More than SCHIP, the important action in the movement for guaranteed healthcare is happening in California, where the insurance industry almost pulled off the big scam, getting Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Speaker Fabian Nunez to cooperate on a plan forcing the sale of more expensive, unworkable insurance products-and blocking the guaranteed, single-payer reform this country needs.
Good news! The Schwarzenegger-Nunez scam is dead! This is a major victory for progressives, patients, and nurses. The Dems have figured out how bad a deal Schwarzenegger is offering, and the plan's main cheerleader Nunez is near-dead politically by revelations that his wife is now on the hospital industry payroll to the tune of six figures, and that he is struggling with a nasty case of luxury shopaholism with donor money.
Like a slow-motion earthquake the healthcare mess continues to roil the Golden State. Just this week, California Governor pitches the lottery as his secret weapon for solving the healthcare crisis, Speaker Nunez makes clear why he has to keep taking so much money from health insurance corporations, and mega-chain Sutter Healthcare faces the largest nurses strike in a decade.
(I've added some multimedia touches, including a video with Asm. Leno. It appears that the nurses will be off the job for 5 days as the hospital seems intent on locking them out for a little while. That'll show 'em. - promoted by Brian Leubitz)
The strike has already become a resounding success, dominating the media throughout the Bay Area, winning broad community support from different organizations, welcoming some 95% of nurses onto the picket line, and forcing Sutter to explain itself and its practices under a bright spotlight.
This Sutter strike affects 5,500 nurses at 16 different facilities. But it also affects each and every one of us. Nurses are walking the picket line for the dream of better health care in this country. Don't take it from me-listen to the striking nurses in their own words in this video.
