FB post about Universal Healthcare in CA

[stopbush]

From Enact Universal Healthcare for California

A message from the founder: You might not like us after this newsletter. Let's talk about honesty.

* State constitution
Absolutely no discussion about expanded healthcare in California can honestly begin without talking about the state constitution. Right now, no matter how much you believe in or were told to believe about SB 562, it is impossible without amending the state constitution.
- Proposition 4 in 1979 imposed a constitutional spending cap on the state budget, "The Gann Limit." It's a spending cap that increases with inflation. Why haven't you heard of it? Because the people who run the state just put the big ticket items on the ballot. You've seen the effects, even if you don't know why. Case in point, and actually the second reason:
- Proposition 98 in 1988 was enacted as a direct response to the spending cap in order to protect education spending. 9 years after Proposition 4, we realized we shot our foot. However, Proposition 98 sends 50% of all funding to education. That protects education, which we are very fond of, but we're now seeing that any healthcare funds would be immediately cut in half. There goes that second foot.

That's why we filed a ballot measure that exempts healthcare, the California Healthcare Roadblock Removal Act. If anyone tells you SB 562 can get along fine without it, they are not being honest, and you should question their principles and their organization's principles.

* $400B
The total cost of healthcare in California is $400B. Own this number. Make peace with it. And use it to make your point. Do not shy away from $400B. Take it and swing it back: 70% of that is already paid by the federal and state governments. We'll need $100B to $150B to cover the remaining 6 million who are not covered by any insurance right now. You will need to own that. Be honest and keep talking about it. Don't bury the numbers. They are absolutely important. Healthcare is expensive. Get people used to the actual costs.

* Rendon
Did you know that Senator Lara (the author of SB 562) agrees with Speaker Rendon?

Let that sink in.

Did you rage quit our page? Well, some people did when we did our own research and pointed out that SB 562 had no cost controls, no funding, and ran afoul of the state constitution, just like Speaker Rendon said.

So, instead of organizing a recall campaign against the biggest labor leader in California and alienating all the unions, whipping up our supporters into a frenzy that culminated in death threats against Speaker Rendon (and recently Asm Jim Woods), talking about bill amendments no legislator had ever seen, and spreading fake memes against other healthcare supporters that didn't toe the line, we began our work to fix things.

Last week, Enact Universal Healthcare for CA sat down with Speaker Rendon's staff and talked about what was necessary to fix SB 562. The staff were very happy about our ideas and the ballot measure.

* Points
If you don't know much about us, we're a nonprofit, all-volunteer organization that wants to enact universal healthcare for California. In fact, that's our name. This is it. This is all we do.

We're not doing this to score political points to advance some other legislation. We don't use single payer supporters to show up at conventions to support our pet candidates but not show up at the actual committee hearings. We don't retcon the timeline and say funding was never intended to be a part of the bill. We certainly didn't lie to you for 20+ years and pretend the state constitution doesn't need to be amended.

We keep you informed. We keep it honest. And we expect nothing less from our supporters. A sign of maturity and intelligence is being able to change one's mind and improve in the face of reasonable evidence. If all of us can't do this ourselves, then we can't expect the general public to be persuaded either.

Thank you for your support, and thank you for keeping it honest.

Dale Fountain
Chairperson/CEO
Enact Universal Healthcare for CA, Inc.

[BigmanPigman]

1. I have been reading about different numbers

($35 billion-$78billion) that would be lost from Fed $ for CA if the Graham Cassidy Hellcare bill is passed. This figure isn't part of the math in the above discussion. I wonder how they will address that in their final estimates?

[Squinch]

2. Careful now. There is a whole contingent here who will call you a troll for raising that

constitutional reality, or indeed for even suggesting that we need to talk about any proposed single payer plan and how it will be funded and how much it will cost.

But good post.

[comradebillyboy]

3. Who knew it would be so difficult to get

universal health care? Only the people that looked at exactly how it might get done and who is going to pay and how much it will cost.