Politics & Power Quote by Russ Feingold

“Far past time” is doing the heavy lifting here: it frames universal health care not as an aspirational policy goal but as an overdue obligation, a bill the country has been ducking. Feingold’s intent is less about policy minutiae than about moral triage. By calling it “the most pressing domestic issue,” he’s attempting to reorder the political agenda, implicitly demoting whatever hot-button fights are consuming cable news and committee hearings. The phrase “deliver health care” borrows the language of service and logistics, as if coverage were a basic utility that government has simply failed to distribute.

The subtext is a rebuke aimed upward. Naming “the President and Congress” is a deliberate pin: this isn’t a vague call for bipartisanship or civic renewal; it’s an indictment of institutional inertia and a reminder of where power actually sits. It also signals a progressive impatience with incrementalism. Feingold isn’t asking for another pilot program, patch, or market tweak. “Everyone” is a bright-line standard designed to make partial fixes look like moral evasions.

Context matters: Feingold built a reputation as a principled reformer, often skeptical of insider bargains and corporate influence. In the health care debate, that reputation translates into a suspicion that industry-friendly compromises will preserve the status quo while pretending to be historic. The rhetoric is blunt because the political reality is crowded: once you define health care as urgent and overdue, delay stops looking like prudence and starts reading as complicity.