We’re Not Asking for the Moon

August 18, 2009

During Saturday's Highway to Health Care event in downtown Lincoln, NE, the crowd got a health care reform history lesson from Vince Powers. It was 100 years ago that President Teddy Roosevelt — a Republican — said the country needed national health care, but he ran into opposition from his party and was unsuccessful.

More from the Lincoln Journal Star:

In the 100 years since, Powers said, incredible advances have made lives easier and better — the automobile, telephone, TV, jet planes, the Internet.

Yet, he said, all over Lincoln, the state and the country, people are worried they may go bankrupt if they get sick because they don't have health insurance.

"How can we get someone on the moon in that 100 years since Teddy Roosevelt, but we can't get health insurance?" he asked the crowd.

We're not asking for the moon, but real health care reform that puts people ahead of insurance company profits. After a week on the Highway to Health Care, it's clear we've really tapped into something — people are eager to learn fact from fiction in a health care debate where opponents spread lies and misinformation.

Stop after stop, we're sending a powerful message to Congress — we need to fix health care, and we need to do it now. For more from Nebraska, watch this report from KPTM Fox-42 in Omaha.

After stops yesterday and today in Fayetteville and Little Rock, we've crossed into Louisiana where we'll be stopping in Shreveport and Baton Rouge. Then we're back on the highway to Indiana, Ohio, Virginia, Delaware and, finally, Maine.

By the way, our Facebook page has 3,141 fans right now — are you a fan? How about your friends? Help us surpass 3,200 today — and pass H.R. 3200 next month! Thanks for your help.