My wife was talking to her friend last week about a tough dilemma. She is self-employed and her sisters have a pattern of cancer that indicates a genetic predisposition to cancer may run in her family. You know the problem: if she gets tested and starts any preventative treatment, that becomes a pre-existing condition that may result in her being denied coverage. My wife's friend was hanging on, waiting for Heath Care Reform to pass so that she could stop worrying about pre-existing conditions.
But enough about my wife's friend, I meant to write about something else. I think it is time to recognize the Historic Victory of so many on this site and elsewhere in the blogosphere who worked so hard to defeat the Senate health bill. It was good enough for Bernie Saunders and good enough for Paul Krugman and it could have been fixed in future budget reconciliation negotiations between the House and Senate, but so many of you stood hard and tough to convince the progressive caucus in the House that the bill deserved total and complete defeat. They will not help to pass the Senate bill and work to fix it in reconciliation.
Victory is yours!
I think we can all calculate the probability that the media narrative will duly note your victory. Next time, the pundits will thunder, the Democratic party must pay attention to the Left! They will surely not mark this as victory for Fox News Republicans and further confirmation that we are a "center right" nation that resists any progressive charge. No, no: this victory is yours!
And as been true since Teddy Roosevelt first asked for national care, as it has been since Ted Kennedy rejected Nixon's health care plan (more liberal than the current plans), as it has been since Clinton's plan was defeated by its left-and-right critics in the Democratic party, true progressive non-corportist, non-sell-out health care remains right around the corner.
The pro-corporation sell-outs like Krugman writhe in defeat and dismay.
Victory! Victory! Victory!