Platform Fight: Activists Win Commitment to Guaranteed Care - CommonDreams.org
The organization that worked for more progressive language on health care is Progressive Democrats of America. Over at the pdamerica site, Donna Smith describes how this victory was achieved, and seems to think it's a pretty big deal. Not a final victory in the battle for universal health care, but a big step forward. It also represented an interesting coalition between Smith, an advocate of a single-payer system, and Bob Remer, a Hillary Clinton supporter on the platform committee:
This was the first time I met Bob. He was (and is) a staunch supporter of Hillary Clinton's. From the icy cold in Iowa to this moment, Bob believed with his heart and his head that Sen. Clinton was the best candidate to lead his nation. A big, hulking fellow with a rich history of community and political involvement and a career spent working in the healthcare field, Bob felt the strengthening of the platform language on healthcare was a way to honor Sen. Clinton. So, I thought, that's fine, so long as we agree that every American has a basic human right to healthcare. We sat in the hotel coffee shop in Pittsburgh, two ordinary folks from Chicago, hoping we could push our party off the mark on this issue and toward true reform. We both agreed that the platform is not where legislative details or programs are either negotiated or adopted--and because we disagreed on what the final outcome of health reform legislation might be, Bob and I quickly moved beyond that discussion. He supports a Clinton-type reform while I am firmly in the single-payer camp.
I find something incredibly encouraging about this. It offers hope that people with similar goals but dramatically different proposals for reaching them can work together respectfully and honestly.
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