The peace movement has stood for peace and justice, for ending wars, preventing new ones, and building peace. Our top priority in Washington, D.C., has been ending the funding of the occupation. That work is over for the next year, because Congress has provided that funding.
We can still work against recruitment, we can still educate, we can still agitate, we can still oppose an attack on Iran. But one of our secondary priorities in Washington has been imposing a penalty for the illegal attack on Iraq in order to discourage future attacks on Iran or anywhere else.
We have pushed half-heartedly for impeachment,
with our main lobbying focus on cutting off the money.
Now, at the same time that the money is
a done deal for another year,
the possibility of impeachment is beginning to spark. After over two years of declaring impeachment "off the table," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has relented and suggested that some sort of preliminary hearing be held in the Judiciary Committee - and specifically on the impeachable offense of misleading a nation into war.
If the peace movement is not just a movement against one war or occupation, but a movement for peace, we should push with everything we've got for that (impeachment) hearing to happen, happen soon, and happen well.
We should ask everyone who cares about peace to phone Pelosi and Committee Chairman John Conyers, as well as their own representatives, whom they should ask to introduce their own articles of impeachment.
We've been on a losing streak, brothers and sisters, and the door is cracking open toward a major victory. Let's open that door fully and lead a peaceful march of millions through it.
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/34705
PLEASE CALL and demand that Impeachment Hearings be started
BEFORE the Election
House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, Jr.: (202) 225-5126
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi: (202) 225-4965
And your Congressman:Contact info
Please join our weekly Impeachment Events, see our Calendar on the website ImpeachCO.com or in the Calendar here on ProgressNowAction.org
John H Kennedy, organizer
Impeach Colorado Coalition ImpeachCO.com
..
Current mood: inspired
Category: Life
Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must love our enemies - or else? The chain reaction of evil - hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars - must be broken, or else we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
(WAR = EVIL)
THIS IS MY FAVORITE ONE......
An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality... I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
NO I LIED....these next two are my favorite ones...... I so would go to jail if I had too!!!!
An individual who breaks a law that his conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
It is not enough to say we must not wage war. It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
A man can't ride your back unless it's bent.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
A man who won't die for something is not fit to live.
Bottom line: Members of Colorado's Republican delegation are far out of the mainstream of their own party, and are not representing Colorado's interests in the least.
For example: Read More »
BUT Udall vs Schaffer
get your tix now and ask questions--all info on this link:
http://www.9news.com/rss/article.aspx?storyid=94369
An open letter to Nancy Pelosi:
To Nancy Pelosi:
TIME to leave your position in disgrace - YOU are a disgrace to your office and your gender. You were the FIRST to break that glass ceiling and you have become a joke. A sad, cruel joke for those of us who had so much hope.
A change that was to be brought in with the election of 2006
But that all changed. We hear it over and over and over again. Any challenge to the cruelties, the evils, the horrors brought by this administration is met with the same standard; Any response or action that is morally correct or ethically right. You take it "off the table" or it is "not an option". Read More »
A study published in Health Affairs (6-10-08) documents a sharp (60%) increase in numbers of underinsured between 2003-2007. Underinsurance rates nearly tripled among those with incomes above 200% of poverty. Consequently, 42 percent of U.S. adults were under- or uninsured in 2007, reporting high levels of access problems and financial stress.
Even among those with incomes over 400% of poverty, 15% are underinsured. The study indicates that the move toward greater consumer cost-sharing for minimum benefit insurance policies in recent years is pushing millions of insured non-elderly adults toward spending large shares of their incomes on health care. The clear impact is to increase the share of families at risk for medical debt and loss of savings for retirement, college, or other long-term needs.
Our current insurance system is working well only for the wealthy, who can afford high costs. Politicians' promises that "you can keep the insurance you have" also apply to the wealthy. Read the Report
Following is a 650-word piece I wrote about the failure of profit-centered health care that has been picked up by several newspapers around the state.
Failure of U.S. profit-centered health insurance
Spending almost twice as much, the U.S. has worse health outcomes than other industrialized nations. Uniquely, U.S. health care is dependent on over 1200 for-profit health insurances, functioning as gatekeepers. Underwriting – the art of risk evaluation and avoidance – insures profits by covering the healthy and rejecting everyone else as a "pre-existing condition."
Profit is a perverse incentive for quality health care: imagine for-profit fire or police protection. "Market-driven" health care treats health as a commodity, to be negotiated like a car or a house. The free market has also spawned "designer hospitals," offering only the most profitable specialties, e.g., cardiac procedures, and eliminating less profitable services, e.g., emergency and mental health.
No reform proposal by current presidential candidates addresses the failure of the private health insurance industry, characterized principally by decreasing benefits and greater costs and risks shifted to consumers. In turn, more are subjected to underinsurance and unpaid medical bills – now the leading cause of personal bankruptcies. Premium increases of 87 percent over 6 years have outpaced both cost-of-living and median family income increases.
Incremental reform proposals demonstrate lack of political will – the same failure to confront corporate profit-taking by insurance and pharmaceutical industries that wrote Medicare prescription drug reform with billions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies and inflated profits to benefit their bottom lines.
Commercial health insurance is the 800-pound gorilla, responsible for over 25% of health care dollars siphoned to excessive administrative costs, lobbying, marketing, CEO salaries and profit-taking: $30 billion annual health insurance profits; $32 billion insurance underwriting and marketing costs (McKinsey Group, 2007).
Gaming the system for profit has given rise to the annual $20 billion business of "denial managment" – health insurance middlemen who search claims for excuses to delay, deny or renege on reimbursements.
Responding to double-digit premium increases, more employers are opting to move employees into underinsurance – high-deductible catastrophic plans. Simultaneously, the American Hospital Association reports that both family out-of-pocket health expenses and unpaid medical bills have risen approximately 60% over a decade – still more costs ultimately shifted to taxpayers and consumers.
Notably, more than 20 federal and state studies since 1990, including the 2007 Lewin Group evaluation in Colorado, have demonstrated that single-payer health insurance is the only reform model that can both save money and provide comprehensive health care benefits for all. Indeed, the single payer model is the only truly efficient, equitable, and sustainable financing system, enabling universal coverage by spreading risk across the entire population.
Contrary to assertions by the "free market" choir, only single payer insurance permits true choice of pubic and private providers; private insurance is limited to "in plan" doctors. Only single payer provides comprehensive benefits and protection against medical bankruptcy.
Rather than comprehensive health care reform, most current proposals revert to a Massachusetts-style nostrum, preserving insurance profits and requiring an individual mandate to purchase minimum-benefit insurance, subsidized by taxpayers as needed. It is a formula for continued inflationary consumer health costs and decreasing benefits.
National single payer bill, HR676, calls for a progressive 3 to 4 percent employer and employee payroll tax to replace all health deductibles and premiums. Full-coverage costs for a family of four earning $40,000 annually would drop to $110 a month, from recent levels of $273/month for employer-sponsored coverage, or $489/month for an individually-insured family (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2007).
A political class dependent on corporate money (and privy to 70 percent-taxpayer-subsidized health coverage) sidesteps meaningful reform. Nevertheless, polls by Pew and others have revealed increasing numbers – 54 to 65 percent of people – support a national single-payer health care plan. A recent survey reports that 59 percent of U.S. physicians now support national health care, up 10 percent from 2002.
A grassroots movement and political reforms, including publicly-financed campaigns, may be necessary to instill the political will for meaningful reform. We have everything to gain from quality-, saftey-centered universal single payer health care to replace U.S. dependence on profiteering health care gatekeepers.
Read this from the Tri-Lakes Tribune.....
06/12/2008
District 20 candidates sound off on key issues
By Danny Smith , Staff Writer
Health care, renewable energy and economic growth likely will be at the forefront of the race for the House District 20 representative slot this election year.
Advertisement
Incumbent Republican Rep. Amy Stephens will again run against Democrat opponent Jan Hejtmanek, who recently announced her candidacy for the 2008 election.
During her two years in office, Stephens has helped pass legislation allowing spouses of active-duty military access to get unemployment benefits, eased transition process for military spouses working in education who move to Colorado and pushed through legislation creating a School Safety Resource Center - intended as a coalescence of security information at public schools in Colorado.
Hejtmenaek ran unsuccessfully against Stephens in 2006, and will try to turn the tide this November with a campaign focusing on sustainable growth, attracting new business, renewable energy and health care.
The candidates' views differ sharply on health care issues.
Stephens co-sponsored a health care transparency bill that passed this year, requiring hospitals to post prices for 25 of the most common inpatient procedures and insurance companies have to post the reimbursement amounts for their most common 25 inpatient procedures.
The bill, according to Stephens, follows her belief in consumer-directed health care.
"I want to continue drawing consumers in to make their own choices in health care, and [work] with insurance so we make that possible," Stephens said. "I really like to explore how we can give consumers more choice. Now, that is tough because your opponents are going to go 'well, do we need this mandate or that mandate?' The more mandates we put on health insurance, the more we are driving up prices and the tougher it is for people to get access."
A state-run health care plan is favored by Hejtmanek.
"Gov. Ritter's 208 Commission recently concluded its research of the top five most viable options for universal health care coverage in the state," Hejtmanek said, "by recommending a single-payer health care system as the most financially efficient means of providing health care for all Colorado residents. Though it is unlikely that any new health care program will be initiated this year, it remains a top priority for this governor and his administration, which I fully support."
Health care legislation would aid small business, Hejtmanek said.
"I think it would alleviate a lot of problems in small businesses," Hejtmanek said. "It supports small business by allowing them to be more competitive. It would be far more efficient and less costly in the long run."
During this year's legislative session, numerous energy bills were passed, many in support of renewable resources. While both candidates support the use of renewable energies, they have divergent views of how to go about supporting it.
"Redirecting the massive coal and gas industry subsidies into renewable energy development will ensure prosperity equaling that of the outmoded energy industries; nurture fledgling industries that have been long ignored; and cultivate the kind of innovation and entrepreneurship for which the United State is world renowned," Hejtmanek said.
Stephens said that redirecting the subsidies effectively means more regulation on energy companies and thinks that the cost of funded research gets balanced on the backs of citizens and individual energy efficiency and stewardship should be the initial step for citizens.
"I don't think there is any problem researching alternative energies as long as we look at how long it's going to take and what the end result is going to be," Stephens said. "When the average consumer looks at how they save energy in their home, what are the things on a personal stewardship level that we can do to make our homes more energy efficient? We don't have enough families who are doing everyday things on a stewardship level. I am not a proponent of the 'nanny state' I don't believe big government should be in every aspect of our lives."
The popular support of renewable energy use was touted by Hejtmanek who cited a Colorado Springs Utilities survey.
"The survey done last year by Colorado Springs Utilities indicated that people are very much in favor of developing renewable energies, and are willing to pay for it," Hejtmanek said, "More than 80 percent who responded were willing to pay more than $1 additional a month on their bill, and around 60 percent would be willing to pay more. I think there is a need, as well as support for it."
To encourage economic growth, Hejtmanek proposes revisions of the 1982 Gallagher amendment to the State Constitution.
"Though the amendment was fair and appropriate at the time, the formulaic complexities of the amendment, combined with a pattern of growth in the past 25 years, has caused business owners to carry an increasingly heavier burden of taxation that is both cumbersome and repellant to businesses," Hejtmanek said.
Stephens was on the Business Affairs and Labor Committee and considers supporting businesses a priority and she said that knowing all the consequences of legislation is of crucial importance when deciding what to support.
"I don't pick up haphazard legislation - that has been a motto of mine. I like to think how it will affect my district," Stephens said.
For more information on Hejtmanek, visit www.janhejtmanek.com. For more information about Stephens, visit www.amystephens4hd20.com/.
I wasn't goofing off because it was a holiday weekend, I swear! JUST as I was patting myself on the back last Friday evening for being almost caught up, I noticed I was suddenly awfully congested in my chest. As though it had been booked for a tour by Bronchitis and the Wheezers, the atonal faux-accordion-pop group.
So I was mainly in bed from then until noon or so today. Thank goodness for my trusty laptop, which not only let me keep up virtually with the big world, but is warm and comforting to cuddle when you are sore from coughing.
Could have been worse, of course. In a funny co-incidence, as I was looking over the blogs I read on Wednesdays I found this article on Damn Interesting.com about The Heroes of SARS. It's an excellent overview of the epidemic from start to finish, showing how some things that are often politicized worked RIGHT for once. There's even a whistle-blower who got listened to! And not stomped on later!
By the way, if anyone is interested in ancient history, I did a write-up on my personal experiences and views of the State Assembly and Convention.
CheneyCare -- We taxpayers pay 70% of guaranteed coverage for VP Dick Cheney and 2 million federal legislators and employees.
Link: Bill Moyers' Journal 5/9/08 -- California Nurses' campaign for "CheneyCare" for all. Read transcript or view program: http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/05092008/transcript1.html
Video "Who the Health Cares?" gets straight to the point: Presidential candidates will not determine health care reform -- the ball is in the court of Congress. http://www.moblogic.tv/video/2008/04/30/who-the-health-cares/
For-Profit Health Insurance and Pharmaceutical Industries -- scary statistics
1) Melody Peterson's book "Our Daily Meds" reveals that the benefit of medicines marketed by pharmaceutical companies "has become secondary to how much it will bring shareholders in profit"...due to constant pressure by Wall Street for drug companies to exceed profits made the year before; Big Pharma employs 2 lobbyists for every Congress member.
2) Tests show that placebos often work as well as the drugs being marketed to the public.
3) 100,000 Americans die annually from taking prescribed drugs as prescribed (FDA reports).
4) U.S. experiences 75,000-100,000 preventable deaths annually, ranking 19 out of 19 nations. (Recent study, Ellen Nolte & Martin McKee, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine)
Please join Be the Change-USA & Health Care for All Colorado
for an exciting, engaging and fun event May 31
Are We All Really Covered? Closing the Gaps in Health Care
12 noon - 7:30 PM, Sat., May 31, 2008
First Plymouth Congregational Church
3501 S. Colorado Blvd. (Hampden and Colorado Blvd)
Englewood, CO
Registration: Full program: $35; Dinner & evening speakers: $25; Evening speakers only: $10. Discount for Seniors, students, veterans, BTC and HCAC members: $5
Special program features:
1-3 PM Providers and Patients Panel: "How did we get into this mess, and how can we get out?"
3-5 PM Presentations by CO elected officials and candidates: "Will Colorado begin to close the gap?"
5 PM Dinner "Legislative Grill" -- Members of Congress and candidates and representatives of Presidential campaigns: "Will Congress or our next President begin to close the gap?"
6 PM Evening Keynote speaker: Elizabeth Kucinich
More info: www.BTC-USA.org or www.healthcareforallcolorado.org or call Dick Barkey, 303-808-8504, or Eliza Carney, 970-416-0636
To register online: www.BTC-USA.org
I'm unclear on the details- but will I really have to move to another state to continue relying on the VA ?
My current understanding is that the VA will lease space in the new UC Hospital. Sounds like a sure way to cut expenses- and also services.
Details to follow.
Please reply to me directly if you wish to be added to my email list for this issue. (I'll never share you r inf with anyone- nor spam you).
Mike Darling
McCain says that his healthcare plan is designed to lower costs. But McCain's plan appears to lower costs "by cutting benefits to people."
The mainstream media has basically given McCain a free ride so far by not asking him tough questions. So it's important for citizens to ask those questions ourselves. If you can make it on Friday, please attend McCain's townhall.
After the townhall, tell us about your experience here on our blog. If for any reason you are not allowed to attend this "open townhall", please call 303-991-1900.
The next hurdle for the Fair Accountable Insurance Rates ("FAIR") bill today will be in committee in the Senate. Following is a list of Senators on the committee. Please contact them TODAY (especially Veiga and Isgar) and urge them to support the FAIR bill for more accountability and transparancy from insurance companies:
Senator Sandoval(D)(CHAIR and Senate sponsor for FAIR): 303-866-4862
Senator Romer (D): 303.866.4852
Senator Brophy (R): 303.866.6360
Senator Harvey (R): 303.866.4881
Senator Isgar (D): 303.866.4884
Senator Kopp (R): 303.866.2683
Senator Veiga (D): 303.866.4861
ProgressNow members have written over 800 emails to legislators in support of the Fair Accountable Insurance Rates ("FAIR") bill just since yesterday afternoon. You can contact your legislators using our simple online form at:
www.ProgressNowAction.org/FAIRSpeakout.
For more info on the FAIR bill, go to www.ProgressNowAction.org/FAIRFacts.
UPDATE: The FAIR bill has now passed the House, and it's on to the Senate. You can still use the link above to contact your Senator by email.
The insurance lobbyists are pulling out the stops to kill this bill and maintain the status quo. Please take just a couple of minutes to contact your legislator now. It really does make a difference!
Here's a list of the folks who voted YES:
Rosemary Marshall,Chair (D)
(303) 866-2959
rosemary.marshall.house@state.co.us
Joe Rice, Vice Chair (D)
(303) 866-2953
joe.rice.house@state.co.us
Dorothy Butcher (D - Pueblo)
(303) 866-2968
dorothy.butcher.house@state.co.us
Morgan Carroll (D)
(303) 866-2909
morgan.carroll.house@state.co.us
Edward Casso (D)
(303) 866-2964
edward.casso.house@state.co.us
Cheri Jahn (D)
(303) 866-5522
cheri.jahn.house@state.co.us
John Soper (D)
(303) 866-2931
john.soper.house@state.co.us
Here are the folks who voted NO:
David Balmer (R)
(303) 866-2935
david.balmer.house@state.co.us
Larry Liston (R)
(303) 866-2965
Victor Mitchell (R)
(303) 866-2946
victor.mitchell.house@state.co.us
Amy Stephens (R)
(303) 866-2924
amy.stephens.house@state.co.us
I've been getting "Push Poll" calls from a place called "Datapolres" on my caller ID, showing this number, 7033788323, which when dialed, is met with a message saying, "this number has been disconnected."
Here's a site about this number: http://whocalled.us/lookup/7033788323
Upon answering the call, a series of leading questions are asked, starting with, "Are you in favor of, or against the government having complete access to your health care records?"
They aren't, of course, looking for or recording a response. They are planting a seed, so to speak. The clear implication is that my privacy is being threatened in some way.
Gosh- what could be then source of this threat? Let me guess. Health care reform?
Further proof that these people are out of control, and need to be neutered like a pit bull.
After that, I utter an expletive, and hang up. I haven't heard the rest of the questions. I'll be more patient next time.
Anybody else been getting these calls?
Posts
Call for Bob Schaffer to Apologize for War Profiteering
Posted Jul 18, 2008 2:28pm
Comments (0)
Action Alert: Fri 7/25 House Juciary Committee Preliminary Impeachment Hearing
Posted Jul 18, 2008 9:43am
Comments (0)
An angry email from the....some part of the politcial spectrum.
Posted Jul 17, 2008 10:15am
Comments (1)
Michael Collins: Election Fraud & Tyranny - Part 2
Posted Jul 17, 2008 10:11am
Comments (0)
Obama leading McCain in . . . . Arizona???
Posted Jul 16, 2008 7:49am
Comments (0)
Mr. Schaffer can you please answer the question?
Posted Jul 15, 2008 12:33pm
Comments (1)
Interns wanted for Talkingpointsmemo
Posted Jul 15, 2008 8:01am
Comments (0)
Colorado Petition for Education Savings Account
Posted Jul 15, 2008 1:47am
Comments (1)
Bob Schaffer just makes stuff up (telling omission edition)
Posted Jul 14, 2008 6:58pm
Comments (4)
Amendment 47 criminal circulators
Posted Jul 14, 2008 2:21pm
Comments (0)
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