In a macabre sort of way, it was almost too perfect to be true, I thought to myself while hanging up the phone Monday night. After arriving in Dayton, Ohio Monday evening to embed as a citizen reporter with President Obama's health care reform bus tour, I got the call from my husband. Our health insurance plan -- one of those heralded cooperatives, in fact -- was being canceled.
Now, while crisscrossing the Midwest, covering rallies and arranging interviews with the tour's lead organizers, I'll have to multi-task. Like millions of Americans who've lost their insurance, I'll be searching for a new plan, reading the fine print and wondering what pre-existing conditions might make Swiss cheese out of any policy I sign.
The political is personal for every American when it comes to the health care debate - up to and including the president, who has spoken movingly about the fight with health insurers he went through as his own mother lay dying. That personal connection has animated town halls across the country in the month of August and now the White House hopes to respond with its own one-on-one campaign.
I'll be watching and reporting from inside the "Health Insurance Reform Now: Let's Get It Done Bus Tour." It's the administration's effort to recapture the energy of the presidential campaign. First stop, Dayton, Tuesday afternoon, then on to Columbus Tuesday evening, and on to Pennsylvania Wednesday.
Millions of supporters knocked on doors, made phone calls, and donated money to elect Barack Obama in 2008, but campaigns traditionally end on Election Day when the polls close. President Barack Obama's theory of participatory government is considered too idealistic by most politicians who believe it is generally not in the best interest of a politician to keep supporters informed and active during the policy-making and legislative process. Too many bipartisan (and intraparty) compromises must be made in order to implement new policies and to enact new laws. Politicians have long believed that the American public does not have the stomach for the real work that happens between elections. They don't want to lose supporters during the long, hard-fought battles for legislative change that too often bring only incremental change, so they go off to Washington, DC and try to involve only their most dedicated, die-hard supporters.
I will be covering the events. The campaign-like rally atmosphere at the bus tour stops. The personal health care stories of both featured speakers and ordinary attendees, The way it all comes together on the ground between organizers, volunteers, and the vast network of independent grassroots activists that OFA has cultivated across the country. But I will also cover the inside story of the organization.
Together, my readers and I will get to know the team that was hand-picked to carry on the campaign that Obama supporters hope will bring to fruition the changes that they elected Obama to make.
I'll explore the benefits and drawbacks of the so-called "constant campaign." Mainstream media has made much of the drawbacks: continuous public relations, constant propaganda, a constant push for the ideas behind a campaign. But the benefits of increasing participation in our government are often left out of the discussion. The much-needed civic education and engagement that is directly derived from a participatory process in policy development. The value of input that comes directly from the people affected by proposed legislation and new policies. The much needed rebuttal of misinformation disseminated by special interests. Last, and perhaps more important, we'll discuss the divide within the Democratic Party on the issue of health care and the misinformation that is being perpetuated not just by Republicans but also by some Democrats.
I am not a proponent of any particular plan, and although I supported Obama during the election season, I am not an Obama cheerleader. I am an ordinary American, just like you, who has the same health care concerns that you do. Over the next few days, I will engage in a substantive, balanced discussion both in the health insurance reform debate and the way the debate is taking place.
And I'd like you to take part: If you have questions that you would like me to ask OFA leadership, submit them to me at dawnteo-at-gmail.com. I'd like to hear from you.
Follow Dawn Teo on Twitter: www.twitter.com/dawnteo
http://obamesque.wordpress.com/2009/09/01/misinformation-distorts-debate
You wrote: "...most politicians...believe it is generally not in the best interest of a politician to keep supporters [the public] informed and active during the policy-making and legislative process."
BINGO. It is mass ignorance which allows for the success of disinformation campaigns. It is mass ignorance which allows screaming fear- and hate-mongering tactics to take the place of an informed, reasoned, civil national dialogue.
And it's mass ignorance which allows macabre fairy tales--like "Death Panels Pulling the Plug on Grandma", "We'll Become Russia!", and the new "They'll Kill Off Women With Breast Cancer" --to take root and pass for truth.
Too many pols benefit from the national disease of an ill-informed public. And too many Americans are far too content to remain ignorant of the facts; if we "don't know", we're not responsible--and taking on responsibility for "the least" among us isn't as much fun as was Dubya's " Y'all Shop for Freedom and Trust Me to Handle the Hard Stuff" meme. We do love the easy "I Got Mine, Buddy--You Get Yours!" philosophy of citizenship...until catastrophic illness hits home and we find we didn't "get" what we thought we got.
I'll be reading your posts and sharing them.
0Bama's Now has 8 General Principals that are "NICE" but do NOTHING in Reality! Just like TARP!
The expansion of Medicare for All Who WANT IT is the only sure way to get Real Reform! Add a clause that those who want to buy from an Insurance Company can continue to do so!
0BAMA must get very specific about what the FINAL BILL CONTAINS! There are too many very NASTY Variables to simply give guidelines or principals.
We NEED A LEADER and TACTICIAN"ER" to get this done RIGHT!
But add an OPT OUT for those wanting to buy commercial health care Insurance and suddenly you have the Strongest possible Public Option!
Then you and your family could solve your problem simply and effectively!
With from 100,000,000 to 306,000,000 people in Medicare for ALL "FAIR PRICES can be negotiated with all aspects of health care.
This does away with the 1,000+ pages of loopholes and "duct tape" applied to the existing systemS!
Hr 676 is a simple to read and understand 50 pages - make that 51 when you add the OPT OUT clause!
This thing is going to happen. PS Only 1 teabagger with a very small sign was seen.
Now that Minnesota spends "20 percent" less per patient than the national average and 31 percent less than in the highest cost state, under a pay for patient's outcome pack, this promising reform could be successful along the way, I believe.
Aside from the already allocated $583 billion and the savings of this reform package, "20%" of $923.5bn (the combined Medicare and Medicaid cost per year, as of July) is around $184.7bn per year and 1.847trillion over the next decade, and this patient-oriented value alone could be sufficient to meet the goal.
As Norman Thomas long ago remarked, "The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism, but under the name of Liberalism, they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program until one day America will be a socialist nation without knowing how it happened." Government takeover of healthcare is just another step in the march to socialism, albeit a large one.
Thomas’s comment, of course, was before LBJ and friends destroyed the term, "liberal", and the party was forced to revert to an earlier term that they had previously destroyed, "progressive". The truth of the matter is that the current Democrat Party should long ago have been re-named the Social-democrat Party or the Euro-social-democrat Party to more accurately represent its true agenda.
Social-democracy is the left’s recognition that socialism can only survive as a leech on capitalism. This fact strikes unquenchable fear deep in the souls of social democrats, forcing them into a need/hate relationship with their mortal enemy - one they cannot afford to risk giving up. As a consequence, they are forced into the very lies that Thomas foresaw in order to mislead their fellow Americans into yielding their freedom for the dream of a socialist utopia, even if this utopia must be funded by capitalism.
If Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Sweden, Finland, Norway, China, Taiwan, Australia, Russia, Czech Republic, Iceland, Greenland, Saudi Arabia, Denmark, the Netherlands, Portugal, Mexico can have a public option built in to their healthcare system and still have capitalism then why can't America?
I guess its that whole American" exceptionalism" thing. As in, every other country in the world can have access to healthcare options that can help keep costs low "except" in America.
Here's my agenda: healthcare coverage that can be in reach of all Americans. Without exploding premium rates or being dropped for pre-existing conditions. That way when you pay for insurance, you get what you pay for. I guess you should report me to the HUAAC.
Second, freedom is decidedly not the highest priority for any of the countries you listed. In this limited regard, you are right re American exceptionalism. Save for those of us who yearn to emulate Euro-social-democracy, America is both the first and last best hope for freedom.
Finally, I support health care for Americans who want it; however, my young son, like many twenty-year-olds doesn't feel that he needs any and he probably doesn't. This leaves the question of who you think that you are to use the force of government to require that he pay for it ? Obviously, a collectivist argument can be made for forcing him to have it whether he wants it or not, however, that is precisely the argument between freedom and socialism.
Those of us who prioiritize freedom will vociferously deny any right of the collective to use the force of government in this manner, whereas those of you who believe that such fundamental decisions belong to the collective will argue the utility of doing so. While I am more than willing to split America into the land of the free and the land of social democrats to free collectivists to leve as they choose, few collectovists reciprocate.
Just to clarify, police protection, as well as most of the other items you listed, are public goods. We yield our freedoms when we empower government to go beyond the limited scope required by freedom to provide non-public goods and to control outcomes. The answer to your befuddled quandry is SCOPE. Socialists contend that control should lie with the collective, whereas freedom demands that it rest with the individual.
But, how exciting to be on that bus tour. I look forward to your updates of the stops!