There's a lot of buzz in health care circles about an editorial in today's Washington Post entitled "If Democrats ignore health-care polls, midterms will be costly." That could be dangerous: the author's conclusions are contradicted, not supported, by the available facts.
The editorial's written by Patrick Caddell, described as a "political commentator and former pollster," and Douglas E. Schoen. Caddell and Schoen play the "pollsters to the past two Democratic presidents" card prominently, but here's what they don't tell you: Schoen's been on a third-party kick since he wrote a paean to centrism called Declaring Independence: The Beginning of the End of the Two-Party System. And Caddell's a "commentator," all right: he's now a right-leaning Fox News regular. There's plenty of YouTube video of Caddell clucking tongues with Glenn Beck over Van Jones' "violent past," or whatever the right-wing outrage of the day happens to be.
Which would all be fine if their analysis of the data was informed and correct - but it's not. It's a skewed piece that reflects the worst of Washington's Villager wisdom. If Democrats listen to them - and many will be tempted - it will make a difficult situation even worse.
"The battle for public opinion has been lost," they write. Nothing could be further from the truth. When asked how much they know about the health reform proposal, 40% of respondents in a recent Ipsos/McClatchy poll said "not very much" and 17% said "nothing at all." 32% said they knew "a fair amount," which isn't a lot. When 57% of the public indicates little or no understanding of the bill and another 32% knows they don't fully grasp it, the battle isn't "lost." On the contrary - these numbers show that the battle has barely been fought.
That impression's supported by what Newsweek calls "The Polling Contradiction." In summarizing its own polling data, Newsweek observes: "The majority of Americans are opposed to President Obama's health-care reform plan--until they learn the details." 81% approve of the health insurance exchanges, for example, and 76% approve a rule that requires insurers to accept anyone who applies.
Caddell and Schoen engage in some extreme cherry-picking of the data. Of four polls used to support their conclusions, three are from Scott Rasmussen, whose findings are known to lean more pro-Republican and anti-Obama than others. Yet here's a credible Rasmussen finding Caddell and Schoen somehow manage to overlook: People who oppose health reform overwhelmingly describe themselves as "Strongly Opposed."
How can any clear-headed analysis lead to the conclusion that a weaker bill will be more popular, given that its opponents feel "strongly" about it? Watering down a few of its provisions isn't going to win them over.
It's true that, as Newsweek observes, "Not all Democrat positions received such high marks. Imposing a fine on individuals who do not buy health insurance was the least popular provision ... (and) fifty-five percent opposed the so-called Cadillac tax on the most expensive health-insurance plans." But the "Cadillac tax" has been loosened and deferred for five years - during which a lot can happen politically. And as for the individual mandate, it's not a popular provision, but it's not going to be changed now.
Of the many polls that show more people opposed to reform than supporting it, it appears that only the McClatchy/Ipsos survey (as noted by Barry Sussman) thought to ask why. After finding that 47% of respondents opposed the bill and only 41% supported it - findings that are fairly consistent with other polls - they asked the reason for their opposition. 37% of those who oppose this bill said they "favor health reform overall but don't think the current proposals go far enough." That means that nearly 59% of the people polled support comprehensive health reform, which directly contradicts Caddell and Schoen's statement that "comprehensive health care has been lost." Actually, comprehensive health care has won. The challenge facing Democrats is to convince people between now and Election Day that they've delivered the comprehensive reform these voters want.
What's comprehensive about this bill? A massive reduction in the overall number of uninsured Americans. Subsidies to provide millions with health care coverage. An end to abusive insurance practices like cancelling coverage once a person gets sick. No more denials for people with pre-existing conditions. A well-designed insurance exchange that will subject insurance premiums to an unprecedented level of public scrutiny. A start on cost controls. A requirement that the exchange offer the same coverage provided to members of Congress (which serves as a brake on future benefit cuts).That's why, after a long year of struggle to improve the bill's flaws, I now support it. I can't turn my back on the uninsured in favor of an idealized bill that might be passed in some bright future ... especially if the likely outcome of failure this year is a Congress that's less likely to pass any reform at all.
Could the bill be improved? Of course, and if history is an example (see Medicare) it will be -- but not if a conservative majority is returned to both houses of Congress. Inaction makes that outcome more likely. Republicans have promised to run on repealing of any bill the Democrats pass. That's not a platform - it's nihilism.
Progressives have an immediate challenge and a slightly-longer term task. The immediate challenge is to pass a bill that improves our fractured health system. The longer-term task is to spend the run-up to November explaining what's been accomplished, and to ensure the electoral victories we need if the future is to be one of continued progress - rather than inaction from the "Party of No." We need a future of reform, not repeal.
When it comes to health reform, Caddell and Schoen have it backwards. Comprehensive health care is the best option, both as politics and as policy. Ignore the naysayers and pass the bill.
_____________________
Richard (RJ) Eskow, a consultant and writer, is a Senior Fellow with the Campaign for America's Future. This post was produced as part of the Curbing Wall Street project. Richard blogs at:
No Middle Class Health Tax
A Night Light
Website: Eskow and Associates
Follow Richard (RJ) Eskow on Twitter: www.twitter.com/rjeskow
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The biggest winner of all are the people who financed the entire mess over the past year: Big pharma and big insurance. With more than half of our elected representatives in the pockets of one or the other, or both, to varying degrees, it is no wonder that in the final analysis big $$$ will decide the faith and health of the American people.
NOSMAVAN
The emphasis seems to be on the 'con' that it will lower premiums (they will continue to rise at their normal 6+% rate - if anything slightly faster than they would with no bill - and the rest of us will pay via mandates and/or taxes for subsidizing the needy), lower the deficit (leaving aside reduction of rampant Medicare fraud, which has nothing to do with the other elements of the bill and should have occurred long ago, it will add very significantly to the deficit), cover 32,000,000 who would otherwise be uninsured (but only by 2019 - and it will still leave 22,000,000 uninsured then), cover people with pre-existing conditions (most of them starting in 2014), and 'pave the way for further so-called reform' (when in fact it will cement the iron grip that private insurers hold over our lives and allow Obama to raise his "Mission Accomplished!" banner and move on to different perfidy).
The bill as-is is a fraud primarily benefiting private insurers - and Obama wants it that way.
The immediate option would be for House progressives to stand by their clear-as-crystal pledge NOT to vote for the bill unless it includes (via reconciliation) a strong public option available to all. Since over 50 Senators are on record as supporting this (see http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2010/01/29/list-of-51-senate-democrats-who-support-a-public-option-whats-stopping-them-now/ and http://whipcongress.com/ ), it could pass this month via reconciliation, making the complete package acceptable if still hardly ideal (the ideal being single-payer).
Or they could send it down to the defeat that it deserves if they can't get the right language through the House - though in that case the right language would almost certainly suddenly become feasible, because that's the way this whole farce has played out over the last year.
By the way, most of my quantitative statements above come from the sources (primarily the CBO estimates) that I used in http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/17/dennis-kucinich-health-care_n_502182.html?show_comment_id=42466979#comment_42466979 - in one case updated to account for recent changes.
If, that is, the will to do so exists. But the people who are urging that we pass this turkey and then improve it later are themselves by definition assuming that such will exists, so it should not require any leap of faith on their part.
I have been saying the same for a long time. When those who are in opposition to health care reform realize that they are not commies, haven't been put in FEMA camps and haven't been taxed to the point of hunger, they will be pleased. When they and their children actually attain health insurance and access to health care they will be thrilled. In my experience, most of the people most afraid of health care reform either don't have insurance or are on Medicare themselves. It is amazing to me that the hard right have been able to get the population so fearful that they would protest the very thing that might keep them alive!
I fear the President and his Chief of Staff have depended altogether too much on Congressional leaders to do their work for them.
It has to be changed, otherwise it will provide greater coverage by robbing from the poor to give to the rich.
If - and ONLY if - the House includes that strong public option available to all in the reconciliation package which it sends to the Senate, THEN the turkey will change into a swan (or at least a good-lucking duck) and become worthy of passage.
If nothing else, the Dems. will have something good to campaign with.
The Dems will have that 'courage', the President is out being that tough campaigner and putting his cred. out there, and more Americans will now be covered and able to go to the doctor. ANYone who accepts 30 million+ Americans only having free clinics and emergency rooms as a health care last resort needs a serious morality check.
What on earth can the Republicans boast about and say other than no, repeal, obstruct....people will ask, with unemployment hovering at 10%, when banks and companies were about to fall off the precipice,
foreclosures, no job, no health care (usually goes with the job, right?), costs of the status quo health care spiralling out of reality...if the Dems are wrong or right, they've been busting a gut to try fix things, so...
What have YOU guys done, at all, lately to help us? I think the people will have an answer the GOP may not like. That's my bet...we'll see.
If they won't do that now, who in their right mind will believe any promises they make to pass it later? I certainly won't: I've committed to voting Republican next November if that happens, just to do my best to throw them out of office - because with Democrats acting like these have there's nothing significant to be gained by electing them, whereas if we throw them out they'll better understand that they won't be allowed to govern unless their walk matches their talk and (after the brief but necessary pain of having more Republicans at the helm) they'll act better next time around.
IT IS USELESS. IT DOES NOT FIX THE PROBLEM.
IT WILL MAKE PRIVATE INSURERS EVEN RICHER, REWARDING THEM, INSTEAD OF PUNISHING THEM FOR THEIR GREED.
IT WILL BANKRUPT THE COUNTRY.
What we need is a president with balls who can confront the greedy bastards and call their game as it is, as already most people knows it is, and push for a lowering of the age limit in Medicare by five years every six months, forcing the private insurers to conform to the new reality, assimilate into the system or get out.
It won't be difficult to convince the unconvinced if the president used the thousands of real stories, by every day citizens, who have suffered the wrath of these inhuman Corporate criminals who profit from the pain of their fellow countrymen.
57% of the respondents have little or no understanding of the bill; another 32% do not fully grasp it.
One might just as well respond to your query with one directed at the GOP: If tort reform is such a great thing, why hasn't it already passed?
There are always a number of factors at play, not the least of which is the massive amount of lobbying $ tossed around by the insurance and pharmacy industries, bent on maintaining the current system which is so lucrative for them. Let me be clear - I don't mean to demonize. These are corporate entities whose fiduciary duty is to maximize return for their shareholders. I don't begrudge them that. But I don't believewe should let the profit motive play such a huge roll in the health care market.
I suspect if the Republicans had the same level of majority the Democrats had until recently, tort reform certainly would have passed had they been in the unlikely circumstances of trying to enact compresive health care.
And this bill gives these corporate interests you mention an awful lot. They're going to be fine if the thing passes - at least until the money runs out, and it surely will.
WHEN, OH WHEN will people finally realize the Republicans are lying to continue getting BIG stashes from Insurance & Drug companies. I just had surgery a few days ago, and I can tell you those pain killing drugs which the Insurance companies wiith the help of Republicans push made me pretty sick, but those are what they load onto Doctors to use on us.
One week of public hearings should be held to educate the President, legislators, and voters, as to how a Public Option using Veterans Health Care successes could save lives and a $trillion annually by using a dual choice Private or Public Option plan.
Only a Free Public Option, run by the government, which eliminates insurance companies, and uses sales taxes to pay for care, which would then be delivered free, to everyone choosing Public Option care, from government hospitals, can produce these drastic cost savings.
No government funding should be paid to private systems.
Medicare and Medicaid could easily be salvaged without bankrupting the federal government by using this Public Option system to deliver all care and medications to all recipients totally free and at a fraction of government’s current costs now devoured by private systems.
If all federal, state, and local government employees were switched to Public Option care along with indigent and all other care programs all their costs would be cut in half.
Between 1995 and 2004, the cumulative increase in the VA’s cost per enrollee was just 0.8 percent, while Medicare was a whopping 40.4 percent.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2005/0501.longman.html
Why not give better care, eliminate costs and hassles, and save a $trillion annually?
there are people who don't like the Health Care reforms
because they don't go FAR ENOUGH!
I completely agree with that, in fact if there is no
"public option" I am against the entire proposal
because in it's current form it mandates that
everyone gets cover without a "true discount"
carrier that will help insure low costs through
competition....
and you are correct the MSM is only telling
one side of the story.Also, If the administration
gets to sign a health care legislation this
year the republicans will have no argument
to make when it comes to the administration
keeping it's promises......The party of NO will
look even more racist and inept!!!
That one little company would by the way have at least one unfair advantage. Sale of product nationwide while the "competition" is limited to a state for clients.
Then there is the fact that the Government is not supposed to compete with private companies!
Dems are the party of "No", especially since Republicans have been seeking HCR for the last 10 years. My guess is that the reform didn't include a socialist takeover, therefore it did not suit the Dems' desires for HCR.
IHS and VA, two shining examples of government run health care. Ask a Native American about the health care they receive from IHS. Ask a Veteran about visits to the VA. As a veteran of the military, before I get either of these, I want to read exactly what is being proposed, and "trust me" will not cut it. The last time I heard those two words from a government paid doctor it cost me.
Perhaps that is because the damn thing is well over 2000 pages long. In addition very little is contained in a manner that people actually read. What with all the references to other legislation and cross references to other parts of this legislation. Then there is the Senate bill which is nothing more than a series of changes to the House bill, itself thousands of pages long.
There are reasons for this mess of writing. Lawyers, trying to cover everything, or even for the purpose of hiding what it is really about?
Or, is the lack of support more of a triumph of Republican opposition?
Were it 100 pages more people would know what it says.
Then there would be no question about the efficacy of the bill.
Actually I think Congress should never propose anything over 100 pages!
Health care is a free market.
It's not. it's already completely government subsidized, and runs under multiple monopolies.
The health insurance industry does not even cover the most costly segment of the population. Medicare does. Add their costs to the sytem, and health insurance companies would implode overnight.
And that's precisely what Paul Ryan is advocating.