A few years ago, there was a Woody Allen movie in which the main character is a man who is able to take on the characteristics of whatever audience or group he is interacting with, so much so that those people see him to be exactly like them, and, in the movie, he physically becomes them. No doubt the dream of every politician. With respect to President Obama, for some reason, I am always reminded of this film.
As much as Obama and all the new Democrats like Clinton are masters of the politics of appearance and symbol, there is deep down a substantial failing in their political souls. They actually think that they need to do something in the real world, to fix things that are broken, or at least to look as though one were fixing things, or more precisely, the confusion that the appearance of fixing something is equivalent to actually fixing it.
The Republicans are untroubled by this shortcoming, having adopted the purely negative poll of the dialectic, seeking to accomplish nothing at all of any social worth other than the perpetuation of the status quo. They are, however, good at starting wars, mostly for the purpose of clouding people’s perception of reality. They are not very good at winning them, but, of course, in the short run, that is not the point provided the war is small enough not to mobilize a substantial portion of the populace and more particularly the political elite against it, as occurred in the case of Vietnam with disastrous results all around.
In any case, I digress. This week, we were treated to no less than three versions of Obama, each somewhat different, but at heart the same rhetorician who can appear to be all things to all men. In the labor day speech, we saw a reprise of the ardent but tired campaigner rallying what appeared to be a somewhat disinterested base with promises of a fight for real heath care reform. Then we saw what can only be described as the reincarnation of Horatio Alger or the channeling of Bill Bennett talking up the virtues of hard work and discipline, a good old-fashioned pep talk.
But the most impressive and strange performance was the speech to Congress. This was really a bit of a rhetorical sandwich. The first part was devoted to trotting out the usual horror stories about how health insurance screws everybody and the whole health-related segment of the economy is increasing at a rate that is likely to bankrupt the country pretty soon.
OK, fine, but then we get to the payoff, which, of course, is that they are not bad guys, they just want to make a buck - what’s wrong with that? - and that anyway the real problem is that we spend so much time arguing about it that we fail to act. Like, like, like, for example, looking at the experience of the rest of the world and coming to the conclusion that the adoption of a single-payer system that socializes the cost is the only proven successful strategy. Forget that, you left-wing nut-jobs because it isn’t going to happen. Why? Well, it’s just not the American way because for one thing we all love our health insurance if we have it even though we just told you it sucks. Go figure. And anyway, the transition from private to public insurance, which hundreds of thousands of seniors negotiate every day when they become eligible for Medicare without any disruption of service, would, would, well, it would just be chaos, I tell you. Chaos!
The top of the sandwich was a grand display of empty rhetoric, moving rhetoric, to be sure, but empty. Stuff about Kennedy’s dreams and how we can work together and unite for the common good even though we haven’t the slightest idea what that is and in any case, anyone who has observed the events of the past month should realize that the possibility of achieving such unity and social cohesion is just about nil. This part was really the so-called home run. And, by the way, it was not a little disconcerting to see all the talking-heads blather on about this, joined by many of the presumed progressive members of Congress. But more on this topic later.
The meat portion of the speech, or in this case the spam surrounded by rancid lettuce, was this. The plan has morphed from universal health care now, which most people thought was one of the things the campaign was all about, although it turns out that wasn’t it at all, but something called health care reform. This is all about somehow lowering the rate of growth of health care expenditures in relation to the GNP. Wow, who knew? But, it turns out that they knew all along, because you can make a good case that this is really what the Obama campaign was talking about all along.
Anyway, this plan, which will take place four years from now (a new and innovative definition of “now” that we all must be grateful to the President for clarifying) amounts to forcing private insurers to accept clients with pre-existing conditions and to continue coverage even when people get sick. There is no mention of how much this is going to cost people and businesses, since, one supposes, the reason the insurance companies engage in these practices now is that it increases their profits and they will want to raise the price of insurance since now they are going to actually have to disperse benefits, a practice that most Republicans believe to be profoundly un-American and an unwholesome interference with our liberties, or their liberties, I’m not certain which.
In return for these concessions, of course, the insurance companies get 30 million new clients because to make this work on the cheap everyone has to buy a policy that provides minimal coverage. From them. Now that’s a sweet deal.
As for the public option, upon which it seemed until yesterday the progressives were to make a stand, well, this is and always has been a means to an end. Foolishly, some of us thought that yeah, it was a means to an end just as the Trojan Horse was a means to an end, namely, people would realize that it was cheaper and better and more efficient than the private plans, so they would all buy it and that would be universal health care through the back door. Minimally, it would force insurance companies to compete by lowering prices.
But the unnecessary public option we’re talking about is nothing like this. Hence, the willingness to consider other means or dispense with it altogether, because this public option, the possible but not perfect public option, must operate just like the private insurers. It cannot use the power of the government to lower charges or the inherent efficiencies that programs like Medicare provide because that would be unfair to the private insurers. So, yes, given these ground rules, it probably doesn’t matter.
Two things stand out to me as the most appalling aspects of this debate. The one is the peculiar attachment of this administration and the Clinton administration before it to market-based solutions even when no classic free market exists. I could go on for pages proving this thesis, but, for the sake of argument, just take my word for it. There are probably four or five markets that set prices for medical services depending on who is paying and who is negotiating fixed prices, i.e., Medicare, Medicaid, PPOs, corporations, or uninsured people who are not bankrupt. And besides this, people don’t shop around for the best deal on cancer surgery like they buy a new refrigerator. There is no market at all to speak of in the insurance sector.
What’s even more appalling is that progressives often fall for this line of reasoning. And what is more appalling than that is the procession of progressives who dutifully fell in line in the aftermath of the speech. So much for the line in the sand approach on the public option. We all hear what we want to hear, and sometimes the tone of a speech attracts more attention than the substance, but the problem here is that the left of the Democratic Party is not taken seriously because, in the end, they always cave. If, for once, we didn’t cave, it might not happen again. It is not words we want, but deeds, not the appearance of change, but real change. The public option issue, a real, meaningful public option, is as good a start as any.
I thought I had fallen into a wormhole and been transmitted to another reality when I watched the commentaries afterward. Had I heard the same speech? I went off to some liberal blogs and I kind of got the same message. It was only when I went to Open Left and read David Sirota’s piece that I came back to my senses. Thankfully, now that they have had a chance to sleep on it, some bloggers have got it right, and even some politicians seem to have second thoughts. Maybe there is hope.
There are really at least four political parties in this country, the right-wing fundamentalist nuts, the establishment Republicans who pull their strings, the centrist Democrats and the so-called progressive Democrats. In a parliamentary democracy, none of these parties would possess a majority and so they would negotiate their participation in the government in exchange for commitments on political issues or cabinet personnel. The closer we get as progressives to thinking this way, the more we will matter and the less we will be taken for granted. We all want to matter, we all want a seat at the table. We will only matter if we have the courage occasionally to allow ourselves to take a stand, even an unreasonable stand.
