California Conservative

Dan Neil, an admitted liberal/progressive columnist for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, can’t understand why the left is losing the health care reform debate:

While opinions on health-care reform break sharply along partisan lines, with most Democrats in favor and most Republicans opposed, independent voters strongly oppose the health-care reform measures pending in Congress by a whopping 70 percent to 27 percent, according to a recent Pew Research poll. How could the left possibly be losing the debate on health-care reform when its opponent is the roundly loathed health insurance industry, an ongoing criminal syndicate, in my view, that demands protection money from sick people?

First, that’s one of the most boneheaded assumptions I’ve ever heard. Neil assumes that people “roundly loathe” the health insurance industry. What proof does he have of that? Yes, people don’t agree with their insurance company but that isn’t proof of loathing. The other thing that Neil doesn’t factor in his predilection towards government. If polling were conducted asking people if they trusted this Democrat-controlled congress more or trusted health insurance companies more, I suspect the people would have more reservations towards this Democrat-controlled congress.

Independents are breaking against the Democrats’ health care reform proposal because they prefer what they have over what they might get. It doesn’t help that Democrat politicians have accused doctors of having an agenda when they’re just asking questions. It isn’t helping the Democrats’ cause when Arlen Specter tells people they don’t have time to read bills because they have to keep legislation moving at a fast pace.

People know that that isn’t true. The people understand that the frenetic pace that they’re moving at is a pace of the politicians’ choosing.

This sentence is utterly laughable:

The reform message is so jellied with politesse, so measured, so anti-inflammatory it might as well be made out of Advil.

I’d hate to think that Speaker Pelosi’s accusation that people asking questions at the townhall meetings were carrying swastikas isn’t an example of that measured message. I don’t think that Sen. Durbin’s accusation that the people asking legitimate questions were either GOP plants or the insurance companies’ operatives is an example of measured communication.

Compare these ads with, for example, the Americans for Prosperity group’s Patients First campaign ad. Cue the scary music.

“Washington now runs your banks, your insurance and your car companies,” the female narrator says while a photo of Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi looking like Skeletor flashes on the screen. “But do you trust Washington with your life? $600 billion in new taxes…cutting $400 billion from Medicare…plus tens of millions will lose their insurance…”

You simply have to concede the point: The insurance industry’s ads are more effective. They are big, scary, threatening. Reform gets rolled like the British at the Somme by this ad. Liberal progressives and advocates are going to have to get down and dirty if they want to win this fight.

First of all, seniors understand that cutting Medicare by 10 percent over the next decade is hurting them. Seniors also know that Medicare enrollment will grow by 30 percent during that decade. In other words, they know that President Obama’s proposal will ration health care for seniors.

This column shows how frustrated Democrats are. In their minds, they think they’ve got the better arguments but the damn peasants won’t listen to those arguments because they’re too afraid. That arrogance will help kill health care reform.

Neil isn’t factoring in the public’s distrust of Obama, Pelosi and Waxman. That shouldn’t be minimized. The SEIU’s thuggish behavior isn’t helping, either.

The Democrats won’t win this argument because their only chance of passing single-payor is if people think their health insurance is utterly inept. Even then, it isn’t likely because they’d still have to convince people that the government is more efficient and responsive than health insurance companies.

Good luck winning that argument.

Technorati Tags: Media Bias, Dan Neil, Speaker Pelosi, President Obama, SEIU, Union Thugs, Violence, Medicare, Rationing

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 9th, 2009 at 12:42 pm and is filed under Activism, Author: Gary Gross, Corruption, Crime, Health Care, Liberals, Media, Obama, Pelosi, Special Interests, Subversives. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.