Joe Wilson and AHIP Team Up to Write Max Baucus’s Health Care Bill
By: Jane Hamsher
http://campaignsilo.firedoglake.com/2009/09/11/joe-wilson-and-ahip-team-up-to-write-max-baucuss-health-care-bill/Friday September 11, 2009 7:06 am
There really doesn't seem to be any limit to what the administration will do to pass Rahm Emanuel's neoliberal giveaway to the insurance industry. The "author" of the plan released by Baucus (and apparently by Mike Ross) is a former VP of Wellpoint. Now AHIP is boasting about their role in crafting it: Many of the changes to the insurance system now under discussion are the ones that have been advocated this year by the insurance companies themselves, said Karen M. Ignagni, the chief executive of America's Health Insurance Plans, the industry trade group. "The industry has been the leader in creating the proposals everyone is about to endorse," she said.
No wonder insurance company stocks shot up after the President's speech.
But now we find, per John Aravosis, that Kent Conrad and Max Baucus are changing their bill to appease Joe Wilson: "We really thought we'd resolved this question of people who are here illegally, but as we reflected on the President's speech last night we wanted to go back and drill down again," said Senator Kent Conrad, one of the Democrats in the talks after a meeting Thursday morning. Baucus later that afternoon said the group would put in a proof of citizenship requirement to participate in the new health exchange — a move likely to inflame the left.
As John says, if Wilson's outburst turns out to be successful, it'll keep happening over and over again. And it will work every time.If you want to stop this travesty from going forward -- and it's turning into a complete travesty -- ask these members of Congress from strong Democratic districts, all of whom have cosponsored Single Payer in the past and know better, why they aren't pledging to vote against any bill if it turns out to be nothing more than an insurance industry bailout:
read the rest at the link..........