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[H/t Heather]

Blanche Lincoln was complaining today about all those outside group ads that were attacking her, but in the end she says she'll vote for cloture today.

Blue America has been running another massive media blitz in Arkansas demanding give us an up or down vote.

Lincoln: For months now groups from outside my state have assigned various motives for my deliberations on health care and tried to define the meaning of my vote. According to the last tally there has been more than 3.2 million dollars worth of media ads that have been purchased from my home state of Arkansas by groups from outside of our state. certainly none by me. And most with my name in the ad. These outside groups seem to think this is all about my re-election. I simply think they don't know me very well. I'm focused on my opportunity to to influence the final version of health care reform legislation in a way that most helps my state. That's why the people of Arkansas sent me here.
--

I will not allow my decision on this vote to be dictated by pressure from my political opponent nor the liberal interest groups from outside Arkansas that threaten with their money political opposition. The multitudes of emails and ads that we have received, Unbelievable types of threats about what they're going to do and how they're going to behave.

She's trying to feign shock that her name showed up in ads targeted at her in her own state over this issue. Jaysus. Our problem is that we know her too well. If she were truly representing her state, then she would get behind the public option and stop joining with the Republicans, Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu and Lieberman to kill it. She does have a D in her title and she should start acting like one. Why is Lincoln so against the public option and using right-wing language to define it?

She has an opportunity to be part of a great moment in our history. She's a politician looking to survive. She hates that she's running for re-election at this time. Well Blanche, sometimes you have to do the right thing and not put your own political career before the entire country's health care. Right now she's saying she won't vote for it. If she joins with the Holy Joes, then she votes at her own political peril.

Here's Blue America's new ad that is running now.

Here's our Blue America Act Blue fundraising page on health care.

(h/t Heather for the video)

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MarketWatch:

A health-care overhaul proposed by Senate Democrats will cost $849 billion over 10 years, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday, and slash the deficit by $127 billion over the next decade.

The price tag is just under President Barack Obama's target of $900 billion over 10 years.

The estimates, from the Congressional Budget Office, also showed that the bill would reduce the number of uninsured Americans by 31 million people, said the Journal, citing a senior Senate leadership aide.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has been anxiously awaiting the CBO's price tag for the bill before moving to debate on the Senate floor. The first procedural vote could come later this week on the bill. Obama wants to sign a health-care reform bill before the end of the year.

Like a bill that passed the House on Nov. 7, the Senate's bill aims to cover most Americans, bar insurers from denying coverage to sick people, set up insurance "exchanges" where people can shop for coverage and fine those who don't get insurance. It also sets up a government-run insurance plan, expected to enroll about 6 million people.

But Reid faces a number of hurdles in getting a bill through the Senate, including concerns about the measure's cost. Sens. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., and Ben Nelson, D-Neb., are among two of Reid's fellow Democrats who have openly worried about the cost of health-care reform.

Per what I've been told from Senate leadership offices, the Senate health care bill will:

• cut the budget deficit by $127 billion over 10 years
• cut the budget deficit by $650 billion in the second decade
• extend guaranteed coverage to more than 9% of Americans -- including a 31 million person reduction in the uninsured

Reid will probably file cloture on the motion to proceed tomorrow. The CBO's report should go up on the Senate Democrats site shortly.

Our new Blue America ad is running all over Arkansas and people are into it.

Roll Call featured it, so you know Blanche is not a happy camper -- and that's a good thing. She was elected as a Democratic Senator and hasn't said if she'll give the health care bill an up-or-down vote. Simply amazing.

Please join in Blue America's Campaign For Health Care Choice

Roll Call writes:

Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), facing the prospect of a tough re-election bid next year, is under pressure from a liberal activist group to support a motion to proceed on health care reform legislation that is poised to hit the Senate floor next week. Lincoln has been on the fence on whether she would support a bill with a government-funded public insurance option. The Blue America political action committee is hitting statewide Arkansas cable television with a 30-second spot demanding that Lincoln “allow an up-or-down vote on the public option.” “Blanche Lincoln claims to fight for health care reform. But whose interest does she really represent?” the ad’s voiceover says as the spot opens. “Lincoln has taken thousands from PACs from Blue Cross Blue Shield, Cigna, Aetna and United Health Group — over $2 million from the health and insurance industries combined. That’s why 56 percent of voters think these contributions hurt her judgment on health care,” the ad continues. “With one in four Arkansans uninsured, let’s save sponsorships for the race cars. Help Sen. Lincoln get back on track.”

And Digby finds this very good article about the new ad that you helped pay for.

Democratic Strategist:

BlueAmerica's latest Lincoln ad is very tough, and graphically amusing, depicting Senator Lincoln all gussied up like a NASCAR driver, only the ads pasted all over her jumpsuit are for her many health care contributors. Slide the right-side bar at the link down and view three more 'Harry and Louise' style ads depicting a couple at the kitchen table wondering why Sen. Lincoln is so concerned about health insurers, when they can hardly pay their bills. The idea here is to build constituent awareness about her foot-dragging and get them to call her and urge her to get on the side of consumers, who need a public option to have any leverage with private insurers.

Some I guess would argue that these ads may do more harm than good if they alienate Lincoln from her progressive supporters. If she is that petty, however, she would probably vote wrong anyway. So I say it's time for the full-court press. The ads are honest, both in the facts presented and in depicting the utter bewilderment many of her constituents -- especially those Democrats who voted for her -- are feeling at her reluctance to even allow a vote on a measure that would let maybe 10 percent of Americans chose government health insurance over private insurance. Will Lincoln be a corporate lackey or champion of the people? Maddow puts the campaign to win Lincoln's support in perspective right here.

Howie Klein has a great post up detailing exactly where the ads are playing and in what cities.

Mike Stark catches up with Blanche Lincoln in Congress and asks her if she'll join the Republican filibuster. She has been virtually silent throughout the whole health care debate and Mike does a great job of getting her to say something on the record. What she said of course was nothing.

Stark: Can you see yourself filibustering or joining a filibuster?

Lincoln: I don't even know what the bill is going to be and I'm going to do what I think is most important for Arkansans and that is to look at the bill, to see if it's going to be helpful to Arkansans and the country in expanding health care...

She knows what's going on in this debate and gives a typical non-answer about supporting the public option like many have given up to this point. We at Blue America are running a brand new ad all over her state starting today so we can help her decide that filibustering health care is not in any one's best interests except the health insurance corporations that she's taken huge contributions from.

Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post writes:

The squeeze is on for Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) on health care in the form of a new series of ads paid for by the liberal Blue America PAC that cast the Arkansas Democrat as bought and paid for by insurers. "Blanche Lincoln claims to fight for health care reform but whose interests does she really represent," asks the ad's narrator before noting that Lincoln has taken more than $2 million in campaign contributions from the health and insurance industries. The narrator concludes the ad by asking viewers to call Lincoln and "demand she allow an up or down vote on the public option." (This is the fourth ad paid for by Blue America targeting Lincoln this year.)

Polling shows Lincoln, who is up for re-election in 2010, holding relatively slim margins over a series of unknown Republican candidates. Lincoln's dilemma? How to walk the line between the conservative leanings of the Razorback State -- Obama took just 39 percent there in 2009 -- and the increasingly vocal and well-funded left within her own party who see the inclusion of a public option as a sine qua non for health care reform.

Her primary is the reason we targeted her originally and it's worked out very well so far.

Please help us continue running this ad and many more to come and join in on Blue America's Campaign for Health Care Choice. Donations are much appreciated.

And Digby writes:

Perhaps Lincoln should start worrying just a bit about what will happen if her Democratic base stays home. The numbers aren't looking all that good for her right now.

She's between little rock and a hard place but it seems to me that's easily solved at this point. She should vote for cloture, thus appeasing her base and then she can vote against the bill if she needs to appeal to neanderthals who want people to die quickly.

Believe me, none of her constituents will hold it against her. Most people think cloture is unpasteurized sour cream. And they like it.

C&Ler Ross from Arkansas writes in about our new Blue America ad directed at Sen. Blanche Lincoln:

I am a resident of Little Rock, AR, and Sen. Blanche Lincoln never, ever responds to my emails. Sen. Pryor (who’s actually more conservative than Ms. Blank) and Rep. Snyder always reply, whether they agree with me or not. Hell, I’m even married to a gal from Lincoln’s home town and my in-laws are still friends with her family. She is in her own bubble and getting, what I believe, to be bad campaign advice. For some reason, she thinks she can garner some Republican votes (no way) by opposing any kind of public option but all she is doing is completely losing her base of liberals and moderates.

Arkansas politics is a funny monster. The voters here respond to leadership. Period. I’m afraid Ms. Blank ain’t up to it.

Keep them coming Arkansas.

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Blue America just produced a new ad that highlights the many payoffs she has received from the health Insurance industry and demands that she starts representing her constituents who unequivocally support the public option. I'm not much of a NASCAR fan, but you can see that the comparison we use in this ad matches her role well.

If you can, please help us to be able to blanket the entire state of Arkansas with this ad, because for a Democratic Senator to filibuster health-care reform is to become an active member of the teabagger/Republican party. She needs to vote for cloture and give Americans the right to an up-or-down vote and to be true to the will of the good people of Arkansas.

Howie Klein writes:

No, as we've been telling you all year, there's only one weak link worth trying to beat into submission: Arkansas' corrupt and reactionary-- don't those two terms always seem to find a way of cuddling up with each other?-- senior senator, Blanche Lincoln. Blue America has run TV spots against Lincoln all summer and fall and she's watched her re-elect numbers dwindle down to a place where if a serious opponent-- i.e., one with big bucks to buy advertising-- jumped into the race, she would lose. She may lose anyway, even though her current opponents would probably do better if they toured together as a carnival show. Yesterday the RNC started trying to push her to vote with Republicans-- as she so often does-- and against health care reform.

This week Blue America and our friends at Donkey on the Edge have a brand new ad for Arkansas voters to look at-- the fourth in our series-- and the message is very different from the Republicans'. By all means, be the first to view it-- and please consider making a contribution of our Campaign for Health Care Choice page so we can run it deep and wide.

If you live in Arkansas and contact Senator Lincoln, please let me know. Contact me at crooksandliars-AT-gmail.com. We need your help and so does America.

Adam Green finds this gem.

Does this ad from the Chamber of Commerce make you furious?

There are like only 200 views of this hideous ad. I hate to post it, but I think some of you who have donated to our Blanche Lincoln action need to be aware of what you have supported and the conservative forces that stand against us. The Chamber of Commerce supports the squishy Conservadem Blanche Lincoln (who is squatting the with Backus Dogs) with a new ad that actually has the audacity to say she's standing up for working families. If she were, then she'd be on board with the public option.

This is our ad running against it right now in heavy rotation in Lincoln's back yard.

As Howie Klein says: The ads run for another 8 days and they are running on CNN, Fox (minus Glenn Beck) and MSNBC in every part of the state.

This ad is part of our Blue America's Campaign for Health Care Choice.
We need your support and have several more actions on the way.

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Rachel Maddow highlighted our Blue America ad which calls out Blanche Lincoln over her stance on the public option.

A Bad Day to Oppose Health Reform

Rachel Maddow: And of course there has been a barrage of ads taken out by progressive groups targeting conservative and potentially vulnerable Democrats like Senator Blanche Lincoln and Congressman Mike Ross both of Arkansas both of who have said they oppose a public health insurance option. A brand new ad produced by the political action committee Blue America just started running last night.

...Ad: We can barely pay our bills and Blanche Lincoln is worried about the insurance companies?...

Maddow: This is what a full court press for health reform looks like. And the terrible, no good, very bad day for the anti-health reform forces today is what it looks when a full court press is working.

There is a full-court press going on and I want to thank the blogosphere for not sitting back and letting Conservadems dictate the terms of the debate.

Digby writes:

We don't know what Lincoln's going to do. She, along with Conrad and Baucus, are the only Democrats to vote against all forms of the PO in the Finance Committee. It's hard to imagine that she's going to vote for a plan that contains one on the floor. But there is no reason that she shouldn't allow her party to have an up or down vote even if she votes no in the end. It's all about cloture at this point and we need to keep the pressure on.

Cloture, cloture cloture.

And as Howie points out, even the very shaky Rasmussen polling outfit shows she's in big trouble now:

...it's still worth noting that they are another firm, even if a compromised one, showing that Blanche Lincoln is likely to be looking for a new line of work next year.

Arkansas' Blanche Lambert Lincoln trails all four of her leading Republican challengers in the first Rasmussen Reports Election 2010 survey in the state.

Lincoln fails to get 50% of the vote in any of the match-ups, and any incumbent who falls short of that level is considered vulnerable.

And don't forget to chip in a few bucks if you can, so we can run more ads against anybody who opposes the public option.

(h/t Heather at Video Cafe for making the video clip.)

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(h/t Heather)

Keith Olbermann discussed how destructive Blanche Lincoln has been over her non-support of the public option as she sits on the Senate Finance Committee even though Arkansas residents favor the public option by a wide margin.

Olbermann: ...others who act like Republicans who still call themselves Democrats -- Senator Blanche Lincoln for instance telling Roll Call that she's all for the public option so long as it is not a pubic option, ostensibly so she can sell it back home in Arkansas. Her quotes: I'm not supportive of a government run and government supported public option. That would be the definition of a public option. She adds,

It's got to be competitive. It's got to create choice for people.

Last month 55% of those people in her state surveyed by Research 2000 were in favor of a public option. The public option is there to create choice and bring down the price of health care for Americans. What is she talking about?

Blue America was the first group to target Lincoln back in June with an ad campaign, and now, as the health-care reform debate winds down, we're buying another round of ads to run in her state for the next two weeks that will inform her constituents once again that she is not working for the people who elected her, but for the health industrial complex that sends funds to her campaign. It's not a coincidence that her poll numbers have dropped big time since we started our ad campaign -- and as time has gone by, she finally became more outspoken about her non-support for the public option. It wasn't a surprise that she tried to stay out of the spotlight as much as possible so that she could remain invisible until she cast her vote, but that was never going to happen.

Please donate to Blue America's public option Lincoln ads if you can so we can keep the pressure on Blanche and make her realize that it's the voters who she's supposed to be working for...

From The Colbert Report:

Senator Max Baucus will pay for your medical bills from the $3.2 million he's received from the health care industry.

Yesterday, as expected, Lincoln voted against the public option in the Senate Finance Committee -- twice. She has a history of always sticking with her campaign donors when what they want conflicts with what Arkansas voters want. In this case only 38% of Arkansas voters -- almost all of them Republicans -- oppose the public option. 81% of Arkansas Democrats support the public option -- as do Arkansas voters. During the committee markup process yesterday, John Ensign taunted the Democrats on the committee by asking them why they couldn't pass a public option in the Senate with such large majorities in the country wanting it. Unlike almost everything Ensign said yesterday, this is a worthwhile question to ponder.

In fact, when polling companies have asked voters in conservative-leaning states and districts if they will be more or less likely to vote for a candidate who votes to kill the public option, the answer is consistently coming back that it would make them less likely to vote for that candidate. Lincoln can hardly afford to lose any of her base. Her unfavorability rating is 49% (favorables are down to 43%) and so far the only thing keeping her from joining the ranks of the political walking dead is the fact that the Republicans can't come up with a credible opponent. No one is polling the impact of the two independents in the race, Trevor Drown and Green Party nominee John Gray. Gray, a single payer advocate didn't mince words in his analysis of what happened yesterday in the Senate:

I’m not at all surprised. She has a rather large campaign chest, almost half of which is from the medical industries. The fact that she is loyal to her sponsors is not at all surprising... Eliminate the health care insurance industry ... and you would save enough money to cover every man woman and child in the United States. Nobody blinks an eyelash if we lay off 40,000 autoworkers, who actually produce something. These health insurance brokers, it’s hard to say what they produce.

This afternoon while Grassley was babbling on incoherently, I took a short break and ran down to the Blue America P.O. Box, where I found the latest report of our cable TV ads running, this time in Benton and Washington counties. The ads ran on a Thursday and Friday night when she was speaking in the area. They ran on Larry King Live, The Rachel Maddow Show, The Colbert Report, The O'Reilly Factor, Headline News Countdown With Keith Olberman, Hardball, The Chainsaw Massacre, Anderson Cooper 360, Showbiz Tonight, The Ed Show, Fast Money, CNN Newsroom and lots of other similar programs-- Nancy Grace and Shepard Smith but no Glenn Beck.

Keep in mind that Tom Harkin told The Hill yesterday that he feels he has enough Democrats now that Massachusetts has their second seat covered, to break the Republican filibuster, get a bill with a public option onto the floor and pass it with 51 votes. That isn't reconciliation; that's simple cloture and majority rule. Would anyone break from the party and vote with the Republicans to filibuster the bill? ben Nelson and Blanche Lincoln are the only two who could conceivably keep the public option from even reaching the floor. Lincoln, who also opposes climate and energy legislation and has already declared that she will join the Republicans in filibustering Employee Free Choice, is not a good player. She doesn't deserve another term. You say, "neither do Nelson, Baucus or Conrad?" I agree. But they're not up for election in 2010. Lincoln is.

We'd like to run some more ads. In fact, we're going to. If we raise enough money we'll put them on network TV. If not, we'll keep running them on cable. The 3 ads are on the Blue America Campaign For Health Care Choice page, which is also where you can donate to the cost of running more spots if you're so inclined.

John Amato:

Blue America helped bring Blanche's approval ratings down with our initial ad campaign against her months ago when nobody was talking about her and we want to keep her accountable. Campaign For Health Care Choice has rocked and I want to thank you. Keep helping if you can.

Daily Kos Research has a new poll out on Arkansas, and Blanche Lincoln has taken a big hit ever since Blue America came after her.
Daily Kos/Research 2000 Arkansas Poll

2010 Senate race

Blanche Lincoln (D) 44
Gilbert Baker (R) 37

Blanche Lincoln (D) 45
Curtis Coleman (R) 37

Blanche Lincoln (D) 46
Tom Cox (R) 29

Blanche Lincoln (D) 47
Kim Hendren (R) 28

Lincoln is under the 50 percent "safe" mark for incumbents, despite facing a lineup of potential foes unknown by 75-85 percent of poll respondents. There is certainly room for those Republicans to make gains -- or lose support -- as they become better known. Still, Lincoln's electoral prospects won't be harmed by the health care debate, as the public option polls extremely well in Arkansas.

Do you favor or oppose creating a government-administered health insurance option that anyone can purchase to compete with private insurance plans?

Favor Oppose Not Sure
All 55 38 7
Dem 81 14 5
Rep 22 71 7
Ind 56 34 10

The major reason we first targeted Lincoln back in July was that she's running for reelection in 2010, while many of the ConservaDems on the Senate Finance Committee did not have to face their voters.

It's amazing that she's under the 50% threshold now. We'll be running another wave of TV ads coming up, and I wanted to thank all our readers for making this possible. You can still donate to Blue America's Health Care for Choice Act Blue page so we can keep fighting for the public option

UPDATE: Change Congress has an action against AR's Blue Dog Mike Ross.

Today, we are announcing our latest TV ad -- calling out the "Blue Dog Democrat" leader, Rep. Mike Ross (Arkansas), for his special-interest contributions from the health industry.

Click here to see the ad and help us air it in Arkansas.

This ad includes a substantial cameo by Keith Olbermann, and for those of you who know my voice, you'll recognize a certain narrator.

We're all keeping the heat on.

I've been reading the coverage about the public option remarks yesterday, and I think I understand the likely scenario now.

First of all, don't panic. Believe it or not, Sebelius is right: The public option is not the only way to get accountability into the health care system. And a rose by any other name smells as sweet.

That said, President Obama is still claiming to back the public option.

Linda Douglass (comm director for White House Office of Health Reform): "Nothing has changed,” said Linda Douglass, communications director for the White House Office of Health Reform. “The president has always said that what is essential is that health insurance reform must lower costs, ensure that there are affordable options for all Americans and it must increase choice and competition in the health insurance market. He believes the public option is the best way to achieve those goals.”

More:

Jim Messina (White House deputy chief of staff): "Nothing has changed. POTUS [President of the United States] has always said that what is essential is that health insurance reform must lower costs, ensure that there are affordable options for all Americans and increase choice and competition. He believes the public option is the best way to achieve those goals."

But those quotes yesterday weren't accidental; that isn't how this game is played. So this quote from Chuck Todd seems right:

The White House has been hinting at this for weeks if not months. When Kent Conrad … came out with that co-op idea, I can tell you, insiders at the White House said: ‘Boy, this is going to gain a lot of traction.’ And those conservative Democrats -- this is not about getting a bipartisan bill out of the Senate, Lester. This is about getting folks like Ben Nelson in Nebraska; Joe Lieberman in Connecticut; Blanche Lincoln, Mark Pryor of Arkansas -- getting them on board. And a full-fledged public option was making them hesitant. Co-op will be the option that probably gets ‘em done. And that’s why the White House is allowing themselves wiggle room.

Seems to me this is more of a re-branding than an actual surrender. These senators are hesitant about the public option but will almost certainly embrace something that sounds more voter friendly.

Remember, the person to watch is Howard Dean. I know he's explained why co-ops don't work, and I think the newest version will be called a "co-op" - but that doesn't mean it works the same way.

So I'm waiting to see what Dr. Dean thinks of the finished product.

That irresistible line about the caveman, by the way, came from a reddit commenter. He was probably feeling celebratory over the fact that GEICO pulled all its advertising from Glenn Beck's hateful Fox TV show. And GEICO isn't the only company to have decided that advertising on the show of a vicious hate monger inciting violence and racial hatred is a bad marketing idea. Men's Wearhouse and Sargento are the latest companies to ask Fox to stop running their ads on TV. And today-- Blue America did the same.

Blue America is running a second wave of ads on Arkansas TV explaining Blanche Lincoln's duplicitous role in the health care debate. After looking at the logs of the first wave and noticing that some of our ads in Little Rock and Pine Bluff ran on Beck's show, we instructed the cable networks to not run any more ads on his programs in the towns we are advertising in this week-- the towns where Lincoln is doing her health care forums. Here's the note the Blue America media buyer sent to the Arkansas cable networks:

Blue America PAC has instructed me to tell you to not place any of their advertising within the Glenn Beck program on Fox News Channel for their upcoming flight.

There is a national boycott of his advertisers ongoing. as Mr. Beck has been promoting racism and violence on his program. We do not want to appear to support his efforts in any way, shape or form.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

Jacqueline Propps

As for Men's Wearhouse, DailyKos published a letter yesterday from Matt Stringer, the vp of marketing/creative services:

Thank you for contacting Men’s Wearhouse and bringing to our attention your concerns with the Glenn Beck program on Fox News. While we support free speech and do not make advertising decisions based on our own personal ideologies, after reviewing his recent incendiary comments we have decided to remove our advertising from his program. We hope that this decision will allow you to continue to patronize Men’s Wearhouse. I would encourage you to please share our decision with anyone else who may have expressed a similar concern.

And Media Matters published a similar note from Pat Lombardo from the Sargento Consumer Affairs Department:

We deeply appreciate your reaching out to us and sharing your comments and concerns about Sargento ads appearing during The Glenn Beck Show. We sat down with the marketing department to talk about it and I learned that we buy time periods not specific programs. But in any event, they've made the decision to exclude that program from our future ad rotation. Simply stated, Sargento ads won't be airing during that show. Again, thanks for contacting us.

As Color Of Change, the online civil rights group that initiated the boycott, points out, these defections come on the heels of pull outs by LexisNexis-owned Lawyers.com, Procter & Gamble, Progressive Insurance and SC Johnson.

So what's wrong with Travelocity? Why do they insist on still underwriting the hatred, bigotry and violence? As a reader pointed out on my travel blog this morning, "perhaps someone could clue Travelocity into the fact that racists aren't the biggest travelers..."

CNN has a similar type of problem with their own in house racist sociopath, Lou Dobbs and, according to MediaBistro.com the network is moving away from using Hate Talk Radio commentators on the air from now on, although they still refuse to fire Dobbs (who also hosts a hate talk radio show).

TVNewser has learned, and a CNN spokesperson confirms, that in his morning editorial meeting today, CNN/U.S. president Jon Klein asked his show producers to avoid booking talk radio hosts. "Complex issues require world class reporting," Klein is quoted as saying, adding that talk radio hosts too often add to the noise, and that what they say is "all too predictable."

Yesterday I spent over 4 hours at a town hall meeting hosted by Rep. Adam Schiff in Alhambra. The disruptive clowns who had come to prevent a discussion were shouting slogans straight from the Astro-Turf outfits' talking points and their world views were clearly formed by Hate Talk Radio and Fox "News." These people are hysterically opposed to immigrants' babies getting health care and opposed to the government making it illegal for Insurance companies to discriminate against people with pre-existing conditions. What they chant instead is "Tort Reform" and what they mutter is divisive and racist epithets most Americans thought went out of style with Lester Maddox, George Wallace and the cavemen.

UPDATE: Bad News For Teabaggers-- You're Being Played

The teabaggers like to take their thumbs out of their asses and jump up and down in front of the TV cameras claiming how real and genuine their grassroots protests are. I talked to so many of them with long lists of legitimate grievances-- one woman was suing her insurance company and very angry man with strange eyes is suing the gold company Glenn Beck shills for on radio that he claims cheated him-- but their grievances had nothing to do with what they disdainfully call "ObamaCare." How did they get from there to here? It wasn't via Pluto. According to a former Insurance Industry executive, Wendell Potter of CIGNA, the insurance companies are indeed the unseen hand behind the curtain manipulating the righteous-- or self-righteous-- indignation of the angry crowds getting their matching orders from hate-mongers like Glenn Beck, Lou Dobbs, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity ,etc.

"The industry is up to the same dirty tricks this year," Potter said at a Capitol news conference after meeting with House Rules Committee Chairwoman Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.), an avid supporter of the Democrats' plans for a healthcare overhaul.

"When you hear someone complaining about traveling down a 'slippery slope to socialism,' some insurance flack, like I used to be, wrote that," Potter added.

Potter said during his 20 years in the insurance business, the industry would funnel money to large public firms who would create front groups and find friendly voices in conservative media.

In particular, he cited front groups created to fight "Patients' Bill of Rights" legislation in the 1990s, as well as a campaign to discredit the Michael Moore film Sicko, which harshly criticized the industry.

Slaughter joined in the attack, saying "the notion that this is going to be something devilish comes from the people who would lose money on it."

Blue America's first push at Blanche Lincoln proved very worth while. As Greg Sargent reported, we forced her to write an op-ed in which she shifted positions on the public option. We raised almost 28K and ran our first ad for two weeks in heavy rotation on CNN, MSNBC and all the major cable networks in Arkansas. With Max Baucus delaying the Senate Finance Committee bill for as long as he has, Blanche is now shifting back to her old position. Haven't you noticed that you never see Lincoln appear on television to express her POV? She's up for re-election, hence with her keeping a low profile.

Howie Klein explains:

Lincoln reacted quickly, making noises that sounded like she might take the side of her state's working families for a change, instead of the big Insurance companies that buy her fealty. But, alas, they were only noises. Yesterday one of our friends in Hot Springs forwarded us a form letter she got from Lincoln's office. As though it were written by a real Democrat, it acknowledges that there's a problem. But the conclusion is very disappointing, some of it coming straight from Insurance Industry Talking Points that are routinely parroted by anti-health care fanatics like Mike Pence (R-IN), Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Paul Ryan (R-WI):

While I support government programs like Medicaid, Medicare and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP, or ARKids First,” as it is known in Arkansas) that provide coverage for specific vulnerable and hard-to-insure populations, I do not support moving America to a nationalized single-payer or “government-run” health care system. Instead, in health care reform I will ensure Arkansans and Americans will have the freedom of choice to keep their current insurance plans and current doctors or choose another plan that better meets their needs.

Well, it's time to see if we can raise enough money to run a second wave of our ad. The next one will be the ad I have embedded in this post. It was #3 called "Bailout" Please donate here if you can.
She's also doing some town halls and we can use the good people of Arkansas to go there and represent Blue America and C&L.
Here's her schedule.

Lincoln will travel the state throughout the annual congressional work period. The following is Lincoln’s schedule of events around the state for August 11-15:

Tuesday, August 11—Little Rock, Malvern

9:10 a.m., Keynote address, Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce/Associated Industries of Arkansas Seminar, “Connecting Your Business with China.” Lincoln will join the State Chamber/AIA, Arkansas Economic Development Commission, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Arkansas World Trade Center, and business and community leaders to welcome the Chinese Ambassador to the United States. Capital Hotel, 111 W. Markham Street, Little Rock.

12:00 p.m., Speak, Lions Club of Malvern. Western Sizzlin Steak House, 621 Martin Luther King Boulevard, Malvern.

Wednesday, August 12—Little Rock

9:00 a.m., Speak, “Jobs for Arkansas” Business Aviation Forum at Dassault Falcon Jet. Lincoln will join Governor Beebe, Senator Pryor, Dassault Falcon employees, and other community and business leaders to discuss the importance of Arkansas’s aviation industry. Dassault Falcon Jet Company, 3801 East 10th Street, Little Rock.

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