Political Spin Made Easy!

The Wall Street Journal reported on the trend that private insurers are beginning to notice that, well, their members are disappearing – half a million from WellPoint alone in 2009. Thanks, economy! Since we’ve already hit that point in the health care debate where facts are slightly less important than how you spin them for political advantage, this is your chance to play at home and come up with your own talking points. Politics can be fun!

Here are the facts from the article: WellPoint has 35 million customers. As is common in the insurance industry, their exact number of customers ebbs and flows as people change jobs, get replaced or not replaced, and as their companies switch their benefits plans. What the industry wasn’t expecting in its quarterly projections, however, were the huge number of customers lost because they were laid offs, because their companies dropped benefits altogether, or who drop coverage for some other reason (say, inability to pay the increased premiums).  Similarly, United Health claims it’s lost 900,000 already this year, and could lose as many as 1.5 million in 2009 if the unemployment rate continues to rise.

The article goes on to cite the Kaiser Family Foundation rule of thumb that for every 1% increase in the unemployment rate, 1.1 million people lose their health insurance coverage. Estimating that 3.6 million people (!) have likely gone on Medicaid or some other public coverage program since the year began, that would put us square on 50 million Americans without insurance.

Now let’s see what you can spin out of this!

1. "The real story here is the drop in customers. How are these private insurance companies to survive with so many people dropping insurance? Don’t these people know that they’re leaving behind a sicker, weaker population and driving up rates for everybody? What, do they expect WellPoint to dip into its $580.4 million profits this quarter so they don’t have to raise premiums? Come on! These unemployed kids probably think they’re entitled and invincible, which is why they were so easy to fire." (Submitted by an editorial page that may or may not resemble the NY Post.)
2. "The real story here is how bad the economy is. Ay-yi-yi, think of all the lost jobs this translates to! And health care is one of the few industries that’s been stable! Clearly this means it’s exactly the wrong time to do anything that would raise taxes on any corporation or in any way do anything like an employer mandate that would make companies' lives harder. The real tragedy here is what’s happening to the poor insurance companies: 1.3% drop in income for WellPoint? That’s unsustainable! 50 million uninsured is sad, but not taking the opportunity to cut capital gains tax would be far worse." (Submitted by a Republican member of the House of Representatives who's reasonable and might vote for a health care reform bill… but I doubt it.)
3. "That’s pretty terrible. Several million more people uninsured because of the economy! I’m completely for doing something about this broken health care system, particularly if doing something means shaking my head and looking sad. I do have to say, though, now is not the time for any health reform plan that requires money in any way. That I’d be totally against. Hey, where are those TV cameras you said were going to be here?" (Submitted by a Senator who may or may not be described as “moderate.”)
4. "You can’t make an omelet without breaking some eggs. If Americans have access to the care they need, that means the Swedes have truly won." (Submitted by an anonymous radio host.)
5. "50 million people? Are you freaking kidding me? 50 million? What is wrong with you people?" (Submitted by most of Europe, Australia, New Zealand, the powerhouse economies of Asia, our neighbor to the north, and at least 62% of Americans.)

Please, submit your own!

(Photo credit:  JoshSchulz on Flickr.)