So what is to be done? Democrats who aren’t Obama should already be working on easy-to-grasp proposals to “reform” the ACA — to make it more public and less private. The immediate priority — and progressives running for office in 2014 and 2016 should practice saying this out loud — is fixing Obamacare. Not just the website, but the coverage gaps, the ways insurance companies will continue to exploit people and rip them off, and the potential for the cost burden on middle-class people to grow.
Liberal Democrats need to propose real, old-fashioned liberal solutions to the real problems of the ACA. Things like federalizing Medicaid, to take care of people in states where the expansion has been blocked, and lowering the Medicare eligibility age. And they need to reintroduce the public option. None of that is attainable now, but it could be in the near future. That whole package ought to be pushed for by unions and by activists in primary elections. The message needs to be nakedly populist — “make Obamacare work for you instead of the insurance companies” — and made without the fear of conservative backlash, because conservative ideas are unpopular. And Democrats in Congress ought to begin seriously agitating for Medicare-for-all, both because it is the correct policy, and because doing so will make everything else seem more “reasonable.”
h/t Nicole Naum.
Today Indonesia is rolling out a universal health care system. Over the next five years every Indonesian will be included in this government run health care program. Clearly the political system in Indonesia is superior to the American political system. Perhaps we should send all of our politicians to Indonesia for a time to learn how to implement a universal health care system here at home?
Here’s something else Liberals need to fix. 1. Christie. 32% of Democrats voted for the fat man. If the Democratic Party had sent money and people to NJ to help Buono she might have won. Or not. But she would not have lost by 20%. More likely she’d have lost by 4 or 5%. Of course Christie wouldn’t then have had the credibility to go out and slay the T-baggers for the 1%. ………………………………………. 2. McAuliffe. A political hack of the Clinton machine. His victory shows that any MT suit, including Hillary, can defeat a crazy, right winger in a mostly red state. ………………………………………………………………………..3. De Blasio. A solid Progressive win in the nerve center of the plutocrats. Proving that there are millions more of “us” than there are of “them.”
“Liberals need to fix Obamacare”.
Yes, I’m sure they could, and I’m sure they would do a fine job. And I think they could also vastly improve the degree of Wall Street reform that came from the Dodd-Frank bill.
One problem, though – the miniscule number of true liberals. Where, other than Elizabeth Warren working with Bernie Sanders, could any kind of liberal reform possibly come from?
Max Baucus? Jon Tester? Dianne Feinstein?
Please.
The leaders of the Democratic Party weed out and do not fund true liberals, because they don’t want them around.
Case in point – Candidate for Governor Barbara Buono.
The Democratic Party is a center right party that loves corporate $$$, and goes out of its way to insulate itself from the middle-of-the-road and center left views of most of its base voting bloc.
Why then should liberals fix Obamacare when they were deliberately excluded from (Joementum Liebermann, anyone?) the original deliberations, and will continue to be excluded from any obvious needed reforms at this stage?
Because this is how extreme Republicans win. They start the fight, and they keep pushing, and they don’t give up — and then their position is suddenly mainstream. See how you just talked yourself out of it?
You do some fantastic research and work, Ms. Madrak – Always a pleasure to visit your site. And your comment about ‘the Republicans always win’ is true, far too often. As Robert Reich pointed out recently, what got passed and what was rolled out was the approach to insurance coverage Richard Nixon proposed back in February 1974.
http://truth-out.org/buzzflash/commentary/item/18283-robert-reich-l-obama-should-have-gone-with-a-comprehensive-public-insurance-plan
excerpt – “…
oops – left out the excerpt – here goes
“…In February 1974, Republican President Richard Nixon proposed, in essence, today’s Affordable Care Act. Under Nixon’s plan all but the smallest employers would provide insurance to their workers or pay a penalty, an expanded Medicaid-type program would insure the poor, and subsidies would be provided to low-income individuals and small employers. Sound familiar?
Private insurers were delighted with the Nixon plan but Democrats preferred a system based on Social Security and Medicare, and the two sides failed to agree.
Thirty years later a Republican governor, Mitt Romney, made Nixon’s plan the law in Massachusetts. Private insurers couldn’t have been happier although many Democrats in the state had hoped for a public system.
When today’s Republicans rage against the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act, it’s useful to recall this was their idea as well…”