Jane,

Is FDL gonna oppose the bill or not?

When will you come to a decision?

As of this minute, it seems that FDL won’t take ANY position. You seem to be afraid to call for defeat. It’s time to shit or get off the pot.

medicare for all needs to start on “day 1″ as Howard Dean has stated.

the trigger will be pulled on a defined date if Insurance companies who are being given another un deserved chance to get it right. They have had decades. Pull the trigger on a determined date. Set in blood

I question the integrity of anyone who starts to “shit” before they see the pot.

There is no bill to oppose.

Other suggestions?

yes! can i have overnight to think about it? i’ll be able to come up with something better than if i just let ‘er rip off the top of my head.

Refuse to take any government subsidies to pay for their health care and will push to eliminate the government subsidy of any elect congressmen, until single payer is passed.

Opposes, by voting and speaking out, any health care reform measure that advances solutions which discredit or derail Medicare For All.

What bill?

The ten Senators in the meeting don’t even know what’s in the bill Harry Reid sent to the CBO for a score. And you expect outsiders to line up for or against?

Jane,

First step is to dump all the possible Medicare for All iterations on the table, and then after deciding which is best, or perhaps the best consensus choice that people in different camps can live with.

There are several “Medicare for All” bills in the hopper this year, Conyer’s HR 676 of course (federal single-payer, funded by taxes), Sanders S 703 (funded by new federal, state management), Stark’s HR 193 Americare “single option on steroids” (funded by premiums, subsidized by existing spending), Dingell’s old school HR 15 (funded VAT and payroll tax IIRC).

In years past, there was the 2007 Kennedy-Dingell Medicare for All bill (funded by taxes, choice between Medicare, FEHB or existing private coverage). From back in the day, I always liked economist Laurence Seidmab’s “Smartcard” proposal from the early 1990′s, it was Medicare for All with an income adjusted deductible and copayment cap (Stark’s Americare bill has something similar).

Finally in the category of “If you can’t beat them, join them”, I just read an interesting op-ed from last year that made the case that the better plan would be “Medicare Advantage for All”.
http://www.seattlepi.com/opinion/367835_solarofocus22.html

I think this is such a great project.

This may be too far off topic, but no Medicare for All bill of any kind is going to pass the Senate as long as any bill needs a supermajority – 60 or 55 doesn’t make much difference. The permanent default filibuster has to go first.

Oh, in my list of “Medicare for All” bills, I forgot to mention that Anthony Weiner did in fact amend the language of HR 676 when he submitted the Weiner Amendment to the CBO for scoring. The original HR 676 was too vague in parts for scoring, but Weiner did a commendable job nailing down some specific details that the original bill lacked. He also made some policy changes (e.g. excluding illegal immigrants / no federal buy out of for-profit hospitals) that you may or may not agree with.

I haven’t seen the preliminary CBO score (though I’ve heard the annual spending was a trillion), but here’s a summary of Weiner’s changes.
http://www.correntewire.com/weiner_not_quite_hr676_amendment

Tweety is asking the pertinent question… “Will Liberals take the deal…?”

Kucinich said ‘Medicare-for-all’ is a step in the right direction…! :-)

our job is to change the political/cultural landscape. nixon didn’t give us the epa and osha because he cared about the environment and worker’s rights.

it’s social movement politics — if this kind of stuff in not familiar to you, i highly recommend a book called “doing democracy” by bill moyer as a place to start.

10. We’ll take a look at candidates from other parties, e.g., Green Party, the Pirate Party, Working Families Party etc., who adopt our principles. Independent candidates need to strive to rise 300000 (One Grayson moneybomb and FDL, Glenn Greenwald and David Sirota will all take part in the fundraising effort…) for a US House race in order to be considered “viable”. (4 moneybombs for a senate run) If not, then we’ll look for the best dem in the field so that Rahm Emanuel and the White House can effectively and continuously threaten them, not to mention running a primary candidate against them a la Donna Edwards.

medicare advantage is a non starter – it’s not single payer. it was an attempt to begin the privatization of medicare. also, we are not in this alone, we are joining with thousands of people who’ve already done a ton of policy analysis and organizing. if you have specific objections, i’m all ears. it’s not up to me, obviously, but i’m not interested in starting from square one. i want to work with the movement that already exists around hr 676 and strengthen it with our participation. there are policy experts but they ain’t us.

p.s. stark’s hr 193 is not single payer either. its a public option in a multipayer type proposal.

I’m expressly concerned about a local race here… Ambercrombie is running for Guv here in the Isles and former Rep Ed Case(bluedog) is running for the seat…! I’d rather have Colleen Hanabusa win rather than him… She’s cut from the same mold as Patsy Mink and Mazie Hirono…! We sacked Case from Hawaii’s 2nd district(rural) after only one term due to his bluedog views…!

Here’s a link to the Weiner Amendment as submitted to the Rules Committee. The Committee pulled it from their server after Weiner withdrew the amendment.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/23949370/Weiner3962-21

One thing we’re promoting in NC – in parallel with federal reform efforts – is to pass a Volunteer Health Care Services Act ( http://wncforchange.com/files/TNVolunteerHealthCareServicesAct.pdf ) like Tennessee’s. It’s a kind of “doctors within borders” law that opens the state’s borders to licensed physicians from other states. It makes it easier for RAMUSA.org and others to mount free clinics like the one nyceve is at in Kansas City. These clinics are the best advertisements for passing Medicare for All. Getting candidates to support a federal VHCS Act (costs taxpayers nothing – who can oppose it?) might be another way to jack up the pressure.

I find it very likely that Medicare for All will eventually become reality in America if the Senate deal works out as planned.

Ed Show from the KC Health Fair.

Selise,

I’d agree with that economically, medically and morally, HR 676 is superior to Medicare Advantage or Americare. Its an open question in my mind whether its the best bill politically. Medicare Advantage is the only kind of universal Medicare plan (using the same payroll tax/premium funding system) that leaves the private insurance around to make money, but are the extra taxes necessary to buy their support worth the trouble? On the other side of the tax issue, Americare redirects existing employer contributions from private insurers to the national (but not single payer) system. By doing so, it would achieve the goal of 100% coverage without imposing a huge tax increase.

One trouble with the original bill was that its too vague for the CBO to score, particularly on the financing side. I do appreciate Weiner for taking the time and effort adding lot of meat to HR 676′s bones. HR 676 is 30 pages, the Weiner Amendment is 56 pages.

Woo-hoo… Chalk Maxine Waters for a ‘No’ vote…! ;-)

i haven’t read weiner’s version, but i’m more interest to see what pnhp comes up with if they think there are any cbo issues. they are the policy experts i trust the most (because when i read their stuff it makes sense, they have done the research, etc).

do you have a count? how many are needed?

oops. maybe we should take this to another thread and leave this one clean for suggestions……

medicare advantage is a non starter – it’s not single payer. it was an attempt to begin the privatization of medicare. also,

Keep reminding folks of this. Medicare Advantage must not be considered part of any Medicare for all initiative.

Jane, thanks for all you are doing. Too many progressives have already decided not to press on for more from our Congress (on health care reform). It’s as if they think 3 million covered in the supposed expansion of Medicare is enough to celebrate. We have nearly 47 million w/o insurance and I hardly think it’s time to celebrate. And few have been as eloquent as you or s tireless to get fairness in the bill.

Watching right now on Ed. THANK YOU! Fight on.

A couple of corrections before I skip out for dinner. The 2007 Kennedy-Dingell Medicare for All bill is funded by a payroll and income taxes. But, like Medicare today, the bill also had premiums and deductibles (and the 5 years to open it everyone seems too long). Also, since Medicare Advantage presently receives both Medicare tax revenue and subscriber premiums, I’d imagine a version for all ages would likewise be financed by both.

Here are links to the other bills if anyone is interested.
Kennedy-Dingell S 1218 (2007) http://www.opencongress.org/bill/110-s1218/text
Dingell HR 15 http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h111-15
Stark HR 193 http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h111-193
Sanders S 703 http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s111-703
And finally, a 1994 article about Laurence Seidman’s “Health Card” (not Smart Card, sorry) proposal.
http://www.udel.edu/PR/UpDate/94/8/5.html

In an overview, I believe Robert Scheer hammernailbangs all of the bullshit.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-scheer/dear-barack-spare-me-your_b_385201.html

Jane,

Phenomenal job on MSNBC this evening!

I question the integrity of anyone who starts to “shit” before they see the pot.

Thank you, Jane.

The annoyance I feel at these buzzing “whatcha gonna do? Hey, hey, what?” folks must be a mere fraction of what you experience.

video up yet?

You tell her, Jane. Maybe the Gang of Ten will be moved by a visit from the Christmas Angel to put back in the public option, cost containment, and imported drugs that have have already been taken out of it.

I hope this comment can be helpful. In the 1990′s Barney Frank explained the legislative procedural part of the process, especially the business in conferences that happens before it reaches the committee level. He said that if you don’t know what you’re doing in there, what you’re up against, if you’re not completely prepared and conversant with all the material, and good at making yourself heard – that is, if you don’t have all of the Right Stuff, you’ll be laughed out of the room.

I’ll second that…! Albeit that it was but a fleeting glimpse…! ;-)

Wondering about Jennifer Bruner who will be running for Voinovich’s senate seat. Would be something to get her to commit.

MauiMom @31:

The fact that the “plot” is being kept under wraps like the formula for the first nuclear device in mid-1945, should tell us a little something about what the denouement is going to be.

And while I’m at it, I’d bet a buck or two that the healthcare insurance industry and Big Pharma are getting minute-by-minute updates on the process of selling us out.

You think there might be some good surprises in it?

As Jane very astutely noted weeks ago, Obama ALREADY made a huge compromise with the fatcats, when he took single-payer off the table, in one swell foop. That he feels constrained to meet them “halfway” in taking huge hacks at what’s left, is shameful.

Heh… I foresee only landmines… Big steamy landmines…!

Jane – under the “removing regulatory barriers” topic, should it be spelled out that the candidate supports withdrawal/repeal of the McCarran Act?

I’ll leave it to you to craft language, but I think a key area is their willingness to be aggressive in pursuing a Trojan Horse strategy (i.e. Weiner’s head and neck of the camel under the tent.) Except I fear Weiner may be wrong about the current proposal which could end up as a segregated high risk pool and not allow Medicare to really expand into the general population. If we can get everyone over 55 regardless of employment status eligible, then businesses will actually be our friend in pushing for Medicare for all. Pretty soon, it will be 50, and then people will wake up and say, hey, why don’t we give all those younger healthy people Medicare as well which could fix the Medicare deficits. That’s how I think Medicare for all will happen, not in one fell swoop, so I’d like to see them somehow commit to a Trojan Horse strategy of aggressively expanding the eligibility.

So what’s the holdup for making a judgement? We may not know exactly what’s in it, but we know enough to be against it.

Isn’t taking a position before you know the entirety of a package pre-negotiating with yourself?

Keep your ammo dry…! ;-0

Precisely… and it’s been a one way losing street since Baucus committee and the House took their vote.

I mean… we know the proposed medicare for 55-65 is likely a joke or will be. But we know placing Joe Lieberman in charge is a serious consideration.

And we know all of the above is not about care. At best it’s about divide and conquer.

As I understand it, negotiating against oneself means compromising on something you are likely to win. Don’t see how that applies to being against a bad bill, unless you think that, after getting worse with every iteration, this time there will be something good in it.

Dry ammo for a battle that will be over by the time we know the details?

Not necessarily… We need to see the white’s of their eyes…! ;-)

Yeah – I don’t expect it to become better. In fact, I’m expecting another ‘hippy punch’ of some kind.

Since it’s been such a long nasty fight, it’s probably more apt to say that I don’t want to respond in advance to some headfake, when it’s really a left hook that’s coming.

I think requiring people to co-sponsor the existing Kucinich-Conyers bill is a good idea. Also, organize them a bit more — have a yearly meeting bringing everyone together, maybe twice a year. Let everyone know we’re really pushing it. Let people know there are consequences if you drop off the bill, too. That’s a good start, we’d obviously have to get more sophisticated beyond that.

People at PNHP and United Nurses also want to push for this one issue very strongly, and it’d be great to integrate everyone together.

Jane, the suggestions you wrote about are excellent. I can’t think of anything else short of a lie detector test and they probably wouldn’t go for that.

I second this, because her other senator from the state is a strong medicare-for-all-er

My copy arrived at Haslam’s this morning and is now in my hot little hands.

They are already walking back the 55 to 64 Medicare plan under pressure by Big Medicine:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091211/ap_on_bi_ge/us_health_care_overhaul

Video of Jane Hamsher on Ed Schultz now up

1-8 look good, but I doubt you could get any aspiring pol to agree to 9.

that was fast!

if you hate it, i pre-apologize!

I was listening to Thom Hartmann’s program a few days ago, and he, too, spoke of MOVEMENTS as being definitive social/political changers–alluding to women’s suffrage, prohibition (and repeal), etc. It evidently doesn’t take a party . . . or a village . . . merely unrelenting activists who refuse to give up or give in.

I dunno. That’s a powerful statement and since Congressional candidates have to file with FEC every quarter this is something that can be easily followed.

Women’s suffrage is a good example. We outnumber men and apparently we scare them to death. Determined women across the country would have a lot of power and we need to get them together.

i don’t know of any major human right legislation in my lifetime that came about solely because of politics as usual (insider compromises and electoral politics alone). movement politics is something else, it can encompass electoral politics, and usually does, but that is only a small part of the whole).

i’m glad people are seriously talking movement politics now. it’s a long haul, but i don’t think there are short cuts.

Would it be possible to add something in there to ensure they also agree to adequately fund Medicare for All IN A PROGRESSIVE MANNER, i.e. through the income tax or some other progressive tax/fee.

I, for one, am tired of the way they keep trying to force us to pay for what should be a right in a regressive way. Obviously, you may not agree with this. I’d just like to see it added.

I don’t know if there will be surprises, or surprises we like or don’t like.

The point is, how can anyone take a position for or against until we’ve actually seen a bill? Not even the Gang of Ten participant Senators have seen a bill, witness Landrieu and Lincoln today.

Asking Jane (or by extension, FDL) to take a position for or against seems premature.

Re-reading Rules for Radicals and a first time through for Doing Democracy at the same time should be fun.

This is the most inspiring article and thread I’ve seen in days. I have nogthing to add, unfortunately, but this is really, really good news!

10. To the extent the Medicare expansion is a “buy in” system, the candidate pledges to support affordable premiums.

i ordered my own copy of rules for radicals based on rbg’s comment (i figure if nothing else, it will help to be able to talk the same language), but now i remember why i wasn’t so impressed. just scanned through it a little to see nonviolence called “passive” and that irked me greatly. but i haven’t read it in a long time and don’t remember much. the rest may be great.

that’s not hr 676. it’s first dollar coverage — and that’s an important feature because cost sharing makes healthcare unaffordable to some, even though they have insurance. also, subsidies mean everyone is not treated the same and the subsidies are thought of as welfare. (and there is the cost of the whole bureaucratic structure that is needed)

when everyone gets the same plan, we’re all in it together and our interests are aligned (in making the system work, be adequately funded, etc).

i’m going to sleep on it, and leave my suggestions on this thread tomorrow….. want to try to make them good ones.

“Passive resistance” was the term in use before “non-violent” came into wide use. Means the same thing. Same tactics, diff nomenclature.

From Wiki on Saul Alinsky, citations omitted:

His ideas were later adapted by some US college students and other young organizers in the late 1960s and formed part of their strategies for organizing on campus and beyond. Time magazine once wrote that “American democracy is being altered by Alinsky’s ideas,” and conservative author William F. Buckley said he was “twice formidable, and very close to being an organizational genius.”

Hey, so Reid canceled his fundraiser. Under pressure from Republicans, yet. Why do the 1919 White Sox come to mind?

The candidate agrees that as regards consideration of health reform he will always vote for Medicare for All. He recognizes that in so doing he is reflecting the wishes of his constituency which he/she is bound to respect and from which he is not at liberty to contravene.

My suggestion is that even if a candidate pledges to do these things, you should insist that there be some indication in his past of a willingness to do difficult and unpopular things, and to keep promises.

Otherwise, you’ll end up with more Charlie Rangels.

thanks. i feel better now. “passive” it surely isn’t.

sorta related, i was just reading about the palestinian village of jayyous. been using nonviolent resistance since 2002 against the wall.

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175175/tomgram%3A__ellen_cantarow%2C_the_great_wall_of_israel/

Seems to have worked well for Ghandi and could work for us, too.

They’re all good ideas, but it’s far too late. Corporate America owns our government, they have our congressmen and senators in their pockets like so many nickels and dimes. It’s a hard fact to accept but it’s a reality and its not going end until the people in this country take it back.
So the question is how hungry, how cold and how scared do the people of this country have to get before they’ve had enough. Most of the people in this country get their news in 30 second sound bites or not at all, they don’t have a clue how devastating this is going to be for them and their family. The biggest mistake the middle class has made in the last 50 years is when they stopped practicing citizenship.

well, we have a poltical process corrupted by money. people power has worked before, and in far worse circumstances. not easy to quick though. and takes courage.

not too late. read the bit that begins, “Forgive me for the long story here…”

… what happened this year was really remarkable and very positive. How many people are on full-time paid staff for single payer in the whole country? Less than a dozen or so, if that? Yet, there was a year of sustained mobilization, starting before Obama’s election, that grew and grew, from local, volunteer organizing.

So a campaign of lobbying, picketing and protesting commenced, from dozens of local organizations and a handful of national organizations. It brought to Congress hundreds of thousands of phone calls and faxes and e-mails, maybe millions–far more than anyone would have predicted. Protests grew vigorous. In fact, over 150 people were arrested in nonviolent civil disobedience actions at insurance companies and at congressional offices, including Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco office.

and that was before today.

Jane,

First, any candidate working within the Democrat party can’t be trusted. That’s the lesson from Judas Obama’s first year. Matt Taibbi has a great piece in the current issue of Rolling Stone. The only Democrats I trust are Feingold, Sanders, and Kucinich.

I agree with perfectioncook about our corporate-owned government. Nothing will ever be accomplished that matters with the current situation.

We need our own version of a Tea Party, otherwise you’re just spinning your wheels.

Reid only cares what Republicans think.

I support single payer but don’t understand why Medicare is the preferred vehicle over Medicaid or VA since the last two are so much less expensive. They rely on managed care but have much greater coverage. I know their payments are a lot lower but aren’t we trying to lower the cost of health care in the US as much as possible to get it closer to what other western countries pay?

This maze of Medicare, Medicaid, Veteran’s, and many others is in itself somewhat wasteful and awfully confusing.

But if Medicare-for-All is the rallying cry, I’ll support it as much as anyone. Medicare has a good reputation and would certainly be cheaper than what Americans pay now and would provide better coverage for many.

Thanks for the link.

Been sayin’ it for nigh onto 40 years.

If you’ve been to jail for justice…

Medicare For All would save HOW many hundreds of billions? 6% of GDP NOT going to f’king criminals = HOW MUCH?

we need to KNOW how much Medicare For All would save EVERYONE by income group – $10,000 increments is 5 bucks an hour in earnings

AND

IF YOU Support Medicare for All,
THEN YOU Stupak OPPONENTS funding -

ANY Senator who will NOT vote for Medicare For All
GETS his / her goody bag ATTACKED AND STRIPPED.

Screw all this legalistic f’king bullshit – the rahm-obama-clinton-gingrich-roves will find a way around it.

make the fucking scum pay, then they’ll stop.
rmm.

Well, Jane, I think that members who are on the right side of this issue should also agree to subscribe to the very same medicare for all plan, not some special plan like the one that congresscritters have now.

Oh, and I would ABSOLUTELY URGE them to pledge to IMPROVE MEDICARE, if that’s gonna be our single payer system.

Plain Medicare does not cover Office Visits (Part B does). And Part A, the “free” part only covers 80% of the cost. Believe me, for most people unfortunate enough to have a bad illness or injury resulting in a week or longer stay in a hospital, they’re 20% of a $100,000 or more bill is still well out of reach.

So, please, pledge to make Medicare pay 100% (with some possible co-pays that aren’t outrageous).

Thanks.

Joe
OldFatGuy

Non-health related commitment that a candidate should be bound to take is that he shall propose legislation requiring that:

No elected official be exempt from any provision in the federal and state legal code. And further that violations of the law be tried in regular criminal court.

Also, that as only people vote and have preferences and interests only these can petition Congress. Expressly non human entities can not be the subject of petitions to Congress in any way. Exception given to wildlife and nature.

Receipt of funds from any institution whose purpose is to garner private profit for any purpose shall be construed as bribery.

we need to run canidates on issues and turn away from party politics period. hr.676 is the best option out there, however there is a better way.why not replace all government sponsored healthcare such as the one that congress gets along with medicare and v.a. etc,with a national benafit plan that comes right out of the department of social security. a acturary taking into acount the cost reduction of eliminating those programs and streamlining their services into one federal department could tell us if such a plan could be workaqble. amagine a singlepayer that guarenties every u.s. citizens with an account with a balance of lets say
2 million dollars. further details later

Bernie Sanders is an independent.

It’s depressing to stay in the loop. All you get is bad news. So Weiner reneged on his earlier theatrics?

An off-axis question: Does defeat of Obama for a second term in 2012 imply a Republican victory, or could it reasonably happen that a Democrat could run against and beat him? Remember how he talked about how much he’d risk his neck because he wasn’t going to kick this can down the road? He said if it meant he lost a second term, so be it. Is there an emerging plan to make this a reality?

Jane, this is wonderful. Thank you.

My suggestion would be to talk to ralphbon, letgetitdone, and some of the other well informed supporters of Medicare for All.

I think the immediate task at hand is to attempt to unseat Reid and Lincoln, and to thereby gauge our strength. In this way as we accomplish a much needed task that message will not be lost on Obama.

Then in 2011 with that victory in hand we can postulate a true progressive to unseat Obama, be it Sherrod Brown, Dick Durbin or someone equally electable. We can also posture our preferred candidate to champion meaningful HCR and provide that candidate with further stature.

What bill?

That just seems like a dodge. We have a process that has been going on for 9 months. At each and every stage, the legislation has gotten considerably worse. We are in the endgame. The insurance companies are declaring victory. Democrats up and down the line (with very few exceptions) have bailed on the public option. The trends have been consistent. The current best case scenario for any bill stinks to high heaven, and you think we need to wait until we see the fine print?

Everything about this process has been completely predictable. Even by June it was clear where this was headed. “What bill?” is just wishful thinking. If PO supporters want to blow all their credibility on riding this out to the bitter end, more power to you. But single payer advocates have legitimate concerns that in blowing your credibility, you are also damaging ours.

A number of commenters have mentioned Saul Alinsky and the present need for us to recall and adopt his methods. A very strong component of his principles was that one should always keep a sense of humor, “the most potent weapons known to mankind are satire and ridicule.” Keep light-hearted and ready to laugh when your opponent invariably screws up, etc.

What could be funnier than us using Alinsky, whose South Chicago techniques taught Obama and Emanuel, against today’s establishment?

BTW, I found that Phyllis Schlafly has written a useful review of Alinsky’s Rules for us. [moderator, please connect through “has written” to: http://townhall.com/columnists/PhyllisSchlafly/2009/02/03/community_organizing_explained

Thanks very much for the reply. It’s one of the first times I’ve ever gotten a substantive reply anywhere on this site for 2 years.

I am happy to hear that you feel it has the coalescence of a plan beyond the two graphical action banners on page 1 of the site.

My one wish, out of the blue, in response, would be to get Marcy Wheeler out in front and on camera, in the way she brilliantly did it for the Libby Trial. I’m talking advocacy media that takes it to people, vs simply being guests on people’s shows.

In my view YouTube is still not harnessed by progressives in a manner it easily could be turned into. And it costs next to nothing.

Regardless if i ever get a single additional reply, thanks for responding.

But with Single-Payer supporters like Dean and Weiner talking up the bill, don’t you think it’s smart to see what the result is before deciding to favor or oppose it? Why would anyone take a firm position one way or another without seeing the bill?

Or are you saying that any bill is bad at this point (which is a legitimate position, of course).

i don’t think dean has ever been a single payer supporter.

Jane
You have been so encouraging on MSNBC appearances the past several weeks, and you were inspiring again tonight on The Ed Show. What a treasure! I like the content of your points 1, 2 & 9 as reasonable expectations of a candidate who is to be supported by an interest group (FDL). The other points (3-8) seem (to me) esoteric and prescriptive. A candidate for Congress is going to be a whole human, entitled so some dignity — not the lapdog of FDL. Your selection committees are going to have to use their best judgment of character, knowledge of their communities and luck, etc., in seleting the candidates FDL supports. Mistakes will be made. Jerks (hopefully few) will be selected. But the point is to put the fear of the People in the Dem incumbents who have been getting by on a free ride and better representing their big corporate contributors than their own constitutents, is it not?
If I am way off on the strategy here, I won’t get mad if someone straightens me out.

your 9 is not realistic

Persuasive and even convincing as far as it goes, but it doesn’t convince me that I wasted my money contributing to the FDL efforts to ‘whip’ House members to say they won’t vote for a bill without a (‘robust’) public option. In fact, it would be a horrifying thought that I had wasted my money.

Or are you saying that any bill is bad at this point (which is a legitimate position, of course).

I am definitely in the any bill is bad at this point camp. I think we all need to sort out where we are now and what we should do next.

I don’t think #9 is necessarily unreasonable. I’d like to crowd source some research on the cheapest, most-effective successful campaigning efforts.

If we’re going to be asking candidates to take adversarial monied interests, we’re going to have to come up with new ways to run and win campaigns that don’t rely so heavily on vast sums of money. I’ll be posting a brief diary to that effect tomorrow.

should read “adversarial positions against”

I’m with Hugh and Jenny.

Something noone is talking about, and one of the sticking points in the whole argument is this: Employers are spending 100′s of billions if not trillions (likely in the trillions) on health care for their employees. How do we get that money into the health system in the way of payment for Medicare? In other words, how do we require those companies to continue to pay the same amount of money into Medicare that they are paying into private insurance? Especially since many companies don’t pay anything at all for health benefits for their people.

Hence the complexity of the current bills being debated. The attempt to keep the employers in the game requires we keep the private health insurers in the game as well which is a losing proposition over time, because as the cost of private insurance goes up, the more companies will drop their coverage. That is why the public option is so vital. The employers who find they can’t continue to provide health insurance have to have somewhere they can go to continue covering their employees. Looking at it from this perspective highlights the influence the health insurance companies have in the debate without uttering the first word, or spending the first dollar.
Private insurers are in the game because employer dollars are in the game. We would have to construct an entire new revenue system for health care, have draconian rules, taxes and audits of all companies that provide health insurance to ensure compliance, and on and on, in order to recapture the money companies are spending and to get new revenue from those who are not providing health insurance, and I think a sales tax of some kind to garner some money from the illegals and those who work in the underground economy, cash workers for instance, who do not put into the system. Whew it is complicated.

here are my initial thoughts (hopefully to be followed by more as i continue to ponder and hopefully discuss).

a) include the words “single payer” somewhere. for example in item #1, the first mention of “Medicare for All” could be something like:

single payer enhanced medicare for all, hereafter referred to as “Medicare for All”

this is really important for two reasons. first, because various talking points that have been used this past year and have sadly confused the rhetoric (for example, the use of “medicare for everyone”) and confused a lot of people. we need to be really clear about what we mean — a single payer financing system, not a multi payer system. second, because of past efforts to privatize medicare we need to be clear that a privatized medicare is not the model, hence the inclusion of “enhanced,”

i’m sure there are better ways to phrase this (i am so obviously not a wordsmith), but i hope the ideas and their importance are clear. if not, please let me know and i’ll try to explain further.

b) on item #2, CBO scoring. this one is really tough because the CBO scoring this year has been so very bad. for example, the focus on fed budget impact as “costs” instead of total national health expenditures (with appropriate detailed costs to various sectors, for more on this see here) which makes no economic sense and leads to incredibly misleading reporting. i’ve been trying to think of a way this item could be written to avoid these problems (and make sure that good research on administrative costs, etc is used), and i just can’t. so long as the party leadership are the people who determine and/or influence the scope of CBO scoring i think it’s better to leave this item (#2) out of the list. CBO scoring has to be done at some point to bring legislation to a vote, but i think it’s a big mistake to legitimize the kind of CBO scoring process we’ve seen this year.

in the past, i don’t think this has been such a problem. see, for example, gao and cbo reports from the early nineties. maybe some good independent report could be made by the gao, the cms or other gov org? but on this i need more info and more time to think.

c) re item #8, “The candidate agrees to oppose any legislation that further empowers or enriches the for-profit health insurance system.”

i love this one! But, based on experience here in MA (with how non profit insurance companies played a big role in the design of our reform), i think the wording should be changed slightly to read:

The candidate agrees to oppose any legislation that further empowers or enriches the for-profit health insurance system industry.

this has to include insuring the uninsured via public insurance and not the private (non profit as well as for profit) insurance industry as well as de-privatizing medicare, medicaid, etc. and opposing all attempts at further privatization.

d) this isn’t an item for the list, just an idea regarding vetting the candidates. i suggest a vetting committee made up of people who are long term activists as well as policy experts. we’ve been fooled before by candidates who learned to repeat talking points, we need to insure the candidates know what they are talking about (especially as we’re asking them to make the case, “present the argument for Medicare for All at all debates and other campaign events”). it might also be of help to potential candidates to get clear, with the experts, on any questions they may have.

my suggestions for such a vetting committee are steffie woolhandler, rose ann demoro and marcia angell (or their designees). this would have the added benefit of building credibility and good working relations with the pre existing single payer movement we will be part of. (google these three amazing individuals for their background, or if i get the chance i’ll add some more on them later today).

……..

thanks jane! hopefully more later… in fact i would love it if you could repeat this post in a couple of days to give people more time to think and discuss. these items will be of critical importance going forward and it’s important to get them right.

thanks again, i really appreciate your solicitation for suggestions.

Question – The Medicare rate structure has a negative impact to both Doctors and hospitals, meaning the cost of providing service exceeds the amount paid. This is for both profit and non-profit facilities.

So, if we go to a ‘single payer’ scenario with medicare for all (including our politicians), how do we address this issue?

maybe get the AMA out of the process? montanamaven wrote a diary on this subject awhile back:

http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/9748

medicare does need fixing in more ways than one.

the single payer scenario addresses the financing first (to get everyone covered in the same program asap), and gives us better leverage (and aligned incentives) to address addition needed reforms.

I think we need to primary Pelosi too. Also, I don’t think Brown or Durbin will run against Obama unless things get very much worse than they are now. Right now we’ve got Kucinich or Sanders, and maybe Feingold on Accountability and the Wars.

I think a bill that lowered the loss ratio to 90% and that opened Medicare to all in the 55 – 64 age group by January 1, 2011. However, it now seems clear that the eligibility for Medicare will be very limited, and also Reid is reported to have removed the provision stopping the insurance companoes from having lifetime coverage limits. So, I now have enough to say that I’m back in the kill the bill camp. See here.

It’s a mistake to keep the employers in the game. It keeps down wages and also makes American business less competitive. One of the advantages about Medicare for All is that it could lift the birden from employers. We don’t need to worry about funding it. What we need to do is get over the deficit neutrality crapola. See mt recent diaries here, here, and here.

selise, I agree with most of this, but want to add a couple of points.

First, for candidates for the Senate we ought to include an item pledging them to filibuster all hcr bills that don’t provide for Medicare for All SP, or alternatively, for a VA type of system. The advantage is that if the Democrats want to get any reform through, they can only gain flexibility by destroying the filibuster. This would be a great victory for progressives in itself.

Second, make them pledge to introduce changes to CBO scoring to include a full social and economic impact analysis of all hcr legislation.

letsgetitdone, i have to disagree with both of your suggestions, but for different reasons. i’ll try to explain….

1. re the filibuster. there are actually multiple ways to filibuster (under current rules) and so one would have to be very specific about what is being asked for. perhaps not agreeing to any UC agreement that furthers legislation that violates item #8 on jane’s list. but i’d want to ask pow wow about that. senate rules are VERY complicated and i’d want to do due diligence on figuring out what the possible ramifications of that would be.

that said, i completely and emphatically disagree with you re destroying the filibuster. i’m firmly in the camp that supports the right of the minority to be heard (not to permanently block legislation). the problem is that the dems are playing procedural games in order to create excuses for not doing what they were elected to do and that’s a problem primarily with the dems and not with the rules. that said, i do favor changing the filibuster rule to make this harder to do, but so long as the dems in deecee are who they are, they aren’t going to do that. what we’ll get instead is a destruction of the filibuster and then that will be used as the procedural excuse for “entitlement reform” — which means undermining ss and medicare. (i know i owe you a real argument on this instead of just restating my position…. but there’s just so much going on i can’t see having the time to pull it together anytime soon.)

2. i don’t see how your CBO proposal would work in practice. the cbo responds to requests first from the leadership of the house and senate (including minority leadership) and the chairs and ranking member (senior member of the minority) and then from individual members as time permits. are your suggesting legislation? that would mean no one could ever get a quick answer to some small question with limited scope even if it passed.

the more i’ve thought about this one, the more important i think it is that we don’t give legitimacy to the current bogus CBO process and that means deleting item #2 on jane’s list out for now. i don’t think it makes sense to make our hcr goals dependent on fixing the CBO process.

……

i guess i just see these two issues as being (other than the possible issue of UC objection, which could be covered i think in item #8), in practice, big distractions about other things that people might want to see changed but are not required at this time to further the goal of advancing the cause of universal healthcare via single payer financed enhanced and improved medicare for all.

so sorry to be overly negative with this comment. would like to be more positively constructive…. :(