Push back today (12/4) on Health Care Reform

[clear eye]

Today is the time to call your U.S. Senators on healthcare reform.

The Senate is being moved further and further in the direction of a do-worse bill that not only doesn't have an effective public option, but which would remove all public funding for abortion no matter what the circumstances.

They are going that way b/c the lobbyists via Lincoln, Landrieu & Nelson are holding the process hostage.

The leadership has decided that anything that uses the words "public option", no matter how miniscule and ineffective at keeping healthcare affordable will satisfy the public. They think the only thing they have to fear, in terms of passage is the defection of the 3 Conservadems.

They need to hear different.

They need to know that if the final bill becomes useless, there is another direction the public and some Senators will move toward. Sens. Bernie Sanders, Sherrod Brown and Roland Burris are offering Amendment 2837, to replace the bulk of the bill w/ the single payer provisions outlined in the previous American Health Security Act (S. 703).

It will be voted on today or tomorrow.

Please call your Senators office to urge a yes vote on this amendment. It could begin the long, hard climb toward a Single Payer health system in the U.S.

At the very least it will raise the credible threat of the defection of progressive Senators if the leadership doesn't come up w/ a decent bill.

From the office of Sen. Bernie Sanders

Summary: This amendment would establish a single payer health insurance system that would cover every person legally residing in the United States. The single payer system would be regulated and funded by the federal government through a payroll tax and an income tax, but it would be administered by the states. It would replace the coverage and revenue titles of the current bill, but it would leave in place most of the provisions in the quality, prevention, and workforce titles of the bill. This amendment starts from the premise that health care is a human right, and that every citizen, rich or poor, should have access to health care, just as every citizen has access to the fire department, the police, or public schools.