I've spent the last few days after Netroots Nation with AFSCME's Highway to Health Care bus tour which is going to cross about 10 states in the month of August. What I've seen is pretty inspiring. During that time I've met a lot of Americans who've come out for rallies, concerts or who happen to walk by press events with elected officials talk about their desire for a public option and health insurance reform. In that time I've met very few people who oppose the public option, and no one that comes to mind who wasn't part of a local tea party group organized to disrupt the tour. And I was just on the bus for three days for the Arkansas and Louisiana legs of the tour.
In Fayettville Arkansas I met Jess Barr from Washington County in northwest Arkansas. As a Korean war veteran Jess has been covered by the VA but unfortunately his wife who is three years out from being eligible for Medicare isn't covered by health insurance and the premiums are too high for their family. She doesn’t have the same option as a veteran and with insurance rates climbing skyrocketing through the roof they find themselves in the same position of millions of Americans who are close to being eligible for Medicare but who find health insurance too expensive to purchase. Jess is also a strong advocate for the public option. He argues that the public option wouldn't just help his family but he wants all Americans to have the same opportunity he had with Veterans health insurance, the chance to leave a job he didn't like to become an entrepreneur by starting his own business without the fear of a disease leaving him bankrupt. He wants health insurance reform and he knows it won’t be able to lower prices without a public option.
Here's Jess in his own words:
For the rest of August AFSCME is running a highway to healthcare tour through seven more states. Check out the schedule of stops and feel free to join us on the road. It was great to see that outside of the corporate echo chamber there are millions of American’s who want health care but who are unable to afford coverage.
If you want to see some of the stories from people we meet at the rallies who support health insurance reform with a public option follow AFSCME on facebook.
PS. I should mention that the teabaggers have been trying to send people to shout down speakers at these rallies. Sadly for them they haven't been able to get more than a few people to turn out to any location and reformers have far outnumbered the people who came to cause a commotion. Everything took an ironic turn yesterday when one of the teabaggers who came out to protest the rally in Shreveport, LA approached some of the organizers and told us he opposes the public option because it would be a new government program and wouldn't it be easier to just "expand medicare to cover the uninsured."
PPS. Want to see the teabaggers in action on the bus tour? Ryan at the Daily Kingfish has a great post about right-wingers who got angry because the speaker, a city councilman from Shreveport reminded the crowd that they were "your brother's keeper." Check it out, the Daily King Fish has video.
Besides just joining AFSCME on the bus tour, I'm also proud to work with AFSCME. Though the opinions here are my own thoughts on the trip.