“The attacks of September 11, 2001 brought Americans together in a remarkable spirit of unity, patriotism, determination and compassion. The tragic events of that day serve as a stark reminder that our fate as individuals is inherently tied to the fate of our nation. I can’t think of a better way to commemorate the American spirit and the heroism we witnessed on 9/11 than by giving something back to our communities and to each other."

He continued, “The service event [tomorrow] is opportunity to honor the victims of 9/11, the heroic first responders of that tragic day and our brave men and women who have fought for our freedom. It's also an opportunity to recommit ourselves to serving our communities. Democrats will continue to heed President Obama’s call to service.”

The June 1 issue of The New Yorker magazine included an article about the soaring costs in McAllen. A few key passages are excepted below – here’s a link to this must read, The Cost Conundrum. The bottom line? More expensive care doesn’t necessarily lead to better health outcomes.

On costs:

”...The explosive trend in American medical costs seems to have occurred here in an especially intense form. Our country’s health care is by far the most expensive in the world. In Washington, the aim of health-care reform is not just to extend medical coverage to everybody but also to bring costs under control. Spending on doctors, hospitals, drugs, and the like now consumes more than one of every six dollars we earn. The financial burden has damaged the global competitiveness of American businesses and bankrupted millions of families, even those with insurance. It’s also devouring our government.

On incentives:

“...One night, I went to dinner with six McAllen doctors. All were what you would call bread-and-butter physicians: busy, full-time, private-practice doctors who work from seven in the morning to seven at night and sometimes later, their waiting rooms teeming and their desks stacked with medical charts to review.

“Some were dubious when I told them that McAllen was the country’s most expensive place for health care. I gave them the spending data from Medicare. In 1992, in the McAllen market, the average cost per Medicare enrollee was $4,891, almost exactly the national average. But since then, year after year, McAllen’s health costs have grown faster than any other market in the country, ultimately soaring by more than ten thousand dollars per person.

‘Maybe the service is better here,” the cardiologist suggested. People can be seen faster and get their tests more readily, he said.

Others were skeptical.

‘I don’t think that explains the costs he’s talking about,” the general surgeon said.

‘It’s malpractice,” a family physician who had practiced here for thirty-three years said.

‘McAllen is legal hell,” the cardiologist agreed. Doctors order unnecessary tests just to protect themselves, he said. Everyone thought the lawyers here were worse than elsewhere.

“That explanation puzzled me. Several years ago, Texas passed a tough malpractice law that capped pain-and-suffering awards at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Didn’t lawsuits go down?

‘Practically to zero,” the cardiologist admitted.

‘Come on,” the general surgeon finally said. ‘We all know these arguments are bullshit. There is overutilization here, pure and simple.’ Doctors, he said, were racking up charges with extra tests, services, and procedures.

“The surgeon came to McAllen in the mid-nineties, and since then, he said, ‘the way to practice medicine has changed completely. Before, it was about how to do a good job. Now it is about ‘How much will you benefit?’ ”

Communities can provide better care with lower costs:

“…The Mayo Clinic is not an aberration. One of the lowest-cost markets in the country is Grand Junction, Colorado, a community of a hundred and twenty thousand that nonetheless has achieved some of Medicare’s highest quality-of-care scores. Michael Pramenko is a family physician and a local medical leader there. Unlike doctors at the Mayo Clinic, he told me, those in Grand Junction get piecework fees from insurers. But years ago the doctors agreed among themselves to a system that paid them a similar fee whether they saw Medicare, Medicaid, or private-insurance patients, so that there would be little incentive to cherry-pick patients. They also agreed, at the behest of the main health plan in town, an H.M.O., to meet regularly on small peer-review committees to go over their patient charts together. They focussed on rooting out problems like poor prevention practices, unnecessary back operations, and unusual hospital-complication rates. Problems went down. Quality went up. Then, in 2004, the doctors’ group and the local H.M.O. jointly created a regional information network—a community-wide electronic-record system that shared office notes, test results, and hospital data for patients across the area. Again, problems went down. Quality went up. And costs ended up lower than just about anywhere else in the United States.

“Grand Junction’s medical community was not following anyone else’s recipe. But, like Mayo, it created what Elliott Fisher, of Dartmouth, calls an accountable-care organization. The leading doctors and the hospital system adopted measures to blunt harmful financial incentives, and they took collective responsibility for improving the sum total of patient care.

“This approach has been adopted in other places, too: the Geisinger Health System, in Danville, Pennsylvania; the Marshfield Clinic, in Marshfield, Wisconsin; Intermountain Healthcare, in Salt Lake City; Kaiser Permanente, in Northern California. All of them function on similar principles. All are not-for-profit institutions. And all have produced enviably higher quality and lower costs than the average American town enjoys.”

No one doubted last night that the Senate's stimulus bill would clear the 60-vote hurdle it needed to move towards final approval today. But while cancer-stricken Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) summoned the strength to cast his vote, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) was the only active senator who missed the boat entirely.

As Ben Smith explains, Cornyn was in New York charming a group of conservative bigwigs -- and likely donors to the Senate GOP's 2010 campaign effort, which Cornyn is leading.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) is reconsidering a plan to resign from the Senate this year, a huge relief to Republicans who fear that a special election — even in deeply red Texas — could give Democrats a 60-seat, filibuster-resistant majority in the Senate.

Hutchison, who plans to run for governor in 2010, has been under pressure from Republican colleagues to stay in her Senate seat as long as she can.

President Bush's political resiliency in his home state has eroded significantly over his nearly eight years in the White House, with Texans joining the rest of the nation in registering sharp disapproval of his job performance as the nation's chief executive, according to a newly released statewide poll.

Only 34 percent of Texans polled in a University of Texas survey approved of Bush's handling of the presidency, with just under 10 percent approving "strongly.’’ By contrast, 55 percent disapproved, with 38.7 percent strongly disapproving.

While the approval ratings are somewhat higher than national polls, the Texas findings reflect a significant downturn in popularity for a native son and former Texas governor who drew 61 percent of the Texas vote in his re-election victory over Democratic Sen. John Kerry four years ago. Throughout much of his two-term presidency, Texas has generally provided Bush with a safety net of robust support while he was losing favor elsewhere.

President Bush, who has been rarely seen on the campaign trail, cast his ballot for GOP presidential nominee John McCain.

In past elections, the president and first lady Laura Bush have traveled to Texas to vote, but the White House said Friday they cast their ballots in the early voting process. Their votes are being sent back to Texas.

The countdown continues. Less than eleven days to change! Get involved!

If you have any questions or need any information, please feel free to contact me at LaVeraD@dnc.org.

In light of Hurricane Gustav and the ongoing situation along the Gulf Coast, the DNC announced that it has canceled the tomorrow morning's news conference at the DNC's More of the Same Media Center in St. Paul. We continue to keep our friends and families in the area in our thoughts and prayers.

Damien

Damien LaVera
Deputy Communications Director
Democratic National Committee
LaVeraD@dnc.org

I am the president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund. After eight years of George Bush, you might be surprised that a Texan is president of Planned Parenthood. After all, there aren’t many people eager to see the words “Texan’ and “president” in the same sentence ever again. I’m proud that for only the second time in our history, the Planned Parenthood Action Fund has endorsed a candidate for president, Barack Obama.

Planned Parenthood health centers are the leading providers of women’s health care in the country. One in four women visit them—and not just for birth control—for cancer screening and breast exams. Many women have no other source of health care. I see firsthand what women and families are facing—choosing between rent and doctor visits—young people needing information to make responsible decisions about their health.

Women deserve a president who understands their health care needs. The record is clear: Barack Obama does and John McCain does not. Barack Obama has worked for affordable family planning, for comprehensive sex education and for a woman’s right to choose. He will be a president who supports women’s health and rights one hundred percent. He’s the change America needs.

And John McCain? He’ll be more of the same. He’s spent 25 years working against the health care needs of women. John McCain has voted against women’s health care 125 times. You can look it up: he voted against real sex education, against affordable family planning and, if elected, John McCain has vowed to appoint Supreme Court justices who will overturn Roe v. Wade.

John McCain believes that judges, politicians and bureaucrats know better than women themselves what’s best for their health. Just two weeks ago, John McCain said he didn’t know if insurance companies should cover birth control. Well, let me remind you senator, you voted against it twice.

Where women’s health is concerned, it seems clear that when John McCain says “I don’t know”, what he really means is “I don’t care.” Women deserve better.

On that summer night in Atlanta 20 years ago my mother introduced her “nearly perfect” granddaughter Lily. Lily is here tonight and there is nothing that would make mom prouder than that this November Lily will cast her first vote for president – for Barack Obama. For mom, for Lily, and for all women, Barack Obama is the right choice.

Barack Obama is the change America needs.

John McCain is campaigning aboard an oil rig, Genesis, jointly owned by Exxon Mobil and Chevron in the Gulf of Mexico. It is laughable that McCain would campaign on the Genesis to push his phony "drill here, drill now" nonsense because it took Genesis ten years to produce any oil at all.

Not exactly the imagery the McCain campaign wants to create.

Throw this one on the heap of McCain gimmicks -- like the gas tax holiday -- that will not provide any real relief for Americans.

John McCain will say and do anything to win this election, including selling out to Big Oil on gimmicks that won't provide any real relief to Americans, but boost their profit margins.

In announcing his newfound support for offshore drilling, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) consistently touts the safety of offshore oil exploration. “[I]t’s safe enough these days that not even Hurricanes Katrina and Rita could cause significant spillage,” he said recently. To make his case, McCain was scheduled to helicopter tomorrow to an oil rig in the Gulf Coast.

But it seems even McCain is fearful of being caught on an offshore oil rig during rough weather.

The weather event that forced McCain to cancel his event is the category 2 storm, Hurricane Dolly that made landfall in South Texas this afternoon.

John McCain, however, is among the many Republicans who continues to push the false talking point that Hurricane Katrina, a category 5 storm, did not cause any oil spills in the Gulf Coast.

The truth?

As the Wonk Room has reported, the clear satellite evidence of major spills was borne out by final reports. In May 2006, the U.S. Minerals Management Service (MMS) published their offshore damage assessment: “113 platforms totally destroyed, and 457 pipelines damaged, 101 of those major lines with 10″ or larger diameter.” [...]

Hurricanes Katrina and Rita Caused 124 Offshore Spills For A Total Of 743,700 Gallons. 554,400 gallons were crude oil and condensate from platforms, rigs and pipelines, and 189,000 gallons were refined products from platforms and rigs. [MMS, 1/22/07]

Hurricanes Katrina and Rita Caused Six Offshore Spills Of 42,000 Gallons Or Greater. The largest of these was 152,250 gallons, well over the 100,000 gallon threshhold considered a “major spill.” [MMS, 5/1/06]

Yet another case of the John McCain Campaign Playbook -- say and do anything to get elected.

The bus tour also builds on the success of the DNC's 50-state strategy and Senator Obama's commitment to running a 50 state campaign, and the belief that if Democrats show up and ask for people's votes, we can win everywhere. Throughout the tour Governor Dean will engage local leaders and grassroots activists in the effort to register new voters and talk about Barack Obama's strong message of change.

Starting Thursday, you can register to vote, find more information on how to register others to vote and follow the bus tour state-by-state at registerforchange.com.

"After eight years of George Bush and with John McCain promising more of the same on everything from the economy to Iraq to Social Security to health care, America is ready to join Barack Obama and Democrats to Register for Change," said Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean. "People are really struggling. They want different leadership, not more of the same failed Bush policies that John McCain will continue. So we'll be going neighborhood by neighborhood, door by door to bring more people into the process to elect Barack Obama and Democrats up-and-down the ticket to bring change that all Americans can believe in."

The Register for Change tour kick-offs of Thursday, July 17, in George W. Bush's backyard in Crawford, Texas - a clear reminder of John McCain's promise of a third Bush term on everything from the economy to Iraq to health care. The tour then heads to Austin, Texas for a Register for Change rally at noon before Dean speaks to the Netroots Nation Convention that night.

From Texas, the tour heads to New Orleans - a city that experienced the failings of Republican leadership in Washington firsthand - and then to Shreveport and Baton Rouge, Louisiana and Hattiesburg and Jackson, Mississippi. The second swing, July 25-26, will make stops in North Carolina and Georgia - two untraditional battleground states where voter registration efforts will help lead Barack Obama to victory in November. The tour will hit states in every part of the country, culminating in a swing through the Midwest on its way to the Democratic Convention in Denver.

Another sign of the incredible energy expressed by Democrats are the record voter registration numbers.

The past seven states to hold primaries registered more than 1 million new Democratic voters; Republican numbers mainly ebbed or stagnated. North Carolina and Indiana, which will hold their presidential primaries on May 6, are reporting a swell of new Democrats that triples the surge in registrations before the 2004 primary.