“The angry opponents are more mobilized than the beneficiaries”
Across the country, many Democrats have made the calculation that embracing the law offers more risk than reward.
The architecture of the law almost ensured this outcome. To win over centrist Democrats, the administration proposed a complicated, market-based overhaul that was undergirded politically by Mr. Obama’s promise that individuals could keep their existing health plans.
“It was sold as small, minor change because of the need to pass it through Congress and assure the vast majority of people that it wouldn’t disturb their existing health insurance,” said Stanley B. Greenberg, a Democratic pollster. “But why defend it, why mobilize behind it if it’s just small change?”…
“This is where the communications failure has been so problematic,” said Ezekiel J. Emanuel, one of the law’s architects. “We haven’t really alerted Americans to the fact that there is much more to this than the exchanges that’s going to be really, really positive for all of us, not just those getting insurance.”…
“In the ’60s, we felt like we could do anything,” recalled Joseph A. Califano Jr., a top domestic aide to Johnson. “We could feed the hungry, cure disease and clean the air. Now there’s just a lot more skepticism.”









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Ideology and drug-induced.
Drained Brain on April 20, 2014 at 2:50 PM
Alternate take – the New Sedition Slimes is deeply saddened that the Free Shat Army isn’t winning.
Steve Eggleston on April 20, 2014 at 2:51 PM
Don’t bother… this is more NYT Bulle Schitt defending ØbamaCare and honing lies to fleece the least informed or most partisan, or both. Joke of an article with nothing new to exploit.
ExpressoBold on April 20, 2014 at 2:54 PM
“If you like our lies you can keep our lies”.
VegasRick on April 20, 2014 at 2:58 PM
“We haven’t punished them long enough and crippled the economy enough for those rubes to appreciate how we’ve turned the country into a third-rate banana republic.”
BuckeyeSam on April 20, 2014 at 3:05 PM
Probably because the beneficiaries only make up about 1% of the total population. The other 99% were screwed.
The Notorious G.O.P on April 20, 2014 at 3:07 PM
See Greek mythology on hubris.
Wethal on April 20, 2014 at 3:11 PM
Incredible self-unawareness of his own auto-fisking!
Now, Mr. Califano, why do you think there might be skepticism these days, as opposed to the ’60s when you promised to “feed the hungry, cure disease and clean the air” by increasing the size and power of government?
Why the skepticism?
Because, despite massively expanded the size and power of government and diminishing the freedom of the individual, YOU DIDN’T “feed the hungry, cure disease and clean the air”!
You make promises, and failed to keep them!
And yet, we remain stuck with the massively outsized government, the massive debt, 50% of the nation stuck on welfare, ridiculous taxes, and diminished personal freedom.
Skepticism? You’re lucky it’s limited to that!
Zombie on April 20, 2014 at 3:15 PM
Let me put that through the Truth-o-lator:
1960s:
“We’re the government. We have declared a War on Poverty! Citizens, give us your money and your individuality, and we will solve this terrible problem!”
“OK. We citizens are a little leery, but sounds like a fair deal. Here’s our money and individuality. Use it well!”
(Fast forward 50 years.)
2010s:
“Hmmm, looks like poverty and ‘income inequality’ is worse now than it was when we started this ‘War on Poverty.’ Gee, we’re not sure what went wrong — all those trillions, all that regimentation, and yet we only made things worse! Hey, here’s an idea: Everybody, give us MORE of your money and MORE of your independence, and this time we’ll solve…uh, something about insurance payments! Yeah, that’s the ticket.”
Zombie on April 20, 2014 at 3:22 PM
OK, I’ve got the pitchforks and tar: anybody have some feathers?
Zombie on April 20, 2014 at 3:24 PM
The “opponents” of the law aka people that are directly harmed by this horrible trainwreck of a law.
ramesees on April 20, 2014 at 3:25 PM
No, bastids, those who pay for those who steal are mad, you obama-chit-consumers. It ain’t Beluga caviar.
Schadenfreude on April 20, 2014 at 3:28 PM
Also – the reason none of the Democrat ideas about solving poverty or cleaning the air never work is because the programs they pass DONT DO ANYTHING TO ADDRESS THE PROBLEMS. All Democrat plans do is pay off special interest and voting blocs for political payoff.
Democrats don’t do anything for Americans – they are simply a special interest lobby.
ramesees on April 20, 2014 at 3:30 PM
But those getting so-called Obamacare health insurance are finding out that they aren’t really insured. They have paid their money and they have a little wallet card but it’s as useless as the fake American Express card I get once a month.
Some Covered California Patients Say They Can’t See A Doctor
“While open enrollment for coverage under the Affordable Care Act is closed, many of the newly insured are finding they can’t find doctors, landing them into a state described as ‘medical homelessness’.”
slickwillie2001 on April 20, 2014 at 4:04 PM
Find our resident geese, Jake-The or Zeus.
Lanceman on April 20, 2014 at 4:49 PM
ObamaCare in a nutshell: Don’t ever get sick until about 5 minutes before you are ready to die.
VorDaj on April 20, 2014 at 5:06 PM
This is one of those NYT articles where you feel like screaming at the end.
It has the semblance of balance and fairness. But when you read it carefully, the reasons why people oppose the law come down to misunderstanding and “communications” problems; that Republicans “argue effectively” against the law (because nobody could possibly oppose it because of their own experience or knowing what it contains); “complexity” that really shouldn’t bother anybody; and, of course, of course, just like Mr. Ed is a horse, the unwillingness of white people to do the least bit to help those whose forefathers came here from Africa in chains — in CHAINS, muthaf*cker, in chains.
bobs1196 on April 20, 2014 at 5:15 PM
we could have covered the same number of new enrollees ( whatever fictitious number that may be) without totally buggering the rest of the country with this 3000 page monstrosity. just wait tip they force people off their employer plans and makers have to go on the exchanges and get far less for far more.
Basically the exchanges are a way of rationing care by making the copays to high and the deductibles too high so decent people won’t use it.
Furthermore the MDs on the exchanges are FMGs from hell that you wouldn’t want to be on a plane with.
avi natan on April 20, 2014 at 5:31 PM
This is all you need to know…
d1carter on April 20, 2014 at 5:43 PM
…well, since it’s been shown by the oh-so-rite-wing brookings institute that it’s only the bottom 20% that benefits financially at the expense of the top 80% — so much for the middle class — one has no difficulty believing that the opposition to the Most Orwellian-Named Legislation In History is more lively.
in a “recovery” whose bounce is about on par with that of a cement-filled balloon, middle-class-warrior barack has working academics with congenital autoimmune diseases unable to pay their rising healthcare premiums so that the hands-out free-sh!t army can spend their job-lock-liberated days sitting around in ED’s and hospitals driving up the general costs of heathcare even further.
…on the dime of working people who can no longer afford their own healthcare.
jaxisaneurophysicist on April 20, 2014 at 5:44 PM
An insufferable Quack masquerading as a President once found a Doctor’s white lab coat which had been left out in the sun to dry. He put it on and spoke of wondrous things to his countrymen. All bowed, both men and women, and he was a proud Quack that day. In his delight he lifted up his voice and brayed treatments and prescriptions and timetables and qualifications randomly and incoherently and unleashed mindless bureaucrat zombies upon the land to look for trouble, find it everywhere, diagnose everything incorrectly and then in a very grouchy and slow manner misapply all the wrong remedies, and then everyone knew him for the insufferable Quack he really was.
VorDaj on April 20, 2014 at 5:45 PM