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Politics : President Barack Obama -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (68154)	1/14/2010 11:59:34 AM
From: tejek	Respond to of 149317

Obama to raise $90B with new financial fee thehill.com

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (68154)	1/14/2010 4:08:48 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 149317

What You're Not Hearing about Haiti (But Should Be) by Carl Lindskoog Published on Thursday, January 14, 2010 by CommonDreams.org In the hours following Haiti's devastating earthquake, CNN, the New York Times and other major news sources adopted a common interpretation for the severe destruction: the 7.0 earthquake was so devastating because it struck an urban area that was extremely over-populated and extremely poor. Houses "built on top of each other" and constructed by the poor people themselves made for a fragile city. And the country's many years of underdevelopment and political turmoil made the Haitian government ill-prepared to respond to such a disaster. True enough. But that's not the whole story. What's missing is any explanation of why there are so many Haitians living in and around Port-au-Prince and why so many of them are forced to survive on so little. Indeed, even when an explanation is ventured, it is often outrageously false such as a former U.S. diplomat's testimony on CNN that Port-au-Prince's overpopulation was due to the fact that Haitians, like most Third World people, know nothing of birth control. It may startle news-hungry Americans to learn that these conditions the American media correctly attributes to magnifying the impact of this tremendous disaster were largely the product of American policies and an American-led development model. From 1957-1971 Haitians lived under the dark shadow of "Papa Doc" Duvalier, a brutal dictator who enjoyed U.S. backing because he was seen by Americans as a reliable anti-Communist. After his death, Duvalier's son, Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" became President-for-life at the age of 19 and he ruled Haiti until he was finally overthrown in 1986. It was in the 1970s and 1980s that Baby Doc and the United States government and business community worked together to put Haiti and Haiti's capitol city on track to become what it was on January 12, 2010. After the coronation of Baby Doc, American planners inside and outside the U.S. government initiated their plan to transform Haiti into the "Taiwan of the Caribbean." This small, poor country situated conveniently close to the United States was instructed to abandon its agricultural past and develop a robust, export-oriented manufacturing sector. This, Duvalier and his allies were told, was the way toward modernization and economic development. From the standpoint of the World Bank and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Haiti was the perfect candidate for this neoliberal facelift. The entrenched poverty of the Haitian masses could be used to force them into low-paying jobs sewing baseballs and assembling other products. But USAID had plans for the countryside too. Not only were Haiti's cities to become exporting bases but so was the countryside, with Haitian agriculture also reshaped along the lines of export-oriented, market-based production. To accomplish this USAID, along with urban industrialists and large landholders, worked to create agro-processing facilities, even while they increased their practice of dumping surplus agricultural products from the U.S. on the Haitian people. This "aid" from the Americans, along with the structural changes in the countryside predictably forced Haitian peasants who could no longer survive to migrate to the cities, especially Port-au-Prince where the new manufacturing jobs were supposed to be. However, when they got there they found there weren't nearly enough manufacturing jobs go around. The city became more and more crowded. Slum areas expanded. And to meet the housing needs of the displaced peasants, quickly and cheaply constructed housing was put up, sometimes placing houses right "on top of each other." Before too long, however, American planners and Haitian elites decided that perhaps their development model didn't work so well in Haiti and they abandoned it. The consequences of these American-led changes remain, however. When on the afternoon and evening of January 12, 2010 Haiti experienced that horrible earthquake and round after round of aftershock the destruction was, no doubt, greatly worsened by the very real over-crowding and poverty of Port-au-Prince and the surrounding areas. But shocked Americans can do more than shake their heads and, with pity, make a donation. They can confront their own country's responsibility for the conditions in Port-au-Prince that magnified the earthquake's impact, and they can acknowledge America's role in keeping Haiti from achieving meaningful development. To accept the incomplete story of Haiti offered by CNN and the New York Times is to blame Haitians for being the victims of a scheme that was not of their own making. As John Milton wrote, "they who have put out the people's eyes, reproach them of their blindness." *Carl Lindskoog is a New York City-based activist and historian completing a doctoral degree at the City University of New York. You can contact him at cskoog79@yahoo.com

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (68154)	1/14/2010 11:26:22 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 149317

Health Insurers Funded Chamber Attack Ads By Peter H. Stone Updated at 10:30 am 1/13/10 Just as dealings with the Obama administration and congressional Democrats soured last summer, six of the nation's biggest health insurers began quietly pumping big money into third-party television ads aimed at killing or significantly modifying the major health reform bills moving through Congress. That money, between $10 million and $20 million, came from Aetna, Cigna, Humana, Kaiser Foundation Health Plans, UnitedHealth Group and Wellpoint, according to two health care lobbyists familiar with the transactions. The companies are all members of the powerful trade group America's Health Insurance Plans. The funds were solicited by AHIP and funneled to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to help underwrite tens of millions of dollars of television ads by two business coalitions set up and subsidized by the chamber. Each insurer kicked in at least $1 million and some gave multimillion-dollar donations. "There's no question that AHIP has quietly solicited monies from their members which were funneled over to the chamber for their ads," said a source. The total donated by the health insurers, according to one estimate, was as much as one-quarter of the chamber's total health care advertising budget. A spokesman for Kaiser said it contributed funds to AHIP last year for positive ads on health care reform, and that AHIP has told the insurer that none of its monies were sent to the chamber. Last August was bruising for the health insurance industry: Obama and congressional leaders attacked its abuses and profits and AHIP President Karen Ignagni warned publicly that "the vilification strategy isn't going to get health reform passed." In late October, Ignagni wrote in a letter to the Washington Post defending a health insurer-funded study critical of congressional cost estimates, "Let me be clear and direct, health plans continue to strongly support reform." However, by that time money was already flowing through AHIP to the chamber to fund its negative ads. The fundraising started last September and continued through December using AHIP as a conduit to avoid a repeat of the political flak that hit the insurance industry after it famously ran its multimillion-dollar "Harry and Louise" ads to help kill health care reforms during the Clinton administration. "AHIP wanted to do this through a third party because of what happened with the Harry and Louise ads," said a lobbying source. "The goal was to get a message out there to make sure the public understood the serious shortcomings of the legislative proposals." Asked about the health-insurer funding for its ad blitz, the chamber's top lobbyist Bruce Josten said, "No comment. We never disclose funding or what we're going to do." However, after the story hit the blogosphere Tuesday, Josten confirmed the money transfer from AHIP to several news outlets. AHIP originally did not return several calls requesting comment for this story. It supplied a written statement Tuesday evening after the story broke. "Reform needs to make health care more affordable, particularly for small businesses that struggle to provide coverage to their employees. We share the very serious concerns employers have raised about provisions that will increase health care costs, including new premium taxes that will hit small businesses hard. So when the employer community--our customers--asked us to contribute to their campaign, we readily agreed." Since last summer, the chamber has poured tens of millions of dollars into advertising by the two business coalitions that it helped assemble: the Campaign for Responsible Health Reform and Employers for a Healthy Economy. In late October, the chamber helped cobble together a larger coalition, Employers for a Healthy Economy, which became the key advertising vehicle for attacking provisions in the House and Senate bills being developed. The newer coalition includes such business giants as the National Association of Manufacturers, the National Retail Federation and the National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors. The ads sharply criticized the high costs of the separate bills, especially the House version. The commercials warned the legislation would raise taxes for Americans and hurt the economy as it tries to recover from the recession. And some chamber-financed commercials attacked setting up a government run plan to compete with private insurers -- a special sore point for the insurance industry -- which is part of the House measure. The U.S. Chamber has spent approximately $70 million to $100 million on the advertising effort, according to lobbying sources. It's unclear whether the business lobby group went to AHIP with a request to help raise funds for its ad drives, or whether AHIP approached the chamber with an offer to hit up its member companies. The House passed its health care reform measure in November; the Senate's didn't pass its version until December. Late last week, Employers for a Healthy Economy launched a new round of TV ads on national cable that are slated to run for a week. Sources say that the chamber-backed ads will likely continue as the two bills are combined in coming weeks. "You don't quit. You fight this thing all the way," said Dirk Van Dongen, the president of the Wholesaler-Distributors. undertheinfluence.nationaljournal.com