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Did ObamaCare Hurt
Democrats on November 2? Part Three of Three By Dave Andrusko
Why? Most importantly to minimize the importance of repealing and replacing what soon-to-be House Speaker John Boehner properly calls a "monstrosity." In President Obama's "just-forget-about-it" view, the American people didn't signal on November 2 that they wanted his first two years "re-litigated." Of course, the public did. Lots of it, including health care "reform." To take just one example from last week, the non-partisan Rasmussen Reports' telephone exit polling found that 59% of those who voted on Election Day favored repeal of that law. This is consistent with what Rasmussen had found for months. And no doubt much to the chagrin of the Kaiser Family Foundation, its new poll shows just how much the public wants ObamaCare revisited. (Bear in mind that KFF consistently spins its own results to minimize the impact of what it doesn't like.) The most important question the KFF poll asked was, "Which of the following comes closest to your view of what lawmakers in Washington should do with the new health reform law." A strong majority--a total of 56%--wanted part of the law repealed (24%) or all of the law repealed (32%). Only 21% wanted to expand ObamaCare while 15% wanted to leave it as is. The opposition numbers would be even more overwhelming if people were reminded that many of the provisions they say they like about the current law would be part of a new law once the old law is history. (BTW: the KFF poll broke out results for Democrats and Republican. Wonder why it did not for Independents, whose votes swing elections these days.) Not to be forgotten is the poll conducted election night for NRLC by the polling company TM inc. Overall 54% said they oppose the health care law (44% strongly) while only 39% favor it (26% strongly)--an almost a 3-2 margin. Last thought. In the KFF poll 17% said that health-care was a major influence on their vote. Those voters "picked a Republican candidate over a Democratic candidate by 15 points," according to the Washington Post's Chris Cillizza. "And, within that same voting bloc, a whopping 56 percent said they had a 'very unfavorable' view of the health-care legislation. So, for those to whom health-care mattered, it was an overwhelmingly negative factor in their vote -- driving them to Republican candidates in hordes." ObamaCare hurt Democrats…badly. Please send your comments on Today's News & Views and National Right to Life News Today to daveandrusko@gmail.com. If you like, join those who are following me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/daveha. |
In
the wake of an election in which ObamaCare was awful medicine
for Democrats, there is a lot of incentive to minimize how much
the public gagged on it.