WE MUST ACT TO HELP SAVE PUBLIC HEALTH CARE

I am not one of those folks who likes to pretend the 2016 national election was anything OTHER than a total catastrophe. But we must move forward as best we can. And, while I am not optimistic about the future of publicly funded health care in America in the short to mid range, the fact is that "Obamacare" WAS the Republican plan, as it was devised by the Heritage Thinktankers back in the 90s as an alternative to Democratic proposals for truly universal and public healthcare. And without its key elements, an individual and employer mandate, regulation to ensure everyone is in a common pool, some kind of cost controls, and incorporation of an expansion of Medicaid, IT SIMPLY WILL NOT WORK. The Republicans CANNOT "replace" Obamacare, unless with essentially the same thing under a different name, without throwing 20 to 30 million people off of health insurance entirely, and drastically degrading the level of care for everyone not able to afford the "Cadillac" policies wealthy executives and oligarchs enjoy. So what will happen? They will repeal the ACA all right, and the result will be a disaster that the great majority even of their deluded supporters will see is far, far worse than what we have now. Maybe THEN we can build a coalition for real national health insurance, which I prefer to call "Enhanced Medicare for All" rather than "single-payer," a term which the Right invented to highlight the supposed Socialistic aspect of it. To ease that eventual transition, it becomes DOUBLY important to resist their efforts to cripple Medicare as it now exists (through idiotic and unworkable privatization schemes. And they are going to try. We must resist, first the effort to repeal the ACA (which I have to assume we can't avoid), and then any effort to destroy Medicare (which we simply MUST succeed in preventing).

PLEASE LET YOUR VOICE BE HEARD IF YOU AGREE. Contact your Senators and Congress persons, and contact key "reachable" Republicans in the Senate, especially in the Senate. Such as Susan Collins, John McCain, Rob Portman, Bob Corker, Bill Cassidy, Lisa Murkowski, even Rand Paul and Lamar Alexander. Let them know you OPPOSE repeal of the affordable care act and OPPOSE any effort to cut, voucherize or privatize Medicare or cuts to Medicaid, especially the Medicaid expansion which is key to Obamacare's workability in the states where the Republicans haven't already wrecked that.

THIS MATTERS.

Thank you.