It's time for the people to vote on whether to join most of the rest of the economically-advanced countries of the world in providing health care as a right. Not as a complicated bureaucracy involving exchanges, Medicaid, Supreme Court decisions, large deductibles, subsidies, hard to navigate websites and incomprehensible insurance statements.Colorado is about to become the first state to hold that vote. Email I received just a few minutes ago sent to supporters of ColoradoCareYes, a group who created Initiative #20, a ballot initiative that will initiate single-payer health care in Colorado, states
Well over 100,000 supporters from all over Colorado signed the petition to get ColoradoCare on the ballot, definitively eclipsing the 98,492 necessary signatures we need to succeed. Thanks to the incredible work of nearly 600 volunteer petition carriers, ColoradoCare will make history when we deliver an ambulance full of petitions to the Colorado Secretary of State's office this Friday, October 23rd.
I then spoke with Owen Perkins, the political director of ColoradoCareYes, as to whether they were confident that they had enough signatures to ensure that the measure would be on the ballot (insofar as "Well over 100,000" is a pretty vague descriptor, and some 150,000+ signatures would be needed given typical validation rates). He assured me that they would be turning in enough signatures that he was "confident" that it would qualify.So yeah! Double yeah!! No quadruple yeah!!!!
Advocates of single-payer watched as hopes were dashed in California years ago with vetoes and legislative inaction. Congress refused to even consider the idea as Obamacare was being crafted. Finally, we watched as Vermont enacted enabling legislation, then failed to follow through on it. Let us hope that in Colorado...
We don't get fooled again.
They will be turning in the mass of signatures on Friday, and holding celebrations.
You need to be there when we celebrate this historic moment in time. Thanks to your support and effort, Colorado is poised to be the first state to offer all its residents a chance at universal health care, covering every Coloradan with high quality healthcare that saves some $5 billion over what we pay by putting a plan developed by Coloradans for Coloradans on the ballot in 2016. Like the territory of Wyoming leading the way in giving women the right to vote, like Massachusetts leading both the effort to set a minimum wage over 100 years ago and becoming the first state to legalize gay marriage just 11 years ago, so now Colorado is stepping up to take the lead on the effort to get universal health care at the state level, sparking a movement that will ultimately lead to a tipping point when the United States follows that lead -- and the precedent of every other industrialized country on the planet -- and makes universal health care available to all its residents. It starts here -- and it starts Friday!
Here are the events planned for Friday, October 23rd:
9:00 a.m. -- Denver -- deliver an ambulance full of petitions to The Secretary of State's office, at the 17th Avenue side of 700 Broadway.
9:30 a.m. -- Denver -- ColoradoCare rally and press conference at The Greek Amphitheater in Civic Center Park (1400 Bannock, by the City and County Building and across from the State Capitol) with speakers T.R. Reid (filmmaker and author of The Healing of America), Senator Irene Aguilar, Senator Jeanne Nicholson, Chip Bair (CEO of Beau Jo's), music, and more.
10:45 a.m. -- Fort Collins -- ColoradoCare rally and press conference at Oak Street Plaza, W. Oak St. in Fort Collins, 80524, with speakers Senator John Kefalas, Representative Joann Ginal, Representative Jeni Arndt, music and more.
2 p.m. -- Colorado Springs -- 1st Congregational Church, 20 E. Saint Vrain St. in Colorado Springs, 80903 with speakers Senator Irene Aguilar, Senator Jeanne Nicholson, music and more.
3 p.m. -- Grand Junction -- ColoradoCare rally and press conference at Mesa County Public Library, 443 North 6th St. in Grand Junction, 81501, with speakers T.R. Reid, Ivan Miller (Executive Director of ColoradoCareYES), music, and more.
