Public opinion, and other problems with ObamaCare

The biggest (political) problem with ObamaCare is that the public doesn't want it, as poll after poll after poll has demonstrated.  The latest comes from Rasmussen, which shows (ominously for Obama) that the more Congress and the public focuses on the issue, the more opposed they become to it. 

Currently, 53% of Americans are opposed to the pending Senate version of the bill, and only 42% support it.  Keep in mind that these numbers come AFTER Congress spent over a year working on the issue, Obama made dozens of speeches and town hall appearances, and after the highly covered health care "summit" meeting with Congress that Obama sponsored.  55% think Congress should scrap the whole thing and start from scratch.

Moreover, Rasmussen points out that, yet again, the strength of opinion is all with the opposition.  He finds that only 20% "strongly favor" the bill now, while 41% are "strongly opposed". All of which seems to put the lie to the suggestion that, if only Americans knew more about what the liberals were trying to do, they would see that it's in their best interests and support it.  As George Will responded to Robert Reich this past weekend on "This Week"...

"There you have the premise of this legislation and the core of today’s liberalism: the American people are such dopes they can’t be counted upon to buy their own insurance".

Exactly.

Of course, public opinion isn't the only "problem" with the bill.  In fact, it's the other problems that have public opinion where it is today.

It funds abortion.

The current Senate version of the bill would allow (no matter what Obama and Nancy Pelosi say) federal funding for abortion by way of abortion coverage under ObamaCare.

It busts the budget.

Despite the fact that Obama has (among other goals at various times) said he wouldn't approve a bill unless it didn't add a dime to the deficit, it does.  Big time.  So how does he keep a straight face?  Well this is Washington, where you can find an accountant or statistician to make any square peg look like it fits in a round hole...as long as you don't look too close.  Keep in mind that we already have trillion dollar plus budget deficits as far as the eye can see...and a national debt set to double to over twenty trillion by the end of this decade.  And that is BEFORE the costs of ObamaCare gets figured in.

It also blows a huge hole in state budgets, as it puts new, unfunded Medicaid mandates on the states.  Considering almost 40 states have balanced budget amendments, this means cuts in other programs, or - you guessed it - big tax increases.

It raises taxes.

Obama's campaign promise not to "raise taxes on the middle class" aside, the Senate bill does just that in order to pay for ObamaCare.  A list of those proposed taxes (including an increase in the Medicare part of the payroll tax) can be found here.

The local kickbacks.

You remember, the "Cornhusker Kickback", the "Louisiana Purchase"...all those favors promised to swing vote senators to get them to vote for cloture on the Senate version just before Christmas?  There still in there.  And who knows what's being promised now behind closed doors in order to buy off House members to get them to approve the Senate bill.

It makes you a criminal if you don't buy insurance.

The Senate bill has an "individual mandate", meaning you have to have insurance coverage by law.  Meaning, if you don't have it through your employer, you have to buy it.  Or else, (as in pay a fine or go to jail).  It's the first time in American history where the federal government will have somehow found the power in the Constitution to force the American public to purchase a consumer product.  Of course, if everyone HAS to buy something, the price goes up.  Meaning higher insurance premiums.

It opens the door for the "public option".

Yes, there weren't able to get the full blown "public option", AKA a single-payer, government run system put in the bill, but the impact of the bill will be to gradually run private insurers out of business, which eventually leaves us with no viable option BUT the government...or make the remaining few into huge "too big to fail" utilities that are kept alive by massive public subsidies.  This is, of course, by design.

It's a "big government" bill.

Despite the fact that there's no "public option', the bill creates a maze of new bureaucracy.  It also requires the White House Office of Personnel Management to establish the parameters of health plans in proposed "state exchanges"...meaning the White House will be defining what health care plans should cover.  Meaning a "one size fits all", federally defined list of insurance plans.  This from the people who run the Post Office.

Of course there are lots of other things not to like and reasons to oppose the bill.  This is just a list of "highlights" if you will.  But they help explain why the majority of the American people continue to oppose this bill.  No matter how much Democrats try to explain it to us.

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