Local Upping the Ante on Obama
May 29th, 2009 by Steven GardnerSince there was an “Organizing for America” event on Bainbridge not long ago, we’ve taken to keeping tabs on when others might be. So it was no surprise to see one scheduled in Port Orchard. What was surprising, however, was the text of the invitation.
“Single-payer universal health care, cutting out the insurance companies entirely, is the only lifesaving prescription to heal our broken health care system. Let’s organize and demand it! If the people lead, the leaders will follow.”
Really? Obama is getting people organized for universal health care, the kind that would cut out insurance companies completely? I could believe that he might want that, but I didn’t think he was willing to propose that as part of his plan for health care reform.
I looked everywhere on the Organizing for America site and found nothing promoting universal health care or eliminating insurance companies. Whether that would be a good or bad thing wasn’t the point. The point was I didn’t think that was what Obama was pitching.
When I searched “universal health care” and “Obama” I did find this from 2007:
“Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama, seeking support from labor union members in New Jersey, vowed Monday to make health insurance available to all Americans by the end of his first term in the White House.
”We can have universal health care by the end of the next president’s first term, by the end of my first term,” Obama said, bringing 600 union workers to their feet during a question-and-answer session with members of AFL-CIO affiliated unions.”
The concept, providing health care for everyone, is the same. But it doesn’t mean making the government the payer, not even in the 2007 story. So I wondered where our local event organizer got her message. From what I can tell, she crafted it herself, though it certainly is a view shared by many. Obama is proposing a sort of compromise, baby steps on healthcare. Some are arguing “accept no substitutes” for single payer. They do it here from time to time.
River Curtis-Stanley is the local organizer, hosting the event from 2-3 p.m., June 7 at Moondogs Too in Port Orchard. As of this writing 16 had confirmed they’d attend, which is a pretty fair number given these are supporters of the party in power. It’s a lot easier to get angry people to gather for a tea party than to get those who might be pretty OK with the way things are going to think about serious things in the middle of a Sunday afternoon.
Curtis-Stanley elaborated on her message on Daily Kos, a Web site for the left side of the aisle. It would appear there are a lot of folks out there who believe like Curtis-Stanley.
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