On November 3rd, there will be a Constitutional Amendment on the ballot in Ohio. This is no ordinary ballot initiative. Its very existence and marketing has been bought and paid for --to the tune of millions--by national and international agri-business corporations, such as Pioneer Hi-Bred International (owned by DuPont, a "developer and supplier of advanced plant genetics"--healthy!--and grantee of 100K to the effort),the National Pork Producers Council (113K), and the United Egg Producers (200K!).

(Join our Facebook Group and help us stop this travesty!)

Now why, you ask, would these Big Agra players get involved in a state issue, and to support a campaign that is for touchy feely things like "food safety" and "local control?" I'm not sure, but it might be that this corruption of Ohio's Constitution will provide "food safety" much like George W. Bush provided "healthy forests," "clear skies" and a "mission accomplished." In other words--and I know this will shock you--they're lying. And they're lying with millions of dollars they've acquired, by being, like their "products," pigs at a trough.

So what is Issue 2, what will it do, and why should you care about it if you're not a resident of the Buckeye State? It's simple: Issue 2 was put on the ballot overnight by state legislators bought off by Big Agri-Business and their mouthpiece here, the Ohio Farm Bureau. Why? So that they can corrupt Ohio's Constitution to give the Governor the power to appoint a board of unaccountable agri-business cronies to make decisions in smoke-filled rooms about all farming practices in Ohio.

I know what you're thinking. Unaccountable, corporate-influenced governing has worked out so well with TARP money and preemptive war, we might as well try it with farm policy.

With Issue 2's passage, those only interested in their bottom line can (and you can bet will) stuff millions more animals into smaller and smaller crates together, increasing the likelhood of H1N1 and E. Coli outbreaks and mutations and their capacity for animal cruelty. They can ignore the waste caused by big factory farms that contaminates the water we drink. They can allow workers to be exploited and placed in situations that endanger their health, while putting family farms--held for generations--out of business.

And why should you care if this passes in Ohio? For all the reasons above, but also...because you're next. This amendment was a reaction to successful efforts to rein in their greedy, dangerous and abusive practices in California (Prop 2), Arizona and Florida, among others. If they can use the camouflage of bought off Democratic and Republican Establishments, millions of dollars in lies, and an off-year low-turnout election to enshrine their corporate malpractice into state constitutions, they can fly under the radar while endangering our health, undermining the people's right to petition (another amendment would be needed to overturn it if passed, as the new board's decisions would supersede ballot initiatives, legislative decisions and opinions by the State Department of Agriculture) and spiking their profits.

How can you help? Well, we only have 10% of their budget. But we have the grassroots energy. We have you.

So please join our Facebook group. Tweet this. Blog it. Call and email everyone you know in Ohio. And be prepared when this garbage dressed up as a gift inevitably makes its way to your state.

(Watch this video for more on this - the 1st minute and then from 5:22 on)

Full Disclosure: I am proud to be a consultant in the effort to beat back Issue 2 in Ohio

It's pretty clear that any health care "reform" bill will be a sorry compromise between what the New York Times on Sunday so delicately calls "organized interests."

This is important, because as you may have figured out, we're the only non-organized interest. No one is inviting us to the table to have a reasonable discussion (and no, allowing us to leave comments on the White House website is not a "discussion.") That means the proposals that are most likely to cut costs and improve efficiency are least likely to remain, and the ones most likely to remain are the ones that stick it to us.

For now, that seems inevitable. Although Congress does have its inspirational members, the legislative body is still a wholly-owned subsidiary of the banking and insurance industries. We're more likely to see progress in legislative tweaks after the bill is finally passed:

WASHINGTON — As the health care debate moves to the floor of Congress, most of the serious proposals to fulfill President Obama’s original vow to curb costs have fallen victim to organized interests and parochial politics.

Peter R. Orszag, the White House budget director, says containing costs will be a priority as health care legislation advances.

And now the last two initiatives with real bite that are still in contention — a scaled-back “Cadillac tax” on high-cost health plans and a nonpartisan Medicare budget-cutting commission — are under furious assault.

Most economists’ favorite idea for slowing the growth of health care spending was ending the income tax exemption for employer-paid health insurance to make lower-cost plans more attractive. But that would hurt workers with big benefit plans, and a labor-union lobbying blitz helped kill that idea by the Fourth of July.

Lobbying by doctors, hospitals and other health care providers, meanwhile, dimmed the prospects of various proposals to cut into their incomes, including allowing government negotiation of Medicare drug prices and creating a government insurer with the muscle to lower fee payments.

“The lobbyists are winning,” said Representative Jim Cooper, a conservative Tennessee Democrat who teaches health policy.

Total health care costs in the last 20 years have doubled to about 16 percent of the economy, with no signs of tapering. Along with universal coverage, Mr. Obama has made controlling those costs a central pillar of his health care overhaul, calling the current course “unsustainable.” The effort is a pivotal test of his campaign promise to break the stranglehold of special interests.

In his weekly radio address on Saturday, Mr. Obama applauded the bill set for a vote next week in the Senate Finance Committee. “By attacking waste and fraud within the system,” he said, “it will slow the growth in health care costs, without adding a dime to our deficits.”

In an interview, Peter R. Orszag, the White House budget director and the official most associated with the drive to cut costs, singled out the proposed Medicare commission and the “Cadillac tax” as evidence of progress. “A key priority now,” Mr. Orszag said, “is to make sure cost containment holds up as we move through the legislative process."

Neither element appears in any of the other four health care bills on Capitol Hill, and both face dug-in resistance in the House.

Although the bills contain other measures aimed at medical costs, most of the surviving ones do not antagonize any organized interest. Among them are voluntary efficiency measures like encouraging the coordination of medical records, disseminating information comparing the effectiveness of treatments and various pilot projects.

White House officials argue that in any case it is prudent to start with such tests, and that many could be expanded to more comprehensive programs. But their real impact is hard to gauge, and the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office assigns them little weight. (The budget office credited the Finance Committee bill with reducing the federal deficit, but how much it will slow the growth of total public and private health spending is another question.)

The tax on gold-plated insurance plans is the last vestige of most economists’ favorite idea, eliminating the tax exemption for employer plans. The finance bill would impose a 40 percent excise tax on insurance plans that cost more than $8,000 a year for an individual or $21,000 for a family.

The bill has aroused the frantic opposition of labor and business lobbyists who appear to have found friends in the Capitol. On Wednesday, 157 House Democrats — a majority of the party — signed a letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi opposing the tax.

“It has no legs in the House,” said Representative Pete Stark, the California Democrat who is chairman of the health subcommittee of the tax-writing panel.

The proposed Medicare commission, aimed at providers instead of consumers, is becoming a case study in the political difficulty of reducing medical payments.

The commission was intended to side-step the interest-group pressure that often stymies Congress. Modeled after the nonpartisan commission for military base closings, it would present a roster of Medicare cuts that Congress could block only with legislation.

But along the way, the White House and the Senate Finance Committee have cut deals for political support with lobbyists that may circumscribe the cost cuts, potentially including the recommendations of the commission.

I went through this a few years ago. I deposited a check right before a holiday weekend at an ATM and they didn't clear the check for ten days - even though my online account already showed it as cleared. This is what debit cards do now: They let you take money out that isn't there.

They charged me $35 for every single one of my debit card transactions (it came to more than $400). When I called my bank's customer service hotline, they told me it was in my service agreement that it could take 10 days to clear something deposited at a "foreign" ATM - even though they all belonged to the same STAR network. I argued with them, but they wouldn't budge.

So I called their corporate communications officer, told them I was writing a story about my experience (noting I'd found a class-action suit filed against them for this very thing) and asked for an official statement to include in my piece. Magically, my charges disappeared and I got an apology. "You've been a customer for such a long time, we'll make an exception this time," I was told.

Isn't America great?

Controversial bank account fees, which have fattened banks' bottom lines at the expense of vulnerable consumers, are rapidly becoming a black eye for the industry.

Under siege are the fees charged to consumers who spend more than they have in their accounts, whether by check, debit card or at the ATM.

Last week, four of the nation's largest banks said they would scale back some of their overdraft policies. Their efforts, while meaningful, have failed to appease lawmakers, including powerful Senate Banking Committee Chair Chris Dodd, D-Conn., who is preparing legislation to crack down on what he calls a pattern of "abusive" practices.

At first glance, banks' practices seem reasonable enough: Overdraw your account, and the bank will cover the transaction — for a fee. The problem is, most banks don't ask consumers if they want their transactions automatically paid. In recent years, as banks realized how lucrative these fees can be, they've made it easier for consumers to overdraw their accounts, to the tune of $36.7 billion in revenue last year, USA TODAY research has found.

Banks have done this by covering debit card transactions as small as $1 and charging a fee as high as $35. Some also charge fees before consumers overdraw by deducting a purchase when it's made, instead of when it clears. And they've processed transactions from highest to lowest dollar amount — which empties consumers' accounts quicker and triggers more overdrafts.

Ironically, the changes banks have made to their overdraft policies are only fueling calls to reform the entire industry. Overdraft coverage can be less regulated and cost more than other high-cost (and equally criticized) options, including payday loans, in an estimated $70 billion short-term credit market. On average, consumers will pay a fee of $26.68 every time they overdraw their account, according to data from Moebs Services, an economic research firm. That means that if consumers overdraw by $100, they'd pay an annual percentage rate (APR) of 696%, if the credit is paid back in two weeks, according to a USA TODAY analysis. This compares with an APR of 450% on a $100 payday loan with an average fee of $17.25.

"When consumers (overdraw) recurrently, it is a credit product, and they're paying eye-popping rates," says Sheila Bair, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. chair, who is pushing for banks to get consumers' permission before covering overdrafts, for a fee, and to disclose APRs.

Barney Frank is weakening the administration's proposed regulation of predatory lending because, well, the conservative Blue Dogs won't go along with the original version. The industry, of course, is taking that as encouragement, and they're pushing for an amendment that would neuter state consumer protection laws:

He would also drop language requiring providers to adhere to a “reasonableness” standard in offering products; in other words, financial institutions would have been required to asses whether there products were clearly understandable to consumers. That language was seen as too vague and would leave providers open to legal challenges.

The Administration is willing to go along. In an appearance Sept. 23 before Frank’s committee, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner acknowledged some of the criticism of the Administration’s proposals and called Frank’s proposed changes, “a pragmatic helpful way to make sure you have the choice for protection.”

“There are lots of different ways to make sure that you don’t create too much unbridled authority that would be damaging to what’s an important part of our financial system,” Geithner said, according to the Associated Press.

Frank is also seeking to clarify just who would be regulated by the new agency, to address complaints by the US Chamber of Commerce that every small business that provides credit to its customers, or the service providers such as CPAs or advertisers who work for them, would be regulated by the new agency. Administration sources from economics chief Larry Summers on down have dismissed those criticisms as nothing more than “scare tactics” but they have nonetheless been effective. In an effort to eliminate that confusion and take it off the table as an issue, Frank will propose language that clarifies that many such businesses will not be included in the new agency’s mandate. Only bona fide providers of consumer finance offerings will be included.

In proposing the changes, Frank is “bowing to political reality” says Howard Glaser, a former top lobbyist for the Mortgage Bankers Association who now runs his own firm. In a note to clients, he points out that the Administration’s proposal was running into trouble with conservative Blue Dog Democrats.

They appear to have raised many of the concerns that have been voiced by the financial services industry and its allies at the US Chamber of Commerce, who have been lobbying heavily against the plan for the last couple of months. They argue that the proposed agency would cut back on the availability of credit, discourage innovation, and tie up many banks and small businesses in a new web of regulation. The Chamber and the community bankers have been taking the lead in fighting off the Administration’s proposal, since small business folk and local bankers who serve them win far more sympathy than do big banks and mortgage brokers at the moment.

Not that Frank’s moves are likely to slow them down. Even amidst news reports this AM that Frank was pulling back on the proposal, the Chamber announced a press conference for tomorrow morning once again criticizing the agency and how it would hurt small business.

Health care costs are exploding. A robust public option would create competition that would lower costs, and increase access to life-saving medicine.

But wait! I have an idea! Let's eliminate the public option, and for good measure, take away the rights of the victims of medical malpractice by passing "tort reform." Even though, it um, doesn't work. You know, if by work, you mean lower health-care costs and do anything to help regular people afford health insurance.

But if you've been trained by "Permanent Majority" Rove, and your real purpose is to 1) Keep your corporate slop-providers happy 2) Punish a group that often gives donations to Democrats (lawyers) and 3) Pretend you actually care a whit about people who don't get Yacht Shoe Weekly, then bingo! You have your made up issue.

Thankfully, the American Association for Justice has begun a campaign to tell the truth about this issue, about the 98,000 people who lose their lives each year due to preventable medical error:

The American Association for Justice announced today it is launching what it called the first phase of a nationwide ad campaign "to educate lawmakers about the epidemic of preventable medical errors and how tort law changes won't lower costs or cover the uninsured."

The ads, running in Washington publications and on online news sites, say the estimated 98,000 deaths from preventable medical errors is "like two 737s crashing every day for a whole year."

But the ad concludes:"Would we blame the passengers or the airlines?"

Well, we know who Republicans and Blue Dogs would blame. The passengers. The pilots. The unions. Gay Marriage. Stem-cell research. But never the big corporations who make the planes.

Thankfully, we know better.

Disclosure: I'm damn spankin' proud to be working with the American Association for Justice to protect patients' rights.

Think Progress does a little digging and finds a lot of right wing groups under the covers with AHIP, the health insurance lobbying association. Whoever would have suspected such a thing?

Earlier this week, the Wall Street Journal reported that AHIP — the multimillion dollar lobbying juggernaut for the health insurance industry — has mobilized 50,000 employees to lobby Congress to defeat the public option. ThinkProgress has learned that AHIP’s grassroots lobbying is being managed by the corporate consulting firm Democracy Data & Communications. DDC has made a name for itself as one of the most effective stealth lobbying firms. Earlier this summer, DDC was caught by reporters using a front group called “Citizens for a Safe Alexandria” to attack the Obama administration for seeking to prosecute Guantanamo Bay prisoners in Alexandria, VA.

According to the server-information hub Domaintools.com, the AHIP grassroots outreach website AHIPAdvocacy.org is hosted on a server owned by DDC. Though DDC conceals the hosting of its other websites using a service called DomainsByProxy, ThinkProgress has obtained a list of the domains hosted on DDC servers. A review of this data shows that DDC maintains the grassroots outreach websites for large health insurance companies, but also for big tobacco and Koch Industries:

– phillipmorrisusaactioncenter.org (Altria)
– tobaccoissues.com (Altria)
– kochpac.com (Koch Industries)
– aetnavotes.com (Aetna)
– healthactionnetwork.org (WellPoint)
– humanapartners.com (Humana)
– ahipadvocacy.org (AHIP)

DDC is a firm that promises “high impact” outreach programs to not only influence the grassroots, but “change attitudes for the long term.” As the Washington Post explains, DDC pays over 500 contract workers to “spend much of their day telephoning people around the country and asking them to sign letters to Congress that press for legislation.” The firm helped orchestrate “grassroots” support for President Bush’s push to privatize Social Security, and helped manage online efforts for the right-wing attack group Freedom’s Watch. DDC is headed by B.R. McConnon, a former associate of Jack Abramoff’s lobbying partners, and a former employee of the Koch-funded astroturf organization known as Citizens for a Sound Economy.

Citizens for a Sound Economy — which has also received funds from private health insurers in the past and played a critical astroturf role in killing reform under Clinton — eventually split, with one wing forming Americans for Prosperity in 2003, and another forming FreedomWorks in 2004. Both organizations, which are still funded by the Koch Industries empire, were instrumental in organizing the anti-Obama tea party protests, and have been spreading misinformation and anger at the current health reform effort. Americans for Prosperity’s anti-health reform front group, Patients United, has hosted speakers comparing the House health reform bill to the Holocaust.

Curiously, DDC servers also host anti-health reform letters from the Chamber of Commerce and Rep. Charles Boustany (R-LA), as well as continual news updates about the reform debate. All three documents are under a subsection titled WellPoint.

Given the stealthy nature of astroturf lobbying firms, it is difficult to discern the extent to which DDC is managing AHIP’s efforts. UnitedHealth, another large insurer, was caught recently using a call center to direct people to a radical tea party anti-health reform protest outside of the offices of Rep. Zach Space (D-OH).

Already, the health insurance industry has flexed its muscle to water down reform. After spending millions on lobbying, advertising, and direct contributions to lawmakers, the Senate Finance Committee made a major concession allowing insurers to reimburse only 65% of medical bills (down from the 76% proposed requirement). And indeed, although AHIP has made grandiose promises of self regulation, many insurers have recently broke promises made by AHIP President Karen Ignagni. On June 16, despite Ignagni’s pledges of commitment, insurance executives from UnitedHealth Group, Assurant, and WellPoint specifically refused to “commit” to ending the controversial practice of rescinding coverage after an applicant files a medical claim.

With DDC’s stealth lobbying assistance, AHIP may well kill the public option too.

Update At the Wonk Room, Pat Garofalo reports that DDC also maintains an anti-Employee Free Choice Act website supported by the Independent Women’s Forum (IWF). The IWF, which is running anti-health reform ads, is another Koch Industries-funded front group that for a five year period operated out of the same office as Americans for Prosperity. DDC not only serves the health insurance industry, but plays a vital role for the constellation of Koch front groups.

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On this morning's Meet the Press, Rachel Maddow backs former congressman Dick Armey (head of the Freedomworks lobbying group) against the wall and lets everyone know exactly what his radical opinion is on Medicare:

MS. MADDOW: Do you really think that there’s a major uprising of seniors wanting to get out of Medicare? I know you’re suing the government for your right personally to get out of Medicare.

REP. ARMEY: Right.

MS. MADDOW: But do you really think that’s the problem...

SEN. COBURN: Is it...

MS. MADDOW: ...that Medicare—that seniors hate Medicare and they want out?

REP. ARMEY: No, I didn’t say that. Most seniors—I was talking to my minister the other day. My minister says, “Dick, I’m so fortunate I’m in Medicare.” I said, “Bless you, my, my friend that you get to be in it if you choose to be so.” But if you give a government program and you let me choose to be in or choose to be out, that’s generosity. If you force me in, irrespective of my desires, that’s tyranny. Now, if Medicare’s $46 trillion in the red, with no idea how we’re going to pay for it, why, why do they not let people who don’t want to be in out?

MS. MADDOW: This is...

MR. GREGORY: Let me—I want to get it...

REP. ARMEY: I mean, that’s...

MS. MADDOW: Just—I—very briefly.

REP. ARMEY: This, this, this defies logic.

MS. MADDOW: This is a really important point. The anti-healthcare reform lobby thinks that Medicare is tyranny, OK?

REP. ARMEY: I did—I said...

MS. MADDOW: This is an—I mean, you said in 1995 that “Medicare is a program I would have no part of in a free world.”

REP. ARMEY: Right. Absolutely right.

MS. MADDOW: You said in 2002, “We’re going to have to bite the bullet on Social Security and phase it out over a period of time.”

REP. ARMEY: And I’m going to enumerate exactly what I’m talking about. Medicare...

MS. MADDOW: Americans need to know this is your position and this is the position of the anti-healthcare reform lobby.

This was a really productive discussion, and I'd like your thoughts. I talked to Joe Sestak (PA-7) backstage after the panel, and he told me he would start a netroots caucus in the House - and one in the Senate if he wins!

It might be the answer we're looking for; I believe it could increase our clout. (As someone commented to me today, politicians just don't care about one $20 contributor. But a few thousand $20 contributors can inspire a little respect.)

If Joe makes this happen, it means that caucus members will keep us informed on developments regarding our issues, and it means that caucus members who respond to our issues will be able to use us as attack dogs more effectively. This seems like a win/win.

Rep. Pat Murphy (PA-8), an early netroots favorite who joined the Blue Dogs after his election, approached me in the convention center lobby and quite enthusiastically told me if there was a netroots caucus, he would "absolutely" join. (This was after I first called him a few rude names over his FISA vote. But we kissed and made up, and he told me to call him any time I had a question. The fact is, he is with us on most of the issues. Not all, but most.)

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Tweety's as aggressive as I've ever seen him with these organized town hall hijackings. Tonight he had Max Pappas, VP for Public Policy at FreedomWorks, the astroturf "non-partisan" group founded by Dick Armey and pushing the healthcare disruptions, and Gerald Shea from the AFL-CIO, whose members will now be turning out to attend the healthcare forums. (The low-key Shea mostly sat back and watched as Matthews went on the attack.)

"You're basically plotting at stuff," Matthews accused, stabbing the air with his pen. "Are you astroturf, or are you grassroots?"

"We're not astroturf, we don't do that," Pappas said. "Ours are all volunteers." He pointed out that "their signs are hand-painted." (Yeah, because no astroturf operation ever turns out hand-painted signs to hand out.)

"You want it both ways. You want to be seen as compassionate without doing anything," he told Pappas.

I swear, I could forgive Chris Matthews every dumb thing he's ever said for the pitbull approach he took with this corporatist weasel. You go, Chris!

So they're rolling out the heavy guns, hiding behind yet another astroturf front. I wonder why they're always hiding behind these fake grassroots organizations? Could it be they don't want people to know the kind of money the massive financial interests against health care reform are spending to stop it?

The new anti-health reform front group known as the Coalition to Protect Patients’ Rights, is being managed by the lobbying firm known as the DCI Group. After being contacted by ThinkProgress this afternoon about its sponsorship of CPPR’s press conference last week, DCI Group staffers acknowledged that they coordinate PR for the front group. Not be confused with Conservatives for Patients’ Rights, another front group opposing health reform, CPPR has been organizing lobbying efforts against health reform and publishing op-eds across the country with misinformation about the public option.

Tom Synhorst, a former staffer to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Bob Dole, joined fellow right-wing operatives Doug Goodyear and Tim Hyde to form DCI Group in 1996. The firm quickly flourished working for the tobacco industry, coordinating a sophisticated astroturf campaign to build public opposition to tobacco regulations. Ironically, before helping to manage this “patients’ rights” campaign, DCI founded “Smokers’ Rights” groups across the country for the tobacco lobby. Indeed, DCI has specialized in manufacturing “grassroots” support — using telemarketers, PR events, and letter writing campaigns — to achieve policy results for narrow corporate interests:

– The DCI Group was retained by the pharmaceutical industry to whip up public opposition against House legislation that would permit the reimportation of FDA-approved drugs from Canada and elsewhere. [Washington Monthly, December/2003]

– The DCI Group worked with Republicans to form various “grassroots” front-groups to amplify President Bush’s call to privatize Social Security. [Center for Media and Democracy, 3/18/05]

– Chris LaCivita, a former DCI Group staffer, took a lead role in organizing the Swift Boat Veterans campaign to smear John Kerry and his war record. [CommonDreams, 8/31/04]

– The DCI Group was behind spoof videos mocking Al Gore and global warming. The firm has been retained by ExxonMobil to lobby. [Wall Street Journal, 8/3/06; Exxon Secrets, accessed 7/28/09

While it is unclear who is funding this latest CPPR front group, DCI has in the past worked for health insurance companies. In 2002, the American Prospect reported that DCI had been hired by the Health Benefits Coalition, a trade association of for-profit HMOs trying to “thwart congressional action on the patients’ bill of rights."

David Sirota with a really insightful piece on the forces opposing progressive reform. Please note: as he points out, Blue Dogs are not actually constrained by their constituents. It's all about the money!

The health care debate has reminded us that there really are three separate but coordinated armies that defend the status quo in Washington - and will defend that status quo, whether on health care or any other economic issue. In my newspaper column today, I look at who these factions are, and what their motives are. You can read the column here.

In a nutshell, you have the Land Rover Liberals, many coming from the 14 out of 25 wealthiest congressional districts that Democrats now represent. Right now, their opposition to health care and tax reform is being led by Boulder, Colorado Rep. Jared Polis (D).

You also have the Corrupt Cowboys - those lawmakers from very poor, mostly Southern and Western parts of the country. These people give themselves Americana sounding nicknames like "Blue Dog Democrats" or "Main Street Republicans" so as to pretend their opposition to health care comes from their being down home guys "representin' the folks back home." Of course, these same lawmakers are among the most rapacious corporate fundraisers and lobbyist-connected insiders in Congress. And as I pointed out yesterday, there's no evidence that the districts and states the Corrupt Cowboys represent despise health reform by virtue of the fact that they are culturally conservative bastions. In fact, Nate Silver says there's exactly the opposite evidence:

There's not really any evidence that health care reform is unpopular in the Blue Dog districts. Although there are exceptions, most of the Blue Dog districts are fairly poor. A Quinnipiac poll released earlier this month suggested that while 53 percent of voters overall think "think it's the government's responsibility to make sure that everyone in the United States has adequate health care", 61 percent of voters making under $50,000 do. Also, while Quinnipaic did not break out the results for moderate and conservative Democrats, which are plentiful in these Districts, one can reasonably infer them. In this poll, 79 percent of liberals agreed with the statement as did 77 percent of Democrats -- not a very big difference. Since almost all liberals are Democrats and about half of all Democrats are liberals, that suggests that support for health care reform among non-liberal Democrats is something like 75 percent.

Thus, the story about the honest, god-fearing, good ol' boy cowboys opposing health care reform out of representational obligation has only been able to become conventional wisdom through the Millionaire Media - the elite national press corps, chock full of very wealthy people, that disseminates the most pernicious kind of anti-reform propaganda. These are the same people who insisted we should immediately rush $12 trillion in bailout cash out to Wall Street speculators, and who now insist that 64 years of debates over a $1 trillion health care proposal is inappropriately "rushing" health care reform. They are also the voices who are actually deriding health care reform as an inhumane proposal to legislatively waterboard the poor, persecuted richest one percent.

In the column, I look at the motives of all these groups, and give President Obama huge props for taking them on. As a sometime critic of Obama, I really think he's doing a fantastic job right now, and the news this morning from the New York Times that "the president planning trips across the country" to campaign for health care reform is just fantastic. He's going to have to take on the three groups I discuss in my column - and if he can beat them, we're going to get universal health care.

We're really going to have to turn up the heat, guys. Make sure you continue calling and emailing your representatives. Don't let the lobbyists be the only ones whispering in their ears:

Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid acknowledged Thursday that his chamber is unable to pass health-care reform before its August recess, a move that highlighted internal Democratic divisions on the legislation and is likely to result in significant changes to the shape of the final bill.

The Aug. 7 deadline that President Obama set for House and Senate leaders to move their versions of reform served as a vital tool for congressional leaders in minimizing dissent as the $1 trillion package moved through five committees. But with their hopes of reaching that target date slipping in recent days, a torrent of complaints and concerns began to surface.

The comments by Reid (D-Nev.) confirmed the growing consensus on Capitol Hill that the White House's fast-track approach has failed, and that a more plodding and contentious process has taken hold. Not only would the Senate not meet Obama's timeline for passing a bill, but across the Capitol, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) was struggling to quell an uprising by conservative Democrats that had brought House action to a near halt.

Appearing at an event Thursday in Shaker Heights, Ohio, intended to rally support for health-care reform, Obama attempted to brush aside the delay, saying he is content to know that Congress is pressing ahead.

In response to a questioner at the event, the president said, "That's okay. I just want people to keep on working," adding that he wants to sign a final bill "by the end of this year."

He did not acknowledge the delay in his prepared comments, telling the crowd of 1,600 at a high school gymnasium that "reform may be coming too soon for some in Washington, but it's not soon enough for the American people." He vowed that the final bill would be deficit-neutral while making systemic changes to stop health-care costs from skyrocketing.

Like a candidate asking for votes, he urged supporters of change to press for it.

"Keep on your members of Congress, keep up the heat," Obama told the crowd. "We've got to get this done."

Lawmakers, however, appeared to be in no rush. When Democratic members of the Senate Finance Committee met Thursday morning and raised doubts about the bill coming through their panel. Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.) questioned new Medicare formulas that could penalize high-cost states such as his. Sen. Bill Nelson (Fla.), who represents millions of elderly constituents, also expressed doubts about Medicare cuts that could add up to $500 billion over 10 years. Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (W.Va.) lambasted the panel's tentative decision to support the creation of member-run cooperatives rather than the government insurance plan that he and many other Democrats prefer.

Some Democrats are so opposed to the cooperative idea that they are urging Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) to offer no new coverage option in his legislation. That would allow Democrats more time to build support for the government insurance plan included in the House bill, along with legislation approved on a party-line vote by the Senate health committee.

But dropping the cooperative provision would risk losing the support of Sen. Charles E. Grassley (Iowa), the panel's ranking Republican and a co-op advocate, whose presence at the negotiating table represents Obama's best hope of getting the broad bipartisan support he has pledged to seek for reform.

Obama will appear on the teevee tonight, further ramping up his push for healthcare reform. In the meantime, the Blue Dogs are sharpening their teeth in hopes of further weakening the bill. I'm trying to remember if they ever expressed similar concerns over funding Mr. Bush's little Middle East adventure, but I seem to be drawing a blank. Hmm.

(CNN) -- As President Obama prepares to address the nation in a primetime news conference, some sources say Democratic grumbling about his plan for health care is growing louder.

One Democratic senator told CNN that some congressional Democrats are "baffled," and another senior Democratic source told CNN that those members are frustrated that that they're not getting more specific direction from him on health care.

"We appreciate the rhetoric and his willingness to ratchet up the pressure but what most Democrats on the Hill are looking for is for the president to weigh in and make decisions on outstanding issues," the senior Democratic congressional source said.

"Instead of sending out his people and saying the president isn't ruling anything out, members would like a little bit of clarity on what he would support -- especially on how to pay for his health reform bill," the source added.

Yeah, I talked to one of the reform staffers last night, who told me the real battle now is over how to pay for it. My source tells me a lot of these "reasonable" proposals being floated in this phase have the potential to inflict long-term damage on the bill, that the work being done on the bill is so arcane and complicated that showboating congressmen don't have a clue - and don't bother to inform themselves.

The Democratic leadership had hoped the work going on behind closed doors for months could bear fruit in time for the president's news conference Wednesday night.

But multiple Democratic sources told CNN that's looking very unlikely, and one senior Democratic source said some Democratic leaders are frustrated that Senate negotiators have, "repeatedly missed deadlines."

The fiscally conservative Blue Dog Coalition of Democrats said Tuesday night that they reached one breakthrough on controlling the cost of health care at a meeting with Obama, House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman and other House Democrats.

Blue Dog Rep. Mike Ross, D-Arkansas, told reporters after the meeting that the group came to a "verbal agreement," to add a "some type of hybrid of an independent Medicare advisory council " that would set reimbursement rates for health care providers to the House Democrats' bill. He referred to the agreement as a "breakthrough."

But Ross cautioned it was only one of 10 items that the Blue Dogs wanted changed.

I read this really interesting piece on Blue Dogs by David Sirota that pretty much sums up the problem:

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According to this Washington Post article, a large group of former members of Congress and former staffers are heading up a giant group of lobbyists who are trying to make sure that millionaire CEOs continue to stand between you and your health care:

The nation's largest insurers, hospitals and medical groups have hired more than 350 former government staff members and retired members of Congress in hopes of influencing their old bosses and colleagues, according to an analysis of lobbying disclosures and other records.

Nearly half of the insiders previously worked for the key committees and lawmakers, including Sens. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), debating whether to adopt a public insurance option opposed by major industry groups. At least 10 others have been members of Congress, such as former House majority leaders Richard K. Armey (R-Tex.) and Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.), both of whom represent a New Jersey pharmaceutical firm.

The hirings are part of a record-breaking influence campaign by the health-care industry, which is spending more than $1.4 million a day on lobbying in the current fight, according to disclosure records. And even in a city where lobbying is a part of life, the scale of the effort has drawn attention. For example, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) doubled its spending to nearly $7 million in the first quarter of 2009, followed by Pfizer, with more than $6 million.

The article goes on to quote one of these insiders as feeling "great" about working against the American people because they already have government experience and gee, they just happen to know how the pay-to-play game works:

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From the Politico:

The Conservative Patients' Rights Action Fund -- the first group out of the box opposing Obama's healthcare plan -- has launched a second round of its campaign on the issue, a source involved in the group says.

The campaign focuses on Obama's proposal to set $634 billion in the federal budget aside for healthcare reform, and links the issue to the Congress's treatment of bonuses for AIG executives.

“Isn’t it amazing folks in Congress were shocked the plan THEY passed allowed those huge bonuses for AIG?" asks Rick Scott, the former healthcare executive who chairs the group, in a new television ad to be released tomorrow. "Now some in Congress want to raise taxes and spend $634 billion for the President’s healthcare overhaul - - WITHOUT even seeing all the details of his plan. They just never seem to learn."

Ah, yes, Rick Scott. Funny, the details the Politico leaves out of their stories! From Christopher Hayes in The Nation:

Having Scott lead the charge against healthcare reform is like tapping Bernie Madoff to campaign against tighter securities regulation. You see, the for-profit hospital chain Scott helped found--the one he ran and built his entire reputation on--was discovered to be in the habit of defrauding the government out of hundreds of millions of dollars.

This is the man who will be delivering what Politico called the "pro-free-market message."

A Texas lawyer who shared a business partner with George W. Bush, Scott started his health company, Columbia Hospital Corporation, in 1987. Its growth was meteoric, expanding from just a few hospitals to more than 1,000 facilities in thirty-eight states and three other countries in 1997. As his firm gobbled up chains, like the Frist family's Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), it became the largest for-profit hospital chain in the country. By 1994, Columbia/HCA was one of the forty largest corporations in America, and Scott had acquired a reputation as the Gordon Gecko of the healthcare world. "Whose patients are you stealing?" he would ask employees at his newly acquired hospitals.

He promised to put nonprofit hospitals--which he insisted on referring to as "nontaxpaying" hospitals--out of business and touted his company's single-minded pursuit of profit as a model for the nation's entire healthcare system. "What's happening in Washington is not healthcare reform," he told the New York Times in 1994. "Healthcare reform is happening in the marketplace."

The press portrayed Scott as a guru to be admired and feared, "a private capitalist dictator," in the words of one Princeton health economist. "Probably the lowest body fat of anybody I've been in business with," his partner told the Times.

"Other hospitals were intimidated," recalls John Schilling, who worked for Columbia/HCA in the 1990s. Scott was "like the bully that would come into town and if you didn't sell to him or partner with him, he would open up shop across the street from you and put you out of business."

Not long after joining the company in 1993 as the supervisor of reimbursement for the Fort Myers, Florida, office, Schilling noticed things weren't quite kosher. "They were looking for ways to maximize reimbursement...which ultimately would improve the bottom line."

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