JULY 3, 2009:NWLP
6/30/09
10:25 AM
Page 3
Mass rally urges senators to back public health option
WASHINGTON, D.C. (PAI) —
Declaring Congress must listen to the
voters, and not the health insurance
companies, thousands of health care ad-
vocates demanded universal, affordable
health care at a mass rally at the nation’s
Capital June 25.
The crowd, featuring more than
1,000 Communications Workers of
America legislative conference dele-
gates decked out in red “We demand
Health Care Now!” T-shirts, later con-
verged on Capitol Hill to lobby for af-
fordable health care.
Other unionists at the rally were
from Steelworkers, Laborers (in or-
ange), Seafarers, The Newspaper Guild,
Office and Professional Employees, In-
ternational Brotherhood of Electrical
Workers, United Food and Commercial
Workers (in yellow), National Educa-
tion Association (in blue), Service Em-
ployees (in purple), Teamsters, Iron
Workers, AFSCME (in green), and
Bricklayers. Advocates from almost
200 other groups nationwide chimed in,
as some came from as far as Portland.
The system they advocate, which is
being pushed by the Democratic
Obama Administration and hammered
out in key congressional committees,
features universal coverage, medical
cost controls, consumer choice of doc-
tors, a government-run Medicare-like
alternative to the health insurers, and
that the cost not be shouldered by taxing
workers for their present insurance.
“All of us in the labor movement
know we can’t just take care of health
care at the bargaining table. The bar-
gaining table is being crushed by rising
health care costs,” said CWA President
Larry Cohen.
Some in the crowd campaigned for
HR 676, government-run universal
health care, with total abolition of the
private insurers, their high co-pays and
premiums, refusal of care, huge profits
and tons of paperwork.
“We are here; we’re not going away.
We voted for change a few months ago.
We expect change. And if we don’t get
it, there’s going to be more change,”
said Democratic National Committee
Chairman Howard Dean.
Success on health care reform is a
must for Democrats, Dean told The Hill
newspaper. “I think it’s going to be a
catastrophic problem for the Demo-
cratic Party if they can’t get this bill
out.”
Sen. Sherrod Brown, (D-Ohio) told
the throng, “We’re counting on you to
go across the street” to the Capitol “and
convince and persuade and cajole and
cajole and cajole” lawmakers to enact
universal health care this year. The spe-
cial interests will not hijack this process.
We must have a strong public option.”
Service Employees International
Union Secretary-Treasurer Anna Bur-
ger said her members see the impact of
lack of health care coverage in the na-
tion’s emergency rooms daily.
“People are more worried about their
medical bills than about the illnesses
they have to treat,” Burger said. The in-
surers “have bean-counters and paper-
pushers telling people what they can’t
get.”
AFSCME President Gerry McEntee
warned the crowd about the controversy
over paying the nation’s health care bill.
Congressional panels are wrestling with
Support grows for single payer health care bill
Northwest Oregon Labor
Council the latest union
group to back HR 676
The largest central labor council in
Oregon has endorsed House Resolution
676, the single-payer health care bill in-
troduced by Michigan Congressman
John Conyers.
Delegates to the Northwest Oregon
Labor Council voted June 22 to back
the bill. The resolution was brought to
the council by affiliates United Food
and Commercial Workers Local 555
and International Brotherhood of Elec-
trical Workers Local 48.
The endorsement wasn’t unanimous,
as a delegate representing Teamsters
Joint Council No 37 voted against it.
HR 676 would institute a single-
payer health care system by expanding
the Medicare system to all U.S. citizens.
The system would cover every person
for all necessary medical care, includ-
ing prescription drugs, hospital, surgi-
cal, outpatient services, primary and
preventive care, emergency services,
dental, mental health, home health,
physical therapy, rehabilitation (includ-
ing for substance abuse), vision care,
hearing services including hearing aids,
chiropractic, durable medical equip-
ment, palliative care, and long term
care.
Its sponsors say HR 676 would end
deductibles and co-payments, saving
hundreds of billions annually by elimi-
nating the high overhead and profits of
the private health insurance industry
and HMOs.
HR 676 has 93 House co-sponsors,
in addition to Conyers. Jim McDermott
of Seattle is the only congressman from
the Pacific Northwest supporting the
bill.
HR 676 has the backing of 541
union organizations in 49 states, includ-
ing the Oregon AFL-CIO and Washing-
ton State Labor Council.
JULY 3, 2009
NOLC is the 128th central labor
council nationwide to endorse the legis-
lation. Also on board in Oregon are the
Southern Oregon Labor Council; Cen-
tral Oregon Labor Council; and Marion,
Polk, and Yamhill Counties Central La-
bor Council.
Nineteen international unions are
backing the bill, including United Steel-
workers of America; United Auto
Workers; National Education Associa-
tion; International Longshore and Ware-
house Union; National Association of
Letter Carriers; Machinists; Plumbers
and Fitters; American Federation of
Musicians; Sheet Metal Workers; Of-
fice and Professional Employees;
American Federation of Teachers; Serv-
ice Employees International Union;
American Federation of State, County
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
and Municipal Employees; California
Nurses Association; Communications
Workers of America; Utility Workers
Union of America; International Feder-
ation of Professional and Technical Em-
ployees; United Transportation Union;
and United Electrical, Radio and Ma-
chine Workers of America.
For more about the bill, go to:
www.unionsforsinglepayer.org.
an estimated $1 trillion cost over 10
years of the health care overhaul. Over-
all, health care consumes $2.5 trillion a
year, one-sixth of overall U.S. output.
At least 20 percent of that health care
cost goes for insurers’ overhead, profits
and paperwork.
“Taxing health care benefits is the
wrong way” to pay for health care,
McEntee said. “The right way is, first,
to start by taxing the wealthy, and sec-
ond, by closing corporate loopholes.”
In their lobbying after the rally,
unionists warned lawmakers that if
workers must pay taxes on their present
health benefits, they and the labor
movement will turn against the health
care legislation.
Obama doesn’t favor taxing health
benefits, and he continues to support a
public option. In making a case for the
public option, Obama has said, “If pri-
vate insurers say that the marketplace
provides the best quality health care, if
they tell us that they’re offering a good
deal, then why is it that the government,
which they say can’t run anything, sud-
denly is going to drive them out of busi-
ness? That’s not logical.”
At the rally, Dean said the public op-
tion “is the compromise position. That’s
going to be the difference between real
reform and a bill that doesn’t do any-
thing.”
The Republican Party and Big Busi-
ness are against the public option —
and much of the rest of Obama’s plan.
PAGE 3