A window for Obamacare -- April 11, 2019 column

By MARSHA MERCER

After nine years of fighting Obamacare, congressional Republicans and the White House have a new bogeyman.   

Look, over there, it’s a radical, socialist scheme! A nightmare that will ruin the economy! It’s Medicare for All!

When independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont Wednesday introduced his revamped proposal to transform Medicare into a universal health program, he said Americans want “a health care system that guarantees health care to all Americans as a right.”

But to White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders, a “Self-proclaimed socialist . . . is proposing a total government takeover of healthcare that would actually hurt seniors, eliminate private health insurance for 180 million Americans, and cripple our economy and future generations with unprecedented debt.” 

The concept of Medicare for All is the latest danger du jour – and that, at last, opens a window for endangered Obamacare.

President Donald Trump has tried repeatedly to kill Obamacare by declaring it dead -- it isn’t – and Americans like it more than ever.

Fifty percent of adults surveyed last month had a favorable opinion of Obamacare while only 39 percent had an unfavorable opinion, the non-partisan Kaiser Family Foundation Health Tracking Poll reported. That’s up from 46 percent favorable in April 2010.

Similar results among registered voters came from a Morning Consult-Politico poll taken March 29 to April 1.

Without a viable plan to replace Obamacare, Senate GOP leaders have moved on to fear-mongering about Medicare for All.

“This radical scheme would be serious bad news for America’s hospital industry,” Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., told the American Hospital Association this week. “You should not be the guinea pigs in some far-left social experiment.”

Four Democratic presidential hopefuls have endorsed Sanders’ Medicare for All bill, but he has only 14 cosponsors this time, down from 16 last year, a sign Democrats are more wary.

People like the idea of Medicare for All, polls show, until they’re told they may pay higher taxes and wait longer for care.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wisely says Congress needs first to protect the Affordable Care Act – the official name for Obamacare -- before it considers any Medicare for All plan.

The requirement to buy insurance stuck in Americans’ craw, but several surviving provisions remain popular.

About 11.4 million Americans get their health insurance through the law, and 12 more million more are covered because of the law’s Medicaid expansion.

The law protects people with pre-existing conditions – about half the population under 65 – from being rejected for health insurance or paying higher insurance premiums.

Young people under 26 can stay on their parents’ health care plans. Seniors save money on preventive care and prescriptions. Caps limit how much patients must pay annually or in a lifetime.

Trump’s obsession with obliterating all things Obama means he can’t admit there’s anything worth saving in Obamacare. His Justice Department has joined a lawsuit seeking to invalidate the entire law.

A federal appeals court will hear arguments in early July, and the case could reach the Supreme Court before the election.  

Trump promises a better, cheaper health care plan to replace Obamacare by and by. Sometime. Eventually. After the election. 

Democrats believe health care helped them win back control of the House. Polls before last November’s elections on which party would do a better job on health care policy found Democrats with an 18-point advantage over Republicans.

Democrats need now not to overplay their hand. Several iterations of Medicare for All legislation are in Congress. A key sticking point is cost. Some analysts say Sanders’ proposal could cost upwards of $30 trillion over a decade.

Medicare for All excites the Democratic base, but if Democrats want more than a campaign talking point, they’ll need to work deliberately and collaboratively and study the intended -- and unintended -- consequences of universal health coverage.

Now is the time to shore up Obamacare. A group of Republican senators proposes, in case the courts do invalidate Obamacare, to preserve parts of the law, such as protecting people with pre-existing conditions.

Even in the run-up to an election, saving the best parts of Obamacare is a worthy goal for Democrats and Republicans.

©2019 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.

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'Socialist' Obama? Truth is a casualty -- Jan. 19, 2012 column

By MARSHA MERCER

Over the holidays, one of my dearest Republican relatives said, “Well, it’s too bad Obama turned out to be such a socialist.”

Then, she added in a tone between sadness and sarcasm, “I’m sure most people wouldn’t have voted for him if they’d known that.”

What? I paused to process her calm declaration and realized that what I hear -- and discount -- as political potshots in a presidential campaign have become in the ears of some voters reliable truth.

That surprised me, but it shouldn’t have. The old saying that “the first casualty of war is truth” also applies to political warfare.

The barrage against President Barack Obama started before he took office and has continued nonstop. Obama’s decision largely to ignore the charges just allows them to fester.

Newt Gingrich’s latest attacks on Obama as “the greatest food-stamp president in American history” are classic. Gingrich portrays Obama as socialist in chief, and Obama refuses to knock down the notion that he favors encouraging dependency on the state.

No wonder that 10 months before the election, half the voters surveyed in the latest New York Times and CBS News poll said Obama doesn’t have the same priorities for the country that they do.

The economy remains the country’s No. 1 issue, and 60 percent think Obama has done nothing to improve it. Most Americans believe the country is headed in the wrong direction.

And, confirming my holiday conversation, the poll also found that better than one in four voters -- 26 percent -- believe Obama’s policies are socialist. Twenty-two percent say his policies are liberal and 28 percent moderate.

If you’ve listened to the Republican presidential contenders sniping at each other, you know it’s now a supreme knock to call someone running for president a moderate.

Despite all this, polls consistently find that Obama would beat all the Republican presidential hopefuls -- except one. He ties with Mitt Romney, who’s most likely to be his rival in November.

And here’s where it gets really interesting. Obama ties with Romney even though most voters say they lack a clear idea about what Obama wants to accomplish in a second term.

In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, Obama will outline his policy goals for the coming year, but implicit will be his plans for a second term. Hoping to rekindle the sparks of 2008, he’ll appeal to the middle class and ally himself with the 99 percent.

It’s a tough sell for a president who seems more professorial than populist. But the best thing Obama has going for him is the contrast with Romney, whose comments this week that he probably paid a 15 personal tax rate set him even farther apart from ordinary people than Obama.

For whatever reason, Obama has been reluctant to mention poverty, even as the ranks of the poor expand. He could use his primetime speech to explain why everyone benefits from a strong safety net. He could tell about policy changes in the George W. Bush presidency that led to increases in the food stamp rolls and trace how the economic slump intensified need. He could call on the Republicans to help, rather than demonize, the poor.

In 2008, voters were willing to buy the promise of hope and change. When Caroline Kennedy endorsed Obama in an op-ed in the Times on Jan. 27, 2008, she wrote:

“I want a president who understands that his responsibility is to articulate a vision and encourage others to achieve it; who holds himself, and those around him, to the highest ethical standards; who appeals to the hopes of those who still believe in the American Dream, and those around the world who still believe in the American ideal; and who can lift our spirits, and make us believe again that our country needs every one of us to get involved.”

That’s still a good job description for president in 2012.

Ms. Kennedy also wrote that Obama would inspire in people “a sense of possibility” that they have the power to shape their own future. It hasn’t worked out that way. Yet.

To shape his own future, Obama needs to inspire a new sense of individual possibility, not imply dependency that his enemies will call socialism.

© 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
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