Sorry, but I don't buy the "But we couldn't have gotten single-payer" defense

[jeff47]

124. So Bernie Sanders is a liar?

Senator Sanders said there were 8-10 votes for single payer in the Senate.

You are claiming he was lying.

ME: We passed the ACA without a single GOP vote.

THEM: But red state dems would have been turned out.

No, the red state senators would have voted against single-payer. Losing 10-90 does not get us single payer.

THEM: So we have to keep working for single-payer!

ME: How? The dems in red states were turned out. We lost the House and haven't realized enough success with the ACA to adequately guard against losing the Senate.

Because the ACA moves the battle for single payer to the states. The next step is to get single payer in blue states. We already won VT. We need to be working on CA and NY and the rest.

Either directly to single payer or via a public option. With no need to profit, a public option should be cheaper than private insurance, which should result in people signing up for it. When they don't die, that means a larger risk pool, which means even lower costs and even more sign ups. You end up with de-facto single payer.

Once we have those examples of single payer working well, that will destroy the FUD the Republicans are spreading about it. Which then lets us return to the national battle in a much stronger position.

1. All we got for being active in 2009 and 2010 was an abomination of a law that has pissed off more people than it has helped. Has it helped people? Yes, but that doesn't nullify the fact that more people are angry than happy

Excellent work regurgitating Republican spin. Actual polling doesn't agree with you.

4. We can't campaign on improving the law because that reinforces the GOP talking point that the law is broken

This is an extremely dumb argument.

Social Security was much smaller in the 1930s. Medicare has been expanded several times. According to you, both of those could not happen.

5. The President continually suspends entire sections of the law including the individual mandate for 2 years

This is false. The mandate was always scheduled to kick in in 2014.

What did we win? We are further behind than when we started because the entire effort was half-assed corporatist kowtowing from the start.

We won single payer.

It's going to take some time, but the ACA is the mechanism through which we get there. The state-based system means we fight in the blue states, where we are much more likely to win. Once we've won there, we are in a stronger position to expand to purple states. Once we've won there, we can return to the national battle in a much better position.

Your alternative is we lose 10-90. Pressure from Obama and voters? Ok, now we lose 25-75. And health care reform is ignored for the next 20 years, just like 1993.