The Next Step in the Health Care Debates
By 
Above: Hells yeah!
Yesterday was a great day. But let’s be clear–Trump and Ryan will treat the ACA as well as they treat any other part of the government, which means trying to undermine its effectiveness. And given how insurance companies are dropping out of the exchanges, there are real problems that need to be fixed. It’s not really on Democrats to defend the ACA as a static program because they originally passed it. What they should be saying is that the ACA was the best that could be in 2010 and yes it does have problems that need fixing. And they should be saying that the way to fix those problems is universal Medicare. And while I get that single-payer has been simplified on the left as the only possible solution for health care when in reality there are many possible roles, expanding Medicare into a single-payer type system does have certain advantages.
It also makes an excellent organizing signpost. Medicare for all is simple, easy to understand, and hard to argue against or distort. Most people know someone on Medicare who can testify to the generally good care, or who is counting the days until they can enroll and have the peace of mind that comes with quality coverage. Fabricated agitprop like the mythical ObamaCare “death panels” will be a much harder sell.
As Republicans do their level best to make sure as many poor people as possible go bankrupt from medical debt or die of preventable diseases, a single-payer counter-offer makes perfect policy and political sense. Even if you think it’s a bit hasty on the merits, it’s still a splendid way for the Democrats to demonstrate, loudly and clearly, that they are for quality health care for all.
That makes plenty of sense to me.
Also, organizing works. Keep doing it. If you flooded congressional phone lines for everything like for this bill, or even 10% of like this bill, we would have a far better nation.