Remember this ad to which you could add your name?
Well, it's aired in Sen. Blanche Lincoln's (D-AR) and Sen. Kay Hagan's (D-NC) districts with happy success. From a PCCC email:
In the last 72 hours, two senators named in our TV ad -- Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) and Kay Hagan (D-NC) -- announced support for the public option!
The big lesson? Pressure works. TV ads work. Now it's our job to keep the momentum high. So we'll be running versions of our hard-hitting ad in targeted states -- pressuring individual Senate Democrats back home where it hurts most. We just need you to help us decide where.
Click here to cast your vote!
On the voting page, you'll see profiles of eight senators -- including how much money they've taken from the health and insurance interests, whether they sit on important committees, and their statements on the public option. Each version of the ad will feature the names of a senator's local constituents who "signed" our ad -- representing the 76% of Americans who demand a public option. It will also display the senator's big contributors.
We know that these ads are working. Not only have our ads been featured in the New York Times and Washington Post (which said we're rattling Democratic senators), but MoveOn and Blue America have been running ads in Sen. Hagan and Sen. Lincoln's home states. And the result? They are coming around. Two down, eight to go.
Now before any of you start dismissing the campaign because it's not single payer--please keep in mind that single payer is not on the table, nor is it likely to be on this go-round of health care reform. Obama has said that it would be too "disruptive" to the existing system. Our goal--and I speak for Blue America's campaign and presumably PCCC as well--is to fight for the most vibrant public option possible currently and then to keep incrementally fighting for something closer and more akin to a single payer.
I believe strongly that we will eventually come around on single payer in this country. But we need to work for it tactically and intelligently, or we risk having the whole thing blow up in our faces as it did in 1993.
