Beware Of The Healthcare Spin

The Washington Times reported yesterday on a plan by groups supporting the President's healthcare proposals to hold a series of tightly scripted events on Tuesday.  The groups have called for an "escalation" of efforts against "enemies" of reform.  The groups involved include Health Care for America Now (HCAN), which is backed by a coalition of labor unions and liberal groups including ACORN and MoveOn.org.  The group organized the protests to target insurance companies and drafted the plan, which describes the demonstrations as part of its "insurance enemies project."

According to the article:

"The HCAN field plan dictates that each protest will include a minimum of 30 participants, target only health care insurers CIGNA, WellPoint and United Health Care and showcase what it calls "victims," or people who have either lost insurance, can't afford it or were denied coverage because of pre-existing medical conditions.

""We built a campaign to win health care reform and that is exactly what we are working on," said HCAN national spokeswoman Jacki Schechner, who authenticated the documents. But she asserted: "There is nothing top-down about this.""

Healthcare legislation is important and will affect every American.  It deserves an honest debate.  To orchestrate this sort of theatrics to attack honest dissent does voters a disservice and stifles honest debate.  To characterize people who question or oppose the current legislation as 'enemies' is simply unfair.  Hopefully voters will ask their own questions and not be swayed by these productions.