LA Philanthropy Watch

This ad from Americans for Financial Reform, Americans for Fairness in Lending, and Change to Win is at Tell the Chamber of Commerce & Big Banks to Stop Lying about the CFPA. It features the voices of Barack Obama (on exploding toasters) and Elizabeth Warren (on the middle class under siege for 30 years) advocating for a strong, independent Consumer Financial Protection Agency.

The headline and subhead (in a story by Janet Hook and Noam N. Levey) in this morning’s print edition of the Los Angeles Times: “It’s now up to Obama, Pelosi: The healthcare overhaul may rest on his leadership and her power of persuasion.”  That sounds right.

As the President has begun to campaign on behalf of health care reform, and the legislation is under threat from both the left and right flanks of Congressional Democrats, a number of progressive commentators have begun to rally ’round the reform flag.

Last Friday at TPM Café Theda Skocpol (Harvard sociologist and political scientist, whose scholarly focus has included the nonprofit and voluntary sector) called on Democrats of all stripes to get on board with health care reform while the window of opportunity to pass it is still open.

“At the risk of irritating people on the left, this is NOT the moment for ‘progressives’ to demand a public option. Nor is it the moment for either pro-choice feminists or pro-life Democrats to derail reform.”

I emphatically agree with her that there is a critical need now to turn attention to getting the job done (and that her abrasive tone will irritate).

At Mother Jones Kevin Drum links to Dr. Skocpol and suggests, “The current bill isn’t perfect, but the combination of community rating at the national level with an individual mandate is likely to be the beginning of the end for private health insurance as we know it.”

At The New Republic Jonathan Chait thinks we’re suffering from myopia about the historical nature of this legislation. He objects to Jane Hamsher on the left, John McCain on the right, and the editorial board of the Washington Post in the middle. “It’s natural to focus on improving a piece of legislation whose details remain in flux. The problem comes when the desire to improve becomes the sole focus for evaluating it. Nearly any of the great political advances in American history, viewed from ground level, looked like a pastiche of grubby compromises and half measures. At some point the imperative is to take the broader view.”  [Editor's note: typo corrected.]

At Think Progress Matt Yglesias notes that (FireDogLake aside) the left is solidly on board with reform: MoveOn.org, SEIU, AFSME, the NAACP, LLUAC, and the liberal columnists at both the New York Times and Washington Post have all endorsed passage of the legislation.

As President Obama campaigns – with an eye on wavering Members of Congress, can Speaker Pelosi round up the votes in the House?  We’ll know soon.

(Image from February rally for health care reform in front of Los Angeles offices of Anthem Blue Cross.)

“If Congress can complete work on health-care legislation and send it to the president (as of mid-January, the final bill is still under negotiation), it will be a stunning historical achievement and the most important liberal reform since the 1960s. It may also be the most underappreciated social legislation in recent history. Never in my experience has such a big reform been treated as so small. Never have Democratic members of Congress who are putting their careers on the line for something they believe in been so vilified as sellouts by influential progressives. And never have those progressives been so grudging in their endorsement of landmark legislation or so willing to see it defeated.”

The opening paragraph of Paul Starr’s article, “Underrating Reform,” in the March 2010 Prospect.

Hat tip to Kevin Drum (”Pass the Bill” at Mother Jones) who says, “Exactly right.”  He also links approvingly to a James Monroe op-ed, “Democrats must find their voice on healthcare reform,” in this morning’s Los Angeles Times.  Professor Monroe contrasts the response of two Democratic Presidents to health care reform setbacks separated by nearly five decades.

President Clinton and Democrats in 1994 “dropped the issue and walked away.”  President Truman heard critics greet his health care plan with cries of “socialism!” and watched the loss of Democratic majorities in Congress in the off-year election before the 1948 Presidential campaign.

“If ever there was a time to retreat on healthcare, this was it. Instead, Truman … found his voice. He passionately embraced the policies he cared about, especially national health insurance. Fifteen times a day on his long, famous whistle-stop tour he would rise and scorch the medical lobbies and their congressional pals. Truman, of course, won that election. He never came close on healthcare reform, but he kept on fighting. As a result, he left his party a legacy, an ideal to fight for.”

We may see this evening, in his State of the Union address, which path Barack Obama intends to take.

(Photograph of Harry Truman from the Naval Historical Center.)