Rogan’s Reelection Bid

What won’t Rep. James E. Rogan (R-Glendale) do to get elected?

In his uphill battle against state Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank), he is spending $40,000 a week for a barrage of “slash and burn” cable TV ads that attack the consumer-oriented record of Schiff while falsely claiming to be for health care reform.

It is an election year, and Rogan will do what he does best, elevate cynicism and disingenuousness to a near-hysterical level.

Rogan is misrepresenting his vote for the insurance industry-sponsored HMO reform bill that was rejected by every responsible senior citizen, health care advocacy and consumer organization.

He will sugarcoat his vote against giving individuals the right to sue health plans when they cause personal injury or wrongful death.

Rogan claims that Schiff’s support of the Norwood-Dingell HMO Patients Bill of Rights was designed to help the “greedy trial lawyers,” not consumers, thereby implying that every one of the 300 consumer groups that supported this bill, including the American Medical Assn. and the American Cancer Society, and the 68 Republicans who voted for passage of this bill are more “greedy trial lawyer”-friendly than consumer-friendly.

SHARON MOLANDER

Burbank