By E.J. Dionne Jr.
Is there any accountability in American politics for being completely wrong? Is there any cost to those who say things that turn out not to be true and then, when their fabrications or false predictions are exposed, calmly move on to concocting new claims as if they had never made the old ones?
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When the health-care Web site went haywire last fall, conservatives were absolutely certain this technological failure meant that the entire reform effort was doomed. ...
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Their representatives in Washington, moderate conservatives as well as the tea party’s loyalists, followed the base’s lead. In mid-November, for example, Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) told Fox News flatly that the law is “destined to fail,” “fundamentally flawed” and “not ready for prime time.” House Speaker John Boehner predicted dire outcomes before the Web site fiasco. He repeatedly insisted, as he did in July, that “even the Obama administration knows the ‘train wreck’ will only get worse.”
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So let’s say it out loud: The ACA is doing exactly what its supporters said it would do. It is getting health insurance to millions who didn’t have it before. (The Los Angeles Times pegged the number at 9.5 million at the beginning of the week.) And it’s working especially well in places such as Kentucky, where state officials threw themselves fully and competently behind the cause of signing up the uninsured. Those who want to repeal the law will have to admit that they are willing to deprive these people, or some large percentage of them, of insurance.
From now on, will there be more healthy skepticism about conservative claims against the ACA? Given how many times the law’s enemies have said the sky was falling when it wasn’t, will there be tougher interrogation of their next round of apocalyptic predictions? Will their so-called alternatives be analyzed closely to see how many now-insured people would actually lose coverage under the “replacement” plans?
read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ej-dionne-the-gop-must-admit-it-was-wrong-on-obamacare/2014/04/02/f5635366-ba98-11e3-9a05-c739f29ccb08_story.html
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