Friday, July 29, 2011

The American People are Angry

"The rich are getting richer. Their effective tax rate, in recent years, has been reduced to the lowest in modern history. Nurses, teachers and firemen actually pay a higher tax rate than some billionaires. It's no wonder the American people are angry."

"In the midst of this, Republicans in Congress have been fanatically determined to protect the interests of the wealthy and large multinational corporations so that they do not contribute a single penny toward deficit reduction."

"If the Republicans have their way, the entire burden of deficit reduction will be placed on the elderly, the sick, children and working families. In the midst of a horrendous recession that is already causing severe pain for average Americans, this approach is morally grotesque. It's also bad economic policy."


Bernie Sanders in the Senate

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Health Care Industry Abuses

Medical debt is the leading cause of bankruptcy in the United States. Wendell Potter wrote an article about some of the abuses by the health care industry. It is pretty outrageous. It makes you wonder how the health care industry got to where it is today where the insurance companies call all of the shots. They set the prices, how much they will pay doctors and hospitals, and how much companies and individuals will pay for a policy. Costs have sky rocketed. When the health care bill was being crafted insurance companies played a huge role in the final outcome. They were responsible for removing the government option. Watch the Frontline about the push to reform health care to learn more about this.

Wendell Potter is a former Vice President of corporate communications at CIGNA, one of the United States' largest health insurance companies. In June 2009, he testified against the HMO industry in the U.S. Senate as a whistleblower. He is now the Senior Fellow on Health Care for the Center for Media and Democracy in Madison, Wisconsin.