Sean Hannity and His Panel Carry Water for the Insurance Companies
By Heather Sunday Aug 16, 2009 8:00am
What would the poor little old insurance companies do without the likes of Sean Hannity and his panel to rush to their defense? After claiming that the protests at these town halls are a grass roots movement, and not one being fueled by groups taking money from the insurance and health care industries, Hannity and Carlson staunchly defend the insurance industry.
HANNITY: And tonight we're launching a new Friday night panel that we call "The Sleep-in Sunday Panel." And we're going to give you all the hard-hitting political news on Friday night so you can enjoy the weekend, get a few more hours sleep Sunday morning.
And joining us tonight, he has been a campaign consultant for over 30 years. Democratic pollster Doug Schoen is back.
He is a FOX News contributor. The one and only Tucker Carlson is here, without a bowtie.
And she's the national security and Pentagon correspondent for the Washington Times. Sarah Carter is with us.
And you gave up the bowtie a couple years ago.
TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Many years ago. I joined the mainstream.
HANNITY: OK. Is that right?
Well, guys, good to see you. Thank you for being with us.
All right. Let's start with the president's town hall. By the way, if they would have had the confetti and the balloons, it would have been, you know, a convention. I mean, everybody standing. One guy mentions the NRA. Three people clapped in Montana.
But let's watch him, again, attack -- attack FOX News.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I believe in our Constitution, and it's a very important thing. I also get my news from the cable networks, because I don't like the spin that comes from them other places.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, you got to be careful about those cable networks.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You can't tell us how you're going to pay for this. You're saving here; you're saving over there; you're going to take a little money here; you're going to take a little money there. But you have no money. The only way you're going to get that money is to raise our taxes. You said you wouldn't.
OBAMA: Look, you are absolutely right that I can't cover another 46 million people for free. You're right. I can't do that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Well, that was one truth. Can we all agree on the panel? Does anyone disagree that this was a well choreographed, you know, ticketed event? They handed it out to their supporters. You agree?
DOUG SCHOEN, DEMOCRATIC POLLSTER: Absolutely. It was well- choreographed. They were on message. And they managed to lower the volume for today.
But as you heard, Sean, the president didn't have a good answer to that question. And what's driving public opinion is not outrage and venom, but it's rational people with real concerns about the role of government and the cost of government.
HANNITY: Then why, Doug -- we've been friends a long time, and I think you've been trying to warn your fellow Democrats. Why are they referring to people showing up at these meetings as political terrorists and mobsters and, you know, Nazis and swastikas and Brownshirts and...?
SCHOEN: It is tragic. I will give the president credit for this. He is at least trying to lower the tone and the rhetorical excess. Because bottom line, Sean, it's un-American to engage in that kind of division and hate; because we are all Americans and we want to work together to solve problems.
HANNITY: It's little old ladies and veterans, Tucker, you know, being called un-American by Nancy Pelosi.
CARLSON: Well, the conspiracy theories that arise are the ones that amuse me most, that -- two. One, that this is all -- these town-hall meetings are somehow being infiltrated by industry, opponents to the plan, and their shills, basically, working on behalf of trade groups, most of which actually support the plan or have remained mum on it. So that's absurd.
Or, it's the Republican Party, which all of a sudden has become incredibly organized. A party that couldn't organize my eighth-grader's birthday party, all of a sudden is able to, you know, rally these unseen forces to derail the health-care plan. I mean, it's absurd. This is a real grass-roots movement.
HANNITY: It's organic. This is real.
SARAH CARTER, WASHINGTON TIMES: This is a grass-roots movement. Town-hall meetings have occurred in this country since the founding of this country. And it's insulting.
And I think the American people are insulted when -- when they're attacked and when they're treated like -- like they don't understand what's going on.
Look, the American people want to know the truth. They want the president to answer their questions. And I think there's nothing wrong with that. And we have a right, as people, to understand what the government is doing with our health care. I mean, this is a very serious issue.
HANNITY: There were two great questions. One was by the NRA guy, and what we just saw: how are we going to pay for this?
And the other question was, why did you start attacking the insurance industry? And it was asked by a guy that worked for the insurance industry.
Now Elmendorf and the CBO said, "Hey, look, all this preventive care money we're going to spend," he says, quote, they find it's going to add costs.
SCHOEN: And the problem is the president basically said, "I only vilify the insurance companies because they're," quote, "not constructive. They're not supporting my policies."
And bottom line is he's not able to work with them, so he attacks them. And he's making them his bogey man, because he's unable to sell his plan.
HANNITY: Isn't this something we see, Tucker, a lot as we stand back and watch elections? Democrats, you know, we can predict with certainty every election years, Democrats will often run ads that divide this country on race -- race lines, rich versus poor, old versus young. This seems to be a tried and true tactic.
They've attacked FOX, talk radio, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity. Now it's the health-care industry, banks, and big business. This is -- they always need somebody to hate, it seems.
CARLSON: Campaign politics is about -- no one wants to say it, but it's about division, in my view, having covered a lot of campaigns. I think the question is, "Who do you make your enemies?"
And in the end, you need the insurance companies. Without them, you don't have a health-care system. Obama's plan, it seems very clear to me - - no one says this. We'll make it impossible for insurance companies to turn a profit.
And so you have at that point two options. They go out of business. Can't have that. Or the federal government ends up supporting them through tax dollars. That's going to happen.






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Click here to hear the Republican corporate anthem.
That's a good anthem.
Here's their motto.
UK health system hits back against lies.
False death panel has familiar roots.
Sarah Bailin and her death panel.
"There are few tribes more loathsome than the American right" (Guardian UK)
... that thiiis appears:
"Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa told a local radio station last week that "countries that have government-run health care" would not have given Sen. Edward Kennedy, who suffers from a brain tumor, the same standard of care as in the U.S. because he is too old."
Maybe more like - good that the Senator has a Government-run Health Insurance Plan and not something "We the -unrich- People' have to depend on
And yet he still won't be waterboarded. Keith's offer's still on the table, Manatee. $1000 a second. Could be you, baby.
he gave the money to a charity on behalf of Mancow, who went through it, after having claimed it was 'a little water on the face,' lasted a couple of seconds and declared "It's not simulated drowning. It IS drowning" and shared how he had nearly drowned as a kid (I think he went unconscious) and said waterboarding was exactly like his experience with drowning. A producer of Mancow's ask if KO's offer to Hammity extended to Mancow, and KO said Yes, and that Hammity could go to hell; it was obvious he was too much of a coward to do it, and that the offer was off the table.
You've got to admit facts..Sean Hannity is truly a card carrying member of the biggest A-Holes on earth... his vile spew should be made into a case study to be taught around the world as everything you NEVER want to be when you grow up..
Just a vile human....
just read cue cards written for him or is he ignorant enough to believe the garbage coming out of his piehole?
Both. The guy is a moron's moron.
mmoorroonn!
:D
I've got one question for Hannity to answer:
When are you going to open the books on your "Freedom Concerts?" You know the concerts Sean you've been holding since '03, but have "NEVER" reported to anyone, anywhere how much money has been raised and how much money was "ACTUALLY" spent on the wounded veterans and their families?
You claim to have donated $10,000,000 from your '07 Freedom Concerts to Freedom Alliance,however Freedom Alliance's Tax Form 990 (for 501c3's) for '07 shows no amount of $10,000,000 being donated! That also goes for the years of '03,'04,'05,'06! 2008's 990 for Freedom Alliance hasn't been released publically yet!
So Hannity, how about producing the balance sheets for your Freedom Concerts for the whole world to see!
Freedom Alliance, when checked out on the BBB website, did not "provide requested information". Meaning they refused to send any financial info to the Better Business Bureau.
Most charities submit their information including a breakdown of how much is spent on admin, fund raising and what portion actually goes to charity.
She has been real quite since KO's challenge, but what can you expect from despicable upper crust white trailer trash, notice if she didn't have her cue cards she wouldn't even be able to put two words together. Why do they keep promoting these Intellectual Midgets to such serious discussions. This nit wit net work Whore is right up there with all the other Intolerant, Ignorant, Indifferent knee jerk Morons of America. Does she swallow.
I suppose you could go over to Free Republic and I am sure there are a few 100 who could answer your question with direct knowledge.
Well wel well, how did I know that Tucker Carlson would end up on Fox?
With apologies to the truly disabled, Tucker should have stayed on the short bus. Funny how giving up the bowtie was his own idea. Seems I remember John Stewart's public spanking had more to do with it than Carlson's own ideas.
the bowtie. Hannity can't stop being a bastard even to his own kind.
Most of us knew he would end up there. He is a egotistical little right-wing bastard, who never misses a chance to make anti-labor comments. Tucker Carlson openly shows his contempt for working class Americans. It would be worth a short stay in jail, to have the chance to throw a pie in his face.
Because he failed at every other cable channel in existence?
Seriously, I'm surprised he didn't try hocking his own line of costume jewelry on QVC at one point...
Michael Panzner at Financial Armaggedon after What Makes a Revolution, a 2001 study by UK economist Robert MacCulloch
here
Panzner also draws on work of Berkeley Professor Emmanuel Saez recently updated through 2007 which shows the record gap in US income distribution.
The Corporate Feudal Overlords (h/t That Mick Piobr have seen their share of the pie grow enormously while we the peons are pushed further into the mud.
The trickle down on your head is urine.
The bubble up is your money gone to the fat cats.
The Insurance Gnomes are at the forefront of the gouging of everyone who doesn't own the bank.
Hannity and his fellow puppets are merely the mouthpieces for the Oligarchs.
The REVOLUTION is overdue.
I think the start date for revolution is 9-2-2009, they will probably chicken out again. I really don't want to fight along side those Tea- Bagger freaks anyway, our revolution was HiJacked. The government has been in the business of mass people manipulation for a long time.
by how favorable their tax plans are. This is a good example of how ruling elites pay no taxes:
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2003/1124/142cha...
Read the accompanying article for more detail.
That seems a bit delusional.
"The president didn't have a good response..." How can you tell that -- they cut it off after two seconds.
There's a corporate shill, a republican lacky, a phony democrat, and an ultra far-right neocon on that panel. So I guess it's balanced in that sense.
Let's get real. Wasn't eight years of catastrophic failure enough? For republicans this is not about health care. It is about their ideology: profits over people, war over diplomacy, dividing over uniting. It is about losing the 2008 election. It is about despising and defeating Barack Obama under any circumstance. Do not let republican policies steer our country.
To win a war one must be prepared to eliminate the other side. The Republicans know this and practice it. The corporate media is more than a willing accomplice.
may not be able to organize your 8th graders birthday party because you didn't give them enough money, but they have organized the MSM.
Faux Noise is the last place left where all the fired Right Wing-nut, Non-jounalist, liars can go to be hired, no matter what.
The ABC morning news dropped "born-again" scott sams back in 2007 for trying to proselytize others at the station to their annoyance and they complained.
After about year-and-a-half he shows up on CBS morning news team. At one point he claimed he was looking to anchor a news show on a "religious" TV channel.
http://www.unclebarky.com/abovethefold_files/...
...about dropping the public options.
When will the Democrats grow a spine and say to the insurance companies, "The people who elected us don't give a flying suck about your profits and we don't either"?
And we're going to give you all the hard-hitting political news on Friday night so you can enjoy the weekend, get a few more hours sleep Sunday morning.
Which is code for.....shoot, you all know what it is.
Sunday Morning has lies, facts, moderators and debate, while Friday night Fox has Hannity.
That is EXACTLY what I was thinking.
Tucker Carlson "mainstream"? LOL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmj6JADOZ-8
HANNITY: And tonight we're launching a new Friday night panel that we call "The Sleep-in Sunday Panel." And we're going to give you all the hard-hitting political news on Friday night so you can enjoy the weekend, get a few more hours sleep Sunday morning.
Sleeping in on a Sunday Church morning?
Oh Sean, to the "Hail Marys" for you, boy!
Also for a few other sins, starting with Commandment #8 ( according to the RCs anyway ): "Bearing false witness".
.
when i look at the still video frame all i see is one huge human/particle board/graphics bow tie.
... if one ever wanted to know how the nazis would have used computer graphics and TeeVee for their propaganda purposes, the only thing we need to do is turn on FOX News to find out.
Tucker CARLSON???? Bwahahahahaha. They've got to be kidding!
... the f#*& is it written that $35 out of every $100 - the money I set aside for my medical needs must become someone's 'Capital Gain' and 'Dividends' or help pay some clown's $40,000,000 salary and benefits and bonuses?
Answer that you f#*& repugs.
Tucker Carlson: "Obama's plan, it seems very clear to me - - no one says this. We'll make it impossible for insurance companies to turn a profit."
And this is a bad thing? This is your best argument, Tucker?
People are going without insurance because they can't afford to pay premiums, and you're trying to scare the public that the poor, downtrodden insurance companies aren't going to make a profit? Gee that's high on my list of things to give a shit about, Tucker. Too fucking bad.
Oh, and by the way, Tucker, with or without bowtie, you are still a preppie asshole.
when all the TARP money was distributed...
Just the audacity of Sean accusing anyone of a choreographed event.
I must live in a different universe than these intellectually dishonest, or just stupid, A-holes. And I will never understand their endgames.
Hannity is getting rich doing this shit as is Beck , Limbaugh ... all of em , half of what they say they don't believe , they are right wing lunatics alright but they are playing to the dumbest most ignorant and pathetic audience on planet earth .
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