August Offensive to Define Health Care Debate: Insurance Companies in the Bull's Eye

A potentially decisive battle to define this year's health care debate -- and the Obama Presidency -- will take place in town hall meetings, little league bleaches, and conversations on door steps near you during the August Congressional recess.

The White House, its Congressional allies, and progressive organizations supporting health care reform have launched a new August offensive to write the narrative of the health care debate. The story line is clear: on the one side are America's health care consumers. On the other are the eight private health insurance companies that dominate the health insurance market, who are doing so much to deep-six the health insurance reform that America so desperately needs.

Americans United for Change (for which I am General Consultant) helps kick off this offensive today with a new TV spot that begins to personalize the private health insurance industry. It asks the question: Why do the health insurance companies and Republicans want to kill President Obama's health insurance reform? It answers with the tale of H. Edward Hanway, the CEO of giant Cigna Insurance.

Hanway made $12.2 million as CEO of Cigna last year. Sometimes that kind of number just rolls off the tongue. But someone who makes $12.2 million is making $5,883 per hour. He makes 30 times more than the CEO of the federal government -- the president. He makes more in one day than the average American worker makes all year long.

And that's not all. Hanway just announced he will be retiring at year's end. For his retirement, H. Edward will get a good deal more than a gold watch. He will get a golden parachute worth $73 million. Probably a fair amount more than the guy who runs Medicare, don't you think?

The private insurance industry is pretty crazed about a health insurance reform plan that will require them to compete with a public health insurance option focused on covering everyone and controlling costs, instead of making off with fortunes.

They would love to see a plan that requires the taxpayers to reach into their jeans and plunk down hundreds of billions more dollars as long as they could continue to skim their take off an ever-exploding national health care bill. They would love to have the government require that everyone must buy their health care insurance. But the idea of competing with a public plan that forces efficiency, drives down the industry's growing profit margins and gives consumers an option other than the oligopoly of eight major health insurance firms? They think that is a terrible idea.

They feel the same way towards a public health insurance option that the local mob boss feels about some interloper who tries to cut into the piece of the action he takes from the bookies operating within his turf.

So, like the local mob boss, they will be pulling out all the stops in August to terrorize members of Congress and sow fear and confusion about the Obama Health Insurance Reform plan. They will run ads. They will make copious political contributions. They will provide ammunition to the right-wing talk show hosts. They will do everything in their power to stop the Obama plan dead in its tracks, because they know that once people have a new health insurance system, there will be no going back.

But this August, Progressives have no intention of being bowled over by the assault of the "insurance gang." Progressives have learned the lesson of 1994, and this time we will go right at them. There are four reasons why we are likely to prevail:

• The polling shows clearly that most people agree that the health insurance industry has worn out its welcome with Americans. Since 1994, there have simply been too many people denied coverage for pre-existing conditions, or told that they are no longer covered because they have gotten a serious illness, or gouged so that H. Edward Hanway can have a $73 million retirement package. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that something's wrong with the health insurance industry when premiums go up three times faster than wages and 14,000 people a day are losing their health insurance, yet insurance industry profits still keep going up in the midst of a horrible recession.

• Even though the health insurance industry has more resources than we do, it is also true that it costs less to convince people that what is good for them is good for them, than it does to convince people that what is bad for them is good for them.

• We have a president and Democratic leadership in Congress willing to make the case against the insurance companies in stark, clear terms.

• Well-organized progressive coalitions like Health Care for America Now (HCAN), and Obama's field operation -- Organize for America -- have been preparing for this engagement for months. They have been accumulating resources, testing public opinion, organizing grassroots field operations -- all in preparation for this decisive battle.

Now the insurance gang has shown its hand. Of all of the "stakeholders" in the health care industry, it is the one that is prepared to sink health care reform if change threatens its ability to siphon off billions of dollars into the bank accounts of the H. Edward Hanway's of the world.

This month let's all look carefully at the way the H. Edward Hanway's live. Let's contemplate whether the fortunes of a few are worth the continued suffering of 43 million Americans who worry everyday that they might fall seriously ill -- or be injured driving home -- and be bankrupted by their health care bills.

Let's ponder whether we should protect those fortunes, even though by doing so we continue to pay 50% more per person for health care than any other country on Earth, for outcomes that rank 37th in the world.

Let's put ourselves in the shoes of the woman who testified before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, who had paid her health care premiums for years and had her policy "rescinded" (cancelled) on a technicality after she got cancer. When asked if they could guarantee that their companies would not continue to "rescind" policies in the future, the insurance company representatives refused to do so. Wouldn't want to cut into H. Edward's $5,883 per hour pay check, after all.

During the month of August, let's make sure that the topic of conversation at every bar stool, kitchen table and barber shop is the health insurance industry and the small group of people who profit from its fine print and monopoly practices.

Much of the health insurance industry's power is its ability to pull the strings of politicians from behind the curtain. Like Count Dracula, another famous baron who was good at siphoning off other people's assets, the health insurance industry does a lot better if it is not exposed to daylight.

In the next four weeks, let's light up the health insurance industry like Yankee Stadium on an August night.

If we all do that, when the game is over, after decades of struggle, America's consumers will finally come out as winners.

Robert Creamer is a long-time political organizer and strategist, and author of the recent book: "Stand Up Straight: How Progressives Can Win," available on amazon.com.

Comments

[gfulmore]

In the Colorado town hall, President Obama said that ending pre-existing conditions immediately would not work because only the people who were sick would want to sign up for insurance. I think that comment is full of holes. Now, the insurance companies have it the other way around: they pick who they want and reject the rest. But if a group plan is involved, pre-existing conditions do not come into play. That makes no sense. I think the rules should change immediately involving pre-conditions. I don't think the insurance companies will be hurt at all. Afterall, the idea of having insurance is to get to a doctor and/or hospital when you need to, and only when you need to.

[UKOH]

I think your point is, as I and my fellow Europeans have know for a long time:

(a) It is immoral to make a profit out of people's misfortune and health issues.
(b) In a civilized country health care is a right not a priviledge for all of its citizens.

As long as these principles are followed, the delivery mechanism for health care has many options. "Single payer" or government run is not the only option.

I lived in Germany for ten years. Germany does not have a public option.

There are private companies called "Krankenkassen" that cover health care. They are legally not allowed to operate at a profit. Fees for doctors, hospitals and other health care services are tightly regulated. You have a choice of "Krankenkasse" with differing premiums and service levels but (unless you are filthy rich) you MUST belong to one. That means that it is like group insurance with the group being the entire membership of the Krankenkasse. As by law young healthy single people as well as sick families are members the premiums average out to be affordable to all. No pre-existing conditions or premium hikes on individuals.
The "Krankenkassen" compete against each other. Even absent a profit motive, there are good commercial reasons to be bigger than your competitor, More members means more cash means better pay etc. Under this system, if a CEO could make $12.5M a year AND the "Krankenkasse" fulfil all its legal obligations, then fine. Good luck!

[Lvsmo2011]

Despite all the rhetoric for or against the Healthcare Reform, remember that Congress still has the absolute BEST heath insurance and retirement plans in this country...and we pay for it. Serve one term as Senator or Representative, you get paid your current salary for life; serve one term, you get the health coverage for life. If you have a medical issue, you can go to the best hospitals in the nation...and we pay for it. If you need transportation and there is nothing easily available, the military will come get you...and we pay for it. There is no real incentive to really help the common people...it's a matter of "I've got mine...screw you!"

[Charlie M]

All this is exactly why we do not need insurance companies,the middle man taking a profit off our illnesses.

[enuffofw]

Health care reform is dead.

Single payer, Medicare for all, universal health care and other ideas of similar ilk, are truly wonderful and grand sentiments. However, those who are actually running the show in this country simply will not allow any meaningful reform.

Give it up and start saving your money. Buy a large caliber handgun to top yourself when the bills get so big your family will suffer serious financial harm.

'Tis better to off yourself than to drive your family into poverty.

Whine and cry all you want; the simple truth of the matter is that health care in this country will remain unchanged (except for Medicare, Medicaid and other guvmn't programs which will eventually be cut to the point of elimination).

This is my pledge:

If no strong public health care insurance option is passed this year and in effect by January, 2010, I will never vote for another Democrat or Republican at ANY level of government, local through federal. If there are no Independent or viable third party candidates running for an office, I simply will not vote that office.

Some may say that by refusing to vote for a Democratic candidate is the same as voting for a Republican. Do you really think your Democratic vote last November resulted in any significant change?

I'm just one person but its got to start somewhere.

'Scuse me, I'm off to the gun show.

[gabemill]

Kind of a premature surrender, enuff. This fight is not over, so save the white flag for now.
To equate Dems with repubs on the issue of health care reform is naive at best. Repubs have done all in their power (joined by the insurance industry) to deep six this administration and health care reform. Party over country.......such wonderful patriots! They are the same lot who attempted to defeat the New GI Bill, saying it was too expensive (actually, the cost was the equivalent of 5 1/2 days in Iraq). Funny how they became "fiscally responsible" when Obama was inaugurated. Prior to this, they were asleep at the switch and rubber stamped anything W put before them. Personally, I'd prefer they go back to snoozing, if obstructionism is all they offer.

[carlonero]

This is all well and good, but Congresspeople and Senators are having their town meetings undermined by organized people bussed in by GOP spinoff groups supportive of the current system. These participants's minds are full of lies--which they repeat.

I saw some of these shenanigans on Keith Olbermann and Rachel last night, as well as the scripts these people were given. These are NOT local constituents--they are storm troops without guns. Yes--it reminds me of what I read about happening before the Anschluss in Austria. It's the SAME m.o.--and should be exposed as such.

[ChelseaC]

Obama's bill isn't good--It throws government subsidies at a broken system.
If Obama is really for a "public option", he should clean up MEDICARE and expand it to ALL--no exception--that's whay he should do along with capping drug prices, close down SCHIP, and Medicaid--these people should obtain Medicare--one option instead of all three--saves overhead costs.
Leave the insurance companies alone to sink or swim with no help or suggestions.
Most Americans would then decide, this for profit BS or MEDICARE.

The Kucinich Amendment--single payer at the state level or HR-676 at the federal level is REAL reform.
This bill is NOT.

[texfly]

All sectors of the current healthcare system are making huge profits. They are much, much bigger than you can imagine since much of their profits have gone into building new infrastructure that does literally nothing for delivering healthcare. These "profits" show up as expenses on their balance sheets while they still have high profit margins to deliver to shareholders. This practice is rampant in hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, medical equipment companies, health insurance companies, and medical practitioners. The biggest area is in real estate, buildings and furnishings. They could amount to half of all healthcare costs over the last ten years or so. To wit, have you paid any attention to the grandiose buildings be erected by all heath care sectors? Not a one is under 10 years old and the furnishings are to die for. They are glass and glitz. And guess what, most of these expenses probably hide even larger investments in rental properties that may or may not be health-care related. I dare anyone to disagree with this assessment, I seen this modus operandi for over 20 years now. It is standard practice, especially in the insurance industry. I venture to say we could save at least 30% in health care costs.

A good public option (one meant to deliver health care) is needed for a basis of comparison. A comprehensive audit of the system is absolutely necessary, followed by complete transparency of the results.

[peteonearth]

Everyone complains about government "bureaucracy"--especially when it comes to Democrats. The conservative pundits think Obama is a socialist, and that a nationalized healthcare system somehow has us doing that Red Army high kick march down Pennsylvania Ave.

As an American, I want choices; and insurance companies offer that in the free market. No boundaries makes for a great blend of ingenuity and destructive unchecked desire. Let's not begrudge CEO's their ridiculous earnings when we give movie stars and athletes HUGE $$$, and then they crap all over our adoration with a DUI on Santa Monica Blvd. That said, I think the government, run by our taxes, is supposed to come up with a way to ensure people get basic needs met.

The muck seems to be in what constitutes basic health care. If Joe Smith eats sausages, drinks Pepsi, watches 8 hours of TV a day for 30 years and needs bypass surgery, what is basic health care? Well, maybe he's depressed. Maybe he needs psychotherapy so he doesn't keep stuffing his feelings with sausages and reruns of Melrose Place... I'm happy to help such a person. Rush Limbaugh perhaps would not. Oh well, if only we could all be as fit and trim as Rush... As I said, choices are good, but I am fine with my tax dollars going toward some kind of plan that helps the poor and sick, and that might reward those who take the time to exercise, and eat their vegetables.

[Gnosisquest]

You make some good points but I feel it should be mentioned that the reason I have to pay about $6.00 for each hour I work to get the second grade insurance offered in the US is because so much of it goes for lying TV ads and bribing senators plus paying astronomical fees for lobbyists to keep a corrupt system in place.

I know they are not telling the truth because I have been in countries with single payer insurance where the medical care is far superior to what these HMO's provide at their inflated rate.

Another thing that should be mentioned is that if the US can't afford to provide proper medical care for all its citizens like the other industrial nations we are among the poorest nations, bordering on a third world country. The wealth of a country is measured by the quality of life for the citizens and not the amassed wealth of a tiny percentage.

[steve-annie]

This article makes some very salient points, especially about paying 150% premiums for 37th place care. I just wish I could believe that third bulleted point about the Democratic leadership. It seems to me that once the Blue Dogs started howling the leadership was pretty quick to make "compromises" (read "sellout") on the public option - the most important part of the bill for creating competition and lowering costs, and what we were promised throughout the 2008 campaign.

[orelse]

I'm self employed and received an insurance quote for my wife and I. I just purchased the policy and the cost since May has gone up $95 per month ! ?...

[quidam56]

Why all the news about how horrifying health care is in Canada and the UK ? We have our own health care nightmares and rationed care but don’t hear enough about that, all they want to holler is Obama is going to kill granny. The status quo killed my father. In the end he was begging for a gun. Looking back, I regret not granting that wish.

http://www.wisecountyissues.com/?p=62

In Tennessee and Virginia, profit care comes way ahead of patient care.

[DaveCarroll4]

"Let's ponder whether we should protect those fortunes, even though by doing so we continue to pay 50% more per person for health care than any other country on Earth, for outcomes that rank 37th in the world." This is the single most important fact that needs to be in Bold Print and blasted like a Trumpet! Why? Just this simple word "Why", is the key to Americans coming together to beat the profiteers! Everyone can contemplate this simple question fairly armed with adequate knowledge. Someone is taking that money that is not getting into the system itself. The 8 major companies and their administrators, period, is the answer. This makes the health care issue, more than a health care issue! It is quite simply, "Us against them!" We-the-People against Big-Business and the greedy bastards reaping all the profit off of human lives...be it by dying from preventable diseases to losing our jobs, for some, after 20 years or more of dedicated work. This is the setting for a "Class War" like American has never seen before. We are electronically enabled to make our voices heard, and WE WANT CHANGE! How many ways do we have to say it? Term limits...kick the "good-ol-boys" to the curb! 2008 was not the end of it...it was the BEGINNING! Incumbents, if you sell us out again, you're gettin' replaced. We know lobbying is bribing government officials and we're sick-to-death of legalized bribery!

[steve-annie]

Not to mention legalized extortion, which is what insurance premiums have become.

[DaveCarroll4]

Yes indeed!!! Too many people defend this wonderful country beyond practicality! That is how Democracy dies! The framers of our Constitutions put things in place so that we could "Speak Out" without fear of repercussions. They did not intend for us to EVER sit back on our asses and take whatever was dished out to us! We have too many periods of extended silence and misplaced loyalties. Now we have legalized bribery; Lobbying... Legalized extortion; health insurance companies/drug companies... Legalized Torture of Human Beings... Wars-of-Choice that border on Genocide... An Antique legal framework that keeps over 2 million American Citizens incarcerated every year (over 1 in ever 100)... Magnanimous tax breaks for people who Outsource American jobs to other countries, while Citizens live in poverty here... Denial of being the most Ecologically disastrous nation on the planet (using 1/3 of all resources wastefully and polluting like there is no price to be paid for it)... What's so good about that? Yes, we are still the best, but can that last forever if we go on as we are? I'm a Vet and I did not serve from 1967-71 for what I now see! CHANGE is "TERM LIMITS" in Congress! 2 terms and your done, period!

[Troyxx]

This is excellent! Now go get the greedy oinkers and get it over with. These greedy bastards need to be exposed and then they should be tarred and feathered and driven outta town. There's a powerful social force called people power, you know. Use it and get rid of these creeps, who are just low down looters of your hard earned money. If you want positive social, get out there and make it happen. There are 300 million of you. That's a hell of a lot of people power. You can do it. Just think of those greedy oinkers as killers, which is really what they are. They will let you die in order to make a profit.

[AskDrNick-anything]

The comment about insurance mob terrorizing Congress to "sow fear and confusion about the Obama Health Insurance Reform plan" is really over the top. The plan itself does all the confusing on the matter. It is consistent with every measure employed by the administration so far, the latest being the "cash for clunkers", or what may be known as "take from Peter to pay Paul" program. Like the proposed health-care reform, the "clunker" program looks at a very short-term-myopic solution, that would last a couple of months, squeeze in a week's time frame, what people would do anyway the next 2-3 months, meanwhile take money from non-clunker buyers and shift it to the clunkers. Really brilliant economics!
AskDrNick-anything

[Donnie4488]

OK,Dr Nick. I'd like to ask how much you're making off the insurance companies trough? Or how 'bout PhRMA? And if you insist on equating the Cash for Clunkers program (a disingenuous argument if I ever heard one), with the health care debate, then let ME edify you, Dr (if you really are one). The cash for clunkers has been the most successful government program since,well, Medicare. All the car company's sales are up and they're putting people back to work. This program succeeds on three levels: putting people to work,stimulating the local economy, and getting rid of uneconomical vehicles. What's your problem with that??

[LCLA]

And it is cutting down our carbon footprint. People are choosing more efficient vehicles which also reduces our dependence on foreign energy which helps keep the USA more resilient (not to mention more clean and green).
As for economics, I think it is a very suspect science as currently employed. Economic forecasts only wish they were as accurate as the weather forecasts. And we all get nearly daily reminders of the flaws in those forecasts.