Yesterday, along with many PUSH members, I received an email that
linked to 29 different op-ed articles, some by politically astute
folks like
E. J. Dionne,
Robert Reich and
Eugene Robinson. All of them suggested that if the Supremes rule the
Affordable Care Act (ACA) unconstitutional, this opens up an
opportunity to pass single payer health care legislation, since it is
a better solution to many of the problems the ACA was intended to
address, and it is clearly constitutional. Some of them referred to
passage of single payer as “inevitable,” although, to be fair,
some of them also called it a “long-term” solution to the health
care crisis.
If you read
my post on this week's events at the Supreme Court, you know that I'm seriously out of step
with these political heavy hitters. We all enjoy reading optimistic
articles, but as much as I hope they're right, I'm afraid these authors are more engaged in wishful thinking than the realistic prediction of future
events.
Apparently MSNBC commentator Chris
Hayes read some of these same op-eds. This morning, on
Up with Chris Hayes, he asked Senator
Sheldon Whitehouse, Jackass from Rhode Island, if he could foresee
any “plausible scenario” by which rejection of the ACA might lead to the passage of single payer. Whitehouse's
answer was an unequivocal no. He pointed out that this week the
House refused to pass even a seemingly non-controversial highway
transportation bill that he said would have created three million
jobs.
These
optimistic-eds seem to overlook the campaign financing, lobbying and
advertising power of the “corporate persons” that us sell health
insurance. Not only is single payer rejected by 100% of the
Elephants, it is opposed by President Obama and a majority of the
Jackasses as well.
When a
major health care reform initiative has failed in this country, it
has taken a long time for someone to try again. It was almost 20
years between the failure of the Clintons' reform proposal and the
passage of the ACA. As we're all learning, just because we have a
serious problem in this country, that doesn't mean our government
will try to solve it. Every year, 45,000 Americans lose their lives
due to lack of or inadequate health insurance. Very few of these
people contribute to political campaigns. As Ezra Klein, one of those "optimists" who sees single-payer only as a distant possibility, states:
The
key word here is “eventually.” This is a long, ugly process that
ensures a very large uninsured population for decades. . . [I]n the
decades between here and there, there will be a lot of unnecessary
suffering and deaths among the uninsured. That's the real cost of
losing this opportunity to insure 30 million people.
If you're hoping the Supremes strike down the ACA, be careful what you wish for.
