News broke today that the U.S. Chamber has been fishing around for an economist willing to file a "report" on health care reform (translation: they're offering to pay $50,000 to someone willing to say health care reform is bad for the economy - which is exactly what they did against the Employee Free Choice Act earlier this year). Sadly, this latest gaffe is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the Chamber's decades-long campaign against the American people, and in the last few months, they've gone into overdrive.

Roll Call reported last month that the Chamber is breaking its own records lobbying Congress, shilling out $52 million this year against legislation on climate change, financial regulation, and of course, health care reform. "While the chamber has historically outspent other companies and associations when it comes to federal lobbying," reports Roll Call, "the spike this time is substantially greater than in the past."

It bears repeating that the U.S. Chamber has a long, storied history of opposing critical programs for the American people:

• The U.S. Chamber opposed the creation of Social Security in 1935, then sought to delay it from going into effect as Americans were in the midst of the Great Depression.
• The U.S. Chamber opposed now-essential health and safety regulations for American workplaces.
• The U.S. Chamber opposed equal pay laws for American women.
• The U.S. Chamber opposed the establishment of a fair, minimum wage for American workers.
• The U.S. Chamber defended outsourcing jobs to foreign lands, on the backs of American workers and our nation's economy
• The U.S. Chamber opposed President Harry Truman's attempt to provide health insurance to all Americans in 1947.

In fact, the Chamber's reckless campaign against American consumers has begun driving some of its largest, most lucrative members out. Recently, Apple and Nike left the Chamber after objecting to their efforts to kill climate change legislation. And now, doctors are hoping the American Medical Association (AMA) does the same.

The Plum Line reports that more than 5,000 medical professionals have signed onto a letter requesting that the AMA - which endorsed H.R. 3962, the "Affordable Health Care for America Act" - resign from the U.S. Chamber for its smear campaign against reform (e.g. equating health care reform as a massive tax increase - which is just plain NOT TRUE for 99.9% of Americans).

Let's hope it doesn't take the AMA much longer to realize what Apple, Nike and others have already acknowledged - that the U.S. Chamber is just plain WRONG when it comes to solving America's problems.