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Even the Republicans of the fire breathing sort might have been shocked by the size of their election victory on Tuesday. In fact, an article in the NY Times today (11.4.10) makes clear that they had been intensely planning to win back Congress since before Obama took office, but even they were somewhat surprised at the size of the win in the House (the Dems kept the Senate, of course). Even most Republicans thought it was a long shot, but a planned was hatched at a “historic inn” in Maryland’s Bay side capital of Annapolis in January, 2009, even before Obama was sworn in.
While it has been clear for some time that 2010 would be a “Republican year”, the rebirth of the Republican party just two years after Obama and the Dems swept the elections has left some of the national news media in a state of head spinning awe. This is over doing it. It is normal, especially in recent decades, for things to swing back and forth, although 60 seats in the House is a big number.
Whatever shock the nation and the news media might have been feeling this week. it should be noted that this has all happened before. As Wendell Potter details in his new book, Deadly Spin, the previous greatest gains by Republicans in the House came in 1938 after Franklin Roosevelt got Social Security passed and, guess what?, decided to pull back on a national plan for health care because he believed it would be defeated. So, this is a battle that has been going on in America for more than 72 years and, in fact, dates to around the start of the 20th century.
After world war two, President Truman again proposed a plan in 1948 for national health care and it happened once more: the right wing labeled his ideas socialist, the business community, led by the AMA, rose up in arms. A major propaganda campaign against it, and Truman, was mounted. Do I have to say what happened next? That’s right, the Republicans retook control of Congress from the Democrats, while a Democrat remained in the White House.
As they say, this story is as old as the hills. It has happened again and again. The Democrats try to bring some sort of universal health care to the American public and the Republicans wind up gaining at least a temporary victory because of it. Clinton tried early in his two terms, putting his wife Hillary in charge and then, as we all know, dumping the whole idea. What happened? The Republicans took control of both houses of Congress and retained the lead until 2006.
With this record of trying, followed by rapid defeat, the question isn’t so much why business and the Republicans are opposed to health care, but why, oh why, do the Dems keep trying and getting slapped across the face because of it? Haven’t they learned their lesson by now? What does it take to see it is a lost cause? (Actually, it is not lost now, because the first big step has been taken, even through Obama might lose in 2012 because of it.)
A national health care plan of some sort has taken on more urgency in recent years. For one thing, the costs of medical care have gone through the roof. Bills of two, three or four hundred thousand dollars are not uncommon for emergency treatment following an car crash or such life threatening episodes as cancer or heart disease. Even if insurance covers most of some events, there is always the prospect of the bill that just can’t be paid. None but the very wealthy can afford major medical care on their own and hope to have any sort of decent lifestyle afterward.
Employers have been steadily cutting back on benefits to employees over the last several decades. Who is to say that health care wouldn’t be next? Companies can offer less and less and require their employees to pay more and more, so long as those employees are not that mobile and don’t have many choices about employment.
Money machines like Wal-Mart, which mainly employs people at the lowest end of the wage scale, offer health insurance but require CO-payments that many of their employees can’t afford and never will be able to afford. Since Wal-Mart is the largest employer in America, and an enormously wealthy company, other businesses are looking closely and many are copying its methods. It is not difficult to project a time when employer offered health care would not cover the actual needs of gainfully employed people, or be too expensive for the average person to afford. Big corporations are looking for every means to cut back on costs to keep profits high and, the recession proves, whatever they can cut, they will.
The Democrats try to maintain themselves in power as guardians of benefits for the lower 2/3s of Americans without much wealth. The fundamental plan is to get and provide benefits for Americans and then keep themselves in their offices and their power in the process. The Republicans fight health care, and other benefits, because they have taken on the job of representing insurance companies, HMOs. businesses large and small, the US. Chamber of Commerce, and the people around the nation who own businesses, plus, thrown in for good measure, those who can be convinced that anything the Dems want to do smacks of “socialism”(this claim was made in 1938 against FDR, too).
Fundamentally, the rich and near rich in America do not want to have to pay for health care for the poor and the near poor. Even if they have billions of dollars in the bank (or perhaps especially if they have billions), they don’t want to spread that money around. Their fear is that the cost will grow, people will like what they are getting and the demand for higher and higher taxes will result. A failing system that doesn’t require too much is fine with them. The rich would rather spend hundreds of millions of dollars this year fighting health care, and defeating the regulation of business that comes along with Democratic control, than worry about what they might have to spend down the road. Karl Rove’s group alone, American Crossroads, and an affiliated group, are said to have raised more than 50 million dollars. That’s money raised from nothing, from zero, in a start up political influence group.
Once you’ve gotten into an employer/insurance controlled system of health care payments, it is very hard to get out. The Obama plan, so far as anyone understands it, involves the continuation of private health insurance companies. Indeed, they would stand to make billions, but they might lose other billions, so they don’t like the whole idea, either.
What it amounts to was a perfect storm of opposition, a storm that first distracted and then disabled Obama’s presidency for months and now has removed his chances of getting any more major legislation through Congress. The legislative battle going forward are going to be small beer and probably even nastier.
Both Obama and the Republicans will be playing on the margins for the next two years. The Republicans cannot just do anything they want, because they have to get through the Senate and passed Obama’s veto. This is really divided government. With less at stake in terms of what might be passed and signed into law, more time is available for infighting, screaming, being disrespectful and generating anger. You asked for it, America.
Nearly 30 million fewer people voted in this election than in 2008, so it is entirely possible that Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2010, was an anomaly, not be to repeated. Yet, with 60 seats having changed hands in the House it could be a long, long time before the Dems see power again in that chamber. Shifts of that size are exceedingly rare. It could take a decade or more for the them to claw their way back, barring some huge, crisis inspired change in voting patterns. (Based on estimated final totals for the House, it would take a net change of 27 seats for the Dems to get back in power. That’s a lot.)
The Republicans are by no means on their way to being a new, permanent majority in America, but they have won a long term victory for power in the House that seems likely to last out this decade, unless voter anger turns on them the way it did Tuesday on the Democrats.
Doug Terry, 11.4.10
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