We've come along way as a movement, the progressive netroots.
We stand, today, on the brink of seeing our years of effort to win elections bear fruit through the passage of new progressive laws, including the passage of comprehensive healthcare reform this fall.
In fact, that's why the yelling and screaming from those opposed to meaningful progressive change in our nation has reached fevered pitch.
In the face of such hatred and the demagoguery, our job is to stay calm and win.
We do that by understanding the phrase at the top of this diary...
both/and is a phrase you hear frequently in progressive activist circles. both/and has many meanings; let me express my take with an example below.
- We need the broadest coalition of Americans to read and sign and SUPPORT THE PRESIDENT'S NEW EFFORT to pass healthcare reform. (We are pushing to cross 1,000,000 emails this weekend.)
- We need the broadest coalition of progressives to rally behind Raul Grijalva so that the House Progressive Caucus (and the Senate!) holds firm for a public option. (If you have a YouTube account please uprate that video and make it a favorite. I did!)
Both of these are true.
It makes no sense for any of us who support Raul Grijalva not to aggressively support this completely new OFA PETITION, which has the potential to deliver millions of in district letters in support of Obama's health care reform agenda to Congress. (This is a new, post-speech petition, I urge you to sign it if you haven't already; it's a way to generate an email to all three of your Congress critters. In-district action is powerful.)
However, all of us committed to making progressive change in this nation need to listen to Congressman Grijalva and, in addition to the above action, we need to support DFA and BoldProgressives and HCAN and other organizations urging that progressives in Congress hold firm and demand that the final bill out of conference include a robust public option open to all Americans with no triggers or coops.
Winning health care will not be done with an "either/or" strategy. We won't win with the advocates of one tactic slamming the adherents of the other. That's not both/and.
We have to stand together to both expand our coalition and keep progressives as tight as possible in our commitment to a bill that will represent real reform.
That's how we pass good bills.
And, yes, for all the debate we have with each other here online, we can agree that passing good bills matters more than anything we've yet done as netroots progressives.
Majorities are cool; we want to pass meaningful progressive laws.
And, yes, that's why the GOP and the insurance industry are up in arms.
To beat them, we will have to fight on more that one front, we will have to fight smart and we will have to fight to win.
Please know this. Millions of in district signatures for the President will allow him to whip moderates and Blue Dogs to support real reform. Hundreds of thousands of calls and letters to progressives demanding that they hold firm for meaningful reform will provide backbone from Congress and allow Obama to tell the big insurance companies, "Not this time."
Not everyone in America is as ideologically committed as the members of FDL or MoveOn.org. We need to work both strategies in full force so that every last American who supports reform takes action in support of health care reform. We need to expand the base and we need to work all out to hold the progressive line.
We need to understand the power of both/and.
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THIS CAN BE FUN.
Please check out this PETITION from MomsRising.org.
If you have a "mom" or "moms" in your life why not pass it along?
What big insurance companies like Cigna and Wellpoint and Pacificare (there's a reason all those people in those ads for those big insurance companies are smiling...and it's spelled $$$) most fear is that average everyday people will get organized at the grassroots level and push for true reform. Critiques of the insurance industry were the most powerful parts of Obama's speech with focus groups.
Yes, corporate opponents of reform fear people like MomsRising. They fear folks like Latinos for National Health Insurance or committed ideological progressives like progressivecongress.org who are all pushing hard in this fight.
You can join them by TAKING ACTION today...and then personally urging every last progressive in Congress to hold the line and stand together for a public option open to all Americans as an essential component of health care reform.
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