If you care about healthcare, then we need ALL HANDS to insure Martha Coakley wins on Tuesday.
You don't need to love her, you must vote for her. This is not a referendum on Obama or whether he has delivered as promised. This is about delivering some level of healthcare to American citizens who bleed and hurt and die just like our Haitian brothers and sisters.
PLEASE DO ALL YOU CAN TO SUPPORT THE COAKLEY CAMPAIGN
Prayer is an appropriate emotion for the people of Haiti and the outcome of the vote in Massachusetts on Tuesday.
Americans are dying at the rate of 44,000 a year because healthcare is not a right in America. And God help this country, if an unimaginable electoral defeat becomes the spear into the heart of healthcare health insurance reform.
We need to pass this deeply flawed healthcare health insurance bill, no matter what. We then must deal harshly with the "Democrats" responsible for making this bill so inadequate.
To walk into a 150,000 square foot convention center in the heartland of the United States and see middle class Americans with untreated diabetes, hypertension and myriad other conditions which can be readily controlled with proper and affordable access to healthcare, is to walk deep into a Third World country.
In all candor, I might not have felt such urgency had I not been at the free health clinics in Little Rock and Kansas City. You can't see what I did, and hear the stories I heard, and not recognize that we cannot fail yet again, despite the bitter pill we are being forced to swallow in order to "pass something".
Make no mistake, this is a huge gift to the insurance industry, and certainly I am deeply troubled that Democrats will own all the gaping shortcomings. Someone noted the other day, once we're all mandated to buy for-profit junk insurance and when this loathsome industry bereft of meaningful regulation (despite reform) continues to deny claims with reckless abandon, you'll be able to turn to your Congressperson who voted for this and demand an explanation. That said, doing nothing, or letting the bill die, seems to me immoral, unethical and simply unacceptable. The Medicaid expansion will help those lucky enough to qualify.
If Martha Coakley loses on Tuesday:
If you haven't noticed, if Coakley loses, the media is already writing the obituary for healthcare reform. Funny how all those pundits with their platinum employer-provided healthcare, are so casual (dare I say, even amused) about the possible death of healthcare reform. Well, hey, nothing like a juicy political story, even as Americans die and the nation slips ever deeper into Third World status.
At this very moment, the same brain surgeon Democrats responsible for the healthcare bill, are figuring out their [if Coakley loses] Plan B. Slow walking the certification of the election, reconciliation and other tactics the Democrats can use, to get the bill passed. I don't know (nor does the elected class, I'm sure), how they will handle an electoral defeat. I do know however, that if this happens, we will need to ramp up the pressure like nothing we have ever done. This bill must pass. No one has explained to me how killing the bill will be good for the Americans like this.
Despite the fact that I believe this legislation will come back to haunt Democrats, it still must pass. It seems to me, the government cannot "mandate" that beleaguered middle class Americans buy expensive insurance from a deeply despised and discredited industry, and have the IRS act as the enforcer, and expect to be embraced by the electorate. But I'm no expert on electoral politics. However, if you're not worried about the real time effects of this legislation on the American people, you ought to read this letter which was sent to Speaker Pelosi on Thursday by the American Academy of Actuaries.
If 2010 turns into the electoral debacle many of us fear, so be it. This will be the consequence of less than ideal governing. If Obama faces a difficult re-election in 2012 because he owns the bill and the American people see no tangible benefits, again, what can you say, live and learn--and don't ignore your base.
After the bill passes, we must then hold accountable all those responsible for dropping this turd on the American people.
But first things first, pass the bill (if it can be improved before the vote, that would be ideal)--no matter what.
If Coakley loses and the Democrats have to bring Olympia Snowe on board, expect the bill to get even worse.
The movement for healthcare rights will be long, ugly and at times, deeply demoralizing. We won't win this fight overnight, and I keep telling myself not to become despondent.