Maggie's Farm

“…I found on most of these questions that the desire for change and support for reform was slightly stronger 16 years ago…”

 

So says Stanley Greenberg, CEO and co-chair with Dem pitbull James Carville of polling firm Greenberg Quinlan Rosner.  Greenberg served as a polling advisor to President Bill Clinton, was deeply involved in Clinton’s failed 1993 effort to rewrite Americans’ health care, and is today a prominent Democrat pollster.

Greenberg points out that, “the country has maintained the same anxieties about government's ability to improve the system.”  Greenberg continues:

…Our inability to talk credibly about how we would reduce health care spending or costs for individuals and the country built a contradiction into all our efforts--the more we talked about the comprehensiveness of our plans, the more voters worried this would yield higher premiums or higher taxes. Very quickly, voters came to conclude that their families would face higher costs.

 

And those dynamics are still in play. In my recent polling, I found that voters are skeptical about claims that reform will reduce costs and personal health outlays. Claims about simplicity, information-technology modernization, and best practices don't seem to be enough to persuade them otherwise.

 

For example: “It may surprise you that Obama has already lost seniors, according to our current survey--only one-third approve of his plan. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see there isn't much in it for them.”  Similarly for union members: “Yet the members will ultimately judge whether the plan is good for their families--and I'm certain that all the talk about taxing insurance contributions has not gone unnoticed.”  Similarly for blue collar Americans: “Ross Perot is a distant memory, but his more libertarian, blue-collar male voters are very much alive. They are pretty certain government will mess this up--and only about 30 percent support Obama's health care plan right now. With Republicans reciting their mantra about no ‘government takeover’ of health care, the plan's opponents have found a common text.”

Greenberg ends with:

He [Obama] must respect the thoughts, feelings and calculations of ordinary citizens who are not easily spun on important issues. People will take out their calculators when he lays out his plan, and he can't avoid speaking candidly about its costs and consequences. And he can't forget that he has a big story to tell about a changed America, one in which health care is but a pile of bricks in the new foundation he is laying.

 

“Health care is but a pile of bricks in the new foundation” by Obama for America?  Pile of bricks or pile of statist BS?  Most Americans can tell the difference.