Obamacare Rage in Retrospect - by Paul Krugman

[kpete]

Whenever I see someone castigating liberals for engaging in identity politics, I wonder what such people imagine the right has been doing all these years. For generations, conservatives have conditioned many Americans to believe that safety-net programs are all about taking things away from white people and giving stuff to minorities.



And those who stoked Obamacare rage were believed because they seemed to some Americans like their kind of people — that is, white people defending them against you-know-who.



It’s certainly not encouraging to realize how easily many Americans were duped by right-wing lies, pushed into screaming rage against a reform that would actually improve their lives.



On the other hand, the truth did eventually prevail, and Republicans’ inability to handle that truth is turning into a real political liability. And in the meantime, Obamacare has made America a better place.



THE REST:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/04/opinion/obamacare-rage-in-retrospect.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-left-region&region=opinion-c-col-left-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region

[Squinch]

1. "It ain't over till the portly golfer sings." I love Paul Krugman SOOOO much and he doesn't even

know I'm alive!

[gratuitous]

2. I don't want to be too hard on Krugman

But a major reason that Americans were duped by right-wing lies about the Affordable Care Act is because responsible media outlets like the New York Times failed to call out those lies and report the truth. In the last six months, Americans have at last had a modicum of truthful reporting about the ACA, and hey presto! it now polls with majority support.

[Cosmocat]

3. idk

i don't know that the average american puts too much actual thought or analysis into it like that.

IMO, the biggest reason ACA is seen more positively now is that after 7 years of republicans screaming that THEIR form of health care reform was the greatest threat to the country ever, they finally ended up in a place where they had full power and had nothing (because ACA was THEIR form of health care reform) and when they realized the untenable position of blowing up ACA with no replacement went into their rat holes and came up with a replacement that by all measurements would have completely blew up health care and medicare.

The simple reality is that Rs had no only did not have a better replacement, they were going to blow healthcare completely up.

[ProfessorPlum]

5. You can both be right

you've described the narrative of what happened accurately. But it is true that accurate reporting by the media, including the NYT, would have blunted the effect of republicans running around screaming about how bad the ACA is/was. Asking them, and demanding an answer, what their actual replacement would be, would have helped for a start.

[Cosmocat]

6. Agreed and one more point

Media being the republican serviant twits they are.

I would add another factor over the last 7 years.

Democrats (edit, ELECTED democrats) running from it.

No sand to take a stand and defend it.

[Squinch]

4. Krugman himself was pretty good on his coverage of it, though.

[marylandblue]

9. Krugman is a Cassandra, always right and never believed

[uponit7771]

7. Yeap, Chuck Todd "Its not the media's job to fact check GOP on Obama care" (vid)

[Saboburns]

8. It was just Obama they hated

They like and want the Care.

[JCinNYC]

10. I guarantee if Obamacare did not exist..

and Dump and the Repubs just passed a similar plan, there would already be calls for his royal mug to be placed on Mt Rushmore (as well as St Ronnie).

He would have been hailed as a great american savior for the working class.
That's how good they are at framing things, and unfortunately, exactly the opposite for us.

[Scurrilous]

11. K&R