"...significant progress reforming the US health care system trumps going down in flames in the name of crafting the perfect piece of legislation. In my opinion, the perfect can't be the enemy of the good."

As we lead up to the full vote on the Senate version of Health care--the blogosphere alights with more and more angry and panicked debate--it swells with misinformation, misquotes and snippets taken out of context. I suppose, that's both the genius and the dark side of the internet.

I read this morning someone weirdly decrying Obama as the Devil incarnate--a traitor to his party--he went on to say that Obama was selling out the American people over health care--someone else wrote that they "loved" Obama last year--now they "despise" him. And these are Democrats! Yet another blogger wrote that she expected "more" of the President--she somehow expected all of the policies he promised in his campaign to come to fruition "by now"--afterall, she went on to say--he's had a year and a Democratic congress to "get things done". Most of it is so absurd, one has to imagine what is going on in the personal lives of these bizarre and angry embittered individuals to make such strange and inconsolable statements--and why they seem to lack even basic knowledge of government and how things are accomplished. Or not. Some new amount of angry blah blah has also surfaced on the internet over Caesar Barackus apparent downplay of the "Public Option" in health care reform in a statement he made yesterday--What he actually said was:

"The public option, he said, "is an area that has just become symbolic of a lot of ideological fights." But, Obama added: "As a practical matter, this is not the most important aspect of this bill — the House bill or the Senate bill."

It's true. The Public Option has now become a myth of epic proportions--the waving flag standard of the left progressives and the whipping boy of the radical right. What most folk forget is that Obama supported a public option all thruout his campaign and the early days of health care debate this past year. But with all of the vitriol over it--and the lines drawn against it not only by Republican party lines--but many of those in his own party who were vehemently against it--or any government run health programme--the man obviously could see the signs--the hand writing on the wall--that reform would fail completely if a government run health plan remained on the table.

The public option, never a clearly defined mechanism in health care reform, is pretty much dead. It's time to move forward and get the best bill we can--to help the most amount of people we can--passed. And signed into law.

Nothing in politics is black and white. And to understand it all, to comprehend the intricacies and machinations behind getting such enormous reform accomplished, I think the American public has to be far more proactive in educating themselves--in reading and listening to the various sides of the debate--and to set aside their personal fears and anger and knee jerk rush to judgments--and to look, finally, to see the Big Picture. Liberals and progressives simply listening to Liberal Public Radio or reading Leftist blogs for their sole source of information is nearly as lousy as the radical right worshiping Fox News as the very Voice of God.

Neither has all the information we need as citisens to make educated and sound judgments.  

In my youth as an AIDS activist, I learned that, while our more demonstrative tactics, our public displays and protests and vocal bouts of civil disobedience--indeed--attracted needed and welcomed attention to the cause---the real fight went on behind closed doors in the federal and state capitals. While many of us were joining ACT-UP in a "bloody" Wall Street protest against pharmaceutical companies, lobbyists from our groups were meeting with Senators such as Ted Kennedy who were fighting on our behalf to pass AIDS anti-discrimination legislation and to fund the Ryan White act which would make HIV health care and anti-virals drugs affordable and available to those who needed them and could not afford them. While one of our groups in Florida made a public stand on the steps of the capital building in Tallahassee, our lobbyists were inside, speaking to state legislatures about enacting laws which would prohibit nursing homes and assisted living centers who take state funding from expelling them, refusing treatment and discriminating against people with AIDS.

I have a small amount of understanding of how government works. Of how compromise is paramount to a final victory. And I know too, the struggle and the anger and the righteous indignation when the cause is right. And the cause is just. And when the end result isn't always what had been hoped at the beginning--one has to stand back and ask...how many have we helped now. That we wouldn't have before.

Millions of lower income people who might have been insured under the never clearly defined and often vague notion of a "public option"--will now, under the current Senate plan--be insured under an expansion of Medicaid. Millions of people.

As for myself, I'll be very proud to be able to ask, this time next year, once health care reform has become law, how many have we helped now. That we wouldn't have before.

I'm optimistic. And I am hopeful.

The Public Option Sideshow

Interesting article by Zack Cooper on the Mythology and Ideological Symbolism of the "Public Option":

The public option has taken on a mythical status. For many people, health care reform will be deemed a failure if the President signs legislation without a public option. That's problematic. The public option was never a coherent, well-defined policy tool.

Instead, it was an amorphous concept that stood as a symbol of reform and as a perceived antidote to the greed and callousness of the insurance industry. However, deputizing the public option as a health care reform litmus test ignores the other policy-changes that need to be enacted for health care reform to succeed. Right now, health care reform in the US needs substance, not symbolism.

A robust public option is important, but it is not the only ingredient necessary for health care reform to succeed. It's understandable why the public option has become the focal point of health care reform. The health care reform bill that came out of the House was 2,074 pages long! A public option is an easy reference for anyone who doesn't have three spare days to read the bill in full. A public option is easy to identify, it has a nifty title and it's intuitively likable. And, the public option was a gesture of good faith from policy-makers that paid homage to those who wanted a single-payer system like the British National Health Service.

The problem with elevating the public option to mythic proportions is that we are putting stock in a symbolic policy that never had a stable definition or a clear purpose. A public option became everything to everyone. At various points in the last year, the public option ranged from being defined as a choice of Medicare for all, to a non-profit insurer that was steered by the health secretary, to limited government run insurance plans that were to be run by each state.... Full article  

Of course a Universal Health Care system--where everyone in the United States, regardless of their income and social status would have equal access to medical care---would be the one thing that would fully satisfy my own liberal leftist socialist leaning sensibilities. That's my own Perfect World. And most Americans say that they want that. They want a single pay health care system where everyone is covered. But Americans don't want to pay for it. And they don't want the government to run it.

You see, to have so-called "Universal" health care. Surprisingly enough. It must be paid for. Somehow. And that somehow is thru taxation. In countries where health care is available to everyone, taxes on income are high. Tell any Brit, where their National Health Service provides health care to everyone--what you pay in income tax here in the states proportionate to your income, and they'll tell you how lucky you are. In Denmark and Sweden, for example , where a vast spectrum of social programmes are free to everyone, including daycare, family leave, lengthy vacation times, structured work weeks, retirement pensions, University education and prescription drugs and health care--all of which is very pro-preventative--personal income is taxed as high as 59%. But for that large tax contribution, the citisens of these nations have piece of mind and know that you're covered for life. From cradle. To the grave. Canada taxes it's populace for their national health care service in part by Province. And it varies by geography and income. But health care is available to everyone. And paid for. By everyone.

While Americans piss and moan about our own broken health care system, they're in no way ready or willing  to actually have to pay for it.

So where does that leave us? In a quagmire of imperfect debate and a legislative mish mash of politics in trying to hammer out some kind of reform that will satisfy the both the politicians and the American people. It's actually quite amazing that the debate has come this far, in less than a year, two bills have been hammered together, from the House and the Senate. More work has been debated and done on health care reform in one year than in the previous forty. In reality, the fact that one hundred senators and hundreds of representatives, each with their own agendas and political ambitions, could come together on any kind of legislation--is, quite frankly--miraculous... Of course Republicans, still licking their wounds from the major losses of the last election refuse--across the board, and along party lines, to approve anything that even hints of a Democratic stamp. And the far left liberal progressive Democrats don't seem to want to compromise on anything that doesn't include a government run public option. Both of these factions would happily kill health care reform. And the system would remain broken with millions of Americans left uninsured. Vulnerable. And at risk.

The Senate bill which was voted on over the weekend moves us forward. Is it perfect? Of course not. And anyone expecting it to be, lives in La La Land.

The bill still needs the official vote of the Senate--and then goes back to the House of Representatives where it's expected to cause even more uproar and vitriol and absurdities until something can be culled together--a compromise between the two branches of government, that will, in the end, no matter what form it takes, be a progressive step--and help millions of Americans obtain health care. And, the bottom line. Save lives. Yesterday, as I cruised about the vast internet, I continue to read the panicked doom and gloom and fear mongering of the health care reform naysayers. Negative Neds and Nelly and Bitter Bobs and Bettys  from both parties. I have my suspicions that few, if any of these folk have actually read the provisions of the New Bill. And too, I have my suspicions that many of these same folk wouldn't be pleased or satisfied, no matter what our government put together.

The New Moan seems to be about the health care mandates. Under the bill, everyone will be required to purchase a health care policy. Whether it be thru private insurance companies, or an insurance pool where rates will be competitive. Those who cannot afford it, will receive help in the form of subsidies.

Personally, I have no problem with mandates. The cost of health care should be shared by everyone who can afford it. Massachusetts signed their huge health care reform package into law a few years ago, which includes mandates, and so far, it has worked out well enough. And the state has managed to insure hundreds of thousands who were not previously covered. Massachusetts is still working out the kinks in their system. But they have a system.

Seriously. You cannot drive an automobile in any state in this country without carrying at least a minimum of auto insurance required by law. If you don't. You're fined. Why wouldn't you want your body. Your health. Your continued self preservation on this earth covered at least as much as your shiny car in the garage?

The most important aspect of the Senate bill is the expansion of Medicaid for those who make less than $29K a year. Millions and millions of lower income Americans would be covered under this federal and state run/funded plan. For the very first time, health care and medical attention would open up to them. And for those who's income is too large and will not qualify for Medicaid---the health care mandate provides assistance thru subsidies for paying for health insurance--for those who cannot cover the entire amount themselves. There will be subsidies for folks making less than $43K a year. That's individuals who make forty three thousand dollars a year.

Seriously. Forgo the daily morning Starbucks. And buy into a health care plan.

Both the House and Senate bill places bans on several common health insurer practices, denying health coverage to people with pre-existing health conditions, dropping people from their health insurance plan after they become sick, charging varying rates based on gender or occupation, and applying overly restrictive lifetime and annual limits to coverage. Include, too, are cost medical cutting measures. Streamlining. And a patient's bill of right.

Right along side a number of negatives anyone can find in both the House and the Senate Health Care Reform bills--there is a cornucopia of good. A very real attempt to create a more right and just system where no American citisen is denied health coverage--where no American citisen will become ill, and die, simply because they cannot afford the medical attention needed to prevent illness. Or to save their lives.

And lest we forget just how major legislation--which effects the health, happiness, well being  and freedoms of American citisens--is written and presented and voted into law by our government---Civil Rights legislation had been toyed with, tinkered with, casually debated since FDR. A true push for equal rights amongst the races began in 1957. It was introduced by John Kennedy in 1963, with little chance of passing. After JFK's assassination Lyndon Johnson took the ball and ran with it. The final bill lacked many things from it's original write--many of the protections of African American citisens such as laws against police brutality were eventually stricken from the final bill--amongst others--and the Civil Rights Bill's very presence on the floor of both houses caused such a rift in our government not seen since the Civil War. Vitriolic and hate-filled and unabashed openly bigoted debate continued non stop in the Senate and the House. Southern states did everything they could to kill or delay or squash the bill. Democratic Senator Richard Russell of Georgia even launched a filibuster against the bill and said from the floor of the Senate, telling the entire world: "We will resist to the bitter end any measure or any movement which would have a tendency to bring about social equality and intermingling and amalgamation of the races in our (Southern) states."  Seriously. He said that. From the floor of the United States Senate. Just forty five years ago.

Deals were made. And remade. Promises. And compromises hammered out. And the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was finally passed. An imperfect bill. But it's passing changed our nation. Did anyone believe health care reform would pass any easier than a bill about the equality and rights of human beings? Sweetheart deals and late night backroom huddles and compromise have always been a part oof American Politics. And perhaps it's the very nature of the beast wherever two opposing parties converge.

I'm sorry, but if one doesn't know this, then one has been living in a box their entire life or doesn't know their history. Or both.

And yet, within one year of Barack Obama becoming President of the United States, we're within a breath away from passing major legislation on health care--which has been sitting idle and unattended for over forty years. The internet is agog with blogs written by doomsdayers, naysayers--and those who simply will not be appeased. No matter what happens. Or doesn't.  I read one blog the other day written by a gentleman who believes passionately that Bush and Cheney should be tried as war criminals and charged with crimes against humanity. And in the same posting, calls Obama a warmongerer. Another writes that they are now completely disillusioned with the world around them. With America. That the nation is basically on the road to disintegration and it seems the health care reform debacle is now the catalyst for everything wrong with America. Everything about our country--all hope and positive faith in our future is somehow being disassembled. And that government, somehow, suddenly, is now completely and irrevocably irreparable.

All very melodramatic. If not darkly and helplessly sad.

There is, of course, the old saying, you can't please all the people all the time. And I have a sense that those who seem to fixate and obsess on the negativity they find...in our government, in the foibles and failures of the world around us--those who spread the Doom-and-Gloom that everything, simply everything is broken, and there is no chance to fix it--those who continuously choose disappointment and dismay--who can see only the negatives and the contraries, will never be happy with any kind of Health Care reform which is passed. And, I suspect, there will always be those who simply embrace negativity and find some odd sense of comfort in disillusionment. Those who are simply. Unhappy. With everything. Will, sadly remain. Unhappy with everything.

We know now, that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was an imperfect bit of legislation. And in the time since, states and the federal government have worked to close the gaps--to make it more right--to fill the voids of inequality and injustice. I'm certain, too, that whatever health care bill is finally signed into law, will be as imperfect. And perhaps it will be another generation before it too is worked out in it's fairness and universal coverage and equality. But it is a beginning. And a beginning that's been a long time coming.

As for me, personally, I've never been able to see the proverbial glass as half empty. Optimism and the belief that What is Right will always win out in the end has given me a push forward and a reason during my journey on terra firma. And I spent half a lifetime fighting for a cause which seemed insurmountable. Impossible. A cause that was literally about life and death. Some people gave up. Said we'd never win. Never be seen. Or heard. Or be able too make the drastic changes needed. As quickly as needed. And yet, we prevailed in the end. Because the cause was Good. And it was right. And because some of us believed in it with every fibre of our being.

I admit. I'm an optimist. But I'm also pragmatic. I believe health care reform will come. And it will come now. Or if it doesn't, it will be, as our President has said, another generation before it's even looked at once again. And in the interim, a broken system will crumble further. And people will become ill. And will die.

I believe that millions of Americans will breath easier once this bill--or it's final presentation is passed. That hundreds of thousands of American lives will be saved because of it. And I also believe it will be imperfect. And that it will come at a price. Financial. And political. Across the board. But to kill it with negativity and a growing malaise of bickering petty self serving anger and hopelessness would be unfair. Unjust. Perhaps even criminal. And would send this nation even deeper into the very self fulfilling prophecy of disillusionment and disappointment the Doomsdayers, Naysayers, and the whiny moaning Bitter Bobs n' Betty's already perceive it to be.

The sky is overcast and gray, with perfect soft light. There's a Jazz Christmas channel on itunes radio, and I'm going to be Christmas-card-making with the kids, then drawing at the Studio all night. All calming; centering; necessary.

The coolest thing I've been given this year is a custom-made artisan clock, which I've decided is what you'd get if you made Roly Poly Olie into a Kachina Doll. We hung it outside the doorway to the toy room. ;)