on the same page about what is important in sports.

This year, we expanded our PCA partnership to create a community consortium among local government, park-and-recreations programs, and the youth sports organizations and middle schools that feed into Niles North. We are confident this bodes well for achieving both our goals as PCA-trained Double-Goal Coaches: winning, and more importantly, teaching life lessons through sports. This is critical in our community because our school district's tremendous ethnic and socio-economic diversity does present significant challenges to our efforts to establish a unifying athletic culture.

Nothing will bring back Derrion Albert or Dashaun Davy. But sports can be a key to both healing communities and preventing future violence. If we can stop the madness within youth and high school sports, putting character-education of youth ahead of adult ego and a win-at-all-cost mentality, then sport can be a safe haven for youth in this generation and beyond.]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:19:48 -0500
An amendment offered by Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.) and unanimously approved by a voice vote in the House Financial Services Committee specifically deletes a provision in the Financial Stability Improvement Act of 2009.

The two draft versions of the bill originally called for the proposed overseer of threats to the entire financial system to prepare an annual report to Congress describing, among other things, "significant financial market developments and potential emerging threats to the stability of the financial system."

But on Thursday, Meeks' amendment deleted that language and instead compels the council to describe:

"Significant financial and regulatory developments, including insurance and accounting regulations and standards, and assesses the impact of those developments on the stability of the financial system."

Thus, "potential emerging threats" was replaced by "financial and regulatory developments."

Groups advocating for financial reform criticized the move.

"Instead of looking out and actually trying to protect the system, the goal appears to be to make sure we have the regulatory structure that is most amenable to corporate interests of anywhere in the world," said Heather Slavkin, senior legal and policy adviser at AFL-CIO. "It's a complete shift in the purpose and goal of the [systemic risk regulator].

Barbara Roper, director of investor protection at the Consumer Federation of America, said of Meeks' amendment, "that language is a prescription for a race to the bottom in terms of regulation."

During Thursday's debate, Rep. Mel Watt, a senior Democrat on the committee, also expressed concern about another aspect of Meeks' amendment.

The amendment additionally calls for the council to monitor international developments in financial, insurance and accounting regulations, and to specifically identify those that may "place United States financial services firms or United States financial markets at a competitive disadvantage."

"Part of what we're addressing here when we deal with systemic risk is a race to the bottom," said Watt, of North Carolina. "We need to be careful not to leave the impression that competitive disadvantage trumps safety and soundness."

During the debate, Meeks defended his amendment:

We must work with our counterparts around the world to elevate the playing field to a higher global standard, monitor international regulatory developments to ensure that our firms remain globally competitive and to prevent international regulatory shopping, and the inevitable buildup of systemic risk outside our borders, outside of our regulatory reach, and beyond our capacity to act.


As happened domestically with individual regulators in the years leading up of the financial crisis, it is quite possible for the members of the council to become so focused on the domestic trees that they fail to see the forest of the international regulatory landscape and its evolution. This amendment would explicitly require them to monitor this global landscape, its impact on the competitiveness of the American financial sector, as well as any new emerging pockets of systemic risks which could spill over into our economy, triggering another financial crisis.

In June the Obama administration released a white paper outlining its plan to reform the way banks and financial firms are regulated. There were gaps in the system, simply put, which played a role in the collapse last fall.

In that paper, the administration called for the formation of the council. It would identify "emerging systemic risks" and "emerging risks in firms and market activities." It would also "identify gaps in regulation and prepare an annual report to Congress on market developments and potential emerging risks."

The bill that emerged calls for a council to oversee risks to the entire financial system, which includes firms and activities that pose such a risk. The firms that required billions in taxpayer funds to keep them afloat, like Citigroup and AIG, and those that ultimately flopped, like Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns, are the kind of financial companies the bill would target. The activities include some of the things that worsened the crisis last fall, like firms' unfunded liabilities -- which ultimately were paid by taxpayers, like the billions paid out to honor AIG's derivatives contracts.

Now, the bill in Chairman Barney Frank's Financial Services committee does call for this proposed council to look for and address such dangers; however, Meeks' amendment deleted the provision that the information be relayed to Congress, and thus the public.

In an interview, Meeks' legislative director, Milan Dalal, said the bill's original language of "potential emerging threats" was "very dangerous. The purpose is to make the language clearer and more concise."

Dalal added that regulators may "have different definitions of 'threats'" and that Meeks' amendment does not necessarily preclude the council from reporting to Congress and the public threats that exist to the financial system.

"It's not just threats. We're trying to make it so the regulators have more information to look at," he said. "We're looking at developments as well.

"There might be a new development that we might want to take into account, like 'Oh, England is doing something that we think we should take a look at as well, and consider implementing. It may not be a threat that's going on over there, but it's something that we might want to consider as well."

CFA's Roper remains skeptical.

"You do start to get the picture that the legislation responding to a crisis that was brought about by lax regulation will perpetuate that same approach."]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 13:45:50 -0500
Unfortunately, bad has become normal in terms of how we eat and how we produce food. Our health, our planet, and other animals suffer by our harmful and illogical habit of consuming meat, milk and eggs. Despite agribusiness asserting that an animal-based food system is scientifically sound, our food choices are more about feelings and custom than about reason.

In fact, a growing bed of scientific evidence is making it clear that animal agriculture makes no sense. Why do we eat foods that make us sick? And why do we buy into an agricultural system that is responsible for the most significant environmental threats of our time, including global warming? Science can show us how to produce meat, milk and eggs in vast quantities, but that doesn't mean we should.

Most consumers don't like thinking about how farm animals are treated, and they are quick to turn away when gruesome pictures show the reality of factory farming. It is the rare miscreant who openly celebrates cruelty and slaughter, but ironically, most citizens unwittingly support it. So for factory farms to survive, consumers must be kept in the dark and live in denial. But people are finally beginning to learn about the abuses of industrial animal farming. As the reality comes to light, Foer concludes, "We can't plead ignorance, only indifference."

Massive animal exploitation and meat consumption has flourished largely because of the stories we tell and the assumptions they bolster. For example, we've convinced ourselves that animals were put on earth for humans to use, and that eating animal foods is healthy and necessary. But these are false notions. We can live and thrive by eating plants alone. In fact, it's healthier and more environmentally sustainable to eat plants instead of animals. And when our food is vegan, we can see how it is produced without feeling bad or looking the other way.

Changing habits involves more than new economic and production systems. It requires us to develop new traditions and stories. One annual tradition that could stand a refresher is Thanksgiving. When you think about it, a dead bird as the centerpiece of the tradition is really quite morbid. Foer says that if his entire book was "decanted into a single question," it might be "should we serve turkey at Thanksgiving?"

Farm Sanctuary has been raising that question for 23 years through its Adopt-A-Turkey Project (www.adoptaturkey.org), which encourages people to join a new Thanksgiving tradition and save a turkey instead of eating one. Through gross genetic manipulation, factory bred turkeys today can't even reproduce naturally - all are products of artificial insemination. They are crowded by the thousands in factory farm warehouses and live in their own feces. Parts of their toes and beaks are cut off to prevent them from injuring each other in these stressful overcrowded conditions. And, the birds that we've rescued through the years arrive at our sanctuaries with increasingly compounded health issues. Isn't it time to adopt a new Thanksgiving tradition?]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 13:31:30 -0500
Kilmeade began the nonsense thusly:

KILMEADE: Do you think it's time for the military to have special debriefings of Muslim Army officers -- anybody enlisted?...Because if I'm going to be deployed in a foxhole, if I'm going to be sticking in an outpost, I got to know the guy next to me is not going to want to kill me.

First of all, as someone who's been unfortunate enough to catch Brian "The Brown Haired One" Kilmeade revealing his personality on the air, my judgment on the matter is that the only foxhole in which Kilmeade is not likely to encounter someone who harbors the desire to do him harm is one in which he is the sole occupant. And even then, who knows? I give even odds!

But it fell to Geraldo Rivera to point out the obvious:

RIVERA: But isn't this the headline, Brian, that there are four or five million American Muslims and how scant and few and far between these horrifying incidents are? It's the same thing in the military. Believe me, I've been in Afghanistan with these guys,in Iraq with these guys. They are treasured for their bilingualism, their multiculturalism, the fact that they can bridge and understand and translate for us.

But then, Gretchen Carlson became concerned with "political correctness," saying, "Could it be that out military was also exercising political correctness -- even though he had a poor performance report, even though he spoke openly about being a radical and had those supposed postings online -- could it be that the military was exercising political correctness in not approaching as seriously as they would have if he had not been a Muslim."

Rivera agreed though he went on to cite government bureaucracy, not political correctness, as the reason those warning signs went unheeded.

WATCH:



By the way, here's a fun fact:

Motorcycle and street gang members have joined the U.S. military and served in Iraq, a new FBI report says.


[...]

The Defense Department does not track gang membership in the military. But FBI investigators believe the reduction in enlistment standards -- due to recruitment pressure related to the Iraq War -- has brought more gang members in.

Recruiters are not trained to look for signs of gang membership, the report said. Others ignore criminal records of willing volunteers -- such as the recruiter who concealed the fact that a member of the Latin Kings was awaiting trial for a razor assault on a New York police officer.

So, I'm not sure, exactly how or where "political correctness" enters into this.

RELATED:
Fox hosts want 'special screenings' for Muslims in military [Raw Story]
Kilmeade, Johnson want to know if it's time for "special debriefings," "special screenings" of Muslim officers [Media Matters]

[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here.]]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 13:31:13 -0500
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Below is the statement of administration policy issued by the Executive Office of the President:

The Administration strongly supports House passage of H.R. 3962, the Affordable Health Care for America Act, a bill that represents a critical milestone in the effort to reform our health care system. H.R. 3962 will provide needed insurance reforms for Americans with insurance, expand coverage for those who do not have insurance, lower costs for families and businesses, and begin to reduce the Nation's deficit. It meets the President's criteria for health insurance reform: it assures that all Americans have access to quality, affordable health care that is there when they need it and does so without adding a dime to the deficit.


This legislation is the product of unprecedented cooperation and countless hours of hard work by Members of the House of Representatives who share the President's conviction that the Nation cannot wait another year for health insurance reform. They have forged a strong consensus that represents an historic step forward.

The House legislation includes critical reforms to the insurance industry, so that Americans will no longer have to worry that they will be denied coverage, or that their coverage will be dropped or watered down when they need it most. It covers virtually all Americans and ensures that all Americans with health insurance are protected against high out-of-pocket spending. The Administration is pleased that the bill includes a public health insurance option offered in an exchange. As the President has said throughout this process, a public option that competes with private insurers is one of the best ways to ensure the choice and competition that are so badly needed in today's market.

The House bill also includes important health care delivery system reforms, and would extend the solvency of Medicare's hospital insurance trust fund. Its Medicare and Medicaid policies promote integrated care, quality care, and primary care. It invests in research on the most effective treatments, prevention, and the health care workforce. It also makes critical improvements for Medicare beneficiaries including closing the coverage gap in the Medicare drug benefit known as the donut hole. In addition, it provides new options for long-term care. Moreover, the House bill is fully paid for and will help to reduce the deficit in the long-term.

This bill provides the necessary health reforms that the Administration seeks - affordable, quality care within reach for the tens of millions of Americans who do not have it today, and stability and security for the hundreds of millions who do. The Administration appreciates the hard work of the House on this bill, which contributes to transforming the health care system. The Administration looks forward to continuing to work with the Congress on this legislation and urges quick action on this landmark bill.

Few, if anyone, doubted that the president would end up supporting the House of Representative's final health care package. The question has always been how much would the president go to bat for a public plan and how concerned was the administration that including such a provision would doom legislation's passage.

Democratic strategists are interpreting Friday's statement as one of the surest recent signs that the public plan has the president's endorsement. But obviously, questions remain. And they'll begin with Saturday's vote. As of now, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer says leadership is close (but not quite there) to getting the 218 votes needed to get the bill passed. Once that hurdle is skipped, the spotlight will shift back to the Senate, where a public plan (with an opt-out clause for states) still does not have the 60 votes needed to cut off a Republican filibuster. ]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2009 13:15:50 -0500