And the Insurance-Loss Spin Will Be....
I try to read a couple of team-politics blogs from both the red and blue side, to stay in touch with what they are saying and stay out of an echo chamber. Also, of course, libertarians make common cause with both parties on various issues. But the mindless team politics angle can really be a bore.
One of the reasons I like to read Kevin Drum on the left is that his initial reactions to things often seems pretty honest. When his side really screws up, like the IRS scandal or failing Obamacare exchanges, his initial reaction will generally be to honestly critique a bad situation. And then about 3-5 days into the scandal or crisis or discussion of an issue, he will catch on to and adopt the party line on an issue and then become incredibly tedious (for example, on the IRS scandal, he was honestly critical for a while and then adopted the silly "leftish groups were equally targeted meme" and has stuck to it by rote since). But at least there are those few days of honesty, which separates him from a lot of the left and right team politics blogs.
So the timing is just about right for the Left to pick a meme to explain away the millions of people who are getting their policies cancelled despite being told that they could keep their health insurance. Mainstream outlets like CBS and NBC are pushing the story, not just right-wing and libertarian blogs, so the Ezra Klein's of the world must be working diligently to pick a meme and then enforce it. It will be interesting to see what they choose.
Update: Well, here is an early entrant from Valerie Jarrett:
FACT: Nothing in #Obamacare forces people out of their health plans. No change is required unless insurance companies change existing plans.
This is hilarious. Technically true, since my cancellation came from Blue Cross and not the government, but obviously the Blue Cross decision to cancel me was forced by the terms of the law. This is obviously absurd, but is it too absurd for the media? I don't know, and of course it gets extra lefty bonus points for blaming government-caused problems on private businesses. Next up, Exxon to blame for gasoline taxes!
mesaeconoguy:
Exactly true, and the same technically correct reasoning that Oblunder used in saying “Raising the debt limit won’t increase the debt 1 penny.”
Obviously, you wouldn’t need to raise the debt limit, unless you were planning on increasing debt outstanding to the public, so it signals intent.
Valerie’s half-wit-tautology above carries a parenthetical sub-clause
“No change is required unless insurance companies change existing plans (which they will have to do because of the mandates we incorporated in the law).”
These people are beyond tolerance.
October 29, 2013, 4:42 pmGdn:
"FACT: Nothing in #Obamacare forces people out of their health plans. No change is required unless insurance companies change existing plans."
True in an utterly dishonest way.
November 5, 2013, 12:13 pm