Within the past month, I have received emails from a group called Organizing for America at "BarackObama.com." A small note at the bottom of the web site informs that this group is a project of the Democratic National Committee. An email on June 18, 2009, said:
Peter --
We've seen a tremendous response to President Obama's email this week and, as of today, an important milestone is within reach -- 100,000 donors to OFA's [Organization for America] health care campaign.
Many are new supporters who did not donate to last year's campaign but know how critical it is to end the broken status quo on health care.
Reaching 100,000* donors will send an unmistakable signal to the opponents of reform: the movement you built is prepared to knock on as many doors, call as many neighbors, and sacrifice as much time and energy as necessary to make health care reform a reality.
Please donate $5 or more today and put us over the top.
Thank you,
David Plouffe
---------Original Message--------- From: President Barack Obama Subject: This is why
David --
Last year, millions of Americans came together for a great purpose.
Folks like you assembled a grassroots movement that shocked the political establishment and changed the course of our nation. When Washington insiders counted us out, we put it all on the line and changed our democracy from the bottom up. But that's not why we did it.
The pundits told us it was impossible -- that the donations working people could afford and the hours volunteers could give would never loosen the vise grip of big money and powerful special interests. We proved them wrong. But as important as that was, that's not why we did it.
Today, spiraling health care costs are pushing our families and businesses to the brink of ruin, while millions of Americans go without the care they desperately need. Fixing this broken system will be enormously difficult. But we can succeed. The chance to make fundamental change like this in people's daily lives -- that is why we did it.
The campaign to pass real health care reform in 2009 is the biggest test of our movement since the election. Once again, victory is far from certain. Our opposition will be fierce, and they have been down this road before. To prevail, we must once more build a coast-to-coast operation ready to knock on doors, deploy volunteers, get out the facts, and show the world how real change happens in America.
And just like before, I cannot do it without your support.
So I'm asking you to remember all that you gave over the last two years to get us here -- all the time, resources, and faith you invested as a down payment to earn us our place at this crossroads in history. All that you've done has led up to this -- and whether or not our country takes the next crucial step depends on what you do right now.
Please donate whatever you can afford to support the campaign for real health care reform in 2009.
It doesn't matter how much you can give, as long as you give what you can. Millions of families on the brink are counting on us to do just that. I know we can deliver.
Thank you, so much, for getting us this far. And thank you for standing up once again to take us the rest of the way.
Sincerely,
President Barack Obama
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Paid for by Organizing for America, a project of the Democratic National Committee -- 430 South Capitol Street SE, Washington, D.C. 20003. This communication is not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee. Monetary contributions to the Democratic National Committee are not tax-deductible.
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*If the figure is true, their goal is to raise at least $500,000 plus the donation is not tax deductible.
I do not appreciate such appeals for monetary support less than six months following a new President's election. I suspect the DNC staff found themselves about to join the ranks of the unemployed unless they could start a new fundraising project. In any event, the appeal assumes that Democrats want the Obama health care plan. This appeal also sends the message that reform will occur on the basis of financial dealings, not on principled policy changes.
I do not like the way the President and his staff have sought input to a plan that the President want to have bi-partisan support. Many of us, a significant number of progressives and liberals within the Party, and a large portion of the public (if polls are accurate) favor a major change and view a single-payer approach positively.
I decided to reply to this appeal without a donation and with my rationale for not answering my party's appeal for money.
David,My position on health care reform, is quite different from President Obama's. Further, it is my understanding that Candidate Obama received $45 million in campaign contributions from the health care and pharmaceuticals industries. My taxes, along with every other taxpayer, are my contribution to the President's reform plans, yet I or other taxpaying members of the public have not had a principal role in the development of the reform package. And we provide $trillions to the President's coffers. Why do we Americans have to reinvent the wheel in this? The Administration is accountable for the quality of the nation's public health, of which the current discussions represent only a means to achieve that public health entitlement implicit in the Declaration of Independence and in the Constitution of 1787.
I want a single-payer health care system for all persons on our soil and for US citizens abroad. If private insurers want to offer supplemental products, more power to them, but they, the insurers, should not drive national health policy. As long as clinical standards and practices have to conform to multiple plans' rules, the administrative burden can only become greater due to normal inflationary wage increases. Also, the Medicare codes and its individual negotiations of acceptable payment rates with institutional providers continue to complicate efficient, effective and appropriate care and treatment.
Many complain about the USPS and ask if we want out health care à la post office. I think that the USPS would do well, certainly better than our complex and needlessly complicated financing of health care. For $0.47, I can send a letter to the right recipient, even if that person lives in Manhattan or Coral Gables. One price for that service anywhere in the United States.
The program being proposed by President Obama does not truly reform our health care system. Where are the price controls for treatment and care? Where are the price controls on pharmaceuticals prescribed by physicians? Where is the limitation on the indirect costs associated with providing health care? Where are the mandated appropriations for internal controls necessary for compliance by all providers and payers? It is in these areas that true reform must occur or else our health care expenditures will exceed the budget of the Department of Defense.
Yours truly,
I wonder where these donations will go [to whom] and why are they needed? Other web sites using names that appeal to a targeted demographic, appeal for donations to save different endangered species, to implement or to support alternative energy and green building agendas. Because all of this fundraising occurs on the internet, the cost to ask for donations is minimal, especially if well-designed software keeps track of the addressees and the funds received.
My question still concerns the use of these funds donated over the internet and why an appeal for money is needed at all. The public can telephone, write and fax their views to the President, to the DNC, to our Congressional representatives and to the Secretary of Health and Human Services. If one must send money, find an organization that is already lobbying for your position, such as the California Nurses Association (CNA).
# posted by Sherfdog @ 15:54
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