Once Upon a Time, Liberals Hated the Individual Health Insurance Mandate [View all]

[Better Believe It]

Once Upon a Time, Liberals Hated the Individual Mandate
by Avik Roy, Contributor
April 2, 2012

There’s a lot of talk—much of it inaccurate—about the minority of conservatives who supported the individual mandate in the past, but oppose Obamacare’s requirement that all Americans buy health insurance. But these critics have devoted less attention to the fact that many liberals—including President Obama—opposed the individual mandate in the past. “The liberals hated it,” notes Jonathan Gruber in a recent New York Times profile. “People forget that.”

“This is not real reform,” said Howard Dean of Obamacare’s mandate in December 2009. “You’re going to be forced to buy health insurance from a company that’s going to take on average 27 percent of your money so they can pay CEOs 20 million dollars a year…and there’s no choice about that. If you don’t buy that insurance, you’re going to get a fine. This is a bill that was fundamentally written by staffers who are friendly to the insurance industry, [endorsed] by Senators who take a lot of money from the insurance industry, and it’s not health care reform. And I think it’s too bad that it should come to this…I’d kill the bill entirely.”

Dean, to his great credit, has been consistent all along in his criticism of the mandate. Not so for President Obama, who on the campaign trail in 2008 ridiculed Hillary Clinton’s support of the mandate. “I don’t think the problem is that people don’t want health insurance,” he told Ellen DeGeneres in 2008, “it’s that they can’t afford it…if things were that easy, I could mandate everybody to buy a house, and that would solve the problem of homelessness. It doesn’t.” As President Obama’s staffers began pushing for a mandate, Ron Suskind reports, Obama expressed concern about Constitutional challenges to the provision. As we know now, he was right to have done so.

Former AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, representing the core Democratic constituency, was even more ardent than the President in his hatred of the individual mandate. In 2006, when Mitt Romney was about to sign his Massachusetts legislation, Sweeney went ballistic. “Who would have thought that Massachusetts—long considered a bastion of progressive thinking—would take a page out of the Newt Gingrich playbook for health care reform?” he asked. “Forcing uninsured workers to purchase health care coverage or face higher taxes and fines is the cornerstone of Mr. Gingrich’s health care reform proposals. And it is unconscionable that Massachusetts has adopted this misguided individual mandate.”

Read the full article at:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/aroy/2012/04/02/once-upon-a-time-liberals-hated-the-individual-mandate/


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In SCOTUS case, Obamacare has industry allies
by Timothy P. Carney
Senior Political Columnist
March 25, 2012

Corporate America's stance on the Obamacare case before the high court this week will surprise those who followed Obama's narrative or most news coverage of the law, which was supposedly a broadside to the special interests. But back then, health-sector lobbies either supported the bill or at least supported its core provisions. Today, industry briefs before the court show the same lack of "special-interest" opposition.

Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Massachusetts filed an amicus brief with the court in support of Obama's Department of Health & Human Services. The insurer writes that it played a central role in crafting Mitt Romney's Massachusetts health-care law that served as the prototype of Obamacare, and that it "remains firmly committed to the 2006 health care reform and the individual mandate, and believes that the closely related reforms enacted by Congress in 2010 will further advance important economic and social goals."

The American Hospital Association is a $20-million-a-year lobby (the third-biggest lobbying organization in terms of spending since 1998, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics). The AHA has filed briefs in support of the law, and its amicus brief before the Supreme Court argues that "the court should uphold the individual mandate."

The health-care law provides new taxpayer subsidies to hospitals, and the individual mandate could reduce the "uncompensated care" hospitals now provide for the uninsured. Plus, more universal and subsidized health coverage could allow hospitals to raise prices.

Read the full article at:

http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/article/scotus-case-obamacare-has-industry-allies/446831