Affordable health care for every citizen that can never be taken away.
And the rest is explication.
This is the simplest and truest description of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) and in less than 140 characters. Unfortunately, liberal pundits and politicians usually talk about it like a charity or welfare program for the fraction of citizens without insurance. Right now, every citizen with health care insurance is at risk of losing access to needed health care. On January 1st, 2014, every citizen, young and old, sick or well, employed or unemployed, will finally be able to have affordable access to health care that can never be denied, taken away or priced out of reach.
Liberals confuse the exchanges to get insurance under the Act as the main part of the law. I can only assume this it the tendency to be empathetic to the poor. My father, who worked for the White House to attempt to pass the Clinton health care program had to fight with liberals hell bent on talking about that program like a welfare program for the poor. Other liberals can not get out of their head the belief that "single payer" is the only true way. The only thing that should matter to anyone is that everyone gets health care including themselves.
Once you describe the law as affordable health care for every citizen that can never be taken away, the details of the program are much easier to explain. For currently insured folks, their access to care can not be denied for any reason:
- no more yearly or lifetime caps,
- no more denial of care when sick, as this is now appealable,
- no more being shifted to a high premium group when sick,
- no more denials based on "incorrect" applications,
- no more pre-existing conditions when switching plans,
- no more lack of affordable plans when leaving a job.
All the new markets are a catch all for all of us for times that we were formerly vulnerable to being blocked from affordable insurance. The reality is that everyone risks losing affordable insurance themselves or for their family. Liberals bring up the number of currently uninsured as being helped when the real number is multiples higher since most people change jobs/plans, get sick or pregnant or are unisured for brief periods during the course of their lives. Everyone is at risk prior to January 2014. The new exchanges are not even for the poor, that is covered by Medicaid (and for the near, but over poverty line, expanded Medicaid).
Liberals seem flummoxed by the law, in that they see it mainly as a net to catch those in a tough spot. Then describing the whole program is much more difficult as most of the law is to protect everyone. And then it is easier for the right wing to confuse people even more when even the liberals act as if this is a new welfare program for the uninsured.
So if the plan is so good, why would the right wing be against it? First, by separating health insurance from employment, it gives power to the workers to leave a job without risking the lives of their family. Secondly, when described as a welfare program, it seems unfair to others that are more "deserving" and pay more into the system. Liberals compound this by talking about the human right to health care.
I believe that health care is a societal need and responsibility. Everyone depends on everyone else being as healthy as possible. Whether communicable diseases like tuberculosis that fester and endanger everyone when pockets of the population are not well cared for or for those that depend on any medicine for which millions need to be in studies to evaluate them or for blood drives or for a healthy food supply, we are all in it together. Your health depends in large part on everyone else being part of the system. Speaking of which, on Monday, I will be getting my free flu vaccine shot, advertised thanks to Obamacare by every pharmacy, and part of the free preventative care to every insurance plan including Medicare. The life I save may be yours.
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