I admit, this doesn't apply to some situations. Most life advice doesn't. You can't get a unicorn by asking for one. Unicorns don't exist. Single payer health care, reasonable drug policies, greater federal transparency, a progressive reform of the tax code . . . most of our personal unicorns do exist.
We're asking for them, blogging for them, working for them. But how many times have we heard "I'd be for single payer if I thought it had a chance, but it doesn't. So I'm for the public option." Chances are that person was never counted as a single payer supporter.
Yes, there will be a silly little 'teachable moment' story. I think this has something to do with the 2010 elections as we look at what "better democrats" means.
TB was more of an acquaintance than a friend. She had the drafting table behind mine for nearly a year. She also had the longest, reddest hair that I, or pretty much anyone at that school, have ever seen. She could sit on it and have some left over. She kept it pulled back all the time. Otherwise it was a safety hazard in most of the work she did in technical theater.
One day, while consulting with the master carpenter of her current show both her hairbands broke. She asked for a rubber band to put her hair back. Anyone who has had long hair knows what a bad idea this is. Anyone who doesn't, well, rubber bands do to hair what small children do to dry spaghetti. The MC looked for a rubber band but, thankfully, he couldn't find one.
He asked his roommates. They didn't have one either. They called their other roommate. He said he might have one in his desk. They checked. He didn't. Finally, someone asked TB why she needed the rubber band. Less than a minute later she was gifted with an entire package of hair ties. One of the roommates had cut his hair the previous month and no longer needed them.
She had asked for what she thought she could get, and ended up with nothing. Asking for what she needed got her a solution. I'm not saying we should demand unreasonable or unachievable things. I'm not a Republican. But we should start asking for what we really want, and put those requests in terms of functional outcome. And we shouldn't back candidates that aren't willing to do the same.
We've seen on the national level that beginning with compromise doesn't work. I don't think that being unclear about what we want is the only reason that's true. I do think that "single payer" or "Medicare for all" or "public option" are not really what we want. They're just possible ways to get it.
I want a health care plan for all Americans that does not cost over $X for an average family, where X is determined by someone who knows far more about reasonable cost than I do. That's what I want for myself. That's what I want for you. That's what I want for the teabaggers and for Glen Beck, even if they don't have the sense to want it for themselves. Most of all I want if for the people who want that too, but don't realize how many other people want the same thing.
Those are the people we need to be talking to. We need to tell them it's okay to tell the truth, to not hold back, and to just plain ask for what they need. We're too needy to ask for what we think we can get anymore.