Posts from — June 2009

Democrats now control the United States Senate 60-40. With Al Franken coming on board as Minnesota’s Senator. [Politico]

Democrats will now hold a 60-40 majority in the Senate, the largest the party has enjoyed in a generation. Sixty votes are needed to break filibusters, ensuring that if Democrats stay united they would be able to cleave the GOP’s last lever of power in Washington. A Franken “yes” vote on health reform, climate change legislation and Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor gives Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) even more of a margin for error on these major votes.

Now, at last, perhaps the Senate will get on with healthcare reform, including a public option, which I hope is single-payer. Now, if we could only get all 60 of those Democratic Senators to come together and start representing us Democrats rather than representing Corporate America.

The healthcare insurance industry may surpass Bernie Madoff in swindling the public.

On June 24, 2009 Wendell Potter testified before the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. Potter is the former head of corporate communications at CIGNA. Cigna is a health insurance company based in Philadelphia. [Transcript of Potter’s Testimony]

The Chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation is Jay Rockefeller (D-WV). The ranking member is Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX).

Also on the Committee are Senators Daniel K. Inouye (D-HI), John F. Kerry (D-Mass), Byron L. Dorgan (D-ND), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Bill Nelson (D-FL), Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Mark Pryor (D-AR), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Tom Udall (D-NM), Mark Warner (D-VA), Mark Begich (D-AK), Olympia Snowe (R-ME), John Ensign (R-NV), Jim DeMint (R-SC), John Thune (R-SD), Roger Wicker (R-MS), Johnny Isakson (R-GA), David Vitter (R-LA), Sam Brownback (R-KS), Mel Martinez (R-FL), and Mike Johanns (R-NE). [Read more →]

Photo: Mona Shield Payne / Special to the Sun

Demonstrators, who gathered at the intersection of Fort Apache and Russell roads in Las Vegas, want healthcare reform. But Wellpoint, a major critic of a government-run health insurance plan, will have none of it. The company spent $1.22 million on lobbying in the first quarter of 2009.

A spokes person for Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield, a subsidiary of WellPoint said:

“The current market for health insurance is competitive, and a government-run insurance plan would create problems in the marketplace, including…reducing consumer choice by driving insurers out of the market and hurting the ability of private plan initiatives to improve the quality and control costs in the delivery system.”

[Read more →]

Zachary Michael Triggs, an Independent American Party candidate, for Washoe County clerk in 2002, neglected to file three campaign contribution and expenditure reports during the campaign.

He now as a $54,303 judgment against him for his omission.

Triggs was ordered to pay $15,000 in civil penalties for failing to file the reports, $33,369 in attorneys’ fees and $5,934 in interest.

He lost the election too. [Las Vegas Sun]

Chalk one up for the voters of Washoe County for not electing him. Just think of the mess he would have made of the Washoe County clerk’s office had he been elected.

Barbara of Deer Island, Florida writes:

I worked for United Health Care in small group customer service. If a company was more than 5 days late in their monthly payments, United would “terminate” their coverage.

When they were terminated the group administrator from the “termed” company would call me to reinstate their coverage. I would take their phone number, go to my supervisor’s office and get a computer disk showing all small groups “loss ratios.”

If the company I was working with was in the high risk ratio, I was not to reinstate their coverage. This meant people in the hospital or scheduled for surgery would never nave coverage with any company because of pre-existing conditions if their coverage was less than 90 days.

Sometimes a new group misses payments in the first few months before they get on a payment schedule.

This is how United would “weed out” the high claims group. Their actions were not illegal, but were IMMORAL!

Source: Organizing for America: Health Care Stories for America

Susan of Portland, Oregon wrote:

Susan from Portland, Oregon

I just got off the phone with my health insurance company. I had just received an Explanation of Benefits showing my deductible was not met, and a bill from a doctor showing that I owed the whole thing.

Now this seemed curious. I have breast cancer and have already been through multiple imaging procedures, surgery, installation of a portacath and the first round of chemo. My deductible was met a long time ago.

The explanation? I have two deductibles on my plan, one for “in plan” and one for “out of plan.” [Read more →]

[scribd id=11804311 key=key-262bbbxil4ah9tlst0gq]Genealogy : Uncovering Your Ancestry

That is the name of an online true story in Ancestry Magazine written by Ellen Notbohm is a three-time ForeWord Book of the Year finalist and frequent contributor to Ancestry magazine. Read her articles at her website.

The story is about Even Paulson on whose tombstone (above) at Mayville, North Dakota, is inscribed:

Even Paulson
Born Dec. 29, 1862
Killed while on duty
As Night watchman at
Mayville, N.D.
Sept. 3, 1893
1 o’clock a.m.

Here are excerpts from the story.

Even Paulson was born in Seljord, Norway. He arrived in Quebec in 1884. He then went to Granite Falls, Minnesota. Filed Declaration of Intention papers in Yellow Medicine County.

In 1892 he went to Traill County, North Dakota. May 13, 1892 Judge William McConnell granted him full citizenship.

He became a Mayville Deputy Marshal. Harold Wenaas in his book Stener, the Sheriff from Telemark, “he could talk unruly toughs and drunks into voluntarily accompanying him to the city jail.”

Paulson had surprised burglars in the act of stealing liquor to bootleg from the warehouse behind the R. L. Kenney & Co. drugstore, where it was used in the preparation of medicines. The first shot, to the abdomen, took Officer Paulson down. His shouts for help carried through the night air until silenced by a second bullet, this one to his forehead at point-blank range.

A posse described in Wenaas’s book as “half the population of Mayville” pulled one James Kelly from under the train depot, either drunk or claiming to be, and hauled him to the city jail.

Law enforcement officials found a .44 Winchester rifle traced to local butcher John William Law (Lowe). A trunk in his room harbored the stolen goods. The price for Even Paulson’s life: a 10-gallon keg of port wine.

A mob of 700 was in the streets. “It was with greatest difficulty that lynching was prevented,” reported the Hillsboro Banner.

A grand jury indicted Kelly and Law for murder and burglary.

James Kelly’s confession to the coroner’s inquest formed the centerpiece of his trial. In it, he had admitted to the robbery, implicated Law and the alleged third party, and claimed he wasn’t present for the murder. Placed on the stand, he denied the coroner’s evidence and, in doing so, contradicted himself. The jury deliberated through the night before returning a guilty verdict.

Law and Kelly escaped hanging due to lack of proof as to which pulled the trigger. They were sentenced to life in prison at Bismarck.

The governor denied Law’s application for pardon. But William Law’s life sentence was commuted to 15 years. John William Law walked free in 1907. He died in 1945.

In December 1911, the board of pardons commuted the life sentence of James Kelly.

Having been a prosecutor in my earlier life I found this story interesting and decided to post it here. Perhaps a reader out there is searching for information about Even Paulson, Kelly or Law. I hope you find it here perhaps in a Google search.

Does he sit tight in his present position or run against Senator Harry Reid or run for Governor of Nevada or wait and run against Senator John Ensign?

Harry Reid

Still no announcement of a Republican willing to tackle Senator Harry Reid for his Senate seat. Reid has low poll numbers and a target on his back. He is recognized as vulnerable. Yet the Republican Party cannot find a viable candidate to challenge Reid. The national Republican leadership would like nothing more than to boot Senator Reid out of office.

Republican Congressman Heller has been wined and dined by the Republican elite to take on the job. However, Heller has not taken the bait.

Jim Gibbons

Then there sits Republican Governor Jim Gibbons a much weaker and fatter target than Reid. His fellow Republicans would like to get rid of Gibbons so Heller would not risk much running for Governor. At least in the primary.

John Ensign

The fall from grace by Senator John Ensign has not helped matters. The following week’s escapade by South Carolina Republican Governor Mark Sanford poured more salt into the Republican wounds. But Ensign’s office doesn’t open up until 2012. A lot can happen before then.

The Playing Field

The political playing field keeps shifting. His base is eroding away. Between April 1 and May 31, a total of 4,306 voters registered in Nevada. Of those new voters, only 148 registered as Republicans; 2,065 as Democrats; the remainder in other minor parties. The Democrats hold a 100,000-voter advantage. But, on the other hand, the rurals of Nevada comprising much of his Congressional District #2 are still quite red with conservatism.

On top of it all is a group called “Republicans for Reid,” with some Republican heavyweights in membership, including Sig Rogich and Dawn Gibbons. And this group has money and considerable political influence. Republican voters seem to be flying the coop.

Heller must note that the exodus of his Republican base. The scarlet letter “R” is tarnished. He must be thinking now is not the time for him to risk his House Ways and Means Committee seat in the House of Representatives and strike out against Reid. Like Ensign, Heller has a chummy relationship with Reid. Additionally, Reid has all that campaign money to run on.

Even Chuck Muth throws cold water on the idea, blaming Senator Ensign for costing the Republican Party of “any chance of anyone getting elected to replace Harry Reid.” Muth recognizes “They’re (Republicans) in a world of hurt and trouble.”

The Timing

The timing is not right for Heller to make a bold run against anyone. The Republican Party has regressed from their beloved Ronald Reagan days. They have now become Herbert Hoover Republicans. Heller is still a lightweight, short on experience. The country is in the throes of historic change and evolution. A contest between “two philosophies of government,” as Hoover described it.  Heller, like Hoover, believes in small government and letting the free market operate. He is on the wrong side of history. As a senator from Nevada he cannot hope to match or supersede Senator Reid’s contributions to Nevada. He may have a better chance to exceed Governor Gibbons’ contribution, but doubtful.

His best chance to rise higher in the Republican Party is to remain patient and see how it looks when Senator Ensign is up for re-election.