Editorial

GOP will need multiple votes to repeal Obamacare

Jim Martin Chairman, 60 Plus Association
Font Size:

It is downright amazing that the most momentous, and contemptible, piece of legislation Washington has seen in the last 50 years passed without tempting one Republican in the entire Congress to cross the aisle and join in. History will forever recall that Obamacare, in all its budget-busting and government-expanding glory, is entirely a creation of the Democrats, from the secret meetings where all 2,700 pages were drafted, to its final passage. And the GOP stayed unified throughout; not a single cat was lost in the herd!

With Democrats cloaked in Obamacare like Rod Blagojevich in prison orange and the law gaining in unpopularity by the day, is it any wonder they are starting to buckle on this issue? And why shouldn’t they? In the 2010 midterm elections they lost more than a quarter of their caucus in the House, in large part due to public opposition to Obamacare. Much of that opposition came from seniors, who, while only 13% of the voting public, comprised 23% of the midterm electorate. Liberal Democrats like Barney Frank, Fortney “Pete” Stark and even Allyson Schwartz, a member of the House Democratic leadership, are part of a small but growing group of Democrat survivalists joining the GOP and voicing opposition to specific tentacles of the new law.

This is why I am so puzzled, even miffed, by the recent public opposition of conservative Don Corleones like Sen. Jim DeMint and Rep. Steve King to the Republican-led charge to repeal the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), the 15-member panel of unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats who will be given carte blanche to ration care by their unilateral decisions. Yes, I know, Congress has the “final say,” if you can imagine two-thirds of Congress agreeing on anything. A bill to repeal IPAB recently passed Chairman Fred Upton’s Energy and Commerce Committee and currently has 20 Democrats as co-sponsors, including the three noted above. The GOP has maintained a unified front, so why go rogue now when so many are on board against IPAB?

On the surface, the argument by DeMint and King seems reasonable: killing portions of Obamacare undermines and confuses the real goal — killing the whole thing, stem to stern, in one fell swoop. Attacking parts of the law, they claim, may appear to signal complacency with mending it, and indicate we are okay with a watered-down version and risk being seen as the “party of some of Obamacare.”

But this simply is not true. As DeMint and King point out, the 2012 election will yield either a pro-Obamacare or anti-Obamacare result based on which party prevails, and total repeal of the law remains a pillar of the Republican 2012 platform without exception. No Republican working to push IPAB off a cliff will settle for less, so the choice is not mutually exclusive and the framing of the election is not affected. Voters still know that the GOP is the party for total repeal, and with continued unanimity long since settled, taking on IPAB strengthens, not weakens, the party’s image on the issue. Seniors understand the stakes, and favor attacking IPAB just as much as repealing Obamacare as a whole. Pronouncements like these from up above fall upon deaf ears.

What the public effort to repeal IPAB does accomplish is three-fold. First, it keeps the issue on the front-burner, reminding the public that we still don’t know what’s in this mammoth-sized law, or what is waiting for us around the corner. The more despicable components of the law we can expose, the more the Democrats have to play defense and answer to their constituents for a bill none of them bothered to read. Republicans employed this strategy in the ’90s, keeping the heat on Bill Clinton until he finally agreed to welfare reform by continually underscoring its wasteful and immoral trappings until he finally relented.

Second, IPAB assists our side in the public relations battle to highlight the pain and suffering inherent within Obamacare, in a way that engages and motivates the public far more than arguments against its “unconstitutional mandate.” The Heritage Foundation recently obtained a memo from the Obama administration outlining a coordinated public relations campaign to support the law, which is sure to feature weepy-eyed citizens falling to their knees, praising Obama for saving their lives. Our side needs to engage in this PR battle and bugle all of its ills, from higher premiums, to people losing coverage, to its trillions in cost, and on and on. IPAB and its rationing panels are central to this strategy.

Finally, the real fear shouldn’t be visions of a diluted Obamacare surviving minus IPAB, but IPAB setting up shop without Obamacare. It is quite conceivable that Republicans may prevail in 2012 and repeal the health care law, only to see Democrats revive the IPAB blueprint years from now in an attempt to re-assemble nationalized health care. Having a public debate on IPAB can help settle the matter for good, much like the “Harry and Louise” ads turned public sentiment against Hillarycare in the early ’90s. Those ads, and the debate they generated, have had such a lasting impact that Obama and congressional Democrats were forced to conceal their agenda to pass Obamacare against the wishes of the American public.

The approach that Sen. DeMint and Rep. King are advocating would not only yield the moral high ground to the Democrats, it would be a failure of leadership. Note that we have not seen Democrats try to revive “catastrophic health care” legislation in the 23 years since a group of angry seniors rocked the car of House Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski so hard he was still being treated for motion sickness years later. When politicians see an uprising, they tuck tail and keep it tucked. Exposing IPAB now while it is still law and ripe for exposure can help ensure we never see its ugly head again.

I can’t think of very many times I’ve disagreed with Sen. DeMint and Rep. King, both of whom I’ve personally campaigned with in their states. Whether on conservative principles, policy or the pronunciation of tomato and potato, we’ve always been in agreement. But on this matter, I believe they have it wrong. Obamacare isn’t Julius Caesar and Congress isn’t Brutus. The issue will be decided at the ballot box after a vigorous campaign that covers all of the law’s failings, IPAB included. Caesar’s fate would be ideal for Obamacare, but a death by a thousand cuts would work just as well.

The battle over Obamacare is really like a boxing match; a jab to the body, a hook to the jaw, and try not to let the Democrats take a bite from our ear. While our side remains unified, the Democrats are starting to show cracks in the facade. This is the debate our democracy requires. Come Election Day this November, the choice belongs to the American people.

Jim Martin is chairman and founder of the 60 Plus Association, which represents 7.l million seniors nationally.

PREMIUM ARTICLE: Subscribe To Keep Reading

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign Up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
BENEFITS READERS PASS PATRIOTS FOUNDERS
Daily and Breaking Newsletters
Daily Caller Shows
Ad Free Experience
Exclusive Articles
Custom Newsletters
Editor Daily Rundown
Behind The Scenes Coverage
Award Winning Documentaries
Patriot War Room
Patriot Live Chat
Exclusive Events
Gold Membership Card
Tucker Mug

What does Founders Club include?

Tucker Mug and Membership Card
Founders

Readers,

Instead of sucking up to the political and corporate powers that dominate America, The Daily Caller is fighting for you — our readers. We humbly ask you to consider joining us in this fight.

Now that millions of readers are rejecting the increasingly biased and even corrupt corporate media and joining us daily, there are powerful forces lined up to stop us: the old guard of the news media hopes to marginalize us; the big corporate ad agencies want to deprive us of revenue and put us out of business; senators threaten to have our reporters arrested for asking simple questions; the big tech platforms want to limit our ability to communicate with you; and the political party establishments feel threatened by our independence.

We don't complain -- we can't stand complainers -- but we do call it how we see it. We have a fight on our hands, and it's intense. We need your help to smash through the big tech, big media and big government blockade.

We're the insurgent outsiders for a reason: our deep-dive investigations hold the powerful to account. Our original videos undermine their narratives on a daily basis. Even our insistence on having fun infuriates them -- because we won’t bend the knee to political correctness.

One reason we stand apart is because we are not afraid to say we love America. We love her with every fiber of our being, and we think she's worth saving from today’s craziness.

Help us save her.

A second reason we stand out is the sheer number of honest responsible reporters we have helped train. We have trained so many solid reporters that they now hold prominent positions at publications across the political spectrum. Hear a rare reasonable voice at a place like CNN? There’s a good chance they were trained at Daily Caller. Same goes for the numerous Daily Caller alumni dominating the news coverage at outlets such as Fox News, Newsmax, Daily Wire and many others.

Simply put, America needs solid reporters fighting to tell the truth or we will never have honest elections or a fair system. We are working tirelessly to make that happen and we are making a difference.

Since 2010, The Daily Caller has grown immensely. We're in the halls of Congress. We're in the Oval Office. And we're in up to 20 million homes every single month. That's 20 million Americans like you who are impossible to ignore.

We can overcome the forces lined up against all of us. This is an important mission but we can’t do it unless you — the everyday Americans forgotten by the establishment — have our back.

Please consider becoming a Daily Caller Patriot today, and help us keep doing work that holds politicians, corporations and other leaders accountable. Help us thumb our noses at political correctness. Help us train a new generation of news reporters who will actually tell the truth. And help us remind Americans everywhere that there are millions of us who remain clear-eyed about our country's greatness.

In return for membership, Daily Caller Patriots will be able to read The Daily Caller without any of the ads that we have long used to support our mission. We know the ads drive you crazy. They drive us crazy too. But we need revenue to keep the fight going. If you join us, we will cut out the ads for you and put every Lincoln-headed cent we earn into amplifying our voice, training even more solid reporters, and giving you the ad-free experience and lightning fast website you deserve.

Patriots will also be eligible for Patriots Only content, newsletters, chats and live events with our reporters and editors. It's simple: welcome us into your lives, and we'll welcome you into ours.

We can save America together.

Become a Daily Caller Patriot today.

Signature

Neil Patel