Nader nags Obama on healthcare
Consumer activist Ralph Nader has a simple message for liberals feeling less warm and fuzzy about President Obama: "I told you so."
"Millions of Americans are feeling betrayed. They thought Obama as President meant change we can believe in. They thought Obama as President meant withdrawal from Iraq. They thought Obama as President meant standing up to Wall Street fat cats. They thought Obama as President meant a living wage," Nader, who ran a presidential campaign last year far less successful than his 2000 bid, said in an email to supporters today,
"But for those of you who stood with us during the 2008 Presidential campaign, you knew the score. You do not feel betrayed. You are immune to Obama Betrayal Syndrome," Nader continues. "Because you knew, as we pointed out repeatedly during the campaign, that Obama was the corporate Democrat. Beholden to large campaign contributors from Wall Street. From the military industrial complex. And from the health insurance pharma complex."
Nader's missive seeks donations for Single Payer Action, a new advocacy group pushing a healthcare plan along the lines of the national insurance plan in Canada.
Supporters of such a plan say it is the only way to cover everyone while cutting costs, but Obama is not among them, saying that while it might make sense if starting from scratch, it makes more sense now to build upon the current system, under which most Americans get their health coverage through their employer.
To combat critics who call his plan socialized medicine, the president reassures that he would not force anyone to change their coverage.
But Nader's new group isn't giving up. Single Payer Action members have confronted members of Congress in their home districts to press them on the issue.
"Let's break through the corporate barriers and make single payer for all a reality," he says in the email. "Together, we can make the difference. Onward to a life-saving, cost-saving single payer."
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I voted Nader and I have no Obama Betrayal Symptoms. I still know some who have their head in the sand with this guy like the Republicans did with Bush. The American people have been duped by both sides. Cast away your party loyalties and be loyal to your issues. What is best for you and the country? Think of the impoverished. Think of the greedy. Decide who you stand with. Then vote for those who share your ideals. Don't let a vague promise of hope and change cloud your judgment. They were never specific.
How about standing up to unions that are ruining this country??? oh wait, thats not going to happen because they vote liberal. Shocker.
Ralph was right!
Foon Rhee lazily parrots right-wing talking points and gets almost every point of fact wrong.
1.. First of all, the bills being supported by Nader and other single-payer advocates--HR 676 in the House and S703 in the Senate--do NOT call for "government-run healthcare." Like Medicare and the Canadian system, these bills call for a publicly financed but PRIVATELY ADMINISTERED health-care system--all private entities such as hospitals, labs, and medical practices--would remain private. Only the financing would be public to achieve the cost efficiences of a single risk pool.
2. Rhee equates the Canadian and British systems. In fact, the UK National Health system is indeed government run, the hospitals and labs are government-owned, and the doctors work for the government. In Canada, the system is publicly financed by privately administered. Rhee's inaccuracies are truly appalling.
Let's face it, Ralph is invariably right on most issues. Check the record. Unfortunately the media-- with the exception of PBS and a paltry few other networks/publications-- suppresses his voice. How long are the American people going to put up with this??? As long as they do they can blame themselves for the ongoing political and social retardation of their country.
As a result of my comment, it appears that Foon Rhee has revised his blog post to correct some of the inaccuracies that appeared in the original. Unfortunately, those original errors are all too common among mainstream reporters whose ideological presdipositions are often evident in their tendency to parrot corporate-disinformation talking points: single-payer health care is "government-run medicine," Nader is a "nag," etc. Of course, Mr. Rhee has not seen fit to revise his characterization of Nader's advocacy as "nagging"--that, too, is the classic MSM ploy of marginalizing dissent: without Nader's "nagging," we would not have the EPA, the Freedom of Infomation Act, and the whole host of consumer and worker protections that were lacking in this country before he selflessly devoted himself to achieving them.
Nader is disagreeing with Obama. Clearly, he must be a right wing nut or a Rush Limbaugh zombie. Nader must only get his news from Fox.
Single payer is not some kind of radical outlier, as this post implies. In fact it's the healthcare plan repeatedly polled as the one most voters prefer, and also physicians, and it is co-sponsored by all 10 members of the MA delegation in the House of Representatives. So why is it being suppressed?
Other questions that should be looked into: Why do both Sens. Kerry and Kennedy oppose it? Why does Congress keep it "off the table"? Why isn't the CBO even allowed to cost it out? Why are Kennedy and Kerry in favor of mandates, subsidies and wasting $4 trillion over the next ten years?
i'm not sure if mr nader realizes there is no untouched, untarnished way to become the president---its a system, and the possibility of a completely uncorrupted person becoming leader of any country really is remote, so we live with the decisions they make and vote them out if we dont like it. at the same time, of everything i've read about other ways of fixing the healthcare system in the usa, hr676 is a thoughtfully created and wonderfully humane healthcare system if assembled and operated correctly---otherwise i would hope for a mix of france and norway's system---go have a look at theirs online.
I’m proud that my family and I voted for Mr. Nader. I spent considerable time researching the candidates and both McCain and Obama were poor choices for this country. It’s truly amazing how the American people are content to remain complicit when it comes to politics. Only when it hits the pocketbooks and wallets will people get involved..but that’s usually when it’s too late.
People have asked me why I bother to vote for Ralph when he stands no chance to win. This question really gets under my skin and I can hardly believe that anyone would ask it. Is that what voting is all about ? Voting for someone simply because it seemed that person stood the best chance to win. To me, if you vote that way, you often find that that so-called "winner" turns out to be a real loser when put into office. Neither do I vote out of party loyalty. I vote my conscience even if I think that person stands no chance at all to win. I sleep better that way. If Ralph runs in 2012, I will once again vote for him. He speaks my language and I greatly admire his tenacity and integrity. Single Payer Health Care NOW !!! Onward.
Thank You Nader/Gonzalez for running in 2008! Single payer hC now!
If it weren't for Nader, President Al Gore would have pushed for a single payer health care system a decade ago, plus we wouldn't have a right wing supreme court which has destroyed individual liberties in this country in favor of corporate America - nader mortgaged his noteworthy career as a public advocate in 2000 when he selfishly split voters and helped a blithering moron and his cadre take over this country, despite warnings from many of his own supporters, and ruined this country for years to come - I COULD CARE LESS WHAT RALPH HAS TO SAY EVER AGAIN.. thanks for helping ruin our country idiot..
I don't see how Obama can say that the American public will still be able to choose their own health care if the government is taking over the system? Also, even if citizens want to get their own private medical care, then they would still be paying for everyone else's "free" health care that is provided by the government. It sounds pretty unfair to those seeking quality medical care if you ask me.
To pserrano...if you think that the Dems didn't act in favor of corporate America from 1992-2000, you weren't watching the same Dems I were. Where'd half the deregulation we saw come from?
Al Gore would have pushed for single payer health care? And didn't he have eight years as the freakin' VP to make that issue more salient? Oh right....there were those Dems who had time to accomplish the missive on Health Care under Clinton and accomplished NOTHING.
Of course, I'm certain that if Obama and the Dems don't get a workable health care plan resolved, this will somehow be Nader's fault as well and we'll all be told to continue our "lesser of two evils" voting even when the lesser of two evils accomplishes absolutely nothing.
The Ralph Naders of this world will persist in the face of constant slander and ignorance sold to them by mass media. Observe how Andree McLeod drove Sarah Palin out of office in Alaska. A vote for Nader in 2004 was a vote against the war. A vote in 2008 was a vote for universal health coverage. The idea that Gore would have ended the war or given us universal coverage is ludicrous. He even backed away from global warming in 2000, so compromised was he. Check the record.
It is astonishing that some people (like pseranno, above) still spout the old slander about Nader being somehow responsible for Bush's victory. Bless your heart, Bush made it into the White House because Jeb Bush's Florida administration pulled an out-and-out vote fraud, and when the Congressional Black Caucus called for an investigation of the fraud it was the Dem leadership (with Gore first among them) who prevented any such investigation from happening. Nader's crime, by contrast, was simply to run for president, which is the constitutional birthright of every native born US citizen.