Last night, in a historic vote, the House of Representatives passed the “Senate Health Care Bill“, followed by the reconciliation package.
By Congress stepping up and acting, an irreversible first step to guarantee universal coverage for all citizens was taken. This is one of the main reasons why so many of us campaigned for President Obama, to finally have someone in the White House who “Gets it.” For those who opposed the bill, the rallying cry had changed so many times. Recently, it’s that we “should start over” or that “it’s being rushed” or “Americans are overwhelmingly against it.” All reasons which are not only moot now, but baseless.
Second, the American people want this bill. The majority of catholic churches backed the bill, the biggest medical organizations back the bill, the public who overwhelmingly voted Democrat (knowing that health care was the centerpiece legislation) backed the bill. In fact, in most polls, when asked about individual components, a strong majority supports the entire bill when explained to them. So who does oppose this bill? A loud, violent and deluded minority called the “Teabaggers”, Fox News (and Fox Nation) and Rand-ites who still believe in the helpless myth that everyone should just pull their bootstraps and that we can live happily ever after, if our neighbors slowly rot to death as long as we, individually, make money. Sorry Ayn Rand, your stories don’t really work all that well in real life. This is a constitutional republic, and as such, the people spoke on November 2008 with their votes.
In the end, this is about making a stand for what you believe in. For better or worse, we (liberals, progressives, democrats, etc) firmly believe that health care, some level playing field at least, should be available to all. Our party took a stance against firm (and violent) opposition. Well done Democrats.
