Diane Black Fights Back Against Bart Gordon's Flip-Flop

I don't think Senator Black speaks for the majority of people in her district when it comes to health care or much of anything else besides the talking points handed to her by the TN GOP.

Ahh the same Senator Diane Black who's office fosters an atmosphere of racism..

Remember May 2009, when Sherri Goforth, a legislative aide in Senator Black's office, circulated a racially charged email depicting a collection of portraits of United States Presidents showing current President, Barack Obama as a black frame with only eyeballs visible. The email was denounced as blatant racism based upon "black" being the same term used by the president for describing his own color.

Senator Black's limited response of reprimanding her employee, Goforth, gained national attention and condemnation.

When asked her if she understood the controversial nature of the photo, Goforth would only say she felt very bad about accidentally sending it to the wrong list. When given a second chance to address the controversial nature of the email, she again repeated that she only felt bad about sending it to the wrong list of people.

Unfortunately, Sherri Goforth’s email joins the list of shameful episodes by Tennessee Republicans, from the infamous “Birds of a Feather” direct mail piece that featured black crows with the heads of Barack Obama and Rep. Nathan Vaughn (who is also African-American), to the “Barack the Magic Negro” song that former Tennessee Republican Party Chairman Chip Saltsman sent to RNC members during his failed campaign for RNC chair.

Senator Black is interested in keeping the Republican status quo, which is why TN is considered a joke on the national political stage.

Any informed person in Middle Tennessee would oppose this horrible legislation. It will add to the budget deficit and national debt and make US companies even more competitive in the global marketplace, costing jobs here in the US. Caterpillar estimates that the health care bill will increase it's health care costs by 20% or $100 million the first year alone. You can expect a similar burden on employers here in Middle Tennessee as well such as Nissan and Bridgestone. The health care bill makes it look more attractive to move jobs to Mexico. The health care bill increases health care spending and costs in the US, further crippling the economy.

Wow, $100 million dollars. Did you know that Cat spent about 9 billion dollars on their employees in 2008? Extrapolating that out to 2010 numbers based on past growth, they probably will spend in excess of $10 billion this year. Did you know they also posted sales and revenue in that year of 51 billion? Doing a little math means that increasing employee expenditures by this $100 million means an increase of about 1%. Are corporations now so greedy that their employees aren't worth a 1% increase. Did you know the top execs in that company took home $50 million in total compensation in 2007? The CEO took home $17 MILLION. Yep, squeeze every penny from the bottom to make the top very, very rich.

For the entire year of 2009 Cat made $895 million dollars in profit on $32 billion in sales. That is 2.76% profit, and now with Obamacare it will be reduced by $100 million. The question isn’t paying $100 million more for employee benefits, Cat employees have good health care benefits already, it is paying more in taxes, making Cat less competitive resulting in lost business and lost jobs for the middle class.


Caterpillar doesn't pay premiums, it is self insured. The health care plan that will be voted on tomorrow will increase Caterpillar's healthcare spending by $100 million the first year alone.

The reasons are the increase in payroll taxes Cat has to pay. Now Cat will have pay for the health care expenses of every adult child of every employee for an additional eight years. The $1 to $5 million lifetime cap on health care benefits that Cat pays out of pocket is gone, so Cat will be paying out ten of millions more per employee over their careers.
Cat is in the same situation of most every employer in America that provides health care benefits to its employees including Bridgestone, Nissan, and the State of Tennessee here locally. The Federal Employee Health Benefit Plan is self insured as well. Ironically the members of Congress will see a 20% rise in their own health care costs by voting for this bill.




http://www.cat.com/cda/files/2057116/7/Final%204Q%202009%20Cat%20Inc%20Release.pdf


Full Year 2009
(Dollars in millions except per share data)
2009 2008 $ Change % Change
Machinery and Engines Sales................... $ 29,540
Financial Products Revenues ................... 2,856
Total Sales and Revenues ........................ $ 32,396
Profit .......................................................... $ 895
Dow Jones Newswires | Caterpillar Inc. said the health-care overhaul legislation being considered by the U.S. House would increase the company's health-care costs by more than $100 million in the first year alone.


Caterpillar, the world's largest construction machinery manufacturer by sales, said it's particularly opposed to provisions in the bill that would expand Medicare taxes and mandate insurance coverage.

"We can ill-afford cost increases that place us at a disadvantage versus our global competitors," said the letter signed by Gregory Folley, vice president and chief human resources officer of Caterpillar."

http://www.chicagobreakingbusiness.com/2010/03/caterpillar-health-care-bill-would-cost-it-100m.html