Let's look at August as a month to mobilize for healthcare reform strategies

[zulchzulu]

People are mad at Reid for saying that the votes won't happen until after August. I am mad as well. But we have to look at what we have and use August as a time to really send the message out about the need for healthcare reform.

I made an ad, called "37th Place":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p49gnnPjx24

I will make more that really go after the Party of No on this issue. Anyone else who is into do that kind of stuff should also do what they can as well.

We can hammer at these people to make sure they are on board with the Public Option:

Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)

Senator Tom Carper (D-DE)

Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA)

Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR)

Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL)
[br />Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE)

Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA)

Senator Kent Conrad (D-ND)

Senator Max Baucus (D-MT)
[br />Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)

Senator Evan Bayh (D-IN)

Senator Mark Pryor (D-AR)

Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT)

Senator Mark Warner (D-VA)

We can educate people about what the healthcare plan is with these links:
http://www.healthreform.gov/
http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/
http://standwithdrdean.com/
http://singlepayernow.net


Here are some facts to tell friends, family, on the radio, in Letters To The Editor or on a home-made grassroots flyer to hand out or leave off somewhere:

• Nearly 46 million Americans have no insurance, and 25 million more are underinsured.
  
• In the United States, total health care spending was $2.4 trillion in 2007 -- or $7,900 per person -- according to an analysis published in the journal Health Affairs.
  
• The United States spends 52 percent more per person than the next most costly nation, Norway, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.
  
• In the United States, every person spends on average $6,714 for health care. That's significantly higher than in the United Kingdom, where $2,760 per person is spent; or in France, where the cost is $3,449 per person; or in Canada, where medical costs are $3,678 per person, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
  
• The United States ranks 50th in life expectancy, and 180th infant mortality (meaning 179 countries have higher infant mortality rates such as Angola and Turkey and 43 countries have lower infant mortality rates such as France and Sweden) according to the CIA World Factbook.
  
• The World Health Organization's ranking of the world's health systems rates the United States 37th in the World.
  
• In 2008, total national health expenditures were expected to rise 6.9 percent -- two times the rate of inflation.
  
• U.S. health care spending is expected to increase at similar levels for the next decade reaching $4.3 TRILLION in 2017, or 20 percent of GDP.
  
• Health care spending is 4.3 times the amount spent on national defense.
  
• Workers are now paying $1,600 more in premiums annually for family coverage than they did in 1999.
  
• According to the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research and Educational Trust, premiums for employer-sponsored health insurance in the United States have been rising four times faster on average than workers’ earnings since 1999.
  
• About 1.5 million families lose their homes to foreclosure every year due to unaffordable medical costs.
  
• Retiring elderly couples will need $250,000 in savings just to pay for the most basic medical coverage.
  

More info:
http://www.nchc.org/facts/cost.shtml

If you want a FREE Healthcare sheet to print and hand out, well, here you go! Save the image to your hard drive and print out.




LET'S GET BUSY!!!

[Vinca]

1. Anyone who happens upon a public meeting with a Senator or

Congressman needs to get the point across. Relating horror stories would make an impact on the crowd. Here's one I just read on the Cafferty File. Having had so many people in my family die of colon cancer, it really hit home.

From someone named Theresa:

Jack, my brother died last week of colon cancer. He worked until 2 weeks before his death when he was taken by ambulance to the ER, needing 2 pints of blood and with a blood pressure that would have you or me passed out on the floor. He is survived by his wife of 42 years, 3 sons, 5 grandchildren and $56,000 owed in medical bills. He had insurance through his employer, but it reached its limit early last year and wouldn’t pay anymore. He stopped his treatments months ago because he didn’t want his wife to lose their home which will probably still occur the insurance policy he had on their bank loan dropped him when he became so ill. So you ask if I think congress should postpone their vacation? I think they have lost their soul and should try to postpone dying. I loved my brother. He was a proud man who could have probably quit work when he became ill and drawn his social security and medicare. Maybe he was a foolish man for not doing so, but he believed in working and paying his own way even though he paid taxes from the time he served in the navy as a very young man until his last day at work 2 weeks before he died. I say he deserved better than being ignored by a corporately owned government (whose medical care is paid for by us for life) and who along with the corporately owned media shames us into believing we’re getting something we didn’t pay for already.

http://caffertyfile.blogs.cnn.com/2009/07/23/should-congress-stay-in-session-until-health-care-legislation-is-completed/#comments

[zulchzulu]

2. Find out where your congress peep will be this month and visit

Exactly as you said...

[Vinca]

3. Mine is already on board . . . I've actually gotten a personal response from him.

I'll keep an eye out for any senatorial activity. I suspect if I confronted Judd Gregg in a public forum he'd tell me to drop dead.

[HopeOverFear]

4. bookmarked and rec'd thanks Zulch

[bleever]

5. K&R.

Thanks.