The Baucus Bill has support from Democrats and (one of the) Republicans—and, with the help of Washington Senator Maria Cantwell, it’s on its way out of the Senate Finance Committee.

But keep in mind: It will soon become just one of five health insurance reform bills that have moved out of their respective committees. And as far as the left is concerned, it’s far from the best bill—because, for starters, it lacks a public option.

Which is why, immediately after Cantwell announced she would be voting to move the Baucus Bill out of committee, MoveOn.org blasted out word of a rally tomorrow to remind the senator to keep fighting for the public option as bills get merged, adjusted, and ultimately voted on once again on the floor of the senate.

With the health care fight reaching a fever pitch in the Senate, local citizens of Seattle will rally at Senator Cantwell’s office at 2:00PM on October 14th to thank Senator Cantwell for pushing for real health care reform.

Participants will tell Senator Cantwell they are counting on HER to keep fighting for real reform that includes a strong public health insurance option. Senator Cantwell has been a strong advocate for offering the choice of a public health insurance option, which is the heart of real health care reform. Passing a robust public health insurance option is crucial to help lower rising health care costs and extend high-quality, affordable coverage to more Americans.

There will be people with boxing gloves on, MoveOn promises, to encourage Cantwell to keep swinging.

But Republican Olympia Snowe’s announcement today that she will support health insurance reform via the Baucus Bill actually makes it less likely that Cantwell and others—whether swinging or not—will ultimately be able to pass a reform bill that includes a public option.

Why?

Because now the only “bipartisan” bill is the one Snowe backed today—the bill that, to repeat, lacks a public option.

Eli Sanders was The Stranger's associate editor. His book, "While the City Slept," was a finalist for the Washington State Book Award and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. He once did this and once won...

6 replies on “MoveOn to Cantwell: Keep Fighting”

  2. I won’t hold my breath. Cantwell is a proven coward on tough matters that require more than a knee-jerk party-line vote. I will never forgive her for voting against TARP – Unless the R’s run out some uber-christian in 2012, I’m voting for the opposition candidate…

  3. I seriously would prefer that if we can’t get reform with a public plan, then we don’t have any reform at all.

    If some piece of shit is passed that doesn’t have a public option, two things will happen: First, our country’s health care will still suck and continue to get worse and second, the republicans will start screeching “I told you so, I told you so!!! We told you the democrat’s health care plan would be bad for America and now you see we’re right!!!” It doesn’t even matter that the republicans are the cause of it… people will have forgotten all their bitching years from now.

  4. Good observations, Urgutha Forka @3. There’s this meme put out by the enemies of health reform and which the mainstream media in Washington has been all too happy to relay. It goes “public option = big-spending” & “public option foe = fiscal conservative.”

    Of course, as with so many of these Washington memes, the reality is just the opposite. The best lever by which to control the cost of health insurance is competition. The so-called “public option” is that competition, but it doesn’t have to be public in the sense of draining tax dollars. It can be self-sustaining just through the premiums of its members. That’s what Chuck Schumer has emphasized.

  5. Politically, it’s perfectly reasonable for the Republicans to fight the public option tooth and nail. Health reform sans competition will mean spiralling costs down the road, and the voters never pay close enough attention to know who’s truly to blame.

    To me, the best hope we’ve got–to get reform passed and then see it actually work–is this Tom Carper opt-out or opt-in, provided the thing being opted into or out of is not some toothless, state-run coop.

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