Ted Cruz: Obama Should Use State of the Union Address to Apologize to America for Obamacare "Lie of the Year"

Video at the link.

“For the State of the Union, one of the things President Obama really oughta do is look in the TV camera and say to the over 5 million Americans all across this country who've had their health insurance canceled because of ObamaCare, to look in the camera and say, ‘I’m sorry,’ ” Cruz said on CBS’s "Face the Nation."

Obamacare meanwhile is at its lowest support ever according to a FoxNews poll.

A record high number of voters now oppose the 2010 Affordable Care Act and a record low number supports it, according to the latest Fox News poll.

In addition, a majority thinks the new law will increase their health care costs, while few think it will improve their quality of care.

...

The new poll finds 59 percent of voters oppose the health care law, up from 55 percent who opposed it six months ago (June 2013). The increase in opposition comes from both independents and Democrats.

Nearly a third of Democrats -- 30 percent -- oppose the law, up from 22 percent in June.

Opposition among independents went from 53 percent to 64 percent today.

Overall, 36 percent of voters favor the new health care law. That’s down from 40 percent in June and marks a new low.

Glenn Reynolds writes of "Irish democracy" in his USAToday column -- killing a law by passive resistance to it, or even active flouting of it. He quotes James Scott to explain the principle:

One need not have an actual conspiracy to achieve the practical effects of a conspiracy. More regimes have been brought, piecemeal, to their knees by what was once called 'Irish Democracy,' the silent, dogged resistance, withdrawal, and truculence of millions of ordinary people, than by revolutionary vanguards or rioting mobs.

Retiring liberal Congressman/longtime bilious psychopath Jim Moran confesses that just that sort of passive resistance, among the young especially, is undermining Obamacare. Or, as the American University radio station he gave the interview to puts it, it could "unravel" the system.

“I’m afraid that the millennials, if you will, are less likely to sign up. I think they feel more independent, I think they feel a little more invulnerable than prior generations,” Moran says. “But I don’t think we’re going to get enough young people signing up to make this bill work as it was intended to financially.”

If Moran’s prediction is correct, the whole law could unravel. He says there just isn’t enough incentive for healthy young people to sign up for insurance.

“And, frankly, there’s some legitimacy to their concern because the government spends about $7 for the elderly for every $1 it spends on the young,” Moran says.

Megan McArdle notes that Obamacare has been most effective at signing up people who already had insurance. That is to say, who previously had insurance, but Obamacare cancelled it. And of those folks, Obamacare has actually managed to sign up... 75% of them.

So of the people who previously had insurance, Obamacare has only taken all insurance away from 25%. The rest have more expensive, worse coverage through Obamacare.

That's a big win, I guess, relatively, compared to the other numbers. Obama's Big Win consists of reducing the insured rate of a group by a mere 25%.

But what about the uninsured, the people for whom we're making all these sacrifices?

Of those, Obmacare has enticed... 15% to sign up. 85% of the previously uninsured remain uninsured.

posted by Ace at 02:12 PM

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