I watched the Bill Moyers interview with Wendell Potter and I am sickened. Not by what was actually said in the interview, but what seems to be a horrible trend in the United States these days. Its the fact that large corporations and wall street have our government in their pocket. This is not a conservative/liberal or democrat/republican problem...this is our problem...THE PEOPLES PROBLEM !! What in God's name are we going to do about this. We can't even turn to OUR elected officials to help us. You know, I am 46 years old and this is NOT the country I once knew. We really need to do something drastic to get their attention. You know, when I was in school they taught us about something called a BOYCOTT !! We, the people, need to standup up for our rights. When the Iranian people didn't like what was going on, they took to the streets in protest. I think we need to have a peaceful revolution to let our government know that we DEMAND change in healthcare, we DEMAND accountablility for the last 8 years of criminal acts, and WE DEMAND CHANGE...NOW !!
Mr. Potter,
I appreciate your argument about George Will's column, but encourage you to be more careful about your own claims, especially given your desire to "call out misleading statements and statistics." You write "chances are [Mr. Will] has stashed enough away that he can afford to shell out the nearly $13,000 that the average annual premium for decent family coverage costs these days... The median household income in this country is just about $50,000. I’m betting it has been a few years since Will faced paying more than a fourth of his family’s annual income—before taxes—just to cover the health insurance premiums." But the dollar amounts that you're comparing come from groups that aren't directly comparable. The "average annual premium" you reference is not an average across all families; it is for a family of four. In contrast, the mean household size is 3. I'm guessing that the "average" annual premium is a mean, not a median, and while I don't expect that the mean and median health insurance costs vary as much as the mean and median incomes, it's still not clear to me that it's appropriate to compare a mean cost with a median income. You also shift from families (for the premium cost) to households (for income); families and households are not equivalent, as the members of a household need not be related. I agree with your overall argument; I just think that you need to be more careful about these category shifts -- if you're sloppy about this, you're telling Mr. Will and others that it's OK for them to be sloppy too. And of course for some people, it may not be sloppiness; it may be a purposeful decision to mislead people by shifting among non-interchangeable categories while glossing over the fact that the categories aren't interchangeable. Thanks for your work. I was glad to see your interview with Bill Moyers, which is what lead me here. We need more people to join you in speaking out.
Dear Mr. Potter,
Thank you so much for coming forth. The lack of health care has been ruling our decisions in my family for the past 9 years. We even quit our jobs and my husband went back to school ,at the age of 50, to get a masters in math. He just finished and now the job market is crazy. Oh well.
We need people like you in America. We work hard at being advocates for health care( DNC, Health Care reform groups, etc.) but the government doesn't listen. Americans are so busy trying to survive day to day that action isn't taken. I have sent your PBS interview to every one I know. It made a difference. Again thank you for what you have done. It took courage and conviction.
Sincerely,
Tina Campbell - North Carolina
<blockquote>Is this a blatant lie, or are they twisting the results of some bogus poll? </blockquote>
How much do you care about fine distinctions? ;-)
I am finding it most interesting, what Mr. Wendell Potter has to say about what the insurance industry has been, and is doing. My brother worked with the insurance industry for over 20 years before retiring, and it puzzled me as to why he was still, though retired, parroting the lies we have been hearing about Gov. health care regulations or programs, using scare tactics, such as our moving toward socialism with such Gov. programs, etc.; telling how bad the health care programs are in Canada, England, and other countries. I thought that he had just watched way too much Fox "news" (propaganda and nothing less) and had become brainwashed by the wild eyed nut case Republicans who never tire in talking this way about any Health care reform. I now know, though well educated and well meaning, that my brother was and is brainwashed first of all by the very corporation with which he worked for all those years. I want to thank Mr. Wendell Potter for clearing this up, and helping me to better understand my own brother, regarding health care reform.
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