I was just ruminating this morning about how framing and messaging that seemed smart at the time will come back to haunt the Republicans and possibly lose them the House in the midterms and cement the Senate and the Presidency in 2016.
The Affordable Care Act is here. The train has left the station. People all across the country are logging on or their friends and family are, and they are finding coverage where before there was none.
ALL of these people covered under the ACA will become committed Democratic voters in the future- how could they not? The Republicans have demonstrated nothing but sheer rabid hatred of this signature legislation as the stand-in piñata for the President .
In their attempt to denigrate the law, they called it "Obamacare". All we will remember about the Republicans in 2013 is that they cared enough to attempt to nullify a national election by "defunding" it. They hated the law and the good it will do enough to shut the whole damn government down over it.
Why? Because they know. They know that they will lose elections in the future because of choosing ideology over lives.
Healthcare matters. It's not some esoteric minor detail in the lives of the 99% as some politicians seem to believe. I could foresee people actually moving from one state to another to access better and more affordable healthcare.
What if the states comprising New AynRandia lose population, businesses and Congressional districts over their Medicaid gap? Some of their Social Darwinists might say - "Great! We lose the poor and ill folks."
Actually, some of what will be lost will also be the young, just getting started wage earners as well. You’ll also lose a lot of retirees that are too young for Medicare. Healthcare for all is a societal good that actually does trickle throughout and fertilize the entire economy of a state. Your loss of population from people you consider disposable will reverberate negatively throughout your entire state.
And, I'm sorry Tea Party and Republicans. You've already lost the next Presidential election. We know you will only allow a Tea Partyer through your primaries. Personally, I just can't wait.
Imagine a Red State Governor running for President who refused the Medicaid expansion in a future Presidential debate:
Q. Governor Blowhard what do you say to the x thousands of citizens in your state who would have received healthcare under the Medicaid expansion that you refused? What percentage of your state remains uninsured?
Q. Governor Blowhard, are you still committed to repealing the healthcare law that covers xx thousand/million of your state's citizens?
Q. Governor Blowhard, please tell us again your healthcare plan. Does it still remain based on emergency rooms, private charity and tort reform?
Because the Republicans were too clever by half and framed the ACA as Obamacare, they themselves have indelibly tied it to this President and the Democrats. They could have climbed on the bus to modernity and fiscal sanity in the realm of healthcare like the rest of the world, but they chose to stand outside and pelt the bus with eggs.
They could have accepted that they lost this battle in the houses of Congress, the courts and the ballot box. They could have begun calling it the Affordable Care Act. They could have focused on how the ACA can be improved (and by improved I don’t mean “gutted”). People from both parties would have enrolled in the ACA and exchanges as they are right now and much of the political punch and advantage to the Democrats would have been diffused.
But, fortunately for Democrats, the Republicans have hung their futures on their hatred for and repeal or defunding of this law to their own inevitable demise. Sad.