Here’s Why Right-Wing Pols Fear Obamacare

Salon‘s Brian Buetler crunches the data in parallel with the latest developments in the upgrades to healthcare.gov, and it does not look good for the Ted Cruz-Rand-Paul-Michele Bachmann hard-right wing of the Republican Party:

For the past couple of months, the Healthcare.gov failure allowed Republicans to ignore the moral imperative they face to direct these constituents toward new options. The cash registers aren’t working, they could tell themselves, so what good would we be doing by directing people to the market anyhow. This was always dodgy logic, but it enjoyed a real sheen of plausibility. And that’s why Republicans have spent most of November soliciting Obamacare horror stories, rather than trying to help the narrators.

A working site that can service nearly a million people a day destroys that excuse. Some conservative groups have been craven and reckless enough to actively discourage people from enrolling in Affordable Care Act coverage. Elected Republicans have generally used their influence more subtly, by drawing attention to the hassles and supposed dangers of using Healthcare.gov. Manipulation vs. direct appeal. They’ve also maligned an administrative solution President Obama devised that will allow carriers in some states to reissue canceled policies.

But the real fix for 70 percent (or so) of people whose policies have been canceled is to get new, subsidized coverage through exchanges, or to enroll in Medicaid. Once Healthcare.gov is working at high capacity, they’ll owe people with canceled coverage more than just the play-acting they’ve offered for the past month.

By: dave-dr-gonzo

David Hirsch, a.k.a. Dave "Doctor" Gonzo*, is a renegade record producer, video producer, writer, reformed corporate shill, and still-registered lobbyist for non-one-percenter performing artists and musicians. He lives in a heavily fortified compound in one of Manhattan's less trendy neighborhoods.

* Hirsch is the third person to use the pseudonym, a not-so-veiled tribute to journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson, with the permission of his predecessors Gene Gaudette of American Politics Journal (currently webmaster and chief bottlewasher at Liberaland) and Stephen Meese at Smashmouth Politics.