The Health Insurance Lobby and the Democrats Smears of their Fellow Americans

BOO! Karen M. Ignagni Health Insurance Lobbyist

With the left and the Democrats in full smear mode as grassroots opposition overtakes the Obama's health plans, the Times takes a look at the bogeyman of the Insurance industry and their collusion with the Obama admin and Democrats to pass some form of legislation:

One of the main architects of the friendly approach, Karen M. Ignagni, the industry’s chief lobbyist, personally pledged to President Obama that insurers would not stand in the way of a sweeping overhaul this time.

For a while, it seemed to be working — until recently, when the insurance industry re-emerged as Washington’s favorite target. “Villains,” Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker, called health insurers. And Mr. Obama derided the industry for pocketing “windfall profits.”

Taken aback, Ms. Ignagni, the 55-year-old chief executive of the trade group America’s Health Insurance Plans, wondered on Tuesday why insurers were being singled out when, in her view, they had accepted that change was necessary.

“Attacking our community will not help get anyone covered,” she said. While taking a conciliatory tack and insisting that insurers remain committed to reform, she says they will aggressively counter the criticism. “What we have to do is make sure we correct the record,” she said.

As the debate heats up, Ms. Ignagni is facing her toughest test. After winning concessions, and consensus, from many insurance companies with competing interests, she now has to keep them together as the assault on the industry picks up. Rather than being cut out of the conversation, her strategy has been to push for changes her members can live with, in hopes of fending off too much government interference.

Despite her efforts to ally the industry with Washington, however, it risks being thrust in the same role it played 15 years ago when it helped derail reform.

Since day one the health industry has colluded with the Obama admin as a means to get favorable deals, they have provided talking points to him and they certainly have not been in rabid opposition, all of this makes the claims of Pelosi and the stunning smear of the DNC about grassroots opposition being astroturfed that much more absurd, from the DNC:

Republicans and their allied groups – desperate after losing two consecutive elections and every major policy fight on Capitol Hill – are inciting angry mobs of a small number of rabid right wing extremists funded by K Street Lobbyists to disrupt thoughtful discussions about the future of health care in America taking place in Congressional Districts across the country.

However, much like we saw at the McCain-Palin rallies last year where crowds were baited with cries of 'socialist,' 'communist,' and where the birthers movement was born – these mobs of extremists are not interested in having a thoughtful discussion about the issues – but like some Republican leaders have said – they are interested in ‘breaking' the President and destroying his Presidency.

These mobs are bussed in by well funded, highly organized groups run by Republican operatives and funded by the special interests who are desperately trying to stop the agenda for change the President was elected to bring to Washington. Despite the headline grabbing nature of these angry mobs and their disruptions of events, they are not reflective of where the American people are on the issues – or the hundreds of thousands of thoughtful discussions taking place around kitchen tables, water coolers and in homes.

The right wing extremists' use of things like devil horns on pictures of our elected officials, hanging members of Congress in effigy, breathlessly questioning the President's citizenship and the use of Nazi SS symbols and the like just shows how outside of the mainstream the Republican Party and their allies are. This type of anger and discord did not serve Republicans well in 2008 – and it is bound to backfire again.

What a load of rubbish, as detailed by Hot Air the smeer the DNC launched on its fellow Americans is exactly the type of behavior that defined the left throughout the 8 years of the Bush presidency. The tea parties were as middle class and authentic as you can imagine and the current bout of opposition is clearly the same in nature. The Birther attack is a particularly small move for a party that traces its roots back to Thomas Jefferson, but hate defines the modern left and its stunning that a party that has majorities in Congress as well as the Presidency can come across so petty and vindictive as they whine away. Of course if Obama didn't attack profits at his health care conference he might provide his opponents with less ammo in regards to accusations of Socialism. Now back to Ms. Ignagni and industry in general, her logic that getting to the table and forming a consensus may have a certain rational , but that certainly has not stopped the Democrats from demonizing them. Let me be clear, industry has been involved in the health care debate, but mostly by working with the Democrats, certainly not by supporting the Americans showing up at town hall meetings demanding that legislators read bills before they pass them. (What a quaint notion.) In other words the left and the Democratic party leadership are clearly lying or delusional. Pick your poison.