"Patients First" Rally in Jax: Death Panel a No-Show
An organization called “Patients First” organized a “Hands-Off My Healthcare” rally here in Jacksonville yesterday afternoon. The standing-room-only crowd was primarily comprised of seniors who had been cold-called by the organization. Here’s the video clip from last night’s news broadcast:
I would have written this off as yet another southern conservative tea party mess if the means of contacting these folks hadn’t pricked up my ears. “Seniors and others concerned about their health care got emails and phone calls just 24 hours before the rally began.” Yet, there were hundreds of them packed into the room. Just try calling my 70-year-old father and telling him he needs to show up at a rally. He’s mastered the fine art of feeding people their own spleens through phone lines.
This made me wonder, just what is “Patients First?” and how did they get so many ticked off senior citizens in one place so quickly?
Let’s explore…
“Patients First” is an off-shoot of “Americans for Prosperity,” a conservative political advocacy group which split off from the “Citizens for a Sound Economy” group. This split came after some sort of rift arose internally when it was affliated with that group as “Citizens for a Sound Economy Foundation.” Confused yet?
That foundation’s chairman and founder is David Koch, best known as the head honcho of Koch Industries, an oil refining and pipeline company. This would be unsurprising and generally unremarkable, if “Americans for Prosperity” hadn’t been the primary sponsor of the Dallas/Ft. Worth “Tea Party” on February 27, 2009. I have to wonder if all the people at that rally were aware that their little stunt was being funded by people who have a vested interest in selling oil and gas to make their living? Would they have cared? Probably not.
Tim Phillips is the president of "Americans for Prosperity." You may not know his name, but he was Ralph Reed’s former partner in “Century Strategies” – best known as the organization Jack Abramoff was convicted of using to launder money.
“Americans for Prosperity” is also the parent organization of “Patients United Now” (no PUN intended). They are best known for their recent television ads featuring a Canadian woman who came to the U.S. to be treated for a brain tumor after difficulty in her country. It evidently does not matter to the organization that the health care proposals being debated have nothing to do with a single-payer public system like the one that exists in Canada. It also doesn’t seem to mind if non-citizens are treated here in America, as long as they come from the "right" country. If you doubt that statement, imagine a commercial from a conservative group about a Mexican coming to America to get medical treatment.
Back in July 2008, “Americans for Prosperity” hosted the “RightOnline” conference in Texas. This was a conference of right wing bloggers who met to discuss the use of new media for conservative purposes. Evidently, they discussed the use of flash mobs made up of crowds of seniors scared for their grandchildren’s future.
The woman in the video above talks about being “concerned about her grandchildren’s future.” She has “paid for her own health insurance” and has “been happy with her health insurance.” It is precisely this attitude that should make her afraid for her grandchildren. The past attitudes of, “I’ve got mine so tough for you” are exactly the reason we are in this mess to begin with.
Let’s get this straight and all out on the table. There are already death panels. They are called insurance companies. They decide if you are treated. They decide if you have been treated enough. They decide when, how, where and if you die. They are there for profit and you do NOT get to vote on who represents your interests in their corporation.
Finally, let me point out why so many hundreds of seniors showed up yesterday afternoon in Jacksonville. They do not have to work. The majority of them (statistically) are retired, receive Social Security and RECEIVE MEDICARE.
They probably have no idea that they were *targeted* by this organization at a time and place where there would be little opposition. The rest of us were out trying to keep our houses, pay our insurance premiums and pay for Medicare and other programs like it. Why should I have to pay for it? I should because it's the right thing to do. With record numbers of seniors being forced to return to the workplace due to depleted retirement funds, it's a good thing they have Medicare to fall back on. I guess they should have called the rally, "Hand Off My Health Care."
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Comments
This kind of crap should be illegal. Really.
It is tantamount to yelling "FIRE!" in a crowded theater.
I don't know what the answer is, but it isn't more of the same thing that got us where we are today.
Bill & Gwen - I'm sure there are nasty practices all around. I'm not so naive as to think that the liberal side of this isn't doing some shady crap too. But, these are our mothers and grandmothers being used to get a sound bite because they are afraid. I don't expect this to go without some poo flinging, but if this rattles some cages, at least I tried.
People need to be informed about whose voice they are echoing.
Er, I meant to say: Great post, Jodi - this is just another example of the bullshit, and I thank you for writing it - gotta think of some kind of countermeasures, dammit.
Fab - They have had a lot of practice.
Owl - I appreciate that feat of self-restraint. I feel the same way. I'm such a dirty little hippie that I think everyone getting health care is a splendid idea. I'll expect the jack-booted thugs any moment.
though in the US, since the corporations own the government and democracy is a cruel fraudulent joke, that accountability is pretty minimal.
Brian - What is this "accountability" you speak of?
The majority of Americans want Health Care Reform. What we need to do is discover our VOLUME KNOB. We can win by reason AND volume, but we have to start drowning out the yahoos NOW.
Rated, even though I'm fuming at those who take adavantage of the vulnerable and gullible.
hmmm... i wonder what would happen if we sent an 'undocumented' mexican unwed mother with swine flu to the rally. i wonder how many of these nutjobs could she infect?
oh, gee.. ::cough:: i'm sorry, does your health plan cover swineflu vaccines? ::cough::
At least it is becoming clearer to many where this is coming from and who it is targeting. The biggest issue for Obama I hear is that the young ones that were a catalyst for the young voters are not involved in this health care bill fight. They view it as a poor people or old people issue because most of them are healthy.
Obama needs to get them rolling along to balance out the busloads of oldsters being carted around to these rallies by the groups you talked about.
Great post Jodi - not only are you a great foodie, but a great investigator of rightwing poopy crap too!
Good one, though, on the realization that seniors have the luxury of attending a daytime rally against big government b/c of their gov't sponsored benefits. That's rich.
But what sort of shady crap do you suppose the liberals are doing too? Spending money to organize folks to spread the truth about our so-called health care system? On this issue at least, there is not a moral equivalency between the two sides.
Healthcare, not warfare!
I do agree that the health care reform advocates should have been better informed about this event and should be better organized in general.
I hope that information like what I'm providing here can aid in that cause. Please see above comments where I say, "I'm not so naive as to think that the liberal side of this isn't doing some shady crap too. But, these are our mothers and grandmothers being used to get a sound bite because they are afraid."
No one is blaming the seniors here.
In other news, I have 8 p.m. reservations for a restaurant I'm reviewing. I'll be back when I'm done!
Oh, and be excellent to each other!
What I want to see is the government doing their job with fair regulations that protect both the consumer and the private enterprise that invest their capital and expect a reasonable profit.
So many of our industries like healthcare, energy and automotive have grown so large they control the market not the consumer. This is where government should be involved. The government should be involved in correcting our trade agreements that favor exporting real jobs and replacing them with low wage non benefit jobs. I know many companies who just want a fair playing field so they can build or service their clients, provide a competitive wage and benefits for their employees. It is hard to do when the field favors the few not the many.
At the turn of the century 19th Teddy Roosevelt busted up the trust. Which created a level playing field again. When you have companies like United Health care with control of over 25% of the market it is time to look at the benefits to everyone of maybe leveling the playing field again. It is not socialism it is strengthening capitalism by making the field playable for a many instead of the few. That benefits millions who now have new opportunities to succeed and fail.
We are taught to be individuals when we are well and in good health, but become part of the herd when we become sick or infirm, even with Medicare. Medicare is never enough. No amount of private insurance is enough.
The question for me is why did Teddy Kennedy understand that every American should think of affordable medical care as a Civil Right, when he was rich. While the lower classes think that health insurace should be limited to them as indiviuals, while the rest of US fellow Americans desever nothing but to send our children and grandchildren off to fight wars to protect the group.
I know that I am miandering but what can you say to people who do not understand that health care in a liberal democracy is a Human Right, not a priviledge.
(Don't you just love that word? ...fisticuffs...)
I do not believe that people on *either* side are fully informed about where the money for these groups comes from or what their monetary and corporate motivations are. None of us will ever know unless we ask the questions. I don't want people to assume they were duped. Unfortunately, that may have been implied by the title on the cover, but that is not my assertion.
But, let me be clear: I don't think anyone told them there would be free puppies. (I would *so* go to that rally.)
For me, this is about motivation. I stated my position, but I also respect the views of others. In regard to health care, there is not a perfect stance that will make everyone happy. Sort of like this post.
We may not all always agree about how things should change, but I don't understand why anyone would think it is okay for the richest country in the world to continue to allow people to die for want of health care.
It's going to take far greater minds than mine to figure out how to make that case and change people's minds about this. But, I can sure as hell Google and report. That's all the effort that this took. Imagine what someone with some power and access could do...
--------
side note: I wrote this at 2 p.m. today thinking everyone would go, "Ho-hum. Everyone knows these dudes are behind the curtain you silly girl!"
I'm supposed to be working! So, apologies to everyone I haven't been able to comment to directly. I'm doing a terrible job of tearing myself away from this, though.
Of course our Republican Representative (Vern Buchanan, a local crook) said nothing to dissuade them. It was a very sickening eye opener.
Americans have been, and continue to be, such suckers. They are so sucked in now that they won't believe the truth if it hits them in the face because to do so would be to admit their stupidity.
And Stellaa, once again, you hit it - WHERE the hell are those bright-eyed wonders in the White House? The left? We got Obama elected, we HAVE a majority in the Senate, things should start crankin' out on a daily basis that put things right where they were destroyed. But we aren't seeing that. Progressives like me are verrrrry frustrated, and wonder who bought the administration this time.
Thank you Jodi, for putting together a great piece! Rrrrated.
Rachel Maddow has me fired up. She and her producers are doing a bang up job of tying things together. She ** is ** the new "must see TV".
We know you're smart. The latin thing seems to tell me I'm short in dead language arts degrees...
--I find it so interesting that people seem to believe that simply putting more insurance companies out there to compete with the existing ones will solve something. For-profit health insurance will ALWAYS lead to this situation. Neither you nor I "deserve" better health care than someone else.
@Jodi--I like Latin (and other smart things) but I can't translate that and neither can any of the translators I found. Rated anyway.
What I don't understand is why the media isn't reporting this, doing precisely what you just did...getting to the bottom of a story, instead of jumping up and down like excited children at a treasure hunt. "lookit what I just found!"
Jodi, this is really valuable stuff. Since the right wing can't possibly muster the votes to defeat healthcare reform on its merits, they are gaming the system to deform reality. I expect that the death panels meme and "Do you want the government running Medicare?" will be just the start; these are, after all, the people who invented Iraqis throwing babies out of incubators to justify the first Gulf War.
This country with a "fair" system of trade creates prosperity for more people over a broader range of social levels. Unfortunately as you go along the strong continue to grow stronger and as a result stagnate innovation and growth. The example of United Health Care is just one example. But yes, when there is real alternatives and competition in a free market that results in better services and products for everyone.
I agree there should be a base level of medical services available to everyone. The poor have healthcare, the elderly have healthcare and those who have insurance have healthcare. The problem is the working poor and many small business are being shut out of the healthcare system because of the control of a few very large providers who have used their influence to control the very government that should be protecting the citizens.
To answer your question should one have better healthcare than someone else. Yes and no. Fact is the rich always have better even in countries with universal health. This country provides a base of care. It could and should be better, but nothing is equal and never will be. Most Americans don't want equal they want fair. The system of risk and reward has always served the greater good than equal.
This kind of crap should be illegal. OOPS!!! Would that include unions and community organizers? Just asking.
First, a word about Latin. It amuses me to bump with a Latin quote. Not every time, but most days, I enjoy saying things like "If catapults are outlawed then only outlaws will have catapults" in Latin.
"Fac ut gaudeam"
Fac - a really basic root meaning "make" or "do." (Think facilitate)
ut - root meaning that, them, they, both
gaudeam - rejoice, happy
So, Floyd gets the cookie (and anything else he wants - he's on my freebie list).
I don't do this to make anyone feel uneducated or lost. I never took Latin - I just read too much. Nothing tickles me more than current phrases turned into Latin: "Things go better with Coke" or yesterday's "Shit Happens."
As for the topic at hand -
::cough::
I completely understand where both sides are coming from. I think the current system is broken and I'm one of the lucky ones that has insurance.
As M Todd says, there are people who fall through the cracks. We are creating an economic class of people who would have been solidly middle class had they not been cleaned out by a health care problem. That isn't good for America because those people can't spend money or pay mortgages when they are trying to pay medical bills, even though they had insurance.
For me, this goes beyond this particular issue. People should be asking who has the motive to form these committees and groups. We should ALL be asking where the money comes from and who is backing the causes we are putting ourselves behind.
It bothers me that people, especially seniors, are being made to be afraid in the name of furthering a political agenda while they accept government assistance. I'm not saying they shouldn't get Medicare. My own parents get Medicare. I'm just wondering where the line is. If we believe we should take care of the medical needs of the very poor and our seniors, why shouldn't we take care of everyone?
I would rather pay more taxes than $26 for a single Tylenol at a hospital. We are already paying. I say let's do it honestly and thoughtfully so that we can make the whole country better.
I don't think that anyone forming any group should be illegal, but we should all take 30 seconds to Google who is serving the tea.
Kumbaya.
Seniors didn't create Medicare. Seniors didn't make Medicare go billions of dollars in debt. Seniors were forced to pay into a system that the government couldn't manage very well.
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