McCain’s Health Care Plan Embraces John Goodman’s ‘Health Care Philosophy’
McCain’s Health Care Plan Embraces John Goodman’s ‘Health Care Philosophy’
On Thursday, numerous blogs highlighted John Goodman’s bizarre claim that everyone in America actually has health insurance. Goodman, “who helped craft Sen. John McCain’s health care plan,” suggested that since “anyone with access to an emergency room effectively has insurance,” the government should “cease and desist from describing any American — even illegal aliens — as uninsured.”
Goodman assumes that the 45.7 million Americans without insurance — in fact, all Americans — don’t really need preventive care or regular check-ups; after all, doctor visits only drive-up medical costs.
In fact, earlier this month, Goodman explained that health care costs too much because employers often subsidize “bells and whistles” coverage. McCain’s plan would put an end to this:
The tax credit “would not subsidize bells and whistles [marriage counseling, acupuncture, etc.] as the current system does,” Mr. Goodman said in an e-mail.
And while the McCain campaign has issued a statement distancing itself from Goodman — by claiming that Goodman’s “philosophy on health care” was “out of step with John McCain — McCain’s plan is deeply influenced by Goodman’s thinking. In July, another McCain health care adviser, Al Hubbard, compared “Americans’ use of the health care system to shoppers who indiscriminately buy caviar while someone else foots the bill”:
So every time you go to the grocery store you just take out your food insurance card, you give it to the cashier, she scans it, and you’re out of there. Pretty soon, you would start buying caviar, expensive steak, and you start buying more than you need.
Even McCain himself has argued that if Americans paid more for coverage, they would use less care:
“If that money [for health care] is coming out of your pocket, you would be more careful about it.” [Town Hall, 6/23/2008]
As Jonathan Cohn points out, emergency-only care is no substitute for real preventive medicine. Like the McCain health care plan, it does little for Americans who actually need to see the doctor.
Unfortunately, for McCain to truly distance himself from Goodman’s “philosophy on health care,” he would have to abandon his entire health care plan.
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The McCain-Palin Contraception Gap
The McCain-Palin Contraception Gap
While running for governor in 2006, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) portrayed herself as a pro-life feminist who opposed abortion but supported contraception. From Anchorage Daily News:
Palin said last month that no woman should have to choose between her career, education and her child. She is pro-contraception and said she’s a member of a pro-woman but anti-abortion group called Feminists for Life.
“I believe in the strength and the power of women, and the potential of every human life,” she said.
But Palin’s support for contraception clashes with McCain’s ignorant record of voting against expanding access to affordable birth control.
As the Wonk Room previously pointed out, in 2007, McCain admitted to reporters that he was “not informed” about “whether I support government funding for them [contraceptives] or not,” and expressed doubts about the effectiveness of condoms.
McCain also voted against requiring insurance companies to cover prescription contraception in both 2003 and 2005, consistantly opposed funding health care services for women, and even supported abstinence-only programs that censored “information about birth control.”
Despite their differences on contraception, however, McCain and Palin would both deny women around the world the right of choice. During her campaign for governor, Palin made it clear that “she is opposed to abortion, even in cases of rape or incest.”
Thus, even with Palin, McCain is still not what women want.
Palin Raised Taxes On Oil Company Profits To Give Citizens ‘An Equitable Share’ — Will McCain?
Palin Raised Taxes On Oil Company Profits To Give Citizens ‘An Equitable Share’ — Will McCain?
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is campaigning on a tax plan that includes budget-busting tax cuts for oil companies and large corporations. He made a pledge to raise “no new taxes,” and believes that higher taxes on oil company profits are “dangerous.”
However, his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK), saw nothing dangerous about raising taxes on the profits of oil companies.
Last year, she “raised taxes on oil profits by $1.5 billion a year” in Alaska, “a step that has generated stunning new wealth for the state as oil prices soared.”
In a statement released after signing the tax bill, she said the tax increase would give Alaskans “an equitable share for our resources”:
By receiving an equitable share for our resources, we are now in a position to demand more accountability and seize opportunities to save for future generations.
The Seattle Times wrote earlier this month that the higher tax “helped push the state’s total oil revenue — from new and existing taxes, as well as royalties — to more than $10 billion, double the amount received last year.” Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL), unlike McCain, has proposed a windfall profits tax on oil companies.
Make no mistake - Palin is still a champion for Big Oil, who favors drilling in the Arctic Wildlife Refuge over developing alternative energy. Still, will McCain embrace Palin’s profits tax as oil companies rake in record amounts? Or will Palin disavow her past to aid McCain, the oil companies’ “million dollar maverick?”
Is Sarah Palin A Creationist?
Is Sarah Palin A Creationist?
Our guest blogger is Rick Weiss, a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
Is McCain’s choice for vice president a creationist? The record offers worrisome evidence that the first woman to make it onto a Republican presidential ticket holds to this backward and wholly unscientific view of reality.
As reported in the Anchorage Daily News during her race for the governorship of Alaska, Sarah Palin offered up a classic anti-evolution answer when asked during a televised debate whether creationism should be taught with evolution in the public schools:
“Teach both,” Palin said. “You know, don’t be afraid of information… I am a proponent of teaching both.”
“Teach both” and “teach the debate” have long been the mantras of the religious right and the Intelligent Design crowds, which have struggled over the years as court after court has batted down their efforts to inject unscientific teachings into the nation’s science classes.
The legal record suggests that Palin’s approach is not just ignorant of the facts, but a plain violation of the Constitutional boundary between church and state.
Recall, for example, the December 2005 United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania decision in Kitzmiller vs. the Dover Area School District. At issue was the legality of a 2004 Dover Area School District decision to inform all students that they should “keep an open mind” about evolution and to encourage students to peruse Of Pandas and People, which the school district gamely referred to as “a reference book,” to gain an understanding of a competing view of how life came to be, known as Intelligent Design.
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What Does Sarah Palin Think Of McCain’s Opposition To Equal Pay?
What Does Sarah Palin Think Of McCain’s Opposition To Equal Pay?
Our guest blogger is Adam Jentleson, the Communications and Outreach Director for the Hyde Park Project at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
Sen. John McCain has a long record of opposing equal pay for women. Given that his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK), is a member of Feminists for Life, an anti-choice group that also calls for equal pay for women, it would be interesting to know her views on McCain’s votes against legislation designed to close the pay gap between men and women. One such piece of legislation is the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which the Senate voted on (and McCain opposed) just this spring.
Would Palin Still Carry A Pitchfork For Pat?
Would Palin Still Carry A Pitchfork For Pat?
Chris Hayes reports that Sarah Palin was a supporter of Pat Buchanan’s 2000 presidential bid. Quoting from a 1999 AP story:
Pat Buchanan brought his conservative message of a smaller government and an America First foreign policy to Fairbanks and Wasilla on Friday as he continued a campaign swing through Alaska. Buchanan’s strong message championing states rights resonated with the roughly 85 people gathered for an Interior Republican luncheon in Fairbanks. … Among those sporting Buchanan buttons were Wasilla Mayor Sarah Palin and state Sen. Jerry Ward, R-Anchorage.
This opens up a whole cornucopeia of policy questions for Palin to answer, such as:
- Where does Gov. Palin stand on Buchanan’s strident opposition to American military interventionism, especially given John McCain’s promise of “other wars” in America’s immediate future?
- Does Gov. Palin still agree with Buchanan that “the ideology of free trade is [an] alien import, an invention of European academics and scribblers”?
- Does Gov. Palin still agree with Buchanan that Capitol Hill is “Israeli-occupied territory“?
- Does Gov. Palin still agree with Buchanan that “there is a religious war going on in our country…a cultural war as critical to the kind of nation we shall be as the Cold War itself”? Or, like John McCain, does she just see culture war issues as things to be exploited in order to get elected?
Americans want to know!
UPDATE: On Morning Joe today, Mika Brzezinski noted that Palin was Buchanan’s Alaska state director. Watch it:
Sarah Palin’s Portfolio Managed By Smith Barney, Her Policies Would Fail Barney Smith
Sarah Palin’s Portfolio Managed By Smith Barney, Her Policies Would Fail Barney Smith
Last night at the Democratic convention, a former Republican named Barney Smith spoke of the need for economic policies that “Help Barney Smith, not Smith Barney.”
Watch it here:
Ironically, according to Sarah Laskow at the Center for Public Integrity who analyzed Palin’s disclosure forms, Sarah Palin’s financial portfolio is managed by none other than Salomon Smith Barney.
Furthermore, by joining McCain on the ticket, Palin is now endorsing a radical $300 billion in tax breaks for corporations and the wealthy that would leave out millions of American families while delivering $45 billion in tax breaks for America’s 200 largest companies and at least $6.3 billion for America’s largest financial firms.
Sarah Palin: A Champion For Big Oil
Sarah Palin: A Champion For Big Oil
Our guest bloggers are Daniel J. Weiss, a Senior Fellow and Director of Climate Strategy at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, and James Kvaal, a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
With the choice of Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) as his running mate, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is not backing down from oil drilling. Palin is a champion for drilling, the Bush-Cheney approach to energy policy that brought us $4.00-per-gallon gasoline and the rising threat of global warming.
Like McCain, Palin believes that oil drilling is the only solution to our energy problems. “I beg to disagree with any candidate who would say we can’t drill our way out of our problem,” she says. She supports more drilling in protected areas of the Outer Continental Shelf and the Alaska Natural Wildlife Refuge, once attacking McCain for his “close-mindedness on ANWR.”
But the Department of Energy believes that offshore drilling “would not have a significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices before 2030.” Moreover, about three-quarters of all the oil in public lands in the continental U.S. are already open to drilling – and yet only one quarter of this oil is under production. Opening the Arctic Refuge would cut gasoline prices by two cents in 17 years. For that, Palin would destroy the home of America’s native polar bears. Not even T. Boone Pickens still thinks we can drill our way out of this crisis.
Palin rejects clean renewable energy that is an alternative to oil. Earlier this month, she claimed that “alternative-energy solutions are far from imminent and would require more than 10 years to develop.”
Alaska has become the “poster state” for the threat of global warming as the climate gets hotter and dryer and sea levels rise. More than 100 towns are vulnerable due to eroding sea lines. Polar bears are threatened by the melting ice floas, and this month bears were spotted swimming as much as 50 miles offshore.
Nonetheless, like many other oil champions, Palin is skeptical of global warming. During her gubernatorial campaign, she said she was unconvinced about how much human emissions contribute to current global warming trends. Palin also opposes listing our polar bears as a threatened species because it could require action on climate change.
As Carl Pope of the Sierra Club says, “No one is closer to the oil industry than Governor Palin.” Sarah Palin has taken positions that would ensure a continuation of the Bush-Cheney energy policies. She supports drilling everywhere and ignores the need for binding reductions in global warming pollution even though her state is melting. The continuation of these policies will continue higher energy costs, more severe hurricanes and droughts, and despoiled natural treasures.
On His Key Issue, McCain VP Pick Rolls The Dice
On His Key Issue, McCain VP Pick Rolls The Dice
Looking at OnTheIssues.org, here’s what we find on the national security positions of John McCain’s choice for vice-president:
Sarah Palin on Foreign Policy:
No issue stance yet recorded by OnTheIssues.org.
Sarah Palin on War and Peace:
No issue stance yet recorded by OnTheIssues.org.
Sarah Palin on Homeland Security:
Promote from within, in Alaska’s National Guard. (Nov 2006)
In an attempt to bind himself to the extreme social conservative base of his party and make news with an unknown, stunt VP pick, McCain has shortchanged the issue which he himself insists is the most important — national security.
Remember — seems like years ago now, way back before the entire Iraqi government endorsed Barack Obama’s plan for Iraq — when John McCain and his flunkies were attacking Obama for having been to Iraq only once? Though she did visit Alaska National Guard troops stationed in Kuwait in 2007, Sarah Palin has apparently been to Iraq…never.
We’d like to perform Wonk Room’s mission and examine Gov. Palin’s views on foreign policy, but no record of such views appears to exist. While we appreciate that Gov. Palin’s son is preparing to deploy to Iraq, and we recognize her accomplishments in defending Alaska from Russian colonization and polar bear attacks over the last year and a half, there is as yet no evidence on the question of Palin’s approach to America’s national security.
McCain And Palin: Promoting Failed Consumer-Driven Health Care
McCain And Palin: Promoting Failed Consumer-Driven Health Care
In choosing Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) as his running mate, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) has found someone who shares his vision of a radically different health care system which shifts the financial incentive and risk from the insurance company to the patient.
While McCain seeks to do-away with consumer protections, deregulate the insurance industry, drive Americans into scantier coverage, and inevitably phase-out the current employer-based system, Palin has similarly called for “flexibility in government regulation that allow competition in health care.”
As governor, Palin sought to push for greater commodification of health care by establishing the Alaska Health Care Strategies Planning Council and, after introducing a transparency act, promised to build “on the work they have done.”
Palin’s council promoted consumer-driven health care. Here are some highlights from the report:
- Increase the place of consumerism in health care purchasing by giving people control over their health care dollar…
- Reduce potential for financial impact from catastrophic loss by supporting new and innovative approaches to insurance for individuals, which would be consumer-owned, portable, and purchased with pre-tax dollar
- With respect to lowering costs, insurance that is portable and consumer-owned plays a central role, and requires much more discussion at the state level.
- Consumerism is an essential component of bringing rationality to the health insurance structure in Alaska…insurance must be consumer-owned, market-responsive and portable;
But ironically, consumers are often dissatisfied with “consumer-owned” plans. Thirty-three to 42% “of people in consumer-driven health plans are extremely or very satisfied with their health plans, compared to 63 percent of those with traditional plans” and Americans in such plans are twice as likely to report delaying or avoiding care and about three times as likely to report paying a large fraction of their income on health costs as those in comprehensive insurance.
What’s more, “enrollees in consumer-driven health plans appear to be significantly healthier than others. As sicker workers stay in traditional plans, the cost of such plans will go up, causing such plans to become unaffordable for workers and employers. This erodes group purchasing power, leading to even higher prices, and possibly more uninsured Americans. It could also undermine Medicare as it expands there.”
Unfortunately, in treating health care like any other consumer good, both McCain and Palin are placing ideology ahead of improving access and expanding health care coverage. Since “health care is ultimately about preserving life and delaying death,” “buying health care may not be the same as buying an iPod” — McCain and Palin should take note.
Tautology In Defense Of War Is No Vice
Tautology In Defense Of War Is No Vice
In a recent TIME interview, McCain defended his support for the war by declaring “I can only imagine what Saddam Hussein would be doing with the wealth he would acquire with oil at $110 and $120 a barrel.”
The key word here is “imagine,” because if the U.S. hadn’t invaded Iraq, it’s very likely that oil wouldn’t be anywhere near $120 a barrel. According to a leading oil economist, the Iraq war “tripled the price of oil…costing the world a staggering $6 trillion in higher energy prices alone”:
Dr Mamdouh Salameh, who advises both the World Bank and the UN Industrial Development Organisation (Unido), told The Independent…that the price of oil would now be no more than $40 a barrel, less than a third of the record $135 a barrel reached last week, if it had not been for the Iraq war.
As I wrote a few weeks ago when Christopher Hitchens first trotted out this crude ex post facto casus belli, it is patently ridiculous to defend the Iraq war on the grounds that it prevented Saddam Hussein from profiting from the skyrocketing oil prices that have resulted from the war to remove Saddam Hussein.
‘Concern’ About Refugee Camp Massacre: The Responsibility to Fret?
‘Concern’ About Refugee Camp Massacre: The Responsibility to Fret?
Our guest blogger is Maggie Fick, Special Assistant at the ENOUGH Project.
Early on Monday morning, some 60 vehicles filled with Sudanese forces, reportedly in search of smuggled weapons, surrounded the Kalma camp for internally displaced persons in South Darfur. When the camp residents tried to block the Sudanese forces from entering, government forces opened fire. Against a wall of gunfire, some civilians tried to defend themselves with ‘sticks, knives, and spears.’
Kalma is home to more than 90,000 people, making it one of the largest camps for internally displaced people in the world. The Sudanese military’s attack left some 64 people dead and more than 115 wounded. Victims ranged from 11 to 60 years old, and the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders treated 65 patients with gunshot wounds in the camp. Joint United Nations-African Union (UNAMID) peacekeepers stationed near the camp did not intervene, and, with Sudanese forces still surrounding the camp, the threat of further atrocities is acute.
In the wake of this attack, the U.S. Department of State expressed its “concern [over] indiscriminate weapons fire” on civilians by Sudanese government forces and preposterously called on the Government of Sudan to “thoroughly investigate this incident and ensure that such actions are not repeated.” The United States has accused Sudan of genocide. Would the Justice Department, I wonder, call on a serial killer to investigate his own crimes?
The fecklessness of the State Department’s response to the Sudanese government’s latest atrocities is all the more conspicuous in the context of the administration’s forceful condemnation of Russia’s aggression in Georgia. President Bush and other cabinet officials have, on numerous occasions since the conflict began on August 7, “deplored” Russia’s actions in Georgia and threatened “consequences” for Russian aggression. Yes, the Russia-Georgia conflict has major geopolitical ramifications, and so the Bush administration has adopted a tough tone in its response. The question, then, is why the State Department puts on kid gloves in response to atrocities, crimes against humanity, and genocide in Sudan.
While the State Department’s limp rhetoric is deplorable, the world’s failure to protect civilians in Darfur remains indefensible. Activists have spent much of the past four years lobbying for a United Nations peacekeeping mission with a mandate to protect civilians in Darfur, and nearly 10,000 of a planned 26,000 peacekeepers are on the ground. Where were the peacekeepers while Kalma was under siege? The reasons are not entirely clear, but UN forces stationed just kilometers away did not get to Kalma until hours after the attack. UNAMID reported that their team was “delayed by a checkpoint and protracted negotiations with Sudanese security authorities.”
Although UN forces certainly could have acted more boldly in response to the attack on Kalma, the finger of blame for the UN’s deficiencies in Darfur rests squarely with UN member states, as troop contributing countries have deployed a force with no deterrent capabilities. No matter how brave, peacekeepers armed with AK-47s, riding in a Toyota pick-up, and lacking air support are no match for a national army with armored personnel carriers and the latest heavy weapons from China. While diplomats come up with excuses why not to send troops and equipment to bolster UNAMID’s strength, how many more Kalmas before they stand up and say “enough is enough”?
Carly Fiorina: McCain’s Middle Class Tax Cut is ‘Drill, Drill, Drill’
Carly Fiorina: McCain’s Middle Class Tax Cut is ‘Drill, Drill, Drill’
During an appearance on CNBC yesterday, Carly Fiorina, an economic adviser for Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), was pressed by Larry Kudlow to explain what McCain’s proposed tax policies will do for the middle class. Kudlow said that he believes the McCain campaign will be “in a squeeze for the lack of a comprehensive middle class tax cut.”
Fiorina responded that “what we need to do for middle Americans” is “drill, drill, drill” for oil, while adding vaguely that “we need to make sure the economy is growing again.” Watch it:
Kudlow was absolutely right to say that McCain’s tax plan lacks a middle class tax cut - his proposal delivers nearly half of its benefits to the top 1% of taxpayers, and gives the top 0.1% a $1 million tax cut. According to the non-partisan Tax Policy Center, “those in the middle fifth of the income distribution would receive an average cut equal to 0.7 percent of income” or just $319. Under Sen. Barack Obama’s (D-IL) proposed tax plan, middle class families would receive three times as much.
Furthermore, Fiorina’s claim that drilling for more oil will help the middle class is simply ridiculous. The Energy Information Administration has said that drilling for oil in the Outer Continental Shelf “would not have a significant impact” on oil prices before 2030. The McCain campaign has already conceded as much, as economic adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin has said drilling won’t affect current oil supply or prices.
Where offshore drilling will help is in lining the pockets of oil executives and their wealthy investors. But the oil and gas industries have donated heavily to McCain, particularly since he advocated lifting the federal moratorium on offshore drilling, so they are the ones McCain’s tax policies cater to, at the expense of the middle class.
Will McCain Still Consider Raising Taxes On Tobacco?
Will McCain Still Consider Raising Taxes On Tobacco?
During his appearance at the Livestrong Presidential Forum in July, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), who had supported a $1.10-per-pack tax hike in 1998, refused to consider increasing the tax on cigarettes because he believed that some of the funds were diverted away from tobacco control programs:
MCCAIN: I don’t think I would, [raise the federal tax on tobacco] because I don’t think the money is being spent on the state taxes right now. […]
ZAHN: So is there any circumstance that could be proven to you, if there was a direct correlation between taxes going up and the use of tobacco going down?
MCCAIN: It would have to be proven and frankly the constitution of this Congress, they couldn’t prove it to me, because I don’t believe them. I don’t… And by the way, I’m not for raising anybody’s taxes. I think, right now with these economic problems we have, lower taxes is what we need
Watch it:
A new study has proven just that. According to new research, despite some diversion of funding, California’s anti-tobacco program — which “was funded with a constant tax of $0.05 per pack” — yielded a 50-to-1 return, saved $86 billion in personal health care costs, and “prevented 3.6 billion–yes, billion with a “b”–packs of cigarettes from being smoked in 15 years.”
So will McCain raise taxes to save money and reduce tobacco consumption or stick by his ideologically-driven ‘no new taxes’ pledge?
The Podesta, Pickens, and Pope Power Summit
The Podesta, Pickens, and Pope Power Summit
At the Big Tent in Denver, Center for American Progress President and CEO John Podesta, Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope, and oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens engaged in a discussion about our energy future. Pickens, who believes that our global oil production is at its peak and will soon inexorably decline, discussed his “Pickens Plan” for a massive increase in wind and solar electricity production and a shift for trucking fleets from diesel to natural gas. Podesta noted that the climate crisis is evident today, in the flooding in Florida and the increasing threat of powerful hurricanes. “The cost of doing nothing,” Podesta said, “is extremely substantial.”
This panel of three highly powerful individuals from the environmental, progressive, and conservative energy industry communities represented a remarkable confluence of priorities, in recognizing the energy crisis and the need to get off oil. As Carl Pope described:
If our politics was even vaguely functional, anything that all three of us agree on would have happened long ago. We have some very deep profound political problems. Our politics are broken.
Pickens himself, a highly influential fundraiser for right-wing politicians, described how his money has gotten him access in Washington but that he had learned that his contributions don’t translate to policy. He expressed his enthusiasm for the ability of the Pickens Plan campaign to reach millions on the Internet and mobilize hundreds of thousands of people. He argued, “I’m not doing this to make money. My entire estate will go to charity when I go. We are now importing almost 70 percent of our oil. It’s too much. We’re not talking about my generation — we can make it to the finish line.”
They also aired for the audience a fifteen-second spot that was rejected by NBC censors, because, according to Pickens, the network wanted him to prove that “we’re not doing a thing here” on energy policy. Watch the rejected ad: More »
Census Data: The Importance Of Public Heath Care Programs
Census Data: The Importance Of Public Heath Care Programs
The decrease in the number of uninsured — from 47 million to 45.7 million — underscores the importance of public health care programs. As Len Nichols of the New Health Dialogue Blog rightly notes:
…a weakened economy and rising health care costs have led fewer Americans to buy private insurance and more Americans to turn to the government for safety net coverage. Let’s keep in mind, however, that the numbers released today are for 2007, before the economy really took a turn for the worse. Therefore, we can expect the reduction in private coverage enrollment and increased dependence on Medicaid to be magnified in 2008. This path places increasing strain on local, state, and federal governments who are already grappling with tough budgetary constraints.
Indeed, while conservatives continue to fear-monger and misrepresent public health programs as “inefficient rationed care,” “government run” or “controlled,” Americans are turning to them in greater numbers.
According to the new census data, in 2007 the percentage of people with private coverage dropped from 67.9% to 67.5%, while the number of Americans with government-provided health coverage increased from 27.0% to 27.8%. The number of children with private insurance also fell by 0.4%, and 1.2% more children received coverage through public programs.
This greater availability of care is the result of state, not federal, progress. President Bush’s refusal to adequately fund SCHIP and expand public health programs has forced state governments to pick up the slack. While the economy tempers prospects “for further progress,” “state efforts to expand Medicaid and SCHIP during 2007 reached a level not seen since the late 1990s.”
During 2007, “governors in 34 states offered plans to reduce the number of uninsured children, parents, adults, aged and disabled in their state through Medicaid expansions, SCHIP expansions…market-based approaches.”
The Kaiser Foundation offers this chart:
In fact, according to the new data, Massachusetts health reform — which has insured 439,000 new residents and cut the number of uninsured nearly in half — is responsible “for 24% of the decline nationally in the number of uninsured.”Last week, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation released a report that underlined the important role public health programs like SCHIP and Medicaid play in providing health care to children. As the CEO of foundation pointed out, “programs like SCHIP are a true lifeline for vulnerable children. Hard-working parents need these programs, and their children benefit greatly because of them.”
Yesterday’s census numbers suggest that public health programs are a “lifeline” for all Americans who cannot afford private coverage.
McCain and Scheunemann’s Iran Connection
McCain and Scheunemann’s Iran Connection
In the wake of John McCain’s latest tacit admission that he’s got nothing to offer Americans other than fear itself — last month it was Iran, last week it was Russia, today it’s Iran again — it’s worth pointing out that John McCain and his foreign policy adviser Randy Scheunemann have a longstanding relationship with an Iranian collaborator.
I’m referring of course to Ahmad Chalabi, the notorious Iraqi former exile who was the source of much of the bad WMD intelligence used by the Bush administration to justify the Iraq war. Chalabi has now been effectively disavowed by the administration because of his connections to Iranian regime, including the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, who the U.S. has designated a “foreign terrorist organization.”
McCain and Scheunemann were early supporters of Chalabi. In 1998, on the basis of an erroneous WMD report which Scheunemann had leaked to Chalabi — and which Chalabi then leaked to the press — McCain led the passage of the Iraq Liberation Act. The act made regime change in Iraq the official policy of the U.S government, and authorized the release millions of U.S. dollars to Chalabi’s organization, the Iraqi National Congress, much of which remains unaccounted for.
Scheunemann was a major player in the neoconservative faction that saw an Iraq war as a necessary first step in reordering the security architecture of the Middle East, and who saw the 9/11 attacks as an opportunity to realize that goal. Scheunemann served as president of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq (CLI), a front organization founded in 2002 in collaboration with members of the Bush administration to lobby for an Iraq invasion. CLI worked closely with Chalabi’s INC, and McCain served as an honorary co-chair of CLI.
In June 2004, the New York Times reported that, according to U.S. intelligence officials, Chalabi had “disclosed to an Iranian official that the United States had broken the secret communications code of Iran’s intelligence service, betraying one of Washington’s most valuable sources of information about Iran.”
In his book on Chalabi, investigative reporter Aram Roston quoted CIA analyst Whitley Bruner, who believes Chalabi to have been an “agent of influence” of Iran:
It became a question to me: what were his long-term objectives, and where, other than himself, are there allegiances? I think when he thinks big, Iran plays a major role. I guess I come belatedly to the idea that there was a very close sense of identity with Chalabi in terms of Iran, and a very emotional tie. Whereas the Americans were always just a means to an end. We were much more of an instrument. The Iranian role was long-term.
Newsday’s Knute Royce reported that “The Defense Intelligence Agency has concluded that a U.S.-funded arm of Ahmed Chalabi’s Iraqi National Congress has been used for years by Iranian intelligence…to pass disinformation to the United States and to collect highly sensitive American secrets.”
Ahmad Chalabi viewed the United States, and the men and women of the American military, as mere instruments for the achieving of his goals. This is the man who John McCain defended as “a patriot.” An INC representative recently described Scheunemann and Chalabi as “close friends.”
In a sane world, McCain and Scheunemann’s longstanding relationship with a man whose betrayal of U.S. secrets very likely got American soldiers killed would disqualify both of them from any position related to U.S national security. But because of McCain’s special relationship with the press, he’ll probably be given another pass over the fact that he and Randy got played.
Health Care Leaders Meet in Denver
Health Care Leaders Meet in Denver
The following post is a dispatch from Peter Harbage, a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund. Peter is attending the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado.
Some of America’s greatest health care leaders gathered in Denver, today, to call for national health reform. Called “Winning Health Care Reform in 2009,” the event is sponsored by Families USA and SEIU.
The crowd was fired-up as the event kicked off with Ron Pollack, long-time health care warrior and head of Families USA, talked about the need for health reform. He lead off talking about how the slight dip in the number of uninsured reported by the Census Bureau just yesterday highlights how much ground we have lost since 2000. Pollack pointed out that today there are more uninsured in the US than the combined population in 24 states.
Pollack also featured the new Harry and Louise (www.harryandlouisereturn.com ) ad. The transformation of Harry and Louise from icons of the battle against the Clinton health reform effort to symbols in support of health reform in 2008 shows how bad the health reform has become. The website features a video where the actors talk about their personal experience with the broken health care system.
Andy Stern, President of SEIU International, followed Pollack by pumping up the crowd as only a labor leader can. He focused on one top message: Get health care done in the first 100 days of the Obama administration.
Rep. Hilda Solis (D-CA), kicked off the speakers talking about the fight for the SCHIP reauthorization last year, which was twice vetoed by President Bush.
Then came Rep. John Dingell (D-MI), Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, whose father lead the fight in support of health reform under President Truman. Dingell, who has lead the fight in the House of Representative for as long as anyone, said that he is “Ready to work his heart out,” for health reform under President Obama.
Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D-KS) focused on the moral and financial urgency for health reform. She talked about the ‘hidden tax’ in health care where those with insurance already pay for care from the uninsured in a way that is hidden. The point: all of us already pay for the uninsured, and we all need to pull together to fix the broken system.
Stay tuned for more updates from the “Winning Health Care Reform in 2009″ event!
Van Jones: ‘We’re Getting Totally Rolled By The Happy Meal Politics’ Of Drill Here, Drill Now
Van Jones: ‘We’re Getting Totally Rolled By The Happy Meal Politics’ Of Drill Here, Drill Now
The Wonk Room sat down with Van Jones, founder of Green For All and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, in the Big Tent at Denver for an interview on the energy fight, what the right wing is selling, and what progressives need to do about it.
Van didn’t mince words. He called it “disgusting” when right-wing politicians only talk about hurricanes Katrina and Rita to falsely claim they didn’t cause oil spills. He reminds us that “we didn’t stop offshore drilling for the duckies and the fishies,” but because coastal communities were suffering. And he discusses how now we have to make the choice between a “pollution-based suicidal economy” and a green economy that lifts everyone up. Van also calls Newt Gingrich’s American Solutions for Winning the Future campaign “Happy Meal politics”:
First of all, I’m mainly focused on spreading the word about the need for green-collar jobs and green communities, as usual. But, I’m also very concerned about the way that we’re as progressives getting totally rolled by this happy meal politics of “drill here, drill here pay less,” this false solution to this gas price debate. I think it’s really important for us to push back on that.
Watch it:
Van Jones concluded by discussing the Green Jobs Now day of action taking place September 27, the day after the first presidential debate. Go to the website — GreenJobsNow.com — and join the fight.
Census Data: Most Americans Suffering Under Bush Economy
Census Data: Most Americans Suffering Under Bush Economy
Today’s new census numbers confirm the disproportionality of President Bush’s economic expansion. Unfortunately, the president’s economic policies — which were supposed to serve as “a rising tide that raised all boats” — have redistributed wealth to the richest Americans and left the middle and lower classes behind.
And while the new data “did show an uptick for 2007,” years of declining income and earnings outweigh this most recent growth.
Taking the new census numbers into account, most Americans lost money during the Bush expansion:
- Median household incomes down: 0.6% lower in 2007 than in 2000
- Men’s earnings down: 0.38% less in 2007 than in 1999
- Women’s earnings can’t keep up: continued upward swing but were unable to “overcome other drags on household income”
- More Americans in poverty: 5.7 million more people lived in poverty in 2007 than did in 2000
The Center for Policy and Budget Priorities notes, “never before on record has poverty been higher and median income for working-age households lower at the end of a multi-year economic expansion than at the beginning. The new data add to the mounting evidence that the gains from the 2001-2007 expansion were concentrated among high-income Americans.”
A new Center for American Progress report graphically presents the severity of the income redistribution:
Pfotenhauer Slams Tax Policy Center As ‘Liberal’, Ignores Conservative Criticism of Tax Plan
Pfotenhauer Slams Tax Policy Center As ‘Liberal’, Ignores Conservative Criticism of Tax Plan
Today, during an appearance on Fox News, McCain adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer dismissed the Tax Policy Center’s conclusion that Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) tax plan would increase the deficit. Pfotenhauer argued that the center was a “liberal think tank” that did not analyze “the spending side” of McCain’s plan:
[We’ll] keep the growth rate in federal spending to about 2.4 percent. I love Austin’s statement that we are going to somehow balloon the deficit. First, the Tax Policy Center is a liberal think tank run by former Clinton-ites and Jason Furman worked there up until about two months ago. But set that aside. They don’t look at the spending side, they only look at the tax side.
Watch it:
But even conservative economists who have looked at the “spending side” of the senator’s plan, believe that his proposal would only add to the deficit:
- “The spending cuts are far too vague to be counted on for significant savings and, even if they were more specific, I can’t see how they would come close to offsetting the level of tax cuts he recommends.” [Robert L. Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition]
- “[But] I am worried that continuing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will tear apart our social fabric and defeat any economic proposal to reduce the deficit and stimulate growth. Guns are crowding out butter.” [Michael Connolly, Professor of Economics, University of Miami]
- “He’s not going to balance the budget.” [William Albrecht, professor emeritus at the University of Iowa]
In July, the McCain campaign falsely suggested that 300 economists agreed that the senator’s economic plan could reduce the deficit and balance the budget by 2013. When contacted by reporters many of those economists — Connolly and Albrecht included — actually expressed deep reservations about McCain’ pledge to reduce the deficit.
Rubin: It’s Biden’s Fault That The Bush Administration Has No Coherent Iran Policy
Rubin: It’s Biden’s Fault That The Bush Administration Has No Coherent Iran Policy
There are a number of questions one could ask about Michael Rubin’s Washington Post op-ed this morning attacking Senator Joe Biden’s past judgment on Iran. Such as: Given that Biden has, for five of the last seven years, been a member of the minority in the Senate, how dumb is it to blame him for the fact that President Bush has no coherent Iran policy? Monumentally dumb? Or just profoundly dumb? And given that Rubin, who formerly worked in the Office of Special Plans and now works out of the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute, is up to his ears in the Iraq debacle, and thus is himself an accessory to the spread of Iran’s influence throughout the region, should one really ever assume that Rubin argues in good faith?
While mulling those questions, consider what Rubin writes here:
Between 2000 and 2005, in an effort to engage Iran, European Union trade with that country nearly tripled. Yet far from assuming a moderate posture, “the elected representatives in Iran” allocated nearly 70 percent of the hard currency windfall into military and nuclear programs.
What could have happened between 2000 and 2005 that might have undermined Iranian moderates, strengthened Iran’s own neoconservatives, and convinced the regime that a greater investment in its military and nuclear program was prudent? Well, there was President Bush’s casting of Iran as a member of the “axis of evil,” which came three months after Iran had aided the U.S. against their mutual enemy the Taliban in Afghanistan. According to Ismail Gerami-Moghaddam, a member of Iran’s moderate Reformist Party, “Including Iran in the ‘axis of evil’ led the Iranian people to grow increasingly skeptical of American slogans”:
Our political rivals … attacked us. They said sympathizing with a country that puts us in the “axis of evil” will take you down a dead-end road, and they were actually correct.
And then later, of course, there was that thing where the U.S. invaded and occupied Iran’s neighbor Iraq.
But getting back to counter-productive rhetoric, Rubin writes:
In the Dec. 7, 2007, official sermon, Ayatollah Mohammad Kashani speaking on behalf of Iran’s supreme leader, declared, “This Senator [Biden] correctly says Israel could not suppress Hizbullah in Lebanon, so how can the U.S. stand face-to-face with a nation of 70 million? This is the blessing of the Guardianship of the Jurists [the theocracy] . . . which plants such thoughts in the hearts of U.S. senators and forces them to make such confessions.” The crowd met his statement with refrains of “Death to America.”
As Ilan Goldenberg notes, Rubin is basically suggesting that American politicians should avoid criticizing policies they disagree with, because of the possibility that that criticism may be used as enemy propaganda. (What do you think the odds are on Rubin following his own advice under a Democratic administration?)
Here’s what Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, speaking for himself, said this past June:
Look at behavior of the US president and members of his team, their words are like those of the mentally ill… Sometimes they threaten, sometimes they order assassinations … and sometimes they ask for help - it’s like mad people staggering to and fro.
Devastatingly for Rubin’s thesis, Khamenei criticized the Bush administration without any signaling whatsoever from Joe Biden.
Finishing off the article with a touch of class, Rubin labels Biden “Tehran’s favorite senator.” Given that AEI’s various goofy schemes for reordering the Middle East have thus far succeeded only in extending Iran’s influence in the region, it’s not hard to guess which is Tehran’s favorite think tank.
McCain’ Missing Poverty Plan
McCain’ Missing Poverty Plan
Our guest blogger is Brian Levine, a senior policy advisor at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
This morning, we learned that 37.3 million Americans are living in poverty. Every year, the release of these numbers brings a wave of attention to the plight of the poor. This year, it might even prompt some curious voters to check out the websites of the presidential candidates. But don’t bother scouring JohnMcCain.com looking for the Senator’s poverty plan – it doesn’t exist.
Visitors to JohnMcCain.com can learn where the Republican nominee stands on the Second Amendment, “liberal judicial activists” — even the space program. While John McCain “understands the importance of investing in key industries such as space,” he apparently does not understand the importance of helping the 37.3 million Americans living in poverty right here on Planet Earth.
You can’t really blame John McCain for ignoring poverty. After all, it would take $90 billion a year to cut poverty in half. That might seem like a reasonable cost for lifting more than 18 million people over the poverty line. But McCain doesn’t have room in his budget – he needs $100 billion a year for his corporate tax break and there better be enough left over to deliver a $992,000 tax cut to each household in the top 0.1 percent of the income scale.
Maybe John McCain will come up with a poverty plan sometime between now and the election. In the meantime, at least we know that in a McCain Administration, the poor will be protected from activist judges and anti-astronaut zealots.
How American Workers Subsidize Excessive CEO Compensation
How American Workers Subsidize Excessive CEO Compensation
Two weeks after the Government Accountability Office reported that “two-thirds of corporations operating in the United States did not pay taxes” between 1998 and 2008, The Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) released a new study revealing that the American tax payer is subsidizing “executive pay excess” to the tune of $20 billion a year.
In fact, “the more that corporations shell out for executive pay, the more they pocket in profit at the expense of average taxpayers.” Through a series of bureaucratic rules and loopholes, the federal government is transferring billions of dollars to the most privileged Americans:
Large increases in executive pay have had an inverse relationship to falling unionization rates — during the 1980s, as workers began losing their ability to check executive compensation by bargaining with employers for fair wages and benefits, CEO compensation steadily increased.
“Thirty years ago, chief executives averaged only 30 to 40 times the average American worker paycheck.” In 2007, top executives faced almost “no institutional challenge from their workers,” and earned “344 times the salary of the average American worker”:
As the report notes, to restore the balance of power in the workplace, lawmakers should pass the Employee Free Choice Act, “legislation that would help workers
realize their right to organize into unions and bargain collectively with their employers.”
Full disclosure: American Rights At Work is currently advertising for the Employee Free Choice Act on this site, though they had no role in any part of this post.