countdowntohealthcare.com

Last night the President struck the right tone.  He made clear that we can’t give up on health care, and that containing soaring health costs will be essential to our country’s top priorities: revitalizing the economy, creating jobs and reigning in deficits.

But the most important thing he did was serve notice to all those who have been standing in our way: Republicans and the Senate.  Health care is one of a list of issues that have received decisive action from the House only to meet resistance in the Senate.  Instead of the cooling saucer of democracy, they’ve turned into the meat locker.

I’m glad to see the President stuck to his values, and made clear to my colleagues in the Senate that it’s time to either do the right thing, or be exposed to obstructionists.

The President isn’t walking away from health care with his tail between his legs—and we can’t either.  Now we’ve got a matter of weeks to get something done.  Let’s answer the President’s call and fight for what we believe.

Anthony

Right now people around the country are debating what impact the Massachusetts Senate race – which has turned Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat over to Republican Scott Brown – will have on the health care bill.

For many of us who were already frustrated with direction of this effort, there can be no doubt that this result is a major setback.

What went wrong?

We lost sight of our values.  We forgot that the target of our efforts should not have been Senators Joe Lieberman, Olympia Snowe, or Ben Nelson.   Our target should be the middle class and those struggling to make it there.

It was we Democrats who created Medicare with its high quality and low administrative costs.  And – as you know because you led the way – the public option won the support of millions of Americans and was included in first major healthcare bill to pass the House in nearly half a century.

Let’s take a step back and then charge forward based on our values.  The important numbers aren’t 60 or 59 Senate seats.  They are the 39 million Americans with no insurance.  They are the 44 years of Medicare success.  And they are the 96 percent approval ratings for Medicare among the seniors who use the program every day.

Those are the numbers we should care about.  Those are the numbers we should focus on.

We’ve tried the “any deal is a good deal” approach.  Now it’s clear the American people want us to fight for them and their future.

Anthony

Many of us are growing more anxious by the day that the negotiations to put the House and Senate health bills together will make too many compromises in favor of a Senate bill we know is weaker than the one passed in the House.

But there’s a limit to how many compromises we can accept before the health care bill becomes a reform bill in name only. That’s why I will oppose the final bill unless it represents a genuine improvement on the Senate bill.

I believe that the bill we passed in the House, though not perfect, would have been a major step forward in providing all Americans with quality, affordable health care that guarantees choice, and competition through a public option. Unless the final bill looks more like what we passed in the House, and less what we saw emerge from the Senate, I will not support it.

Do you agree? Cast your vote in the poll on this page and let me know what you think.

Anthony

It’s beginning to look as though, instead of a full conference committee, the House and Senate health care bills will be combined through closed door negotiations.

Closed doors or open, sitting or standing, round table or square—we cannot allow the Senate to prevent us from achieving a real public option.  What matters is passing a health care bill with a public option.  Not how we got there.

Please take to Twitter and Facebook in order to ask the negotiators to stand strong against the Senate bill and to adopt a public option.  We can still make our voices heard before it’s too late.

Anthony

In 2009, we made important progress on the public option, but also suffered some frustrating setbacks.

After Republicans had left the public option for dead during the fall, we refused to buckle.  Thanks to our voice, the public option was included in the House health care bill.

What happened in the Senate was harder to swallow.  Some promising early signs to include either a version of the public option or a buy-in to the Medicare program for people 55-64 fell away thanks to a few voices who held the debate hostage.  In the end, the Senate passed a far weaker health care proposal than the House.

This process is far from over and we cannot give up without a fight. Before the President can sign health care reform into law, the House and Senate bills must be combined.

I am committed to fighting for the public option in the final bill. We heard from the public option naysayers before, but we refused to listen.  It’s time to redouble our efforts and work to ensure that the bill the President signs includes a real public option to lower health care costs.

That’s why it’s time to reset the clock here at CountdowntoHealthCare.com to the State of the Union address.  By the time the President addresses the nation, I hope and believe we will be able to celebrate the passage of a public option and ensure a brighter health care future for our nation.

Anthony