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Bloomberg/ - Politics, Seg, 02 de Abril de 2012
CLIPPING INTERNACIONAL (Supreme Court)
Democrats Resort to Magical Thinking on
Obamacare
In the span of one week, Democrats went from
dismissing the possibility that the Supreme Court
would strike down the 2010 law mandating individuals
to buy health insurance to consoling themselves that
any such action would have a silver lining.
James Carville says it would help the Democrats in the
election. Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson
writes that it would make single payer -- a government
health system as in the U.K. and Canada --
“inevitable.” Other liberals, and even the occasional
right-of-center analyst, have echoed that point: The
conservative legal challenge to President Barack
Obama’s health-care overhaul could prove
self-defeating.
It’s an interesting and counterintuitive analysis, but it’s
almost certainly wrong. If the court undoes
Obamacare, either in whole or in part, conservatives
who would like to reduce the government’s role in
health care are likely to get policies much more to their
liking.
Let’s say the court strikes down the entire law. The
Democratic fantasy goes something like this: The
public will still be upset about the number of Americans
without insurance, rising premiums and the difficulty
people with pre-existing conditions have getting
insurance. Republicans will have no plan for achieving
universal coverage. Sooner or later, single payer -which
would probably be more popular than a
mandate, and thus an easier sell to the public -- will
prevail.
Political Reality
Reality-check time: When Obamacare became law,
Democrats had more power in Washington than at any
time since the Carter administration in the 1970s. They
had the presidency and lopsided majorities in both
houses of Congress. Because conservative Democrats
have declined in numbers, it was probably the most
liberal Congress since 1965-66. They were still barely
able to pass the law. And that was with important
medical industries either neutralized or in favor of the
legislation, which they would not be in the case of
single payer.
Democrats attained that degree of power because of
an unusual set of circumstances: an unpopular
Republican president reaching the end of his second
term and a financial crisis hitting at exactly the right
time. The odds are that it will be a long, long time until
Democrats again hit the jackpot. And without an
overwhelming Democratic majority, getting single
payer through Congress would be almost impossible:
Republicans won’t acquiesce to any steps toward such
a system.
It’s true that people like the idea of helping the
uninsured and those with pre-existing conditions, but
the support melts away when this help involves higher
taxes or intrusive regulation. Look at it this way: For
several years, fans of the health-care law have been
saying that any day now the popularity of Obamacare’s
regulation of insurance companies would start
trumping the unpopularity of other parts of the
legislation. It hasn’t happened yet, and there is no
reason to think it would once the court struck down the
law.
Or let’s say the court strikes down the mandate, but
leaves in place the insurance regulations. The
regulations without the mandate would lead healthy
people to drop their coverage -- the insurance rules
mean such people would be able to get it again if they
get sick -- and with only ill people covered, premiums
would soar.
The question then becomes: Would Congress be more
likely to respond by moving to single payer or by
getting rid of the regulations?
We have seen just this scenario play out in a number
of states that imposed similar regulations without any
mandate. Iowa, Kentucky, New Hampshire and South
Dakota have all repealed their regulations, while
Maine, New Jersey and Washington State have
weakened theirs. Only liberal Vermont, according to a
study conducted by America’s Health Insurance Plans,
a trade group, has moved toward single payer.
Clearing the Way
In those cases, of course, the Supreme Court wasn’t
involved. Democrats would be outraged if the court
struck down the mandate, and would presumably
blame any resulting problems in the health-care
market on its decision. Republicans, meanwhile, would
blame the Democrats for enacting a flawed law that
couldn’t survive legal scrutiny.
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