Cross-posted at Facing South
We're now two weeks into the Town Hall Uprising that has rocked members of Congress coming home for their August recess. The signs and screeds have been uncannily similar: "Obamacare" will kill your grandma. Bureaucrats will choose your doctors. We're headed towards socialized medicine, a slippery slope towards communism in the USA.
But whether coming from a hot-headed protester or a former governor of Alaska, the rhetorical bombs share at least two things in common: One, they have little basis in reality. Two, they have little if anything to do with real health reform. And the sooner reform advocates adjust their strategy and tactics to these realities, we'll have a much better chance of ensuring this once-in-a-generation opportunity to reform our health care system doesn't slip away.
Health reform isn't being debated in the country's TV screens and town halls -- it's being swift-boated. And just like the infamous 2004 TV ads by deep-pocketed right-wing operatives had little to do with Sen. Kerry's military honor, the current assault reveals more than anything the ability
of powerful interests to fan lingering resentments - especially in places like the South - to serve their bottom line.
Slaying the "death panels"
Consider Exhibit A: Sarah Palin's so-called "death panels." The former VP candidate's charge that the Democratic health bill would lead to euthanasia of the elderly and disabled - while clearly not based in fact - quickly became the right's number one talking point against reform. The rhetorical air war led by Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and other fiery pundits gave cover to ground troops at town hall meetings, like the woman in Raleigh, NC who equated Obama with Hitler and labeled him "Doctor Death."
Facing South and other media fought to bring the debate back to reality, with some success. On Monday this week, our reporter Sue Sturgis broke one of the most important stories of all: The fact that a leading champion of end-of-life care was actually a pro-life Republican -- Sen. Johnny Isakson of Georgia.
Facing South's piece on Isakson quickly got picked up by The Huffington Post and Firedoglake, which then led Ezra Klein of The Washington Post to interview Sen. Isakson -- who said the notion that the health reform bill included death panels was "nuts." By the next day, President Obama was noting the "irony" that a GOP stalwart promoted a concept that Beck suggested would lead to eugenics and Fascism.
But in the hot-house health reform debate, cold hard facts don't last for long. Momentarily stunned by evidence of bi-partisan support for end-of-life care, Republicans like Iowa's Sen. Chuck Grassley - the "moderate" who is part of six senators leading reform negotiations - still couldn't resist: On Wednesday, Grassley claimed "you have every right to fear" government will "pull the plug on grandma."
Who needs reasoned debate when you can terrify seniors and inflame the base? (Today, Sen. Isakson refused to make a statement on Grassley's claims, fearing it could be "misinterpreted.")
It's not a debate -- it's political war
The lesson here is clear: In the "anything-goes" battle over health care, powerful interests are going to do and say whatever it takes to stop reform.
And the interests are very powerful: Remember all those "Hands Off my Health Care" signs you see brought by bused-in protesters? Those come courtesy of Patients First, a front group for the corporate lobby American for Prosperity that previously advocated for its business donors to oppose the economic stimulus and tobacco regulation.
Of course it would be helpful if the media would move beyond the "he said, she said" style of reporting which gives outrageous distortions equal time with reality-based arguments.
But reform advocates can't count on point-by-point fact checks to change the debate -- or complaining about the other side's unfair tactics.
The larger issue is that they're losing a political power struggle. Consider the media: Progressives still have no answer to the right's near-total dominance of talk radio, a vital conduit that informs and inflames millions of listeners, delivering ready-made talking points to an army of grassroots protesters and TV pundits.
The right is also winning the ground war: As much as progressives wring their hands about "town hall mobs," their quick and effective mobilization reveals how badly reform advocates have been out-organized. An organizer for one of the leading pro-reform groups frankly admitted to me that it took "about a week" for them to realize what was happening and develop a strategy to counter the opposition at Congressional events.
And then there's the main theater of battle: Washington. Health interests are now spending over $1.4 million a day to lobby on Capitol Hill. Over 3,000 lobbyists - about six for every 535 members of Congress, the majority representing the health industry - are exerting their influence, including a revolving door of over 350 ex-Congressional staff members.
The industry is also shoveling tens of millions in campaign contributions to Congressional PACs and lawmakers -- according to a recent Democracy North Carolina report, $5.2 million to the 15 representatives and senators in the Tar Heel state alone. They're leaving nothing to chance: Sen. Richard Burr, one of the industry's most reliable allies, still raked in $420,782 from the pharmaceutical industry alone between 2003 and 2008 - the most of any U.S. Senator.
Where do reform advocates have the advantage?
Amidst the chaos -- which the status quo interests have every incentive to encourage -- one can see why health reform advocates want to depict themselves as the voice of reason, advocates of calm and civil discourse (although a recent Gallup poll suggests that the right's rabble-rousing isn't hurting their cause: 38% of independents said the protests made them "more sympathetic" to the opposition view, while only 16% said it made them "less sympathetic.")
If the last two weeks have taught us anything, it's the sad fact that "reasoned debate" won't decide the future of health care in our country -- not in an environment of high-decibel backlash and high-power corporate influence. Pro-reform advocates will only succeed when they fully harness their biggest strength: power in numbers.
At the end of the day, prospects for health care reform will turn on whether advocates can channel the political clout of the millions who stand to benefit from change. It will take tireless organizing and bold tactics, from the netroots to the grassroots. When pro-reform forces reach critical mass in size and visibility -- a tidal wave that matches the opposition -- politicians will be reminded that their future depends not only money but also votes, and they ignore the reform constituency at their own peril.
It's at that point -- when leaders are convinced that the political costs of ignoring reform outweigh the benefits of embracing it -- that advocates will be able to seize back this once-in-a-generation opportunity to change how our country ensures the health and well-being of its people.