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ACTION ALERT: March 23, 2010
Congratulations! We DID IT!!
THANK YOU, EVERYONE! Working together,... WE DID IT!!
After almost a century, Congress finally passed major, comprehensive health care reform legislation, setting our nation on a path toward health care justice.
It was truly historic to witness President Obama signing the new health care bill into law this morning. America has taken a giant step forward to join the rest of the civilized world in assuring comprehensive quality health care for all. We couldn't have accomplished this goal without all your efforts and everyone working together, not necessarily in lockstep, but in complementarity, each contributing in their own way as best they could.
All but one of our NYC Congressional delegation voted for the new law. The one exception was Rep. Michael McMahon who represents Staten Island and parts of southwest Brooklyn. Other NY Reps. who did not vote for the law included Rep. Peter King (Long Is.), Rep. Mike Arcuri (Utica), and Rep. Chris Lee (western NY.) Only one last step remains: Senate passage of the budget reconciliation "sidecar" law to improve the base bill signed into law today. The Senate is expected to vote on it by this weekend. Both Senators Schumer and Gillibrand are committed to voting for these good and necessary changes.
ACTION STEP: Call your member of Congress and thank them for supporting the reform bill. (If your Rep. is Mike McMahon, call and express your disappointment and inquire as to why he chose not to vote for it.)
A report from the front:
Yesterday in Washington, a major rally and march in support of reform was led by hundreds of health care professionals: doctors, nurses, medical students and their allies representing over 20 professional associations and community partners. Although it poured rain, our spirits were not dampened as a sea of people in white coats and scrubs marched from near the White House up to Capitol Hill for a celebration and call to action for the Senate. MoveOn leaders who'd been in the Capitol the night before to witness the historic House vote augmented our ranks. Buses came from all over the northeast and mid-Atlantic, including two from NYC sponsored by the Committee of Interns and Residents, Doctors for America, the National Physicians' Alliance, and the American Medical Student Association. Overall, medical professionals came from all across the nation, at least 30 states.
One particularly moving moment occurred as we walked past the Newseum, a museum dedicated to journalism. Each day, the museum posts scores of front pages of that day's papers in display cases that line its block-long facade, featuring a variety of newspapers from cities and towns large and small from all across our nation. Every single one of them had large bold banner headlines declaring the historic nature of the previous night's House vote (...and often noting that no Republicans supported it or that Democrats had to do it by themselves.)
A second moving moment occurred as we walked past the Canadian embassy. Staff came out onto the balcony and cheered us on. While many of us in our hearts had wanted to see reforms enacted here that would have been much closer to the system they have in Canada, the Canadians understood the important and historic step that America had finally taken with this new law.
Once inside the Senate's Hart Office building, a major press event was held that featured leaders from all the various organizations involved in the march. The energy was electric. People were thrilled and cheered enthusiastically as we were also addressed by Sen. Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Illinois, and Rep. Jim McDermott of Seattle, himself a physician-psychiatrist by profession. Afterwards, we visited Senate offices to urge swift consideration of the budget reconciliation bill, and then went over to Representative's offices to thank them for their votes. It was particularly moving to stop by the offices of Rep. John Dingell, whose father introduced one of the first national health care bills in Congress over 60 years ago.
So,... what's up next?
1. Sit back and savor the moment and our accomplishment. Let yourself feel good. Congress has passed the most significant piece of social justice legislation in over two generations, since the civil rights bill and the creation of Medicare and Medicaid. We should all be both very humble and very proud.
2. IMMEDIATELY: set the narrative. Don't let the opponents of reform tell the (his)story of what happened this past weekend and the meaning/significance of the new law and the year(s)-long struggle to get where we are today.
3. Get ready for the work ahead:
- Educating the public about what's in the new law, what happens when, and what people's various options are.
- Pushing back against efforts at repeal. The "tea party" activists and their allies are already doing everything they can to undermine the historic new law. Some of them are also exhibiting very unacceptable tactics against the supporters of reform, including name-calling, use of racial and homophobic epithets, spitting, intimidation, and threatening violence.
- Moving forward with implementation, much of which will take place at the state level over 3-4+ years.
- Taking maximum advantage of all options to move as far as we can here in New York.
We'll likely be having a celebration here in NYC sometime soon in the next few weeks and we'd very much like you to join us. We'll also be doing a "thank you" press event with our Congressional delegation, so watch for future emails!
In the meantime,... thank you, thank you, thank you!! ...and best wishes for the upcoming spring holiday season.
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