That said, Kucinich provides the logical measuring system, if the market ups the anticipated future value of health-industrial complex stocks on the trading markets, something shown by current trading price increases, then the dark forces are gaining at the expense of the decent folks. Kucinich's email, in that context, states
Values of Health Care Stocks Increase Fearlessly as Public Option Is Dead
Wall Street Celebrates Senate's "Significantly Watered Down" Health Care Bill
Dear Friends,
Wall Street is celebrating "Health Care Reform." According to an industry insider report yesterday by MarketWatch (Gibson and Britt) health care stocks rallied as the bill moved through the Senate, particularly since there is no public option in the bill to compete or compare with insurance company rate-making.
"Health care investors find themselves having confronted their greatest fear, and, while there will be legislation, it will be significantly watered down ..." said Mike O'Rourke, chief market strategist at BTIG LLC. As a result, shares of Aetna gained 4.7%, while Cigna rose 3.9%. United Health and Wellpoint "rallied to 52-week highs."
Once the bill becomes law, insurance companies will gain at least 26 million new customers and as much as $50 billion in new annual revenue from private-pay and from government subsidies as people will be required by law to purchase private insurance. While certain expenses are capped in the bill, it appears that premium costs are not.
The Senate's move prompted Gregory Nersessian of Credit Suisse to raise his price targets [predicting greater strength of stock performance] on seven insurers: Aetna, Cigna, Amerigroup Corp., Humana Inc., Molina Healthcare Inc., UnitedHealth Group Inc. and Wellcare Health Plans Inc.
" ... the [bill] is a positive first step" Nersessian said in a note to clients. "The heavy lifting will come when Congress is forced to slow the rate of medical cost growth through more aggressive payment restrictions and utilization controls down the road," he said - meaning that this particular industry insider is predicting limitations on benefits.
Marketwatch also wrote that none of the new standards on how much the industry must spend on medical expenses will "impose great hardship on any insurers."
Tomorrow: My analysis of the health care legislation as it currently stands.
I do not see how anyone with any intellectual honesty can deny the compelling truth of that communication. This one sentence rang my BS meter - pinned it to the far end of the scale and rang an alarm bell:
United Health and Wellpoint "rallied to 52-week highs."
That fits a barometer of mine - what's a boost for Hemsley [aka UnitedHealth's poster child CEO] is bad for all real people, those earning their keep by honest labor rather than by heading a plundering operation, which is my view of what the health insurance providers are up to. Kucinich might agree.
Relate betting on the market, and watching changes in the betting, to a Vegas tracking of point spread allowances in betting on the NFL. My guess is if the bookies in Vegas saw betting swings such as the Kucinich email highlights, they'd pull the game from the boards. They do that when their evidence suggests a fix is on.
And Obama, if you've noticed, is no longer singing along with Dylan, "The Times They are a'Changing." But what in the world did you expect? Change? Get real.
We have to conclude that Mark Dayton's assessment, DC is a cesspool, has merit.
I suggest that Baucus and Lieberman right now are in contention for being the biggest cess in the pool. So to speak. But each is certainly not without many, many challengers for the accolade. Any reader nominees - biggest cess in the pool? Leave a comment if so.