Sorry Sen.
Cruz, it’s hard for me to believe you.
Tell me if
you’ve heard this before: It will
increase the national debt. Enrollment
will be a train wreck. It’s just too
confusing. Let’s just delay it. The President did a poor job with
messaging. The government shouldn’t get
between you and your healthcare providers.
Or you may
have heard something like this:
“The
denouncers said the new benefit was too expensive, too complicated, a
boondoggle created by the [health care] industry, and yet another example of
bad public policy run amok.”
Does any of
this sound familiar? I bet you’d
attribute all these comments to Sen. Cruz, wouldn’t you? If I was referring to “Obamacare,” you’d be
correct. But I’m not. Nope, these comments were made some 10 years
before “Obamacare.” These are just a
handful of the comments directed towards the Medicare Modernization Act (MMA)of 2003, better known as Medicare Part D.
And, as far as I can tell, Sen. Cruz, Rep. Bachmann, Gov. Palin, etc.,
said nothing. They did nothing. And we certainly didn’t see any anger or rage
or disdain from anyone on the right demanding a shutdown or default. No demands to recall congressional
members. No threats to impeach President
Bush. No filibusters. No debt ceiling threats. No offensive commercials. No budget battles. No crashing town hall meeting to shot down congressional
members. And, I certainly don’t recall
ANYONE yelling “You Lie!” during President Bush’s State of the Union
addresses.
Now, you may
be asking, “What does Medicare Part D have to do with ‘Obamacare?’”
Well, good
question.
To me, there
are many similarities between the two programs.
So much so, that most arguments for made towards one would also apply to
the other. Think about it, both focused
on providing better insurance coverage. Both
use a partnership between the private and public sectors. Both establish mandatory insurance
standards. Both used graduated cost scales
for payments to/from states. Both employ
subsidies/penalties for employers. Both
required outreach and education in a short time frame. Both establish cost-sharing requirements to
keep down costs. And both require the
government to provide income-based subsidies to help pay for coverage. I’m sure there are plenty of others, but you get
the idea.
Yet, with
all the similarities, the Tea Party – or more accurately giving the year, those
who would go on to become Tea Partiers – said and did… NOTHING. It
wasn’t as if they weren’t in positions to not say something. They were.
Cruz was the Solicitor General for the State of Texas under Gov. Perry,
another anti-Obamacare Tea Party sympathizer.
So it would’ve been well within both of their job descriptions to not
only say something, but DO
something. But still they did
nothing. Well, to be fair, Texas (read: Gov.
Perry) did sue over the bill’s “clawback” provision. A provision, ironically, that “Obamacare” scaled
back because of the financial burden it placed on States. But other than that, silence. Come on now, it’s not like Cruz is shy or
something. Quite the contrary. As Solicitor General, Cruz drafted an amicus
brief which was signed by the attorney generals in 31 states in the D.C. vs.Heller handgun case. Clearly, speaking
out against federal legislation was NOT a shortcoming of Solicitor General Cruz.
So what
changed? What was the earth altering phenomenon
which caused a (larger number than desired) group professional, politically like-minded
adults to completely change their political positions. What caused Republicans that voted “YES” in
2003 to turn around and not only vote “NO” to "Obamacare," but are SOOO outraged,
that they shutdown the most powerful government in the world. Why?
If you say “Obamacare” is the reason, then I’d say that you’re full of
shit. And here’s why:
Conservatives
call "Obamacare" illegitimate because it was passed into law along party lines
Well, that
may be so. To me, that’s politics; that’s
the system. If your side lost, then
yeah, it stands to Too bad
you don’t carry that same feeling with you when you grab the majority.
I guess power does corrupt.
You see,
like “Obamacare,” Medicare Part D was – as you might have guessed – passed along
party lines.
It was passed
by a Republican majority in the House.
It was passed by a Republican majority in the Senate. And it was signed into law by a Republican
president – all over almost-unanimous Democratic objection. Yet… silence from the extreme right wing. Nothing.
Zilch. Also, I think it should be
noted that while the Democrats stood in opposition to the law (another
political flip flop since most support “Obamacare”), NO ONE attempted to shut
down the government. Why not?
Conservatives
also like to play medium and channel the “will of the people.” You’d hear them say that the American people
don’t like it, don’t understand it, and don’t want it!
Really? I guess that means we should just ignore the most
recent presidential campaign, the debates, and even the re-election?
Okay,
fine. For sake of argument, I’ll ignore
it…
Instead, let’s
look at the numbers and see what they revel.
Now, to be clear, I’m not 100% supportive of using poll numbers as the
basis of an argument. Especially since the
numbers surrounding “Obamacare” do not accurately reflect what the public
REALLY feels. But since the numbers are
used as ammunition for Ted Cruz and the like, let’s go with it.
You may be
shocked to know that while Medicare Part D – which, by-the-way, didn’t have
anywhere NEAR the vitriol, disdain and flat-out lies hurled at it – was, by
far, less popular with the American people than Obamacare.
Upon
implementation, 21% of the public had a favorable opinion of the program in
April 2005 compared to 35% in April 2013 for the Affordable Care Act. If “they don’t like it” is a legitimate
reason to stand against laws like these two, then why did Boehner (for example)
vote FOR Medicare Part D? I mean,
shouldn’t he have stood up for Americans?
It’s okay to use that argument today.
But not in 2003?
Furthermore,
the public was way more confused about Medicare Part D than “Obamacare.” And that’s not hyperbole. I LIVED it!
I was literally on the front-lines and witnessed the confusion
first-hand. Beyond that, 66% percent of
Americans felt that they didn’t have enough information about Medicare Part D
to know if it would impact them or not compared to 49% for “Obamacare.” While neither are great numbers, if Sen.
Cruz’s reason to stop progress was based on numbers, how outraged was he in 2005? It appears, the answer is… not very.
Oh, by the way: Today, Medicare Part D has a
90% favorability rating with seniors. It
makes you wonder how successful Obamacare would be if you didn’t have Republicans
trying to sabotage it. Doesn’t it?
All the implementation
issues are proof that “Obamacare” will fail.
Well,
against my attempts to not sound like a broken record… yes, Medicare Part D
ALSO had implementation issues.
Similar to
Obamacare, Medicare Part D was plagued with implementation issues. There were tons of The Centers for
Medicare and Medicaid Services didn’t have the resources to reach all the
communities to appropriately implement the new law. The
Social Security Administration had the resource but only had part of the law
and could adequately respond to public’s demands. It was, quite literally, a colossal
mess. Folks were confused, angry, and Fed_UP.
(LOL – see what I just did there… “Fed_UP"… get it… whatever…)
Where “Obamacare”
websites had ‘glitches’ and other tech issues, folks calling the 1- 800#
looking for assistance for Medicare Part D was met with long wait-times,
unexpected disconnects, and even inaccurate information. After witnessing how badly implantation was
going, the government had to set up local support teams to help answer
questions and respond to the outrage. Heck,
even the conflict between the federal law and state regulations caused
problems. Ironically, many Red states
actually spend money to HELP with the implementation of Medicare Part D. You mean to tell me, on one hand a state
spends money, on the other hand, the LITERALLY turn their noses up to BILLIONS
of dollars? WTF?
It. Was. A.
Mess.
However, as
we can tell by today’s numbers, it got better.
Another Tea
Party favorite is that Obamacare will explode the deficit and add to the
National Debt.
I’ll keep
this short and sweet:
The CBO
said that Obamacare “will reduce federal deficits by $210 billion over the 2012
– 2021 period.”
Any
questions?
To recap: Medicare Part D was passed along party lines,
was extremely unpopular and confusing, and was going to explode the deficit. However, we heard nothing from conservatives
and the extreme right-wing then, but they are the central obstruction to progress today. To borrow
from Ezra Klein, shutting down the government over “Obamacare” by many of the
same people who voted for Medicare Part D is like “watching arsonists calling
the fire department reckless.”
Bottomline,
Sen. Cruz, I don’t believe you. If you’re
so outraged by “Obamacare” where were you when Medicare Part D was being “forced”
upon us? Is your heroism time-bound? Is it only out of convenience? How can I respect your position when it
appears you just pulled it out of your ass?
Maybe it’s
time for our government to institute more standards to keep saboteurs out because
to me, you look more like a Manchurian-like mercenary than an American
Senator.
BTW, in case
you were wondering: Mitch McConnell, John
Boehner, Steve King, Peter King, Eric Cantor, Joe “You Lie” Wilson, and Rick Santorum
are just a few of the Republicans who voted FOR Medicare Part D.
Can anyone
justify the extreme positions of supporting Medicare Part D and be against “Obamacare?”
