The insurance industry has nothing more than profit as their sole raison d'ÃÆ'tre. One of the most profitable of these companies, Allstate Insurance, has quite a track record for claim denial. According to All American Public Adjusters...
"There is no greater poster child for insurance industry greed than Allstate. According to CEO Thomas Wilson, Allstate's mission is clear: 'our obligation is to earn a return for our shareholders.' Unfortunately, that dedication to shareholders has come at a price. According to investigations and documents Allstate was forced to make public, the company systematically placed profits over its own policyholders. The company that publicly touts its 'good hands' approach privately instructs agents to employ a hardball 'boxing gloves' strategy against its own policyholders."The company essentially uses a combination of lowball offers and hardball litigation. When policyholders file a claim, they are often offered an unjustifiably low payment for their injuries, generated by Allstate using secretive claim-evaluation software called Colossus. Those that accept the lowballed settlements are treated with 'good hands' but may be left with less money than they need to cover medical bills and lost wages. Those that do not settle frequently get the 'boxing gloves' -- an aggressive litigation strategy that aims to deny the claim at any cost. Former Allstate employees call it the 'three Ds' -- deny, delay, and defend. One particular power point slide McKinsey prepared for Allstate featured an alligator and the caption 'sit and wait," emphasizing that delaying claims will increase the likelihood that the claimant gives up."
At the beginning of the article, the A.A.P.A. lists the top ten worst insurance companies and all seem to have only one interest: Their own profit over the main purpose of the industry; health care coverage for their customers. Yes, I can see how the Ryan plan is better than Obama Care. (Note the sarcasm)
The main argument for the privatization of medicare (and by proxy Medicaid) is the crippling deficits of this Nation. The Ryan Plan may alleviate the Federal Burden in the short run but it transfers it to our elders at a time in their lives where our country is supposed to honor them for their sacrifices and service to our Nation. These politicians are performing all of these dramatic, reactionary, political scenes as an effort to ignore the real creator of our economic distress; America's Holy War with Islam. This is the sickness of the current Democratic and Republican Parties; self absorbed politics.
People like Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachman and Newt Gingrich continue to be the models of what a Republican is. Rush Lindbaugh and Glenn Beck represent the right's radical idolatry, while FOX News, the media front of the Right, continues to spread an agenda that is destroying any ability for the party to reclaim the Presidency.
To be fair though, the Democrats are suffering from a similar insanity with Pelosi, Reid and Obama making up the front line of the politcal side-show and they are supported by their own MSNBC night-time clowns. Washington has become a joke and the roadies; mass media, while We the People are paying the ultimate price for viewing the show hoping for real change: Our livelihood.
Wake up people; no matter how you cut it, death-panel accusatory rhetoric and actual implementation is coming from both sides of this corrupt, political coin. The last two years has produced nothing but increased debt, polarized politics and negative rhetoric while our poor become poorer and corporations rape our Great Land. We the People can only hope that as these fools continue to speak of the opposite side's death panel threat, they condemn each other to its implementation and leave We the People the hell alone to govern ourselves as it was Constitutionally meant to be.
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