Mawethu balang die ding is waar! USA is the most legally corrupt country in the world! ------Original Message------ From: [email protected] To: [email protected] ReplyTo: [email protected] Subject: So, How Corrupt Was He? Sent: Aug 2, 2009 6:58 PM
Pay to Play Is Washington's Sport of Kings by: Michael Winship t r u t h o u t | Perspective 01 August 2009 http://www.truthout.org/080109Z?n As we marvel over the depths of hypocrisy and greed currently plumbed in the health care reform debate, it may help to remember that even Honest Abe Lincoln had his share of tainted colleagues, one of the most notorious of whom was his first Secretary of War Simon Cameron. According to Doris Kearns Goodwin's "Team of Rivals," when Lincoln asked radical Republican Thaddeus Stevens how corrupt Cameron was, Stevens paused and replied, "I don't think he would steal a red hot stove." When Cameron objected, Stevens allowed that maybe he was wrong - implying that the cabinet secretary would steal a hot stove. Cameron resigned after less than a year in office, plagued by allegations of war profiteering and overall ineptitude. He's largely forgotten now, but something he supposedly said is immortalized in the lexicon of famous sayings about money and government. "An honest politician," he declared, "is one who when he is bought, stays bought." The giants of the health care industry fighting legitimate reform will soon discover whether all the money they've spent on lobbying has worked yet again and which of the politicians they have showered with campaign contributions will toe the line and stay bought, thwarting the desires of the majority of the American people. This week, the Center for Responsive Politics reported that in the second quarter of this year alone, the pharmaceuticals and health product industries spent $67,959,095 on lobbying, and the insurance industry $39,760,477. Another $25,552,088 was spent by lobbyists for hospitals and nursing homes. That's a total of $133,271,660 in just three months, and that's not even counting the lobbying money spent to fight health care reform by professional associations like the US Chamber of Commerce. Just to further roil your ire, comes news from McAllen, Texas, reported in the July 30 New York Times: "One of the largest sources of campaign contributions to Senate Democrats during this year's health care debate is a physician-owned hospital in one of the country's poorest regions that has sought to soften measures that could choke its rapid growth. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee collected nearly $500,000 at a reception here on March 30, mostly from physicians and others affiliated with Doctors Hospital at Renaissance, financial disclosure records show." A June article in The New Yorker magazine painted a devastating portrait of the sky-high costs of physician-owned hospitals in the McAllen area and President Obama has cited it often. But money talks, and the Times notes, "Thus far, physician-owned hospitals have been insulated from some of the most onerous potential restrictions in the health care legislation moving through Congress." Business as usual amongst the dough-driven denizens of Washington, DC, where they may as well replace the national anthem with Randy Newman's "It's Money that I Love," and pay to play is the sport of kings. Anything and anybody are up for sale in the capital. You'll recall the story in early July about the intimate dinner party Washington Post publisher Katharine Weymouth was planning. Her soirée would have brought the paper's reporters and editors covering health care reform together with officials from the White House and members of Congress. But she also invited CEO's and lobbyists - at $25,000 a pop, or a quarter of a million if they wanted to underwrite a series of these intimate salons. The invitation offered, "An exclusive opportunity to participate in the health care reform debate among the select few who will actually get it done." The dinner was scrapped when The Washington Post invitation leaked to the press. But such exclusive events where the elite meet to eat - for a price - are standard operating procedure in DC. The Economist magazine and The Wall Street Journal have hosted Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
