Dave Zweifel: Clinton, health care industry get cozy

By Dave Zweifel

As long as money holds sway in our political system, nothing should surprise us any more.

But even my jaw dropped last week when I saw the story that Hillary Clinton is being plied with more money from the health care industry and pharmaceutical companies than any other U.S. senator except Pennsylvania Republican Rick Santorum.

Yes, this is the same Hillary Clinton who was belittled and disparaged by many of these same donors when in 1993 she, as head of her husband President Bill Clinton’s plan to overhaul U.S. health care, proposed a form of universal coverage with minimum standards for coverage and payments.

That’s when the health care industry, alarmed at what the proposals might do their own special interests, pulled out all the stops. It sent hordes of lobbyists to Congress and paid for a huge advertising blitz on both network and cable television featuring the infamous "Harry and Louise" to mock the Clinton plan.

The health care initiative, as we all remember, crashed in flames.

That’s all in the past, the hospital companies, insurance firms and pharmacy giants now say. The president of the Federation of American Hospitals, the lobbyist organization for companies like HCA and Tenet, told the New York Times that his battle with the former first lady "is ancient history."

So has Hillary changed her mind about health care?

Since being elected to the U.S. Senate, she’s been holding her health care cards pretty close to the vest. She has sponsored some legislation to increase Medicare payments to doctors and hospitals and has introduced a bill in the Senate to cut down on doctors’ malpractice costs, but she hasn’t disowned the concept that many feel is an absolute must if we’re ever to get health care fairness in this country single-payer national health insurance for all.

But, just in case, those who are raking in the fruits of our current system are making sure Hillary Clinton is hearing them.

According to the New York Times, in 2005 and so far in 2006 she has collected $854,462 in campaign contributions (she’s up for re-election in New York this fall) from the health care industry. She’s the only Senate Democrat in the top five.

Frederick H. Graefe, a health care lawyer and lobbyist, told the New York Times that the industry is contributing to Clinton "because they fully expect she will be the Democratic presidential nominee in 2008."

And, of course, the telling line, "If the usual rules apply, early donors will get a seat at the table when health care and other issues are discussed."

If only the 42 million uninsured working people and children in the U.S. could be in a position to get a seat at that table too.

Dave Zweifel is editor of The Capital Times. E-mail: dzweifel@madison.com

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