This week the House will vote on repealing healthcare reform, the first big legislative move of the new Congress. Perhaps the GOP leadership in the House wants to rethink this, since they are “listening to the people” and all:
As for repeal, only about one in four say they want to do away with the law completely. Among Republicans support for repeal has dropped sharply, from 61 percent after the elections to 49 percent now.
But what people need to realize is that they were sold a big lie from the GOP. The talking point of the last election cycle was “repeal and replace”. Well they are trying to do the first one, but the second is non-existent. The Republicans have absolutely nothing to replace it with, meaning we will go back to the same old broken system. That’s something else the people don’t want:
Also, 43 percent say they want the law changed so it does more to re-engineer the health care system. Fewer than one in five say it should be left as it is.
So what should the GOP do? For starters, scrap the vote this week. Instead of repealing everything, work to fix it. Let’s start with getting rid of the mandate, which seems like a very popular idea:
Nearly six in 10 oppose the law’s requirement that people carry health insurance except in cases of financial hardship. Starting in 2014, people will have to show that they’re covered either through an employer, a government program, or under their own plan.
They can spend the entire session working on repealing that part of the law, but there is a problem. Health insurance mandates are a Republican idea. They only turned on the idea because the Democrats started pushing it. If the Republicans target only that part of the law through legislation then they risk the old hypocrite label. Of course they should be used to that already, so why not actually try to do something the people want? We are talking about the health of our nation after all. This should have never been a partisan issue, but we don’t have that kind of Washington anymore. Today everything is a partisan issue.