During the George W. Bush years, a whole lot of us were critical of the view that you're either with us or against us. It encapsulated the whole lazy thinking, jingoistic, false patriotism nonsense of the Republican party.
But that sort of thinking seems to have infected parts of the blogosphere, including here.
Now we hear that the most important step forward in providing health care to Americans is just horrid because it isn't single payer. Sure, there are restrictions on what insurance companies can do and nearly all Republicans aren't happy about any of them (have you heard the BS arguments about how insurance companies shouldn't be forced to cover folks with pre-existing conditions?), but none of it means anything. No, it's all ashes and crap because it doesn't do everything you and I want.
Or take the attacks on Olympia Snowe. Today she did this:
After a heated hour-long exchange, Democrats defeated a Republican effort to restore $113 billion in funding for Medicare Advantage, a private insurance program that has been criticized for high costs. All 13 Democrats on the committee were joined by one Republican, Sen. Olympia J. Snowe (Maine), in voting against the amendment offered by Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), who was backed by eight other Republicans.
The vote was significant because it protected a major source of funding in Baucus's bill. Republicans were willing to reduce Medicaid payments to states to keep the legislation from adding to the federal deficit.
Washington Post
This matters because Medicare Advantage is a huge waste of federal money and Republicans have already signaled that they will use the vote to scare seniors. But, ya know, Snowe is just terrible, terrible because, although she's already voted with the Democrats in the Senate Finance Committee on some key amendments, she doesn't support a public option on day one. Well, I'm a Mainer who never voted for her and never will, but isn't having someone who is an ally some part of the time better than having a vote that's consistently against you?
You know what: Political progress doesn't come about by being pure. If you only want to work with people who agree with you 100% of the time, you'll spend a lot of time looking in the mirror. Past triumphs didn't fulfill 100% of what people really wanted to achieve, including Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid, which didn't cover all Americans.
Now, that doesn't mean that I think we should stop pushing. Yes, we need to work hard to get a far better bill than what Max Baucus hatched. But we can do this with some political maturity and intellectual honesty.
If we don't, we injure our cause, now and in the future.
As one political observer wrote:
If health care passes, will it be a grand historical achievement, or a crushing disappointment? The answer, I predict, will be both. The American health care system is an indefensible morass of waste and cruelty. The distance between the status quo and the ideal is therefore so vast that we could—and probably will—end up with a reform that massively improves the system, while coming nowhere close to the ideal.
Which basis of comparison will prevail? In the long run, obviously, the substantive merit of the legislation is what counts. But, over the next few years, President Obama’s political capital will hinge in part on whether Americans see health care reform as genuine progress or a political fig leaf. And his biggest foe in the perception battle seems to be the liberals.
link
We'll get more from pushing and pushing and pushing the Congress - and then celebrating. Yes, there are some possibilities for health care that would be steps backward, like a mandate with weak subsidies and regulations. But the Baucus bill is already better than it was (in part because Democrats and, yes, Snowe) have made it better, with stronger subsidies.
If we want a successful Obama presidency, one which will make considerable progress toward our goals, giving up the "you're for us or against us" thing is essential.