Fight the Real Power: the Cause for a Public Option

I just finished watching Michael Moore's Capitalism: A Love Story, and boy oh boy, am I certain of one thing: the current battle over healthcare reform is a battle that must be won. It must be won, and can only be won, by the people and for the people. We are at the crossroads the Robert Johnson wrote about. As the King of the Delta Blues Johnson was well aware of the horrifically seductive forces of the human will that are easily exploited by those wishing to have their way with the body. Gold and vainglory are offered up as the payoff for complicity in schemes of exploitation and treachery. That cannot be enough today. And while I think it careless and intellectually lazy to couch any argument in terms of dichotomous forces, e.g., good vs. evil; right vs. wrong; the damned vs. the redeemed, I find myself willing to take that position in this case.

Admittedly, I am quite often wrong, wrong, wrong--whatever the situation. I often make mistakes and misjudge intentions, relying on the fallibility of my own human mind to try to discern the true from the false--separate that which is permanent from that which is fleeting. Accepted. I accept that, but please give me this one. Let me explain.

We live in a country that promises, at its very core, the pursuit of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The governance of our lives relies heavily on precepts offered by the Constitution which divides government into three ostensibly balancing entities: the judicial, the legislative, and the executive branches. We believe in the power of laws and many have given their lives that so many more of us have the birthrights promised through the vein of citizenship. We have fought for freedom from tyranny, freedom from unjust conditions, freedom from abuse, and moreover the freedom for all to be protected by the law. Yet, I am quite certain that we who have given our lives to the idea of freedom, and all it's noble sentiment, would not shed a precious tear nor a single drop of blood to protect the rights of Bank of America, Lehman Brothers, AIG, Monsanto, Pacific Bell, Blue Cross, Aetna, and the list goes on and on. We are at a crossroad in America. Which way do we go? How hard will we resist our elected officials buckling in the heat of this organized onslaught.

We elected a president who we thought would restore the rights of ordinary Americans to no longer be poked, penned, and squeezed by the multinational corporations which currently run our country. We finally, as a nation awoke to the reality that we live in a country that allows companies to count our lives as commodities. We became completely clear on the fact that they own everything! We saw as collective citizens the truth that there is no possibility for true democracy when a rapacious creditor (The Corporation) works in collusion with the government to take every penny you or I earn, not for our betterment, but instead, for their own profit. They work together to take everything. That is their job: to become richer and externalize all costs to us. They are vultures, they are snakes in the grass, they are the profligate brother eyeing his brother's kingdom. They have no soul. They have no conscience. They are not like you and I. They really do not care about people. They care about money.

So how do they do it? And moreover, how do we stop it?

They do it by exploiting the fear that we have of each other. If I am in my quiet heart a racist, an anti-Semite, a homophobe, a sexist--if I am fearful of those people coming over the border, if I am afraid that because you have something, it means I get nothing--well it's easy. Noam Chomsky says that we are a society trained to respond to images. We ebb and flow according to the images fed us by not only media, but also our neighbor. Within this society, overrun by subtle and powerful images, whenever I want people to think and then behave in a particular way, all I have to do is send out messages. My case in point: how did George W. Bush get re-elected in 2004? We were shocked. Well, we can blame the fear conservative churches have of gay marriage. It's the same impetus that convinces us that we need a new cell phone, when the one we have works just fine. Five years ago, we didn't have cell phones, but I buy a new one because if I do not, I fear that I will miss out on something. If they gays get married, I am somehow threatened. If the Latinos and Chinese continue to come to America, I fear I will miss out on something. If African American children get a decent education, then white children will not. It is the projection of fear onto an entire populace. It is a lie. And we must fight it--and fight it with tooth and nail.

I am almost a pacifist. I do not believe in violence as a solution. I do believe in organized resistance. We must resist. We must fight. We must not let them win. We must push these corporations to the side now if we are to ever be free. This is a critical stand. We must fight for a public option as part of health care reform. We must fight, because we are the people. We must fight, because only the people can save us. We must fight because our children depend on our will and our wisdom to guarantee their freedom to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.