As an attorney, I understand initiative. My best opponents, including those who are fun to negotiate with, always plead aggressively. While they may ultimately be willing to compromise, those who take the initiative, sometimes well before I have even been retained, see to it that I work to win it back. Republicans use it and so should Democrats. The rationale for health care reform, as it was passed, makes perfect sense from a fairness point of view, but not from an initiative-posturing-for-strategic-measures perspective. While single payer health care was, and still is, the only way to fix the problems in our system, public option health care may have felt more fair to all the interests. The same goes for my president's judicial appointments. They have been slow, yes, but thoughtful and fair. As November, with its threat of resurgence, is fast approaching, the slow appointments and moderate health care reform have created just as much vulnerability as progress. Initiative is becoming even more crucial. Appointing in larger numbers, including even marginalized candidates, could have made Republicans work harder and possibly protected the moderates Dems wanted anyway. As for health care reform, an initiative strategy might have been to push single payer, make our opponents destroy it, then attack them for doing so. If that sounds destructive to the billions of Americans who were getting screened out for health insurance, an argument can be made that they are no better off, as long as health care maintains a financing system based on private insurance. This is what Nick Skala meant by "public option is like a doctor prescribing Tylenol, when what you really need is surgery." His point was that the Congressional Progressive Caucus, as well as the public, needs to hear a side by side comparison of public option and single payer health care. I know I need to hear the comparisons. In the distracted, only moderately informed, "I'm so busy" reality I inhabit, my understanding of all subjects is invariably truncated. I'm so hyper focussed on the things I need and want and already have, but need to replace, I'm high. High like some citizen of an Opium Regime occupied third world country, as far as my firm understanding of things like health care reform go. The corporations that provide it all to me, have me so addicted, I don't complain. And when I do complain, I still want my opium.
We can be roused from a narcotic state by anger initiative, because anger is hard wired. Anger initiative is harder for Democrats. It invariably gets monopolized by Republican rhetoric. Republicans, who get more mileage out of glittering generalities than Democrats, know how to work serious anger up to initiative. Democrats should utilize more anger framing, to assist with initiative. Unleashed Rahm Emanuel anger. It's hard to get worked up about things, if you're not angry. It's hard to be too upset with Tylenol, even when you need surgery, if your daddy, or your privatized-corporate-controlled-disabled government keeps you flush with the good stuff.
Here's an excellent 1 hour or less detox from beltway politics, which can lead to health care reform enlightenment (and anger) :
Watch Nick Skala's June 12, 2009 interview. "The Single Payer Action Interview"
Read Nick Skala's testimony to the Congressional Progressive Caucus, for Physicians for a National Health Program.
Visit Single Payer Action's site.
Read "Health Care Reform For Beginners" by Ezra Klein, in the Washington Post.
Watch Single Payer Action interview with Stan Brock.
