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Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon and Governor Jerry Brown: whodunnit?
[Editor’s Note: The Progressive Caucus of the California Democratic Party is its ideological (rather than demographic) left wing. It takes positions on a variety of party and state political issue. This press release is reprinted with permission. Photo illustration means that Photoshop is working again. – GAD]
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
CA Dem Party Progressive Caucus Officers Denounce Speaker Rendon & Gov Brown for Blocking Single-Payer
The Executive Board of the Progressive Caucus of the California Democratic Party denounces the “eleventh hour” decision of Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, beholden to Governor Brown, to hold S.B. 562, single-payer healthcare, within the Assembly Rules Committee “until further notice.”
We believe that this lack of political courage by Speaker Rendon, specifically announcing the bill’s fate at 5 p.m. on a Friday, is a clear example of moral cowardice. The overriding question to Governor Brown and Speaker Rendon is why weren’t the thousands of Californians, who have been organizing around the bill for over six months, not consulted prior to this decision?
We find the excuse of labeling the bill “woefully incomplete” to amount to nothing more than smoke and mirrors. Indeed, indefinitely holding the bill hostage in the Rules Committee, thwarting its movement to other standing committees, prevents the work of amending the bill to address areas including funding, governance, and cost control.
However, we are aware of the fact that since 2010, 24 lawmakers involved in the committees that have or will hear the bill, have received over $819,000 in collective donations from groups officially opposing single-payer, and that the insurance and pharmaceutical industries are among the top donors to Governor Brown’s campaign coffers. We also know that behind the scenes, Governor Brown has been actively lobbying the Legislature against this bill.
With Senate Republicans in Washington having constructed legislation in secrecy that would leave millions of Americans without health coverage, and threaten nearly 14 million Californians covered by Medi-Cal, time is of the essence for the California Legislature and Governor Brown to be proactive and prevent senseless pain and death to countless people.
We call upon Speaker Rendon, beholden to Governor Brown, as well as members of the Legislature, to send S.B. 562 out of the Rules Committee and on to Governor’s desk, so that the important work of creating a single-payer, universal healthcare system that protects all Californians, a major plank of our California Democratic Party platform, can continue without interruption.
We dare to ask, which side are you on?
Karen Bernal
Chair
Thomas Tellner
Vice-Chair, Northern Region
Zach Denney
Vice-Chair, Central Region
Susie Shannon
Vice-Chair, Southern Region
Marlin Medrano
Treasurer
Marcy Winograd
Secretary
Katrina Bergstrom
Parliamentarian
Glenn Glazer
Communications & Social Media Officer
Phillip Kim
Officer-at-Large
Elizabeth Lavertu
Officer-at-Large
[Ed. Note: this was sent to us in ALL CAPS. Please don’t do that; your comment will likely be tossed out unread unless it’s short and funny. In this case, we changed the case and added some spaces between run together words, but didn’t fix the spelling errors because there’s only so much time in the day.]
Without competition, single payer would be doomed to fail. Because single payer has no mechanism to drive down insurance cost. Now on the other hand the healthcare option, is a more viable, politicaly silable plan. Using the same healthcare providers that insure federal employees, provides competition to all other healthcare providers that have to compete for healthcare dollars. What doomed obamacare, was not that obamacare did not do as intended. To the contrary, what doomed obamacare was that all states did not expand medicaid #1, & #2 most states did not set up exchanges in their states. Mostly republican states, so without medicad expansion, insurers just pack up, & left the states. & in some cases with only one insurer. So much for competition, & lowering insurance premiums. Now on the other hand obamacare worked as intended, by providing millions of people with insurance, improved, & guarenteed coverage, & preventive care, which kepted million out of intensive, emergency room care. Thus lowering healthcare cost overal. So now we know why healthcare premiums did not go down. Republican sabotage of medicaid expansion. & rpublicans killed the prescription drug competition bill. Which would lowered healthcare cost of not only medicaid, but of the overeral entire healthcare system. Medicare included. So what would i recommend to improve obamacare, go with the healthcare option. & give all americans the same plan federal employees enjoy. & keep the healthcare mandate, because it’s the healthcare mandate that helps pay for the overal bill. Continue to expand medicaid, & healthcare exchanges for all the 50 states. & pass prescription drug competition. No need to pay $1000.00 dollars for a presription, that you could otherwise get the generic form at 70% less. F.M.