> Thinking strategically, the AFL-CIO should go for single payer *to the
> exclusion* of these more expensive, more complicated, more 'practical'
> plans (i.e. the failed tactic of trying to be palatable to insurance
> companies). I say this not because in bargaining you go for more and
> split the difference, but because the strength of public support will
> be related to what segments of the population stand to benefit.
> Complicated, segmented plans are hard to understand and unite around
> and will benefit lots fewer people. In other words, our movement will
> undermine the very support it needs by supporting lesser plans. And
> whatever Obama-Kennedy mess emerges will also be attacked for its
> large public cost, further weakening the argument for it (a problem
> single-payer avoids). So on those two counts at least, it's
> strategically bad to support whatever, on the strength that it's
> better than what we have.
I was just thinking that the single-payer forces, when making their
case, should respond to the inevitable "centralized government-run
health care" charge simply by pointing out that Obama's plan also calls
for a centralized health care system (i.e., the proposed national
insurance exchange where everyone must buy coverage) - only in his plan
the centralized system is dominated by private insurance companies. By
hammering away - from the left - at the fact that the Obama-Kennedy plan
is centralized, the idea would be to force them to *defend* the idea of
a centralized system (on efficiency grounds), thus neutralizing the main
objection to single-payer. Jujitsu.
SA