Ouch for Obama!!!

The article was entitled, "At the time, her cousin Barack Obama was fast becoming a rising star in the Illinois State Senate."

Wow that doesn't brim with the confidence that we have in him now and this article basically is just one negative against the Senator. I found this article actually on Capitol Fax Blog and I clicked on that link in the Morning Shorts all the way to a more complete version here. The more complete story talks about declaring bankruptcy because a person is unable to pay their medical expenses. Sad huh, according to this article this was unheard of 25 years ago.

Read a little with me...

Five long years ago, Rose Shaffer's life seemed sweet. A nurse since the early 1970s, Shaffer had spent most of her 60 years working at various Chicago hospitals, rising through the caregiver ranks and raising three kids. Now in the twilight of her career, she'd been hired as director of nursing at a home health agency in the suburb of Lombard. The position made Shaffer proud – she knew her salary could pay off the mortgage on her house a little sooner. At the time, her cousin Barack Obama was fast becoming a rising star in the Illinois State Senate.

Seven months into her new job, Shaffer suffered a heart attack, and an ambulance rushed her to Advocate South Suburban Hospital. Shaffer assumed she was automatically covered – health insurance was a given at her previous nursing jobs. She thought she'd filled out the proper forms. But she hadn't.

A week later, Shaffer received a bill from Advocate for the three days she'd been hospitalized. It was for $18,000. Shortly thereafter, Advocate began sending letters to Shaffer demanding payment. Then, a summons to appear in court was tossed on her porch. Advocate was suing her.

Shaffer was terrified and didn't show at her court date. She says she even received a letter from the Cook County Sheriff's Department, threatening arrest unless she appeared. Under pressure from Advocate and now behind on her mortgage payments, Shaffer filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy in December 2002, which meant her debtors would garner a reduced portion of the money she owed.

"The hospital saved my life, but now they were trying to kill me," Shaffer says.

Uh-oh. Could this be one of Sen. Obama's skeletons? Or will this be relatively minor? Anyway lets read a little more but the less complete link got more on Obama and his cuz...

It seems, all that State Senator Barack Obama got done for her was to make her a part of the Service Employees International Union's campaign against the hospitals.

Any good elected official would have intervened and gotten action, that's what caseworkers do in elected officials offices.

Especially for relatives.

Especially when the President of the Illinois State Senate considers you his political son!

She did go to Springfield to testify in favor of a bill that would end price gouging, but that bill never became law.

Shaffer was part of a lawsuit filed against Advocate by the Union, which was dismissed.

I remind readers, that Obama once appeared on the website of that Union, with a quote under his picture that said "hospitals terrorize the uninsured".

His picture and quote were removed about the time his wife got a big pay hike from a hospital.

As for what he's doing as a US Senator about price gouging, he's protecting hospitals.

When asked to sign on to legislation sponsored by seatmate Dick Durbin aimed at forcing hospitals to disclose prices, his staff said that the Senator would not, "because he was concerned about the impact on hospitals".

So Roze apparently is still paying these bills by working two jobs seven days a week for close to 60 hours. She still must make monthly $2038 in Chapter 13 payments. At least when that article was completed in 2005. So no thanks to her cuz, she was able to pay off her debts. So the Capitol Fax Link ends on this note...

It would seem that Rose finally completed her payments in 2006, apparently without help from her cousin, who could have taken a few thousand dollars from his million dollar book advance and given it to her.

But, he was probably too busy promising to make health care more affordable.

What's really sad is Rose probably believes him.

Let me say this again, OUCH!!!