“Very Well-Insured Critics”: Serving The Smug, Shortsighted, Dopes And Demagogues, Obamacare Will Be There Even For Its Enemies
Obamacare’s enemies are right about the disastrous Web site launch and the president’s misleading mantra about “keeping your plan.” I’m furious at the White House myself for having botched these technical and messaging challenges — issues that anyone could have seen coming three years ago and whose amateur handling has given needless ammunition to the foes of expanded health coverage.
But for those of us who think the health security the Affordable Care Act provides marks a fundamental advance in America’s social contract, these White House failures don’t come close to the vices of Obamacare’s adversaries. Let’s just say it: To judge by their behavior, the Affordable Care Act’s enemies couldn’t care less about helping millions of low-income workers achieve health security, and every time they open their mouths, it shows.
When conservatives rant about the latest mess-ups attending the rollout, they never add the obvious empathetic refrain. It would be simple, really. They’d just need to preface or append to their daily attack a line like this: “Of course we all agree we need to find ways to get poor workers secure health coverage that protects their family from ruin in the event of serious illness.”
That’s all it would take. But they don’t say that. None of them. At least none that I can hear. A single omission might seem an oversight. A few might be a sign of distraction. But when day after day you wait in vain to hear such empathy amid the torrent of anti-Obamacare venom being spewed, you realize something bigger psychologically is at work.
Obamacare foes are more than just angry with the “lying” and the bungling they disdain. They are Very Well-Insured People. We all know about “VIPs.” Well, these are VWIPs. Or at least, a certain conservative species of VWIP.
For many on the right, being a VWIP seems to bring with it a certain blindness. They see the Web site comedy of errors and cry (rightly) “incompetence!” They see some people who have to change their health plan and cry (with some fairness) “liar!”
But that’s all they see. What they don’t see is nearly 50 million uninsured Americans, 20 million or so of whom stand to have relatively desperate lives made immeasurably more secure thanks to this law. These Americans will finally know what it’s like to go to bed at night certain that they can’t be wiped out financially by illness — and that free or affordable preventive care may help their loved ones uncover disease while there’s a chance for a cure.
Obamacare’s well-insured critics don’t see these Americans at all. And they seem unable to imagine what it would feel like to be one of them.
I want to be careful here. I know this isn’t the outlook of every Republican or conservative. John Kasich’s Medicaid expansion makes him the most prominent exception (though even Kasich can’t see the benefit for many Ohioans of Obamacare’s big private insurance expansion). Meanwhile, in yet another case in which your zip code seals your fate in the United States, millions of citizens who could have had Medicaid coverage will remain vulnerable, abandoned by well-insured GOP governors who think their job involves tending to well-insured GOP voters.
Poor uninsured workers didn’t make U.S. health care the costliest, most inefficient system on the planet. But these workers are the ones who suffer most under it. And VWIPs on the right don’t care.
New rule (as Bill Maher would say): Politicians and pundits who bash Obamacare should have displayed under their talking head or byline the source of their own coverage. Let’s caption Ted Cruz in flashing neon that reads, “Enjoys Gold-Plated Health Coverage from Goldman Sachs Spousal Plan.” Let’s have the subtitles for John Boehner and Eric Cantor read, “Has Never Worried About Going Broke From Illness A Day in His Life Thanks To Federal Government Insurance.”
And let Obamacare supporters begin their response to absurd claims that “Obamacare is the enemy” with this simple line: “Spoken like a Very Well-Insured Person.” (I’ve tried this on radio and TV — not only is it accurate, but it feels great to say so, too.)
My wife and I discovered we were uninsurable in the individual market in 2003. It was scary. And we’re the lucky ones — bona fide members of the Lower Upper Class with the wherewithal to maneuver to protect our family (and with access to the New York Times Magazine to write about the experience).
Obama said, “If you like your plan, you can keep it.”
The Very Well-Insured Obamacare critic effectively says to the uninsured, “If you enjoy being vulnerable to financial ruin or death from serious illness, under our plan you can keep that, too.”
Both of these positions are wrong.
But which, at the end of the day, seems more like a hanging offense?
The irony is that Obamacare’s protections will be there even for its enemies if, God forbid, they (or someone they love) find themselves sick, unattached to a large employer and looking for coverage in the individual market. I suppose that’s the beauty of the rule of law — it serves the smug and the shortsighted, the dopes and the demagogues along with the rest of us. Might be a more just world if it didn’t now and then, but them’s the breaks.
By: Matt Miller, Opinion Writer, The Washington Post, November 6, 2013
“Highlighting The GOP’s Worst Qualities”: For Democrats, Raising The Minimum Wage Is Good Policy, Better Politics
As Congress considers raising the minimum wage for the first time since 2009, Democrats have a golden political opportunity to pressure congressional Republicans on an issue that splits the GOP’s base — and highlights the GOP’s worst qualities.
The battle is currently being led by Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Rep. George Miller (D-CA), who have crafted a bill that would raise the federal minimum wage to $10.10 per hour, up from the current level of $7.25. The bill, titled the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2013, would immediately raise the minimum wage to $8.20 an hour, then to $9.15 an hour after one year, $10.10 an hour after two years, and tie it to the Consumer Price Index thereafter.
There is a litany of evidence backing up the value of such a proposal. The current minimum wage of $7.25 an hour has lagged far behind productivity growth over the past decades, and falls short of most living wage standards. A worker employed full-time at the current minimum wage would make $15,080 for a full 52-week year, 19 percent below the poverty line for a family of three. As over 100 economists agreed in a June 2013 letter supporting a $10.50 hourly minimum wage, raising the wage “will be an effective means of improving living standards for low-wage workers and their families and will help stabilize the economy. The costs to other groups in society will be modest and readily absorbed.”
Opponents of raising the minimum wage generally argue that such a policy would hurt job growth. “When you raise the price of employment, guess what happens? You get less of it,” House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) declared in response to President Obama’s call to raise the minimum wage at his 2013 State of the Union address. Contrary to the Speaker’s claim, however, there is little to no evidence that modest increases in the minimum wage actually eliminate jobs.
As strong as the economic case for raising the minimum wage is, however, the political case is even more persuasive. The Harkin-Miller bill has almost no chance of becoming law during the 113th Congress; it will almost certainly be blocked in the Senate, and even if Democratic leadership can round up 60 votes, the bill stands no chance in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives. But the GOP could pay a steep price for killing the measure.
Americans strongly favor raising the minimum wage. According to a Hart Research Associates poll conducted in July, an overwhelming 80 percent of Americans support raising the minimum wage to $10.10, then adjusting it for the cost of living, as the Harkin-Miller plan proposes. The basic parameters of the bill are supported by 92 percent of Democrats, 80 percent of Independents, and even 62 percent of Republicans.
The poll also suggests that the issue could prove critical in the 2014 midterms. The Hart poll found that 74 percent of registered voters believe that raising the minimum wage in the next year should be an important priority for Congress, and 38 believe it is very important — 51 percent of registered voters would be more likely to support a candidate for Congress who favored raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, while just 15 percent said they would be less likely. Furthermore, 37 percent believe that — should Congress fail to raise the minimum wage this year — Republicans would be to blame. Just 15 percent would blame the Democrats.
In the wake of the Republican Party’s disastrous government shutdown strategy, it finds itself in a very precarious political position — especially on the critical question of whether they are actually interested in what’s best for the country. A high-profile act of obstruction to block a minimum-wage hike — a raise that is supported by four-fifths of Americans, and almost two-thirds of Republicans — would surely compound that problem. If Democrats want to paint congressional Republicans as elitists who are out of step with the needs of average Americans, this is how they do it.
On Friday, the Obama administration signaled its support for the Harkin-Miller bill, and it would be wise to be very vocal about that position. If the White House throws its full weight behind congressional Democrats’ efforts, then the minimum wage could form the backbone of an effective economic pitch for the 2014 midterms.
By: Henry Decker, The National Memo, November 8, 2013
“The GOP Anti-Life Syndrome”: Are Politicians Who Cut Food Stamps And Deny Health Access Truly “Pro-Life”?
When Wendy Davis proclaimed that she is “pro-life” – a description long since appropriated by conservatives opposed to abortion rights – the right-wing media practically exploded with indignation. How could she dare to say that? But having won national fame when she filibustered nearly 12 hours against a law designed to shutter Lone Star State abortion clinics, the Texas state senator with the pink shoes doesn’t hesitate to provoke outrage among the righteous.
Speaking to a crowd at the University of Texas in Brownsville last Tuesday, Davis, now running for governor as a Democrat, made a deceptively simple but profound declaration: “I am pro-life. I care about the life of every child: every child that goes to bed hungry, every child that goes to bed without a proper education, every child that goes to bed without being able to be a part of the Texas dream, every woman and man who worry their children’s future and their ability to provide for that.”
Her argument directly pierced to the contradiction within the right’s “pro-life” sloganeering. So far the feeble answer from the right is that Davis must be “lying” because nobody who supports a woman’s right to choose is pro-life.
But that response is merely a repetition that seeks to evade her deeper philosophical thrust. Whatever anyone may think about abortion, the persistent question for self-styled pro-lifers is why they tend to insist on making life so much more difficult for so many children who have entered the world. The same Republicans – and they are nearly all Republicans – most vocally opposed to reproductive rights are also most likely to cut assistance to poor families, infants and children at every opportunity, from the moment of birth long into adolescence and beyond.
The imperiled Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is only the latest instance of this drearily familiar anti-life syndrome. This week, more than 48 million Americans, including 22 million children, saw their food stamp benefits cut as a temporary enhancement of the program expired. That was worse than bad enough. But next year if the Republicans have their way, the government would cut $40 billion from the program over the next 10 years – immediately depriving four million people of food assistance and then another three million every year.
Supposedly the excuse for this cruel scheme is to encourage able-bodied adults to work, even though jobs continue to be scarce. But what about the children who will go hungry, thanks to the budget advanced by the “pro-life” House leadership?
Incidentally, these are the same “pro-lifers” who will do almost anything to frustrate the long-sought national objective of universal health insurance. On that issue, one of their favorite complaints is that expanding health care to all will increase the availability of family planning, including abortion. But what of the tens of thousands of Americans who die every year because they lack insurance? Saving their lives is evidently not a “pro-life” priority.
Wendy Davis is right, but perhaps she didn’t go far enough. You see, the other self-serving sobriquet appropriated by the right is “pro-family,” a code term for opponents of reproductive rights, marriage equality, and other progressive policies that actually empower families of all kinds. Again, these same politicians tend to disparage not only Obamacare, but extended unemployment insurance, Social Security’s old age and disability assistance, Medicaid, Medicare, student loans, tuition assistance, family leave, the earned income tax credit, and the entire panoply of successful government programs that help to keep real working families from disintegrating under economic, social, and medical stress.
In fact, Davis might reasonably question whether the minions of the religious right and the Tea Party are even truly “anti-abortion,” although they have long since tried to escape that category. It is true that right-wingers have tried incessantly (and unsuccessfully) to outlaw abortion. But today they often seek to restrict contraception and effective sex education as well, even though preventing unwanted pregnancies is the most obvious way to reduce the number of abortions.
How would conservatives behave if they honestly wanted to save the family – as House Republicans will now claim when they kill the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, banning workplace bias against lesbians and gays? They might begin by reconsidering their ideological project of dismantling federal programs, long supported by Republicans and Democrats alike, that help families maintain stability, care for each other, maintain healthy children, and advance in each generation.
The real enemies of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” for American families are those who seek to polarize incomes, destroy the social safety net, and impose misery on women and children in the name of religious morality.
By: Joe Conason, The National Memo, November 7, 2013
“The Grand Old Party In Reverse”: Christie, Cuccinelli And What The GOP Didn’t Learn In 2012
Elections, the saying goes, have consequences. Of course, some have more consequences than others. Consider the 2012 election – and then ponder this week’s gubernatorial races. You’d imagine that the big nationwide election would do more to jar the GOP than a couple of off-year gubernatorial races. But given the right’s nonreaction to 2012, reality-based Republicans must hope otherwise.
Think back a year. Given the results of the 2012 elections – Barack Obama won re-election by 4 percentage points and 5 million votes; Senate Democrats gained seats, and House Democrats drew more votes (if not more seats) than House Republicans – you would not be faulted for thinking that the GOP was in for a course correction. And, for a brief while, it seemed likely. The Republican National Committee issued a postmortem with a slew of recommendations on how to turn the party around, with a focus on reaching out to female, minority and young voters. Washington pundits declared comprehensive immigration reform inevitable because Republicans had to do something to get on the right side of Hispanic voters. That was then. Now?
“At this point, we’ve gone backwards because of the government shutdown,” says Republican pollster Whit Ayres. “That doesn’t mean we can’t be resurrected in time to do very well in the 2014 elections given the gift of Obamacare. But it’s hard to look at the state of the party today versus Election Day in 2012 and think we’ve made much progress.”
What happened? The party leaders who wanted to adjust to the facts of reality were rolled by the alliance of the tea party and the right wing’s media-industrial complex, which is more interested in whipping up the base (and then fundraising off of it) than what movement conservatives like Erick Erickson derisively refer to as the “‘governing’ trap.” The Republican reboot was lost in a miasma of conservative windmill-tilting that culminated in the ill-conceived, predictably disastrous shutdown.
“They don’t care [about polls], but they need to care,” says Cook Political Report’s Jennifer Duffy. “When you need to pick up as many [Senate] seats as Republicans need right now, you can’t afford to have your brand hurt.” As former Rep. Tom Davis, a moderate Virginia Republican, said recently, “You’ve had the diagnosis, and now there’s the denial.”
When asked whether the GOP is better off a year later than immediately after getting trounced last November, one veteran Republican lobbyist offers that sometimes a party has to hit rock bottom. “At some point you have to cleanse your system,” the lobbyist says. “The question is how do you respond when you hit rock bottom?” The twin events of the dismal shutdown and this week’s contrasting gubernatorial elections give the GOP a fresh chance to hit the rock bottom reset button.
And there’s some hope that the 2013 elections will have the consequences that can finally penetrate the right’s bubble. Mitt Romney might have been challenging Obama in 2012, but he was also stalked by a phantasm of the right – a “true” conservative candidate that could set their hearts aflutter. The far right says “look, Romney wasn’t conservative enough … you need to shut the government down over Obamacare,” according to Davis. A true conservative, the theory goes, would have delivered the victory over Obama that the right wing fully expected right up until Fox News declared the president re-elected last year.
The 2013 elections, while more narrowly focused, present a starker contrast. You have conservative darling Ken Cuccinelli in the purple state of Virginia losing to Terry McAuliffe of all people; and you have New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, the Republican who literally embraced Obama last October after Superstorm Sandy, winning by a landslide in a true-blue state. As pollster Ayres said when asked about this scenario last week: “It certainly presents a pair of compelling case studies whose message is obvious to all who are willing to see.”
So where to from here? Two things to keep an eye on: First is the budget battle rerun due in January – to what extent is the Ted Cruz-led conservative cabal able to drive the party into another vain, self-destructive shutdown? Early signs give reason for skepticism. Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell, for example, has ruled out another shutdown. “Ted Cruz went out and led a parade that he said would be a success … and then he walked down the alley like that character at the end of ‘Animal House,’ marched the whole band into the wall – and then he ran out and had a TV interview,” says conservative activist Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform, who adds that the next time Cruz has an idea, Republicans are either “going to throw something big at him” or otherwise politely dismiss him.
A second focus point will be the 2014 primaries. McConnell faces a serious challenge and a slew of other incumbents have primaries as well. “Rest well tonight, for soon we must focus on important House and Senate races,” former half-term Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin wrote on Facebook recently. “Let’s start with Kentucky – which happens to be awfully close to South Carolina, Tennessee and Mississippi – from sea to shining sea we will not give up.” The latter references were to GOP Sens. Lindsey Graham, Lamar Alexander and Thad Cochrane – all incumbents facing challengers. It’s early to say whether any are credible, says Duffy, “but for a collection of safe incumbents, that’s a lot of primaries.” If the primaries produce few or any upsets, it could mean the tea party’s influence has receded.
“Republicans are only one election and one candidate away from resurrection in 2016,” says Ayres. Time will tell.
By: Robert Schlesinger, U. S. News and World Report, November 8, 2013
“What Really Matters”: Don’t Knock Obamacare Until You Try It
There has been a steady drumbeat of news stories about health insurance companies informing customers that their policies will be dropped or that they will face steep rate increases due to requirements of the Affordable Care Act.
This has opened the door to fair criticisms that President Obama wrongly stated that people would be able to keep their current insurance policies if they are happy with them, as this isn’t necessarily the case. However, the real question for individuals facing rate hikes or dropped coverage is whether there are insurance options provided through the exchanges, mandated by the new law, that these people would actual prefer, thanks to some combination of lower prices and more generous benefits. Obamacare might cause some to lose their current policy, but it also might provide them with options they would prefer. That is what really matters.
People should remember that the program provides subsidies for lower income individuals and families. At least in states that have accepted the very generous federal contribution, Obamacare also expands access to Medicaid. For many people who currently lack insurance, a group of people who tend to be poorer, Obamacare insurance policies will be free or relatively cheap.
The initial implementation of Obamacare has not gone smoothly. The key problem is website difficulties faced by people who are attempting to see just how much a plan will cost them, and whose attempts to actually sign up for a policy have been thwarted. We will see if these problems are fixed in a timely fashion, and whether other serious problems crop up.
But the program, as designed, is intended to lower prices for the vast majority of people on the individual insurance market, as well as to open it up to people who previously have been denied affordable coverage because of pre-existing medical conditions. Optimistically, increased competition could even lower prices for employer-based health plans.
Admittedly, such optimistic predictions might not come to pass. Over the next several months we will get a better idea of how many people manage to enroll, whether their coverage is adequate, and whether their overall medical costs, including premiums and out of pocket costs, fall. We might ultimately declare Obamacare a failure, and if that happens we should figure out a better way to expand access to affordable health insurance and care.
Despite the rhetoric from many conservatives, Obamacare isn’t the way most self-described liberals would reform our health care system. It is needlessly complicated, not guaranteed to reduce overall medical costs significantly and its subsidies, while significant, are too stingy. People with lower middle class incomes will still likely find the premiums to be a budgetary strain. At the very least, liberals would have included a government run “public option,” a Medicare-like program that would have competed with the private insurance.
But problems aside, people who are currently navigating the private insurance market –both those without health insurance currently and those who might be receiving scary policy and price change letters from their current insurance companies — should make sure to see just what their Obamacare options are. They might be pleasantly surprised.
By: Duncan Black, USA Today, November 5, 2013
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