Apologies for the health care post overload recently but there's much to be said. I want to make a quick note about the merits of message coordination.
On the way home from lunch at my local brewing establishment, I happened to hear part of a tele-townhall meeting held by Dennis Kucinich. The townhall was on the topic of health care and the little Congressman was taking calls and answering people's questions. It didn't take long for me to realize that the bill he was promoting and explaining was a "Medicare for all" plan, not the plan before Congress now. Kucinich was pushing H.R. 676, a single-payer plan that has been introduced in the past few Congresses. Single-payer systems work like Canada's Medicare: virtually everyone gets their insurance through the government, even if hospitals and doctors remain private. What Kucinich arguably should have been talking about was H.R. 3200 (wow, what a shit wiki page), the health care bill that's going to be voted on in September and discussed throughout the month of August.
That's not to say I think single-payer is without merits or that it shouldn't be be a subject of public discussion (in some ways, I suspect it would be a better idea than the current plan). But at this moment, people are confused about the health care plans being devised in Congress. Republicans are in full fear-mongering mode, yet I'm not seeing a coherent, coordinated explanation of the reforms in question being made by the Democrats. In fairness, there isn't currently a plan, there are multiple plans. But I think House Dems should be at home this month selling the House bill (and, as we've seen, some are, despite astroturf opposition). And Kucinich's decision to sell a single-payer system instead of educating constituents on H.R. 3200 strikes me as counterproductive and irresponsible. He did try and clarify that the two are different bills--apparently he's undecided on H.R. 3200--but I wonder how many people who listened to him will now believe that Congress will be voting on "Medicare for all" when they go back in September?
To make it all more confusing, Congress will be doing just that. For the first time ever, Congress is going to take a floor vote on single-payer health care. Anthony Weiner (D-NY), the guy in the video a few posts down daring Republicans to vote against Medicare, will introduce an amendment to H.R. 3200 that effectively strips out most of its 1,000+ pages of text and inserts much of the language of H.R. 676. Speaker Pelosi has indicated that she's going to allow this and that the House will indeed vote on replacing the plan currently under consideration with a single-payer plan. I assume this is meant to try and appease the liberals who are upset that single-payer was never on the table during this ongoing health care debate, though I wonder what would happen in the unlikely event that House Republicans decide to play a high-stakes game of chicken and actually vote for Weiner's amendment?
What's the takeaway point of all my hand-wringing? People are confused--bombarded with misinformation actually--and this stuff isn't helping.
On a totally unrelated note, here's a cool link: Recovery Tracker, Lake County.
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