Part One:
THERE’S ANOTHER CANDIDATE CHALLENGING MITCH MCCONNELL IN KENTUCKY
We speak with Travis Waldron, a reporter with HuffPost, about the “other” Democratic candidate who is trying to unseat Mitch McConnell in Kentucky. We’ve all heard of Amy McGrath, a better-known and better-funded Democrat. But Charles Booker, though less known outside of Kentucky, is fighting to save coal country from McConnell’s right-wing policies.
Booker grew up in the poorest zip code in Louisville, the poorest city in Kentucky. He understands, deep down, how desperate are the lives of Appalachian families who for generations have risked their health eking out a living in the coal mines. He understands the Hobson’s choice these folks face: the coal industry is the only livelihood they’ve ever known, but it’s killing them while it’s not really even feeding them very well.
Booker pitches voters on an aggressive response to the climate crisis and the collapse of Kentucky’s coal industry. He advocates for programs that offer former miners an opportunity to support their families while replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy.
In some respects, the Kentucky Senate race is analogous to the national race for the presidency. Would Charles Booker be the authentic leader that regular Kentuckians — the hard-working and the vulnerable who have been exploited for all these years — truly need to guide them toward a better future? Does he have a chance to beat(first McGrath and then) McConnell? Or might his candidacy simply undermine McGrath and enable “Senator No” McConnell to continue his harmful obstructionism?
Part Two:
HOW BIG INSURANCE KILLED A PUBLIC OPTION PLAN IN THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT
Our guest is Shefali Luthra, correspondent from Kaiser Health News. We discuss her article: “Insurers Sank Connecticut’s Public Option and What That Means for the U.S.” as a whole. When Obamacare was still in Congress, there was a draft that included a public option. Thie big-money lobbyists (representing insurance companies, hospitals and some doctors) quickly killed the ACA’s public option. But individual states were left free to adopt their own additional options if they chose.
The State of Connecticut’s legislature went ahead and passed a public option law, but the insurance industry (which is extremely powerful in Hartford) lobbied hard to make sure the bill never became law. Industry groups encouraged their members to make their voices heard as well.
What does the Connecticut experience teach us about the national debate over making health care both available and affordable? Does the (justified) panic over the coronavirus change the debate in any identifiable way?
WHY DID JOE BIDEN SAY HE’D VETO MEDICARE FOR ALL, EVEN IF BOTH HOUSES OF CONGRESS PASSED IT?
Finally, we discuss Joe Biden’s shocking statement yesterday that, even if both houses of Congress passed some kind of Medicare for All bill, as president Biden would veto it! We tried to understand why he would say this, or whether he simply doesn’t understand that a so-called Medicare for All bill that the Congress might adopt is not necessarily the exact same bill proposed now by Bernie Sanders or the modified proposal put forward by Elizabeth Warren. Wouldn’t the two houses of Congress have crafted a bill that they knew would work, the cost of which would be paid for, and the vast majority of American consumers would support.
