The Speech I Want Obama To Give
August 12th, 2009 | EdWords | 6 Comments
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My fellow Americans, I’m speaking to you today from the Oval Office on a subject of great importance to all of us. The past few weeks have seen the debate over health care reform turn into an ugly, angry, divisive shouting match. Senators and Congressmen have been shouted down, insulted, even threatened at town hall meeting all across the country, meetings designed to help inform the people of this country about the complex issues confronting us. I am ashamed and embarrassed by the behavior of Americans who should know better.
I confess that I am angry, too. Angry at the lies that have been spread, the distortions of the truth so extreme and so vile I find it hard to fathom that anyone believes them. And some of the rhetoric has crossed into an area that I find personally obscene. To invoke the visions of Hitler’s Germany in the fanatical opposition to health care reform is beyond , to call the good, hard-working men and women who are trying to create a new health care system for this country Nazis is despicable, and I will not stand for it.
I call upon the American people to stop the shouting, to restrain your anger, and to engage instead in a respectful conversation. I ask my colleagues in the Republican Party, the television and radio commentators and others who have spread the lies, stoked the anger and the fear and encouraged the mob mentality that has taken over this debate to help restore of a civil dialogue.
So much misinformation has been disseminated, so much fear has been spread, it’s time to start the conversation over.
The real health care debate is about what kind of country we want to live in. I ask every Americans to ask yourself these fundamental questions. Do you want to live in a country where almost 50 million of your fellow Americans are without health insurance? Do you want to live in a country where 22,000 people a year die of preventable or curable illnesses because the don’t have access to adequate health care? Do you want to live in a country where 2 million people a year go bankrupt because of medical costs, where 1.5 million homes are foreclosed because people have run out of money paying for medical care, where if you lose your job you lose your health insurance, a country where you can be denied health insurance because you have a pre-existing medical condition? A country where a sudden illness can destroy your economic future, even if you have a job and health insurance?
If you find those conditions acceptable, then we need do nothing, because that’s the country you live in now. Alone in the industrialized world, America, the wealthiest nation on earth, is the only country which allows these things to happen. Our current system of health care is broken, fatally broken, and when I took the job as President, I made it my first priority to fix it. I do not, I cannot believe, that Americans want the status quo to continue.
Now ask yourselves another question. What do the shouting mobs who are drowning out the debate offer in place of what we are proposing? What do the angry opponents, opponents who spread lies and fear, want? Do they have a plan for solving the problems? They offer you nothing but opposition to fixing what is broken. Some for political reasons; they simply want to hand my administration a defeat. Some because they fear that any change will affect their corporate bottom line. Those who have accumulated fabulous wealth from a system that impoverishes millions want to keep the money flowing. Some oppose change because they are ideologically opposed to anything that government might propose. Some because they fear any change. No wonder they are shouting. They cannot offer you a genuine solution to our broken health care system, so they drown out the voices of hope and change instead.
My fellow Americans, we are better than this. We are a nation that has always found a way to solve our most vexing problems. Even when the issues were the most divisive, we have pulled together in the darkest of hours and forged solutions to the most difficult of issues. Today I call upon all Americans to lower our voices, to listen to each other, to speak calmly and respectfully, and to work together to build a health care system that will provide excellent, affordable medical care to every citizen of this great country.
Thank you, and may God bless America
Topics: health care reform, mobs, Obama, speech, town hall meetings
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Dream on…
The short speech Obama should give.
I can understand your anger on this Health care and Cap & Trade bill. After all we politicians have tried to ram them thru in the middle of the night without debate, adding 300 pages in the wee hours of the night, then forcing a vote a few hours later. These bill are so important that I pledge to you now that we will take our time, allow all Congress people to read them with their attorneys for several days, and we will post them on the internet for several days so the public can read them and understand them, after all we will all be effected by these bills.
So, as President I will respect the people enough to give them time to read the bills along with their representatives. Also, we will stop calling concerned citizens at town hall meeting “a mob”. In other words, we will start today looking out for the needs of the people, not just our own power.
ML
Mr. Obama would rather balme and point fingers at the people because he thinks he is smarter than the people who elected him. He is just like Bill and Hill . They are God after they are elected and They should not be questioned. NOW that the American people are starting to wake up and ask a few questions GOD can not stand it. Well He had bettere get used to it he has 3 and a half years left and it will not get any easier.
Yes we do need to change our health care system but not in the middle of the night and not without the people understanding what is really going on and what will change. Obama does not want to talk about the coverage costs for the Mexicans that are not US citizens included in the bill. WHY?
IT IS THE LITTLE THINGS LIKE THIS THAT UPSET PEOPLE. It is the Lie about the increase in cost to retired people for the Medicare supplement insurance. What is before the people is a pile of paper not even a bill that you can point at and say this is what it will be. Come back with a plan, then we can talk.
As the author said, it is difficult to even know where to begin – but I will attempt brevity. I applaud those who have taken time out of their lives to educate themselves on this critical issue and peacefully, rationally engage their representatives. I am sorry for the fact that some who oppose you are being divisive by trying to demonize you by grouping you with the minority whose disruptive antics we see on YouTube and the news. As human beings, we have passions. Do not suppress them, do not let them control you, but channel them and use them appropriately. For some, the reasons for passions running high transcend this piece of legislation. Frustrations have been mounting with some of the extreme measures that this administration has already taken, or is promoting, and health care being the largest and most critical yet has created a tipping point.
Our health care needs work, and I hope all who wish to have it, can attain it. Some things could immediately help, such as by creating a more competitive environment by allowing the hundreds (over 1300 I think) health insurance companies to operate freely, like auto insurance and not be shut out of some states. I don’t believe this is the case with car insurance companies. I obviously don’t have all the answers, but I firmly believe solutions can be crafted, and that what is being proposed to us isn’t even in the ballpark. Just a few examples – There is language in the bill that requires people to have health insurance or suffer penalties (Section 401.) There is language that allows determination of whether or not coverage is acceptable (Section 102.) What if a person just wished for catastrophic coverage? Other Sections such as 223 and 313 create a framework that does not eliminate private insurance, but will make it very, very difficult for it to survive. Perhaps those who despise corporate success and a capitalist system are fine with this. I am not, as the success and prosperity of this country found its roots in the allowance of the individual to operate freely and not be derided for any great success. If they achieve it immorally, then let the justice system attend to them.
For those who believe it must be through the government that we get health insurance to the (deceptive) number of Americans who are without it, can the government come up with a plan that leaves those who want nothing to do with it alone? It’s sure not the case here.
What is really amazing to me is the fact that one moment I am told that no one knows what is in the bills and that more time should be given to let people read them. Then I get detailed (including section #s) information on those same bills (someone is reading them?). I even hear responsible people like Ms Palin and Newt Gingrich, telling me about things that are in the bill that I’m also told are not; like “death panels” and the coverage for illegal aliens.
There is also a lot of discussion about “what’s the hurry?”. Teddy Roosevelt first called for universal health care 100 years ago. Reform has been tried by many presidents since then with no success. This reminds me of folks in the ’60s saying ” what’s the rush with civil rights legislation”?
P.S. My funk & wagnells defines a mob as: a disorderly crowd of people and a town hall meeting as an informal public meeting derived from the traditional town meetings of New England. Similarly to those meetings, everybody in a community is invited to attend, voice their opinions, and hear the responses from public figures and elected officials.
My daddy told me “if it walks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a duck”. They look like mobs to me.
Bravo Mr. Stein. Good speach.