AHIP has taken off its mask of benevolence and revealed itself to be the self-serving beast that it truly is. The White House no longer considers them credible and neither do almost all Democrats. AHIP is declaring war on Democrats and that is most likely a good thing.
Read below the fold to find out why.
America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), the lobby group for the health insurance industry is even more insidious than the regressive United States Chamber of Commerce. The US Chamber of Commerce was against any kind of reform from the start, they were even against the Baucus bill. AHIP on the other hand tried to play friendly to reform. AHIP's president Karen Ignagni visited with the president a few times early this year to discuss the upcoming legislation and to lobby for her interests.
Throughout the summer, AHIP stood somewhat at the sidelines of the health care debate. They released commercials that called for "bipartisan" reform. That always struck an ominous chord in me as I knew that the only way this could be "bipartisan" is if the bill was cut down at its knees. Therefore, I knew their intentions were not good at all. I knew that they were not with us and that they will turn on the debate when it becomes clear that the bill will not be "bipartisan."
Well, in that "study" that AHIP commissioned that was released on Monday, they made it quite clear that now that push had come to shove, they would accept nothing short of complete capitulation. They liked the Baucus bill, but when it was given minor and moderate improvements during mark-up to protect SCHIP and to lower punitive taxes significantly, they realized that they were not getting complete capitulation. Therefore, they've decided to go all in and fight health care reform. They've already put in a million dollars for an ad campaign and they are using scare tactics directed at seniors (a la GOP). Somehow, I do not find this to be a bad thing. It may actually solidify the Democrats in opposition to corporate welfare.
The White House has already debunked AHIP's report as self-serving and shallow (no duh). Blue Cross also released a report similar to AHIP's report threatening higher rates if reform is passed, but the White House has already disavowed this report. Now, Senate Democrats realize that the private industry is truly wicked and are now working to put more regulations into the final Senate health care bill. Senators Leahy, Schumer, and Reid are pushing a repeal of the anti-trust exemptions that the health care industry has enjoyed for the past 60 years.
The Senate Judiciary Committee actually held a hearing today on repealing those exemptions. Testifying at this hearing is Senate Majority Leader Hon. Harry Reid, Hon. Christine Varney, Department of Justice Antitrust Chief, J. Robert Hunder, Consumer Federation of America, and Prof. Lawrence Powell, PhD, University of Arkansas. Senator Kerry said at yesterday's meeting of the Senate Finance Committee that the AHIP report actually presses the importance of having an inclusive public insurance option to keep costs down for consumers (seeming to echo Representative Weiner's remarks the day before).
I feel that this is a turning point because the White House and Senate Democrats realize that the public insurance industry will not be good and swallow the fact that their gravy train will be hindered. Now if only we can build on the momentum and make sure that Conservadems fall in line too. Activism needs to go up and complacency needs to go down.
Progressives and a fair number of Democrats in Congress now know who the enemy is in this debate.
P.S. I loved it when Keith Olbermann called AHIP the Ass***** of American last night!