Ed Show: Bernie Sanders on single payer
Bernie Sanders on the Need for a Single Payer Health Care System
Ed Show
April 28, 2009
(Clip courtesy of Video Cafe)
Bernie Sanders: … We can guarantee every man, woman and child health care with a single payer system.
Ed Schultz: Senator, that is what just boggles my mind. We have, right now, a political moment in this country. The president has high approval ratings; you have the people out there; town hall after town hall I hear it, they want single payer; you’re close to the super majority depending on how…
Sanders: Ed, what are you forgetting in that equation?
Schultz: Well, I’m forgetting the filibuster I guess.
Sanders: And you’re forgetting the power of the insurance companies…
Schultz: Yes. Right.
Sanders: The huge amounts of money they spend; the power of the drug companies, and if you think that every member of the Democratic caucus is prepared to stand up to those guys, you’re mistaken.
****
Sanders: But the bottom line here, Ed, is, you’re absolutely right; we have a Democratic president, a strong majority in the House, sixty votes in the Senate. If we can’t deliver on energy, on health care, on workers’ rights, then what’s the sense of it all. The answer is people have got to put pressure on Congress to have the guts to stand up to the insurance companies, the drug companies, the banks, the military-industrial complex.
Schultz: Well, who’s going to put pressure on them?
Sanders: We’re going to need a strong grassroots movement to make that happen.
Schultz: So you think the people can be heard on this.
Sanders: Absolutely. Absolutely they can.
****
Schultz: I think this is a real moment for the president. What if the president comes out tomorrow night at the press conference… I would love to hear President Obama come out and say, “Look, I don’t have all the answers, but everything is on the table.” And this idea that single payer is not politically achievable, Mr. President, respectfully, I think you’re wrong on that. I think it is politically achievable, because the people want it.
Video clip (7 minutes, 41 seconds):
http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/heather/ed-show-bernie-sanders-need-single-payer-health
Comment:
By Don McCanne, MD
When the people lead, Congress will follow.