Washington
The Congressional push for real healthcare and labor law reform is heating up, and not a moment too soon. As expected, however, the corporate news media reporting leaves much to be desired. The following is a brief review of some of the recent developments in the ongoing battle to reform our healthcare system as well as restore the right to join a union.
Healthcare
During the final weeks of July both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives and their respective committees will be moving several different healthcare bills. Congressional Democrats and the Obama White House have declared that they want sweeping reform bills to pass full floor votes in each chamber by July 31. While this is an extremely ambitious time frame – and the final legislation will be measured on its merits – we applaud the sense of urgency now propelling the healthcare reform debate. That sense of urgency is sorely lacking most of the time on Capitol Hill when it comes to solving the problems confronting working people.
Keep in mind that various claims that this or that bill has “passed” are completely premature; what is being reported is that one or another piece of the larger bill has cleared a committee hurdle, or some other hurdle. And remember that what has “passed” and cleared such a hurdle might just as quickly be stripped out of the bill at the next junction in the lengthy and frequently contorted legislative process. There is a near certainty that whatever bills pass full House and Senate votes will also be different bills, which means that the merging of the two must be accomplished through a conference of House and Senate committees starting in September.
Our union laid out the markers for what must be included in any final reform legislation in mid May in the statement from the UE General Executive Board Please review this statement, in particular to be ready to measure the usefulness of the “public option” insurance plan which will be mandated by the legislation. There is also a need to defend the Kucinich amendment to the current House bill which would allow individual states to construct single-payer systems should they so desire. This amendment was won on July 17 in the House HELP committee (Health, Education, Labor and Pensions), but it is sure to come under attack as the bill moves to the next stage. More than 50 members of the House Progressive Caucus have indicated that they are opposing any further watering down of healthcare legislation, and on July 30 single-payer supporters will be once again lobbying lawmakers to hold the line against anti-reform moves by the insurance companies, the Republican congressional caucus, and some Democrats.
For ongoing updates about this critical legislative battle please visit the web pages of the following organizations supporting real reform;
Physicians for a National Health Care Program
Leadership Conference for Guaranteed Health Care
For those wanting to scan the text of the legislation itself you may do so via the web pages of the Senate and House committees with primary responsibility for this reform effort.
Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA)
Action on the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) is now almost certainly postponed until September, due to the failure of a number of Democrats in the Senate to stand up to the big business campaign of lies and distortions. Corporate media reports that the legislation is “dead” are false; the legislation will be weakened however. However disgraceful, this is not a surprising development. The watering down may include a substitution of a faster NLRB election for the “card check” provisions of the original EFCA bill, as well as weakening provisions of the bill which guarantee that workers who organize will achieve first union contracts through a mandatatory arbitration process. Visit our section on EFCA for details and background on this critically-needed legislation to restore the right to organize.
Commenting on these Congressional developments UE General Secretary-Treasurer Bruce Klipple said, “I urge all UE members to redouble their political action efforts on these two issues. Tell your lawmakers - again – that working people need real healthcare reform as well as EFCA to restore the right to join a union. There is no excuse for further stalling or watering down these bills; the only explanation is that too few members of Congress are willing to stand up to big business. Call your members of Congress, send them e-mails, and go visit their local offices. Tell them to stop making excuses for the corporations who have made these messes, and who profit from them. We have to ask ourselves whether or not there is a majority in our U.S. Congress who can recognize the fact that we have a disastrously overpriced and inefficient healthcare system, as well as a human rights disaster in the workplace. Both of these disasters are made by big business. The outcome of these two battles will be a test of whether Congressional Democrats and President Obama are serious about following through on their campaign promises. It’s as simple as that.”