On another site's forum today, a conservative wrote disapprovingly of another commenters' use of the phrase "real death panels" in connection with the kidney donor who cannot get insurance.
He also said that conservative ideas must be popular because their legislation has passed without a filibuster proof majority. Below is my response. (Names have been changed to protect the wrong.)
Dear Michael,
You criticize use of the phrase "real death panels" in connection with the un-insurable kidney donor. I would like to know if you believe that the ACA contains "death panels." If you do, then I believe you are seriously misinformed.
But if you don't (the likely possibility given your intelligence), tens of millions of Americans do believe that, because of hundreds of millions of dollars of anti-ACA propaganda and the regular media's failure to call "death panels" a lie when it first leaped off the Facebook page of that noted expert on health care and the ACA, Sarah Palin.
Now we deal in facts here, I hope. It is a fact that the ACA does not have "death panels." It is also a fact that millions believe that it does have death panels.
But the story of the kidney donor is also a fact (and there are thousands of similar stories).
That tens of thousands die every year because of lack of insurance is also a fact.
That even insured people die or have their lives shortened because they are under-insured is a fact.
That millions of people have to file bankruptcy because of medical costs is a fact.
That medical costs are a constant source of anxiety and depression for millions of uninsured and under-insured people is a fact.
That millions must cut back on other necessities because of medical costs is a fact.
So if we balance all factors: that millions have bought the lie about the ACA and death panels and that the US health care system today allows thousands of preventable deaths, I have no problem saying the current system has "real death panels."
In fact, it leads to one answer to your other comment as to why Republicans have been able to pass legislation without a filibuster proof majority:
One factor is that lies get disseminated widely and are hardly ever debunked, death panels being Exhibit A (which is why it was miraculous that even the ACA was passed). Exhibit B is "Obama cut $500B from Medicare" -- the lie that helped elected the 2010 Tea Party Congress. (How many people know that most of the same "cuts" are in the Ryan budget?)
Another is that if Dems try to be aggressive (and not even lying), e.g., the ads about Bain Capital, they are pounced on by some of their own (Booker, Huffington) and told to retract.
But much more than either of these, the answer to your question involves several factors, including:
Republican use of reconciliation (and "Demon pass") in the case of the tax cuts (while these procedures were excoriated when proposed by Dems)
That the Dems have not used the filibuster as routine the ways the Reps have done since 2006.
That there are conservative Dems, but no real moderate Reps, and therefore conservative bills can get a majority, even filibuster proof. (a product of the structure of the Senate and reapportionment) (see also Booker, above)
That Republicans are willing to use Kamikaze tactics like the debt ceiling vote, and Dems are not nuts. (There is no debate that the debt ceiling tactic is nuts.)
That Republicans can get away with things like the Tauzin bribe (took a million dollar bonus job a week after Medicare D passed) and the Foster intimidation (Medicare actuary threatened with firing if he revealed the real costs of Medicare D) and the Dems are met with scorn, derision, horror and intimidation when logrolling is used to attempt to pass legislation (the "Cornhusker Kickback"). You might think that the CK was the most horrible piece of legislative bribery in history (as it was portrayed), but there are CK's in scores of laws every year.
Finally, other than the tax cuts, Medicare D and the war, what other significant legislation did the Republicans pass recently?