2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Bernie Sanders is not afraid to talk about SINGLE PAYER HEALTHCARE [View all]still_one
(92,061 posts)dogs and other democrats in Congress made it very clear they would not support it. They did not have the votes, and they had a very limited time to get something.
Whoever becomes President, including Bernie, will not be able to realize it either. Even if every single Democrat in Congress supported it, which they won't, they don't have the votes.
As for your argument that "if only the President would have advocated so single payer, he could have made a lot of hay with that fact", would have gone no where, and only delayed things. They did throw out trial balloons of Medicare for all, and the public option, and that was squashed immediately by the blue dogs. Every republican voted against it, and again the blue dogs, along with Lieberman, Bayh, Nelson in Nebraska, Nelson in Florida, and others were adamant they would NOT support single payer, Medicare for all, or a public option. That is the reality.