By Vasu Sunkara
To media pundits and the Republican right, 106,177 means an overnight change in Washington, D.C. It’s the game changer, the sign that America has had enough of President Barack Obama and his aggressive “socialist” Democratic caucus.
What is the number 106,177? It’s the number of votes that Scott Brown had over Martha Coakley to become the new junior senator from Massachusetts. Now, 106,177 people define a country of 300 million.
Does the rhetoric hold up? I say no. Brown’s victory was a surprise, but honestly, who was following the campaign? The public only paid attention after Coakley’s defeat, when the media would not let up on how the Democrats’ deck of cards had finally fallen down. The insistence on this point by cable TV talking heads surprised me. But my cynical side accepted that for them, news is only news if it sells.
But is Brown really the reaper to Obama’s health care reform agenda? It’s possible, but it doesn’t have to be. What all the rabid commentators ignore is that health care reform has never gotten this far before. It passed the House of Representatives. It passed the Senate. It survived the tantrums of town hall hucksters and the lie of “death panels.” Over the last seven months, this bill has been left for dead at every turn of the road. But it’s still alive.
I say, let it survive to the moment when Obama signs it into law. The 30 million uninsured people who would get coverage from this bill are worth more to me than the 106,177 that gave Scott Brown his moment in the sun. If this is a democracy, let the real numbers speak for themselves.
In a plan that stops the economic roulette that insurance companies play with people’s lives and that cuts the fat off health care expenses, this bill can save lives. For that alone, I hope Obama works to get the Senate bill passed in the House.
For those who yell “no” and say everything is moving too fast, well, I hear you. But your claim reminds me of what one cabinet official said to his sitting president decades ago: “I can’t help but feel that you’re going too fast and too far with certain of your domestic reforms.”
A legitimate opinion perhaps, but one that the president thankfully did not heed. For without President Franklin Roosevelt, Social Security and the great programs of the New Deal would not have been born. And without that generosity, our country would not have the opportunities it has today. Like Roosevelt, Obama stands at a defining moment. A moment that deserves a good fight.
106,177 votes or not.
Sunkara is a graduate student in health policy.