Guaranteed Healthcare

Here’s an extraordinary image of an extraordinary moment: Steve Maviglio, the Deputy Chief of Staff to Fabian Nunez, the Speaker of the California Assembly, directing Capitol police to arrest an un-insured patient for trying to speak to the media about healthcare reform.  That’s Maviglio on the far right.

Conversations with press like this happen every day, every hour in the Capitol; it’s why the building exists.

But I guess most conversations aren’t on the subject of the insurance industry’s number one priority—which is to pass an “individual mandate” law.  And most conversations don’t happen as a gigantic fake healthcare reform bill seems to be careening to an ugly defeat.

Which is why most conversations don't end with patients being cited for a misdemeanor.

We’ll tell what happened and why, below

The Los Angeles Times reports this morning that one of the nation's largest health insurers paid bonuses to its employees for kicking sick people off the health insurance rolls, including approving chemo therapy for a 51 year-old woman, then cancelling her policy immediately afterward.

The revelation that the health plan had cancellation goals and bonuses comes amid a storm of controversy over the industry-wide but long-hidden practice of rescinding coverage after expensive medical treatments have been authorized.

And these are the people that Mitt Romney, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Clinton/Edwards/Obama see as the answer to our healthcare crisis?

The California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee said today that it will oppose the latest healthcare plan proposed by Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, which would sentence patients to patients to forced insurance, threats to seize wages to pay the premiums of the very for-profit insurance companies who are speedily wrecking our health care system, and no controls on the costs patients would be legally required to bear.

“As more details continue to emerge, it is apparent that this proposal is riddled with flaws that could exacerbate the healthcare crisis for countless numbers of California families,” said CNA/NNOC Executive Director Rose Ann DeMoro.

More than SCHIP, the important action in the movement for guaranteed healthcare is happening in California, where the insurance industry almost pulled off the big scam, getting Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Speaker Fabian Nunez to cooperate on a plan forcing the sale of more expensive, unworkable insurance products—and blocking the guaranteed, single-payer reform this country needs.

Good news!  The Schwarzenegger-Nunez scam is dead!  This is a major victory for progressives, patients, and nurses.  The Dems have figured out how bad a deal Schwarzenegger is offering, and the plan’s main cheerleader Nunez is near-dead politically by revelations that his wife is now on the hospital industry payroll to the tune of six figures, and that he is struggling with a nasty case of luxury shopaholism with donor money.

Nunez Forced to Recuse Himself from ALL Healthcare Votes??

In a stunning turn, it appears that Speaker Fabian Nunez must recuse himself from any votes on healthcare legislations—including any attempts to revive AB 8, the healthcare bill that Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed this month.

The Sacramento Bee reported this morning that Maria Robles, the wife of Fabian Nunez, has accepted a six-figure salary with Californians for Patient Care, a front group for the hospital industry that receives approximately 99% of its funding from the California Hospital Association.

Like a slow-motion earthquake the healthcare mess continues to roil the Golden State.  Just this week, California Governor pitches the lottery as his secret weapon for solving the healthcare crisis, Speaker Nunez makes clear why he has to keep taking so much money from health insurance corporations, and mega-chain Sutter Healthcare faces the largest nurses strike in a decade.

A picture beats a thousands words so just go look at this striking nurse.  Sutter was humiliated this week when 5,000 nurses walked off the job in a revolt against patterns of unsafe care by the chain, which pulled in $587 million in profits just last year.  RNs like Millicent Borland walked out because they are obligated to stand up for their patients. 

The UAW’s strike against GM is not just about their members' healthcare…but also about the healthcare of millions of people not represented by a powerful union.  We’ll look at the potential impact of this historic strike and what it means for workers and the nation that is healthcare increasingly becoming the central issue for labor, both in bargaining and activism…

Barbara Ehrenreich was channelling Mother Jones when she gave this advice to 1,000 nurse activists gathered in California this week, but she really didn’t have to worry. Like her the nurses were channeling the famous labor leader, as the emotional gathering marked the true birth of a national nurses movement, whose women (and men) have made “elegant militancy” their calling card. 

We’ll take a look at some of the glowing press coverage and consider the implications for the important healthcare battles in California and the nation after the flip.

system.

1000 Registered Nurses storming the Capitol and clogging its halls in one of the most dramatic and militant protests in recent history was not enough to stop Sacramento politicians from selling out patients and rewarding their insurance industry donors with a major financial boon, in the latest step of a complex healthcare dance orchestrated by and for Governor Schwarzenegger

We’ll take a look at what it means for the drive for guaranteed healthcare nationally over the flip, but first take a look at these pictures from inside the Capitol this morning. 

The final days of California’s legislative season are here and there is at least one issue of national important left to be decided: will insurance companies get their dream bill handed to them by an unholy alliance of sell-out Democrats and Governor Schwarzenegger? 

The Schwarzenegger-Nunez bill distorts healthcare reform by forcing more Californians into the arms of the insurance companies, thereby increasing their revenue, power, and ability to meddle in medical decisions.  The California Nurses Association, other unions, and the state’s healthcare reformers, are turning up the fight to block this harmful bill with op-eds and a new advertising campaign, coming on top of mail pieces we’re already sending into the state.  The insurance advocates are worried and sending out their attack dogs, but new polls suggest they have an uphill battle.