JERSEY CITY HEALTH CARE VIGIL 9/2/09

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Photos from the JERSEY CITY INDIPENDENT
http://www.jerseycityindependent.com/

More pictures at: http://picasaweb.google.com/REDHOT269/HealthCareVigil#

WE MADE THE 11 O'CLOCK NEWS!!!!

On Sep.2nd MoveOn.org organized more than 300 "We Can't Afford to Wait" vigils all around the country. Many of our members attended the vigil we held at Hournal Square in Jersey City, NJ. It was a truely remarkable event. It was our biggest event of the year, a scathing indictment of our broken health care system.

WWOR Channel 9, Mike Gilliam,a My9 News Reporter/Anchor and his crew did extensive interviews and filming at our vigil and then aired a very positive piece on the 11 o’clock news. Take a look:

To hear so many stories, see so many candles, stand shoulder to shoulder with so many other people who care so deeply about health care reform was truly moving.
Remember, it was only three or four weeks ago when it seemed a loud few would overpower the calls for reform from the many.
But throughout August, MoveOn members and other health care supporters turned out in droves to more than 700 town halls and meetings with members of Congress. By the end of the month, most public events were dominated by health care supporters, not the opposition.
And last night we shared stories of people bankrupted by medical bills and shut out by pre-existing conditions.

The New York Times wrote, "Under the banner of 'Can't Afford To Wait,' the vigils...put a human face on the need for" health care reform. Many local newspapers and TV stations prominently covered last night MoveOn vigils and last night they made it on to the front page of the Washington Post's website.
Next week, lawmakers will return to D.C. with these vigils fresh in their minds.

And for all who still have doubts about the necessity of a strong PUBLIC OPTION, I just want to quote here something Robert H. LeBow MD wrote at the end of his book "HEALTH CARE MELTDOWN":

"...Tonight ..... I want you to go to a quiet place and think about what would happen to your community if your local fire and police departments were converted to for-profit, fee-for-service industries. Imagine them being financed with a combination of poorly funded public support, depending heavily on fee-for-service reimbursemnet (or bribery) from people who may or may not have funds to afford their service. Think of the chaos, the inequality, the unnecessary loss of life, the injustice, and the potential for abuse. Think about entire neighborhoods of lower income individuals or remote rural areas with no fire or police protection at all, because they are deemed "unprofitables."

Privatization of those services is unconscionable!

Now think about our health care system. Why should medicine be any different?"

Call Sen Lautenberg Fliers at Grove St

We are handing out fliers at Grove St PATH station, urging commuters to call Sen Lautenberg and give support for the ACES Act and reinstating EPA Authority over CO2.

Five of us handed out 100 fliers in less than an hour. Plenty of people shook their heads and walked past, but no one was against clean energy.

If you read this, please pick up the phone and

CALL SENATOR LAUTENBERG - 202 224 3224 ANY TIME, DAY OR NIGHT

PRESS 1 – to leave your message and say something like:

• I support the ACES Act (American Clean Energy and Security Act)
• I want the Senate EPW Committee to make it stronger by reinstating the authority of the EPA to regulate C02.
• Without this measure, Existing Coal Power Plants will continue to generate tons of CO2 that could be avoided with cheap and simple upgrades.

Then give your email address and home address (to verify you live in NJ)

We will do this again soon. Stay tuned to this channel.

Here's a short video (22 seconds), and a couple more pix.

Quick update on energy bill timing

From MoveOn e-mail dd 7/9/2009
.........................

Energy and health care are the two biggest issues on Capitol Hill right now, and MoveOn Councils are planning fantastic local actions this month urging their senators to support clean energy jobs and a public health insurance option.

And we just heard some news about the energy fight that we wanted to share. As you may know, we've been expecting a key vote on the big clean energy bill in the Senate Environment and Public Works committee by the end of this month.

Today, Senator Barbara Boxer—the Chairwoman of the key Senate committee now considering the big clean energy bill—announced that her committee won't vote on the bill until after the August recess.1

Actually, this doesn't change much for our summer organizing plans. The bill is still being written and debated now. And grassroots organizing to pressure key senators while the bill is in committee remains our best chance to fix it.

So we're moving ahead with our national day of action on July 23rd. That's when Councils working on health care and energy will hold media events all around the country to spread our message!

To check which actions are planned by our council please go to:
http://www.moveon.org/team/ and sign in

If you haven't joined a council yet you can check planned activities by searching for councils using your zip code

Let's Celebrate & Plan for the Senate!

Let’s celebrate! ACES passed and MO can take a lot of credit for making that happen! More than 44 Representatives signed the letter to Speaker Pelosi, asking for the three amendments we wanted.

The JC-Hoboken Council was responsible for getting Rep. Rothman to sign it! Thank you Glenn for getting our meeting with his aide!

But the bill passed the House by only seven votes, and the Senate will be tough; we will also strategize what to do in August.

If you know anyone who would like to get involved, invite them to RSVP.

Next Thursday, July 9 @ 7PM we'll get together to celebrate and discuss the next steps. (at the moment we have not yet decided where we will meet, so check back at the link below for further details)

Here is the link to sign up for this brainstorming event:
http://pol.moveon.org/event/events/hosts/index.html?event_id=94188&id=-10000761-HvxU2cx

Next steps for MoveOn Councils

Dear MoveOn Council member,
On Monday, we asked MoveOn members whether to move forward with a massive effort to fix the energy bill in the Senate—and a whopping 95% of them said yes! This is consistent with how Council members responded late last week.
Now, we wanted to give a special update about our next steps in the Power Up America campaign—and get your feedback on where we go from here.
Read on for more, then click here to a complete a survey about our next steps:
http://pol.moveon.org/powerup/nextsteps/councilsurvey.html?id=16489-8727613-YfczcQx&t=1
Here's what the landscape looks like in the Senate:
Just like in the House, conservative Democrats are already fighting hard to make sure the big energy bill protects the interests of Big Oil and Coal. In fact, they're pushing to weaken the legislation even more than their colleagues in the House already did.
In the next few weeks, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will take up work on their own version of the bill. Many members of the committee, including Chairwoman Barbara Boxer, are supporters of clean energy—but they'll be under tremendous pressure to preserve the worst provisions of the House bill.
One big thing that's at stake: The version of the bill passed in the House would repeal a key Clean Air Act provision and prevent the EPA from cleaning up global-warming pollution from dirty coal plants. So we'll be asking Chairwoman Boxer and the committee to pass a bill which doesn't have that problem.
Meanwhile, the fight over health care—MoveOn's other big campaign right now—is also heating up in the Senate. And it's a similar story—some conservative Democrats seem to be siding with the health insurance industry and trying to scrap President Obama's proposal for a public health insurance option.
So we face some critical questions: How can Councils be most effective moving into the big Senate fight on energy? And should Councils also begin working on health care?
To plan our next steps, we need to hear from you. (If you responded to our email last week, thank you! And we'd love to hear more from you now.) Click here to take an important survey to guide our next steps on energy and health care:
http://pol.moveon.org/powerup/nextsteps/councilsurvey.html?id=16489-8727613-YfczcQx&t=2
And as always, thanks for all you do.

JUNE ACTIONS

We just heard some breaking news that affects our Power Up campaign organizing this month—so we're writing with an important update.

The big clean energy jobs bill is moving through Congress more quickly than anyone anticipated. We're hearing reports from Washington that Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives are planning to hold a full floor vote the week of June 22nd.

That's a really big deal, and it means that we need to accelerate and intensify our organizing. The current draft of the bill has been weakened and isn't yet the strong clean energy jobs bill we've been fighting for. Right now, it's critically important that we persuade Congress to pass amendments strengthening the bill.

Here's what that means in practice

We need Congress to strengthen the bill in two key ways. First, the bill must ensure the creation of clean energy jobs by including a stronger renewable energy standard. Second, it must not remove President Obama's authority to crack down on global warming pollution from coal plants, refineries, and factories. In June we''ll focus our advocacy on these two fronts.

Here's what the Jersey City/ Hoboken Council has decided to do during the conference call on June 3, 2009

This new timeline for the bill means we need to ramp up our advocacy on progressive members of Congress. There's a great deal of pressure on these members to sit quietly and accept the weaker version of the bill.

So since our local representatives are progressives who supports clean energy, we have decided to organize three different actions to keep the pressure on.

1. 
   3 of our council's members will call Congressman Sires (Rossella) Congressman Payne (Jacquie) and Congressman Rothman (Glen) to ask them their position on three key issues (1. to authorize the EPA to regulate power plant emissions; 2 to call for stronger renewable energy mandate; 3 to cut emissions permits give-aways). We will ask them to lead the fight for a stronger bill. During the phone call, we will also ask them if at all possible to set up a personal meeting with some of the Clean Energy business owners or workers who have a vested interest in the bill. The goal is to have the representatives hear from them directly how this bill can create new economic opportunities and new jobs and why it must remain strong.


2. 
   
   This is a moment for rapid response. Move on will send a blast e-mail petition which should be signed by as many members as possible. Look for it in your e-mail box and reply asap. The petitions will be printed out and dropped off at each of the Congressman offices. Please add your comments to let your Congressman know your position.


3. 
   
   Our June actions need to happen before the big vote. To make a greater impact and add more voices, we have also decided to do a sign-on letter. We will ask local partner groups to sign a letter; and we will deliver this letter signed by many groups to the congressmen's offices. We will need to reach out to many groups, especially to groups that are important to the Reps., such as donors, and groups they have had endorsements from. We will need to call all these groups and we need all of our members to help. If each one of us calls 3 or 4 groups it will be an easy job. The 6/7 people that always make phone calls can’t do this alone. We need you to step up and help out. We need you to send an e-mail to jc.h.council@gmail.com and let us know how many groups from our list you are willing to call or if you want to call groups that you are already involved with and that in your opinion will be willing to sign-on. The call should not take more than a few minutes. We’ll send you a script to follow. So it is a very simple action but it is very important.

This is really a make-or-break moment in the fight for a new energy economy. We have a unique opportunity to influence legislation that’s in Congress as we speak and that’s very exciting.

Please help out. Contact us at jc.h.council@gmail.com. We need to push our members in the House—and be ready for round two of this fight when the bill moves to the Senate.