The Truth Behind Social Security

At last - the whole scoop from the Century Foundation...

http://www.tcf.org/4L/4LMain.asp?SubjectID=1&ArticleID=507

The Cost. Oh, the Cost!

A look at today's innaugural festivities by the numbers:

$40 million: Cost of Bush inaugural ball festivities, not counting security costs.

$2,000: Amount FDR spent on the inaugural in 1945…about $20,000 in today's dollars.

$20,000: Cost of yellow roses purchased for inaugural festivities by D.C.'s Ritz Carlton.

200: Number of Humvees outfitted with top-of-the-line armor for troops in Iraq that could have been purchased with the amount of money blown on the inauguration.

$10,000: Price of an inaugural package at the Fairmont Hotel, which includes a Beluga caviar and Dom Perignon reception, a chauffeured Rolls Royce and two actors posing as "faux" Secret Service agents, complete with black sunglasses and cufflink walkie-talkies.

400: Pounds of lobster provided for "inaugural feeding frenzy" at the exclusive Mandarin Oriental hotel.

3,000: Number of "Laura Bush Cowboy cookies" provided for "inaugural feeding frenzy" at the Mandarin hotel.

$1: Amount per guest President Carter spent on snacks for guests at his inaugural parties. To stick to a tight budget, he served pretzels, peanuts, crackers and cheese and had cash bars.

22 million: Number of children in regions devastated by the tsunami who could have received vaccinations and preventive health care with the amount of money spent on the inauguration.

1,160,000: Number of girls who could be sent to school for a year in Afghanistan with the amount of money lavished on the inauguration.

$15,000: The down payment to rent a fur coat paid by one gala attendee who didn't want the hassle of schlepping her own through the airport.

$200,500: Price of a room package at D.C.'s Mandarin Oriental, including presidential suite, chauffeured Mercedes limo and outfits from Neiman Marcus.

2,500: Number of U.S. troops used to stand guard as President Bush takes his oath of office

26,000: Number of Kevlar vests for U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan that could be purchased for $40 million.

$290: Bonus that could go to each American solider serving in Iraq, if inauguration funds were used for that purpose.

$6.3 million: Amount contributed by the finance and investment industry, which works out to be 25 percent of all the money collected.

$17 million: Amount of money the White House is forcing the cash-strapped city of Washington, D.C., to pony up for inauguration security.

9: Percentage of D.C. residents who voted for Bush in 2004.

66: Percentage of Americans who think this over-the-top inauguration should have been scaled back.

BAD MEDICINE! - Meriden R-J Op-Ed

Call it “Malpractice Assurance”, call it “Redress Restriction”, call it “Greed Protection”, call it a “Corporate Handout”, or just call it what it is, “Justice Denial”, the new Republican proposal to deny abused patients a just court reward for their suffering is everything but “reform”.

“Tort reform”, a term slammed together in 1992 by GOP spin guru, Frank Luntz, is propagated by corporations in the tobacco, drug, and asbestos industries, as well as others vulnerable to legal actions seeking damages for damages caused by their products. Proponents use the term to refer to legislative measures designed to limit the ability and potential damages available to individuals who take legal actions against these companies. It has become a cause celebre with the Bush administration, so much so, that Bush traveled all the way to Collinsville Illinois earlier this month to hawk his latest proposals.

“The United States Congress needs to pass real medical liability reform this year,” Bush said, slapping his lectern with an open palm to emphasize his point. Behind him, the White House advance team arrayed audience members in white medical coats. Bush warned of a crisis but said it could be averted if the Republican-controlled Congress adopts his plan.

“This liability system, I’m telling you, is out of control,” Bush said. While his proposal has stalled in the last Congress, expanded GOP majorities in both houses have given him and his cronies renewed hope.

The Bush rationale for this move, like so many of his rationales, is quite simple. He believes that a flurry of “Frivolous” class action lawsuits have driven up medical and insurance costs to the point where they are unaffordable. Also like many of Mr. Bush’s rationales, it is far from the truth. According to a recent study by the Center for American Progress, sixty-one percent of lawsuits brought alleging malpractice are dropped or dismissed, so the doctors win. Where lawsuits are shown to be frivolous, the plaintiff can be ordered to pay the legal bills of the defense. Thirty-two percent of such cases are settled. The average award for a successful malpractice suit, according to the National Practitioner Data Bank, (which receives all malpractice settlement and court award information by federal law), is $235,000. Awards of over $500,000 in both actual and punitive damages are rare enough to be newsworthy.

Though the numbers appear at first to be substantial, we are talking about the damage to people’s lives and health caused by dangerous drugs that have not been pulled off the market, misdiagnoses resulting in death or permanent injury, and all other deliberate or accidental violations of a physician’s primary oath – “First, do no harm.”
It is true that healthcare and health insurance costs have risen astronomically. In Connecticut, health care premiums have gone up an average of $2,990 since President Bush took office. The culprit, however, is not overly high awards given to successful malpractice suits. The Major driving force behind the increased cost of Health Care is the skyrocketing cost of prescription drugs. The cost of the ten most popular prescription drugs has gone up and average 8.7 % over the last year alone. Prescription drugs now account for 23 percent of American's out-of-pocket costs.

The Drug Industry is the Most Profitable Industry In United States. According to the Minnesota Attorney General's Office, "[T]he pharmaceutical industry has been the most profitable industry in the United States for each of the past 10 years. In 2001, it was 5-1/2 times more profitable than the average of all other Fortune 500 companies."

Bush and national Republicans have taken more than $100 million from the pharmaceutical, health services, and insurance industries in the past few years, an investment that has been repaid many times over. Bush has consistently worked to keep the interests of industry ahead of patients' interests, meaning higher costs and fewer protections for American families.

In particular, these industries have given $112 million to national Republicans since 1999. What’s more, 43 health industry Bush-Cheney Pioneers and Rangers, (campaign contributors of over $100,000), raised at least $5.9 million. It has turned out to be a very lucrative investment. Since 2002, drug and insurance companies have received safeguards to ensure corporate profits, billions of dollars in taxpayers subsidies with no demands for accountability, special legal protections for industry, (breaking a GOP campaign pledge to protect consumers, less restricted access to confidential patient information, and now immunity to a patient’s last line of defense – the Court System.

My goal in these columns is to promote both truth and active citizenship, and action is what I encourage now. New legislation is about to be introduced in both the House and Senate during the next two weeks that threatens to follow-up on this dangerous GOP agenda. Congresswoman Nancy Johnson’s Washington office phone number is
202-225.4476. Senator Dodd’s is 202 244 2823, Senator Lieberman's is 202 244 4041. Ask for the staff person who handles healthcare issues and urge them to oppose these bills.

Bush Plans to Cut Vital Programs

Click here to see the truth about the new Bush budget...

Vote with your wallet

I've gotten a few questions about how we can use our hard-earned cash to support progressive-friendly companies. Buyblue.org and choosetheblue.com are organizations that rank companies according to their fair business practices and commitment to progressive causes, or in their words...

You may have voted blue, but every day you unknowingly help dump millions of dollars into the conservative war chest. By purchasing products and services from companies that donate heavily to conservatives, we have been compromising our own interests as liberals and progressives.

This is a concerted effort to lift the veil of corporate patronage, so consumers can make informed buying decisions that coincide with their principles.

Currently, we are developing an extensive and interactive website where users will be able to monitor corporate activity in real time. We cannot do this alone; we need an army of Blue buyers to be the eyes and ears of this movement. All we have to do is put our money where our mouth is to make it profitable to be ethical.

Our collective buying power WILL make a difference, and we WILL be heard.

Don't Just Talk About it!

Democracy for Connecticut has a whole menu of places you can go to lobby legislators, start petitions, connect with fellow-thinkers, or just make noise. They've put a lot of work into it too.

http://www.democracyforct.com/links_activisim.htm

Something we can do...

Stand Up Democrats is a group of progressive working to reform the message of the Democratic party. They are collecting ideas to reform the party at their site...

http://standupdemocrats.org/

A Response to Recent Comments

OK, folks... we're not playing bean-bag here. No one ever said that nonviolent moral suasion was easy, or that one big burst of energy was ever enough to push a whole country back on the correct and constructive path.

The Right spent 40 years and trillions of dollars to give us the violent, divisive, impoverishing, soul-eroding chaos we see around us. We're lucky enough to see it for what it is, but that doesn't mean we should allow it to cow us into grumbling submission. The Right wants Democrats to do one thing and one thing only --- "Bend over and take it like a prison bitch." Those who are leaving the party or giving up are performing just that feat.

Yes the party should listen to its Progressive wing, but it won't until enough of us make enough noise, and find a focus and consistency to our message.

Take on Tucker

I sent this letter to Station WGBY last night, cc: the producers of the Tucker Carlson Show (tuckercarlson@weta.com)

Though I fully understand that everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion, I believe it's a greater truth that NO ONE is enttiled to his or her own facts. I am reminded of that truth tonight after having waded through the morass of deception, distraction, innuendo, spin and outright lies which oozed together to form "Tucker Carlson Unfiltered". Beginning with a diatribe against helping those most in need of our generosity, then continuing from Paul O'Neill's attempt to wriggle my retirement money from me, to Carlson and Frum ganging up on the unfortunate, (if heroic), Katrina van den Heuvel, to that embarassing puff-piece about why so few elephants were killed in the tsunami, Carlson reached one of the few true lows I have ever witnessed in broadcast journalism. (I use the term "journalism" here merely as a marketing category, not a description of what Carlson accomplished tonight). It sullies the tradition of fairness and balance established not only by "NOW" and "The News Hour", but by PBS' other conservative offerings over the years, (Firing Line and Tony Brown's Journal" come to mind as shows that inspired rational discourse through presenting contrary points of veiw.) How low we have fallen this evening.

Please stop this nonsense. I expect so much more of WGBY and PBS than to think that bowing to the pressure of the right-wing echo chamber the network has replaced a full half of "NOW" with this dangerous and deceptive sort of pseudocommentary. WGBY has the power to pre-empt or to re-schedule this show. I urge you to use this power as soon as possible as a service to your viewers and subscribers.

Mike Reynolds
Meriden, CT

I mentioned to some that I was planning a "conditional donation campaign" for WGBY in Springfield. I chose this station because they are small enough to listen, and hurting for cash. My plan is simple... I plan to call the station and offer to donate $250 dollars on the condition that they reschedule Tucker Carlson's show to Saturday Mornings at 8:30 AM.

Obviously, my small chunk of change won't do much persuading. In order for this to work, I need a lot of help. Anyone with me to strike a blow against the right-wing propoganda machine? Please comment on whether or not you think the plan has a chance of succeeding.

Progressive Talk Call-in Info...

Below is contact information for all Progressive Talk Radio Call-in shows ---

Morning Sedition with Marc & Marc:
toll free: 1-866-303-2270

The Stephanie Miller Show:
toll free: 1-800-783-7412
stephanie@stephaniemiller.com

The Al Franken Show:
toll free: 1-866-303-2270

The Ed Schultz Show:
toll free: 1-877-934-6833

The Randi Rhodes Show:
toll free: 1-866-303-2270
rrhodes@airamericaradio.com

The Lionel Show:
toll free: 1-866-654-6635
lionel@lionelonline.com

So, What Else is News? w/ Marty Kaplan:
toll free: 1-866-303-2270
heymarty@airamericaradio.com

The Laura Flanders Show:
toll free: 1-866-303-2270
laura@airamericaradio.com

EcoTalk with Betsy Rosenberg:
NOT A FREE CALL: (415) 561-2165
betsy@ecotalk.net

The Revolution Starts Now! w/ Steve Earle
toll free: 1-866-303-2270

The "Boxer Rebellion" - Response to a Letter

I received this letter this morning which I'll quote a section of here...

"Democrats must stop being afraid of the accusation that they are "obstructionists." Anyone who stands up for what is right can be called that by goons on the other side. It's simply rhetoric, and meaningless. Fight the Republicans at every turn. Don't "cooperate" with them on anything except non-political questions like disaster relief. Continue to remind open-minded people that two elections in a row have been stolen. Don't be afraid to use the "f" word...FRAUD.

Moderation doesn't work when the other side can paint you as liberals anyway and steal elections while they're doing it. Be aggressive, loud, and forthright. Call a spade a spade. Insist that Blackwell be prosecuted for illegally stifling the Ohio recount. Don't let DeLay off the hook. And if anyone says you're "unpatriotic," laugh in their face."

It is good advice, but my point is that the fight now must be issue-by-issue, not candidate-by-candidate. Fair or not, the election results are now law, and we can no longer do anything to change them. We must now fight the battles we CAN fight. Our most potent weapons in this fight are what they have always been, our voice, our compassion, our commitment, and the truth. Our vehicles for expressing this truth are our representatives, our remaining political allies, and the mainstream media. Letters, phone calls,interviews, blogs, emails, etc. are the tools the Right used to take power.

We can use these to take it back and exert the muscle we have. I feel we owe ourselves and those we care about nothing less.

The Truth about Social Secrity

Click the title to check out the latest by economist Paul Krugman...