Republicans think they’re messing with Obama, and “Obamacare”. I think they’ll find that they’re messing with people’s health care. And that most people won’t take too kindly to that.
Mike Capuano wrote recently in the Globe how the Republicans are so afraid that Obamacare The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act might work, that they’re dedicating themselves to making sure it doesn’t:
Republicans have denied funding for essential preparations and made it plain they will resist confirmation of presidential nominees needed to administer it. Moreover, the Republican-led House has voted to defund the law and targeted specific aspects of it. They have voted to withhold salaries for employees who will set up health care exchanges, the marketplace where consumers will go to choose a plan. They have voted to repeal funding for school-based health care centers and voted numerous times to eliminate the Prevention Trust Fund. You don’t have to be a doctor to recognize that preventing illness is cheaper than treating it. Eliminating funding for programs like this will result in higher health care costs.
And then you’ve got Jim DeMint and the Heritage Foundation trying to throw a monkey wrench into the works, with endless public FUD:
While opposition to the health-care program is nothing new, the tactics are changing. Rather than focusing on repealing the law in Congress and the courts, two avenues that have failed so far, the groups are aiming to prevent the cornerstone of the legislation, the insurance exchanges, from succeeding. Their goal is to limit enrollments, drive up costs, and make it easier to roll back all or part of the law later.
“If you’re committed to making sure Obamacare doesn’t go into effect, you have to focus on the expansion and on the exchanges,” said Dan Holler, a spokesman for Heritage Action. “Once you have people under a program, it’s really hard to change that system no matter how badly it needs change.”
Aha. “The law won’t work. So we need to prevent it from working.” That makes a hell of a lot of sense.
The law is, in fact, working. This is not news to us in Massachusetts since we have a quite similar system already; which is functional, does what it’s supposed to do, enjoys wide support, and is non-controversial. Go us. This will likely be a similar experience in those states, like California and Oregon, that are putting in a good-faith, vigorous effort to create the exchanges, negotiate with plans, and make the pricing system transparent.
And young people have been benefiting from the law in precisely the way it was intended: Less exposure to crippling medical bills. (My goodness, did Congress actually do right by young adults for once??)
In the New England Journal of Medicine, the RAND analysis found that the new law resulted in $147 million in hospital bills charged to private insurance companies in 2011.
“Some of those costs would have been born by individuals,” said Mulcahy. “Some of those costs would have been ultimately been born by hospitals as uncompensated care.”
The population that gets benefits from the Affordable Care Act will continue to grow. And people are going to remember those 37 repeal votes and the endless mischief and toying with people’s lives, as embodying the Republican brand.
Good luck with that, fellas.
Al says
Republicans are doing this are reliably red, and their voters have been shown to act against their own best economic interests again and again. I can’t see where they are going to change their behavior, although we can always hope.
theloquaciousliberal says
Yes, many of the states are reliably red (the deep south, Nebraska, Idaho). BUT, there are also several purple states (e.g. Florida, Iowa, Wisconsin, Virginia and, I hope, Texas) that also plan to resist Obamacare and the proposed Medicaid expansions. I think Charley is right that opposition to Obamacare won’t play well in those states in the long run.
stomv says
“Those voters” vote against their economic interests? How about the voters of the Northeast, who consistently send legislators to raise taxes on the rich — that is, themselves? Everybody has seen the charts where, by-and-large, blue states are net payers of taxes and red states are net receivers. Then folks on the left proclaim that the conservatives aren’t acting in their own best interest. Thing is, if that’s true, the same can be said of blue states.
fenway49 says
There’s a clear difference in saying, “I personally am doing quite well, but I believe the society should be set up in a way that works for everyone, even if I have to pay a little more in taxes myself,” and saying, “I will keep voting for people whose main agenda is making sure the wages, job security, healthcare, education, and transportation infrastructure on which I depend continue to deteriorate.”
In any event, while I’m well-placed in Newton to know that there are high-income people who “send legislators to raise taxes on the rich,” Democrats continue to do better among those making less than 50K than among those making more than $250K, even in Massachusetts. Plenty of high-income Romney supporters here.
jconway says
My fear is this debate will continue to devolve into a holding pattern whereas the progressive side has to defend nationalized Romneycare in the form of ACA while the right can’t abide by any change. We have to move past that to get real change. I switched jobs and then got laid off by my new employer, I couldn’t afford Cobra premiums on my unemployment, and since my parents are on Medicare and not a family HMO the under 26 provision doesn’t help me either. There will be lots of people falling under the cracks and it will be up to us to explain why that’s a case for more not less government intervention in health care.
fenway49 says
And we’re seeing this on issue after issue, across the board.
The conservative argument, which often succeeds with the huge majority of voters who aren’t policy wonks, is that “we tried government ___________ and it didn’t work.” Often it “didn’t work” because they watered it down so badly under threat of filibuster.
Peter Porcupine says
Remember – the SCOTUS did not uphold the Commerce Clause argument for Obamacare. Instead, it said it could proceed as a tax.
The power to tax originates in the House.
Not that long ago, the Massachusetts House undermined and eventually repealed a piece of legislation by refusing to fund it.
It was called the Clean Elections Law, and Speaker Tom Finneran (D-Omnipotent) simply cut the enabling funds out of the budget.
We are just the legislative epicenter of the universe!
Bob Neer says
A convicted criminal and out of power. The GOP is writing itself out of modern America: “the foreign policy of the 1980s, the social policies of the 1950s and the economic policies of the 1920s.”
fenway49 says
Speaker Tom Finneran (D-Not A Real D)
Mr. Lynne says
Ezra (emphasis mine):