Another account of Obama dealing the Public Option away to the health industry [New]
I mentioned earlier in the week how the public option fight changed the progressive movement. You had a popular, compromise measure that the public supported, where advocates did everything right, getting their pledges and using allies to make demands, and none of it mattered. It bred cynicism for future fights.
Underneath all that was a belief that the public option’s fate represented a sellout, that forces inside Washington cut a deal, whether with the hospital industry or the insurance industry or whoever, to get rid of the public option at the last minute. Tom Daschle confirmed this in a book all the way back in 2010, which he then had to walk back. And other reports have made similar claims, though nobody could nail it down.
Now, Richard Kirsch, who was the head for Health Care for America Now, the labor-backed coalition trying to pass the Affordable Care Act in 2010, admitted that the public option was traded away in the midst of the fight.
The book is Fighting For Our Health, by Richard Kirsch, who directed the advocacy group Health Care for America Now during the push for reform. HCAN is a well financed umbrella group backed by scores of liberal groups, unions, and other reformers — making Kirsch a close witness to the entire saga. He confirms that the White House treated the public option like a bargaining chip with powerful industry players, and believes that when his group became most critical of the bill mid-way through the fight, that top White House aides sought to have him canned.
“The White House had negotiated a number of deals with the health industry, designed to win their support for reform, including agreeing to oppose a robust public option, which would have the greatest clout to control how much providers got paid,” writes Kirsch, largely confirming what has become an open secret in Washington.
(emphasis added)
I think this sellout exposed Democrats and separated them from the progressive movement like nothing else has. Anyway, I like to think that…
What Do You Think?
2 Responses to 'Another account of Obama dealing the Public Option away to the health industry'
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bystander.again [New]
Friday, 20 Jan, 2012 at 7:54 pm
Well, TBH, that’s what did it for me. I put 110% of myself into the public option fight. Attended a number of town halls, made phone calls, harangued friends and neighbors, badgered my representatives by phone, email, and in person. Then, to confront the emerging picture that it had all been traded away, even – apparently – before the fight was fully engaged? Whoa, Nellie. It’s one thing to lose in a fair fight. It’s another thing to discover that you’ve been shadowboxing with an imaginary opponent. That the entire fight wasn’t real. Just a mirage. A colossal waste of time, energy, and effort. I haven’t felt the same about any Democrat, or the Democratic Party since. And, I’ve considered all personal inputs into the political process in a much more jaded and jaundiced way as a result.
Sadie Baker [New]
Sunday, 22 Jan, 2012 at 12:41 pm
“Obama traded the public option for campaign contributions” is how one friend put it at the time. And godammit, it was true.