Jesus.
Me, I'm different. I got Health Care. My workplace is loaded. I can even choose a "gold plated" option should I choose.
Let's be honest, if the Congress puts a Bill containing Public Option in front of the President, he will sign it. Hell, if they put a bill with Single Payer in front of the President, he'll sign that, too.
But neither is going to hit his desk. Why?
It's not the House. The House going to pass real reform. Its not even all the Senate, where the HELP Committee at least voted out the real deal.
It's the Senate Finance Committee, more specifically the gang of six, maybe five Senators from piss-ant small States that are going to dictate what my girl in California can get as far as Health Insurance.
This is Kent Conrad. This is Max Baucus. This is Charles Grassley, and let's be honest, this is my worthless, good for nothing but her own ambitions, Senator Dianne Feinstein (whose office you can't call now to save your life, or even express your opinion.)
I don't think we (and I mean we as progressives) have been honest or fair in this process. On the one hand, we praise President Obama (as a Candidate) for being level and cool headed during the campaign, and then we damn him for not picking more fights when we want him too.
You can't tell me that, because even you don't believe it.
And before anyone says anything about an Independent Uprising, be honest...you and I both know it ain't coming. It's nice to think about. It's nice to threaten. But it's about as likely as Sarah Palin reading a newspaper, or anything else for that matter. Independents need organization to pull that kind of victory off, and organization kinda belies the name Independent.
Face it, we're trapped.
No one likes to think of themselves as trapped, and sure as hell no one likes to accept being trapped, but I don't much of an alternative here.
There's another problem with Health Care Reform. When the President and everyone else on the Democratic Side says (in effect) there's too much good stuff, aside from the Public Option, that demands its passage...face it, they're right.
Can you really tell me that we should lose out on the Insurance Exchange or the elimination of the Pre-Existing Conditions, or the Medicare Subsidies because we couldn't get the Public Option??
Norman Thomas, the head of the Socialist Party in the 1930s, was also the Dennis Kucinich of his times, running four times for President. He also hated Roosevelt's guts. He called the New Deal, cough syrup for a case of pneumonia. He, and other like minded Liberals/Progressives were constantly attacking, berating (at lot of times with just cause) the New Deal for not going far enough.
But the verdict is in on Norman Thomas. The most he ever got was two percent of the vote. Odds are the only way you've heard of him is the fact I just mentioned him now.
The verdict is certainly in on the New Deal (no matter what conservative wingnuts want to believe). Despite it not being perfect, despite it not going far enough, it certainly put us back on the path to recovery.
Now, Obama isn't Roosevelt. The times we face (as bad as they are) don't measure up to the times Roosevelt faced. Maybe the corrective measures can fall a little short, and still do us a world of good. Even though they piss us off in the process.
This is not the Health Care Reform I want. I want the Health Insurance Companies screwed. This is not the Health Care Reform that's going to do what I need it to, and protect who I need it to protect.
But I don't know if I can be selfish enough to say no. And saying no to this is an act of selfishness.
I'd love to punish the Democrats who screwed me, you and the lot of us over, but I don't know if I can be so selfish as to subject this country to a fate worse than the one we've suffered the last eight years.
Because as bad as Bush was, the next generation of Republicans are going to make him look downright...sane by comparsion.
Like I said, trapped.
Me, I'm different. I got Health Care. My workplace is loaded. I can even choose a "gold plated" option should I choose.
But for once, it's not all about me.
There's this girl. She works at a Restaurant in beautiful downtown Burbank, a local family joint. She's one of the 50 million. She doesn't have Health Insurance. She can't afford to pay the going (insane) rates with what she makes.
These is my bona-fides as a supporter of the Public Option, a real Public Option.
In truth, I'm a Single-Payer guy. The Public Option was merely the compromise I was willing to put up with.
Now, that's looking like it's gone.
A Public Option was the only way I could see my girl affording Health Insurance in the near future. No Public Option, and I don't see how she afford Health Insurance once even if President Obama's plan passes.
I don't like this. I don't like where I am. I don't like where we're at. Like most progressives, I resent over the fact that I voted for Obama and the Democratic Slate. I voted for a Platform, yet my voice isn't the one they're listening to.
At the same time, who should really be at blame here? Because I'm about to hear a lot of blame coming the President's way, and the last I checked, the President doesn't pass legislation. Congress does.
There's this girl. She works at a Restaurant in beautiful downtown Burbank, a local family joint. She's one of the 50 million. She doesn't have Health Insurance. She can't afford to pay the going (insane) rates with what she makes.
These is my bona-fides as a supporter of the Public Option, a real Public Option.
In truth, I'm a Single-Payer guy. The Public Option was merely the compromise I was willing to put up with.
Now, that's looking like it's gone.
A Public Option was the only way I could see my girl affording Health Insurance in the near future. No Public Option, and I don't see how she afford Health Insurance once even if President Obama's plan passes.
I don't like this. I don't like where I am. I don't like where we're at. Like most progressives, I resent over the fact that I voted for Obama and the Democratic Slate. I voted for a Platform, yet my voice isn't the one they're listening to.
At the same time, who should really be at blame here? Because I'm about to hear a lot of blame coming the President's way, and the last I checked, the President doesn't pass legislation. Congress does.
Let's be honest, if the Congress puts a Bill containing Public Option in front of the President, he will sign it. Hell, if they put a bill with Single Payer in front of the President, he'll sign that, too.
But neither is going to hit his desk. Why?
Even I know there aren't the votes for Single Payer. The President is right. We're not ready for Single Payer, for whatever reason. Fear has won the day, even though we have Single Payer already in the form of Medicare, and we have Socialized Medicine in the form of the VA.
It's not the House. The House going to pass real reform. Its not even all the Senate, where the HELP Committee at least voted out the real deal.
It's the Senate Finance Committee, more specifically the gang of six, maybe five Senators from piss-ant small States that are going to dictate what my girl in California can get as far as Health Insurance.
This is Kent Conrad. This is Max Baucus. This is Charles Grassley, and let's be honest, this is my worthless, good for nothing but her own ambitions, Senator Dianne Feinstein (whose office you can't call now to save your life, or even express your opinion.)
I don't think we (and I mean we as progressives) have been honest or fair in this process. On the one hand, we praise President Obama (as a Candidate) for being level and cool headed during the campaign, and then we damn him for not picking more fights when we want him too.
On another hand, we praise President Obama for coming up with a better strategy to get Health Care Reform passed, only to change our minds when it doesn't go our way and we start to lose out on Public Option. (And yeah, I think Co-ops, especially ones that involve the Insurance Industry, are frauds.)
Listen, I'm pissed that we may have lost out on the public option just as I was pissed that we had to let Susan Collins water down the Stimulus, just as I was pissed that Byron Dorgan (and others) voted against Mortgage Cram Downs, or the Blue Dogs stalled the bill coming out of Waxman's Committee.
But do you seriously believe that the more logical alternative to what we have now is to have Republicans in control of the House, or the Senate?
Are my fellow Progressives seriously going to tell me that, no matter how many promises he breaks, that a President Santorum, or a President Romney, or God forbid a President Palin is better alternative to a weak-tea President Obama???
Listen, I'm pissed that we may have lost out on the public option just as I was pissed that we had to let Susan Collins water down the Stimulus, just as I was pissed that Byron Dorgan (and others) voted against Mortgage Cram Downs, or the Blue Dogs stalled the bill coming out of Waxman's Committee.
But do you seriously believe that the more logical alternative to what we have now is to have Republicans in control of the House, or the Senate?
Are my fellow Progressives seriously going to tell me that, no matter how many promises he breaks, that a President Santorum, or a President Romney, or God forbid a President Palin is better alternative to a weak-tea President Obama???
You can't tell me that, because even you don't believe it.
And before anyone says anything about an Independent Uprising, be honest...you and I both know it ain't coming. It's nice to think about. It's nice to threaten. But it's about as likely as Sarah Palin reading a newspaper, or anything else for that matter. Independents need organization to pull that kind of victory off, and organization kinda belies the name Independent.
Face it, we're trapped.
No one likes to think of themselves as trapped, and sure as hell no one likes to accept being trapped, but I don't much of an alternative here.
There's another problem with Health Care Reform. When the President and everyone else on the Democratic Side says (in effect) there's too much good stuff, aside from the Public Option, that demands its passage...face it, they're right.
Can you really tell me that we should lose out on the Insurance Exchange or the elimination of the Pre-Existing Conditions, or the Medicare Subsidies because we couldn't get the Public Option??
Norman Thomas, the head of the Socialist Party in the 1930s, was also the Dennis Kucinich of his times, running four times for President. He also hated Roosevelt's guts. He called the New Deal, cough syrup for a case of pneumonia. He, and other like minded Liberals/Progressives were constantly attacking, berating (at lot of times with just cause) the New Deal for not going far enough.
But the verdict is in on Norman Thomas. The most he ever got was two percent of the vote. Odds are the only way you've heard of him is the fact I just mentioned him now.
The verdict is certainly in on the New Deal (no matter what conservative wingnuts want to believe). Despite it not being perfect, despite it not going far enough, it certainly put us back on the path to recovery.
Now, Obama isn't Roosevelt. The times we face (as bad as they are) don't measure up to the times Roosevelt faced. Maybe the corrective measures can fall a little short, and still do us a world of good. Even though they piss us off in the process.
This is not the Health Care Reform I want. I want the Health Insurance Companies screwed. This is not the Health Care Reform that's going to do what I need it to, and protect who I need it to protect.
But I don't know if I can be selfish enough to say no. And saying no to this is an act of selfishness.
I'd love to punish the Democrats who screwed me, you and the lot of us over, but I don't know if I can be so selfish as to subject this country to a fate worse than the one we've suffered the last eight years.
Because as bad as Bush was, the next generation of Republicans are going to make him look downright...sane by comparsion.
Like I said, trapped.
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