Dear Sentor Daschle,
Go away.
Please.
Look, I'm going to be frank with you. You were a terrible Majority Leader. The Republicans were more powerful in the minority -- framing the debate, setting the agenda -- than Democrats were in the majority when you ran the Senate.
When President Obama nominated you to be his HHS Secretary and health care czar, I was a little baffled. When the explanation was that you could skillfully guide health care reform through Congress, I was outright bewildered. I couldn't remember you skillfully guiding anything through Congress when you were its most powerful member.
And when your nomination imploded, I was relieved. I thought we probably had a better shot at getting health care for everyone -- by far the most important issue in America -- with you out of the picture.
But this week, you forced your way back into the picture, releasing a "bipartisan proposal" that you crafted with, of all people, Bob Dole. It was a depressingly typical effort at bipartisanship from you: all the compromise came from the Democratic side. It included no public option, essentially leaving the health care out of health care reform.
You said you'd prefer a public option, but that reaching a "consensus" is more important. "We've come too far and gained too much momentum for our efforts to fail over disagreements on one single issue," you said.
In other words, it's more important that Bob Dole approve of the plan for health care reform than to actually solve the problem health care reform is supposed to solve.
And that's your fatal flaw, Senator. You put bipartisanship above all other values. You believe that consensus is more important than results. Your comity created a do-nothing attitude while you were the Majority Leader, and it is the last thing we need now in the middle of a fight to fix the most broken thing about America: its criminal health care system that literally kills people.
So please, I beg of you, do America a favor. Take your bipartisan health care plan and go away. We don't need another Democrat telling us how important it is for us to play nice with the Republicans while millions of Americans go without health care.
We don't need you, Tom Daschle. We don't need your bipartisanship or your defeatist attitude. We don't need your signature under a bunch of giveaways to the insurance companies.
We just need 50 votes in the Senate. We can ignore the Republicans. We can laugh at their fake concerns about "choice" and "quality" and "cost" while they oppose every solution that increases choice, improves quality, or reduces cost.
We can finally make sure that no one in America ever has to stay in a job because they can't get health care anywhere else. We can make sure that no one goes bankrupt because they get sick. We can make people healthier and even save lives.
All we need is strong leadership from the White House and unity of purpose from our Democrats in Congress. What we don't need, Senator, is you.
Sincerely,
Jesse Berney
Lyndon Johnson is rotating in his grave: We have everything we need to pass this, yet Dems would rather keep the cash coming from their corporate sponsors.
Obama needs to wake up and put his weight behind the House bill. If he doesn't, everything else was in vain.
Or “Expanded & Improved Medicare For Allâ€
Introduced by Rep. John Conyers, Jr.
Go to his website and read this. Call and demand your representative co-sponsors, and votes, to send this to the Senate. Then demand your senators support it. It is exactly what we are asking for.
Every poll taken has indicated an OVERWHELMING amount of support for single payer universal healthcare. This should be a given. It is what the vast majority of Americans want.
I have no idea why this is taking so long, why there are so many competing, alternative plans.
These LOBBYISTS (Daschle and Dole) need to crawl back into their hole like the rodents that they are. They are trying to save their own jobs. If the industry can't write its own legislation (historically the banking industry wrote bankruptcy law, credit companies wrote credit card regulation, and insurance companies has written insurance law) who needs lobbyists?
This government needs to listen to the people. Otherwise, in 2010 and 2012, we will be seeing a whole lot of new faces.
It is a government with the power to decide who will and will not receive what treatments.
It is healthcare rationing. It is waiting lists. It is people who die on waiting lists without ever receiving timely treatment. It is a shortage of dentists. It is fewer new drugs taking longer to reach patients. It is a restriction on free choices by individuals.
Think not? Every one of the above conditions exists in the Canadian and European socialized medicine systems. People die in those bureaucratic morasses every day of conditions that are routinely and successfully treated here in the US.
Bipartisanship = Democrat caving.
I second the motion. Daschel should go away and stay there.
We don't want excuses.
We don''t want concensus.
We don't want Bi-partisianship.
We don't want Insurance Company health care.
We want and NEED Government Administerd Health Care. Single Payer, Public Option.
NOTHING will change until the politicians are NO LONGER OWNED BY THE CORPORATIONS!
Thus we need "Public" Campaign Financing & Term Limits to return "our" government to "We the People"!
The Plantation Owners of old fought to "own" slaves in order to have "free labor", but the "new" Plantation Owners - THE CORPORATIONS - long ago discovered that the most PROFITABLE people to "own" are our elected politicians, that will do the Corporations bidding for the price of a campaign donation!
The "only" solutions that can change Washington from the worlds most successful "brothel", to a city that will finally represent & "serve" We the People, is to implement "Public" Campaign Finance Reform & Term Limits!
It is LONG PAST time to outlaw congressional corporate prostitution & TAKE BACK "OUR" COUNTRY!!!
The Corporate "owned" politicians are working for the "exclusive" benefit of the Corporations PROFITS - We The People have been "left behind"! Watch what happens with Health Care "Reform" - the Corporate "owned" politicians will give the Corporations what "they" want, "PROFIT CARE" - not what the PEOPLE want, HUMANE, NOT for PROFIT, HEALTH CARE for ALL AMERICANS!
The US Legislature has been bought off by the Corporations & therefore "controlled" by the Corporations - THAT is THE PROBLEM, that is what is destroying America!
You say - "Can it really be, Congress is destroying America?" - You betcha!!!
Can't the Democrats act on (and fulfil) the demands of their mass base too? Can they not worry about what conservatives will say or do when they author and vote on bills? Can't they kick the GOP minority to the curb and get on with creating the policies that will save the lives of many (if not all) Americans and repeal laws/policies that deprive people of their human rights (like DOMA and DADT)?
When will the Democrats stand-up against the GOP bullies?
When BOTH the Democrats & Republicans are no longer "owned" by the CORPORATIONS!