MISISSIPPI FOCUS: Recovering from Katrina

Bush and the current Mississippi Insurance Commissioner are trying to tell America that all is well with the victims of hurricane Katrina...our wonderful insurance companies have taken care of all that, right?

Wrong. Most victims of Katrina have still received little help and Insurance Companies are doing their best to keep from paying.

Here is a statement from Gary Anderson, the progressive candidate for Mississippi Inusrance Commissioner:

Jackson, Mississippi - Democratic Insurance Commissioner Candidate Gary Anderson responded to George Dale's lies today at the State's Capitol Building. Anderson referenced Dale's latest TV ad in which he claims that 99% of all insurance claims have been settled.

"George Dale is either lying or in denial about the percent of Katrina claims settled. Ask Mississippians in the south if 99% of lives are back to normal, ask Mississippians across the state if they feel they have been treated fairly - they will tell you they have not. Dale is making a desperate attempt to link me to different groups but the truth is he knows Gary Anderson is on the side of Mississippi's insurance ratepayers", said Anderson at the press conference.

With Election Day tomorrow, Anderson feels confident that the people of Mississippi will vote for a change in the way Mississippi deals with the insurance industry. After 32 years of Dale's cozy relationship with big insurance, Mississippians have the third highest insurance rates in the nation according to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. Anderson believe Mississippians deserve price relief.

Anderson said, "Mississippians can no longer afford Dale's relationship with big insurance. Rates are sky high, enough is enough. You can't protect the pocketbooks of ratepayers of you are in the back pocket of big insurance."

Anderson concluded, "For too long the fox has been guarding the hen house, as it relates to insurance companies and insurance rates in Mississippi. We cannot let this stand in Mississippi and that's why I signed a pledge not to take a single dime from insurance companies. I will be independent of political influence and I will be able to fight for families, who insurance rate increases hurt the most."

Gary Anderson has worked as a senior VP in the private banking sector and served as Mississippi's Chief Fiscal Officer where he helped cut over $200 million in government waste. Anderson grew up on his family's farm in Byhalia, Mississippi where his mother taught school and his father farmed and worked as a fireman.

You can read more about what is going on in post-Katrina Mississippi on Daily Kos here and here.

And you can help elect Gary Anderson as a pro-consumer, progressive Insurance Commissioner of Mississippi by donating here. This is probably the most important race of 2007. Many people's lives depend on it.