Comments on: February: A month of celebratory contradictions http://www.healinghealth.com/blog/archives/114 Susan Mazer's Blog Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:40:13 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.1 By: Judith Saum http://www.healinghealth.com/blog/archives/114#comment-36 Judith Saum Sun, 24 Feb 2008 15:49:42 +0000 http://www.healinghealth.com/blog/archives/114#comment-36 Susan, Your message of hope so fit's with the longing of our people, our community, our nation. I was a delegate to the County Democratic Convention yesterday (BTW, it wasn't the "State Convention" as you indicated in your blog. That doesn't happen until May.) It was truly energizing to be in a room of 2000 people, all with the same mission. To change the status quo. The political conversations around my table were enthralling. I met some wonderful people who, if I had met on the street, I would never have suspected I shared such commonality. Yet the "differences" were dramatic, too. The platform written by our County Democratic Platform reflected the difficulty of trying to come up with common solutions to the problems we face. A friend who was on the platform committee, called me last night, after it was all over, and described her frustration as the "floor" kept refusing to accept the platform the committee had crafted. The process itself had been very heated, according to her, and ultimately, the committee members were unable to come up with a strong statement on many topics, including a health care plan. (Only 2 of the 10 members on the committee supported a "single payer" plan, for example.) Hence the language to improve health care is very general and without significant substance. It will be interesting to see how all of this shakes out on the national level. So I guess ultimately we all have a personal vision of "change" and "hope" and what that means. For me, the attempt itself of trying to craft a plan for the future that will best serve our people, as "messy" as it was, was an exercise in hope. Susan, Your message of hope so fit’s with the longing of our people, our community, our nation. I was a delegate to the County Democratic Convention yesterday (BTW, it wasn’t the “State Convention” as you indicated in your blog. That doesn’t happen until May.) It was truly energizing to be in a room of 2000 people, all with the same mission. To change the status quo. The political conversations around my table were enthralling. I met some wonderful people who, if I had met on the street, I would never have suspected I shared such commonality.

Yet the “differences” were dramatic, too. The platform written by our County Democratic Platform reflected the difficulty of trying to come up with common solutions to the problems we face. A friend who was on the platform committee, called me last night, after it was all over, and described her frustration as the “floor” kept refusing to accept the platform the committee had crafted. The process itself had been very heated, according to her, and ultimately, the committee members were unable to come up with a strong statement on many topics, including a health care plan. (Only 2 of the 10 members on the committee supported a “single payer” plan, for example.) Hence the language to improve health care is very general and without significant substance. It will be interesting to see how all of this shakes out on the national level.

So I guess ultimately we all have a personal vision of “change” and “hope” and what that means.
For me, the attempt itself of trying to craft a plan for the future that will best serve our people, as “messy” as it was, was an exercise in hope.

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