Quote:
Originally Posted by ijusluvit
Bucco,
On the insurance mandate thing. Saying he 'changed his position' is done all the time by political opponents, but it's a contrivance to find a piece of something much bigger and then to use it to prove 'hypocricy'.
You have to look at the bigger picture. Obama had the guts to go "all in" on a health care plan which would finally BEGIN to correct the decline in quality, accessibility and the alarming escalation of health care costs. We all know how long this problem has festered, and worse, where we were headed in the future. We all know the failures of Congress and previous Presidents to find a workable plan, much less one which could be approved by an increasingly divisive Congress.
Sure Obama said the insurance mandate was inappropriate when campaigning against Hillary. ANYBODY would have said that because it is so controversial. The facts are that Obama risked his reputation and political future by insisting on Congress passing the best health care plan he could get. He didn't veto the eventual package, with it's faults, because it contained the historic core of provisions which could make health care finally work and be accessible in this country. If he wasn't at the same time trying to quell the worst financial crisis since the Depression I think he would have insisted the insurance mandate be removed. But with Congress actually noticing the money meltdown and increasing deficit, there had to be something in the bill to pay for the the uninsured.
So Obama let his domestic legacy rest on the flawed law. Many say it was a courageous, exhausting feat which will eventually be recognized as a giant step forward for our society.
Opponents don't seem to really attack the principles that our society should be able to implement a high quality health care system and go beyond only emergency care for the poor, ill or disadvantaged. What opponents attack is Obama, the insurance mandate, spending any large sums of money on health care, too much regulation, not enough regulation, picking on the insurance companies, and helping people who somehow don't deserve to be helped. None of those things are the central issue.
What we should do is to fix those pieces of the law which don't work as intended. This is what the President said when he signed the bill. It may take some years to tweak the provisions so that they work well. My contention is that even with a reluctant Congress and slow improvements, we will be better off five years from now than we are now.
We can go on attacking and blaming, or we can take what we have and make it work. There's proof we've done greater things in our past.
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I certainly respect your opinion on the mandate comment and totally understand your logic.
In respect to the entire post, on which you ONLY addressed the mandate part, the post was intended to show what this President has done not just as President but all of his adult life going back to his days as a neighborhood organizer. He is such a great speaker, or better said CAN be a great speaker when he wants to that he can sell anything, and he sold us all in 2008 IN MY OPINION. He "soared" above everyone and placed himself in a no win situation because he could never ever fulfill what he promised. I believe him to be a double talker on most issues and I must add that I do not disagree with him on all issues.
The two examples I gave are just TWO....I was opposed to his even getting the candidacy in 2008 and my basic objection was his TOTAL AND COMPLETE lack of any kind of experience in ANY postion of making decisions; Secondly, I totally question his associates and his training. I just finished a book which talks about many historical leaders and mentioned as one common theme with all was the inability to break away from how they were trained and exposed as young men. I read BOTH of his autobiographies and did a lot of reading through archives of the Chicago newspapers BEFORE the campaign of 2008 and the common theme is that he will do what or say what is necessary to proceed along what HE considers the correct road. He will praise and laud a reverend and then simply toss him aside easily when it gets in his way..fact is if you research the primary reason he even joined that church you will find it was for politics.
No sense in beating this to death.....I just get very frustrated when some who adore him will criticize ANYONE WHO DISAGREES but never present a case...never debunk what is said about him,,,,it is blind and it is scary. I have been called so many names because I oppose him, BUT NOBODY ever debates the facts.....that should scare anyone..that kind of blind loyalty is not good.
Ii will accept as your feelings on the mandate issue...one of two that I mentioned.
My thought was that he promised us a national public and open debate on HEALTH COSTS. That he did promise. He never got close to public on anything..he went behind closed doors almost exclusively and actually paid "blackmail" to get the votes necessary to pass it. He actually smiled and made a joke when asked about why not public....that bothers me. The final bill did NOTHING to address health costs....the numbers given to us were a mirage and the CBO continually updates the new costs because so much was based on MAYBES. How can you have such an important bill based on MAYBES ?
NO, I think the hard thing to have done was to ignore the politics...actually have that public debate...remember both sides admitted the problem....doing that would have been courageous AND would have been what he said he would do.
I do respect a thoughtful and sincere post however.