Beware the Bad-Faith Reformer
By Joe Conason
RealClearPolitics
Uplifting as it was to see insurance executives, pharmaceutical manufacturers, hospital officials and doctors gather at the White House on May 11, pledging cooperation toward health care reform, nothing they said or did was inconsistent with precisely the opposite objective. According to the famed pollster who is helping Republicans in Congress to block reform, in fact, the first critical step toward stopping real change is pretending to support it.
"You simply must be vocally and passionately on the side of reform," urges a recent strategy memo authored by Frank Luntz, the opinion research expert who has counseled Republicans since the heyday of Newt Gingrich. "The status quo is no longer acceptable. If the dynamic becomes 'President Obama is on the side of reform and Republicans are against it,' then the battle is lost..."
The same advice that Mr. Luntz provided to the Republican Party leadership applies with equal force to the corporate opponents of reform, who appear to have grasped the political realities of the moment. So when the lobbyists who have long protected the profits and privileges of Medicine Inc. stand beside President Obama and declare their determination to help, they are simply following the script. Whether those organizations are actually willing to accept government action that will bring lower costs and universal care remains very much in doubt.
Taken at their word, the voices of the lobbyists sounded promising -- especially in contrast to the multimillion-dollar propaganda war they launched against the Clinton administration's attempt to reform the health system in 1993. In a letter to the president, they agreed to implement new measures that would reduce costs, presumably including some of the ideas that have been endorsed by the Obama administration. Without offering any details, the lobbyists estimated that their proposed changes would reduce the growth in health care costs by 1.5 percent annually -- or about one-fifth of the current, unsustainable rate of 7 percent. In terms of the national budget, that would amount to approximately $2 trillion over the next 10 years.
(More here.)
RealClearPolitics
Uplifting as it was to see insurance executives, pharmaceutical manufacturers, hospital officials and doctors gather at the White House on May 11, pledging cooperation toward health care reform, nothing they said or did was inconsistent with precisely the opposite objective. According to the famed pollster who is helping Republicans in Congress to block reform, in fact, the first critical step toward stopping real change is pretending to support it.
"You simply must be vocally and passionately on the side of reform," urges a recent strategy memo authored by Frank Luntz, the opinion research expert who has counseled Republicans since the heyday of Newt Gingrich. "The status quo is no longer acceptable. If the dynamic becomes 'President Obama is on the side of reform and Republicans are against it,' then the battle is lost..."
The same advice that Mr. Luntz provided to the Republican Party leadership applies with equal force to the corporate opponents of reform, who appear to have grasped the political realities of the moment. So when the lobbyists who have long protected the profits and privileges of Medicine Inc. stand beside President Obama and declare their determination to help, they are simply following the script. Whether those organizations are actually willing to accept government action that will bring lower costs and universal care remains very much in doubt.
Taken at their word, the voices of the lobbyists sounded promising -- especially in contrast to the multimillion-dollar propaganda war they launched against the Clinton administration's attempt to reform the health system in 1993. In a letter to the president, they agreed to implement new measures that would reduce costs, presumably including some of the ideas that have been endorsed by the Obama administration. Without offering any details, the lobbyists estimated that their proposed changes would reduce the growth in health care costs by 1.5 percent annually -- or about one-fifth of the current, unsustainable rate of 7 percent. In terms of the national budget, that would amount to approximately $2 trillion over the next 10 years.
(More here.)
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