Under Mayor Palin, Wasilla police department was charging women between $500.00 -$1200.00 for ”rape kits” used to collect evidence. What the fuck? They didn’t charge burglarized folks for “fingerprinting kits”!

  Wal-Mart Drops

Lawsuit

  Over Health-Care Reimbursement

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is dropping a controversial effort to collect over $400,000 in health-care reimbursement from a former employee who is confined to a southeast Missouri nursing home since she suffered brain damage in a traffic accident.

The world’s largest retailer said Tuesday in a letter to the family of Deborah Shank it will not seek to collect money the Shanks won in an injury lawsuit against a trucking company for the accident.

Wal-Mart’s top executive for human resources, Pat Curran, wrote that Ms. Shank’s extraordinary situation had made the company re-examine its stance. Wal-Mart has been roundly criticized in newspaper editorials, on cable news shows and by its union foes for its claim to the funds, which it made in a lawsuit upheld by a federal appeals court.

Insurance experts say it is increasingly common for health plans to seek reimbursement for the medical expenses they paid for someone’s treatment if the person also collects damages in an injury suit. The practice, called “subrogation,” has increased since a 2006 Supreme Court ruling that eased it.

Wal-Mart’s Ms. Curran said the retailer was required by the rules of its plan to seek reimbursement from the Shank’s settlement. But she said the case has made Wal-Mart revise those rules to allow for flexibility in individual cases. “Occasionally others help us step back and look at a situation in a different way. This is one of those times,” Ms. Curran wrote in the letter.

Ms. Shank, 52, lost much of her memory and ability to communicate or walk in a crash between her minivan and a tractor trailer in May 2000. Her family sued the trucking company and won $700,000. Court records show that after attorney’s fees and costs, the remaining $417,477 from the settlement went into a trust to care for Ms. Shank. The fund now has about $270,000, the family said.

Ms. Shanks’ health insurance was through Wal-Mart, where she worked nights stocking shelves. After the Shanks won their lawsuit, Wal-Mart sued the Shank family to recover medical costs totaling about $470,000.

Wal-Mart won its case and subsequent appeals by the Shanks that went as far as the Supreme Court, which closed legal avenues this month by declining to hear the case.

The case put a spotlight on the growing use of reimbursement claims by health plans, experts say. Roger Baron, professor of law at the University of South Dakota and a specialist in health-plan law, said health plans have become “very aggressive” about subrogation since the 2006 Supreme Court decision.

“It’s free money. They want the free money,” Mr. Baron said.

Lynn Dudley, vice president for policy at the American Benefits Council in Washington, D.C., said the negative publicity around the case was beginning to draw the attention of lawmakers who might want legislation to stop or limit subrogation.

Mr. Baron said Wal-Mart’s size — it is the nation’s largest nongovernment employer, with over 1.3 million workers — means that its willingness to compromise in an individual case may have a wider impact on reimbursement practices by other health plans. “I’m so pleased to see an element of reason because so much of this subrogation has been about just blindly going after the money,” Mr. Baron said

 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120708739471181553.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

     Do we really want a  man named Obama for President? Or are we somehow compensating for not catching Osama? Ponder it…If I were a martian looking down at this 2008 electcion I’d be shaking my head in wonderment. If Freud is looking down at us from some heavenly cloud, he must be laughing -saying to himself, “talk about unconscious motivations…” I wish Carl Jung were here to report. This is the stuff of Dr. Seuss tales. 

Seriously, maybe we hate Bush so much that we want Obama to lead our nation, like saying, “See there Bush, Osama won after all.”

The Obama Fans pride themselves on being for CHANGE and yet if change were truly what they wanted, they’d vote for the ULTIMATE change – a woman.   I’ve heard people ask, “Are we ready for a black president?” “As long as he has a penis,” should be the answer.

It’s a sad state of affairs for women. We’ve not come as long a way as we’d like to believe. I remember learning something quite unbelieveable to me (then, anyways) in a psych class. My gray-bearded, womanizing professor said, “I pity  women for they are the most hated of all – men hate women and women hate women. ” I am so disgusted.

Watching The View this past week brought that college memory to the forefront of my thinking…someone said, “White men HATE Hillary.” 

It’s really nice to know we’re ready for a black pres. but why does it have to be one that’s so GREEN? Obama is inexperienced, and unoriginal. The only confidence he exudes has come from hanging off of  Oprah’s skirt.

I, for one, am sick of men ruining this country with their warrior mentalities, and egoistic dicks.  I’m ready for real change – Hillary. She’s not perfect, but she’s solid, committed, experienced, and who can heal better than mommy. Lord knows, WE NEED A HEALING!

George Washington was Father of our country – we’re ready to make Hillary Mother of our country! Amen, and Amen!