Candidate Forum for DPCC Chairperson Election

Democratic Campaign Development Coalition Presents Candidate Forum for Democratic Party of Collin Co. Chairperson Election Tuesday July 14, 2009 7:00 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. Collin Co. Community College Central Park Campus Pike Hall 2200 W. University Drive McKinney, TX 75070 (map) On July 22, 2009 the Democratic Party of Collin County Executive Committee will elect a new chairperson. In light of the July 22nd special election, the DCDC is inviting all potential candidates and filed candidates to speak at our general meeting to hear their ideas for moving the Party forward. While the election for County Chair is done by the Executive Committee, this meeting is open to all Democrats. The DCDC is dedicated to developing Democratic leaders in local, State and Federal government, and to electing Democrats to public office. For more information on the DCDC, please contact Linda Magid at developdemocrats@me.com.

Democratic Party of Collin County Chair Candidates Stepping Forward

Today, June 30th, Daniel Dodd ends his tenure as Democratic Party of Collin County (DPCC) Chair due to health reasons.

So far, three people have announce their candidacy for the Democratic Party of Collin County Chair position:

• Shawn Stevens, who served as Vice Chair of the DPCC for five years, from 2003 until mid-November 2008,
• Victor Manuel, who was the Democratic Candidate for Collin County Commissioner, Precinct 3, in 2008, and
• Marlene Byndon, who was appointed as the replacement Vice Chair by Chairman Dodd and confirmed by the Executive Committee in February 2009.

More on these three candidates coming soon...

The County Party Chair is a critically important leadership position that is the focal point for local party building and organizing efforts. More importantly, the County Party Chairperson has the responsibility to organize, fund and execute the party's local primary election and convention activities every two years.

In Texas the Democratic party's county executive committee consists of one precinct chairperson from each of the county's designated precinct subdivisions, plus, a county party chairperson elected by voters to two year terms of office in even year Democratic Party primary elections.

The county executive committee and county chairperson determine policy in such matters as the conduct and financing of the Democratic Party's primary election and officially canvassing election results. In Texas the county party's primary election responsibilities include staffing each primary election day polling place with at least one Election Judge, one Alternate Judge and one Clerk, working with the county elections office to request adequate voting equipment for each Democratic Primary polling place, conducting the post election day Democratic Precinct Conventions at every polling place, conducting the Democratic County Convention and sending a county delegation to the state Democratic Party Convention.

Remember the 2008 primary season that was marked by record-shattering turnout at the polling places, the precinct conventions on election night and the county convention?

During the 2008 Democratic Primary more people voted in the Democratic Primary in Collin County than voted for John Kerry in the 2004 Presidential Election. More than 20,000 people attended the Democratic Party's 2008 Precinct Conventions all across Collin County on primary election night and approximately 4,000 people attended the Democratic Party's 2008 County Convention. These are all historic record turnouts for the Democratic Party in Collin County and the total number of voters registered since the 2008 primary election has grown by approximately 60,000.

The 2010 primary election turnout numbers will likely not be near the record levels of 2008. Yet, proper organization and funding for the 2010 primary in Collin County will be a critical priority for the new party chairperson and executive committee between now and March 2010.

A quorum of the DPCC Executive Committee, comprised of county precinct chairs, will elect a new chairperson to serve out the remainder of Mr. Dodd's two year term of office, until March 2010, in a special election meeting on July 22, 2009.

Dr. Murray Leaf, Secretary of the DPCC, will gavel the special election meeting to order and then hand the gavel over to a temporary chairperson who will run the remainder of special election meeting. Dr. Leaf has designated Mr. Robert Miller to serve as the temporary special election meeting chairperson.

There is no requirement for candidates to make advance notice of their candidacy for county party chair, but three candidates have, so far, announce their intention to stand for election. Nominations for party chair must be given and seconded from the floor during the meeting. One to three nominating and seconding speeches for each candidate and candidate acceptance speeches are standard procedure for these special election meetings.

Party rules preclude secret ballots for executive committee special election voting, but the rules do provide for signed written ballots. The rules also allow for voice vote, standing division of the house or role call voting, at the discretion of the meeting chairperson.

According to the Article III, Section E, Subsection 5, Paragraphs (a) and (b) of the Texas Democratic Rule Book, the election process is as follows:

5. Vacancies.

(a) When a vacancy occurs in the office of County Chair, the outgoing County Chair or the Secretary of the County Executive Committee may call a meeting to fill the vacancy at any time after it occurs. Upon the written request of any Committee member, however, the Secretary shall call one for a date not more than 20 days after receiving the request, giving each [Executive Committee] member notice of the time, place, and purpose. Should a Committee Secretary fail to act after being requested in writing to do so, the State Chair shall call the meeting in like manner. The officer calling the meeting shall designate a Temporary Chair to preside until the new Permanent Chair is elected. (Texas Election Code §171.025)

(b) Any vacancy on the Committee [including Party Chair] shall be filled by majority vote of the County Executive Committee at a meeting at which a majority of the membership shall constitute a quorum. (Texas Election Code §171.024) Written notice of the replacement member’s name and address shall be promptly delivered to the State Chair... (Texas Election Code §171.024)

Hazardous To Be A Democrat In Some Republican Neighborhoods

Sheriff's Deputies Douse Democratic Fundraiser House Party Guests with pepper spray and threaten to use a taser gun.
Francine Busby, 58, is a Democrat running in 2010 for the 50th Congressional District seat in San Diego County, CA., which is a Republican strong hold. This is the House seat formerly held by Randy “Duke” Cunningham the Republican Congressman sent to prison for taking bribes.

Busby had sought the 50th Congressional District seat in 2006, but was defeated by Republican Brian Bilbray, 53 percent to 44 percent. Last Friday night Busby attended a fund raiser with about 30 supporters at the home of one of the supporters - who happens to be gay.

Near the end of the house party the San Diego County Sheriff's Department arrived with eight patrol cars and a helicopter on an alleged noise complaint. Neighbors said the neighborhood was quiet until the eight patrol cars and a helicopter arrived. The only disturbance was from a man on a next door property shouting “disparaging remarks” at the house party attendees about gay people.

The sheriff's deputy who first entered the home said he felt threatened by the large number of people and that is why he started dousing the guests with pepper spray with one hand while holding a taser gun in his other hand.

Read the full story

Why We Need a Public Health-Care Plan

NPR: Insurers Revoke Policies To Avoid Paying High Costs [3 min 57 sec]

According to a new report by congressional investigators, an insurance company practice of retroactively canceling health insurance is fairly common, and it saves insurers a lot of money.

A subcommittee of the House Commerce Committee recently held a hearing about the report's findings in an effort to bring a halt to this practice. But at the hearing, insurance executives told lawmakers they have no plans to stop rescinding policies of people who submit claims for high dollar medical care.

Former Cigna senior executive Wendell Potter, who has more than 20 years of experience working in public relations for insurance companies Cigna and Humana, said companies routinely drop seriously ill policyholders so they can meet "Wall Street's relentless profit expectations." "They look carefully to see if a sick policyholder may have omitted a minor illness, a pre-existing condition, when applying for coverage, and then they use that as justification to cancel the policy, even if the enrollee has never missed a premium payment," Potter said.

The act of retroactively canceling insurance is called rescission. Insurance companies are, by law, allowed to rescind policies for customers who found to have purposely lied or omitted information from their policy applications. But the subcommittee found some of the rescissions were for seriously ill people who had simply made mistakes on their applications. The process begins after a policyholder has been diagnosed with an expensive condition such as cancer. The insurer then reviews the health status information in the questionnaire, and if anything is missing, the policy may be rescinded.

The omission from the application may be deliberate, to hide a health condition that might have made the applicant ineligible for insurance. But sometimes there's an innocent explanation: The policyholder may not have known about a health condition, or may not have thought it was relevant.

According to Potter small businesses, in particular, have had trouble maintaining their employee health insurance coverage.

"All it takes is one illness or accident among employees at a small business to prompt an insurance company to hike the next year's premiums so high that the employer has to cut benefits, shop for another carrier, or stop offering coverage altogether," he said.

Potter also faulted insurance companies for being misleading both in advertising their policies to new customers and in communicating with existing policyholders.

More and more people, he said, are falling victim to "deceptive marketing practices" that encourage them to buy "what essentially is fake insurance," policies with high costs but surprisingly limited benefits.

Insurance companies continue to mislead consumers through "explanation of benefits" documents that note what payments the insurance company made and what's left for consumers to pay out of pocket, Potter said.

The documents, he said, are "notoriously incomprehensible."

"Insurers know that policyholders are so baffled by those notices they usually just ignore them or throw them away. And that's exactly the point," he said. "If they were more understandable, more consumers might realize that they are being ripped off."

The House Commerce subcommittee study found that three of the major U.S. insurance companies, WellPoint Inc., Assurant Health and United HealthGroup, canceled nearly 19,800 customer policies between 2003 and 2007. The committee found that the companies saved more than $300 million as a result of the rescissions. [ABC News: Retired Health Insurance Executive Blows the Whistle on His Former Industry] [NPR: Insurers Revoke Policies To Avoid Paying High Costs ]

Jay Rockefeller, Chairman of the House Commerce Committee, had this to say about health care in a newspaper interview in his home state of West Virginia: :

"To me, there is nothing that ultimately makes more difference to Americans than health care.

"People often talk about 45 million uninsured Americans, but rarely mention the 25 million Americans who are underinsured."

"At least 100 million Americans face major problems paying for health care today."

"We can't count on insurance companies. They are just maximizing their profits. They are sticking it to consumers."

"I am all for letting insurance companies compete. But I want them to compete in a system that offers real health-care insurance. I call it a public plan..."

"Back in 1993, all our Veterans Administration hospitals got together and agreed to buy prescription drugs as a group. The next week, the costs of those drugs went down by 50 percent.

"Today, the insurance industry runs this whole deal, spending $1.4 million every day to fight health-insurance reform. The government has a lot of power to lower prices"

"We have a moral choice. This is a classic case of the good guys versus the bad guys. I know it is not political for me to say that"

"But do you want to be non-partisan and get nothing? Or do you want to be partisan and end up with a good health- care plan? That is the choice."

NPR: Health Care Overhaul Opponents Use Selective Stats [3 min 57 sec]

Republicans, who unanimously oppose Pres. Obama's call for a public health insurance plan, frequently misquote a recent healthcare study prepared by the Lewin Group in their claim that 119 million people would "lose" their private insurance coverage. (The Lewin Group is owned by Ingenix, which is a subsidiary of UnitedHealth Group.)

That "119 million" number does not represent the number of people that "lose" their private health insurance coverage, rather it is the number people that could happily switch from their private insurance to a public plan. The point of the study was to show that the number of people who would eventually join a government-sponsored public insurance plan would vary — dramatically — depending on how that plan is designed.

If the public plan is open to everyone and pays health care providers rates similar to those paid by the government-run Medicare program, which are lower than most private insurers pay, you'd have a lower premiums for the same (or better coverage) and no risk of coverage cancellation or "rescission" when diagnosed with a high dollar illness. Thus, through free (and fair) market pressures many people and small business owners will voluntarily switch to the public plan.

Unfortunately, it is looking less and less likely that blue dog Democrats will allow that good of a public health insurance option to advance, indeed, if they let any advance at all, even though 72% of all Americans want it.

NPR: Doctors Say Current System Impedes Medical Care [3 min 56 sec]

President Obama told the American Medical Association that the health care system costs too much, includes too few people and is unsustainable without major changes.

Dr. Nancy Nielsen, president of the American Medical Association, says the biggest problem is when patients don't have health insurance. "Every study that's been done has shown that people who lack health insurance don't go to the doctor for preventive care — they delay care," she says. Nielsen says doctors face other challenges as well, such as coordinating care when patients' insurance plans limit the choice of doctors and hospitals. Doctors often have to pick drugs off a list of covered pharmaceuticals.

For emergency room doctors, one of the big problems with the current health care system is the recession.

"We're seeing newly uninsured patients. We're seeing patients who as they get into greater financial distress are cutting corners and delaying the care that they need," says Arthur Kellerman, professor of medicine at Emory University. He works in the emergency department at Grady Hospital in Atlanta and sees patients who have delayed getting treatment for too long.

"By the time they come to us, they are in legitimate emergency condition with problems that are far more costly and sometimes impossible to treat. And that's heartbreaking," he says.

More:

• WSJ Opinion: Why We Need a Public Health-Care Plan - Without the government as competition, the private sector has little incentive to improve. By Robert Reich, professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley and former Secretary of Labor under President Clinton
• NYT Opinion: Not Enough Audacity - The big question here is whether health care is about to go the way of the stimulus bill. By Paul Krugman