Most of you will remember the wailing and gnashing of teeth when California SB562 (single-payer healthcare for California) was shelved by Democratic speaker Anthony Rendon.
Leftie Twitter went nuts on Rendon, and the usual suspects here used it to bash Democrats once again.
Bernie Sanders’ ‘Our Revolution ’, and the California Nurses Association, obviously blamed Democrats and Rendon for the tabling of the bill. However, The Intercept, hardly a bastion of ‘alt-centrism’ as the worst among us like to use these days, says the blame is squarely on the bill itself not taking into account the California direct democracy system.
theintercept.com/…
IN THE DAYS SINCE California Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon shelved for the year SB562, which intends to establish a state single payer health care system, he’s been subject to mass protestsand even death threats. The bill’s chief backers, including the California Nurses Association and the Bernie Sanders-affiliated Our Revolution, angrily point to Rendon as the main roadblock to truly universal health care.
They’re completely wrong. What’s more, they know they’re wrong. They’re perfectly aware that SB562 is a shell bill that cannot become law without a ballot measure approved by voters. Rather than committing to raising the millions of dollars that would be needed to overcome special interests and pass that initiative, they would, apparently, rather deceive their supporters, hiding the realities of California’s woeful political structure in favor of a morality play designed to advance careers and aggrandize power.
Ouch.
See, single-payer bills in California can't just be protest bills that lack detail and funding ( because it’ll never pass and is meant to act as a stake in the ground); CA has a Democratic majority in its legislature and can pass a law like this.
When such a revolutionary change is proposed to be put into law, you have to have the major details worked out and the funding covered and acceptable. Clearly, that's a gap in SB562, and Rendon has been smeared (and worse per the links in the Intercept article) for holding off until those details are taken care of.
Unity and cooperation has to go both ways to be successful, and in this case, there was only smearing and Trump-level smears.