(ERISA lives – promoted by blogswarm)

All these post-Hillary, post-Arnold health reform plans force people to sign up with big insurance companies, either individually or through their jobs–an “employer mandate” or “individual mandate.”  But a court ruling yesterday in Maryland might kill the employer mandate strategy. 

Meaning that the big solution being offered for our system-wide health disaster?  Forcing individuals to buy some junk health insurance.  All hat, no cattle there–helping along the movement towards single-payer health care.

In other single-payer news, the coalitions for health care reform keep growing, as part of a rapidly evolving health care/political landscape, and even conservative editorialists see single-payer in the offing–despite the best efforts of insurers, certain other corporations, and their allies to block it.  Activists from coast-to-coast are pressing their case, while the rich have a new kind of health care available: the four-star hospital spa.

Brought to you by the National Nurses Organizing Committee as we organize to make 2007 the Year of Single-Payer Healthcare.

Dan Walters in the Sacramento Bee analyses the effect of the Maryland ruling on Schwarzenegger’s new health care plan.  He writes:

A federal appeals court this week struck an indirect but potentially fatal blow to one of the most controversial pieces of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s comprehensive health insurance plan — requiring employers to either provide coverage to workers or pay 4 percent of their payrolls into a state insurance purchase pool.
By a 2-1 vote, a panel of the 4th District Court of Appeals ruled that Maryland’s play-or-pay health insurance law, specifically aimed at retailing giant Wal-Mart, violates a federal law governing employers’ group health plans. It upheld a lower court’s finding that invalidated “any and all state laws insofar as they may now or hereafter relate to any employee benefit plan.”
If upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, the ruling bolsters a simmering contention among California employers that Schwarzenegger’s version of the employer mandate also would run afoul of the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act. ERISA was enacted in 1974 to allow companies to establish health care plans for their workers that applied in multiple states, without having to tailor plans to individual states and to protect the rights of workers under such plans.

In other words, the employer mandate might be completely off the table, unless passed at the federal level, which seems unlikely. 

Wall St. Journal reporters Deborah Solomon and David Wessel have been putting their neandrathal editorial board to shame lately with smart stories about the nation’s on-going health care debate.  Today they look at the pressure for change–much of it coming from the business community:

Thrusting the long-running issue to the fore are political and economic forces that have been building for years but are given new force by political events. Not only have the Democrats taken over Congress, but state political leaders, including Republicans such as California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, are moving on their own to change the system. And U.S. companies increasingly complain that the current employer-paid insurance system puts some of them at a disadvantage — either globally or vis-a-vis firms that won’t provide insurance. …
The heightened political focus on the issue reflects pressure from two sources. One is voters’ anxieties, both about the cost of care and about the risk of losing insurance for reasons such as changing jobs. “A member of Congress goes home and two issues come up every time you get together with folks: One of them is Iraq, and one of them is health care,” says Sen. Wyden, an Oregon Democrat. “A lot of people who have coverage think they’re one rate hike away from losing their coverage.”
The other is an ever-louder complaint from U.S. businesses that they can’t compete in a global economy when companies from other countries don’t have to pay for health care. Deere & Co. Chief Executive Robert Lane told Congress last year that failure to act could result in a “limiting of covered services, loss of employer-provided health care … and even a loss of American jobs, both in the manufacturing and service sectors.”

The key element here is that businesses MUST start cutting the cost of their health care-and only a single-payer system, doing away with insurance company middlemen, can contain costs.

Even the right-wing Washington Times realizes that if the health care problems don’t magically go away in the next two years, then single-payer health care becomes a much more realistic possibility.

A few years down the road, January 2007 could be remembered as a turning point in American health care…. a serious drive for a statist, single-payer universal health-care program for the country could well be unavoidable. 

This is an extraordinary admission for such a right-wing newspaper.

Of course, some groups-such as the national coalition the New York Times describes here-seem pretty happy with today’s health care system, but want a few tweaks here and there.  And the health insurance industry will continue to advocate for tinkering within the current system.  Their take in the Wall St. Journal (reg. req’d)  on Arnoldcare (and other mandated purchases):

“There’s no question (the plan) broadens the opportunity for the industry.”

Meanwhile, Zenei Cortez, RN, Vice President of the California Nurses Association explains why the insurance industry loves both employer and individual mandates-and why patients won’t:

  With no controls on skyrocketing premiums, comprehensive plans will be out of reach for millions of Californians. Most could end up with junk insurance, with up to $10,000 in out-of-pocket payments for any medical care, meaning the average person will likely pay for all his or her medical expenses on top of the premiums. And many may forgo any medical care, risking worse health problems and greater health costs down the road.

Elsewhere, blogger Blake at Critical Condition puts the need for single-payer within a larger public health debate, Jonathon Cohn in the New Republic’s blog Plank finds one possible Presidential candidate calling for single-payer health care, and blogger Anna points out how much better Canadian-style health care is for patients than the US approach.

For a picture of how the other one percent lives, the Chicago Sun-Times writes about the latest trend in high-end hotel spas: medical treatments now available.

George Bush and Arnold Schwarzenegger look ridiculous supporting the “McCain Doctrine” escalation of the Iraq war. California Democrats have a huge opportunity to do the right thing (supported by the vast majority) and stand up against the Escalation of the war in Iraq that has already cost the lives of more than 300 Californians and is on track to cost Californians more than a half a trillion dollars.

Progressive States is working with MoveOn to introduce Resolutions against the surge escalation in a 50 State Strategy manner. As of yet, I’m told that it has yet to be introduced in California. Who is going to step up and lead on this no-brainer and where do your legislators stand? You can contact your legislators and when they step up, all they need to do is cut and paste the draft resolution that is after the flip:

Edited from here:

RESOLUTION OPPOSING ESCALATION IN IRAQ

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution shall be sent to George W. Bush, President of the United States, to the Congressional delegation of California state, and to the United States Congress.

(Cross-posted from The Courage Campaign also at MyDD)

Last week, The Courage Campaign hosted a public conference call to discuss the status of the fight for universal healthcare in California. We enlisted Assemblymember Karen Bass (also our majority leader in the Assembly), as well as Sal Roselli, President of SEIU United Healthcare Workers West and MyDD's Chris Bowers to lead a lively 1 hour discussion on the topic.

Go here to listen to it in its entirety.

What was great about the call was the sense of optimism among all of our speakers. Karen Bass opened by remarking on the great opportunity we have, not only with our new majorities in Congress but also with a Republican governor calling for universal coverage as Arnold Schwarzenegger has done rhetorically if not substantively. But as Roselli made a point of saying, this fact alone really is extraordinary, especially considering the governor has called for all children to be covered under his plan, including children of undocumented Californians. Bowers, in his opening remarks, echoed this sense of optimism, saying:

I am hopeful that what we are seeing is a new era where moderate and conservative Republicans break with their own party to support what can be seen as progressive agenda ideas.

This is how Bowers sees Schwarzenegger's call for universal healthcare and I'd agree.

More over the flip…

Having said that, all of the speakers noted some real concerns with the governor's proposal, namely the central premise behind it, the individual mandate, which would require all Californians to get health insurance as we currently are mandated to get car insurance. Luckily, we have other proposals on the table including, by all accounts the gold standard, Sen. Sheila Kuehl's single payer healthcare bill that passed the legislature last year only to be vetoed by the governor. And since in California a bill that calls for raising taxes, as the single payer bill does, requires a 2/3 majority to pass, the best option for successful healthcare reform through the legislative process will require support from Republicans in the legislature as well as the governor. Single payer does not have that…yet.

Which leads us to the ground campaign of coalition building, grassroots organizing and voter education that SEIU plans to launch later this month called "It's Our Healthcare." A year ago, SEIU declared pursuing the passage of universal healthcare to be their number one priority and set out to do the research that would be needed to begin a fight in 2007. What they learned, as SEIU's Jeanine Rodriguez noted:

People are supportive [of single payer healthcare] up until the end when they start getting real fearful about how reform is going to change their own healthcare.

Which is why SEIU's campaign this year will be one largely focused on educating voters. It also plans to work with legislators on alternative bills to see if they can indeed pass something amenable through the legislative process. Roselli said they feel Speaker Fabian Nunez's bill in particular has great potential. But, again, getting the governor AND Republicans on board is a tall order so if nothing passes this year, they will seek to put an intiative on the 2008 ballot and let the people, by then hopefully warmed to the idea of single payer or something close to it, decide. This, as Roselli said on the call, is their single biggest piece of leverage in this fight.

The Courage Campaign looks forward to joining the SEIU's coalition in their fight for real universal healthcare here in California. If you'd like to find out more about the "It's Our Healthcare" program, you can e-mail Jeanine Rodriguez at [email protected]. We'll certainly keep you updated on the blog and for a more comprehensive look at what is planned for 2007 and beyond, I recommend listening to the entire conference call, which you can access HERE.

(I love diaries with maps… – promoted by blogswarm)

As we speak, hundreds of young immigrant women and children are being sexually abused in the US Territory of the Northern Mariana Islands, and our government has done little to stop this from continuing.

In 2005, it was discovered that numerous lawmakers in the House of Representatives were being essentially bribed by a lobbyist representing the Marianas. The lobbyist was none other than Jack Abramoff. Mr. Abramoff, who is now in prison for bribing public officials for votes benefiting his clients, lobbied key Congressmen such as former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, John Doolittle and Richard Pombo to kill or halt legislation that would have forced the Marianas to comply with US labor and immigration laws. In exchange for supporting the causes that literally put lives in danger, Abramoff and his clients gave considerable donations to the re-election campaigns of these GOP leaders.

There are horrific human rights abuses on these tiny Pacific Islands under US supervision. Workers in the garment industry work roughly 18 hour days locked into cramped spaces with no restroom facilities. Men are literally beaten by their employers for no reason. Women are told if they get pregnant they could face imprisonment or deportation, so they resort to back-alley abortions to keep their jobs. Children barely 13 years old are pulled from their sweatshop jobs and sold into virtual sex slavery as go-go dancers in “karaoke” clubs in the Marianas’ capital of Saipan. They are too ashamed to tell their families in mainland China, Thailand, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka or the Philippines of their experiences in the “American Islands”. Culturally, they are in a position to be completely cut off from their families and loved ones if they speak out in their letters home.

Situations like these are happening right this moment all around the world. We see sexual abuse all throughout the globe. Forced abortions happen all around in the third world. Sweatshops have been discovered in Panama City, Nairobi, Beijing and New York City.

But the Marianas are different.

The Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) has been a US Territory since 1978. During World War II, the Japanese Empire had a firm grip on the Marianas. A garrison of nearly 30,000 Japanese soldiers under Lieutenant General Yoshitsugu Saito had been deeply entrenched on the islands. Admiral Chester Nimitz led the Pacific Fleet on a brutal campaign to free the Marianas from Japan in 1943. By June of 1944, Saito abandoned his hold on the Marianas’ main airfield. By July of that year, Saito was killed in a final charge against the Americans, along with a majority of the final 3,000 Japanese soldiers that had survived nearly two months of intense fighting. When all was said and done, 3,426 Marines lost their lives in the taking of Saipan and the Northern Marianas. American blood was spilled for the freedom of the CNMI.

In 1952, Japan officially gave up all claims to the Marianas at the Treaty of San Francisco, and the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands was created, with the United States as the administering authority. On January 1978 the Northern Mariana Islands became self-governing in political union with the United States under the terms of a covenant negotiated between the two government and the area’s first elected governor took office.

Over the last 5 decades, our tax dollars have gone into repairing the damage inflicted on the Marianas from the war. Almost every law and regulation observed in the United States is observed on the Marianas, with the conspicuous exceptions of labor and immigration control. With these exceptions, major corporations have ended up taking advantage of these small islands. Garment factories from mainland China started making their way to the islands, some run and owned by suspected Chinese mafia families. No tariffs and duty-free, clothing produced in China are sent to the Marianas where “Made in the USA” labels are sewn onto the foreign-made garments. Those garments are then sent to the United States for consumption by an unwitting public.

From a security standpoint, we should all be concerned about the Marianas’ lax immigration and labor practices. Our ports are frighteningly insecure, and a potential threat to our country is highly likely to come from such a place. With the Marianas a virtual “middle man” to the rest of Southeast Asia, and little inspection or security in places like Long Beach and Seattle, any type of weaponry or other foreign agents could potentially be smuggled to the US.

The situation on the Marianas could become a threat to the stability and integrity of this nation. We must do what is necessary to right the years of wrongs done to these islands. Ripples of Hope aims to do just that.

My name is Neil Pople. I served as Deputy Communications Director for the Charlie Brown for Congress campaign in California’s 4th Congressional District. My friend and former co-worker, Nick Shepard, served as Field Director on the Brown campaign. Together, we are in the process of starting up a non-profit organization called “Ripples of Hope.”  We are basing our organization on a simple thought, a quote from a speech Senator Robert F. Kennedy gave in South Africa in 1966:

“It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped.  Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope; and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”

This simple notion, that we stand up and take action whenever and wherever we see problems, has been part of the backbone of American idealism since its inception. Action, on the other hand, has not been as popular as the intention… but we hope to change that.

The most effective way to address the issue is to force our government to recognize the problem. Because the CNMI is a US territory, the United States Congress has ultimate authority over the islands. It can pass legislation to help stop the abuses but has thus far been unwilling to do so other than Congressman George Miller’s minimum wage bill passed last week.  A great first step would be for everyone who hears about this to write to Congress and ask them to look into the issue and what needs to be done on a governmental oversight basis to help. Then, visit our webite at www.ripplesofhope.org and email us at [email protected] to be put on our contact list.

We would be proud to have your support in our endeavors if at all possible. Nick and I are still in the process of getting the group official 501(c)3 status. However, money has become an issue. To put it simply, a lack of money means that we cannot get started just yet. In the meantime, we have been active on the internet by spreading word about the Marianas on blog sites like DailyKos and Calitics. We’ve been contacting potential board members and donors, and planning our first fundraiser once we get cleared with the IRS. A pledge to our group will help ensure that we will have the financial means to get the work done that needs to be accomplished in the Marianas.

We would love to have your input on Ripples of Hope and what should be done with this group. Please feel free to email us with any questions, comments or concerns you might have.

Thank You,
Neil Pople
Co-Founder, Ripples of Hope
[email protected]