You know at the beginning of the pandemic I thought it created the perfect basis to win M4A. It did create the perfect MORAL basis, but seriously weakened our organizational & political basis for doing so, & not just bc we couldn’t knock doors anymore.

The pandemic has created a profound societal & economic crisis that has empowered the section of the Dem base that just “wants things to go back to normal” while lowering expectations for everyone else of what can be accomplished

It’s also created completely new fights, like this stimulus. We’re fighting for the basic idea that the government has any responsibility at all for its citizens in a way we weren’t a year ago, and sadly we’re losing it

We have to also account for the fact that Bernie lost. Whether or not we like it that had a big impact on your average non-politics-addicted person’s perception of M4A. From “it’s an ambitious proposal but possible” to “it’s a moonshot so I’m tuning out now”

Obviously I don’t think it’s a moonshot, but we have to acknowledge that we’ve experienced a setback, that we’re not fighting from the same place we were in 2019, and we need to think seriously about how to build ourselves out of it