How shameless.
Posted on 10/06/2007 10:42:57 PM PDT by icwhatudo
Graeme Frost, who gave the democrat rebuttal to George Bush’s reasons for vetoing the SCHIP Bill, is a middle school student at the exclusive$20,000 per year Park School in Baltimore, MD.
Graeme was in a severe car accident three years ago, and received care paid for by the government program known as SCHIP-(State Children's Health Insurance Program)
"I was in a coma for a week and couldn't eat or stand up or even talk. My sister was even worse," Graeme wrote. "My parents work really hard and always make sure my sister and I have everything we need, but we can't afford private health insurance."
His sister Gemma, also severely injured in the accident, attended the same school prior to the accident meaning the family was able to come up with nearly $40,000 per year for tuition for these 2 grade schoolers. Confirmation both attended Park found here using edit-"find on this page"-Gemma. It will take you to an article in the schools newspaper about a fundraiser for Gemma class of 16, and Graeme class of 13.
Here are photos of the school's 44,000 square foot Wyman Arts Center: two galleries, an outdoor ampitheater, Meyerhoff Theater, Macks-Fidler Black Box Theater, practice rooms, rehearsal space, and ceramics, 3-D sculpture, woodworking, jewelry, painting, photography, digital graphics studios, recording studio, and keyboard lab.
In a Baltimore Sun article the family claims to be raising their four children on combined income of about $45,000 a year. "Bonnie Frost works for a medical publishing firm; her husband, Halsey, is a woodworker. They are raising their four children on combined income of about $45,000 a year. Neither gets health insurance through work."
What the article does not mention is that Halsey Frost has owned his own company "Frostworks",since this marriage announcement in the NY Times in 1992 so he chooses to not give himself insurance. He also employed his wife as "bookkeeper and operations management" prior to her recent 2007 hire at the "medical publishing firm". As her employer, he apparently denied her health insurance as well.
His company, Frostworks, is located at 3701 E BALTIMORE ST. A building that was purchased for $160,000 in 1999. The buildings owner is listed as DIVERSIFIED INDUSTRIAL DESIGN CENTER, LLC whose mailing address is listed as 104 S Collington Ave which is the Frost's home. The commercial property he owns is also listed as the business address for another company called Reillys Designs which leads to the question of whether rental income is included in the above mentioned salary total
The current market value of their improved 3,040 SF home at 104 S Collington Ave is unknown but 113 S COLLINGTON AVE, also an end unit, sold for $485,000 this past March and it was only 2,060 SF. A photo taken in the family's kitchen shows what appears to be a recent remodeling job with granite counter tops and glass front cabinets
One has to wonder that if time and money can be found to remodel a home, send kids to exclusive private schools, purchase commercial property and run your own business... maybe money can be found for other things...maybe Dad should drop his woodworking hobby and get a real job that offers health insurance rather than making people like me (also with 4 kids in a 600sf smaller house and tuition $16,000 less per kid and no commercial property ownership) pay for it in my taxes.
Sounds like a Dem to me, yep
The family plans to join Gov. Martin O’Malley, House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer, Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin and others at a rally Monday in Annapolis.
House Democrats called up the advocacy group “Families USA,” which supplied Gemma Frost and her mother, Bonnie, survivors of a car accident that left Gemma and her brother, Graeme, with brain injuries.
“Gemma, we want you to be healthy and happy and successful,” Hoyer told the girl. “That’s why we’re doing this.”
******
The advocacy group “Families USA” is a SOCIALIST group connected to George Soros which is filled with DEMOCRATS. It is NOT a non-partisan group.
http://www.familiesusa.org/about/
American non-profit consumer health-care advocacy organization. It was founded by attorney Ron Pollack, its executive director.
Pollack was Dean of Antioch School of Law, and argued cases involving food aid for low-income Americans before the Supreme Court.
In 1997, President Clinton appointed Pollack as the sole consumer representative on the Presidential Advisory Commission on Consumer Protection and Quality in the Health Care Industry, where he worked on the Patients’ Bill of Rights.
Familes USA is an influential health-care lobbyists in Washington, DC. They’ve taken positions on every major piece of health care legislation, most recently the Medicare Part D plan.
Families USA is a partner in the Campaign for Children’s Health Care, a multi-year campaign to raise awareness about the problem of uninsured children in America.
******
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Families USA Refuses to Disclose Funding
Families USA, a long-time critic of pharmaceutical industry, recently joined a coalition calling on the pharmaceutical industry to disclose its contributions to educational and charitable organizations. (See press release).
Yet, curiously, despite these public calls for transparency, Families USA refuses to disclose its own sources of funding. It is nowhere to be found on its website. A call to Families USA to inquire and the development woman said that the organization only discloses to the IRS. (Most reputable non-profits usually disclose this sort of thing directly on their websites, including the posting of 990 forms.)
******
Also connected to the Clinton’s:
President William Jefferson Clinton
Remarks as Delivered
For Families USA
January 23, 2003
Thank you very much for the warm welcome.
And, Ron, thank you for the reference to Hillary. You actually should have given her a bigger round of applause because, unlike me, she can still do something for you.
I am delighted to be here. Chris Jennings, who was my health care adviser in the White House, and several other people who worked with us are here today. And I see a lot of other old friends in the audience, some of whom I worked with in Arkansas over 20 years ago.
I can’t say how much gratitude I feel for the work that Families USA did with us, the information they gave to us, and the mistakes they kept us from making during the eight years I had the privilege to serve here in Washington.
Social change is hard work. In 1918, in a remarkable essay called “Politics as a Vocation,” the great German sociologist smart guy Max Weber said: “Politics is the long and slow boring of hard boards.”
Ron Pollack and the Families USA crowd have never forgotten that, never whined about it, never quit in the face of frustration and defeat. They just keep boring the hard boards. And I’m very, very grateful.
(APPLAUSE)
We can’t move backward. Cutting people off Medicaid is not only the wrong thing to do, it’s actually bad for the economy; it will spread all kinds of anxiety throughout this country. It will hurt people, it will hurt businesses, and it will hurt hospitals and health care workers. Families USA just released a report on the multiplier effect of cutbacks in Medicaid. Clearly, we should increase the federal contribution to Medicaid. It will save jobs and improve health care. We should do it without delay.
But we can’t do that, because they want to give me the money.
You know, I never made a nickel to my name until I left the White House, and I love being able to talk like this now.
(LAUGHTER)
(APPLAUSE)
And furthermore, as George Soros said the other day — God bless his soul, he and Bill Gates gave a big speech here in Washington against repealing the estate tax. George said, “Look, right now interest rates are low, even though we’re running deficits, because the economy’s down. When the economy picks up, interest rates will soar, and that will slow economic recovery in America.”
Bill Gates Sr. said something the other day that made me so proud I could pop. He said, I don’t understand why they keep trying to give me a tax cut. He said, “What do you think people like me would pay in advance just to be born in America? That ought to be worth something. Why do we think that we’re somehow entitled to be a permanent privileged class with no responsibility to the country that’s given us these opportunities?”
There was a cartoon the other day in the paper. I almost fell out of my chair laughing.
This kid is asking, “What did you do in the war on terror, Daddy?” And the daddy says, “Oh, I took a tax cut so that you could pay higher taxes when you grow up.”
(LAUGHTER)
We should be able to do this. There was enormous bipartisan support for the SCHIP program. It was part of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. I’ve talked to a number of Republican members of Congress who are quite proud that they voted to create that program.
Again, I want to say the way Families USA has tried to reach out to people in every sector of our society who are giving care, who are paying for care, who are receiving care is important. I think this Covering the Uninsured Week you’re going to launch in the spring is very, very important. I hope all of you will participate in that.
Again, I want to acknowledge that it’s easy for me to give this speech now. I have no responsibilities. But at least you know I did try for eight years to fix this, and I was willing to pay quite a high political price for it.
(APPLAUSE)
60 Minutes broadcast failed to tell viewers that Families USA, which issued the study, “is a left-wing organization with an agenda of increasing government involvement in health care.”
“60 Minutes” identified Families USA as a non-partisan group
“We are non-partisan – I want to be clear about that,” said [Families USA Executive Director Ron] Pollack. “We have never supported or opposed any political candidate for any office, ever. I don’t know how I could be more resolute about this. And indeed, our tax exempt status requires us to be.” Pollack said that the vast majority of the group’s finding comes from non-partisan foundations, though it has received a “tiny proportion of funding” from George Soros.
Ron Pollack is right when he says Families USA is non-partisan, but that’s a red herring. The National Center for Public Policy Research did not say that CBS should have told viewers that Families USA supports candidates of one particular political party for public office, we said viewers should have been told that Families USA is “a left-wing organization with an agenda of increasing government involvement in health care.” When CBS decided to call Families USA a “non-partisan health care watchog group” without saying anything about its leftism, viewers were misled. What possible reason, other than bias, would 60 Minutes have had to do that?
Interestingly, while CBS called Families USA a “non-partisan health care watchog group,” it called the National Center for Public Policy Research “a conservative group called The National Center For Public Policy Research.” The National Center is conservative, but it has the same tax status as Families USA — and has an equal claim to be called “non-partisan” by CBS.
Families USA bills itself as a “national nonprofit, non-partisan organization dedicated to the achievement of high-quality, affordable health care for all Americans.” This has led the media to refer to it as a health care consumer advocacy group. But Families USA has strong partisan ties to the Democratic Party, labor unions and liberal activism. And it has received major financial contributions from George Soros, who is donating millions to Democratic-leaning advocacy groups.
President William Jefferson Clinton
Remarks as Delivered
For Families USA
January 23, 2003
Thank you very much for the warm welcome.
And, Ron, thank you for the reference to Hillary. You actually should have given her a bigger round of applause because, unlike me, she can still do something for you.
I am delighted to be here. Chris Jennings, who was my health care adviser in the White House, and several other people who worked with us are here today. And I see a lot of other old friends in the audience, some of whom I worked with in Arkansas over 20 years ago.
The Institute on Medicine as a Profession (IMAP) which according to it’s website “aims to set forth a vision for professionalism in the 21st century and to promote that vision through research and policy initiatives. “
IMAP received a $7.5 million grant from George Soros who made his money in part from wrecking currencies. IMAP is part of a new venture called The Prescription Project, which is funded by Community Catylst, which in turn is funded by the same group that funds the liberal Families USA which also receives money from Soros. The Prescription Project is being funded by the Pew Charitable Trust to the tune of $6 million but is also linked to the Prescription Access Litigation Project through its affiliation with Community Catalyst. That project is comprised of the largest tort lawyers suing drug companies for a variety of reasons.
The Prescription Project is designed to end companies from having any contact with doctors or patients whatsoever
PS. Health Care For All is affiliated with Community Catalyst and Families USA
Send her an email!
The Prescription Project is “ an initiative of the Boston-based nonprofit healthcare advocacy group Community Catalyst, which made headlines a little over a year ago when it sued Pfizer over its marketing claims for Lipitor. The Prescription Project is being conducted in partnership with the Institute on Medicine as a Profession (IMAP) and is funded by a USD 6 million, two-year grant from The Pew Charitable Trusts and money from George Soros.
Part of this campaign includes class action lawsuits initiated by the Prescription Action Litigation Project which in turn is comprised of Trial Lawyers Inc (large trial firms that seek huge monetary damages by suing corporations) and their public advocacy front, Public Citizen and various state organizations.
For instance, one mainstay of the PALP is the law firm Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro (HBSS)
Hagens, Berman is famous for suing Starbucks for unbridled competition and being slapped with a $10 million penalty for violating their “.. duty of loyalty to three small water bottlers that in 2003 were close to settling a claim with Nestle Waters North America, the owner of Poland Spring Water Co.” “Seattle law firm told to pay $10.8 million”, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Mar.24; Lattman, Mar. 24).
Public Citizen and the U.S. Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) works closely with Hagens Berman and other tort firms through Community Catalyst and TPP and other conduits to attack off label prescribing via fishing expeditions, testimony and now legislation at the state level to force doctors to either disclose or disgorge any money obtained from drug or biotech firms for any purpose.
This is not an effort to ‘clean up’ medicine. This is a witch hunt, a Stalinist effort to purge medicine of any relationship between academia, private industry and clinicians. And it is an effort to presume that off-label prescribing is both hurtful and possibly criminal behavior. Let’s be clear: the goal is to create another opportunity for shaking down the drug industry and physicians. All you need are RiskMaps that prohibits and limits off-label prescribing and you have a whole new source of revenue for tort lawyers.....
The kids’ injuries are from a car accident. Health insurance has little-to-no applicability here. Their auto insurance should have covered this.
Ping! When I emailed this to you, I also sent it to Carolyn!
Wow.
Wow. Talk about unflattering. Why would she wear that dress to a press-conference?
David Rothman, PhD, Associate Director of The Prescription Project and Director of the Institute for Medicine as a Profession at Columbia University.
David J. Rothman is Bernard Schoenberg Professor of Social Medicine and History at Columbia University. His books have explored the history of prisons and mental hospitals and the impact of bioethics and law on medicine. He has just been named president of the Institute on Medicine as a Profession, funded by George Soros.
******
“Soros is successful because his giving is openly political and daring,” said David Rieff, a writer who serves on one of Mr. Soros’s boards. He is determined to use his money to change the nation’s social agenda and is tough-minded about achieving his goals.”
Public records show that since 1993 he has donated some $15 million to foundations and groups that favor changing the nation’s drug policies. Ethan A. Nadelmann, head of the Lindesmith Center, a New York City institute founded in 1994 with Mr. Soros’s money and budgeted for $828,000 in 1996, has called for legalization of marijuana and other drugs.
In addition to this charitable, or tax-exempt, support, he donated more than $1 million to the ground-breaking state ballot initiatives on drug laws in California and Arizona, contributions that are not tax deductible. Both measures were over-whelmingly approved by voters.
Mr. Soros dismisses criticism, arguing that drug policy is surrounded by “hysteria, passion and extremism.”
Aryeh Neier, the human rights advocate who is Mr. Soros’s closest adviser and president of the Open Society Institute, the nonprofit foundation that supervises much of Mr. Soros’s domestic giving
Mr. Sores was further “repulsed,” Mr. Neier added, by the “Gingrich revolution,” the triumph of conservative Republicans in the 1994 Congressional races, which symbolized for Mr. Soros the state’s abandonment of its obligations to citizens, particularly the poor and immigrants. And finally, Mr. Soros said, he was worried about the extent to which “market values and excessive individualism” were permeating the professions of medicine, law, journalism and politics, turning them into businesses rather than callings.
Mr. Soros, advised by Mr. Neier and Gara LaMarche, both veterans of the Human Rights Watch organization, directs his spending to wide-ranging grassroots projects that he hopes will help transform the nation’s political culture and protect Americans from what he calls “unintended consequences” of bad government policy. There is variety in subject and amount:
* A $50 million commitment to the Emma Lazarus Fund, a project started in September to help legal immigrants attain full participation in American society. Mr. Soros described the grant as a spontaneous response to his “outrage,” as an immigrant, over the recent law denying legal immigrants several types of public assistance and benefits.
* A $15 million commitment for three years to the Project on Death in America. The effort, headed by Kathleen M. Foley, a doctor and senior pain specialist at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, supports projects that enhance comfort, dignity, care and relief from pain for the dying. Mr. Soros says he is trying to end America’s “denial of death.”
Mr. Soros’s domestic giving is increasing exponentially — from $15 million to what Mr. Soros says will eventually be more than $100 million a year.
The Institute on Medicine as a Profession[1] was founded in 2003 with a grant of $7.5 million from George Soros and the Open Society Institute (OSI).
Grants and Contracts
ABIM Foundation:
$ 325,000 (2003)
American Legacy Foundation
$ 295,124 (2003)
New York Community Trust Foundation
$ 10,000 (2006)
Oregon Department of Justice
$ 399,495 (2007)
OSI funding
$ 2,070,000 (2003-07)
The Pew Charitable Trusts/Community Catalyst[2]
$ 1,154,835 (2006-07)
Reminder that they might not be paying any tuition at all. From the school site:
“In 2007, 18% of Park students in grades 1-12 received over $2 million in financial assistance that ranged from $1,000 per year to full tuition.”
It seems to me that the Frost's probably received tuition assistance from the Park School (check the link.) IF this is true then we have a couple with four children, two of which attend a PRIVATE instead of a local PUBLIC school, mooching off financial assistance instead of using whatever amount of non-subsidised tuition they pay for health insurance for the entire family instead.
There are more questions to be answered...
1) Did they not have auto insurance?
2)Since they DID have CHIP, did it not cover the expenses?
3)If so why the need to fund raisers in the community?
And dont they prove that it does not need to be expanded since they already had the coverage?
Exactly! (I'd like to be a professional "quilt designer" too but I have to work for my living at least in part to pay for my family's health insurance. I guess I'm just stupid.)
Maybe Soros could stop spending his money in attempts to fraudently change the government, and instead put his money where his mouth is and cover those he sees as poor and disadvantaged.
But that doesnt really fit his agenda. Instead he uses these people to advance his personal goals.
Don’t worry, the ‘decider’ has changed his mind.
Bush calls for compromise on children’s healthcare
Oct. 7
“If putting poor children first takes a little more than the 20% increase I have proposed in my budget for SCHIP, I am willing to work with leaders in Congress to find the additional money,” he said.
Regardless of the boy’s financial status, for the Democrats to use him as a political prop is deplorable. Is this what they really have come to?
These are the kinds of people who will be running the country if the Democrats win in 2008.
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