Obama on Olmstead--"Lip Service?"

For the anniversary of the Olmstead decision, Obama issued a press release, declaring this "The Year of Community Living."

Several specific initiatives were mentioned in the press release, such as more section 8 (housing) vouchers, better interagency communication, and increased funding to independent living centers.

These are all moves in the right direction, yes. But conspicuously absent (still) in the press release is any mention of the core issue of institutional bias in the health care system and the need for significant health care reform in order to actually realize Olmstead. It's continuing, to me anyway, to be very hard to believe that the administration is truly "getting it."

Something that may not be very obvious to policy makers is that many of us who rely on "the system" have been lied to and let down so many times now that to eliminate something we care deeply about from all discussion ends up feeling like "the last straw." The first time a promise is broken, OK, stuff happens, and there are complex issues at play always. But for many of us this is just one more thing in a long line of being ignored and neglected.

We need to see some more aggressive action on core issues in health care reform--time for the administration to "put the money where its mouth is." Else, "The Year of Community Living" is just another broken promise and more "salt in the wound."

(Apologies for all the American idioms, but they all seemed unusually appropriate.)