Democrats Against ObamaCare - WSJ's James Taranto - Granite Grok

Democrats Against ObamaCare – WSJ’s James Taranto

In his column today, “The Devil Made Them Do It“, WSJ’s James Taranto reports that some Democrats are finding that the Devil of Obamacare is in the details, of implementation, that is.

A group of the same mental giants that brought us Obamacare were getting angry with Gary Cohen, head of the Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, because their Frankenstein’s monster was proving difficult to tame. For example Ron Wyden D-OR:

“[P]ressed Cohen to help find ways to resolve a glitch in the law which may result in the denial of federal assistance to millions of Americans of modest means who could be priced out of family health coverage at work,” according to Kaiser [Health News].

At issue is an IRS ruling limiting federal subsidies for such plans. Said Wyden: “We’ve got millions of people–working-class, middle-class people–who are going to be pushed into a regulatory health coverage no man’s land.” So much for President Obama’s promise that if you like your plan, you can keep it

The Hill reports that Maria Cantwell D-WA:

[C]riticized the administration for delaying implementation of the Basic Health Program — an option for states to provide cost-efficient health coverage outside of Medicaid and the law’s new insurance exchanges.

HHS has said it will not have the Basic Health Program ready until 2015 — a year behind schedule. State officials have balked, and Cantwell echoed their criticisms Thursday during the Senate Finance Committee hearing on the status of the implementation effort.

“We’re very concerned about the approach by the agency in trying to thwart this effort,” she said. “Are you artificially raising the cost to all taxpayers by trying to lure them onto the exchange?

Meanwhile, Walter Russell Mead thinks that it is dawning on key Democrats that this “achievement” is turning out to be a boat anchor for them:

The fate of the Democratic party in America over the next decade is tied to Obama’s healthcare reform. If it is seen to be a success, America could trend Democratic for the foreseeable future. If it fails, liberalism as we’ve known it will take a massive hit. But, so far, support for Obamacare has been waning instead of waxing.
Even a recent piece by Talking Points Memo that placed the blame for Obamacare’s potential failure on Republicans noted that the law’s unpopularity with the public at large was the number one threat to its success. Democrats are getting nervous and consequently are trying to put some distance between themselves and the ACA (Obamacare).

Obamacare was massively flawed from the get-go – Who knew?

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