AOC lowers expectations on Medicare for All, admitting Sanders 'can't wave a magic wand' to pass it

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said Thursday that if Sen. Bernie Sanders were elected president, he still might not be able to get Medicare for All, his signature health plan, passed in Congress.

“A president can’t wave a magic wand and pass any legislation they want,” Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., told HuffPost this week.

While Ocasio-Cortez rarely tempers expectations when championing ideas like Medicare for All and the Green New Deal to fight climate change she helped author, she went on to suggest that under a President Sanders, a “compromise” might emerge on health care, even though she still considers Sanders’s bill the gold standard.

“The worst-case scenario? We compromise deeply and we end up getting a public option. Is that a nightmare? I don’t think so,” she said.

https://news.yahoo.com/aoc-lowers-expectations-on-medicare-for-all-admitting-sanders-cant-wave-a-magic-wand-to-pass-it-212943695.html

[RandySF]

1. She admitted the same last year about the Green New Deal

[mvd]

2. Well, she is right

I think even Bernie knows this but understandably won’t show that now. It may take some time, but having an advocate for it sure helps.

[TDale313]

3. Well, yeah... of course.

Still good to fight for it, start the discussions, make the case. It may take years... decades... but if you don’t start laying the groundwork you never get there. Republicans know this... they always play the long game and push for more than they can get right now.

[democratisphere]

4. Truth.

[pertello]

5. You may recall Buttigieg

His plan: designed to start as Medicare For All Who Want It and transition yo MDA as people realize the public option preferable for their needs. Don’t toss people off their hard won union medical insurance.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

6. One issue with M4A that I don't think I've seen addressed,

is that its proponents often compare it to the health care arrangements in the Nordic countries - that their systems are the ideal, or close to it, and that we should adopt their kind of system. Ideally, maybe we should. But here's the catch: Those countries have never had for-profit, privately-owned primary health care. In Norway, for example, the oldest hospital still in existence was built in 1277 and was operated by the church; later on, other charities ran the hospitals. After WWII the government took over the entire health care system, with the actual provision of services being managed by local governments. https://www.lifeinnorway.net/healthcare/ In contrast, the United States has never had government-provided health care, with the exception of the VA. Even Medicare isn't really government health care because it is provided by privately-owned and in many cases for-profit providers, and we and our employers, not the government, paid for it (and you still pay premiums). So the transition to a government-managed single-payer system would require massive restructuring of almost everything, that would take years to implement. Candidates flogging M4A aren't being honest if they're trying to convince voters that it's going to happen like flipping a switch as soon as there's a new administration.

[Watchfoxheadexplodes]

7. So, Bernie can't hmmmm

His premier flagship promise knocked down by his lead weapon.

[Cha]

8. K

[R B Garr]

9. OMG, this is sad and pathetic.

It’s been five years of this, and this is what it comes to? What the rest of us knew all along?

[Gothmog]

10. Joe Biden addressed this on Meet the Press

Link to tweet

?s=20

[Tom Rinaldo]

11. Same as it ever was. It takes time to build a winning constituency for any major change

It does not logically flow from that fact however that the sensible course defaults to halting work on building that constituency. We have moved much closer to achieving it over the last four years. The stronger we make the case, the sooner we will get there. We can't pass an amendment to repeal Citizens United through Congress now either. That doesn't mean we should stop advocating for that amendment.