In Honor of Senator Edward Kennedy

I would like to take a moment to honor and express gratitude for the positive difference that Senator Edward Kennedy made by acknowledging a glimpse into his record. Much of the below I wasn't even aware of. I am deeply appreciative and honor the work accomplished by Senator Kennedy which made a real difference in creating a more just and caring nation. I also would like to acknowledge my deep respect for anyone who has sought to turn their inner demons into blessing. This is not an easy path to walk... May we each find our own ways, no matter how small, to increasingly work toward a world which works for all beings. May we each connect more and more with inner peace and see that peace reflected and rippled out across our beautiful Mother Earth...

Peace & blessings ~ Molly

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Sen. Edward Kennedy's Career Timeline

by The Associated Press
Wednesday August 26, 2009, 2:30 AM

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/sen_edward_kennedys_career_tim.html

1962

Edward M. Kennedy is elected to the United States Senate.

1964

Senator Kennedy makes his maiden speech to the Senate on the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which was signed on July 2, 1964, and outlawed segregation in public accommodations. He also strongly supported the Economic Opportunity Act, a key bill in President Johnson's war on poverty, which was signed on August 20, 1964.

1965

The first major bill that Senator Kennedy managed on the Senate floor was the Immigration Act of 1965. It was enacted and stood as a major turning point in immigration and civil rights policy because it eliminated discriminatory immigration quotas which favored European immigration, but restricted immigration from other parts of the world. Senator Kennedy also won passage of a bill establishing The National Teacher Corps, which awarded scholarships to college students who agreed to teach for at least two years in economically-distressed rural and urban areas after graduation, a program which continues today. He was also a strong and vocal supporter of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, to end discrimination against minorities in voting.

1966

Senator Kennedy passed legislation creating the national community health center program. He joined a health center in Columbia Point in Dorchester, Massachusetts, with a center in Mound Bayou, Mississippi as the start of a national program that now includes more that 1200 health centers nationally serving more than 20 million low income patients.

1967

Senator Kennedy was a strong supporter of the school reforms in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the first comprehensive federal aid for public schools. He also made his first speech that openly questioned the Vietnam War.

1968

Senator Kennedy was a strong supporter of the Fair Housing Act of 1968, the third major civil rights legislation of the decade after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. As a result of Senator Kennedy's championing of bilingual education, the Bilingual Education Act of 1968 was passed by Congress. The Act required schools to offer bilingual education programs, the first time Congress had endorsed funding for bilingual education. Senator Kennedy was also a leading supporter of President Johnson's Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act.

1969

Senator Kennedy gives his first speech calling for national health insurance for all Americans. His amendment creating a minimum tax -- the so-called "Alternative Minimum Tax" -- becomes law, setting a limit on the amount of taxation for middle-income Americans.

1970

Senator Kennedy amended the Voting Rights Act to lower the voting age to 18, laying the basis for a constitutional amendment moving the voting age from 21 to age 18. He was also a leader in enacting the Occupational Health and Safety Act to protect workers on jobs and the Older American Community Service Employment Act. To ease the high cost of home heating, Senator Kennedy actively worked to create a fuel assistance program for low-income persons now known as the Low Income Heating Energy Assistance Program or "LIHEAP". He was also responsible for legislation laying the basis for the "War on Cancer" by quadrupling funds for cancer research and prevention. When President Nixon attempted to pocket veto Senator Kennedy's Family Protection of Medicine Act, the Senate won a court decision invalidating the pocket veto and enacting the law.

1971

Senator Kennedy becomes Chairman of the Senate Health Subcommittee. He held a series of field hearings around the country on national health insurance, and is a leader in passing the National Cancer Act to expand research on all aspects of cancer. Inspired by the civil rights movement in the United States and because of his growing concern over British policy in Northern Ireland, Senator Kennedy joins Senator Ribicoff in introducing a Senate Resolution calling for immediate withdrawal of British troops from Northern Ireland and the unification of Ireland, beginning his long involvement with Northern Ireland.

1972

Senator Kennedy champions the Meals on Wheels Act, which offers nutritional meals to homebound senior citizens and the Women, Infants, and Children Nutrition Program, known as WIC, which offers food, nutrition counseling, and health services to low-income women, infants, and children. Kennedy was also a key supporter of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which protects women from discrimination in educational institutions and increases opportunities for women to participate in college sports.

1973
Senator Kennedy continues to improve legal services and emergency health services for the poor, and improve educational opportunities for persons with disabilities. After the revelation of several life-threatening research projects with human subjects, many of whom were Americans who were minorities, institutionalized or incarcerated, Senator Kennedy's Health Subcommittee held 11 days of hearings into the ethical implications of human experimentation. These hearings resulted in strengthened regulation of human experimentation and the establishment of the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects in Biomedical and Behavioral Research. In addition, Senator Kennedy and Senator Hugh Scott sponsor legislation for public financing of Senate and House elections. The bill is approved by the Senate but not the House.

1974
After the CIA-backed military coup that toppled democratic government in Chile and brought General Pinochet to power, Senator Kennedy leads the fight to cut off U.S. military aid to Chile. His amendment to the foreign aid bill marked the first time that Congress had ended military aid to another nation. Kennedy and Wilbur Mills, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, introduced comprehensive legislation providing national health insurance.

1975
Senator Kennedy was an original cosponsor of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, which later became the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and requires a free and appropriate public education for children with disabilities in every state.

More: http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/sen_edward_kennedys_career_tim.html

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I hope for an America where the power of faith will always burn brightly, but where no modern inquisition of any kind will ever light the fires of fear, coercion, or angry division... I hope for an America where we can all contend freely and vigorously, but where we will treasure and guard those standards of civility which alone make this nation safe for both democracy and diversity.

~ Senator Edward M. Kennedy, 2008

The Political Economy of Media

Robert McChesney is an amazing man and someone I have the utmost respect and appreciation for. I had the great honor of seeing him speak several months ago at the University of Portland and walked away from that event with even greater awareness and passion that our corporate owned media system must change. This is about his latest book... Peace & hope ~ Molly

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The Political Economy of Media:

Enduring Issues, Emerging Dilemmas
by Robert W. McChesney

Praise for McChesney’s The Problem of the Media:

“As Chomsky is to linguistics, Ben & Jerry’s to ice cream, and Elvis to shaking one’s hips, McChesney is to media analysis. He is the King: there is no one more definitive.”—Danny Schechter, founder of MediaChannel.org

“McChesney’s work has been of extraordinary importance. It should be read with care and concern by people who care about freedom and basic rights.”— Noam Chomsky

“Robert McChesney follows in the great tradition of Upton Sinclair, George Seldes, I.F. Stone, and Ben Bagdikian in exposing the ruthless hold of corporate power on the nations media.”— Howard Zinn

"As with all his prior works, this new volume demonstrates McChesney’s signal strengths as America’s leading critic and historian of the media: unrivaled erudition across several disciplines; a bracing theoretical lucidity; and – not least – a blunt and lively style, enlivened by a killer sense of humor. This book, in short, is a must-read not just for all admirers of McChesney’s work, but for everyone concerned about the global sway of the commercial media, and keen to put a stop to it at last."— Mark Crispin Miller, professor of media studies at NYU and author of Fooled Again

More than any other work, The Political Economy of Media demonstrates the incompatibility of the corporate media system with a viable democratic public sphere, and the corrupt policymaking process that brings the system into existence. Among the most acclaimed communication scholars in the world, Robert W. McChesney has brought together all the major themes of his two decades of research. Rich in detail, evidence, and thoughtful arguments, The Political Economy of Media provides a comprehensive critique of the degradation of journalism, the hyper-commercialization of culture, the Internet, and the emergence of the contemporary media reform movement. The Political Economy of Media is mandatory reading for anyone wishing to understand and change media, and the political economy, in the world today.

Robert W. McChesney is the Gutgsell Endowed Professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He is the author of Communication Revolution, The Problem of the Media, and Rich Media, Poor Democracy.

More:

http://monthlyreview.org/books/politicaleconomymedia.php

http://www.robertmcchesney.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_W._McChesney

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/McChesney/Robert_McChesney_page.html

http://www.amazon.com/Political-Economy-Media-Enduring-Emerging/dp/1583671617

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“It's clear that there is a highly corrupt relationship between some journalists and those in positions of power, ... This indictment shows the corrupt nature of the press system and its linkage to power.”

"They've got to be held accountable; our broadcasting system has to be made accountable; and unless it is, it's going to be very hard to change anything else for the better in this country."

"You know, a left-winger, the barrier to success if you're on the left in commercial radio is a mile and a half higher than it is if you're on the right."

"Hightower's (Jim Hightower) problem, among other things, is that advertisers would be a lot less interested in his show than in Limbaugh's, even if they have similar ratings, because of what Hightower is saying."

"So the system we have in radio and television today is the direct result of government policies that have been made in our name, in the name of the people, on our behalf, but without our informed consent."

“As the mainstream media has become increasingly dependent on advertising revenues for support, it has become an anti-democratic force in society.”

~ Quotes by Robert McChesney

Health Care Rally Featuring Wendell Potter

There will be a health care rally 9/28/09 at Terry Schrunk Plaza (at SW 3rd and Madison at 10am) for any of you who may not be aware and may want to go. One thing that is very exciting is that Wendell Potter will be the featured speaker. I have seen him interviewed on Bill Moyers Journal and also heard him interviewed on radio and read a lot also about this man's story and what he is doing today to work toward a more caring world. As a former 20 year executive in the health care industry, he is very powerful! I so admire this man's courage, experience, and his commitment to shining light on both misinformation and truths regarding the multi-trillion dollar insurance industry. Wendell Potter is truly trying to walk his amends in the way he lives his life today for his many years of participation in an industry that has cost so many lives, so much suffering, and is now succeeding in convincing millions of Americans to be screaming in protest against their own and every one else's best interests. Bless him. Hopefully you can make it or watch Wendell Potter on the Journal: http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/07102009/profile.html. Thank you for also considering sharing this information with others. Envisioning a more caring world for all... Molly

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Looking back over his long career, Potter sees an industry corrupted by Wall Street expectations and greed. According to Potter, insurers have every incentive to deny coverage — every dollar they don't pay out to a claim is a dollar they can add to their profits, and Wall Street investors demand they pay out less every year. Under these conditions, Potter says, "You don't think about individual people. You think about the numbers, and whether or not you're going to meet Wall Street's expectations."

~ from Bill Moyers Journal transcript, 7/10/09

A Mean Streak in the US Mainstream

by Mary Dejevsky

Published on Tuesday, August 25, 2009 by The Independent/UK

The US tolerates more inequality, deprivation and

suffering than is acceptable here

When we Europeans – the British included – contemplate the battles President Obama must fight to reform the US health system, our first response tends to be disbelief. How can it be that so obvious a social good as universal health insurance, so humane a solution to common vulnerability, is not sewn deep into the fabric of the United States? How can one of the biggest, richest and most advanced countries in the world tolerate a situation where, at any one time, one in six of the population has to pay for their treatment item by item, or resort to hospital casualty wards?

The second response, as automatic as the first, is to blame heartless and ignorant Republicans. To Europeans, a universal health system is so basic to a civilised society that only the loony right could possibly oppose it: the people who cling to their guns, picket abortion clinics (when they are not trying to shoot the abortionists) and block funding for birth control in the third world. All right, we are saying to ourselves, there are Americans who think like this, but they are out on an ideological limb.

If only this were true. The reason why Obama is finding health reform such a struggle – even though it was central to his election platform – is not because an extreme wing of the Republican Party, mobilised by media shock-jocks, is foaming at the mouth, or because Republicans have more money than Democrats to buy lobbying and advertising power. Nor is it only because so many influential groups, from insurance companies through doctors, have lucrative interests to defend – although this is a big part of it.

It is because very many Americans simply do not agree that it is a good idea. And they include not only mainstream Republicans, but Democrats, too. Indeed, Obama's chief problem in seeking to extend health cover to most Americans is not Republican opposition: he thrashed John McCain to win his presidential mandate; he has majorities in both Houses of Congress. If Democrats were solidly behind reform, victory would already be his.

The unpalatable fact for Europeans who incline to think that Americans are just like us is that Democrats are not solidly behind Obama on this issue. Even many in the party's mainstream must be wooed, cajoled and even – yes – frightened, if they are ever going to agree to change the status quo. Universal healthcare is an article of faith in the US only at what mainstream America would regard as the bleeding- heart liberal end of the spectrum.

More: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/mary-dejevsky/mary-dejevsky-a-mean-streak-in-the-us-mainstream-1776795.html

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One isn't necessarily born with courage, but one is born with potential.

Without courage, we cannot practice any other virtue with consistency.

We can't be kind, true, merciful, generous, or honest.

~ Maya Angelou

The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction,

is the first and only object of good government.

~ Thomas Jefferson

Genuine politics -- even politics worthy of the name -- the only politics I am

willing to devote myself to -- is simply a matter of serving those around us:

serving the community and serving those who will come after us. Its

deepest roots are moral because it is a responsibility expressed

through action, to and for the whole.

~ Vaclav Havel

This Isn’t Reform, It’s Robbery

by Chris Hedges

Published on Monday, August 24, 2009 by TruthDig.com

Percentage change since 2002 in average premiums paid to

large US health-insurance companies: +87%

Percentage change in the profits of

the top ten insurance companies: +428%

Chances that an American bankrupted by medical bills

has health insurance: 7 in 10

—Harper’s Index, September 2009

Capitalists, as my friend Father Michael Doyle says, should never be allowed near a health care system. They hold sick children hostage as they force parents to bankrupt themselves in the desperate scramble to pay for medical care. The sick do not have a choice. Medical care is not a consumable good. We can choose to buy a used car or a new car, shop at a boutique or a thrift store, but there is no choice between illness and health. And any debate about health care must acknowledge that the for-profit health care industry is the problem and must be destroyed. This is an industry that hires doctors and analysts to deny care to patients in order to increase profits. It is an industry that causes half of all bankruptcies. And the 20,000 Americans who died last year because they did not receive adequate care condemn these corporations as complicit in murder.

The current health care debate in Congress has nothing to do with death panels or public options or socialized medicine. The real debate, the only one that counts, is how much money our blood-sucking insurance, pharmaceutical and for-profit health services are going to be able to siphon off from new health care legislation. The proposed plans rattling around Congress all ensure that the profits for these corporations will increase and the misery for ordinary Americans will be compounded. The corporate state, enabled by both Democrats and Republicans, is yet again cannibalizing the Treasury. It is yet again pushing Americans, especially the poor and the working class, into levels of despair and rage that will continue to fuel the violent, proto-fascist movements leaping up around the edges of American society. And the traditional watchdogs—those in public office, the press and citizens groups—are as useless as the perfumed fops of another era who busied their days with court intrigue at Versailles. Canada never looked so good.

The Democrats are collaborating with lobbyists for the insurance industry, the pharmaceutical industry and for-profit health care providers to craft the current health care reform legislation. “Corporate and industry players are inside the tent this time,” says David Merritt, project director at Newt Gingrich’s Center for Health Transformation, “so there is a vacuum on the outside.” And these lobbyists have already killed a viable public option and made sure nothing in the bills will impede their growing profits and capacity for abuse.

More: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090823_this_isnt_reform_its_robbery/

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Thou shalt not be a victim. Thou shalt not be a perpetrator.

Above all, thou shalt not be a bystander.

~ Holocaust Museum, Washington, DC

Cowardice asks the question, 'Is it safe?' Expediency asks the question, 'Is it politic?' Vanity asks the question, 'Is it popular?' But, conscience asks the question, 'Is it right?' And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but one must take it because one's conscience tells one that it is right.

~ Martin Luther King, Jr

All the President’s Zombies

By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published on Monday, August 24, 2009 by The New York Times

The debate over the “public option” in health care has been dismaying in many ways. Perhaps the most depressing aspect for progressives, however, has been the extent to which opponents of greater choice in health care have gained traction — in Congress, if not with the broader public — simply by repeating, over and over again, that the public option would be, horrors, a government program.

Washington, it seems, is still ruled by Reaganism — by an ideology that says government intervention is always bad, and leaving the private sector to its own devices is always good.

Call me naïve, but I actually hoped that the failure of Reaganism in practice would kill it. It turns out, however, to be a zombie doctrine: even though it should be dead, it keeps on coming.

Let’s talk for a moment about why the age of Reagan should be over.

First of all, even before the current crisis Reaganomics had failed to deliver what it promised. Remember how lower taxes on high incomes and deregulation that unleashed the “magic of the marketplace” were supposed to lead to dramatically better outcomes for everyone? Well, it didn’t happen.

To be sure, the wealthy benefited enormously: the real incomes of the top .01 percent of Americans rose sevenfold between 1980 and 2007. But the real income of the median family rose only 22 percent, less than a third its growth over the previous 27 years.

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/24/opinion/24krugman.html?_r=2&ref=opinion

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We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals.

We know now that it is bad economics.

~ Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1937

You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which

you really stop to look fear in the face.

You must do the thing which you think you cannot do.

~ Eleanor Roosevelt

Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.

~ Erich Fromm

Hanging Buddhist Monastery in China

Thank you to my friend Keith for sharing this one.

How beautiful, amazing, wondrous...

Hanging Buddhist Monastery

http://www.slideshare.net/guestfea295/huyenkhongtu-pptminimizer-presentation

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Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.

~ Kahlil Gibran

Spirituality exists wherever we struggle with the issue of how our lives fit into the greater cosmic scheme of things. This is true even when our questions never give way to specific answers or give rise to specific practices such as prayer or meditation. We encounter spiritual issues every time we wonder where the universe comes from, why we are here, or what happens when we die. We also become spiritual when we become moved by values such as beauty, love, or creativity that seem to reveal a meaning or power beyond our visible world. An idea or practice is "spiritual" when it reveals our personal desire to establish a felt-relationship with the deepest meanings or powers governing life.

~ Robert C. Fuller

Extraordinary Video: We Are All One

Thank you to my friend Diana who shared this extraordinary video with me.

The website is called We Are All One. They state:

Our purpose

We want to change the global markets to protect the future of our beautiful world. Every single person should make aware choices to contribute to help

our environment.

We want to encourage everyone!

Spread the understanding that everyone has an individual power to make a difference, we are the consumers in this world, what we don't buy, doesn't sell.

Take action!

Please help us carry this message to various media, including the major TV networks. This is the lesson we all must learn and pass on to our children. We are privileged to put your compassion into action.

Please watch this amazing and important video here:

http://www.weareallone-support.org/

Please pass this on. Thank you so much. Peace ~ Molly

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The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

A significant portion of the earth's population will soon recognize,

if they already haven't done so, that humanity is now faced

with a stark choice: Evolve or die.

~ Eckhart Tolle

What would happen if we consciously created human societies that are based on core values of our wisdom teachers? What would happen if we healed our human relations, clearing our nations and our hearts of violence, hatred, and the illusion of separation? What would happen if we replaced the love of money and the love of violence with a different set of values - and then ACTED on those values? HOW WOULD SUCH A SOCIETY OPERATE?

~ Sharif Abdullah, from Seven Seeds for a New Society

Documentary: Money Driven Medicine

The below is taken from California Newsreel: Film and Video For Social Change Since 1968. This is the third incredibly powerful documentary by this film maker. I am deeply appreciative. This documentary also powerfully highlights what the corporate driven media neglects. May we all be increasingly informed, conscious, and called to care for all beings... Peace ~ Molly

Money-Driven Medicine provides the essential introduction Americans need if they are to become knowledgeable participants in healthcare reform.

Produced by Academy Award winner Alex Gibney (Taxi to the Dark Side; Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room) and based on Maggie Mahar's acclaimed book, Money Driven Medicine: The Real Reason Health Care Costs So Much, the film offers a behind-the-scenes look at the $2.6 trillion U.S. healthcare system, how it went so terribly wrong and what it will take to fix it.

Effective Care, or Just Expensive Care?
The U.S. spends twice as much per person on healthcare as the average developed nation, one-sixth of our GDP, yet our outcomes often are worse. The problem is that much of that spending is wasteful – and provides no benefit to the patient. The reason? The U.S. is the only developed nation that has chosen to turn medicine into a largely unregulated, for-profit enterprise.

In Money-Driven Medicine, Dr. Donald Berwick, president of the Institute for Health Care Improvement, explains: “We get more care, but not better care.” If you look at how we manage chronic diseases, he points out, our outcomes are not as good. We focus resources on the high-tech, exorbitantly expensive “rescue care” that patients need after they become terribly sick – and pay far less for the preventive and primary care more likely to keep people out of the hospital in the first place. Emergency rooms overflow while primary care physicians are becoming an endangered species. Medical students explain that the compensation system is driving them away from primary care, and into high-paying specialties.

Medical ethicist Larry Churchill doesn’t mince words: “The current medical care system is not designed to meet the health needs of the population. It is designed to protect the interests of insurance companies, pharmaceutical firms, and to a certain extent organized medicine. It is designed to turn a profit. It is designed to meet the needs of the people in power.

”These businesses comprise the “medical-industrial complex.” They’ve gradually wrested power from doctors, turning medical care into just another commodity and patients into profit centers. More: http://newsreel.org/nav/title.asp?tc=CN0225

Watch Nightline's feature (8/11/09) on Money-Driven Medicine

Watch other on-line clips of Money-Driven Medicine:
Not the Best, Only the Most Expensive
Patients for Sale
Questioning Healthcare

Money Driven Medicine Website:

http://www.moneydrivenmedicine.org/

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"One of the strongest documentaries I have seen in years and could not be more timely. The more people who see and talk about it, the more likely we are to get serious and true health care reform."

- Bill Moyers

“Few Americans appreciate how the health care system is gamed against physicians’ professional commitment to focus only on their patients’ best interests. This outstanding film helps us all understand why reform is essential.”
- Elliott S. Fisher, MD, Director Dartmouth Center for Health Policy Research

Principal Investigator, Dartmouth Atlas Project

"In the midst of all the hollering comes a calm, quiet new documentary that offers another diagnosis of what’s ailing the American health care system. What makes Money-Driven Medicine so compelling is how the film listens to patients, and even more, to doctors."
- Terry Moran, NIGHTLINE

Those "Death Panels" Really Do Exist

by Karl Frisch

MediaMatters For America

http://mediamatters.org/columns/200908200036

At this point, if anyone still believes that progressive proposals for health insurance reform contain ominous "death panels" designed to kill their grandparents, I have a bridge to sell them in Arizona. Fear not, my conservative friends: The bridge connects a tea bag manufacturing plant with a militia training camp stuck in the 1990s, so you should feel right at home.

The "death panel" smear goes something like this: President Obama and his comrades in Congress are hell-bent on instituting mandatory end-of-life counseling sessions for American seniors as part of their socialist takeover of the health insurance industry. They will choose who gets to live and who will die. You know, just like Adolf Hitler and the Nazis did in Germany.

To date, the media have debunked the "kill granny" lie more than 40 times. The nonpartisan FactCheck.org says the claim of mandatory counseling on ending seniors' lives is "a misrepresentation." ABC's chief medical editor, Dr. Tim Johnson, said "the idea about death panels" is "not at all legitimate." PolitiFact.com has called "death panel" claims "a ridiculous falsehood." When the Associated Press conducted a fact check of the bogus charge, it reported, "No 'death panel in health care bill.' "

After former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin claimed that "Obama's 'death panel' " could decide the fate of her parents or her son who has Down syndrome, conservative radio host Larry Elder aptly called her comments "over the top."

Having been called on the carpet repeatedly for their "death panel" claims, other media conservatives like ABC's John Stossel and Fox News' Glenn Beck have taken a new approach. Many now claim that while proposals for health insurance reform may not actually force seniors into end-of-life counseling, they will result in "de facto death panels" via the government's rationing of care. Seriously.

The dubious right-wing spin surrounding health insurance reform is a bit like that bad cough that just won't go away -- persistent and annoying.

Despite the coverage allotted to debunking the right-wing "death panel" smear, the bigger picture remains intact. Americans face real death panels from their own health insurance providers. Rather than simply debunking the right's false talking point, the media should have gone one step further and pointed out that health insurance companies make life-and-death decisions every day when they decide what they are willing and not willing to cover.

Largely lost in the media discussion surrounding health insurance reform is the reality of the status quo -- you know, why we need reform in the first place.

Back in June, the evening news broadcasts on ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS ignored a congressional hearing on insurance companies' practice of investigating the medical histories of people who become ill and submit claims for expensive treatments, and then rejecting those claims on the grounds that those individuals had pre-existing conditions. The goal is quite simple. Find something -- anything -- and cancel or deny coverage for needed, potentially life-saving treatment. Why save a life when you can save a buck?

Robin Beaton, a former policyholder, testified in the hearing that she had been subject to this very practice. A retired registered nurse, Beaton's dermatologist had mistakenly indicated that she may have been suffering from a pre-cancerous skin condition. Soon after, she was diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer. A few days before her scheduled double mastectomy, Blue Cross launched an investigation into her health records going back five years, convinced she was hiding a serious pre-existing condition.

Many Americans have stories just like Beaton's. Congress ultimately concluded that three major American insurance companies rescinded 19,776 policies for over $300 million in savings over five years, a number that Wendell Potter, a former senior executive at CIGNA health insurance company, said "significantly undercounts the total number of rescissions" by the companies.

More: http://mediamatters.org/columns/200908200036

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America's health care system is neither healthy, caring, nor a system.

~ Walter Cronkite