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Secret
Donors Screw Health Care
The
super-rich like things as they were
According to tax records unearthed
by Bloomberg News, the health insurance lobby secretly gave $86.2 million
to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 2009 to try to prevent the health
care bill from becoming law. The huge
contribution - 40 percent of the chamber’s spending for that year -
allowed the group to run ads against the bill
without tainting the insurance industry, which was negotiating with
Democrats on the bill at the same time.
This year, the chamber raised nearly $33
million in secret donations for political ads in the midterm
elections,
almost all of which was used to elect Republicans who have vowed to
repeal the health care law. Did some of
that money come, once again, from health insurance companies that were
unwilling to attach their names to
their contributions? It’s a logical assumption, but only the donors and
the chamber know for sure.
And that’s the problem with secret political donations, which played
such a large role in the elections earlier
this month. They cast a shadow of doubt and distrust over a huge field,
raising questions about who is covertly
pushing which bill and supporting which candidate, and for which
self-serving purposes. Lobbying and political
contributions can be perfectly legitimate practices, but only when the
public can see who is pulling the strings.
Secret donors spent at least $138
million on the midterm elections
and 80 percent of that secret money supported Republican candidates.
What will those donors get for their money, and who will they get it from?
They will get $1500 - $2,000 from every insured family in America every month and when
it's time to pay a claim, they'll reward the adjusters who denied the most claims a week in Hawaii.
If only Obama had gotten involved and stuck to his guns, but no. He turned everything
over to Reid & Pelosi and now we're once again stuck in Groundhog Day hell.