I typically avoid getting into full on battle mode with the local conservative jackasses who post on the comments section of my county newspaper. The editors put up a pro-ACA editorial today and it was predictably attacked by the local conservative intelligentsia. After doing some smaller line item commentary I decided to put a full-on pro ACA rant up into the comments section. I'll add it after the jump.
The original article can be found here:
ACA article on the Delco Times
Here is the full text of my most recent comment:
The hatchet jobs on the ACA by people hell bent on preventing the uninsured from getting coverage will no doubt continue as the ACA further cements itself as the beneficial law of the land. The % of Americans enrolled in health insurance has increased as a result of the ACA. The cost curve of endless increases in premiums has been bent and controlled by the ACA. Predatory and un-liked policies offering non-coverage to low-income Americans desperate for protection from the ravages of illness have been outlawed and replaced with more affordable plans that provide actual coverage. Countless tens millions of Americans who had the unfortunate being sick in the past are no longer banned from insurance polices due to pre-existing conditions and the countless tens of millions of Americans who will get sick in the future are protected from policy rescissions.
The main flaw of the ACA is that is it still allows insurance companies to bleed an ungodly level of profit out of the system and forces consumers to navigate a somewhat onerous web site and enrollment process. My own preference would still be for single-payer because it would truly bring great health care to every American in the most efficient way possible as in the case in nations with significantly better health outcomes and lower healthcare costs per person as a result of their single-payer systems.
All in all the ACA will continue to enroll more and more Americans in better health insurance programs and the blatant intellectual sabotage of the law by conservatives will be appropriately banished to the lunatic fringe where it belongs.
We're all waiting on the edge of our seats for the actual national healthcare policy that Republicans will put forth as the "replace" element of their endless repeal tactics.
I'm still of the mind that I'd like single-payer, but the ACA is clearly a huge step of from the non-policy it replaced. I simply had enough of the conservative bullshit lies about the ACA, so I felt the pro-ACA rant was needed. I'm hoping as we head into the 2014 elections we, as supporters of progressives, all do our part to vocally support and encourage vocal support of the ACA while challenging Republicans to produce their own plan that would be an improvement as a replacement for what they hope to repeal. I'm simply tired of the passivity and ceding of ground to conservatives in the marketplace of ideas. I think we need to be more vocal in our support of the ACA, and other accomplishments / goals of progressive governance, to help fire up the base.
I think we all learned that a more progressive and more immediate attack on insuring more Americans would have helped prevent the disaster of 2010 elections from taking place. I'm going to try to do my part to create more safe places for liberals to fight back on conservative BS.
Thank you for any time you spend reading and commenting on this.