AN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT OBAMA ON THE HEALTH PLAN FROM AN ARDENT SUPPORTER

Dear President Obama,

We live in a nation where a woman can run for one of our highest office with little understanding of geography and can quit a governorship midstream and yet she can sell a million copies of her book and get a job with the FOX network;

where an actor acting as a commentator can garnish incredible publicity by stating that the people of an island devastated by an earthquake deserve no money from us at all ("We already give them aid. It's called taxes.");

where a former president can bring us to our knees and a year later what he did is no longer remembered.

Dear Mr. President,

I am an ardent supporter of you and I am an ardent supporter of a universal health plan. I support the health program because I have seen firsthand how our health system built on greed and a lack of compassion destroys the human spirit. I support it for personal reasons and reasons that have nothing to do with me. Nonetheless, I understand when enough is enough.

Last night when Republican Scott Brown won the Senate seat in Massachusetts--a state that has now turned its back on the great liberal legacy of Teddy Kennedy just a few months after his death--I believe the message is clear.

I wrote you this letter to include this speech:

My fellow Americans,I am honored to come before you this night and talk about universal health care. When I made the pledge to give every American a choice to be healthy, to have insurance even when they have preconditions or lack the financial means to purchase health insurance, to make sure each American was able to get the care they needed because we are a great country made even greater when we all have access to quality healthcare, I did not believe the power of money could misrepresent facts and issues as effectively as it did. I did not believe the lobbyists who fought against this bill would do so out of greed and a lack of compassion. I thought strongly that our country could get around its divisive ideologies and work for an issue that is in the best interest of all Americans--economically, emotionally and compassionately.

I've been in office a little over a year. During that time I have passed legislation on ninety-one promises out of about five hundred that I made on the campaign trail. There are many other issues before us. A lack of viable jobs. The misuse of TARP funds. Large bonuses for banks paid from government monies. A war in Afghanistan. A souring impatience that a job can be done overnight correctly when many good things and ideas need time. The health bill will have to be one promise I can't keep.

I have spent a lot of time on the health bill. I have spent a lot of energy and strength on what I believe in. Now its time to move on. If a health bill is to come, it will have to come from within the Congress--a Congress that cares more about the people of this country. I may not agree with the bill in its entirety, but I will sign it if it is a good bill.

As your president, I have said a great many things and I have tried to make this nation a greater force--a force for the good of the world--and a force to be contended with at home.

I have 407 more promises to keep. A few have already failed on the first attempt. I will not give up. I just hope when I walk away from this speech, all of us--me included--will take a look around and reflect on how our nation in the grips of a grave economic downturn can continue to allow medical debts and a lack of quality care for everyone to continue.

We did not win World War ll in a year. We did not cure polio in a year. We did not land the first man in space in a year. But we did win the war, we did find the cure and we did succeed at landing on the moon. We will succeed at making this a better nation--a nation where everyone who wants to work can and where everyone who needs access to quality care can get it.

Today I ask for your patience. Today I ask for your help. Today I ask that we put aside our differences and come together because we are more alike than we are different and that's because first and foremost we are Americans and proud to be Americans.

Thank you.

Dear Mr. President,

As one of your most ardent supporters, I want to thank you for trying.

Michael H. Brownstein