Tweet
I’m having a hard time with this.
As Rep. Alan Grayson said yesterday in his chat, "AIG blew up because it was a casino that dabbled in insurance on the side." To date, they’ve received $173 billion — billion — and we’ve got no idea what they did with it. Now we’re being told that Citi needs a "bad bank" too to buy up their toxic assets, after they already received $250 billion — billion — in guarantees for their worthless shit in exchange for the low, low price of $7 billion in preferred stock for taxpayers.
And what are Americans–who are losing their jobs and their homes because AIG acted like a casino and taxpayers paid off all their gambling debts–getting?
21% of Americans scramble to pay medical, drug bills
Denise Prosser, 39, has battled cancer since she was a toddler.
Yet Prosser can’t afford her next cancer treatment — a radioactive therapy that she’s supposed to receive once a year — because she and her husband lost their jobs in December. Without insurance, she has postponed the radiation indefinitely and is taking only half of her asthma medications — sacrifices that often leave her gasping for air and could allow her cancer to come surging back.
She’s dying because she lost her job and she can’t pay her medical bills. She didn’t steal anything so she could get taxpayer money so she can pay lobbyists to get her more taxpayer money–that’s AIG.
Nobody will tell us who the AIG counterparties were, all we know is that they were a bunch of degenerate gamblers who got rich on taxpayer money. Meanwhile Ellen Tauscher is bragging that she and her New Democrat Coalition come from Wall Street, and work as henchmen for bank lobbyists. Of course they are — the New Democrat’s Executive Director, Adam Pase, was a lobbyist for predatory lenders. And bank lobbyists love them back, cooing about how the New Dems will keep Congress from "punishing" banks with new regulation of the financial system.
But don’t think Tauscher and the New Dems are completely cold to people who can’t pay for healthcare. Tauscher voted for the bankruptcy bill that made it more difficult for people with bills from catastrophic illness to file for bankruptcy, saying it "encouraged personal responsibility." I’m sure Denise is touched by Tauscher’s concern for her moral fiber. And the power of the New Democrats is only growing — yesterday, Obama proudly identified with them, saying "I’m a New Democrat."
We keep shoveling money to banks that are "too big to fail," but there’s no money to help Denise Prosser. Watching her die while Ellen Tauscher and the New Democrats scramble to lick the boots of lobbyists, it’s hard to resist the idea that everything else is just window dressing so we won’t notice while the banks fleece us.
Tell Congress to tell us where all the money is going, and why people have to die so bankers can get even richer.
39 Comments
Support this site!
Subscribe to the newsletter
Advertise on Firedoglake
Send
us your tips
Make us your homepage
About Firedoglake
bastards
I love it when Jane Hamsher displays her righteous indignation and anger at the crooks in congress and on Wall St. It would help if more members of Congress could respond to her as Rep Grayson has done, rather than as Rep Tauscher has done.
“encouraged personal responsibility” = I’ve got mine, fuck you, you’re on your own.
Thanks Jane.
digg is open.
Bullseye.
This is hard to look at.
Jane,
I have a family member who is contemplating filing for bankruptcy because of medical bills. Do you have a reference to a guide that would help us understand the restrictions you mention? Thanks.
Fuck Tauscher. Someone needs to primary her ass.
Exactly.
Between a rock and a hard place…… I’m a 57 yr old single woman sole support for myself
On short term disability while receiving treatment for cancer, been off since 11/22/08 and will max short & long term disability on 11/22/09. That means my job, benefits and everything goes. I can apply for social security disability under a compassionate clause for cancer patients BUT Medicare does not kick in for 24 months. WTF?
So working with my disability case worker on return to work so that I can move the goal posts down the road. BTW when you are on short term disability they take your FLMA days concurrently so that was gone on 2/5/09 and cannot take another FLMA day until after 11/22/09…… that works really well when trying to return to work!
Global Control of Finance?
The US has caused two great crashes in 70 years, and clearly cannot be trusted to regulate financial markets. It’s not Europe which wants control of its internal financial industry; the non-US Rest of the World will impose control on the global financial industry including the inept US regulatory system.
An second issue, not yet asked is: If Banking is essential, and must be supported by Government & Taxpayers, why is it private? Why is it not an essential Government function?
Either, the risk in Banking is to be taken by taxpayers, and the taxpayers should get the rewards, or, taxpayers would not have to take the risk.
In the US, these issues are heresy, as the question go against the “free market” (LAMO at the to-date $2 – $3 trillion taxpayer support for free markets), dogma in the US.
Ask yourself the question: Do you trust the US Government to regulate Wall St, when Wall St can buy any set of laws it wants?
Which pulls a thread and starts to unravel really difficult questions about the US Governmental system – is it hopelessly corrupt? Can it be reformed from within? Or, must it crash and be remade?
Jane!
I’m convinced the only reason we didn’t have significant rioting in the streets during Bush’s Regnum was because the Country was doped-up on Prozac and Meth.
Tauscher, and Obama, too, ought to consider the consequences of All those people not being able to afford their ‘tranquilizers’ any more – and turning their newly-energized anger and rage on Them.
I saw Jane on one of the cable news programs a couple of days ago, which is amazing, because this hardly ever happens…
Jane is too level-headed and truthful for the bobble-head pundits we see on cable news all the time who dutifully follow the DC insider line!
I’ve been following the whole financial crisis for years, and those who saw it coming were mocked and left out of the dialog, while those who have been wrong all along get to spout their BS daily!
Thank you Jane…you are a true hero of the people, and we love you out here!
Look, although I didn’t agree with her on te mortgae stuff, I xcould at least understand the position that some of the bankrupt people had been irresponsible. I mean, it’s a whole ‘nother can of worms so i don’t wanna revisit that but I could at least fathom where Tauscher was comming from. But hey, let’s encourage people to not get cancer! We don’t want to encouarge people who were so irresponsible as to get cancer! Jeez. I’ll never get my brain around that.
There must be a concerted effort to get Tauscher, her “New Democrat” gangster cronies and any fellow travelers summarily ejected from office in the next election. These bastards have got to go. In the meantime, can they somehow be humiliated in the press? In other words, is there a way to break through the stone wall of the MSM, if only in brief segments? I know that’s a tall order, but…
This is a disgusting part of being an American. Our government will keep us in hell as long as they can justify it. Their contributors have lost the license to be called human.
We are pumping huge amounts of money into those institutions and activities that created the financial meltdown and economic depression. This means that money is not available to those sectors of our economy that actually are productive. It means that money that should be going for jobs and healthcare is going instead to pay off the bad bets of bankrupt banks. If anything our priorities becoming more and more inverted not less so.
they’re just trying you to be responsible is all, doncha know?
assholes.
was it with that Twitt lady on msnbc on saturday?
Jerkweed Kashkari is back up. Get me a flight bag…
BREAKING: Greenspan – I did not cause the financial meltdown – from HuffPo
Later, Greenspan retorted, “I also did not wet my pants, but I think I know who did !”
yes, it’s called accountability now,/a> and you should give them your money, and if you can your skills.
if being a democrat means sucking off the bank while cancer patients die, i want no part of it.
ACCOUNTABILITY NOW, MOTHERFUCKERs!!.
i think it’s really important to understand that the insurance industry is part of the financial industry – with the end of glass steagall, those walls came down.
that means when people advocate for “health insurance” instead of “health care” it is EXACTLY the same thing as what tauscher is doing here…. designing our most critical policies for the benefit of what has become a parasitic industry instead of ordinary people. and right now we just don’t have the financial surplus to do that and make it work.
from democracy now! a few weeks ago:
my bold.
i’d love to see even one non-single-payer program that could work. will keep looking, but i just haven’t seen anything yet…
This guy shoud’ve been disappeared the moment Obama took office. I think I’m going end all of my FDL comments,
“Fire Kashkari”
I share your outrage, Jane. As a family living with cancer we know firsthand the challenge of just dealing with the disease.
The craven greed and corruption and, yes, piracy of the Bushie Era is criminal. And too many are not only not held to account, they are rewarded for their abuse of “capitalism.” Which is a joke, by the way. The Bush Era Republicans and their Wall Street cronies waged war on capitalism and have brought it to its knees.
Yet it is the working class, the real builders of anything in this country, who will pay the ultimate price of the vampire economy that has run rampant in this country.
We are doubling down on a losing bet, aren’t we?
I think it’s rather simple:
No health care for anyone in Congress or their aides. Period! Make the assholes pay like the rest of the people do. Let’s see how Specter deals with not getting help because of a prior condition. Let’s see Tauscher’s ‘personal responsitbility’ if someone in her immediate family gets sick and the cure will cost her her home!
I’m unemployed with no benefit’s right now. Oh yeah, they tell me I can get COBRA. HWF can I afford almost $1,000 a month, you assholes in Congress. I’m unemployed, i.e.: No money.
Let’s see you MF’s deal with the same things we have to.
Blue Texan is upstairs!
RedState: Marines Standing at Attention Proves They Hate President Obama
“C’mon Seven! Geithner (etal) needs a new pair o’ shoes!…”
How about a real life “trading places” and a congresscritter has to live your life for a month without a staff, extras and live on what you are making. Hey would love to have someone else have my chemo side effects ;)
Yep I can just see Senator Kyl out in my back yard picking up dog pooh and weeding the cactus garden……
(((katymine)))
Thank you Jane Hamsher for your courage, insight and willingness to speak truth to power.
After reading this story I fired off an email to a long time acquaintance, Harry Reid. I directed him to firedoglake and this story, but I’ve fired off lots of emails to Harry and no longer get a response from him or his staff.
I grown tired of statements by the President telling the citizens that a website will be up and running soon that can be accessed showing what is happening with taxpayer money used by the government.
In the meantime, accountability and openness can be shown in many other ways; for example, the press secretary telling the press and the American People where money is going, the conditions for its use, accountability, etc, the President himself could spend time explaining everything, the Secretary of Treasury could do the same, as could leaders in Congress.
This kind of story should not be happening in America. It is time for our representatives consider what is best not only now, but in the future for America and to act accordingly. The problems are many and complex and need dedication to solving them and not dedication to get re-elected.
The “health care” system in our country really chaps my ass. I just tried to switch to a lower premium plan with the same insurance I have over-paid for years without a claim of any kind. Suddenly, I have become an un-insurable risk due to seasonal allergies (2-3 wks in the spring) and mild osteopenia, typical for my age and gender.
I am totally healthy and have not seen a doctor except for annual exams for years. I did not even ask for prescription coverage for the plan. Denied altogether.
I can’t imagine how hard it is for people to fight the system if they are actually ill. This is why we need universal care, not universal coverage.
1) There is no health care system in this country. A system is something that works the same way all the time for everyone.
We have a traffic-control system – whether you’re rich or poor, single, divorced, young, old, widowed, whatever, red means stop and green means go. That’s a system.
We have a highway system – the shortest route from Providence to Detroit is the same whether you’re rich, poor, etc., etc. That’s a system.
If you’re rich, you get great health care. If you’re middle class, you get meh health care. If you’re poor, you get no health care. That’s not a system; it’s a market. To say we have a health care system is like saying we have a car-ownership system. We don’t. We have a market.
2) New Democrat? How come we always have New Democrats? And why is each wave of New Democrats more and more like Republicans?
3) And while we’re at it, the Old Democrats took this country from a semi-agrarian nation struggling to emerge from the shadow of civil war and turned it into a country that won a World War, built an economic colossus probably never seen before, and a standard of living that was envied the world over. I like the Old Democrats. Why do we nee dNew ones?
Sorry; end of rant.
I’ve been saying for years that there’s really no major differences in the dems and the repubs.
The more time passes, the more we see them meeting in the middle.
Unfortunately their middle has never been a good spot for the American people. Their middle is the spot where they can best screw all but the rich, keep their cushy jobs and rule forever.
(((katymine))) I hope you’ve written to your Congressman/woman’s case worker and to the case workers for your Senators. Even though each may not be able to do much, they REALLY need to hear your story. And who knows, perhaps some miracle will emerge. Good luck.
Oh, and I hope, Jane, that you’re sending this story to KO and Rachel.
I know this post is about much more than healthcare, but I’m not educated enough on the financial mess to really comment. I know in the UK there are similar goings on, there is definitely a need for accountability. What I don’t get though is why healthcare isn’t provided to everyone in the USA. Maybe I’m just naive and ignorant but it doesn’t make sense to me. Maybe someone can shed some light on it for me? It is completely shocking that people have to pay for their own cancer treatment. I don’t understand things like medicaid etc. but the country seems to be failing if people like Denise Prosser are having to go untreated.
I think RickMassimo nailed it. “New Democrats” look a lot like “Old Republicans”. They’re filling the space on the right of the spectrum that has been vacated by the Republicans’ shift ever further right. It’s chilling that Obama identifies with them.
But I’m sorry to say, when you have representatives who are not accountable to you this is what you get, and when you allow elections to be decided by the guys with the most money to buy exposure with, well, you’re going to get representatives who have access to money.