From: Joshua Bregman <melodiousthunk at gmail.com> Date: October 26, 2009 12:10:34 PM EDT To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Subject: Re: The possibilities of failing upwards with healthcare
> Whereas today at the national level, the Republicans not
> only don't support reform, they will spend the next three years
> campaigning against it, using every one of its manifold horrors to
> argue against the whole idea of universal coverage.
Which, by the way, would explain why Obama is so determined to get Olympia Snowe's vote.
........maybe, but can he really believe that a single Republican vote will provide enough of a fig leaf? If the Republicans campaign against universal care by pointing to the shortcomings of this bill, I doubt confronting them with "B-b-b-but...it was a bipartisan bill!" would even constitute a speed bump on that path. They regularly overcome more substantial hypocrisies than that before hitting the snooze button each morning.
A far bigger hypocrisy for them to overcome would be explaining why they accepted all that yummy Federal subsidy money without pushing to "opt out". Of course, Obama's not pushing for that, but if his strategy was to box them in rhetorically, he might be.
At any rate, the reforms aren't scheduled to go into effect until 2012, conveniently late for any evidence of horrors to surface and become rhetorical bludgeons against Obama.
As much as I hate to admit it, the liberals may be on to something here. Even right-wing die hards get skittish about the idea of medicare being taken away (as in the infamous, "get your government hands off my Medicare"). Bush and a Republican congress couldn't get rid of Social Security, etc.
- josh