Home > Andy Stern Points to Health Care
By Greg Moses July 28, 2004
Like environmentalists looking back on James Watt, or
peace activists looking back on the draft, lefty
organizers realize they will lose something if they
lose Bush in November. Question is: will electing Kerry
be worth the cost? While many leftists answer with a
resounding no, Andy Stern this week, in a pair of
reports clipped and distributed by the Portside list,
answers no, and yes.
On the no side, Stern tells David Broder that a Bush
defeat will leave labor feeling less threatened, in
less of a fighting mood, and less conflicted among its
membership. Bad signs for movement history. In effect,
Stern tells Broder that he agrees with critics who
allege that the left will be deflated by a Kerry win.
On the yes side, however, Stern replies in a statement
at the website of the Service Employees International
Union (SEIU), that he is backing a $65 million campaign
to elect Kerry. Why? Because Kerry has been a better
friend to labor over the years and because labor does,
in fact, expect better things from a Kerry
administration.
Stern’s journey from no to yes is interesting to
consider as an internet play made during a widely
touted internet convention, where bloggers have made
their official debut. With the help of the internet,
Stern can spin one way in the morning, another in the
afternoon, offering on one hand important concessions
to leftist critics while presenting on the other hand a
clear determination to get Kerry elected.
Between yes and no, Stern also offers an intriguing
strategic proposal that sets out for leftists and labor
activists an agenda that might help to reclaim long-
lost liberal momentum in American politics. If labor is
going to stand loyal with Kerry, says Stern, they
expect that Kerry will stand loyal with them by fixing
health care in the first hundred days of his
administration.
At first glance, the Stern proposal looks neat,
unwinnable, and an evasion of Iraq. But it may also
deserve further consideration. The neatness of the
Stern deal gives left organizers a clear deadline for
their honeymoon with Kerry. If Kerry doesn’t move on
health care, if Kerry doesn’t deliver a fixed health
care system very early, then the gloves come back off.
If Kerry does deliver health care, then left organizers
can chalk up an achievement worth their while.
But fixing health care in 100 days? Haven’t we seen
something like this before? Is this plan to be counted
as anything more than Hilary’s revenge? Doesn’t it seem
incredible to think that the empire beast of the USA
government, which just roared through Iraq, is going to
change its spots by Spring Break 2005, and suddenly lie
down with the lambs of universal health care?
And on the question of Iraq, how can Kerry’s campaign
promises on that front be nailed to the same platform
as universal health care? So far, he is promising more
money for the Iraq war, not less. Is the health care
issue supposed to make us forget all about Iraq?
On second thought, however, there is a chance that
Stern’s proposal for a health care agenda might keep
the left moving toward peace under a Kerry
administration. If pressures for health care can be
assembled and funded, then budgets will have to shift.
It will be impossible to reconcile the books of health
care with the books of war. If Iraq is an empire’s
elective war that can be abandoned, then Stern’s plan
offers to Kerry’s activist base a way to mobilize a
peace presidency as soon as the oath of office is
taken.
If this strategy works, then the left can begin winning
sooner than we think. Indeed, if it possible for the
left to do something coherent in the coming year,
Stern’s plan beats any other that I’ve heard.
But there are a lot of "ifs" here. For instance, can
this empire walk away from the Iraq war? Is Kerry’s
left base capable of shaking up American politics to
the point where universal health care becomes a
political mandate? To answer these questions would
require from left and labor activists a sober inventory
of what they are able to bring to the struggle at hand.
Labor Day would mark an auspicious time to launch the
strategy that Stern has in mind. As he says, "Fixing
the health care system in America is going to take the
blood, sweat, and tears of all of us and we’ll need the
energy and unity we have now to do it." Question is:
are activists willing to risk it?
Greg Moses is editor of Peacefile and author of
Revolution of Conscience: Martin Luther King, Jr. and
the Philosophy of Nonviolence.