Amid new polls showing a majority of Americans don’t like his health care policy, President Obama is redoubling efforts to frame the measure as a campaign asset.
But with time running out before November and the economy far outstripping health care as a top concern among voters, it’s unlikely the president’s push will get much traction.
“We’ve got to make the system work better for consumers,” Obama told supporters in Falls Church. “We’ve got to make it more responsive. But ultimately, the thing that’s most important is, we’ve just got to give people some basic peace of mind.”
The carefully staged event placed Obama in a suburban backyard — with a lemonade pitcher nearby — to hear stories from supporters with health care issues.
The backyard is a recurring backdrop for the White House, part of a larger effort to counter Obama’s image as a remote, passionless leader by positioning him as affable, approachable and concerned.
“I love bookstores,” he said at one point, to the owner of a bookstore who participated in the event.
It may be too late for the White House to do much about health care. The policy was never overwhelmingly popular to begin with, but a recent poll by Kaiser Family Foundation found 45 percent said they oppose the law, to 43 percent who support it. Three other recent polls, by Gallup, CNN, and Rasmussen, registered opposition to the plan from 56 percent to 61 percent.
In an apparently unscripted remark in the backyard, Obama said, “sometimes I fault myself for not having been able to make the case more clearly to the country” on health care.
Even so, six months after Obama signed his signature issue into law, an Associated Press poll found more than half of Americans wrongly believe the measure will raise taxes for most people this year.
And about one-fourth of respondents erroneously believe that health care reform will establish so-called “death panels” to make critical decisions about patient care.
In returning to health care as a campaign theme, Obama faces two problems: More Americans are concerned about the economy, and his base was largely disappointed with health care reform because many felt it didn’t go far enough.
Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele called “Obamacare” a “radioactive” problem that defies White House public relations efforts.
“Rather than work across the aisle, Democrats chose to pursue a health care takeover that has resulted in higher premiums for families, more taxes for businesses and reduced benefits for our seniors and children,” Steele said.
Obama’s journey to the Washington suburbs drew both supporters and protesters to nearby streets — one holding a sign that said “Nobama Care For Us,” and another that said, “We Still Believe.”
