Congressman Alan Grayson rocked my little world this week. When I talked about fighting fire with fire last week, this is exactly what I meant.
The Republicans want you to die quickly. Insurance companies want you to die quickly. Health care reform without a public option wants you to die quickly. Here is our answer to “Death Panels!”
Suddenly the Republican leadership that seemed content to let all kinds of outright lies stand unchallenged in the healthcare debate is up in arms when their own tactics are turned against them - crying out for Civility! Honesty! Respect! This quick retreat is a giveaway that there’s very little substance behind the Republican message.
Let’s remember that the Republicans and insurance companies are not victims in this debate, and the millions of people living in the United States with no healthcare at all are the real priority. Too much of the real healthcare reforms we want have been sacrificed because we allowed the messaging of this debate to be taken away from progressive reform. Making a case with facts and figures is not enough to win, only enough to feel confident in defeat.
The real solution here is to keep both the message and the meter of the debate. We need to keep shouting out that opponents of progressive healthcare reform want everyone to die quickly, and then supply the intellectual ammunition to back up this claim. And here is our advantage: While our opponents need their smoke and mirrors, we need only to point to our reality. The failures of healthcare reform really are killing us all.
