Astroturf campaign uses fake letters from senior citizens to push for Medicare Advantage.
Astroturf campaign uses fake letters from senior citizens to push for Medicare Advantage.
The Eagle-Tribune reports that a lobbying group hired by America’s Health Insurance Plans, a trade group for insurance companies, is waging a pro-Medicare Advantage astroturf campaign. The Dewey Sqaure Group, a consulting group founded by Democratic operatives, sent letters to the editor purportedly written by seniors urging support of the costly private Medicare plans, which the Obama administration plans to eliminate. However, some of these seniors had never written any such letters; a few didn’t even know what Medicare Advantage was:
A letter supposedly from Ana Abascal of Lawrence said she “wanted to express how important my Medicare Advantage health plan is to me and other fixed-income seniors in my community.”
But when contacted by The Eagle-Tribune, Abascal was shocked and concerned to learn someone was using her name on a letter to the editor. She did not know what the Medicare Advantage plan was.
The Eagle-Tribune writes that the “tip off” to the fake campaign came when a man who turned out to be a Dewey intern called the paper to check if a letter from Gloria Gosselin had been published, falsely claiming to be Gosselin’s grandson. (HT: Romenesko)
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whoops…
Oh wait, it wasn’t a mistake.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:25 pmMore privatization….I mean more privatizing the profit and socializing the debt.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:31 pmWhile he is at it, I hope Obama eliminates Medicare Part D.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:31 pmYou know it’s a rip off if it was pushed by Tom Delay, the Republicans and the Evan Bayh type Democrats.
If editorial page editors are doing their job, they’ll screen out these fake form letters. My local paper replies to my submissions, via e-mail or phone call. They don’t publish if they can’t confirm.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:31 pmWow, you mean people lie? Who could have anticipated the breach of ethics?
April 13th, 2009 at 3:33 pmWhy does the right wing have to fake so many things to get their message out there? Fake news reports, fake populist uprisings, fake letters-to-the-editor…
could it be because most people find their ideas repugnant?
I think it could.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:33 pmQuite a development! Good work uncovering this!
They don’t believe democracy will take care of us. They don’t believe in democracy.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:36 pmDewey Square Group-Democratic lobbyists
http://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/firmsum.php?lname=Dewey+Square+Group&year=2008
Besides healthcare, Dewey was hired to improve education. I hope the next round of letters is from people who can write.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:37 pmlol, funny but this was more than people lying. This was a case of identity theft, misrepresentation, forgery, etc.
This was a pretty serious offense when you think about it, and if the people impacted end up with attorney’s over this, someones going to be in some serious trouble.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:37 pmThis is the second post today on distortions by Democratic lobbying firms.
1. Gephardt Group
2. Dewey Square Group
They can sell their souls just as well as the Red team.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pmMedicare (besides ripping off both seniors and the public) is such a convoluted sick joke that we’d be far better off scrapping the entire thing and starting something a normal human can understand. The different parts, different options and yearly changes in coverage are beyond obtuse.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pmstateofthedivision Says: OT
April 13th, 2009 at 3:41 pmI would sue the SHYTE out of the frauds!
April 13th, 2009 at 3:41 pmFor profit corporations have absolutely no business in the health care industry.
When are the people going to wake up to the fact we do not need this middle man reaping and exploiting the benefits of their health care dollars?
Kick the insurance companies out of health care and let us have a decent system as the rest of the industrialized countries.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:42 pmWAYNEBRO Says:
If it happened to me i would sue for sure. i wouldn’t want my name being defrauded by radicals. no way.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:44 pmTraditional Medicare should not be undermined by these Medicare Advantage plans! Get rid of them President Obama! MEDICARE FOR ALL!!!
From a 2007 article:
>>The Medicare Privatization Scam By Trudy Lieberman
Congress will decide whether to cut $54 billion in overpayments to Medicare insurers, igniting a battle that may well determine whether the program survives. On one side are Medicare supporters, who want it to continue as a successful social insurance program. On the other is the insurance industry, which is spending millions and lobbying hard to put Medicare on a fast track to privatization, a goal long sought by fiscal conservatives and their allies in right-wing think tanks…
..Some Medicare Advantage plans were not new. Medicare HMOs had been around since the 1970s. But by the late 1990s, conservatives had seized on HMOs, as well as new options such as medical savings accounts and PPOs, as ways to speed up privatization. Under the guise of “consumer choice,” always a popular concept, Congress authorized four new kinds of plans, in the 1997 Balanced Budget Act, that would compete with traditional Medicare….<<
http://www.healthjournalism.org/health-news-details.php?id=98
April 13th, 2009 at 3:47 pmNo doubt. And this should come as no surprise. The Democrats are in charge now. The go-to lobbying groups of the past eight years aren’t gonna be able to accomplish squat, so the big money special interests are gonna hire the “D” lobbying groups, who will be just as willing to sell their souls as the last bunch.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:48 pmAmerica will always be like Upton Sinclair’s ‘The Jungle’.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:53 pmIt wasn’t that long ago that medicare did just fine with out the for profit corporate health care middle man… which weaseled in and attached itself.
Shouldn’t medicare rid itself of this parasite?
April 13th, 2009 at 3:57 pmstateofthedivision Says:
This is the second post today on distortions by Democratic lobbying firms.
1. Gephardt Group
2. Dewey Square Group
They can sell their souls just as well as the Red team.
I wonder how many left-wing blogs would resort to such partisan actions as TP has today…oh. wait.
April 13th, 2009 at 3:57 pmMedicare advantage is a joke. We basically hire beauracracy on top of a beauracracy. None of these companies would want to insure seniors if they weren’t being paid by the government benefit.
Old people couldn’t hack it on the free market. No one would do business with actual risks.
April 13th, 2009 at 4:08 pmPhony claims and letters mustered up by the for profit health care industry shows how desperate they are becoming.
They know they have no value or benefit and only parasitic means in the health care business.
April 13th, 2009 at 4:10 pmWaltB Says:
Medicare (besides ripping off both seniors and the public) is such a convoluted sick joke that we’d be far better off scrapping the entire thing and starting something a normal human can understand. The different parts, different options and yearly changes in coverage are beyond obtuse.
So Walt, how does Medicare rip off seniors and the public? And what is your alternative, that seniors have no medical care?
April 13th, 2009 at 4:13 pmhad enough Says:
It wasn’t that long ago that medicare did just fine with out the for profit corporate health care middle man… which weaseled in and attached itself.
Shouldn’t medicare rid itself of this parasite?
That was before Bush started starving medicare providers and we came to the point where doctors wouldn’t take Medicare patients because they were a losing proposition. Once they were adequately starved, Bush came up with these “Advantage” policies to fill in the gaps he had purposely made in the system.
April 13th, 2009 at 4:15 pmWhen and how did these for profit parasites attach their self to medicare?
April 13th, 2009 at 4:16 pmBilbo
You answered my second question before I posted it.
April 13th, 2009 at 4:20 pmYes folks, astroturfing, brought to you by the same people who’ve put America at #37 in healthcare…
..and fighting to keep us there.
These corporatist firms are a cancer on the American public. We need to eradicate this infection that’s ailing democracy…
April 13th, 2009 at 4:21 pmI can’t help but wondering if Medicare Advantage isn’t a smoke screen to push back a national healthcare system ????
And it worked so well and is so easy to use. Just ask anyone who has tried to help a senior citizen through the morass.
Works as well as the idea of privatized Social Security would have worked in the Bush years.
And are the folks behind it, the some folks who in the Regan admin who came up with the idea that they were going to improve healthcare by shuttling money into HMOs which decreased Dr. payouts, denied coverage, but channeled money into the CEO pockets.
See Columbia HCA.
April 13th, 2009 at 5:19 pmTP’s sudden burst of courage is inspiring. The jaded might wonder if The Podesta Group has a big lobbying bid, with Gephardt and Dewey as competitors. Nah, democracy doesn’t work that way!
April 13th, 2009 at 5:34 pmIt is amazing how naïve people are who post about topics on which they clearly know nothing. I guarantee you 75% of the commentators know little more about Medicare Advantage than what they hear from the bias media outlets. The reality is that providers such as Blue Cross, Aetna Medicare , and others are providing better benefits, like health club memberships, dental, and vision benefits, saving Medicare Beneficiaries Millions of dollars, and improving quality of life and health of recipients.
April 14th, 2009 at 10:02 amSomeone posts actually suggested eliminating the Rx program, and promote Medicare for all. Both ideas are naïve. Medicare recipients spend at age 65 an average of about $175/month for Medicare Supplement Insurance plus an RX plan. Medicare Advantage recipients pay about ½ that and get more benefits. Hmmm. Why do these posters want beneficiaries to spend more $$$, reduce their standard of living and minimize their health care? Do they hate senior citizens or just capitalism? Someone please explain. For capitalism haters you are free to leave any time. I stick with what our founding fathers envisioned.
These plans are not perfect, but what’s needed is leadership, fresh ideas, not ideology, and solutions, not irresponsibility. If the best you can come up with is to scrap this plan than you have no idea what you are talking about. If you’re concerned about saving money why don’t we just scrap Medicare and Social Security all together? Maybe the two largest Ponzi schemes on the planet should be eliminated. That thought has about the same level of intellect and leadership as eliminating Medicare Advantage. Maybe some of you should work with Senior Citizens or actually educate yourselves on what it is you disparage. I’m sure you’ll be thankful for the benefits when you turn 65.
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April 18th, 2009 at 5:31 amsac ekimi