Monthly Archives: August 2009

I have talked to many people out here in the still-pretty-red end of Virginia who took and wore the blue ribbons I gave out in support of the public option. In the Ninth District, Congressman Rick Boucher opposes the public option. He invited panelists who have vested interests in the for-profit system to stand by him at his town hall. I am sure that was easier for him than speaking on his own to people who voted for him who will continue to be exploited for profit if the public option fails.
The opponents of the public option are loud, but they are not representative of the general population. Most of them are coached or paid to equate support for the public option with support for illegal immigration, abortion, and (thank you, Lyndon LaRouche website, Sarah Palin, Chuck Grassley) death panels.
The great majority of people who need the public option work every day. There are a lot of us, doing our jobs and counting on the people we elected to stand up for us. We can’t come to a rally because we have to go to work. There is a privileged, sponsored, well-orchestrated few of the bus people and Tea Party crowd. That is why their sponsors have to train them and bus them around.
We need the public option. We need single payer in America, but if a strong public option is as close as we can get, we want that.
People like Jim Moran (Virginia, Eighth District) are listening to the real voices of America and not the bus people and tea party brigade. They are making hard decisions and they are committed to finding a way to get what people need. They are holding true to the principle that government should be representative of the people, not sponsored by a corporation.

Sam Youngman on “The Hill” in an article titled “White House insists it wants bipartisan health bill” reported:

Some Democrats want the administration to use special budget reconciliation rules that could allow a healthcare reform bill to move through the Senate with only 51 votes. That would negate the need for Republican support.

But of course the Republicans have a good reason to oppose that:

Former President George W. Bush used reconciliation rules to move tax cuts in 2001 and 2003. Republicans have argued using the rules to reform healthcare would be different because of the scope of the legislation.

Do they mean it would affect more people, and some of them would not be millionaires?