Health Care Blitz: A Call to Action

The Supreme Court Justices have spoken and the prevailing wisdom is that they will overturn the Affordable Health Care Act. That might be presumptuous as I do believe the Supreme Court can be unpredictable at times. The reality is, however, that they have heard the arguments, will render a decision in June, and little or nothing can be done to alter their decision at this point.

Their decision, if it is to declare the law unconstitutional will be most unfortunate. It will be a product of an extremely conservative reading of the constitution, and it will fly in the face of many decisions; including those which upheld the new deal programs of the 1930's. It will do significant harm to many individuals, prevent about 30 million Americans from obtaining insurance, and throw the health care system into greater chaos than its in already. We could discuss all the arguments indicating that the individual mandate is constitutional and provide examples to buttress that argument, but as I said, from a legal perspective there is pretty much nothing further that can be done.

Yet, those supporting the health care law cannot sit idly by over these next three or four months until the court releases its decision. The Republicans have seemingly won the public argument against the health care bill, but they have won it by twisting the facts and distorting the reality. If they can win over public opinion through deception, surely public opinion can be turned around with the truth. Even the game of statistics is being used against the law. We continue to hear that two-thirds of all Americans opppse the law. Yet in a poll on the individual mandate, 47% were in fasor and 51% were opposed to the mandate. That means the American people are essentially split on the most controversial part of the law. That is a far different fact than the two-thirds majority point of view. Why is that particular statistic not being highlighted in the mainstream media?

The truth is, most Americans support the content of the health care law, such as allowing no preexisitng conditions, permitting young people to remain on their parents' health care policies until age 26, and other popular provisions. Either they don't actually know what is in this bill or they have somehow been convinced that terrible consequences will ensue from this act over time.

Between now and the Court's decision in June we need to saturate the airwaves so that people understand the truth about the health care law. A good place to start is with the article by Fareed Zakaria in the March 26th issue of Time Magazine. It is actually the best article I have seen on the subject. Also, the editorial in the March 29th issue of The Baltimore Sun on the law's constitutionality is excellent. We need to get President Obama out in the country with 3 or 4 big speeches on the topic - not campaign speeches but legitimate serious explanations of what the importance of the bill is and how it would actually operate for the benefit of the peoople. Senators, congressmen, Doctors, nurses, and individuals needing care need to serve as surrogates in every 'village and hamlet' across this county.

What is the point of such an effort if the law is to be struck down? First of all, too many Democrats and liberals failed to support this law in the beginning and allowed the argument to go to the Republicans who talked about everything from death panels to socialized medicine. Democrats have fought for health care coverage for all our citizens for decades, and to allow this bill to die without a fight after all that has gone into making it possible is not acceptable. Also, it is important that people understand what we are losing if the health bill goes down and what the impact will be on our future health care services. Finally, if the court injudiciously strikes down this law it will be far reaching in its effects on what the congress will be able to do in the future. We will be taking a giant step back to the days of the Articles of Confederation, when we were a collection of states with an ineffective federal government. The Federalists, like Alexander Hamilton and James Madison knew at the dawn of this nation that a strong federal government was needed, and clearly in today's society that is more true than ever.

I would strongly encourage anyonwe who has the contacts or the capacity to mobilize groups or government in support of this bill to do so now. We owe it to the president, our party and its history of supporting rights for all people, our country, and ourselves.