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Today: We Tell Health Insurers Stop the Hikes, Back Reform
Today, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka is leading a large union contingent in a march from the AFL-CIO and AFSCME buildings to a mass rally at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Washington, D.C., during the meeting of the big insurance industry front group, the America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP).
Many unions and union-related groups are working together on the rally, but some are making a major effort, including AFSCME, AFGE, AFT, Communications Workers of America (CWA), Office and Professional Employees (OPEIU), Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE), United Steelworkers (USW), United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), SEIU, Alliance for Retired Americans, Coalition of Labor Union Women (CLUW), Pride At Work, Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA) and Interfaith Worker Justice (IWJ).
Join us here where James Parks and Danielle Hatchett from our online team will live tweet the march and rally, starting at 10 a.m. Follow #m9 for the latest updates on Twitter from some of the thousands of participants expected to attend.
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14 Comments
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I am in DC for other business and I made a special effort to go to the Rally at Dupont Circle. I just came back from the event and -Boy, am I ever big-time disappointed in the turn-out. The crowd was only about 600, if that, nowhere near the “thousands” you report. The only Unions I saw were SEIU, UFCW, a few Steelworkers and some Teamsters. No one from my Union – CWA, the Nurses, AFSCME or others and no Bulilding Trades at all. If that is all this movement can produce for an issue like healthcare – it’s no wonder we’re being screwed!
Jim Gordon
CWA
maybe obama will take the hint now, the american people do not want obamacare. fix the system we have in place
Health Insurance run by ‘for PROFIT’ corporations is actually an oximoron to say the least. It does not come close to making any type of sense. Countries that are responsible to their citizens (such as germany, etc.) have trust funds set up to pay for most, if not all, of the cost. If and when our country wakes up and smells the coffee, maybe they would be able to show the same consideration and responsibility to their citizens.
Health insurance companies are single-handedly ruining this country. They really should be arrested for grand larceny.
This is a waste of time. Tell the for profit Insurance companies to “go to hell.” President Obama thinks we are past “single payer” because we have been “weaned” on the so called “free market” system. Health Care is not about $$$$. It’s time to stop begging the fox to ‘kindly leave’ the chicken coop. Hold the Dems “feet to the fire,” and DEMAND SINGLE PAYER HEATH CARE FOR ALL. And if that doesn’t work, (which it more than likely will not) it’s time to begin a bonafide US LABOR PARTY, and let the “blue chips” fall where they may.
In response to Richiethemailman,
I support you advocating a Single Payer Healthcare For All. The plan,most specifcally, for which I advocate is “Improved Medicare for All.”
We are failed by the labor movement, which initialy endorsed a single payer system. There is a group called Healthcare for America Now(HCAN),easily confuseed with Healthcare NOW.
As citzens, we need to demand of the President,and our legislators why and when they were convinced to abandon an Improved Medicare for All medical care delvery system. the focus seems to be on “Health Insurance Reform”. Health Insurance is not Healthcare.
During the Reagan administration, health insurance reform began a singular race towarsd the mediocre. HMO’s were supposed to control cost.they did not.
The Medical Industrial Complex,including the Drug Companies,Medical supply Venders, and many other for profit and not for profit coorporations have a strangle hold on both houses of congress,the American people, and the cost of medical care.
WE MUST: Educate ourselves: visit the web sites for Healthcare NOW, Physicians for National Healthcare Plan(PNHP),California Nurse’s Association, Progressive Democrats of Ameerica.
Confront our legislators with the facts
Stop believing we have the bst medical care in the
world*we ARE # 37
Demacd Single Payer experts be included in any further discussion and planning for substative reform.
We cannot afford to wait. Over 45,000 Americans died last year(2009) due lack of access to medical care. Approximately 2/3 of all personal bankruptcies are due to medical debt.
Our moral and economoc recovery are contingent on making drastic changes to the current system.
Thank you ,Rich, for having the courage to speak in a labor forum. The profiteers of ,Insurance are cut from the same cloth as the pirates of Wall Street.
Healthcare NOW
In Solidarity and Service
I’m with you Sister, my dear friend is Dr. Steve Fenichel one of the Baucus 13.
Or we will start to divest….
As a CalPers member, I know we have $67 Million in Wellpoint shares.
Indirectly we are profitting off Anthem raising rates on INDIVIDUAL subscribers.
How many of you have union health insurance?
We do and we love our insurance company!
Insurance companies are not the problem. The government is the problem.
Let the insurance companies compete and you will get lover prices and better service!!!
Alex Majthenyi on 10.03.2010 at 09:26: All these years premiums have risen and you still thinkprices will get lower? Insurance companies ARE the problem. they dictate what to charge, who they will insure, who they deny, and deny treatments/procedures to the insured to save money, that’s better service?
Alex Majthenyi on 10.03.2010 at 09:26: All these years premiums have risen and you still think prices will get lower? Insurance companies ARE the problem. they dictate what to charge, who they will insure, who they deny, and deny treatments/procedures to the insured to save money, that’s better service?
NurseMotherJones : Amen, HCAN is a thorn in all our sides.How labor got in bed with them is unbelievable, which goes to show HCAN is a product of the White House occupier to stray people away from the single payer movement, something Obama endorsed! the AFLCIO has endorsed single payer, what only in spirit? They continue to roll in bed with HCAN and their push for Obamacare. The 2 bills in Congress (House & Senate) are flawed, and favor insurance companies! Medicare for ALL!!
I agree that insurance companies must be told they cannot deny coverage to people based on preexisting conditions nor can they drop subscribers because they get sick. As for their premiums rising? A little thing called regulation could take care of that. But in order to reign in the cost of health insurance don’t we first need to reign in the cost of health care?
My problem with the whole health care reform bill is the cost. To achieve what I pointed out above should not cost a trillion dollars. From what I’ve read of ‘the bill’ a great amount of the cost comes about due to the creation of about a hundred new bureaucracies to oversee the damned thing. That just seems unrealistic. Surely we already have persons sitting up there in DC with a little time on their hands. Just ‘lay down the law’ to the insurance companies (sort of like ehat was done to the credit card companies only better) and give those folks with ‘time on their hands’ something to do! A hundred new bureaucracies? I don’t think so!
And there’s another thing that could be done to reign in the cost of the reform. Pull the pork! This bill is laden with it.