Poll: More Americans Want To Keep Or Expand Obamacare Than Repeal It

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In spite of spin by the GOP and the corporate media.


More Americans want to keep the Affordable Care Act as it is or expand it than want to get rid of it, according to a new poll released Friday.


The Kaiser Family Foundation found that 47 percent of Americans want to expand (22 percent) or keep the law (25 percent). Conversely, 37 percent said they wanted to either repeal the law and replace it with some Republican alternative (13 percent) or repeal it without replacing it (24 percent).

That's despite the fact that more Americans have an unfavorable view of the law (44 percent) than a favorable view (38 percent), according to Kaiser.

The poll surveyed a nationally representative sample of 1,513 Americans ages 18 and over. It was conducted from Oct. 17 to 23.


http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/poll-more-americans-want-to-keep-or-expand-obamacare-than-repeal-it

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1. Mend It, Don’t End It..

Republicans want to repeal Obamacare. Obama wants to fix it. The polls are on his side.

Obamacare is under attack. Its website is glitchy, its prices are uneven, and insurance policies that don’t meet its standards are being withdrawn. But President Obama is sticking with it, scolding its Republican critics, and betting that in the long run, he’ll win. He may be right.

Obama’s bet, on a message level, is that the public likes the idea of the Affordable Care Act, even if they’re unhappy with its implementation or some of its features. He’s for something that addresses our health care needs. Republicans, lacking a plausible alternative, offer nothing but obstruction. The law is being implemented. The GOP can’t fight it without, in effect, rolling back coverage and benefits. Changing the law’s details is a popular position. Repealing it isn’t.

Look at the polls. In a CBS News survey taken Oct. 1–2, a majority of Americans—51 to 43 percent—disapproved of the Affordable Care Act. Only 43 percent, however, said the law went “too far in changing the U.S. health care system.” Thirty percent said the law was about right, and 20 percent said it didn’t go far enough. The plurality supported the law or an extension of it. In an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll taken Oct. 7–9, 43 percent of respondents said the law was a bad idea. Only 38 percent called it a good idea. But 50 percent opposed “totally eliminating federal funding” for it, compared with 39 percent who favored cutting off funds.

Twenty-one percent of Americans in a Gallup poll conducted Oct. 12–13 said they’d like major changes to the law. Ninteen percent said they’d like minor changes. But only 29 percent said they’d like the law to be repealed entirely—less than the 32 percent who took that position three years ago, and not much more than the 24 percent who said they’d like to keep the law as it is. When Gallup pressed further, asking respondents whether the changes they had in mind would scale the law back or expand it, 40 percent of those who wanted changes (and who answered the question either way) said they preferred to expand the law.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/frame_game/2013/10/obamacare_polls_americans_want_to_reform_the_affordable_care_act_not_repeal.html?wpisrc=burger_bar