There are so few mainstream investigative journalists in this country
anymore, I have to wonder in whose pockets the MSM has cozily
slipped--and why.
When one of our best investigative newspapers has slipped to such depths that it's publisher invites health insurance execs
hellbent on killing any hint of public options to hobnob with, and thus
lobby, top-level White House officials at a private soiree in her own
home (but only if they fork over $25,000), and when nobody else seems
to notice or care, we can give up any remaining quaint notion of a
watchdog press.

We're on our own, folks, and if not for the precious few like Bill Moyers and Rachel Maddow,
we would be dead in the water. They are the mainstream media remnants
of a once-proud profession and we need to treat them like the treasures
they really are.

They study the issues, they bring on guests who
can discuss them intelligently, they ask the right questions, they give
their guests time to answer thoughtfully, they continue the
conversation with smart follow-ups, and best of all, they don't give up
their precious air time to raucous, spitting catfights between
notoriously biased opponents.

Last week, Bill Moyers brought to our attention two important stories. (See above for the first one)

On "Bill Moyers Journal" on PBS Friday night, Bill talked with Wendell Potter, a former Cigna exec turned whistleblower. In Potter's own startling words
(startling not because we didn't know, but because a former insider,
someone who, less than two years before, was a practicing purveyor of
these professed sleazy tactics, said them):

"The
industry has always tried to make Americans think that government-run
systems are the worst thing that could possibly happen to them, that if
you even consider that you're heading down the slippery slope towards
socialism... I think that people who are strong advocates of our health
care system remaining as it is, very much a free market health care
system, fail to realize that we're really talking about human beings
here, and it doesn't work as well as they would like it to... They
are trying to make you worry and fear a government bureaucrat being
between you and your doctor. What you have now is a corporate
bureaucrat between you and your doctor... The public plan would
do a lot to keep [health insurance companies] honest, because it would
have to offer a standard benefit plan. It would have to operate more
efficiently, as does the Medicare program. It would be structured, I'm
certain, on a level playing field so that it wouldn't [have an] unfair
advantage [over] the private insurance companies. Because it could be
administered more efficiently, the private insurers would have to
operate more efficiently."

The interview is a half-hour
long. Later into it he outlines the insurance industry's efforts to
discredit Michael Moore's documentary, "Sicko", when they saw the truth
in it and were afraid the American people might believe it, too. This
to me was a stunning admission, the entire interview an astonishing
piece of journalism--again, not entirely surprising, but I saw a door
opening, enough for us to wedge our foot in. Wan rays of sunshine about
to turn dazzling, if only we can keep the momentum going.

I beg
everyone who reads this and clicks onto the link to send it on to
everyone you know. Send it to your congressmen, your governors, your
legislatures, the White House. Get an email chain going--put the link
up on yard signs or billboards. Put it on bumper stickers. Stencil it
on tee-shirts or tattoo it onto your forehead. Whatever it takes.

This is a television event too important to let die. Please. Keep it alive. Keep it going. It's up to us now.
(cross-posted at Ramona's Voices here)

Ramona