Whether you support single payer healthcare (which is most of us), or something else, starting today, we need to work together.
We need to try and put aside some of our quite profound differences (and I recognize this won't be easy), and do exactly what we did when President Obama became the nominee of our party. We worked day and night to get him elected.
I'm sure you remember before the election, Markos Moulitsas admonished us to leave nothing on the road. I hope we can do this again. This does not mean we surrender to incrementalism, surrender to Max Baucus or even Ted Kennedy, surrender to one iota of Republican horse shit, or give up fighting for what we believe in.
But it does mean in the most profound sense (forgive the cliche which follows), we do not allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good. I hope it also means we use our collective strength to assist some of the various groups working for meaningful reform, though their ideas of reform might not perfectly mesh with what we believe in.
And let me make it very clear, I am not for a nanosecond suggesting that we abandon the fight for single payer healthcare.
I am telling you in no uncertain terms, that the insurance industry is focusing its guided missiles on a critical element of healthcare reform. The insurance industry wants nothing more than to kill the creation of a robust, well-funded public health insurance option. This public option would stand alongside private insurance and be available to any American who wanted to ditch their for-profit, unaffordable junk insurance. This piece of healthcare reform is already in grave jeopardy. And without a public option in the reform legislation which is already being debated behind closed doors, we are no place. We would have healthcare reform in name only.
The reality I am describing is not idle conjecture. In late January, when I attended the Families USA annual meeting in Washington, several of us spoke to Ron Pollack, the executive director of Families USA about precisely this issue. It is shaping up as the line in the sand position of AHIP. Pollack knows AHIP as well as anybody in Washington, and you can take to the bank the accuracy of the scenerio he predicts.
Our message to President Obama and every member of Congress and the United States Senate should be that a public option is also the line in the sand of the American people. We demand that a well funded, affordable public option be made available to every man, woman and child in the United States.
The insurance industry knows that the days of the taxpayer giveaway known as Medicare Advantage are over, or certainly winding down. AHIP must concede defeat on this very profitable line of business, but in return, this murderous killing lobbying machine, will turn heaven and earth to block a public option. They will have to surrender Medicare Advantage, but in return they will be given the American people as hostages and we will all be mandated to buy their garbage (take your money, deny your claim), health insurance.
I wonder why the public option is their line in the sand? Could it be because given the opportunity, millions of Americans would cancel their unaffordable junk insurance and sign up with what would undoubtedly be a revitalized version of Medicare. And to make matters worse for AHIP, we'd also very likely be on our way to single payer healthcare.
Remember all the bullshit from AHIP about how they wanted to participate this time. They wanted to contribute to solving the problem, not continue to be the problem. It was just that, bullshit.
President Obama is holding a healthcare summit at the White House this week. No single payer advocates have been invited.
We need to let the president know that this is unacceptable.
Would you please call the White house and register your outrage.
This is from an email I received this morning:
On Thursday, March 5, 2009, the White House will host a summit on how to
reform the healthcare system.
The 120 invited guests include lobbyists for various interest groups
including the private-for-profit insurance industry (AHIP), some members
of Congress including Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus who has already
ruled single payer "off the table," and various others concerned with
healthcare.
No single payer advocates have been invited to attend.
Please urge President Obama to fulfill his promise for transparency and
openness in government
Call The White House (202) 456-1414 or (202) 456-1111.
Tell them to let single payer into the White House Summit on healthcare.
Would you also please sign the MoveOn petition. MoveOn wants to deliver this to The White House by Thursday.
UPDATE:
There were several comments asking whether John Conyers, the father of single payer and HR 676 would be at the White House Summit. I made some inquiries and have the following information.
I just received a phone call from a source who wishes not to be identified at this time. He advised that Chairman Conyers was not invited to the White House Healthcare Summit. I was also told that Dr. Quentin Young and Dr. Marcia Angell were proposed as participants, but are also not attending.
You are obviously free to draw your own conclusions.