Congressman Anthony Weiner (D-NY), Co-Chair of the Middle Class Caucus and member of the Energy & Commerce Committee who led the effort with Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI); Rep. Mike Doyle (D-PA); Rep. Elliot Engel (D-NY); Rep. Rep. Bobby Rush (D-IL); Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-IL); and Rep. Peter Welch (D-VT), released the following statement:
"Single-payer is a better plan and now it is on center stage. Americans have a clear choice. Their Member of Congress will have a simpler, less expensive and smarter bill to choose. I am thrilled that the Speaker is giving us that choice."
US House Rep Anthony Weiner's office announced the following Friday. The New York Daily News reports, "The Brooklyn-Queens Rep. looked a little surprised when Chairman Henry Waxman said Pelosi would allow that vote, and made Waxman repeat the deal to be sure it was clear and on the record."
Weiner (above) was happily surprised. Others caught by surprise weren't happy.
Just the idea of a vote was too much for some people apparently.
Jonathan Conn (New Republic) rushed in to insist, "Single-payer is no more likely to pass the full House than it it is to pass Energy and Commerce. But having the full vote is a milestone all the same."
It is a milestone but it's also a bit more than that. A vote on the House floor? How many Democrats are going to want to face their constituents after voting down single-payer? And, come 2013, when ObamaCare would kick in, how many are going to want to have their "NO" vote on single-payer thrown in their face as everyone catches on to the waste of time and money ObamaCare is?
Pelosi promised a vote. A vote puts it on the record.
This is a crack in the dam and it could do the trick and force the House to support single-payer.
"The bottom line is that we don't need insurance companies and their vastly overpaid executives to get between us and treatment from our doctors," writes Tom Wingfield (The Coloradoan). "We ought to finance basic (not elective) health care and wellness programs the same way we finance public education, national defense, or fire and rescue services. In other words, a well-run single-payer system is the optimal way to go for everyone except those few industries that hope to continue to glean obscene profits from our presently sick and unsustainable health-care morass."
Dr. Richard A. Damon advocates for single-payer to The Billings Gazette, "A national single-payer health care program is the best plan for every American." He argues single-payer offers:
• Long term perspective, willing to spend today to save tomorrow.
• Preventive programs that save by keeping us well.
• Compassionate, personal care with choice.
• Coverage for every American.
• Simplicity of administration.
• Funding by simple, fair taxation.
• Savings by elimination of waste and duplication.
• Comparative procedural effectiveness.
• Oversight.
That's what is needed and that's what we can support.
Otherwise? We join with Single Payer Action in saying "NO" to ObamaCare.
As Barack Obama's doctor of 22 years, Dr. David Scheiner, declared, "It's a bad bill. No bill is better than this bill."