On health care, let's do the impossible
By Jonathan Tasini
Updated 3:20 PM ET, Mon September 25, 2017
Excerpts:
Transformational politics resets our social and political priorities by marrying economics and public policy with a willingness to challenge the conventional ways that society and government exercise power. Nelson Mandela summed up transformative politics succinctly: "It always seems impossible until it's done."
Fast-forward to 2016, where Sanders' campaign had a singular characteristic: From the outset, it embraced transformational politics. Helping people envision things that can improve their lives, even when mainstream rhetoric tells them those big changes are impossible, works only when it syncs with people's beliefs, making them clearer than they were before.
This has great value to our society because it can encourage people who gave up on politics and have forsaken civic engagement to re-engage. Once the mind is unshackled and encouraged to think beyond a small policy box, our circuitry can be rewired in other arenas.
Transformational politics can even elicit a flicker from unexpected corners. Two billionaires, Warren Buffet and Mark Cuban, have in recent months opined that, as I argued back in January, single-payer is the most rational solution for business. While they and other business leaders may have held such beliefs in the past, the emerging transformational shift clearly helped to encourage them to speak up. As I have written before, single-payer is a no-brainer for CEOs in particular: It would allow them to save money, give workers a raise, have more money to put into research and development, and boost international competitiveness.
The Democratic Party will be stronger if it embraces a transformational vision.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/25/opinions/transformational-politics-healthcare-tasini-opinion/index.html
