Rep. Joe Heck (R-NV) is another recipient of a well-informed, Obamacare-supporting constituent schooling, just like Reps.
Patrick McHenry (R-NC) and
Daniel Webster (R-FL). Heck was confronted by a small business owner in Nevada, an employer who has always provided health benefits and a living wage to his employees, who doesn't appreciate the fact that he's subsidizing the uninsured to the tune of $600 annually out of his insurance premiums, but who appreciates the fact that he's now getting a tax break for doing the right thing.
He had a question for Heck:
Why would you oppose the ACA if it was passed by congress, passed by the senate, signed by the president, upheld by the supreme court and re-affirmed by the reelection of the president of the United States who won your district? Why would you revoke something that's helping me now? It's bending the cost curve and it's going to bend the cost curve in the future? Why Congressman? Why?
To which Heck replied "2,700 pages! Dead of night! Nobody read it!" and then a tutorial on how health insurance works, as if this is all new under Obamacare:
You talked about the $600 everybody was paying for the uninsured, there's no such thing as free preventative health care. You might not be pay for it but somebody's got to pay for it. And that payment is going to be spread across everybody that's insured.
Well, Heck has that part right, though he doesn't recognize that he's making the case for Obamacare. This is how insurance works, and if
everyone is paying into insurance, the cost spread across everyone's premiums is
much less. Note, however, that Heck also says "[t]here are good things in the bill to keep and there are bad things. [...] I won by 8 points here, more than President, and I ran on fixing ACA." Obama won Heck's district, so this is one Republican who has to think about something besides repeal, repeal, repeal and needs to talk about that whole fixing part. Too bad his leadership isn't up to that part.