Obamacare gets its vindication
By Matt Miller, Wednesday, November 7, 3:18 AM
George Shultz once offered advice to Cabinet secretaries seeking to make a difference, advice that applies equally well to presidents. It’s easy to be consumed by your in box in these big jobs, Shultz explained. The flow of “incoming” could keep anyone fully occupied from the moment they were sworn in to the day they left office. The key to leaving your mark is to be sure you work on priorities you select and put into other people’s in-boxes. Don’t just work off your own.
This sound counsel captures why Barack Obama’s devotion to major health reform was so important — and why the risks he took to pursue that course must make his vindication Tuesday night especially sweet.
Obama didn’t “have” to do health reform. It wasn’t in his in box. A historic economic collapse was. He could have devoted himself exclusively to economic crisis management. (Though even if he’d done that, it’s not clear the recovery would be further along. After all, the Republicans blocked the sensible infrastructure investments in his Jobs Act a year ago that would have left 1 million more Americans working today — and unemployment at 7.2 percent, not 7.9 percent).
But Obama took the longer view. He knew U.S. health care was a scandal, with outsize costs and 50 million people uninsured. Now, thanks to the president’s reelection and the certainty that the law will be phased in by 2014, everything will change.
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/matt-miller-obamacare-is-vindicated/2012/11/07/2a33b842-28a5-11e2-bab2-eda299503684_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines
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It's been passed.
It's been upheld by the Supreme Court.
It will not be repealed by the 113th Congress (other than maybe another symbolic vote by the House)
It goes into full-effect on Jan. 1, 2014.
HALLELUJAH!!!
