I think it’s time for Democrats to stop treating a vote to have a debate about the health care bill the same as a vote in support of the bill. I don’t think that having a conversation about what the Republicans are proposing and what Democrats would propose as an alternative is a bad idea. Proceeding with the debate will allow Democrats to make proposals about how they would improve the Affordable Care Act and gives them the opportunity to be clear that they would want to improve it rather than just stand on what they have already done. A big part of the problem with this debate now is that you don’t ever really hear Democrats recognize that there really are problems with the way the Affordable Care Act actually works that need to be dealt with and that Democrats want to deal with those problems. A debate about the Republican proposal will give Democrats an opportunity to say they understand that some things needs to be fixed and propose a fixes that they would support. Thus I think John McCain cast the correct vote in both instances.
Month: August 2017
Single Payer should not be the first proposal
Democrats need to stay with their principles but also look for ways to develop policies that are likely to be OK with most Americans so that the choices can be viable on a long-term basis. That means that in terms of healthcare you cannot just say single-payer is the solution since it’s clear that lots of people won’t accept that as a solution unless they see it working somewhere and decide that it can work well for them. This is not a situation which exists today since we do not have any state that actually uses single payer so that people can see it working. People need to be able to see things in action before having it offered to them as their only choice. It would make more sense for progressives to focus first on a public option as the alterative that you make available first. After people see the public option in action, then you can go from there and try to sell sell single payer.
Ross's Writings 