May
16
Legislators To Ignore Mental Health Needs… Again?
ByRead the whole thing. Contact your legislators.
Big Insurers Stymie Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Parity Bill
By Rob SchofieldQuick Take:
- Member of the General Assembly are considering an important proposal that would require health insurance providers to cover mental illness and chemical dependency.
- Despite deep and longstanding support from the advocacy community and a proven record in other states, the “parity†legislation is encountering behind-the-scenes opposition from the insurance industry.
- Absent a courageous move by state lawmakers to stand up to this enormously powerful interest group, the proposal seems likely to be stopped or significantly watered down.”
UPDATE at NC Policy Watch
4 Comments
May 17th, 2007 at 12:45 am
If insurance companies, power companies, developers, big pharma (and who else) have more more influence over our legislators than the people who elect them, what’s the point of voting?
We’d have far more influence spending all our electioneering time traveling to Raleigh to harass their asses into voting our way and skip the voting booth altogether.
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May 17th, 2007 at 12:56 am
You make one giant assumption.
“the people who elect them”
Go look at the costs of some of these races, and then look at the election filiings of incumbents. We the people have elected too few of these people, and consequently they are owned by the groups you mentioned.
If we the people elected them, then we would own them instead.
I hear a motion for public financing…Do I hear a second?
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May 17th, 2007 at 12:59 am
Second. But it’s the incumbents who have to vote for financing their possibly hopeless challengers. That’s the tough sell.
Hey, where do the senate and house “caucus” bots get their money?
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May 18th, 2007 at 5:16 pm
Don’t forget gerrymandering. How many of our incumbents are likely to ever face a real challenge?
It’s a one-two punch: the way districts are drawn, an opponent from the opposite party probably won’t have the votes. And because almost all campaign money comes through the caucuses, primary challengers will never have the money.
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