Carl Wolfson and Christine Alexander from the KPOJ morning show guest hosted for Thom who was on the road.

Carl Wolfson: Before we bring on our first guest today to talk about healthcare reform, and he’s one of the great guests, Wendell Potter, who worked for CIGNA and Humana for so many years, worked for CIGNA as director of their communications, and is the insider now, telling us what really went on in these health carrier companies, to sabotage healthcare reform in this country. We’ll speak with Wendell in a few minutes.

Before that, I want to play for you an ad that was just released by the Democratic National Committee. It’s an aggressive web ad, released last night, and it accuses the Republican party of being taken over by these angry mobsters. Let’s listen to this ad.

"The right-wing extremist Republican base is back. They lost the Election. They lost on the Recovery Act, the Budget, and Children’s Healthcare. They’ve lost the confidence of the American people. After eight years of failed policies that ruined our economy and cost millions of jobs. Now, desperate Republicans and their well-funded allies are organizing angry mobs, just like they did during the election. Their goal – to destroy President Obama, and stop the change Americans voted for overwhelming in November. “It will break him” “I hope he fails” This mob activity is straight from the playbook of high-level Republican political operatives. They have no plan for moving our country forward, so they’ve called out the mob. "And I want to know, why are you people ignoring his birth certificate?" Call the Republican party. Tell them you’ve had enough of the mob. The Democratic National Committee is responsible for the content of this advertisement."

Carl Wolfson: The number at the end of that ad, I’ll just give it out, if you want to call the Republican National Committee, 202-863-8500 ... and you know, Christine, this has been kind of our meme this week, how the base of the modern Republican party, the current Republican party, they’re a bunch of nutbags, and I’m telling you, it’s not just the fringe that’s out there as they were at the McCain-Palin rallies during the campaign. They are the people in Congress who are now aligned with these mobs. I mean, these are nuts. I actually saw a squirrel today that had Michelle Bachmann in its mouth. These are some nuts out there. And they are not only trying to do the bidding of these private insurance carriers, and thwart any reform for healthcare. They are also trying to bring down, as the ad said, the President of the United States.

Christine Alexander: That’s right. It’s interesting, Carl, because yesterday on Thom’s show, in his third hour, he had a woman who was talking about strike-breaking, union-busting that’s happening at the Red Cross, of all places, and I likened what we see in these meetings to union-busting and strike-breaking because they’re using the same tactics. They’re infiltrating. They’re spreading disinformation. They’re being aggressive. I mean they might as well have, you know, billyclubs and brass knuckles. Going in there, and beating people up, essentially, they’re threatening, they’re burning Congressmen in effigy outside these townhall meetings, and it’s outrageous. And I think that progressives should go to the Republican townhalls and make their voices heard.

Carl Wolfson: And Republicans also ought to be going to Democratic townhall meetings, and it’s not enough to sit back, and just assume that since Democrats won in November, and Democrats control Congress and the White House, that reform is somehow going to happen without a fight. These people are going to defend their turf to the death.

Christine Alexander: To the death.

Carl Wolfson: And this is a great place to bring in our first guest ... very pleased to welcome our first guest who is Wendell Potter. Wendell Potter is the Senior Fellow on Healthcare at the Center for Media and Democracy. That website is prwatch.org ... and Wendell, welcome to the show.

Wendell Potter: Thanks very much, Carl and Christine. Good to be on your show.

Carl Wolfson: Let me just preface this by saying that Wendell’s an old friend of mine. We went to the same journalism school. He was a year ahead of me at the University of Tennessee. And, that in June, you were testifying before Congress, Christine was reading a story on the air about a Wendell Potter, and I said "Wendell Potter?!", and I grabbed the story, and it indeed was you, and I’m so proud of the work you’ve done, the visibility you’ve shown, Wendell, on this issue, congratulations.

Wendell Potter: Thank you very much, Carl. It’s been a true pleasure, I feel like I'm finally doing the work that I’m supposed to be doing.

Carl Wolfson: Yeah. How’s your dad, by the way? I understand you’re in the hospital, visiting your dad.

Wendell Potter: Yeah, he’s right beside me. He’s doing better, and I think there’s a chance he might be discharged today, so let’s hope so.

Carl Wolfson: Great. Wendell, I'm going to get to these townhalls in just a second. But, when you testified before Congress, and let me say again than you worked for Humana and CIGNA for many years. At CIGNA you were the chief spokesmen, the director of communications there.

You said in your June testimony before Congress, that this is exactly what the health industry said in 1993. That they were all for helping reform. They were all for making sure people weren’t denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions. At the same time they were moving heaven and earth to kill reform.

Wendell Potter: Right. Exactly. That’s what they said then, that’s what they did then. They’re saying and doing the same thing this time. And I think that they think people have short memories or weren’t around during that time to know what they were doing, but those tactics worked then, and so they’re trying to replay them again this time.

Carl Wolfson: And I was just reading a story in the Los Angeles Times, by Michael Hiltzik who said, who quoted your testimony, in saying that this time around, because of mergers and acquisitions, the industry is even stronger.

Wendell Potter: It is. The industry has gone through an enormous consolidation since 1993/94. There are now about seven very large for-profit health insurance companies. I call them a cartel, because one out of every three Americans, one of every three people in this country are insured, either have insurance, one of three people in this country is in some kind of a plan owned or operated by those seven large companies. So, they’re very huge, they’re very powerful, they’re very rich.

Carl Wolfson: Let’s just talk about these townhall meetings because you’ve said all along Wendell, that their chief tactic, then and now, is fear. And it’s very clear that these groups like Conservatives For Patient Rights, CPR, which is run by this guy Rick Scott, who was also behind the Swift Boating campaign against John Kerry, that they are working in coordination with Freedom Works to send these mobs out, and to define this reform as socialized medicine, government takeover, they’re going to force old people to be killed, and so forth. It’s the same fear card.

Wendell Potter: It is. It is, and it’s all coordinated. It would be hard to trace the money that’s supporting it, because the health insurance industry and other special interests launder money through ways that’s it's really hard to trace the money, and often, the money flows into very large PR firms. They set up front groups and create these advertisings and advertisements you referenced and conduct the deceptive PR campaign.

Carl Wolfson: Before Christine gets in here, I want to mention when you were on Bill Moyers Journal and did a fantastic job on that show, you mentioned what the industry did when you were a part of it just to discredit Michael Moore over his film “Sicko”, over a film.

Wendell Potter: Absolutely. It was something that the industry felt it had to do because they were concerned that the movie might make an impression on Americans, and make people more inclined to think that a single-payer system would be the way to go in this country, because that movie was about the ability of other countries, other developed countries to make sure that every citizen had access to decent health care, unlike the United States. So they pulled out all the stops to discredit the movie.

Christine Alexander: Wendell, I’ve known how serious this is, but for some reason it’s just been dawning on me in the last week or so, maybe it was these mobs at these healthcare townhalls, that this is mortal combat. This is a fight to the death. We’re talking about a corporate monarchy that will not give up their rule without a very, very serious fight, a revolution. I mean, how much profit are we talking about? How much business are we talking about? Their profits are in the billions, aren’t they?

Wendell Potter: Oh yeah, in fact you’re right about that. It’s a fight to the death because we’re talking about many, many billions of dollars, and not only the insurance industry is doing this, but their owners, their Wall Street owners are very much engaged in this, and they’re watching this very closely. It’s high stakes.

Carl Wolfson: Wendell, can you hold on for one more segment, Wendell Potter. I want to correct that website, prwatch.org I was right the first time, prwatch.org. Our guest is Wendell Potter. Your calls after Wendell is with us, we're taking about health care reform and what the opposition is doing to kill it. We'll be back on the Thom Hartmann program.

...

I gave out a number for the Republican National Committee to start of the show, to let them know you’re tired of this mob action they’re running at townhall meetings across the country. Let me give that number once again, 202-863-8500, that’s the Republican National Committee in Washington. 202-863-8500.

We’re very pleased to have Wendell Potter with us. Wendell spent many years, decades, in the private health insurance industry, with Humana and CIGNA, was the chief spokesman for CIGNA, their communications expert. He is now a Senior Fellow on Healthcare Policy at the Center for Media and Democracy prwatch.org. Wendell, thanks for staying with us for another segment.

Wendell Potter: Thank you.

Carl Wolfson: We left you talking about the health industry corrupted by greed and Wall Street expectations. Tell us a little more about that.

Wendell Potter: Well, the total amount of money that flows through these seven largest companies that I mentioned totaled about two hundred and fifty billion dollars last year alone, so that‘s about one out of every eight dollars in America that we spent in this country on healthcare flows through these seven companies. So we’re talking about an enormous amount of money. These companies are accountable to Wall Street investors. We’re talking about big institutional investors, not just you and me who own a few shares and stock, but these are big guys and hedge fund managers, and they make sure, every three months they look very closely at how much money of every premium dollar that these companies take in is actually being paid out for medical care, and since 1993, it’s been shrinking. Back then it was ninety-five cents of every dollar, now it’s around eighty cents. And that is because of the relentless pressure from Wall Street, for them to spend less and less every single year on health care, on invoices or claims that go to doctors in hospitals.

Carl Wolfson: And you mentioned again, in your testimony before Congress, that the two largest insurers, that’s WellPoint and UnitedHealth Group, UHG ... that they each acquired eleven other insurers between 2000 and 2007. This is the functional monopoly that we’re talking about.

Wendell Potter: It is. The industry was in a great consolidation period, has been for the last fifteen years, and it continues. They’re gobbling up smaller players. The Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans that we used to think of as being non-profit, many of them have been converted to for-profit status, and have been gobbled up at WellPoint. That’s the way the industry has changed in just a few years.

Christine Alexander: We’re talking to health insurance industry whistleblower Wendell Potter. We know that they’re going to fight everything, because of what we talked about before the break. You know, this is a matter of life and death. We’ve got the lapdog Democrats, essentially corporate shills, trying to negotiate with Republicans, and rob us of any real reform. Why don’t we just throw out everything that’s been written so far, and go back to single-payer or Medicare for all?

Wendell Potter: Well, the fact that we’re not considering that as a viable option is just a testament to the power and influence of the insurance industry. That would be the ultimate danger to them, because it would essentially put them out of business, so they’ve been able to keep that absolutely off the table. So even leading Democrats have been too afraid to even offer it up seriously. So that just shows you how much power they've got.

Carl Wolfson: Wendell, a couple of things. What’s your best guess as to what the House and Senate will pass this year? And tangential to that, what is the strategy of the health insurance industry to say that if there is a public-payer option, let’s water it down to X,Y,Z. What do they want to water it down to so that it’s not effective?

Wendell Potter: Yeah, I think that there is a chance, maybe a good chance that the final legislation that reaches the President’s desk could include a public insurance option. It likely will be included in the House version of the Bill. It will have to be reconciled with the Senate, which might not include it, but I think the House leadership is very much behind a public option. I think the Senate leadership actually is too, except for Senator Baucus and a few of his colleagues.

The insurance industry, if it sees that it is inevitable, will try to weaken it to the point that it will be available to few people, and that it will not be on a level playing field. They’re very concerned about having to compete against a public option that would provide a decent, affordable benefit plan to Americans at a price they can afford.

Carl Wolfson: Very quickly, we have less than a minute, Wendell, but Dennis Kucinich has an amendment to the House reform bill, I believe, and we talked about it on our shows, to amend the Employee Retirement Insurance Security Act, ERISA, to allow states to develop their own single-payer systems. That potentially can be something good.

Wendell Potter: It’s very important, a very important amendment, because some states have actually looked at that. In fact in California, as you may know, legislation was passed twice but then vetoed by the Governor, that would have established such a single-payer system in California. ??? now in Pennsylvania have been looking at the same thing, and there is legislation there and in Illinois and other states. So that’s important. If we do ever have single-payer, if could develop at state level, like it did in Canada.

Carl Wolfson: Yea, yea. Wendell, thank you so much for joining us. So great to hear your voice, and wishing your dad well, hope he gets released today. We’ve been speaking with Wendell Potter. He’s Senior Fellow on Healthcare at the Center for Media and Democracy, prwatch.org is the website. Wendell, keep up the good fight. We thank you so much.

Christine Alexander: Thank you.

Wendell Potter: Thank you very much.

Transcribed by Gerard Aukstiejus