Action Alert: UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE PETITION TO MOVEON.ORG
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE PETITION TO MOVEON.ORG Issue
MoveOn.org should query its members on the issue of health care for all. Background
WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, respectfully petition the leaders of MoveOn.Org to abide by its core democratic principles and ask the opinion of its members whether they support reform of the private health insurance system or replacement of private health insurance by universal single payer health care, before MoveOn continues to organizationally and financially support a new coalition which supports the former and excludes the latter.
WHEREAS, MoveOn has had extraordinary success because it has presented itself as democratic organization in which, as its web site proclaims, every member has a voice in choosing the direction.
WHEREAS, MoveOn's leadership has not followed its democratic principals regarding the choice of MoveOn's direction on one of the most important issues confronting the country, universal health care.
WHEREAS, Tens of thousands of activists, including many MoveOn members, have been organizing at the grassroots in support of replacing Americas fragmented and wasteful system of private health insurance with a universal single payer Medicare-For-All system that would cover everyone from cradle to grave, in which health care decisions would be made between patients and doctors and not by insurance company bureaucrats, and in which everyone would have the right to choose her or his own doctor. Medicare-For- All is embodied in H.R. 676 introduced by Rep. John Conyers and co-sponsored by 91 members of Congress.
WHEREAS, With the longstanding coalition called Healthcare NOW playing a key role, HR 676 has been endorsed by 452 union organizations, including 111 Central Labor Councils, 36 State AFL-CIO federations, and 17 national or international unions including the United Auto Workers, The National Education Association, The American Federation of Teachers, the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers, The International Longshore and Warehouse Union, and The California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee; such national organizations as the NAACP, Progressive Democrats of America, Physicians for a National Health Program, the United Church of Christ, and the United Methodist Board of Church and Society; and 32 City Councils including Baltimore, Louisville, Indianapolis, Detroit and Boston.
WHEREAS, Without asking the opinion of its members, the leaders of MoveOn have chosen to join the steering committee and pledge $500,000 of its members money to a competing health care coalition with the confusingly similar name Health Care For America Now, whose Statement of Principles seeks to preserve and reform the private health insurance system (adding an expensive public alternative that businesses and individuals can pay for with their own money) and which systematically excludes supporters of single payer health care, including many of MoveOn's own members, from its events.
WHEREAS, We, the undersigned, believe that this decision by MoveOn's leadership to take a major leadership and fundraising role in this competing coalition to reform private health insurance and exclude single payer supporters, many of whom are MoveOn members, violates MoveOn's core principle that MoveOn's members choose its direction.
NOW THEREFORE, We, the undersigned, respectfully call on MoveOn to follow its core democratic principles and sponsor an online debate between supporters of universal single payer health care and supporters of reforming private health insurance with a voluntary public alternative, and then let MoveOn's members vote on which approach to health care reform they believe MoveOn should support