{news} Fw: GP RELEASE Greens: Dems' town hall meetings & phony health reform deserve civil protest

Wed Aug 12 16:39:39 EDT 2009

----- Original Message -----

From: "Green News DC"
To: dcsgpnews2 at yahoo.com
Subject: GP RELEASE Greens: Dems' town hall meetings & phony health
reform deserve civil protest
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 2009 14:34:24 -0400

GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES
http://www.gp.org

For Immediate Release:
Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Contacts:
Scott McLarty, Media Coordinator, 202-518-5624, cell 202-904-7614,
mclarty at greens.org
Starlene Rankin, Media Coordinator, 916-995-3805, starlene at gp.org

Greens: Democrats' town meetings on health care reform deserve debate
and civil protest, not disruption and mob violence

• Serving the health insurance lobby, both Republicans and Democrats
have tried to shut down open discussion on single-payer, promote phony
reform, and spread disinformation; whether Democrats or Republicans
win the health care debate, Americans will lose, say Greens

• Greens urge Americans who support real health reform to contact
Congress members in support of single-payer (HR 676)

• Greens mourn the deaths of two single-payer heroes: Marilyn Clement
and Nick Skala

WASHINGTON, DC -- Green Party leaders spoke out today against the
violent disruptions taking place throughout the US at town hall
meetings on health care reform.

But Greens said that both Democratic and Republican leaders deserve
blame for obstructing the public debate on health care reform. Greens
pointed to various attempts to silence discussion of single-payer
national health care in public forums and the media, as well as spread
misinformation about single-payer and the Canadian health-care system.

The Green Party is urging supporters of real universal health care to
lobby their US Representatives in advance of a promised vote on the
single-payer bill (http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2009/08/05-8).
Greens have called for a nationally televised debate on the merits of
single-payer and for GAO and Congressional Budget Office studies on
single-payer. Analyses from these offices in the 1990s showed that
single-payer will reduce health care spending by billions
(http://www.gp.org/press/pr-national.php?ID=226).

• Candace Caveny, Michigan Green candidate for the US House, 10th
district (http://www.candacecaveny.org): "While storm troops egged on
by Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and other shills for the insurance
industry are disrupting town hall meetings, the Democrats running
these events are also squashing open debate on health care. Democrats
in Congress have blocked discussion of the single-payer plan, keeping
it 'off the table,' to use Senate Finance Committee chair Max Baucus's
words. Both the disruptors in the audience and the Democrats and
certain union leaders on stage are defending the right of insurance
companies to maintain their profits and control over health care,
while hundreds of thousands of Americans are going into financial ruin
because of illness and injury. The only real solution is the
single-payer plan, represented by John Conyers' House bill 676 and
supported in Michigan by UAW Local 599 and the Steelworkers Union, as
well as the Green Party."

• Lisa Green, Green candidate for the California State Assembly, 53rd
District, in the 2010 election (http://www.votelisagreen.net): "In
May, physicians, nurses, Greens, and other single-payer advocates were
arrested after peacefully standing up to protest the exclusion of
single-payer experts during Senate Finance Committee roundtables on
health care reform. If fearmongering Republican leaders, front
groups, and public personalities like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and
Glenn Beck are urging mobs of their supporters to break up town hall
meetings, they should be investigated and prosecuted, just as the
nonviolent single-payer protesters were arrested."
(Leaked memo on disruption from insurance industry front groups
Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/07/31/recess-harassment-memo/)

• Alfred Molison, Green candidate for Houston City Council, District C
(http://www.votealfred.com): "Americans are receiving mountains of
disinformation about health care reform from Democratic and Republican
leaders alike, as well as from TV, radio, and the Internet. Democrats
keep telling us that single-payer is not possible or desirable,
despite polls showing majority support for guaranteed national health
care. Republicans, media shills, and groups like Conservatives for
Patients' Rights are equating Obamacare with the Canadian single-payer
system -- an outright lie, since the Democrats' reform plan favors the
health insurance industry. As in 1993, Democratic front groups like
Health Care for America Now! and Citizen Action and many union leaders
believe it's more important to declare victory for the Democrats than
to provide real health care reform."
(Video of Mr. Molison and other Green candidates: press conference at
the Green Party's 2009 National Meeting in Durham, North Carolina,
July 24:
http://www.livestream.com/greenpartyus/ondemand/flv_8f77dfc8-b911-4950-902c-346c35ca3b90)

• Jody Grage, treasurer of the Green Party of the United States: "Rick
Scott, head of Conservatives for Patients' Rights and an inspirer of
the town hall disruptions, is a welfare cheat. Mr. Scott was fired
from his position as CEO of Columbia/HCA in 1997 after he was caught
trying to defraud the government for hundreds of millions of
taxpayers' dollars in false Medicare and Medicaid payments, the
largest Medicare-Medicaid swindle in history
(http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/05/22-4). The company had to
pay back $1.7 billion, but Rick Scott, instead of facing prosecution,
received $10 million in severance pay and $300 million worth of stock.
In reality, insurance companies have no objection to health reform or
government intervention if it means they'll receive huge
taxpayer-funded subsidies to inflate their profit margins and CEO
salaries. The enraged mobs storming town hall meetings and the
liberals swallowing the Democrats' 'public option' and 'mandate'
schemes have all been manipulated in a game played by and for the
health insurance industry. Whether the Democrats or the Republicans
win the health care debate, the American people will lose."

SIDEBAR... Greens mourn the recent passing of two leaders in the
movement for single-payer universal health care: Marilyn Clement, 74,
founder and national coordinator of Healthcare Now!
(http://www.healthcare-now.org); and Nick Skala, 27, staff member of
Physicians for a National Health Program (http://www.pnhp.org) and a
member of the Green Party in Texas and Illinois.

MORE INFORMATION

Green Party of the United States http://www.gp.org
202-319-7191, 866-41GREEN
Fax 202-319-7193
• Green candidate database and campaign information:
http://www.gp.org/elections.shtml
• Green Party News Center http://www.gp.org/newscenter.shtml
• Green Party Speakers Bureau http://www.gp.org/speakers
• Green Party ballot access page http://www.gp.org/2008-elections
• Green Party Livestream Channel http://www.livestream.com/greenpartyus

"Internal RNC Memo: 'Engage In Every Activity' To Slow Down Health
Care Reform"
Huffington Post, July 21, 2009
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/21/internal-rnc-memo-engage_n_241940.html

"Top Ten Ways To Tell Your President & His Party Aren't Fighting For
Health Care For Everybody"
By Bruce A. Dixon, Black Agenda Report, July 29, 2009
http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=content/top-ten-ways-tell-your-president-his\-party-arent-fighting-health-care-everybody

"Inside Story on Town Hall Riots: Right-Wing Shock Troops Do Corporate
America's Dirty Work"
By Adele M. Stan, AlterNet, August 10, 2009.
http://www.alternet.org/story/141860

"My 1933 Nightmare"
By David Michael Green, Common Dreams, August 11, 2009
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/08/11

Single-Payer Frequently Asked Questions
http://www.pnhp.org/facts/singlepayer_faq.php

Green Pages: The official publication of record of the Green Party of
the United States
Summer 2009 issue now online
http://gp.org/greenpages-blog

~ END ~

******************************************
Tim McKee, New Britian, CT, main number cell-860-778-1304, 860-505-8454
 National Committee member of the Green Party of the United States and is a spokesperson for the Green Party of CT.
/www.ctgreentimes.org
BLOG-http://thebiggreenpicture.blogspot.com

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