I was noodling around on the KFF site this morning and came across their most recent tracking poll about Obamacare. I was surprised to see how popular it's become:
Obamacare has been through a lot: passage by a single vote, endless attempts to repeal it, and multiple Supreme Court challenges that nearly cratered it. Somehow, though, it's not only survived but been expanded and improved over the years.
Today it's no longer an object of derision. It may not quite be in the ranks of beloved social programs, but 15 million people rely on it and a solid 60% of the country thinks it's a good thing. It took a little patience, but it's now—finally—a permanent and popular part of the social welfare landscape.
It is popular, and effective. (Could be better, though) Which means the current SCOTUS will have no issue with ignoring any precedent and gutting Obamacare like a fish when they want to.
On what is this pessimism based? The Court had multiple opportunities to do exactly that. It eviscerated the mandatory Medicaid expansion, leaving it up to the states, but took a pass (with hints of exasperation at the progressively more flimsy nature of the cases) on the rest of the challenges.
During the many fights over the ACA, I liked to quote the following passage from Machiavelli's The Prince. I think it explains pretty well why it took us so long to get to this point:
"It must be realized that there is nothing more difficult to plan, more uncertain of success, or more dangerous to manage than the establishment of a new order of government; for he who introduces it makes enemies of all those who derived advantage from the old order, and finds but lukewarm defenders among those who stand to gain from the new one.
Such a lukewarm attitude grows partly out of fear of the adversaries, who have the law on their side, and partly from the incredulity of men in general, who actually have no faith in new things until they have been proved by experience.
Hence it happens that whenever those in the enemy camp have a chance to attack, they do so with a partisan fervor, while the others defend themselves rather passively, so that both they and the prince are endangered."
I love Obamacare. It has meant my husband and I could both be self-employed artists instead of one of us having to work for health insurance for both of us or the even-worse alternative of only having a catastrophic policy so that we don't lose our house if one of us get's seriously ill.
And with those attacks on Obamacare, the Republicans would insist that they'd "have a plan" to keep everything that people liked about Obamacare while trying to kill it.
It's good to remind people what Obamacare has done--e.g. children can stay on parent's health care plans until they're 26. Insurance is available to everyone at reasonable costs--and those are real plans.
Health care is still messed up in this country, but Obamacare has made it a lot better.
There are still people who will not seek coverage under ACA,
Not because of Obama, or socialism, but because it's not M4A.
Which would be free.
And wouldn't cost you more in taxes.
Because if you taxed billionaires, we could have universal coverage for nothing.
And coverage would be better than anything the ACA covers.
I know this because I have Twitter
😉
Those hold out states rejecting expanded Medicaid are really sticking to Washington!!!
1st a nod to golack: Yeah I live is such a state, but it's another triumph for the pro-death party that controls the state.
I'm a confirmed advocate of M4A as defined by Sanders' bill. Never-the-less I truly rejoiced in the passage of ACA. It was a giant improvement to a still abysmal situation. I was giddy with delight when McCain went thumbs down on the repeal.
Something that needs to be said is that the Republican and MSM pundits harping on the cost of M4A are damned liars. Government in the US already pays for about 67% of all healthcare in the US thru direct payments and tax breaks. The asymptotic limit for government's share of healthcare spending in countries with the most generous systems is 90%. The savings generated by eliminating most of the bureaucracy associated with insurance companies and the associated bureaucracy required of providers will eliminate almost all of this additional 23% of putative cost.
Additionally, having health insurance concentrated in a federal agency would give us a tremendous opportunity to slash drug costs and attack healthcare fraud. The government could come out well ahead financially.
Mind you I'm all in favor of taxing billionaires out of existence. But we don't have to raise tax rates at all to pay for M4A.
Best. Death. Spiral. Ever.
Doesn't mean Republicans still won't try to kill it.
"America finally loves Obamacare"
That seems a bit optimistic
1. 60% favorability, while good in our current political climate, does not equal broad based love.
2. For many Democrats, they would prefer a much broader program/single payer, and or material enhancements to the ACA. So I suspect many Dems support the ACA, but would love a broader health program.
3. For the GOP, perhaps similar to gay marriage, the ACA just does not have the same political thunder as a few years ago. I think lots of Republicans reluctantly accept the ACA, versus actually loving it.
4. Lots of folks probably love elements of the ACA, such as expanded Medicaid in their state, but actually don't know that is the ACA/ would not tell a survey person they love the ACA.
A Gold plan for my wife and I for just $437/month? Thanks, Obama!
The actual math for the subsidies is pretty wacky, and could have been done smarter, but the results for self-employed upper-middle class folks like us are pretty awesome.
But then again, we always win, eh comrade?
M4A would be better for everyone....Obama cowarded out....climbing an unclimbable mountain rather than blasting a fresh way though...as time passes on, I have more and more resentment towards Mr Obama. Best wishes, Traveller
ACA passed by 1 vote and the Democrats lost 63 seats in the House in 2010. M4A would have gone nowhere in 2010 and is still politically unattainable today, and for the foreseeable future.
My son had need of the ACA for about 2 years and I am thankful it was enacted.
M4A is why I'm firmly in the "Never Bernie" camp (unless he somehow ended up the nominee in 2020, in which case, all in for Bernie). And I say this having lived in Canada, and firmly believing that it was easier/quicker to obtain medical care there compared to any other place I have ever been. (OK, had to schedule CAT scans for Fridays, but that was quick and easy. Here in the US one can get a Wednesday if one prefers, but it can take months.)
But people tend to forget about the Dem blood bath after passing ACA -- and they knew that was going to be the result but voted for it anyway. It's a fantasy that somehow M4A would have been feasible.
Having both the Republicans running around in 2016 proclaiming "Obamacare is a disaster, it's Socialism!" and Bernie running around effectively proclaiming "Obamacare is a disaster, it's not Socialism!" was not helpful. Americans only heard the first half. And with Scalia dead, and a 5-4 liberal court a possibility for the last time in my lifetime (plus Ginsberg then likely retiring), just shut up and take the win. That was the game right there, and as we're seeing as the court finishes out the season, we blew it.
Especially as there were ways of playing the long game to inch closer to M4A within the confines of ACA. Get a government run insurance plan to compete with insurance companies. Get the hold out states to expand Medicaid. Reduce the eligibility age for Medicare. Shrink the subsidy gap. Shore up what you won, and paid a heavy political price for, before trying to alter it.