Health Care: Keep Up The Pressure!

Supporters of free market health care reform have reason for a little cautious optimism.

First, Democrats are issuing a constant drumbeat about passing a health care bill "in the next six weeks" because they know that time is not on their side and they're getting desperate.

As this Slate piece noted:

...[T]he 6-week frame is not an accident, because something happens in 6 weeks: elections. If Democrats lose big gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia, that could produce a new wave of jitters among already skittish Congressional swing Democrats...

The key Democrats know that the momentum is moving away from them, as these recent polls show:

• "Public Wary of Obama on War and Health Care, Poll Finds," New York Times, 9/25/2009
  
  
• "Opposition to Health Care Plan Hits New High of 56%," Rasmussen Reports, 9/18/2009

That's why they're trying to ram the health care bill through Congress during October before it's too late.

This means two things:

(1) We're winning
(2) We need to keep up the pressure

In particular, we need to continue to write letters to newspapers, send e-mail to our elected officials, disseminate information to friends and family, etc.

We need to reinforce the growing sense amongst our fellow Americans (and our politicians) that ObamaCare is bad and it's a political loser.

Our elected officials are feeling a lot of pressure to vote for ObamaCare and right now. We need to create the proper counter-pressure. If we can create and sustain the (accurate) perception that this is will be a political "hot potato" for them, with thousands of passionate voters on both sides of the issue, then they might decide that it's not worth voting for right now.

Hence, our window of opportunity is short. If we want to act, the critical time period will be these next six weeks.

As for myself, I'm going to keep writing as many OpEds as possible these next 6 weeks, then take a break after the political dust settles in early November. As always, everyone should decide for themselves what method of activism (if any) is best suited for their own personal circumstances, given the context of their lives. Activism is not any kind of self-sacrificial duty, but rather an opportunity.

If you need "intellectual ammunition" to help with the health care fight, here are some resources from three health care groups:

• AFCM (Americans for Free Choice in Medicine) Editorials
  
  
• FIRM (Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine) Articles/Editorials
  
  
• Lucidicus Project Editorials

These sites have plenty of good material you can disseminate.

We have two powerful assets:

(1) We have the truth
(2) Most of America is on our side.

We can win.

So let's keep up the pressure!