MSNBC Countdown w/ KEITH OLBERMANN - 15 Sept. 2009: Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY9): Senate HC bill woefully lacking.
OLBERMANN: ... Wendell Potter, the former communications director for CIGNA, as well as a frequent guest on this news hour, testifying to lawmakers yesterday. He told reporters that the finance committee bill is an absolute gift to health care insurance companies. Today he suggested that any legislation which does not include a public option should be given a new name.
POTTER: If Congress goes along to the so-called solutions the insurance industry says it is bringing to the table, and acquiesces to the demands it is making of lawmakers, and if it fails to create a public insurance option to compete with private insurers, the bill it sends to the President might as well be called The Insurance Industry Profit Protection and Enhancement Act.
OLBERMANN: In 2006, Democrats in the Senate, having tried to end the insurance practice, now legal in eight states and the District of Columbia, of discriminating against people who are being beaten by their spouses, an amendment introduced by Sen. Patty Murray of Washington was defeated then in the help committee in a tie vote, 10-10. All of the 'no' votes were Republicans, among them, Sen. Enzi, the same Mike Enzi now drafting and complaining about the bill about to come out of the finance committee.
Let's turn now to Congressman Anthony Weiner, Democrat of New York, member of the energy and commerce committee.
When insurance companies are not rescinding one woman's coverage because she once had acne, they're rescinding another woman's coverage because she's a victim of domestic violence, a culture of, insurance-wise, blaming the victim. Does that pretty much sum up the American health insurance industry at the moment.
WEINER: Well, you know, it's frequently been said, and I've said as much on your show, I don't think people in insurance companies are evil, but it's clear what they want to do is take in as much money as they can and pay as little as possible out as benefits. That's the way they function and that's the way they make profits. And if you remember what the President said, there are three things we need to accomplish in health care. One - cover about 40 million additional Americans. That's good for health insurance companies. Two other things are going to be tougher, and that is making sure health insurance companies don't do things like deny coverage. And third: is hold down costs, meaning they have to take less profits and have lower overhead.
What seems to be coming out of the Senate bill is, we're going to say 'O.K. everyone has to go out and get coverage, which is good for health insurance companies, but basically everything the insurance industry wants, they're going to get to keep doing in the bill and that's the problem. This is why you need some element of competition, so that they're held honest,
but right now what's coming out of the Senate bill is so watered down, it can hardly be called reform at this point.OLBERMANN: So to the point of Mr. Potter's terminology here, the insurance terminology here, "The Insurance Industry Profit Protection and Enhancement Act," if it's like that, wouldn't you have to vote against it?
WEINER: Well, it sure has to have more than the Senate is putting in. You know, I keep hearing people say that the Public Option is just one element of the bill, but it is an extraordinarily important one and your viewer's need to understand why. If we leave the insurance companies to their own devices, they have shown no instinct at all for saving money for the taxpayers or their customers. That's not what they do. They save money if they can get any, by cutting services, and then keeping money for their shareholders or for bonuses for their executives.
So, unless there is some element of these bills that says we can contain that, then, frankly, we're going to be right back to the drawing board a couple of years later with exploding costs and the same thing. Remember, we didn't have the term 'pre-existing condition' until we out-sourced so much of the job of health care to private health care companies.
- snip -
The Senate bill might be a starting point for something, but right now they have taken the basic elements of health care that the President said he wants, that the American people need, containing costs through competition, and guaranteeing that we don't have abuses of people who have private insurance, and they've watered them down to the point where they're virtually meaningless. So if you just say this is only going to be about insuring more people, giving more customers to the insurance companies without any of those protections,
we're basically worse off then when we started.
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