I've seen the polls and they, the American people, are overwhelmingly opposed to the bill in it's current form.
Originally Posted by DFW5Traveler
You must be watching the MSM, the most conservative and lazy organization in our society. They couldn't scratch their ass if they had a hand full of fishhooks.
The public, especially the Democrats and Independents, are not against this bill. Properly polled, it has a broad majority of support.
Look at this quote from a news story (from someone who isn't lazy and conservative) on the very recent McClatchy/Ipsos poll.
Comes now (Feb. 26-28) a McClatchy/Ipsos poll of 1,076 people that on first glance offers rocks to sling at Obama. The lead question asks, “As of right now, do you favor or oppose the health care reform proposals presently being discussed?” Forty-one percent said they favored them, 47 percent said they were opposed, and the rest said they were unsure. Those are numbers the Republican leaders could work with.
But the pollsters went a step further, asking those opposed – 509 people in all – if they were against the proposals because they “don’t go far enough to reform health care” or because they go too far. Thirty-seven percent said it was because the proposals don’t go far enough. Thus – are you ready for this? – the addition of an obvious, simple follow-up question completely turns the tables. The overall numbers switch to 59 percent in favor of health care reform, 30 percent against. Putting aside those with no opinion, it becomes 66 percent in favor of health care reform, 34 percent against. Some would call that a consensus, or these days, a super majority.
http://www.niemanwatchdog.org/index....groundid=00435
See also:
http://www.pollingreport.com/health.htm
The lazy will only see 41/47 against the bill. But when you ask the next question, why are you against it, over a third 37%, said they are against it because it doesn't go far enough in it's changes. They are like me -- they want either single payer or at least the public option.
So you add those back into your initial group, 59 percent favor health care reform at least as significant as this bill. Throw out the no opinion folks, and it gets even stronger -- 66 percent in favor.
You also overlook one important issue. Democrats want a bill passed badly. Independent are split almost down the middle, but prefer this bill by a narrow margin. It's the Republicans who don't want it and they're not going to vote for Obama or Democratic Congressional candidates in any event. Fuck them, they don't count in the political calculus of what to do. They're going to vote against anything Obama or the Democrats do and their voters will vote against Democratic candidates no matter what. They lost the election and elections have consequences. Can you imagine Bush worrying about what the other side thought? Hell no, he'd just go do what he was elected to do -- fuck the Democrats.
CaptianMidnight, you oil change analogy is flawed. That might work for routine medical care. Getting checked out when you have a cold. A once a year physical, etc. And there is very effective cost competition for those sorts of medical services. What is driving costs are the low to zero elasticity of demand services like an acquaintance of mine experienced last week. He'd been having chest pains for a few days and his wife talked him into going to the doc. They rushed him from the doc's office to the hospital and he was having quadruple bypass within two or three hours of leaving the doc office.
That's the sort of procedures that are driving costs and the competition model doesn't work there. There is no time to shop, no time to move from place to place, you do what they say, and you pay what they pay and you don't ask questions, at least not before the fact. Same with critical care after a big accident, a heart attack, a stroke, premature kids, end of life care, etc. All the big cost drivers.
