Thousands of demonstrators gather on the plaza near the US Capitol on September 12 to participate in a "Taxpayer March on DC", protest against President Obama's fiscal and economic policies.
(Mike Theiler/REUTERS)Photos (1 of 1)
GOP pins comeback on anger at ‘big government’ healthcare
New poll shows lowest support yet among public for Obama's and Democrats' healthcare plan. Republicans see backlash to huge overall increase in federal spending.
By Gail Russell Chaddock | Staff writer/ September 28, 2009 edition
Reporter Gail Chaddock talks with CSMonitor.com's Pat Murphy about the current healthcare reform debate on Capitol Hill and how it could affect the 2010 midterm elections.
Reporter Gail Chaddock
Washington
For Republicans, the way out of the wilderness in the 2010 midterm elections looks to be paved with healthcare votes.
More than bank bailouts, stimulus spending, or illegal immigration – other hot-button issues for voters in middle America – the overhaul of the US healthcare system would affect every family. Increasingly, voters expect that the impact to be negative.
Just 41 percent of voters now favor the healthcare reform proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats, according to a Rasmussen Reports national poll, released Monday. That’s the lowest level of support yet measured – down two percentage points from a week ago.
But heathcare reform on top of unpopular bank bailouts and stimulus spending also raises the specter of big government and massive deficits – a key concern for many centrists and moderates.
“It opens a real door for Republican resurgence in 2010, primarily because the views of independents are far closer to Republicans than Democrats on fiscal issues,” says GOP pollster Whit Ayres.
“Independents distrust both Republicans and Democrats, but they are particularly concerned about spending money you don’t have. The longer these enormously expensive proposals go forward in Congress, the more independents will be pushed away from Democrats and toward Republicans,” he adds.
It’s a path the GOP has tried before. Insurgent Republicans took back the House of Representatives in 1994 by campaigning against big government and a 1993 Clinton
healthcare plan they said could have bankrupted the nation. GOP activists say the bank bailouts, stimulus plans, and trillion-dollar deficits in the Obama era make the case for change even stronger.
“This is bigger than ‘93. What I believe I see is a larger population of citizenry and voters in the center of American politics that are very angry and upset about this,” says former House GOP leader Richard Armey, who now chairs FreedomWorks, a conservative grass-roots group that is mobilizing protests over taxes and big government.
“If Republicans want to prosper at the polls in the next election, they need to tell this great big huge center in the middle of the country: ‘We get it. We’re with you. We’re not them,’ ” he adds.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi shot back Monday that Republicans are “spreading myths” about Democratic proposals. “Far from a ‘government takeover of healthcare,’ America’s Affordable Health Choices Act builds on the current private, employer-provided healthcare system we have now – and expands enrollment in private insurance,” she said in a statement.
The congressional debate over healthcare reform – and options for paying to expand coverage – is producing the starkest partisan differences in years.
“If you take just about every single healthcare proposal in Congress, there’s a huge division between Republicans and Democrats,” says pollster G. Terry Madonna, director of the Center for Politics and Public Affairs at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa.
In a Franklin and Marshall poll to be released this week, 81 percent of Democrats favor offering the public a choice of a government health insurance plan, compared with 42 percent of Republicans and 57 percent of independents. Support for requiring businesses to provide insurance coverage or pay into a government fund ranges from 81 percent of Democrats and 53 percent of independents to 41 percent of Republicans. Asked whether individuals should be required to have health insurance, 71 percent of Democrats say yes, compared with 35 percent of independents and 31 percent of Republicans.
“Big government is an issue that Republicans feel they can put at the forefront in 2010,” says Julian Zelizer, a congressional historian at Princeton University in Princeton, N.J. “Unlike many social and cultural issues, it can resonate with moderate voters – with the damage to Democrats being that much greater.”
Comments
2. Jason | 09.28.09
They’re not angry at Obama’s plan, they’re angry at the distortions created by the republican party aimed to discredit his plan… unfortunately, people are scared too easily and fall for the bait. All they (repubs) care about is destroying Obama’s attempt at reform, and the “government take-over” is just one piece of catnip being tossed-out to excite and enrage the masses.
3. Jill | 09.28.09
I am one of those independents concerned about healthcare, and I don’t like some of the compromises Obama has apparently made, but what I do know is I write my representatives in the House and Senate every month to request they fight for a single payer healthcare system. Of all the world’s modern and industrialized nations, the US stands alone as the most expensive system in the world, while delivering the worst health care outcomes. That’s not a record we should be standing proud on. And doing what we have been doing is reducing the number of covered people, while costs skyrocket. What’s amazing is that we seem to think we shouldn’t follow proven, effective systems such as France, Italy, Belgium, where their plans cover everyone, and do so at half our total outlay of dollars. Republicans are shrinking faster and faster as more and more people realize that the party no longer stands for fiscal conservatives, but for special interest campaign contributions. It’s time to reform healthcare in the model that works. Single Payer, now.
4. AkCoyote | 09.28.09
The GOP had better be careful. This die hard conservative will be voting the issues, not the party. The way I feel, we need to throw out every democrat AND republican and start over. We need another revolution and the ballot box is the place to start.
6. Jeff C. | 09.28.09
The GOP’s Bush and **** put this country $1 trillion dollars in debt. I would call that big government. The republicans are absolutely crazy and the big corporate media loves to fuel the drama of it all.
7. Keep Dreaming | 09.28.09
We saw the largest increase in government size under the republicans and I’m pretty sure that the American people know their opposition is only to get back in power and not in our interest. They cannot just say no to everything and then turn around and point fingers. We have very serious problems that need solutions and I haven’t heard any good ideas come out of that party since Obama came to power. They might win a few seats but not enough to make a difference. It’s going to take ideas and leaders and they are short on both
8. Barbara Culpepper | 09.28.09
I question these polls and who is conducting them. Are they weighted to
show the stance of the pollsters who conduct them? The friends, neighbors, and family I’ve talked to are very supportative of the President’s health care reform issue. A couple who have had their insurance premium increased by $100 per month are incredulous that anyone wouldn’t want health insurance regulation. The insurance companies have run amuck with high premiums and less coverage. Where will it all end?? Polls don’t really mean that much
and shouldn’t sway anyone in their deliberations.
9. Michael | 09.28.09
I noticed how much they were against “big government” when Bush was president. GOP, the usual hyocrisy and BS.
10. MRM | 09.28.09
Bottom line is President Obama and the Democrats will, by necessity, enact some sort of universal or near-universal health insurance reform because they have a mandate from the country to do so. Democrats won the election with a 60 vote majority in the Senate that can short circuit any fillibuster attempt. This will happen. Obama and his team are laying the groundwork for health care reform and will overcome Republican resistance–by whatever means necessary, including, if possibly Reconciliation. The country will be grateful for health care reforms when it turns out to be more popular than anyone had expected, and perhaps even slowing down health care spending, Republicans will quietly get in line and work with it.
11. PMHass | 09.28.09
Nancy Pelosi is wrong. How can the current events be “MYTHS” when everything I have seen and heard is backed by print, video and audio clips (in context) of Pelosi and other “Progressives” stating how they are right and we are ALL WRONG! I am 54 and this is THE MOST AROGANT President, House of Reps and Senate I have ever experienced. But, don’t worry, November 2010 will be here soon.
12. episcopalmystic | 09.29.09
Anger is a deeply dangerous foundation for politics, frought with passionate judgments about others. Once again, America’s “public square” lacks a common grammar for civil discourse. It puts me in mind of Yeats’ “The Second Coming”: “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.”
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1. Michael | 09.28.09
How about anger at the Republicans for yet again torpedoing healthcare reform? How about anger at the Republicans for not stopping the economic crisis in the first place? How about anger at the Republicans for adding $5 trillion to the national debt in 8 years. If the Republicans are so opposed to government run healthcare, let them propose abolishing Medicare, Medicaid and the VA hospitals. Then we’ll see about those mid-term election gains.