House Healthcare RepealFollow

I thought Varus claimed he wasn't a Republican a couple of years back because they weren't conservative enough? Actually, saying the GOP was a joke were almost his exact words...

You're delusional dude.

I've always been a social liberal (and fiscal conservative) and never claimed to be anything else. Hence why I like the Dalai Lama but realize causing an international incident with a country that owns 1/8 of our national debt is a bad idea. I've never been a registered Democrat though, which is what I've always said but you seem to forget constantly

It can't be any more partisan than the bill they are attempting to repeal, can it?

Ugly is right, however that does not eliminate the need to pass this bill in the house. It sets a starting point for the process. If you start off saying "well, we're ok with just trimming off a few bits here and there", the other side will negotiate that until you get nothing. Or what gets trimmed is the stuff you're ok with, and bad stuff is left in and the result is worse. By starting with a firm "we want this thing gone completely", you force the other side to either dig in their heels or come up with a compromise that is actually in the middle instead of skewed to one side.


The other component to this is that the health care bill is *very* unpopular nationwide. I know we get caught up in hyperbole here, and while it's wrong to say that "everyone" wants it repealed, it's more right than saying that "no one" does. Simply pointing out that the other guys exaggeration isn't true doesn't remove the core reality that most people really don't like the health care bill as passed. By pushing for a full repeal, it puts the Dems in the position of defending a bill that most people don't like. Politically, that could be disastrous.

What's going on in the Senate right now is an indication of this. If it was such a simple deal Reid would call for a vote on the bill and the Dems would vote against it. But instead he's refusing to put it on the schedule. That sort of avoidance speaks volumes. It says that they know their position is unpopular and while they don't want the bill to pass, they don't want to be on record voting against it. If it were to come to a vote it's not outside the realm of possibility that it might just pass. Even a filibuster is problematic for the Dems since, as I've pointed out repeatedly in the past, the public perception of the filibuster is based on the base public support/opposition to the bill in question.


IMO, passing the repeal bill in the house was exactly the right thing for the GOP to do. It puts the Dems on notice and puts the core issue the voters reacted to last year (wasteful spending in bad economic times) front and center. The reality is that the Dems badly miscalculated with the health care bill. And once they realized it, instead of reversing course, they just rammed it through anyway. That's going to cost them and it's going to continue to cost them. Of course the GOP is going to keep it in the spotlight. It would be foolish for them not to. You have one of those rare cases where public opinion and political value are aligned. Of course they're going to push the issue!

Well, you whined about that so let's hear you whine about how "partisan" this bill is and how it was "rammed through" the House without being allowed through the amendment process, etc.

Hehehehe... I slay me.


That's not accurate.

Repeal is running about even with not repealing right now.


What he should do is put it on the schedule and then filibuster it. Because that's how you handle legislation you're afraid to vote on, AMIRITE?

You're completely discounting the level of polarization. People have been thrashed with the message that you're either for something or against something, it's not surprising to see that play out. Actually read the link, the people who support a repeal are balanced by the people who strongly oppose the repeal.

It was kept out of the committee and amendment processes to expedite pushing it through. Amusingly, compared to the HCR bill that spent a year in various committees and being bounced around, the repeal bill was very much "rammed through".

I'm not particularly worked up about it but I find it funny that you cried so hard about the HCR bill being partisan and rammed through but know nothing about this bill (or just don't want to talk about it).


"No one wants it repealed" is as accurate as "Everyone wants it repealed". Really, neither is remotely accurate and the real numbers are about even. Was that your point?


Really? I'm using the meaning where you try to prevent a bill from coming up because you don't want to vote on it. But I guess that only counts in your eyes if it's Democrats doing it.

Understood and hardly any surprise from you.

Why should he do it? Are you suddenly saying that bills in the Senate all deserve votes? Because that's never been your position before. Are you just wanting to see if you can score some political points? That certainly does sound more like you.

Edited, Jan 25th 2011 4:23pm by Jophiel

Except that it doesn't in this case. People may like or dislike something, but to take or support action, they have to *really* like or dislike said thing. Please tell me you can grasp this concept?

You can't just change the words around. Human behavior doesn't work that way. There are lots of things you might like or dislike, but not enough to bother doing anything about. Action itself tends to meet opposition just because it requires time and effort. So when people support an action you can reasonably assume that the number that support the idea behind the action is higher. Similarly, when you count those opposed to the action, you're really counting up the total of those who are opposed to the idea behind the action *and* those who don't think it's important enough to spend the time and effort.


This principle applies kinda double when we're talking about a repeal of a law that was just passed less than a year ago. It has to be really really bad for 50% of the population to support repealing that law outright. Think about it. We're not talking about 50/50 support for passing something. We're talking about 50% wanting to get rid of something we just spent time and effort doing and only 50% who don't think we should get rid of that thing. That's pretty darn bad for the health care bill, right?


It would be like if 50% of your customers wanted a refund for their purchase. We'd assume that it was a really really really crappy product, wouldn't we? Well, that's what the health care bill is. A really crappy product.


Edited, Jan 25th 2011 4:50pm by gbaji

I remember back when I had good "Cheap" and great health coverage. The company signed up for it and we had to pay a small amount to have it. I had Dental, Vision and cheap doctor appointments. Life was good. For a good 10 years it was still cheap and we had great coverage. Even when I worked for Dell I had good cheap coverage. Bout half way into my Dell career fees for health insurance started to skyrocket. Every year after we had to get new insurance and each year it covered less and less. I wondered why the costs just kept going up. Now the costs have gone up more than one can imagine. My Question is Why?
How? Is the Obama plan the right answer? Or is regulation and investigation into the costs and pratices a better answer? This to me is one of the reasons that the current mess that was forced upon us needs to be repealed and gone through and reworked.

I'm surprised the analogy police haven't take Gbaji away by now.

The analogy police trying to take me away would be like a mall security guard trying to take down a marine platoon. ;)

Gbaji's method of rationalizing polling numbers he doesn't like is to invent new ones (or entirely new polls) in his head and argue those instead. It's been that way forever now.