Dear President Obama
I just sent a message to President Obama via a White House feedback webform. I plan to send him a fax tomorrow with the same message. I urge all of you to write President Obama and your Senators and Representatives and tell them to provide a public option, and even better, a single payer.
Here's what I wrote:Please, for the health and welfare of the people who elected you, please provide greater guidance to the senators and representatives in the creation of a health care bill. The bills that are currently being crafted by the Senate and House are ineffectual, lacking any significant change, and will most likely leave us in a worse state than before. This is OUR one chance, in our lifetimes, to make this happen. We need a real, competitive public option (and single payer, too, but you've given up on that) and strong requirements for businesses to provide GOOD health care options. If those things aren't in place, then all this legislation is going to do is stick us with a tax penalty for not insuring ourselves, the same exorbitant prices (on health services and insurance) that we currently pay, and another forty year wait before we have the right political climate to try again. Not only am I asking for you to help guide our Senators and Representatives, I am asking for you to guide ME. Tell ME (and people like me) what I can do to help. I will work with you to make this happen, but I don't know what to do. I live in Mississippi where it seems as if my Senators and Representatives have already made up their minds to sabotage any health care reform. Please, give us direction, tasks, encouragement, anything to pass effective health care reform legislation.
Required reading:
Sick & Wrong
The Five Biggest Lies in the Health Care Debate
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200909/health-care
Here's what I wrote:Please, for the health and welfare of the people who elected you, please provide greater guidance to the senators and representatives in the creation of a health care bill. The bills that are currently being crafted by the Senate and House are ineffectual, lacking any significant change, and will most likely leave us in a worse state than before. This is OUR one chance, in our lifetimes, to make this happen. We need a real, competitive public option (and single payer, too, but you've given up on that) and strong requirements for businesses to provide GOOD health care options. If those things aren't in place, then all this legislation is going to do is stick us with a tax penalty for not insuring ourselves, the same exorbitant prices (on health services and insurance) that we currently pay, and another forty year wait before we have the right political climate to try again. Not only am I asking for you to help guide our Senators and Representatives, I am asking for you to guide ME. Tell ME (and people like me) what I can do to help. I will work with you to make this happen, but I don't know what to do. I live in Mississippi where it seems as if my Senators and Representatives have already made up their minds to sabotage any health care reform. Please, give us direction, tasks, encouragement, anything to pass effective health care reform legislation.
Required reading:
Sick & Wrong
The Five Biggest Lies in the Health Care Debate
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200909/health-care