Republicans Outraged Americans Are Happy With The Affordable Care Act

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary . H.L. Mencken couldn’t have predicted the hysteria generated by the rollout of a plan to insure every American, since we don’t have Single-Payer (government run healthcare).  The fear-mongering from the media has been unprecedented as they have malevolently exaggerated the negatives of President Obama’s signature healthcare law. No President has faced such unparalleled sabotage and antipathy from those on both sides of the political spectrum. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) has been panned by the Left for not going far enough (it’s not single-payer) and the Right because it has anything to do with the administration of the first black president. Ironically, the ACA is THE Republican plan formulated by the Heritage Foundation, Romneycare and Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley (R).

Until the idea of a health insurance mandate was proposed by the Obama Administration, right wingers were all for the mandate which would require all Americans to be covered by private, for-profit insurance companies. The motivation behind the law was to help 45 million uninsured Americans get coverage.  Even the most deleterious acts of environmental disaster have been covered by the media more favorably than this genuine effort to help people. Truly, big corporate malfeasance is held in higher esteem than a plan to save lives. The media has been complicit in sabotaging the rollout of the ACA and it’s time for them to be called out on the carpet.

Now we’ve reached five million  sign-ups on the healthcare exchange and every poll taken shows overwhelmingly, Americans do NOT want to repeal the law in its entirety.  Contrary to the horror stories of a disastrous website (which is now functioning perfectly), mass insurance cancellations and “death panels,” the ACA has given millions coverage for the first time in their lives. I’d love to see these Republicans inform parents their child is no longer covered because he or she had the misfortune of being born with a preexisting condition. See how popular the GOP becomes when they revoke the insurance the minimum-wage employee can now enjoy due to the Medicaid Expanision under the ACA.  Poor Americans and previously uninsurable citizens can FINALLY go to a doctor without the exorbitant costs of an Emergency Room visit. The GOP wants to take this away from countless Americans and have spent millions on repealing the law FIFTY times and counting.

Naturally, the insurance companies are going to act in the interest of profit, not results. Their timing of sending out cancellation notices (which they’ve always done, before the ACA) right when the website was launched with much difficulty was no accident. They are bankrolled by billionaires who wish to maintain the status quo of the most broken healthcare in the Western World while making the President look bad.  Labor groups like the Culinary Union  in Las Vegas may be experiencing higher rates of insurance as the insurance industry is behaving in typical profit-driven fashion.  The costs to establish a functioning healthcare system will be an initial sacrifice, but as more people enroll, the costs will go down. As history has shown, Social Security and Medicare were vehemently opposed, more so by Republicans of course. The ACA has the dubious honor of being the most contested of the three revolutionary social welfare programs.  Many Americans couldn’t imagine life without Social Security and Medicare and soon Affordable Care will be considered a necessity just the same.

It does seem as if the enrollment target which seemed unattainable in October, 2013 may actually become a reality by March’s end. Much to the dismay of those afflicted with Obama Derangement Syndrome, especially the TeaParty wing of the GOP, this law could be the stepping stone to a functioning healthcare system like the one in Germany and France. The Republican viewpoint of good government helping people terrifies those who are simply horrible at governance (Republicans). With a strongly mobilized Democratic base running on the merits of the ACA, the 2014 midterm elections could give the President a functioning Congress. If only the media was on the side of the people who need Obamacare to save their lives instead of favoring the vile agendas of the insurance plutocracy, this painful transition towards functioning healthcare for all could happen with minimal trauma and unnecessary loss of life.

By: VegasJessie

A resident of Las Vegas Nevada, a graduate of the University of Oklahoma as a Political Science major. Very motivated to get people to participate in the electoral process.