From Volume 36, Issue 45 of EIR Online, Published Nov. 20, 2009

United States News Digest

Some Truth in Report on Pelosi Health-Care Bill

Nov. 15 (EIRNS)—The Nov. 13 report of the actuary for the government's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, while it covers up most of the genocidal features of the so-called health-care reform bill that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) forced through the House of Representatives a week ago, does make two admissions that are true. First, that the bill would cause more doctors and hospitals to deny service to some Medicare and Medicaid recipients. (Many doctors refuse to treat these patients already, because they lose so much money for each visit.)

The report says that a result of the bill's $570 billion in cuts in Medicare reimbursements over ten years, will be that "providers for whom Medicare constitutes a substantive portion of their business could find it difficult to remain profitable and might end their participation in the program (possibly jeopardizing access to care for beneficiaries)."

The second admission is that the reason these patients would be cut off is essentially that the U.S. lacks the required medical infrastructure, or, as the report says, "supply constraints might interfere with providing the services desired by the additional 34 million insured persons."

This is why Lyndon LaRouche has insisted that the solution to real medical problems in the U.S. begins with returning to the Hill-Burton legislation, which London puppet Richard Nixon overthrew.

Will Glass-Steagall Supporters Join LaRouche's Call Now?

Nov. 13 (EIRNS)—On the tenth anniversary of the repeal of Franklin Roosevelt's Glass-Steagall Act, by the November 1999 passage of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley bill, will those who opposed the repeal of Glass-Steagall then, and those who have since opposed it, join Lyndon LaRouche in calling for "the application of a Glass-Steagall-type reorganization of the U.S. banking system as a reorganization of the national commercial banking system, as an action enabling the uttering of U.S. Federal Credit for launching a half-century building of the basic economic infrastructure of the U.S.A. and associated nations...."?

There is increasing support for Glass-Steagall at present, as well as a certain sense of panic among Wall Street bankers who can sense the rage against them. Recent statements of support include that by former Labor Secretary Robert Reich, on NPR's Marketplace Morning Report on Nov. 4: "A better idea is to restore the Glass-Steagall Act, which until 1999 separated investment from commercial banking. No public interest has been served by allowing the casino called investment banking to merge with the traditional intermediary function linking savers to borrowers."

John S. Reed, former Citibank CEO, endorsed the Glass-Steagall concept in an Oct. 27 letter to the editor of the New York Times: "I would agree with Paul A. Volcker (and also Mervyn King, governor of the Bank of England) that some kind of separation between institutions that deal primarily in the capital markets and those involved in more traditional deposit-taking and working-capital finance makes sense."

In 1999, Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) had said, "I think this [repeal of Glass-Steagall] legislation is just fundamentally terrible. I think we will look back in ten years' time and say, we should not have done this, but we did, because we forgot the lessons of the past, and that that which is true in the 1930s is true in 2010." Other Senate Democrats who voted against repealing Glass-Steagall include Tom Harkin (Iowa), Barbara Boxer (Calif.), Richard Bryan (Nev.), and Barbara Mikulski (Md.). Sen. Richard Shelby, who still speaks of the need for Glass-Steagall, was the sole Republican to vote against its repeal.

Obama's Nazi-Care on 'Life Support,' Says Dealmaker Dem

Nov. 13 (EIRNS)—Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.), a key "Blue Dog" Democrat who voted for the House health-care bill, told the editorial board of The Tennesseean yesterday that the bill stands a good chance of being defeated in the Senate. "If you peel back the layers further, you realize it may be difficult for the Senate to vote on anything," Cooper said. "I'd say health reform, despite the House vote, is still on life support."

Cooper cited Sens. Robert Byrd (W.Va.) and Ben Nelson (Neb.), as two Democratic votes that the party may not be able to count on, to cut off debate and pass a bill: "They know what they have to do to get the 60 votes. A 60-vote majority is very fragile.... There are a number of senators saying they're not going to send it to conference. They're going to say to the House, take it or leave it."

Democrats Fear Mass Strike; Poll Shows Voters Hate Incumbents

Nov. 12 (EIRNS)—While the Republican Party is calling for a surge of anti-health-care-bill town meetings in the next two weeks, the Democratic Party is reportedly going into hiding in order to avoid confrontations with angry voters, one week after Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi bulldozed the health-care vote through. A meeting held by Rep. Allen Boyd (D-Fla.) who had voted against the bill, was a case in point: About 500 senior citizens who attended were so angry, and unswayed by Boyd's "No" vote on Obamacare, that half the audience walked out to protest that Boyd was not doing enough on the economy and other issues. One of the signs shown in TV coverage was "Repeal the Stimulus Bill." Boyd told local TV that the walkout "exhibits people's anger" about the economy.

Republican members of Congress, on the other hand, are seeking to capitalize on the anger directed largely at Democrats, and there are some 50 town meetings planned by GOP Senators before Thanksgiving. But Republicans have a lot to fear as well for their promotion of the bank bailout and other crimes. A new Pew Research Center poll shows that "53 percent of Americans said most members of Congress should not be reelected, compared with just 34 percent who said most members should be reelected," reports Politico today. While 52% of Americans would support the reelection of their own Congressman, the hatred of the Congress as a whole is massive. In 2006, 57% did not want the majority of Congress reelected; and in 1994 (the year of the Gingrich coup), it was 56%; the incumbents' majority was booted out in both elections.

There is a concerted propaganda effort by the GOP to claim "ownership" of the mass strike process that is rising up against Wall Street, the bailout, and the Nazi health-care bill, but as one veteran organizer said, "As they know in Texas, Dick Armey couldn't organize a two-car funeral."

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