Earlier today, I posted about single-payer activist Nick Skala's complaint about Darcy Burner. Skala, formerly with Physicians for a National Health Care Program, said he was scorned by Burner after she invited him to speak to the Progressive Caucus in Congress. Skala says he spoke about the Single Payer solution—arguing that it was much better than President Obama's "Public Option" plan.

Skala's angry video about the episode made the rounds this weekend and Burner was hit with at least one angry email (that I saw), which did things like put the word "Progressive" in quotes, said Democrats are in bed with the insurance industry, said Rep. Dennis Kucinich is the only Democrat with integrity, and concluded by opining that after 30 years of supporting Democrats they wouldn't support Democrats anymore because Democrats are  just the same as Republicans.

You know the letter.

I asked Burner for a comment for my post this morning, but instead, I'm going to use her response to the angry email from the disappointed progressives, which Burner forwarded to me.

Here's the crux of Burner's response (which mainly points out that there simply aren't enough votes in Congress to pass a Single Payer system): 

 Now as to Nick Skala: I was the person who put on the event for the Progressive Caucus. I decided who the speakers would be, and intentionally invited someone to talk about single-payer because I consider it important. Nick was asked to address what elements should be in the current legislation in order to insure that we were on a path that would allow single-payer to be passed later. He chose, instead, to spend his time reading a rant about why single-payer is good and a public plan is bad to a room full of people who already support single-payer. It was, unfortunately, a tremendous waste of time for the staff and members of Congress who showed up. In addition, when he was asked to provide information backing up some of his more controversial claims, he continued to simply make unsubstantiated assertions rather than contribute to the dialogue. In short, handed a golden opportunity to make a difference, he chose to indulge his hurt feelings instead.

And I've posted Burner's long (too long) response, below the fold.


 Burner writes: 

Hi [Name redacted],

 

I’m grateful you wrote, as it gives me an opportunity to respond that I have not otherwise been afforded.

 

First: the 80 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus overwhelmingly support single-payer healthcare reform. The vast majority are co-sponsors of HR 676, which is the single-payer bill in the House. They have been and continue to be deeply invested in ensuring that all Americans have access to high-quality healthcare, and they overwhelmingly believe that single-payer is the best solution.

 

Very very few of the members in question have received support in any form from the insurance industry, who correctly  see them as people who would not protect insurance industry profits.

 

But it is also the case that those 80 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus are essentially the only people in Congress who support single-payer. It takes 218 votes to pass legislation in the U.S. House; the progressives are only 80 of those votes. Given where things are in the current legislative process, it’s clear that there aren’t enough votes right now to get single-payer reform through the House.

 

Now, if we want single-payer, it does seem to me like it would be constructive to convince an additional 140 members of Congress to support it, and I’m surprised Nick isn’t working on that.

 

But lacking those additional 140 votes, the progressives were faced with a critical choice:

·         They could decide that they were going to vote only for single-payer and that nothing else would get their vote. In that case, how would leadership pass healthcare reform? They don’t have the 218 votes for single-payer right now. If they lose the 80 votes of the Progressive Caucus, then to get to 218 they need the other Democrats plus about 40 Republicans. In order to get those 40 Republican votes, they’d have to offer legislation that was pretty far to the right – in all likelihood that pandered to the insurance companies at the expense of the American people. So we end up with healthcare reform that the Republicans like in this scenario.

·         Or the Progressive Caucus members could try to find a path wherein the healthcare reform that happens this year, if not perfect, at least takes us closer to the right direction. Rather than forcing leadership to pander to Republicans, they could work to build legislation that would both help Americans now and make it more likely down the road that we’d get better and better solutions. To do this, they would need to take a position that it was possible for most of the rest of the Democratic caucus to support, but that moved us in the right direction. All of the credible analysis indicates that a public option moves us in the right direction.

 

The second is what they chose to do: they are insisting that every American have the option of choosing a public plan instead of private insurance, where the availability of the public plan provides immediate downward pressure on insurance company profits system-wide, and as more and more Americans choose the public plan, we get closer and closer to it being politically possible to enact single-payer.

 

Now as to Nick Skala: I was the person who put on the event for the Progressive Caucus. I decided who the speakers would be, and intentionally invited someone to talk about single-payer because I consider it important. Nick was asked to address what elements should be in the current legislation in order to insure that we were on a path that would allow single-payer to be passed later. He chose, instead, to spend his time reading a rant about why single-payer is good and a public plan is bad to a room full of people who already support single-payer. It was, unfortunately, a tremendous waste of time for the staff and members of Congress who showed up. In addition, when he was asked to provide information backing up some of his more controversial claims, he continued to simply make unsubstantiated assertions rather than contribute to the dialogue. In short, handed a golden opportunity to make a difference, he chose to indulge his hurt feelings instead.

 

It’s clear to me that Nick is upset at the path progressives in Congress have chosen, and he’s entitled to his opinions and feelings. I have invited him repeatedly to lay out a strategy wherein we get to single-payer healthcare; his response is consistently to say that strategy isn’t his problem. I’m not entirely sure, in the face of that, precisely what response he expects from those of us working our tails off to get the most progressive outcome we can create for the current legislation.

 

I wish I could wave a magic wand and make single-payer pass, but I have no such magic wand. Lacking such a magic wand, I will continue to work tirelessly to put us on a path that immediately improves the situation and increases the odds that it will be possible to pass single-payer down the road.

 

Finally, I would say this: Nick is clearly enjoying demonizing the people who agree with him on policy and disagree with him on strategy. My personal opinion is that he’s being lazy and destructive. It’s much easier to throw a fit than it is to persuade people who don’t already agree with him on policy, and it’s a whole lot easier to throw a fit than it is to construct a strategy to get us where he thinks we need to go. I am saddened by his approach, because it detracts from our ability as progressives to work together to change things.

 

But I am, as I said, grateful you wrote, as that gives me an opportunity to respond.

 

Darcy