In the Social Democracy we must become, healthcare reform is absolutely essential. The collective mind simply cannot only be a majority of self interests. Somewhere, the body politic has to recognize the needs of of everyone. So the House of Representatives did the right thing. This time, a little over half of them voted for "us" instead of "me." At least this time, the most were for the most.
The Republicans under the leadership of John Boehner had only one defector from their bloc voting strategy. Now they’re going to ramp up their attacks with their cries of "Socialism," "Communism," "Liberalism," "Obama-ism," "Fascism," "Pelosi-ism," etc. That’s to be expected. Instead of seeing us half-way there, they’re going to look at this as a challenge. The roar will be deafening. They’re aiming for an empty glass.
I was surprised by some of the Progressives. They see the amendment that ruled out government funded abortion as a great loss – the glass as half empty. I call it losing to win. It’s just the way things are. Most Americans don’t want the government to pay for abortions. I’m not even sure I want that myself. Abortion isn’t "medical" in some sense. It’s become a part of medicine because when it wasn’t, it killed people and wasn’t widely available. It’s a desperate solution to a much more simply solved problem. If churches gave out condoms and birth control pills, we wouldn’t need abortion. Neither celibacy nor rhythm got the job done. Abortion and birth control for the poor can be financed privately with the money being spent lobbying. I’d rather donate to that cause than to organizations that proselytize in vain.
It’s like winning a huge battle, but half of your friends were killed or wounded.36 million more people will be insured or become eligible for Medicaid
There will be a trillion dollars raised to help subsidize this.
There will be multiple measures to help control the costs of Medicare
We will stop subsidizing private insurers in Medicare Advantage
Closes the donut hole
Allows Medicare negotiation for drugs
Includes the seeds of a public option
Prohibits denials based on prior conditions; ends rescissions except for fraud
Funds more education for doctors/nurses
Begins dozens of health prevention programs, pilots, surveys
Creates entities to evaluate and recommend better treatment, cost saving
And on and on.It’s a massive achievement, but women, mostly poor, paid a price.
I reckon we’re just going to have to raise the money outside the government to keep doing the right thing…
From the beginning in the early 1970’s when Roe v. Wade became the lead law, the pro-choice forces ought to have been about building a not-for-profit nationwide Reproductive Health Clinic System that was essentially private, not dependent on any public funds, and not subject to anti-choice votes or legislation. If that had been done, Reproductive Choice would now be so instutionalized it would not be a potent political issue, and it would not be a tool Churches and Bishops could play with in their eternal battle to control people by using sexuality tools.
When we consider all the money womens groups have raised to fund political campaigns of candidates who support choice, and all the money spent lobbying over the years — it would have gone a fair way toward building such a system out that would have been fully private, but as a non-profit could have designed means to serve the poor and the near poor who needed and requested these services. Similarly, Reproductive health is about a lot more than abortion — and if such clinics also offered these services at a modest cost, they could have made small profits to cover costs of service to the less able to pay. For instance, if they only had a small part of the birth control pill market, instead of the profits going to Big Pharm, they could have been re-invested in services.
As Liberals, Progressives, whatever we call ourselves, we cannot expect to create a liberal-utopia in an American Democracy. If we’re honest, that would be something like the socialism they accuse us of wanting. We can, however, pick our legitimate battles carefully and win. The way to do that is to understand the real answer to the riddle: Is the glass half empty or half full?
Which is: Neither. The glass is the wrong size.
I mostly agree with your comments about abortion, especially the wailing and wringing of hands in headlines that scream about “Democrats selling out women’s rights.”
However, regarding your line, “But we don’t have the right to insist dissenters pay for abortions they don’t believe in:” How far do you go with that? Should I not have to pay my (considerable) share of the cost of the Iraq war, which I don’t believe in? I think I’d also like to deduct my share of the TARP money that went to CEO’s bonuses, and all of the abstinence-only sex ed programs, and a lot more.
Ralph has good points as usual. The part about our paying for a war we don’t believe in reminded me of what that awful Senator Lieberman said yesterday on one of the talk shows about why he opposes the health bill and how he won’t let it come to a vote when the bill reaches the Senate because it’s too expensive and will cause too much debt. When the sanctimonious senator said that I wanted to crawl through the tv and cause him some bodily harm. I am not usually so violent but Cheney, Addington, and Lieberman cause my temper to rise everytime I see them on tv.
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