Obama Must Reclaim The Debate (Katrina vanden Heuvel, The Nation, 9/8)

[Apollo11]

Obama Must Reclaim the Debate

posted by Katrina vanden Heuvel on 09/08/2009 @ 07:00am

Barack Obama's genius was to run a campaign that understood how much Americans wanted change. On Wednesday evening when he speaks to a joint session of Congress President Obama will need to reclaim that genius. And he will need to reclaim the debate from those who would deny the urgency of real healthcare reform for the millions insured, underinsured and uninsured.

(...)

The president should challenge the Blue Dogs. Place the burden on them to get out of the way of the majority in favor of a comprehensive plan. The question isn't whether the progressive majority is unreasonably resisting reform to save the public option. The question is whether a small minority of conservative Democrats will sabotage reform simply to stop the public option. Do the Blue Dogs wish to cripple their own President in his first year in office for seeking an objective that has been the stated goal of their party since the Truman administration?

Obama must lead the charge and rally the people who swept him into the White House. And challenge the Democrats. Make it clear to the Democratic Caucus in general, and to the Blue Dogs in particular, that for the sake of the country they must vote for cloture so that a bill that will accomplish substantive reform can have an up-or-down vote on the floor. Don't heed those who counsel incrementalism or bipartisanship at all cost. The art of the possible is not the same as the art of incrementalism. And healthcare reform enacted by a Democratic majority is still meaningful reform.

If President Obama can boldly lay out those principles and priorities that inspired the movement which swept him into office, Americans will stand and fight with him to make the changes this nation so desperately needs.


www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut/469852/obama_must_reclaim_the_debate

[Captain Hilts]

1. EXACTLY! BRAVO!