Please comment before I do it. Sometimes I can be a bit brittle and terse.
Dear President Obama:
Remember that huge crowd that attended your acceptance speech in the Denver sports stadium back in 2008? Those were the people who contributed to you, worked for you and voted for you. A bigger crowd nationwide watched you on television that also contributed to you, worked for you and voted for you. There were no Republican birthers or teabaggers in that crowd. There were no insurance companies there, just the people of the United States who supported you. Those were the same people who filled the Mall on your inauguration day and those, who couldn’t be there, who watched you on their TV sets and cheered for you from their living room couches.
Seventy percent of those people nationwide, according to various polls over various months, want Medicare for all, or at least would want Medicare offered as a public option. How disappointing it has been to watch the Republicans and the health care insurers and industry lobbyists take over the discussion and the issue.
Remember it was the people who got you elected, not the Republicans, not the “K” street lobbyists, nor the Blue ‘Cross’ Dog Democrats. It’s time to move forward with the legislation the people want. You don’t want to become a one term President. Getting us health care legislation along progressive lines like Social Security and Medicare will seal your destiny in a positive direction. You will be reelected.
Capitulating to using taxpayer money for welfare for the corporate health industry and wasting time with talking about coops, which apparently are not working that well for the people that belong to them and need them, will make you a one term President. A caller into a radio show today belongs to one of the coops that are being touted by Senator Conrad and he said they are very expensive to belong to. How will a poor person join? Any commercializing of what should be a social program will fail, will be costly and will give Republicans campaign fodder for the 2012 election by beating the drum of your failure. Medicare for all or even as a public option will not fail anymore than Social Security has failed or Medicare for the elderly has failed in the past. Take the leap, Mr. President, into history.
You don’t need the Republicans and trying to reach out to them for bipartisanship is a fool’s errand. Please remember those people in the Denver stadium and on the Washington Mall, who are counting on you. They are the only people you need to reach out to and they will be the ones who have your back if you take care of them. Those people you have been reaching out to for a plan will only stab you in the back. Those Blue Dogs and GOP elected leaders will do nothing for you ever. Please remember that. We are counting on you to make Congress do the right thing.
Sincerely,