In the News – 9/9

Yesterday was certainly more interesting from a news perspective than Labor Day.  Keith Olbermann had a fantastic “Worst Persons” segment.  Here it is.

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On the health care front, Snake-Oil Sarah Palin is back with more claims of death panels.

As President Barack Obama prepared to make a new pitch for healthcare reform, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin warned that Democrats sought a government system that would include "death panels."

Writing in The Wall Street Journal newspaper, the one-time Republican vice-presidential candidate did not hesitate to revive a claim she made last month: that the healthcare reform package would create panels empowered to make life-and-death decisions on behalf of Americans.

Palin said Obama had suggested in an interview in April that expert panels "should guide decisions regarding that 'huge driver of cost... the chronically ill and those towards the end of their lives..."

"Given such statements, is it any wonder that many of the sick and elderly are concerned that the Democrats' proposals will ultimately lead to rationing of their health care by -- dare I say it -- death panels?" Palin wrote...

Inserted from <AFP>

Sarah wants to cover up the fact that Alaska’s state healthcare program for the disabled was so grossly inefficient that people have died from neglect, thereby more closely resembling death panels than anything in any of the Democratic versions of the bill.

Perhaps even more outrageous is this: the details of the plan from Baucus’ Finance Committee went to special interests on K Street before going to the President.  Here is a segment from an interview with Robert Gibbs.

…

QUESTION: The Finance Committee — well, actually, Senator Baucus’s draft has been, now, bouncing around for a few days on Capitol Hill.

First, has the president seen it (inaudible) his outline?

GIBBS: I don’t — I don’t believe — I don’t believe anybody here has — I’m — we’ve seen what we’ve read in the paper, but I do not believe that we’ve seen paper on the plan.

QUESTION: I understand it’s bouncing around K Street.

GIBBS: Not surprisingly, but I have not seen it here.

QUESTION: And has there been any direct consultations between anyone at the White House and Senator Baucus or anyone in the group of six, since this outline began being floated on Sunday?

GIBBS: I don’t — I don’t know how far back that would go. We’re — we continue to talk to all the players involved. Obviously, you know Speaker Pelosi and Leader Reid will be here momentarily. So he’s going to continue to talk to all of those involved.

QUESTION: What did you just mean…

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: I’m sorry. What did you just mean by it’s bouncing around K Street ?

GIBBS: I was told that — that K Street had a copy of the Baucus plan, meaning, not surprisingly, the special interests have gotten a copy of the plan that I understand was given to committee members today.

…

Inserted from <Think Progress>

If Baucus isn’t putting anything before the President without clearing it with the healthcare lobby first, there is reason or concern.

On a positive note, Cramdown is back.

Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) plans to make the bankruptcy reform for homeowners part of a bigger financial regulatory reform package in the fall, he tells the Huffington Post.

Wall Street banks scored an overwhelming victory in April when they soundly defeated an effort, known as cramdown, in the Senate to allow bankruptcy judges to renegotiate home mortgages.

Only 45 Democrats voted with homeowners, dealing the measure the kind of defeat that often sends legislation off into the wilderness for years, if not for good.

Nothing comes back the same year. It just doesn't happen. Frank and Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who led the bill in the upper chamber, both said after its defeat that it was finished…

Inserted from <Huffington Post>

Wall Street banks have made it crystal clear that they want taxpayers to finance the consequences of their greed,  while retaining the independence to wreck the economy all  over again.  Cramdown is needed relief for victims of Big Finance and their fraudulent loan brokers.  But we need even more.  First we need a comprehensive regulatory package.  Second, taxpayers must never again be forced to underwrite a company, because it’s too big to fail.  Too big to fail is too big to exist.  Where is today’s Teddy Roosevelt?