Open Letter to the Democratic Party
Democrats held Congress for 40 years, but by 1994 the American public had had enough. 1994 was the year of the Republican Revolution. Riding a wave of Democratic dissatisfaction, Republicans picked up 54 seats in the House and eight seats in the Senate. The Contract with America avoided hot-button issues and made appealing centrist promises:
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i'd really like some concrete examples (from somebody, not necessarily you) of what 'extreme' policies people are fretting endlessly about.
The definition of "extreme" politics is whatever the voting public thinks is extreme. To a voting bloc in the 1600s, not crushing witches under large stones is an extreme position. And the definition of "leader" is someone who can persuade the center to be shifted. Someone who is able to approach the public and explain why burning witches might not be such a good plan anymore. I supported Obama because I think he has an exceptional ability to explain his policies in an intelligent and persuasive way, and because I think his plans are innovative. The key is that you can't just do what Republicans did and flex your power to pass whatever you want to pass. You have to get the public on board and you have to make sure it's a good enough idea that you can keep them on board.
Single-payer health care is a good example. Even though it works quite well in many other countries, it's an extreme position in this country because there's a large group of people who are satisfied with their employer-provided health care and are scared of their boat getting rocked. They view single-payer as an extreme disruption of their situation, so it is. That's why Obama isn't advocating single-payer. He's advocating supplemental health care for the uninsured. Content voters can continue to get health care from their employer while the formerly uninsured get health care from government providers. That's less extreme. Even if the government health care is so good that everyone quits their private insurance and buys into the government's plan and we end up in the same place as we would have under single-payer.
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My sister's an RN for a large medical industry chain.
She expects immigrant hoardes washing over our shores, stealing bed from decent, hard-working Americans, draining our coffers, and slurping social services until the country is bankrupt. (She's never seen a debt clock.)
(http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/)
She's terrified of the whole mess-o-Dems invading Washington, fearful of losing her 401(k), dealing with huge and complex procedure approval proceses, and upset at mandatory overtime, excessive patient loads and little influence over the medical process improvement opportunites about which she can speak authoritatively.
Same, Same, Only Different.
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As far as the 401k, McCain was the one who wanted to privatize Social Security, which would have shaken things up quite a bit, likely in a bad way being the economy isn't guaranteed to be stable. The tweaks to 401k proposed by the Obama camp were pretty minor; requiring employers open them for you if they offer them (opt-out instead of opt-in) was interesting.
As far as healthcare, isn't that exactly what happens now with Medicaid? My mom works in a rural hospital, and that's what they have already.
Dunno. I'd love to hear opinions on the proposed changes by someone who's vaguely familiar with them, and not familiar with them through the conservative rumor mill?
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