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Whither the fight for national health care?
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s we prepare this Volunteer for the press, theprospect is bad for the passage of any worth-while health care legislation.Responsibility for the present setback falls on thecongressional combination of reactionary Repub-licans and “conservative” Democrats. They are out tokill or, at least, maim, any beneficial measures. And,of course, it must not be forgotten or forgiven, thatthese same legislators deny the rest of the populationthe health care that they themselves enjoy, paid forby all the people.Despite all the flaws contained in the Clintons’original proposals, and the tactical errors committedin the original planning stages, they have projectedthe image of health care with a sharpness that hasnever before existed in American political discourse.In the past hundred years, healthcare legislation hasbeen enacted in one industrial country after another,but one has heard only muffled and crushed refer-ences to it in the U.S. Congress. The Clintons mustbe given credit for nullifying this obscene evasion.The criminals here are the usual suspects: thosesections of the insurance industry which refuse toconsent to any modification of their charges and pro-cedures, the pharmaceutical companies and doctorsmore devoted to mammon than Hippocrates.There is an important ideological component of this fight. It is necessary to counteract and defeatthe promoted notion that the government cannot doanything right. It is with this kind of barrage thatNixon and Reagan, Bush, Dole and Gingrich havecovered up the ways in which they have handed overresources and treasures to the most powerful, andthereby worsened the plight of the powerless.What lies ahead? Protracted fight. The constant-ly increasing need is too great for the fight to beabandoned. Single payer insurance remains the bestoption. The fight for this kind of coverage may haveto shift from the national arena – to be waged on astate-by-state basis. The ever present puppets inCongress have already proposed making these stateinitiatives illegal. This only proves how determinedtheir proponents must be.All of us must join in this fight.
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The
V
olunteer
Journal of the
Veterans of theAbraham Lincoln Brigade
799 Broadway, Rm 227New York, NY 10003(212) 674-5552
Editor
Leonard Levenson
Editorial Board
Abe Smorodin • Bill Susman • Irving Weissman
Contributing Editor
Seymour Joseph
Submission of Manuscripts
Please send manuscripts typewritten and double-spaced, if possible. If you wish your manuscripts returned, enclose a self-ad d r es se d ,
stamped envelope
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Support people’s rightto travel to Cuba
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t has been reported that Castro has called for ameeting with Clinton to resolve outstanding differ-ences between the U.S. and Cuba. If Rabin couldmeet with Arafat, Nixon with Deng Xiaoping, thatrequest certainly ought to fall within the range of possibility.Meanwhile, the tightening of the U.S. embargonoose around Cuba is impelling thousands of Cubansto attempt migration under conditions hazardous tolife. There is a new urgency for continued support of the third Freedom to Travel Challenge by the SanFrancisco-based Global Exchange, planned for Oct. 1through 9, and of the fourth Pastors for PeaceFriendship Caravan scheduled for Nov. 2 throughNov. 27. The latter will include a parallel CanadianCaravan which will travel west to east, joining theU.S. contingent in Washington, DC. The mergedCaravan will then proceed north into Canada wherethe accumulated humanitarian-aid supplies will beshipped to Cuba.Further information on these activities may beobtained by calling:• Global Exchange at (415) 558-9490, or FAX at(415) 2557498;• Pastors for Peace at (612) 378-0062.
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