Wendell Potter in Salon.com continues his whistleblowing on how health insurance PR aims to spread lies and kill reform.  They have been instrumental in stirring up support on right-wing talk shows, put up front groups, and feed talking points to Congressmembers.  In the lead up to Michael Moore’s new film on capitalism, it is interesting to see how much effort the healthcare lobby put forth to try to discredit his previous film Sicko.

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How corporate P.R. works to kill healthcare reform by Wendell Potter

It is easy to think of efforts to influence lawmakers as the exclusive domain of K Street lobbyists. Much has been said and written about the millions of dollars the special interests are spending on lobbying activities and the hundreds of lobbyists who are at work as we speak trying to shape healthcare reform legislation. Very little by comparison has been written about the millions of dollars that special interests are spending on P.R. activities to accomplish the same goal and that are vital to successful lobbying efforts.

One of the reasons I left my job at CIGNA, where I headed corporate communications and was part of the Legal & Public Affairs division, was because I did not want to be involved in yet another P.R. and lobbying campaign to kill or gut reform. I finally came to question the ethics of what I had done and been a part of for nearly two decades to influence decision making and bill writing on Capitol Hill.

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