A new poll on the Massachusetts Senate race has state Attorney General Martha Coakley dominating the field with 37 percent support from registered Democrats and unenrolled voters, who are eligible to vote in the primary. That is more than double her nearest challenger, with 14 percent backing Boston Celtics co-owner Steve Pagliuca and 13 percent supporting Congressman Mike Capuano.

The Hill is reporting that Democrats are 'rebranding' the public option as 'Medicare for All.':

Say hello to “Medicare Part E” — as in, “Medicare for Everyone.”

House Democrats are looking at re-branding the public health insurance option as Medicare, an established government healthcare program that is better known than the public option.

Seems Congress has finally locked on to the fact that Medicare's pretty popular:

While much of the public is foggy on what a public option actually is, people understand Medicare. It also would place the new public option within the rubric of a familiar system rather than something new and unknown.

Health care reform panel set for Thursday night

Participants in the panel discussion include Washington, D.C. resident Donna Smith of the National Nurses Organizing Committee; Rob Stone, a Bloomington, Ind.-based emergency room physician and Indiana coordinator for Physicians for a National Health Program; and William Connolly, a professor of philosophy and religion at the University of Evansville and a member of the steering committee of Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Plan.

I see three likely scenarios. One, the whole bill implodes and no health care bill passes. In that case we start over. Two, a bill passes with mandates, subsidies for junk insurance, and no public option, BUT DOES CONTAIN THE KUCINICH AMENDMENT. In that case the battle moves to the states, big time. Three, a bill passes with mandates, subsidies for junk insurance, a pathetic public option, and no Kucinich amendment.

I was late to the rally, I came in while the Raging Grannies were singing. Given that it had been raining, there was a decent crowd, I would guess 100 people. The Progressive Democrats of America were there wearing hospital gowns over their clothes with signs in the front that said "health insurance is like a hospital gown" with a sign in back that said "You are not really covered." They were wearing false fannies for full effect. It was pretty funny. Then the doctor's spoke. They told all the stories we have heard about how they cannot practice medicine the way they were taught in a for profit system.

Time to go to Jail; Civil Disobedience Campaign "Patients NOT Profits: Healthcare for All"

On September 29th in New York City, the Mobilization for Health Care for All is launching a campaign of "Patients Not Profit" sit-ins at insurance company offices to demand an end to a system that profits by denying people care and puts insurance company bureaucrats between doctors and patients. We want the real "public option": improved Medicare for All, a national single payer plan that cuts out the profit and puts patients first.
Private insurance death panels are killing people every day and blocking real health care reform.

It's time for nonviolent civil disobedience to turn the tide.

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Really, I am just going to STFU.

Because one must not annoy one's health insurance company, nor must one annoy one's current employer, who may in fact be demanding twice as much work for no more pay, because one is bound to one's job as serfs were once bound to the land, but we won't really want to talk about it because the lives of oneself and one's loved ones may depend on one's ability to STFU.

And even though, more and more, one is encountering denial of medicines and services, in an apparent attempt to "cut costs" -- or perhaps "increase profits"? one must not talk about that.

Even though fiddling around with meds can sometimes, um, down the road, cause those who had previously been stable to, um, you know de-stabilize? Resulting in repeated, you know, hospitalizations? Which are actually more costly?

But -- I'd better watch what I say.

Then, I'll watch what you say.

Insisting on "Medicare Equality"? "Medicare for All"?

STFU.

Dr. Flowers to Dems: Vote Against Obamacare

Dr. Margaret Flowers wants the 86 co-sponsors of the House single payer bill (HR 676) to vote against Obamacare.

Dr. Flowers is a leader of the group Physicians for a National Health Program, whose 17,000 member doctors support a single payer, Medicare for All system for the United States.

Visible Vigils for Health Care Reform

The next two months will be critical in the shaping of health care bills in the U.S. Congress. We want to let our Congressmen know that Rhode Islanders support meaningful health care reform, a strong national health care option (“Medicare-For-All”). We are holding “Visible Vigils” across the state every Tuesday evening between 4:30 and 6:00 p.m. from September 15 until November 17th.

Update: Join the Mad as Hell Doctors on Sept. 30th in Washington, DC

The Mad As Hell Doctors have been traveling across the country speaking out, educating and listening. They are appropriately angry at the current situation (which they distinguish from the destructive rage witnessed recently at Town Halls) and are doing something about it.

The tour will arrive in Washington, D.C on Wednesday, September 30th. We hope you can join us for their final stop – the White House. ...

...Meet at McPherson Square at 3 pm to march down Vermont Ave to Lafayette Park. Rally begins at 4 pm with music and exciting speakers

.

Single-payer health-care system touted by supporters

GARY — Unlike recent town halls and tea parties focusing on health care reform, there was little vitriol, name-calling and rage at McBride Hall in Gary on Friday.

Rather, the 200 local retirees, union workers and officials, and health-reform activists who gathered listened and clapped to support physicians backing a single-payer health-care system.

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Group to walk for health care

A van full of doctors from Oregon will be joined by local residents Tuesday night to advance the cause of Medicare for all ages.

The public is invited to the Indiana side of the Clark Memorial Bridge to participate in the Medicare-For-All Bridge walk. The Oregon group, calling themselves the Mad as Hell Doctors, left Portland earlier this month on a 27-city tour that will end in Washington, D.C.

September 20th – 27th, 2009

Join us in Washington D.C. September 24th, 4:30 pm
for the
3rd Annual Health Care Justice Vigil

In solidarity with American Patients United's 3nd Annual Health Care Justice Vigil in Washington DC, single-payer/Medicare For All healthcare activists are organizing solidarity vigils from New York City to the state of Washington. Also, the G20 Summit will take place in Pittsburgh on September 24-25, and provides another opportunity for single payer activism.

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To appear in this Sunday's Washington Post Outlook section:

George McGovern:

But what seems missing in the current battle is a single proposal that everyone can understand and that does not lend itself to demagoguery. If we want comprehensive health care for all our citizens, we can achieve it with a single sentence: Congress hereby extends Medicare to all Americans.

...

We recently bailed out the finance houses and banks to the tune of $700 billion. A country that can afford such an outlay while paying for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan can afford to do what every other advanced democracy has done: underwrite quality health care for all its citizens.

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unless you were compromising with yourself. I'm sick of hearing the "public option was the compromise". No, it wasn't. You can't compromise on something when it's the only policy for which you have advocated. The public option, not single payer, is the demand. A compromised public option is likely to be the compromise. Improved and Enhanced Medicare for All, or single payer, was never on the table. It was never part of the negotiations, thus it was never a policy up for compromise.

September 17, 2009, New York City

Single-Payer and Healthcare Reform–What’s Happening in Washington

Speakers: STANTON SHEK / ANTHONY ACCURSO / LEONARD RODBERG, PH.D
When: 7:30 PM
Where: Beth Israel Medical Center, Phillips Ambulatory Care Center, 10 Union Square East, Second Floor, Lecture Hall

I was indulging in the luxury of a Reuben at my local sandwich shop, and I overheard a change.org organizer's pitch when he came in to talk to the staff*. This was the key part of the pitch:

[ORGANIZER] ... a government-run public insurance** option.

WORKER: Like Medicare?

ORGANIZER: Exactly like Medicare.

BarbMD declares "This is what is sounds like when someone representing the Democratic wing of the Party speaks" in reference to AFL-CIO president Trumka laying down markers for what health reform must have, including the so-called public option (It is unclear if Trumka is referring to Hacker's 2007 Medicare Plus, or the sliver public option being debated in Congress). Trumka's line in the sand is the public option, but where do member unions stand?

The article is about a dispute between Jon Cooper and Gillibrand about who is more committed to the public option. Cooper is challenging Gillibrand in the 2010 primary.

Spokesman Matt Canter cited a Gillibrand mailing issued last week stating: "I continue to advocate for a public health care option, like "Medicare for All," that would allow people to buy in at an affordable rate - something like five or six percent of their income.

This is a way of piggy backing off of the popularity of the real Medicare for All without actually doing anything.

PhillyBurbs.com

He also repeatedly told seniors that he does not support a Medicare-for-all type health system.

"We can't have a single-payer system," he said. "We can't afford it."

As you know this is a lie. HR 676 would SAVE the taxpayers $400 billion a year.

If you live in Murphy's district, please contact Murphy and tell him that HR 676 would save us $400 billion a year. Please write a letter to the local newspapers explaining the same.

Landrieu: Under "Very Few, If Any" Circumstances Would I Support A Public Option

"I'd like to cover everyone -- that would be the moral thing to do -- but it would be immoral to bankrupt the country while doing so," Landrieu said. The public option as currently conceived is expected to be a deficit reducer.

Now as we know, HR 676 would save the US Treasury $400 billion a year. That is $400 billion a year that Landrieu and others are willing to spend to prop up health insurance parasites.

Reid on stump in Pahrump

A group favoring House Bill HR 676 staked its claim along Highway 160.

HR 676, is the National Health Insurance Act, introduced by Congressman John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., who represents Detroit. Conyers' Web site states the bill's purpose is "to ensure that every American, regardless of income, employment status, or race, has access to quality, affordable health care services."

According to organizer Margery Kay Behrens, who has lived in Pahrump for 15 years, "Organizing for America has requested our presence to greet Harry Reid and the tea baggers with signs, banners and 'tea'-shirts in support of HR 676, single-payer health care."

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What frustrates single payer advocates the most is how they have been sidelined from the national health finance reform debate. People who support single payer, or enhanced and improved Medicare for All, have long waited for the chance to present their case to the American people for real health care reform via a single payer method. With the ever increasing cost of care, and the growing number of uninsured and under insured Americans, single payer advocates view inclusion of proposals that support a one payer system for financing health care an essential part of the debate.

Via Ed Cone the health care debate on the back of a napkin.

h/t BDA in VA