Lost in the entire debate over Republican efforts to reform the healthcare system is the reason the GOP has taken up the task at all: Americans are suffering under legislation passed by the Democrats. Sure, this inconvenient fact gets some attention at times, but is largely drowned out by the media’s preference for entertaining the dire predictions liberals are currently making.
As has been the case for years, Democrats are better at appealing to people’s emotions than Republicans. But that doesn’t mean Republicans don’t have a case.
As Erica Grieder wrote in The Week on Wednesday:
While the Affordable Care Act has surely helped millions of Americans, it has also still left millions of Americans uninsured, and many more with higher premiums and deductibles than they had in 2009, when Democrats promised that their plan would deliver precisely the opposite, among other things.
Even now, many Democrats are reluctant to acknowledge that ObamaCare’s conservative critics were correct in predicting such problems, and that in some cases, at least, their objections were rooted in concern for the Americans who would be disproportionately affected by them, if so.
Many people benefitted directly from provisions in Obamacare. Many people also suffered. Even if you believe the same will be true of Republican reform legislation, that doesn’t excuse ignoring the stories of people who are suffering while elevating the stories of those who may suffer.
Rolling out the sob stories is an easy, and sometimes important and productive, political strategy. But when Democrats avoid acknowledging the painful reality they created for so many people in order to draw attention away from their own mistakes, their concern for future sufferers feels more cynical than it does productive.
Emily Jashinsky is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
