No slam dunk?
Ed Morrissey at Hotair.com :
Since fixing this means less revenue, any fix will have to raise taxes, co-pays, etc. for others (or further explode the deficit). Many of those others will be folks who know they are less well compensated than these union workers. The issue of union pay, perks, and job security is starting to gather steam, especially with respect to public employee unions and government workers generally compared with those in the private sector. The disparity during this recession has become somewhere between glaring and outrageous. The Dems may find another deep division developing within the working class that they claim to represent. (Marx dreamed of a homogeneous, unified proletariat, but it was only a dream, even then.)
If ObamaCare begins to be recognized for the zero-sum game it is -- and not just for Medicare recipients and doctors -- the whole project may collapse in a snarl of competing interests. Polls show that most people don't really want this massive program, but they will mostly remain supportive or neutral as long as they don't think it will cost them anything personally. Good luck with that. Good luck also with getting House members who have to run for re-election every two years to stiff arm their constituents. Presidents come and go, but if you play your cards right you can stay in Congress until you die of old age.
The Dems are in a big hurry to get this monstrosity passed and signed before one constituent group after another discovers that it can't work the way they've been led to believe. The political problem is that the primary beneficiary group is low income people, and they tend not to show up at election time; Medicare recipients, on the other hand, will push their walkers through sleet and hail to take revenge for lost benefits. Choices, choices. Stuff like this is why it's so much harder to govern than it is to take cheap shots from the sidelines, and why when either party gets into power it tends to be of short duration.
Byron
Nancy Pelosi’s caucus held a conference call yesterday to discuss the health-care overhaul bill that came out of the Senate, and it appears that House Democrats are in no mood to accept it. Ben Pershing reports in the Washington Post that the “Cadillac tax” has generated the most opposition, with only one House Democrat (Colorado’s Jared Polis) defending it. Driven mainly by union opposition, Pelosi’s caucus appears ready to revamp the bill again — which will create more openings for division...
Since fixing this means less revenue, any fix will have to raise taxes, co-pays, etc. for others (or further explode the deficit). Many of those others will be folks who know they are less well compensated than these union workers. The issue of union pay, perks, and job security is starting to gather steam, especially with respect to public employee unions and government workers generally compared with those in the private sector. The disparity during this recession has become somewhere between glaring and outrageous. The Dems may find another deep division developing within the working class that they claim to represent. (Marx dreamed of a homogeneous, unified proletariat, but it was only a dream, even then.)
If ObamaCare begins to be recognized for the zero-sum game it is -- and not just for Medicare recipients and doctors -- the whole project may collapse in a snarl of competing interests. Polls show that most people don't really want this massive program, but they will mostly remain supportive or neutral as long as they don't think it will cost them anything personally. Good luck with that. Good luck also with getting House members who have to run for re-election every two years to stiff arm their constituents. Presidents come and go, but if you play your cards right you can stay in Congress until you die of old age.
The Dems are in a big hurry to get this monstrosity passed and signed before one constituent group after another discovers that it can't work the way they've been led to believe. The political problem is that the primary beneficiary group is low income people, and they tend not to show up at election time; Medicare recipients, on the other hand, will push their walkers through sleet and hail to take revenge for lost benefits. Choices, choices. Stuff like this is why it's so much harder to govern than it is to take cheap shots from the sidelines, and why when either party gets into power it tends to be of short duration.
Byron
posted by Byron | Friday, January 08, 2010
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