[Peace-discuss] AWARE single-payer liberal vs. socialist debate

[Corey Mattson]

Dear AWARE activists - I couldn't help but put my 2 cents into the health
care debate. Most of you don't know me --- I live in Bloomington and am
active in the Bloomington-Normal Citizens for Peace and Justice.

In my view, the Democrats are the single biggest obstacle to getting real
health care reform in this country. Ricky Baldwin asked in an earlier post
where the mass movement for single-payer was. My response is that there
would have been a mass movement for single-payer if the Democrats had not
excluded it and then worked to absorb people's desire for reform into its
campaign for the Big Pharma bill. The movement for single-payer was visible
in alternative media outlets, Democracy Now! and the like. It was there in
the streets, people getting arrested, etc., just ignored by corporate media.
What was surprising was just how weak the Obama campaign turned out to be,
given that the Dems had the party machinery and such groups as MoveOn to
work from. A push for single-payer would have been a united movement, not
the divided and demoralized one we witnessed. But, as people said in the
60s, the Democratic Party is "the graveyard of social movements." Nothing
new here.

Because of this role of the Democrats as a constant barrier to change, I
support those who have to point this out. This view has nothing to do with
what liberal Democrats accuse leftists and socialists of... some supposed
desire for perfection or Bob's strange assertion that socialists really want
people to suffer. Socialists believe in reform that moves us forward, not
backwards or sideways. The difference of opinion involves a difference of
analysis. I believe that the cheerleading among Democrats for what turned
out to be a very rotten bill (I thought the public option was the line in
the sand?) has to do with a wish-fulfillment that their enthusiastic vote
for Obama was not all in vain. Never mind that that the health care bill is
a huge corporate give-away to the insurance companies and it entrenches them
in the years to come making the fight for real reform harder. Or that it
does little to rein in costs, leading to a huge waste of tax dollars for
these same corporations. Or that it could collapse of its own weight.

I definitely hope to work with liberals and leftists in winning real health
care reform. But we will never get there without a movement independent and
in opposition to the Democrats. This, I think, is the perspective of those
opposing the bill. Right now, unions and social movements are cheerleading
Obama when he is proving to be a union-busting, conservative president.
Turning that around will require opposing the Democratic Party politicians.

In solidarity, Corey Mattson
BNCPJ

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