Sunday, August 02, 2009

Getting - Semi-Real - at Least - RE: Health Reform

It seems obvious to me that to date President Obama has fallen into a trap similar to what the Clintons fell into early in the first Clinton Administration and that Unless Obama recognizes this and takes decisive action the results may end up similarly bad for him. To date he seems paralyzed as the Clintons were.

The Clintons took their electoral mandate as a mandate for change. Their approach seeking a Single Payer Healthcare System (or similar) was totally flawed because they posed things (realistically) as a totally unorganized, non-unified - "public" confronting a well-organized Insurance Company Alliance - who had plenty of power with other big business interests.

To date Obama has spoken many things in varied environments as an idealistic, "realistic" concensus builder. This approach is totally naive given how the insurance industry and their allies have virtually conquered the "blue dog" Democrats and are pressuring mainstream others such as Senator Baucus and similar leadership. The battle for the support of mainstream America is now being lost by this naive approach, because of the Strong efforts of the opposition.

Scare tactics with divide-and-conquer strategies will succeed in butchering the Obama initiatives unless Obama - takes clear control of the issue in the public eye - and starts moving the public to see more of his position, whatever that might be. To do this, he will need to publically:

1.) Be directly publically connected with at least a few top Democrats - including Pelosi, Reid, most probably Baucus and possibly a single "Blue Dog Democrat" - building a Democratic Party Consensus with his leadership and

2.) Be directly connected to the American People - as a decisive - communicator - with clear goals - connecting the Democratic leadership, himself and "us" - the "public".

Such a push may not be that different from what he's done so far, except that he needs to be "the leader" instead of the "consensus builder" - as well as - the "hero against the lies" - of the "right".

In doing this he's going to need to be realistic in terms of what is doable, what isn't doable as well as How - the necessary compromises are a start, that will need more work over time to be successful in the long run. It is foolish to pretend that - major compromises - by themselves - will allow the obvious benefits of a Single Payer System - which evidently is deemed not doable now. To put forth the proposed reforms he's going to need to convince us - the public - that things will be Much Better than they now are. We're going to need to believe - which many of us do not - as of now do.

Thanks!

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