by Charley James

Six months ago, in a long-forgotten article, I quoted a Cleveland physician complaining that health care reform will cut his income so sharply he will be forced to curb his lush standard of living.

… a physician acquaintance in Ohio who is a highly regarded specialist with a seven figure income … complains to me that any of the current health reform proposals will cut his income in half, at least, as if his life would disintegrate if he had to live on only five or six hundred thousand dollars a year. Better 47-million people not have access to his training, skills and expertise than he drops one of his two country club memberships because of personal financial hardship.

While the health insurance industry’s immoral, amoral and, sometimes, illegal treatment of policyholders is an appropriate prime culprit and target in the current push for reform, the fact is that physicians, hospitals and drug companies are getting an undeserved pass by much of the media. They are as much to blame for health care problems and out-of-control costs as Aetna, the Blues, Wellpoint and other insurance companies.

Trouble is, not only is the media letting them off the hook, so is Congress.

One of the original key goals of health care reform was to lower the obscene cost of getting sick and recovering in America, whose citizens pay far more for everything from a simple visit to the doctor to complicated tests to prescription drugs than anyone else in the civilised world. Yet neither the likely House version nor the current Senate version of reform give cost cutting more than a flicker of attention.

So Kaiser Permanente chief executive George Halvorson showed Ezra Klein of the Washington Post a series of revealing and extremely disturbing charts, comparing the cost of similar medical services in the US and five other Western countries plus US Medicare.

Kaiser is the largest managed care organisation in the US, founded in 1945 by industrialist Henry Kaiser, and consists of the Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Kaiser Foundation Hospitals and regional Permanente Medical Groups.

Since it insures some nine million people as well as operating not-for-profit hospitals and clinics, Halvorson has horses running in the race – but on both ends of the betting line. So while he is in a unique position to see the issue two ways.

Office Visits
According to Halvorson’s charts, it costs the typical patient in the US anywhere from $59 to $151 to see a doctor. In countries with a national health plan, the price is a fraction of what it is here. In Spain, the cost to see a doctor is $15; Germany $22; France $31; the Netherlands $32; and Canada $30. Under Medicare, it is $72. In Canada, for example, the fee for a doctor’s visit is negotiated between the government and the College of Physicians and Surgeons in each province; in the US rates are whatever the doctor can get away with charging, except when treating Medicare and Medicaid paitents.

Yet Congress is backing off trying to control even a portion of the cost of an office visit by refusing to roll back scheduled increases in what Medicare pays physicians to see each patient. No wonder the AMA gave its full-throated endorsement of the House bill – and reform generally – yesterday: Its member’s income won’t be affected one bit so my physician friend in Ohio will be able to keep both of his country club memberships.

Complex Exams
Nothing in the human body is more complex than the brain yet there are enormous spreads in the cost of a CT head scan between the US and other countries. In America, with “the greatest health care system in the world,” a CT head scan cost ranges from $950 to $1,800. In Canada, where I’ve had such a scan, the cost to the system ranges between $41 – really! – and $530. Germany is the most expensive of the six countries compared yet its cost per scan is one-third of the low end of the US range.

Prescription Meds
It’s just as bad in the US after the tests are done and a patient walks from the doctor’s office to a pharmacy across the street to fill a prescription.

Lipitor is a widely-advertised and often-prescribed medication for lowering cholesterol. In America, the pharmacist will collect anywhere from $125 to $334 before handing over the prescription bottle because drug prices are not regulated.

In one of Congresses most disgraceful sell-outs, in 2005 it prohibited Medicare from negotiating with Pfizer for what will be charged patients for the drug. Yet in each of the five other nations surveyed – where government negotiates the price of all prescription medications – patients pay a tiny fraction of what Americans must shell out.

What happens when the price of Lipitor is negotiated? It plunges. I mean plunges: In each of the other five countries, the cost per prescription is anywhere from one-quarter to one-half of what Americans shell out for the exact same medicine treating the identical ailment.

Yet Big Pharma got Congress and the Obama administration to agree to not set up a system to negotiate drug prices. So, every time any American needs to have a prescription filled, the pharmaceutical industry and member of Congress will make them wish they lived somewhere else. No wonder so many people in the US buy medicine in Canada.

As WaPo’s Klein notes, “There is a thudding consistency to the (charts): A series of crude bars, with the block representing the prices paid by American health-insurance plans looming over the others like a New York skyscraper that got lost in downtown Des Moines.”

There is a reason why American health care costs so much more than in any other country: We pay so much more for each unit of care. As Halvorson explained to Klein, and both university studies and consulting companies confirm repeatedly, if you leave everything the same – number of procedures, days spent in hospital, number of operations done – but plug in prices Canadians pay, America’s health care spending falls by 50%.

This is more than enough to cover every uninsured person in the US.

The Daily Kos US veteran Markos Moulitsas calls out GOP apologist former Representative Republican Tom Tancredo (and Presidential ‘wannabe’) for his depression deferment in Vietnam and slam of the VA, government healthcare that saved the lives of several tea party protesters, cue irony machine. Must See TV.

Repub Mainstream Ceases to Exist. This film makes the UK BNP look almost sane. Watch if you can this incredible display of lawless wing-nuttery. Michele Bachmann. Man Tan Minority Leader Boehner and Minority Whip Eric Cantor join in the insanity of Foxx, Gohmert, Wilson, Diaz-Balart and crew. Speechless.

By Denis Campbell

International Business Wales (IBW), subject of a Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) expenses inquiry initiated this past summer by the Welsh Lib Dems, last month released an annual report showing Wales ranked near the bottom of the table of UK business development regions. IBW will conduct three trade missions to the United Arab Emirates nation of Dubai. The first of these trips falls on the heels of current weeklong each trade missions to China and India.

On the surface, one could argue these trips show business development ‘activity.’ But are high cost junkets the best use of increasingly limited funds? Especially when we see the WAG struggling to find £100 million pounds in savings and local councils are cutting back on education and other services?

What is the development strategy at work here? At what point does one say to IBW’s leaders, you need to target your investment and trips in a more focused manner? When does the taxpayer get more than lip service when asking what the return on this investment is and the specific businesses it attracted? And when are these executives held accountable for costly expenses and what would in the private sector be categorised as a failure?

Who within the WAG is asking if IBW should embark on three junkets in four months to a country reeling from depressed petrol prices, a Real Estate, investment and banking catastrophe or otherwise looking to investment from farther eastern nations producing goods and paying workers $1 a day or less?

Are leaders in business and government really expecting that businesses in Wales will convince those in the Emirates, China and India that Wales’ manufacturing and technology job base is cheaper, larger, smarter and better than their own? Are we somehow now generating exports of products there large enough to create massive jobs growth and business here in Wales?

One ballyhooed but amount unspecified partnership and order of photo cells to Hong Kong from Cardiff-based g24i does neither a Mideast and Orient strategy make, nor, like was mentioned in Part One, allow IBW to take credit because it is an international deal.

Indeed is no one remotely concerned about dealing with such a sensitive and proprietary new technology in a country known for its complete disregard of international intellectual property law? A country whose stated goal during the September pre G-20 meeting was their intention to invest heavily in green technology energy storage cells to dominate that market? So we’re dead level certain they would never use the g24i partnership/order to develop/steal the technology for themselves?

Deserted Desert
Dubai is literally crippled by over expansion and the current global economic, banking and real estate crises. Why send three missions there?

To his credit, the Emir articulated a great vision in the late 1980s. He knew that oil (like our coal) would not sustain the economy or educate his people beyond 2050. He had a spectacular coastline for real estate development and set about to create huge economic investments to build a broader economy. He did this by building industrial duty-free ‘ports’ and financial services opportunities of all kinds. This led to a phenomenal two decade period of economic development and expansion in his nation.

My firm was asked in the mid 90’s to help create a feasibility study for a Muslim and Arabian ‘Disney-style’ theme park to be called ‘Magic World.’ I remember seeing huge lines at the Dubai exhibits in the Frankfurt Book Fairs of 2002 and ‘03 as they unveiled a virtual media, graphic and printing duty-free ‘city’ where all commerce and export would be conducted tax-free.

They had great plans, were considered to be the most ‘moderate’ of all Muslim nations, had unlimited petro-dollars to spend and squarely aimed to become the Riviera of the Gulf.

The photo leading this essay though shows the impact of the current real estate over-building bust. Today Dubai struggles to complete their world’s tallest building. Investment has dried up in the desert so much that ex-pat investors and bankers park their top of the line Mercedes roadsters at the airport with the keys in them for repossession because they can no longer afford the lifestyle and abandoned everything heading for home.

What can IBW Wales possibly accomplish that benefits Wales with three visits to a now struggling nation that both over-promised and over-built?

Washington Dreamin’
The IBW website has a broken/incomplete link pointing to “Post-Mission Details” yet has only the daily schedule that sat on their website since long before the June ’09 week-long, 88-VIP, junket to the week-long Smithsonian Folk-Life festival in Washington, DC.

This ‘trade mission to Washington’ needs a local’s perspective as background. Having lived in greater Washington from 1990-95 and attended this and many other festivals on the National Mall, I can only tell you who the featured nations were each of those years by visiting the ‘past festivals’ tab on their website. For those scoring at home Senegal, Indonesia, Bahamas and Cape Verde were featured when I lived there. I only remember the Bahamas because a colleague invited me to a dinner where one was obliged to appear in jackets, pink shirt and regimental tie, long socks and Bermuda shorts.

My family would visit the festival for part of one afternoon and that… was that. There was no business conducted there. The Folk-Life Festival is a lot of wonderful things; centrepiece of a trade mission does not remotely spring to mind. Even the IBW working sessions featured visits with/to: NASA, the British Embassy, The Smithsonian and un-named green and entertainment industry representatives.

It seemed short on trade, investment and policy discussions. It was further surprising to note that there was not one meeting scheduled with the US Cabinet-level Commerce Department, the agency most responsible for international trade. And despite their recent problems, even The US Chamber of Commerce would have been a group to meet with. But, hey, I’m sure the National Geographic and Discovery Channel presentations were entertaining and riveting.

With as many people and businesses listed as being on this mission, where were the meetings on Capitol Hill with key-state Senators and Representative staffs? Last week unplanned in one day on The Hill, I buttoned-holed Barney Frank’s staff on the financial services committee for a progress update on Internet gaming relief, watched floor debate on healthcare reform in both Chambers and participated in a Senate press gaggle over healthcare reform.

Why with so much time to plan this junket, were IBW not meeting with local Chambers of Commerce and businesses in states with Welsh history and populations such as: Philadelphia’s Main Line (2 hours north by train), New York City (4 hours) and across Pittsburgh, Youngstown and northern Ohio?

Someone is responsible? And again, what was the return on this investment of airfare, hotels, ground transport, food and entertainment? What was sponsored and paid for by others and what was picked up by the WAG and IBW?

Time to Lead from the Front
Going back to examples from Part One, The Beacon Council in Miami did not take a trip unless all of the details were pre-set in detail by an advance team and 90%+ of all expenses were picked up either by companies in the area directly benefiting from the businesses we sought to attract or… locals wanting to support the trade mission out of a sense of civic duty and pride.

Real, professional management is needed to right this ship and convert it to a real economic development power. Government alone cannot lead in the economic development arena. It must work with the private sector and provide infrastructure help that moves at the speed of business.

Cosseted, myopic group think where one only talks and listens to oneself or a small group of like-minded individuals, often leads to full throated support of strategies destined to fail. Thinking small brings small results. Thinking too big without the talent to execute and win also creates ‘activity’ but disastrous results.

Wales can little afford either.

Rev. Irene Monroe

Rev. Bernice King has been bestowed the honor to be the eighth president and first women to head the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).

Co-founded by her father, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the Rev. Bernice King may be a legacy pick for SCLC, but unfortunately she will not be carrying on his legacy.

As a matter-of-fact, given the homophobic vitriol Rev. Bernice King has spewed out over the years the LGBTQ community is bracing to see what next she’ll say and do given the bully pulpit she now has.

Rev. Bernice King’s track record concerning LGBTQ civil rights has been less than humane and antithetical to both legacies of her parents.

For example, Rev. Bernice King’s most audacious sign of desecrating her father’s legacy was the December 2004 march titled “Stop the Silence, “ promoting an anti-gay agenda.

Beginning the protest march by lighting a torch at her father’s grave site and then passing it on to her spiritual mentor and the march organizer, Bishop Eddie Long of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church who proudly carried the lit torch in a two-mile march through Atlanta with thousands of followers, Rev. Bernice King adamantly stated that the march was not against LGBTQ people. It’s a “need for God’s People to stop being silent” and being “ about God’s business of speaking up for the Kingdom of God,” King told Associated Press.

However, contrary to her claims, the first goal of the march listed on the church’s website promoted a constitutional amendment to protect marriage “between one man and one woman.”

On speculating about her father’s viewpoint on marriage equality let us not forgot one of Rev. Bernice King’s sanctimonious moments of ranting and railing against it when she stated that  “I know in my sanctified soul that he (Dr. King) did not take a bullet for same-sex marriage.”

Bernice dishonored her mother’s civil rights legacy by holding the funeral at Bishop Long’s church, which Julian Bond, the national NAACP chairman, didn’t attend.

“Mrs. King was a strong supporter of gay and lesbian rights. Her husband was a strong believer in helping the poor and preached a theology of contempt for seekers of material goods — and lived his life that way. The pastor of the church where she was funeralized led an anti-gay march through Atlanta — sadly, Mrs. King’s youngest daughter, an elder in his church, accompanied him. We cannot know what Mrs. King’s wishes were for a funeral — she probably had no choice about church or minister — but I did have a choice — and while I have an abiding respect for my former neighbor and friend, I chose not to be in that church” Bond told AP.

SCLC has an outstanding legacy of championing the civil rights of African Americans. But it has not expanded its reach beyond racial discrimination. And attempts to do so have been admonished by SCLC’s national board.

For example, Reverend Eric P. Lee, president of the Los Angeles chapter of the SCLC and the author of the book, “Marriage Equality: Proposition 8, The California Divide” was called on the carpet by SCLC’s national board last year for his advocacy in favor of LGBTQ marriage equality during California’s heated Proposition 8 controversy.

Comprised mostly of conservative clergymen and some churchwomen, SCLC remains in an intentional time warp.  With its refusal to speak on present-day issues not only plaguing the African American community but plaguing all Americans, SCLC exists as a visiting museum tethered to the 1960’s civil rights era rather than exist as an organization faced toward the challenges of today. For example, King’s oldest son, Martin Luther King III, was president of SCLC from 1997-2004. He failed to join the national fight against HIV/AIDS, ravaging African American communities, because he “felt uncomfortable talking about condoms,” L.A. times reported in 2001.

SCLC’s religious rhetoric against LGBTQ citizens chokes progress, hinders equality, and allows religion-based bigotry to flourish.

“The SCLC cloaks its support for inequality in religious rhetoric. I often hear the argument that religious African Americans are somehow required to be homophobic and to oppose marriage equality because of their deep commitment to Christian doctrine, practice, and belief. But this ignores that the primary distinguishing characteristic of African American Christianity is its rejection of oppressive biblical interpretation in favor of embracing a liberating and loving God,” Melissa Harris-Lacewell, professor at Princeton, wrote on the blog, “The Notion.”

While many in the LGBTQ community now gasp at the reality of Rev. Bernice King being at the helm of SCLC, I gasp at SCLC’s audacity to still call itself a civil rights organization.

by Charley James

Thanks to the movie website Corona Coming Attractions, there’s an advance review of the new film Fair Game, based on the book by Valerie Plame, the CIA case officer who was “outed” by the Bush Administration when her husband called the president a liar in The New York Times in July, 2003, for claiming Iraq was acquiring nuclear weapons material.

Wilson’s Op-Ed piece led to a firestorm in Washington, an admission by the White House that it had exaggerated the claim in Bush’s State of the Union address during the run-up to the war, and a series of investigations that resulted in convicted felon Scooter Libby not going to jail thanks to his pal Dick Cheney.

The rest is history – and now a movie.

A test screening for Fair Game, which stars Naomi Watts and Sean Penn, was held a few days ago and someone at Coming Attraction caught an early cut of the film:

Fair Game is really a tremendous, thought provoking film. It’s based on the same titled memoir by former CIA Agent Valerie Plame, who of course worked for the agency as an undercover spy until her husband wrote an op-ed piece declaring that the Bush White House lied about Sadaam Hussein’s efforts to buy yellow-cake uranium from Niger. Naomi Watts plays Plame (and as shown at the ending, really looks a lot like her), and plays her wonderfully. The story is set up through a sequence at the beginning showing her in action in the field, and in the CIA headquarters being completely dedicated to her job. She loves what she does for her country even at the price the travel and the secrecy puts on her family life.

“She’s married to former Ambassador Joe Wilson, played by Sean Penn in what very easily could (and should) be his next Oscar nomination. Wilson is a man in turmoil almost from his opening scene, dining with friends who think they know everything about the world. They don’t, Wilson doesn’t, but he certainly knows more about the Iraq situation than they do and is glad to tell anybody about it who will listen. His expertise gets him looked at (through no suggestion of his wife) and requested of by the CIA to take a trip to Niger to investigate reports that Hussein was looking to buy uranium from that country, which Wilson was a leading expert on. He agreed, made the trip, found that there was no possible way that a purchase of yellowcake was made, and reported that back to the government. The administration, as we now know, chose to ignore this report, and used the incorrect intelligence as a key basis in its case for war.

“This destroys Wilson, who starts to speak up in the press, and the leak of his wife’s identity was made. We’re led to believe that the order of the leak was made by Karl Rove to Scooter Libby (played by a hilariously serious David Andrews), and the rest is history. Plame’s career is destroyed, her marriage (and life) nearly go along with it, and a major investigation into corruption in the Bush White House is launched, ultimately leading to the fall of Libby.

“The film clocked in at roughly 1:50, and paced tremendously well. There was a side-plot they spent a bit too much time on involving an Iraqi family and Plame’s valiant efforts to save them from the invasion, but that was really the only downfall of the film. Watts is excellent, at least as good as she was in Eastern Promises, and Penn is as good here as I’ve seen him. It’s directed by Doug Liman who did an excellent job of it, and I believe he also served as DP, so kudos to him as I often forgot the camera was even rolling. Truly a wonderful human drama with political suspense that should interest anybody no matter how they vote. 9/10 (stars).”

Fair Game does not have a scheduled release date and often films are edited heavily based on audience comments at advanced screenings.

Denial (Nile) is a river in Egypt. Repubs are not part of the crowd voters don’t like?

By Denis Campbell

Democrats lost Governorships in New Jersey and Virginia and won a House seat in upstate New York as the Republican Party continued to implode. $400 million dollars worth of money could not buy love for NJ’s Governor Corzine or Mayor Bloomberg (but ‘da mayor’ narrowly won his so coveted 3rd term that he changed the City’s Charter to be allowed to run for it). And gay marriage lost yet again as the right wingnut base voted it down in Maine.

While incumbents lost roundly one only need look at the disastrous ratings of governors Schwarzenegger in California, Palin in Alaska and incumbents across the nation to see that voters are upset with the glacially slow pace of legislation and government response to the current economic crisis.

Team Obama neither lost nor benefited and team Axelrod and Plouffe will have lots of data to pour over.

Not lost but missing from most reports is the low turnout in all contests. The loyal, older base of both parties came out but most others (as is the case in mid-term and these even worse off-year elections) stayed home.

But don’t tell the breathless pundits on FOX or MSNBC. There every open microphone foretold of doom for Democrats.

Time now for a reality check.

What was fascinating to see was the implosion of the Republican Party along ideological lines. The party of NO! has only has 20% support and in the NY 23rd where less than 150,000 people in total voted, they handed the seat to a Democrat for the first time since the Civil War? The Sarah Palin’s Facebook Page vs. former Speaker Newt Gingrich battle for the soul of the party is not going well at all and driving more moderates away. Why these folks even get airspace is beyond anyone. That is the real story of this election.

President Obama has let Congress prove its worth over 10 months and the verdict is ‘not-so-good.’ It is wise to remember that Candidate Obama learned from every setback in the 2008 campaign and became a tougher, better candidate. Now with 10-months of continual crisis leadership under his belt, you can safely bet President Obama will not allow this lesson to go unlearned. The right has vexed the Jedi master so here’s what “The Force” and political reality of 2010 will bring:

• Obama will lead from the front on healthcare reform and financial services reform. He gave Congress a chance and they failed. December will see dramatic change and real bills with teeth on both issues.

• Stimulus funds will create more jobs in January and February than ever before as market optimism returns everywhere except the health sector.

• Obscene banker bonuses will be clawed back and the party will end this year with tough reins on compensation across the board, ‘let them move to London’ will be the rallying cry, ‘no one is worth that kind of money.’ (Of course moving to London will mean they will be at the mercy of a desperate Labour Party entering an election cycle… I hear Singapore is lovely this time of year.)

• The economy will improve slowly but surely and unemployment will dip to 7.5% or lower.

• The Republicans will continue to in-fight, narrow the base, implode and become even less significant.

• More incumbent governors of both parties will lose.

• In the 2010 midterms, Obama voters will return hand more seats to the Dems, punish LIEberman and other churlish moderate DINOs (Democrats in Name Only)

• Iraq will be a US ghost town, Afghanistan will be scaled back to counterinsurgency fights only vs. nation building.

• The Cheney family will continue to speak to any open microphone and attack the Obama’s for dithering, read deliberate, thoughtful action.

• The President and his team will continue to clean up and eradicate the messes W Bush left behind.

• Come 2011 gays will be able to serve in the military and we will see torture trials held.

• Harry Reid should lose his Senate seat with a new, stronger majority leader taking his place but he will likely hang on and Dems will gain even more seats in the midterms and better be able to push an agenda through and handle the debt.

And it will all be great fun to watch.

Louisiana Senator caught on DC Madame’s prostitution ring customer list ignores rape pleas of constituent.

by Charley James

Here’s good news for college and university students desperate for a part-time job that won’t even require leaving a dorm room.

Humana, Inc., the fine and good corporate citizen that spends millions of its customer’s premium dollars to fight health care reform and a public option rather than using them to pay claims, now wants to use even more premium bucks to pay students willing to sneak on-line at places such as Facebook and Twitter to tout the horrors of any change to America’s superb health care delivery and financing system.

In other words, Humana is trolling college campuses looking for whores willing to accept money to be on-line promoters of an anti-reform policy that’s against the student’s own, best interests – or will be, once they leave school and are on their own. Given the state of the economy, no doubt Humana will be overwhelmed with applications.

On Monday morning, blogger Molly Horan reports that Humana is actively recruiting students to develop and implement viral media strategies designed to undermine support for health care reform among their unsuspecting peers, making the whole thing appear as if it’s coming from just another tea party protester who can use a computer.

Fortunately, the Federal Trade Commission is one step ahead of Humana.

New Disclosure Rules
Beginning Dec. 1, bloggers and TV shows alike will have to disclose if they’re getting cash for mentioning or touting a product or idea. Clearly, Humana’s paid corps of anti-reform student zealots will have to mention they’re getting more than a penny for their thoughts.

As N.E. Marsden wrote Friday in an Op-Ed piece at the Washington Post, “bloggers and, more important, stealth corporate marketers (must) post ‘clear and conspicuous’ disclosures when they receive payment for endorsing online. … The principle is sound: People have a right to know when someone is trying to sell them something.”

While I’m all in favour of the free marketplace of ideas, when the ideas are being slipped to a writer in exchange for cash, I’d like to know who’s footing the bill. This is on a par with George Bush paying Iraqi journalists in 2005 to write glowing articles on the glorious wonders of the American invasion and occupation.

Humana’s strategy gives a new and broader meaning to its slogan, “Guidance when you need it most.” Under the circumstances, it might be more appropriate as “Guidance we pay for when we need you to shill for us.”

Is Everyone A Fraud?
Look, I know times are tough. Jobs scarce. The future scary. Real health care and insurance reform a toss-up. So, having been one once, I can’t really blame journalism students for trying to grab a bit of spare change where they can – although, hopefully, some will have the integrity to see the offer for what it is, and reject the idea of applying out-of-hand.

Still, I can’t help but shudder when I read the job posting:

Humana – Guidance when you need it most
Role: Political Communications Specialist (part-time, limited-term)
Location: Chicago, Ill. or work-at-home

Are you interested in politics and political communication? Have a way with words? Know your way around Facebook, Twitter and the blogosphere? Put your skills to work where politics, communication and public relations intersect. You will:

• Help manage and track a variety of online (“Web 2.0”) channels

• Build a strategic new media and social media presence

• Contribute content for both traditional and new media

• Get a “foot in the door” and gain valuable experience in one of today’s most challenging and fast-paced public policy arenas – health care

This is PR flackery, pure and simple, and of the worst kind. Humana is trying to lure virgin minds onto the rocks of whoredom by singing a siren song promising money and “valuable experience” in exchange for selling out America.

It’s ethical fraud; not illegal but definitely immoral.

Of course, it turns out there’s as much ethical fraud being committed by mainstream and highly respected journalists, as well.

A week ago, the lead story on CBS’ 60 Minutes covered the supposed $60-billion fraud in Medicare payments. I sat watching it dumbfounded, wondering if this might pound a huge nail in the coffin of the public option. Pierre Tristam had the same reaction. But then, he decided to confirm the 60 Minutes reporting.

Tristam is an editorial writer for the Daytona News Journal. He started by calling the show’s producers who referred him to the person at the Justice Dept. who worked with 60 Minutes which, he eventually admitted, used a high figure in the “range” of “possible” and “believed to be” Medicare fraud.

So Tristam kept digging, finally publishing a remarkable Sunday piece titled “Loose With Numbers: Medicare Fraud Report A Fiction.”

Steve Kroft and his producers never bothered to trace their facts to the source for viewers, relying instead on the slob-journalist’s cheapest cop-out: Attribution by estimates. Nor did they make the equally important point: Insurance fraud isn’t unique to Medicare or government-run programs. If anything, it affects the private sector more. Shame on “60 Minutes” and the Justice Department for throwing around wild numbers. Those are the numbers – the fictions – shaping public opinion across the country and public policy in Washington.

“Medicare fraud is a serious problem. But singling it out and exaggerating it beyond credibility won’t fix it, although it may help doom any government expansion of health care. In that regard, the 60 Minutes segment did its death-panel best.”

I feel as if the whole world has turned into the 1919 Chicago Black Sox, sneaking around behind everyone’s back, putting in the fix, and damning the consequences – or the rest of us.

It’s not just Humana that’s looking for students to be on-line trollers. Israel is also looking for people, according to the website Desert Peace:

The Foreign Ministry unveiled a new plan this week: Paying talkbackers to post pro-Israel responses on websites worldwide. A total of NIS 600,000 (roughly $150,000) will be earmarked to the establishment of an “Internet warfare” squad.

“The Foreign Ministry intends to hire young people who speak at least one language and who study communication, political science, or law – or alternately, Israelis with military experience gained at units dealing with information analysis.”

And so it goes.

A special h/t to Breandan Healy