Wednesday, September 30, 2009

He Hasn't Given Up - How Can We? Part III

He may not look as chiseled as Bruce Willis in the "Die-Hard" movies, but he's twice as tough:

"Mr. Rockefeller’s outspoken criticism – he is particularly worried about protecting existing health benefits for millions of children – prompted Mr. Obama to invite him to the White House for a face-to-face chat earlier this month. But the senator did not seem mollified.

"He has repeatedly criticized the legislation as offering a huge pay-day for private insurers, and not doing enough to look out for average Americans.

"And while it may be unlikely that Mr. Rockefeller would cross his fellow Democrats and vote against the legislation in the committee, the Democrats can spare his vote. They have a 13 to 10 majority on the panel.

"The bigger question for Mr. Obama will be what position Mr. Rockefeller takes on the Senate floor, where Democrats control 60 votes, and can’t spare a single one."

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Nowhere for Blue Dogs to Hide!

TPM's analysis is worth reading:

"...even if they're just making excuses, or they still need more time to think, nobody will be able to hide much longer:

"First, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will have to decide whether or not to import the HELP Committee's public option into the package he brings to the floor. If he does, it would completely shift the onus. As it stands liberals are forced to make the push for the public option; if Reid adopts it, conservative Democrats would be smoked out: either they'd have to accept it, or come out strongly against it by voting with Republicans to strip it, or filibustering the entire bill.

"But even assuming Reid does not import a public option (a safe assumption) there will be more amendments, and, soon enough, the entire Democratic caucus will have to go on the record. More than that, they'll have to decide whether a public option is worth filibustering.

"To take things one step further, if a public option is not in the final bill that passes the Senate, Democratic leaders could still adopt one in negotiations with the House of Representatives. Maybe they will and maybe they won't, but if they do, then conservative Democrats will have to decide whether it's worth tanking the entire reform project over the inclusion of a fairly modest public option.

"That's a lot of choke points, and a lot of pressure on public option skeptics. So while it's much too early to predict what will happen, it's also extremely premature to say the public option fight is over. As you can see, there are much more favorable battlefields ahead."

Senate Panel Rejects a "Public Option" in Health Plan

What now?

On the hush-hush! Is AARP changing their tune on the public option?

Our embedded reporter sends us this:

"Here is something you might want to include in your newsletter. Today while at the Health Fair at the SF Expo Center I met Celina Echazarreta, the Associate State Director of AARP.... she gave me several copies of a brightly colored brochure, which bears both AARP and HEALTHACTION NOW.org on the cover.

"It is entitled 'Don't be scared by myths about health care reform, get the facts.'

"...before she gave me this document I asked if AARP was going to take a position in support of the public option. This question came to mind in part because on Wednesday or Thursday I received a somewhat similar but larger brochure in the mail from AARP which listed three of the same myths but did not mention the public option. Celina said that last week at their national board meeting the board had split on the public option issue and therefore had not yet taken a position. This could be very good. With AARP’s support we could make substantial gains in this fight.

Let us hope."

Monday, September 28, 2009

An Urgent Message from Robert Reich and Ellen Shaffer

Local (and high-profile) heroes Robert Reich and Ellen Shaffer are again united in their appeal for you to contact Senate Finance Committee Senators. Yes, again. And yes, now.

As Reich puts it:

Tomorrow (Tuesday, September 29, 2009) is a critical day in the saga of the public option. Democrats Charles Schumer (New York) and Jay Rockefeller (West Virginia) are introducing an amendment to include the public option in the bill to be reported out by the Senate Finance Committee -- the committee anointed by the White House as its favored vehicle for getting health care reform.

"Before you read another word, call and email the Senate offices of Democrats Max Baucus (Montana), Tom Carper (Delaware), Robert Menendez (New Jersey), Kent Conrad (North Dakota), Jeff Bingaman (New Mexico), John Kerry (MA), Blanche Lincoln (Arkansas), Ron Wyden (Oregon), Debbie Stabenow (Michigan), Maria Cantwell (Washington), and Bill Nelson -- telling them you want them to vote in favor of the public option amendment. And get everyone you know in these states to do the same. Hell, you might as well phone and email Republican Olympia Snowe (Maine) and make the same pitch.”

Here's the contact information of the senators Shaffer and Reich both recommend contacting:

Max Baucus MT (Committee Chair)
Phone: (202) 224-2651
Fax: (202) 224-9412

Thomas Carper DE
Phone: (202) 224-2441
Fax: (202) 228-2190

Robert Menendez, NJ
Phone: 202.224.4744

Kent Conrad, North Dakota
Phone: (202) 224-2043
Fax: (202) 224-7776

Jeff Bingaman
Phone (202) 224-5521
senator.bingaman@bingaman.senate.gov

John Kerry
Phone: (202) 224-2742

Blanche Lincoln AR
Phone: (202) 224-4843
Fax: (202) 228-1371

Ron Wyden
Phone: 202-224-5244

Debbie Stabenow:

Maria Cantwell
Phone: 202-224-3441
Fax: 202-228-0514

Bill Nelson
Phone: (202) 224-5274
Fax: (202) 228-2183
http://billnelson.senate.gov/contact/email.cfm

Olympia Snowe, ME
Phone: (800) 432-1599

Dr. Jim Kahn makes a deal

Dr. James G. Kahn of UCSF Medical School has cut a deal with The Feinstein 1200 that he may regret - he agreed to tackle the remaining audience questions from the Feinstein 1200 Physician-Economist Seminar, if you will answer his questions about your premiums.

Dr. Kahn will set up a survey through "Survey Monkey" - I'll send out the link as soon as he's ready. In the meantime, here's a list of your remaining questions. You can see a small fraction of the answers from the seminar on the new youtube playlist. (The Q&A segments are the final three of the playlist.) Please note that questions markedfor Dow and Jacobs are being handled by Dow and Jacobs.

Remaining Audience Questions from Physician-Economist Seminar:

1) How will tax subsidies for purchase of health insurance be limited? Will the mandate and subsidies drive up demand and thereby drive up premiums over time?

2) For Professor Dow: I run a family practice medical group here in Oakland. I would like to differ with you about rate setting. The vast majority of my practice’s reimbursement is set by contracted arrangements with insurance companies. If I want patients, I must accept these rates. It seems that rate setting is also an essential element in the current system. Currently, rates are often unfavorable to primary care and favorable to specialists. Since primary care holds down costs, government should participate in reviewing rate setting for the benefit and cost savings of the whole country.

3) How many more people will be without insurance if nothing is done about health coverage? How do we counteract the greed of the insurance companies?

4) For Professor Jacobs: What leverage is available to us in the effort to get the best possible legislative action out of congress NOW?

5) For Professor Dow: Which private insurers are “non-profit”, and how are they doing in decreasing cost compared to for-profit insurers?

6) For Professor Dow: Is something like your limited program for uninsured persons of less than 200% poverty level on the table now in congress?

7) Dr. Kahn: What, if anything, in the present health care reform can move us toward a single payer system? And what can we do to further that?

8) Doesn’t the proposal of Mr. Dow essentially do the cherry-picking for the private insurers? Wouldn’t this put the low-income people into the public option, thereby relieving private insurers from covering them? And aren’t the low-income people more lemon flavored than cherry flavored?

9) How would taxing the insurance companies who offer so-called “Cadillac” plans to union members affect the union members’ plan? Would we pay more than we are now? Would our benefits be cut?

10) Health care reform has been focused on financing. Yet how will any of these proposals address a system of medicine focused on disease management (dispensing pharmaceuticals) and not health promotion?

11) For William Dow: If one can’t cover a risk, it’s necessary to buy insurance. Some entities are large enough to self-insure. In the case of health care insurance, companies mark up cost of health care by 130% to 150%. The U.S. government is large enough to self-insure and provides Medicare at 103% of the actual cost of health care. Most people can’t wait to get on Medicare and 70% want single payer or a strong public option. Why not open Medicare to all? Bring down the cost of Medicare with healthier people and eliminate the high cost of private insurance and their nasty practices.

12) How about expanding nationally the Massachusetts Plan?

13) Does the Healthy San Francisco program serve illegal (undocumented) individuals?

14) For William Dow: Dr. Dean contends that countries with universal coverage either have a public option OR the health care/insurance industry is treated like a “utility.” Is this true? (Germany as an example of utility.)

15) If profits of insurance companies have been rising, why are profits not a focus of cost containment?

16) For Professor Dow: Re countries that contain costs with no public option - how do they contain costs?

17) In California, PERS negotiates prices – why can’t a public option do so at a national level?

18) Is it possible that for-profit insurance companies would have to lower cost of premiums if there is a public option?

19) How much does the government pay to the insurance companies or the health provider for each Medicare recipient?

20) For Ken Jacobs: Why not wrap in ALL health care into the new system, such as: workers comp (medical portion); property insurance (medical portion); car insurance (medical portion); travel insurance (medical portion). In other words, remove the costs of all the underwriting, administrative and legal costs of these items and move it into the support of a new universal option.

21) I understand that we currently spend about 60% of total health care spending on the last 18 months of life. What ideas are under consideration for reducing that percentage?

22) Obesity and lifestyle factors cause a fraction of the population to consume more than its share of health care. How can we motivate people to make better lifestyle choices?

23) For Ken Jacobs: Can employer responsibility encourage companies to compete by offshoring more work to countries that don’t require health care contribution and have lower wages?

24) To Professor Dow: the compromise you suggested based on Health San Francisco sounds appealing. Does it have an advocate in the current debate in Washington?

25) How does having health insurance guarantee good health care? Insurance companies make administrative and profit-based decisions to their “covered” customers, which lead to poor health care decisions, more serious health consequences.

26) For Ken Jacobs: Will the threat of a trigger for public option control costs of private insurance coverage?

27) Why should we expect that employers should design and choose health care options for the American people – employers have zero expertise in this arena.

28) Obama claimed that his plan would not increase cost to government because savings would cover the costs. Can someone explain how possible this is?

29) For Dr. Kahn: A Norwegian-born citizen now living in the US says that Norway’s health care system is great if you are under 55. If you are over 55, many treatments, including for heart disease, are not options. Does anyone know if Norway and or other countries with socialized medicine have age restrictions on care? Would a US system have to revert to such policy to control costs?

30) What is the value of a Baucus proposal to allow premiums based on age to be five times more?

31) Why is public care NOT Cadillac care if you define Cadillac care as having access to the best docs? Look at UCSF!

32) What is the fuction of delay and denial used against patients with insurance coverage? Will we require in the end unaffordable (22% of income) underinsurance?

33) For Professor Dow: Health insurance companies say they make cost more affordable because they insure healthy and non-healthy people. Insuring mostly healthy people drives up profit presumably. Does the public option for only low income people run additional risks because low income populations may also carry many high risk individuals? Is this population less healthy than other groups?

34) What are your thoughts on rate regulation of premiums (similar to ultility rate regulation) in lieu of a public option.

35) The most lucrative area for cost control in our health care system is found in the 20%+ insurance premiums which go to non-health care administrative costs. What do you think is the most salable to the insurance companies? a) telling them there is a new competitor on the block called the public option, or b) mandating that they change their business model to “non-profit” – like the Bismarck model used in France, Germany, Switzerland, etc.?

36) I would argue that the current Medicaid program would make a poor public option because few providers actually accept Medicaid, especially the specialists. We could end up with fewer uninsured, but more underinsured. We need a strong public option in terms of quality as well. Would you agree?

37) The current health care system is unsustainable. We pay more and get less. What can we do to encourage other leaders to vote for health care reform?

38) For Professor Dow: It seems to me that your scenario of allowing low-income people to buy into medicare (up to 150 or 200% of federal poverty level) rather “stigmatizes” the public option. Perhaps a way to introduce it by “stealth”, but not in tune with the ultimate foal of incorporating all into an equitable system. Doesn’t this approach merely widen gaps?

39) Question for Dr. Kahn: What happens to your $400 billion total or $1,000 per person per year totals when you factor in the time the individual spends on the phone/paperwork with the insurers, doctors, hospitals, etc?

40) Senator Feinstein is concerned that expanding Medicaid to cover the uninsured would bankrupt states which share in that cost. Is that a valid concern?

41) States pay a big share of Medicaid – states are broke. So how is it realistic to let a lot of poor people with deferred health maintenance into Medicaid?

42) True or false: Insurance coverage does not equal health care (insurers delay and deny.)

44) True or false: 10% is an internationally accepted amount of income to spend on medical care (about what I spend as a complicated Medicare patient.) But the House plan assumes 23% of income for a plan that may not even cover them well.

Physician-Economist Seminar Now Available as a Youtube Playlist

We're still editing our introductory physician's presentation, adding in some powerful stills that describe the fascinating work he did as a young physician in one of the last remaining mineworker's hospitals, and his four-decade-long career as a pediatrician and award-winning clinical professor at the elite UCSF Medical School.

In the meantime, here's a playlist for the following segments:

1) Economist William H. Dow on Healthy San Francisco as "a public option that works," in four parts.
2) UCB Labor Center Chair Ken Jacobs, on hybrid health reform, in three parts.
3) UCSF Medical School's James G. Kahn on single payer, in three parts.
4) Post-presentation Question and Answer Session, in three parts.

Dr. James G. Kahn is handling the remaining dozens of questions, except for those specifically marked for Dow or Jacobs.

Our Feinstein 1200 Envoy to DC Delivers the Goods!

One of our Feinstein 1200 was in DC to visit family the weekend of September 18 (Rosh Hashanah), and generously offered to deliver a Feinstein 1200 letter to the Senator's office. As I never post names without first asking, I'll refer to this person only as Selfless and Heroic Envoy, because they actually made time to do this during a busy holiday/family visit.

Here is our envoy's abbreviated report:

"Eva,

...I found Feinsteins office on the third floor, they have 3 nice young folks working reception in a small anteroom and that's as far as I got. From that point there was a closed door and lots of busy suits hustling in and out. I handed one of the young receptionists the Feinstein 1200 letter and spent about a half an hour reciting the litany of health insurance dysfunction from my vantage point running a family practice medical group.... I wrapped it up saying that without a robust public option I didn't see any reason to have hope for any significant change in the problems. He said that Feinstein had met with the White House and was much happier with the public option. The gist of his comments were she was much happier with the public option but he didn't actually say she was supporting it....

I'm glad that I went, mostly I thought the receptionists jobs was to act sympathetic and take notes that are probably recycled as soon as I left the room. But who knows at least your letter made it into the office and maybe one little point I made will sneak past the closed door to the real office and land on someones desk."

Let's give deep thanks to our friend. I include the letter delivered by our envoy below:

Dear Senator Feinstein,

Thank you for accepting this letter from our envoy, who generously offered to visit your office while in Washington, D.C.

Our organization represents the 1200+ physicians, nurses, scientists, small businessmen and other constituents of yours who gathered in your San Francisco office the week of August 10, 2009 to support the public option and/or single payer.

As you well know by now, we are deeply disappointed with your failure to support in any significant manner a robust public option, which is the most practical and achievable tool proposed by the House to control insurance premiums and provide affordable health insurance to millions of uncovered Americans.

We are also disappointed that your office refused our many entreaties to meet with you personally while you were in California during the August recess. And that neither you nor your San Francisco office saw fit to respond to the invitation to our Physician-Economist Seminar, held on Monday, September 14, 2009.

Our September 14 seminar featured award-winning UCSF physicians and UC Berkeley economists on the savings that would accrue from the public option and single payer systems. The information provided by the panel, which included a former Senior Economic Advisor to the Bush administration, was both high-level and timely. The event had excellent attendance, and the highly educated audience, which included many primary care physicians, stayed for a full three hours to hear all the panelists speak. At the very least, your staffers, who had been invited, should have attended – but they failed to even RSVP for you or for themselves.

We have read your last official press release on health care reform. In this press release, you note the essential role of the public option to rein in insurance premiums, but you weaken that support drastically by stating your interest in exploring other means of reform, such as cooperatives, which have already proven to be ineffective.

As your constituents, we urge you to bear in mind that any alternative to the public option must demonstrate that it can control costs as effectively as a robust public option, as outlined in HR 3200. To date, the only method proven to control costs more effectively is a single payer system, which you have not supported.

We would also like to point out a recent Robert Wood Johnson Foundation study published in The New England Journal of Medicine, which shows that 63% of U.S. physicians support the public option. An additional 10% of doctors support an entirely public health care system.

Combining these metrics means that three out of four U.S. physicians support much stronger health care reform than you have actively supported.

We regret to inform you that your failure to support the public option in any meaningful way throws into question our decades-long support for your leadership. Moreover, your repeated dismissal of our concerns, including but not limited to the mass misfiling of our pro-health-care-reform letters as anti-health-care-reform letters – an “error” to which your staff repeatedly admitted during the week of August 10, 2009, blaming a “computer glitch”, shows a high level of disregard for your constituents.

We once again welcome you to meet with us when you are next in California.

Monday, September 21, 2009

Who Needs Great White Sharks When You Have Anthem Blue Cross?

After a month of talking about protesting insurance companies, it's finally happening. Join MoveOn.org at Two Embarcadero Center on Tuesday, September 22, at 11:30 a.m. to protest Anthem Blue Cross' opposition to the public option. (While you're there, you might also want to protest the fact that they've been astro-turfing on company time!)

Tell me what you want on your sign, and I'll have it painted and ready for you on Tuesday at 11:30 a.m. at the rally location. We're meeting on Davis between Sacramento and Clay streets.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Seminar Panel and Audience Outstanding!

Last night's Feinstein 1200 Physician-Economist Seminar was a huge success, thanks not just to a fantastic panel, but to the incredible audience that showed up on a Monday night and stayed for a full three hours to hear the speakers and have their questions answered. 

Despite the rush-hour traffic and the limited parking, we had a full house, THANK YOU!

The award-winning UCSF physicians and UCB economists on the panel were impressed both by the passionate attention of the audience, and the tough questions they submitted.

We were very lucky to have in our audience SFSU Emerita Professor Deborah Leveen, who processed the dozens of index cards on which our audience had asked serious questions about policy. 

Other Feinstein 1200'ers provided essential assistance with tech issues and video, and we hope to provide a video of the event soon. There will also be a written summary of the seminar available soon. 

As not all of the questions were answered, we are working on getting answers to them from the panelists. At your request, we have also asked the panelists to submit their slides.

Many thanks not just to the speakers, but to our wonderful volunteers and our incredible audience who made this event happen! 


Friday, September 11, 2009

Location and Details of Monday's Physician/Economist Seminar

The Feinstein 1200's Physician/Economist Seminar will examine the potential savings that would accrue from the public option and single payer systems.

DATE and TIME:

The seminar will take place this Monday, September 14, 2009, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.

LOCATION/DIRECTIONS: 

The Garden Room of the Clark Kerr Conference Center in Berkeley  (directions) at 2601 Warring Street (five blocks from the main Berkeley campus.)  Here is a map of Clark Kerr itself - The Garden Room is located a few steps after the main entrance. Here is a larger map that shows the short distance between Clark Kerr and the main Berkeley campus.

MEALS:

Clark Kerr has its own cafeteria and sandwich kiosk, which adjoin the Garden Room. You are welcome to bring your own meal/”bento” box from home or to buy from Clark Kerr facilities; food is allowed in the Garden Room.

PARKING:

Clark Kerr has a pay-by-the-hour parking lot. On a Monday evening, we anticipate there should be a good deal of street parking available.

PANEL:

The now-confirmed panel includes:

Introductory Speaker Dr. John Bolton, Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at UCSF Medical Center. Dr. Bolton will discuss the challenges faced by young parents and children within the current U.S. health care system.

Ken Jacobs, Chair of the Labor Center at UC Berkeley. Professor Jacobs will speak on the relative merits of health care reform both with and without the public option.

William H. Dow, former Senior Economic Advisor to the Bush administration, now on the faculty of UC Berkeley's School of Public Health. Professor Dow has publicly supported the"Healthy San Francisco" program as a viable public option. He will give his academic, non-partisan view of the potential costs and savings of the public option. 

James G. Kahn, M.D., of the University of California San Francisco Medical Center and California Physicians' Alliance. Dr. Kahn will explain the savings that would accrue from a single payer system.

QUESTION AND ANSWER PERIOD:

There will be a question and answer period after the panelists speak. We will distribute index cards for you to write your question on.

RSVP:

Seating is limited, and priority goes to Feinstein 1200 members. For reservations and site details, send an email stating your full name and the number of seats you would like to reserve to:

thefeinstein1200newsletter@gmail.com

ARTICLES BY SPEAKERS:

For articles by some of the speakers, click here

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Dear President Obama: Thank you for fighting!

We needed to see and hear a fighter - and we did. It's what's been missing. 

My question was: would he give strong support to the public option?  

I and many others think he did. He did a great job of explaining to the American people what the public option is - and that's what was most needed. 

(Was it in time? That's a hard question to answer.)

I know this: The pitch he made for the public option gave us some of the means to fight for it. It got our foot back in the door. 

From now on, the bulk of this is up to us - we'll need to be in the streets and at the town halls until this comes to a vote. 
(Until a photo from tonight is available, the photo above is from the President's February visit to the House Chamber - it was taken by Doug Mills for The New York Times.)

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Robert Reich on the Public Option: DON'T give up now.

Only a man this smart could put it so simply: Ladies and Gentlemen, this is the man, and the video
"Not surprisingly, there are powerful groups with a huge self-interest in seeing this reform fail. They are drug companies, insurance companies and political operatives.... They want to scare you.  And they have plenty of money and plenty of partisans to do their dirty work. So what can you do right now? I've served in Washington, and I know that unless you make a hell of a racket, the for-profit insurers and drug companies, along with their lobbyists and lawyers, are going to win this thing.... Make your voices heard. This is your last chance."

How simple was THAT? 

Required Reading: Articles by Seminar Speakers

For those attending the seminar (details here), please take the time to prepare informed questions for the speakers, as there will only be 30 minutes for questions and answers. 

I highly recommend Professor William H. Dow's opinion piece "A Public Option That Works" from The New York Times.

Additionally, Professor Ken Jacobs' home page has a large supply of his articles in pdf format. 

I will add to this list in the coming days. 

Hidden Cost of Our Unequal Provision of Health Care

This Darian Meacham letter appeared in the Times: 
"Inequalities in access to health care do not have a negative effect only on the health and well-being of the uninsured. There is a serious body of evidence to suggest that middle-income groups in less equal societies have worse health than comparable population groups in more equal societies. These findings, reported by Norman Daniels, Bruce Kennedy and Ichiro Kawachi in their essay “Justice Is Good for Our Health,” deserve scrutiny.

If they can be substantiated, then it is in the interests of the already insured middle classes to promote universal coverage and to work toward reducing other social inequalities. Simply put, making sure that everyone has equal access to high-quality medical care could make us all healthier." -Darian Meacham
Brussels, Aug. 23, 2009

On "The Great Divider"

One of FDR's many biographers, Jean Edward Smith, counsels on the wisdom of strength:
"Roosevelt relished the opposition of vested interests. He fashioned his governing majority by deliberately attacking those who favored the status quo. His opponents hated him — and he profited from their hatred. “Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today,” he told a national radio audience on the eve of the 1936 election. “They are unanimous in their hatred for me — and I welcome their hatred.”

As for the President's (and our Party's) current leadership, Smith writes:
"President Obama's apparent readiness to backtrack on the public insurance option in his health care package is not just a concession to his political opponents — this fixation on securing bipartisan support for health care reform suggests that the Democratic Party has forgotten how to govern and the White House has forgotten how to lead."

I pray that the President will backtrack on his previous backtracking and support - at the very least - a robust public option in his Wednesday address to both houses of congress. 

Sunday, September 6, 2009

He Didn't Give Up - How Can We? Part II

 

September 7, 2009 - On this Labor Day, when so many are losing hope for the public option, The Feinstein 1200 sends you an image of authentic courage: Lech Walesa, the legendary Polish Solidarity leader who, in his fight for workers’ rights, ended up indirectly challenging the brutal Soviet empire – and won.

Walesa, like many of today's primary care doctors working in the shadow of the U.S. health insurance empire, understood his Goliath.  He knew that the creaky imperium was far weaker than the powerful image it had purchased with the lives of others. 

So Walesa made a calculated, pragmatic decision to invest in those ordinary people who supported him, rather than succumb to a corrupt system.

Like the public option, Walesa’s Solidarity movement offered workers a broader range of choices, and in doing so, helped to defeat a brutal system. Similarly, a robust public option would give ordinary Americans leverage against the for-profit U.S. health insurance monopoly.

Why didn’t Walesa betray his friends and their goals, even when the Communist government in Poland imprisoned him in a secret cell in Soviet territory? And how did he win against a Leviathan far more deadly than a bunch of sleazy health insurance lobbyists?

Perhaps it’s because Walesa, who lacked a formal education, understood that victory didn’t come by lying down.

This month, let's stand strong for nothing less than a robust public option, and let’s ask the same of our President. 

Take heart - and fight.

Your Comments - Moyers Schools 'Em

Several of you referred me to the closing essay in this weekend's Bill Moyers' Journal. Excerpt:

"As we speak, Pfizer, the world's largest drug maker, has been fined a record $2.3 billion dollars as a civil and criminal — yes, that's criminal, as in fraud — penalty for promoting prescription drugs with the subtlety of the Russian mafia. It's the fourth time in a decade Pfizer's been called on the carpet. And these are the people into whose tender mercies Congress and the White House would deliver us?

"Come on, Mr. President. Show us America is more than a circus or a market. Remind us of our greatness as a democracy. When you speak to Congress next week, just come out and say it.... We thought you said Uncle Sam would sign on as our tough, cost-minded negotiator standing up to the cartel of drug and insurance companies and Wall Street investors whose only interest is a company's share price and profits.

"Here's a suggestion, Mr. President: ask Josh Marshall to draft your speech. Josh is the founder of the website talkingpointsmemo.com. He's a journalist and historian, not a politician. He doesn't split things down the middle and call it a victory for the masses. He's offered the simplest and most accurate description yet of a public insurance plan — one that essentially asks people: would you like the option — the voluntary option — of buying into Medicare before you're 65? 

"This health care thing is make or break for your leadership, but for us, it's life and death. No more Mr. Nice Guy, Mr. President. We need a fighter."

Your Comments - A Physician's Reference

One of our physician Feinstein 1200'ers recommended this letter from a former Texas pastor now living in "coal country" who won't back down on his support for the public option.  

If Pastor Heacock's letter is indicative of his sermons, I don't think any of his Texas parishioners ever slept through Sunday services. 

Physician-Economist Seminar Details

The Feinstein 1200 will examine the potential savings that would accrue from health care reform in its Physician-Economist Seminar. The seminar will take place on September 14, 2009, from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. in Berkeley. The now-confirmed panel includes:

Introductory Speaker Dr. John Bolton, Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at UCSF Medical Center. Dr. Bolton will open the seminar with a short presentation that describes - from the perspective of a pediatrician whose career spans five decades - the challenges faced by young parents and children within the current U.S. health care system.

Ken Jacobs, Chair of the Labor Center at UC Berkeley. Professor Jacobs will speak on the relative merits of health care reform both with and without the public option.

William H. Dow, former Senior Economic Advisor to the Bush administration, now on the faculty of UC Berkeley's School of Public Health. Professor Dow has publicly supported the"Healthy San Francisco" program as a viable public option. He will give his academic, non-partisan view of the potential costs and savings of the public option. 

James G. Kahn, M.D., of the University of California San Francisco Medical Center and California Physicians' Alliance. Dr. Kahn will explain the savings that would accrue from a single payer system.

There will be a question and answer period after the panelists speak. Seating is limited, and priority goes to Feinstein 1200 members. For reservations and site details, send an email stating your first and last name, the number of seats you would like to reserve, and how you heard about the seminar to:

thefeinstein1200newsletter@gmail.com