Single-Payer Deserves a Hearing in the Senate

Today is the day when Organizing for America, the heirs of the Obama campaign, are calling on people to organize around health care in their communities and brainstorm on what they can do to help move the ball forward.  I’d like to take them up on the offer, though probably not in the way they intended.

We’ve heard repeatedly from the president, Sen. Max Baucus and other Congressional leaders in the fight for health care reform that “everything has to be on the table.”  We’ve heard that we need to have a frank, open and honest debate on how to achieve the three goals of “(1) reduce costs, (2) guarantee choice, and (3) ensure all Americans have quality, affordable health care.”  But what we've heard just hasn’t been true.  Single-payer advocates, who represent a large constituency in this national debate, have been entirely shut out so far.

It’s time to end that disgrace with a hearing before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

Look, you don’t have to be a proponent of single-payer to realize that what we’ve seen so far is ludicrous.  As Sen. Bernie Sanders said in an interview with Ezra Klein:

I think we will try to get a hearing in the HELP Committee.  I think the importance of the hearing is not that it will change minds but that the American people -- and Congress -- should hear the facts about the enormous waste and bureaucracy and profiteering associated with private health insurance. Not to deal with that is mind-blowing.

I wrote in the past about the Senate Finance Committees’ guest lists.  Although they eventually got better after the first one featured a list where a full third of the speakers had ties to the insurance industry, the only time single-payer was mentioned during the proceedings was when several nurses attending stood up in protest and were dragged out of the chamber.  That means the Senate Finance Committees heard from economists, doctors, nurses, hospitals, private insurance, not-for-profit insurance, pharma and medical device manufacturers, unions and patient advocates.  That’s healthy – they heard quite a few dissenting views.  But it makes it beyond incomprehensible to exclude one and only one perspective.

We’re not talking about a fringe group.  As Matt Holt (who doesn’t even support single-payer) writes on The Health Care Blog, “Now imagine that there’s a policy that polls show at least 35% and (depending who you believe) perhaps up to 60% of all Americans want, and that the same polls show that a vast majority of Democrats want it… So by the numbers, in not even considering the single payer option (not even Kennedy’s plan comes close), the Democrats are proving themselves to be pussies.”  But even beyond partisan politics, we’re talking about simple fairness.  Many countries around the world enjoy the benefits of reduced costs, choice of provider, and equitable, quality care.  That doesn’t even warrant a hearing?  Moreover, Baucus, Kennedy, Obama and the House leadership are themselves championing public coverage based on Medicare in the public health insurance option – the main fault line between progressives and conservatives in Congress.  It would only be to their benefit for a frank discussion of an even more aggressive approach to public coverage – namely, Medicare for All.

In that same interview with Klein, Sen. Sanders, dishes some dirt on a cordial meeting with Sen. Baucus and single-payer advocates:

Baucus began by talking about a trip to Canada and saying he left impressed by what he'd seen. People in Canada seemed to be doing a very good job. He also indicated that he regretted having said that single payer is off the table. But he felt that at this point the process was so advanced and the timetable so tight that he didn't think he could schedule anything.

So much for the Finance Committee.  The Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, chaired by Ted Kennedy, is a different story, as their hearings and deliberations are to begin this month.  For the sake of having a true, honest debate on all options that can meet the president’s three principles, single-payer deserves an honest hearing.

Write to the Senate HELP Committee now.  Tell them single-payer deserves to have a hearing this month.

(Photo credit:  Jenae on Flickr.com)