Barack Obama Facts - Fact #5 Continued

So where were we?

Ah, yes. Health care.

And what's happened in the last 24 hours?

Tom Daschle has been named the prospective Health and Human Services Secretary.

Now, everyone's going to say, "Ah-ha! See! Told you Barack Obama was serious about national health care. After all, he just went out and got himself an advocate for it."

To which I respond, "Oh, really?"

After leaving the Senate, it is true that Tom Daschle wrote a book about universal health care. And he has talked up universal health care and he's talked about how this country could do that.

But what some people don't realize is that Tom Daschle went to work for a law firm called Alston & Byrd and, as with Eric Holder before him, Tom Daschle's firm has represented some not-so-human clients.

One of those clients is a corporation known as CVS Caremark.

Have a read about CVS Caremark:

"A coalition of labor unions that has been a thorn in the side of CVS Caremark Corp. is accusing the drugstore chain's pharmacy benefits unit of violating the privacy of plan members and trying to get doctors to switch patients to an expensive diabetes drug.

"At issue is a mailing sent by Caremark and paid for by drugmaker Merck and Co. to doctors who treat Caremark patients with type 2 diabetes. The letter touts Januvia's potential benefits in improving blood sugar control, and suggests doctors may want to consider talking to their patients about using Merck's drug Januvia in addition to their current treatment.

"The Change to Win union coalition says the mailings are intrusive and an improper use of CVS Caremark's relationship with its patients. Merck and CVS Caremark say they are trying to make physicians aware of a drug that may be more effective than older therapies, and that personal information on patients is not being shared.

"A CVS Caremark spokesperson responded that Change to Win 'has launched several aggressive misinformation campaigns' against the company since early 2007, when it began a drive to organize more CVS employees. It said Caremark does not provide services for any members of the coalition, which includes the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the Service Employees International Union and the Laborers' International Union of North America.

"Change to Win's investment group also objected to CVS Caremark's purchase of Longs Drugs Stores Corp. earlier this year. CVS said the group has also 'wag(ed) campaigns against directors' nominated for its board. The company added that Change to Win wants CVS to impose unacceptable workplace rules on its stores."

So not only is CVS Caremark alledgedly (and I'll use that word for the moment) violating the privacy of their patients, they're also attempting to keep unions from organizing, claiming that these unions are attempting to "impose unacceptable workplaces rules", whatever that means.

I mean, Buddha forbid people should actually work in safety, right?

Another example of someone connected to Barack Obama, who has no great love for unions himself, who is connected to another group of people that hate unions.

It just gets more and more interesting.

But this was about health care, wasn't it?

Exactly how does Tom Daschle explain away one of the clients that his firm works for violating their patients' privacy and further that they are trying to force a more expensive drug on those same patients?

How does this fit with his universal health care plan?

We'll revisit this issue at a later time.

Tomorrow, I think I'm going to drop a nice little Democratic Party surprise on anyone that didn't see it. CNN actually did their jobs today and it was amazing to me. If you saw CNN during the 2-4 PM block, you know what I'm talking about.