Dear Mr. President,
If you have not heard it yet let me be the one to tell you that liberals and progressives--the people who fought so hard for you so you would win the primaries and the general election--are growing more and more disappointed with the way you are governing. There are plenty of places where we have to agree to disagree but when it comes to saving lives and fixing our broken health care system we have very little patience left.
I understand that Congress, and especially the Senate, has been heinously corrupted by the contributions and lobbyists paid for by corporate interests. And I understand that Americans are usually opposed to radical changes, especially in something as so essential as health care. And if our system was only marginally malfunctioning incrementalism would be fine but people are dying and families are being ruined by our current system and that is unacceptable after we worked so tirelessly to get you and more fellow Democrats elected. And you have indeed, at the start, passed legislation that has been long championed by progressives such as the Lily Ledbetter Equal Pay Act and desrve to be thanked and applauded for that but that initial shine has worn off.
2010 is going to be a difficult election if you stay on the path you are currently on because you will continue to lose strong support from your base. And at the same time the GOP base is being energized so they can vote out the evil socialist dictator that wants to kill grandma and Trig, who wants to turn America into the U.S.S.R. (which those morans do not even realize does not exist any more), and who wants to round up all gun owners and true Christians to put them into FEMA concentration camps. Some are even convinced you are the Anti-Christ (again, showing their stupidity as antichrist appears in the bible only four times, once in the plural form, and it only meant against the teachings and ways of Christ and not an actual being). Without the support of liberals doing all the grunt work for free--remember the GOP had to pay people to campaign for McCain it won't be like that the next time around as the base is going to do their best to nominate a wingnut they can rally around like Sarah Palin or Newt Gingrich--you and the Democratic party will be in serious trouble. You are going to desperately need us for that hit the streets work and if you do not get the public option through you will lose a sizable portion of your dedicated volunteers.
So the question you must ask yourself what is more important? Do you want to pass the public option and risk not getting a second term or do you want to negotiate away the public option and insure electoral losses in 2010 and your own loss in 2012? Because if you give up on it we are most likely going to give up on you. We worked so hard to insure your election and a sizable majority in both of the houses of Congress and we did not do that so health insurance companies could get their everybody has to buy their crappy, expensive insurance mandate without a public option to act as a free market cost control mechanism. That path will bankrupt us. We already negotiated away our true choice, single payer, so do not expect us to negotiate away the public option and do not expect us to work so fervently for you and our fellow Democrats next time around. We won't be able to because our hearts will be broken and no amount of soaring, election time rhetoric will mend them.