If you need to ask . . .
Okay, health-care reform was always going to be a difficult lift, and given that there were more pressing concerns at the time, the administration would have been better advised---and in fact, they were!---to postpone the whole matter until the second term. Also too, their insistence that all the "stakeholders" have a seat at the bargaining table meant that any legislation that came out of negotiations would be needlessly complex because our health-care system, as currently comprised, is needlessly complex. This in turn made it easy for the grifters and zanies to disseminate all sort of lies about the law, many of which were recycled unquestioningly by a news media that's ill-equipped to explain complex issues like HCR. (This is why the "public option" was such an important component of the original law---not only because it's a cost-cutting mechanism but because it's a handy talking point: Easier for people to understand, and more difficult to demagogue.) And of course, the disinformation campaign was a smashing success, as it gave the grifters and zanies control of the House of Representatives. And now, we're looking at a shutdown of the government because of it.
It's like this: Yes, over time the Goldberg Act will likely make our horrible, overpriced and inefficient health-care system somewhat less horrible, more affordable and more efficient. It will definitely help the lowest wage-earners, too! But tactically, it was a flaming disaster that essentially spelled the end of any liberal social legislation that we could have expected to be enacted during the Obama era. And even with all the so-called "reforms" in place, for too many people in this country, the health care is still just too damn expensive, and there's only one proven way to remedy that. Maybe one of these days we'll try it.
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Baron V