Repubs have terribly misread the polls on Obamacare...

[kentuck]

Most of the polls show the majority of Americans do not support Obamacare. Those are believable polls.

However, those polls also include Democrats that supported a single payer plan and, in no way, support the Tea Party and the Repubs in their threatened shutdown of the government.

They have misread their tea leaves.

Mitt Romney ran the last election with a promise to repeal Obamacare. He lost.

Repubs say Obamacare was "forced down the throat" of the American people. As I recall, it got 60 votes in the Senate? That is more votes than the Bush taxcuts received when they were "forced down the throats" of Americans in 2001 and 2003.

They simply do not have a rational argument.l

[Ron Green]

1. I think lots of those folks don't support the brand "Obamacare"

as delivered by the corporate media.

They just don't know squat about it.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

3. And that is partly the fault of the administration, which acted as if they'd never heard of PR

Before starting the fight in Congress, Obama should have done a Reagan by going on TV, explaining his plans in simple terms (no more than 5 bullet points with short sentences), and asking viewers to call their Congresscritters to support it.

Instead, no one really knew what was in the bill. I know. I had to Google like crazy to find even an executive summary of it, and it wasn't put out by the Obama administration. It was put out by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

The lack of information allowed everyone to go forward with misconceptions:

The Republicans went whole hog on a disinformation campaign with their talk of death panels and no more medical treatment for people over 75 and every horror story they could find in British and Canadian tabloids, even though Obama's proposal was totally unlike either the British or the Canadian system (and the British and Canadian system are like each other ONLY in the fact that the patient does not see a bill; under the British system, the providers are government employees, but under the Canadian system, private practitioners are paid by the government).

Partly because of the Republicans' disinformation campaign with scare stories from British and Canadian tabloids and partly out of wishful thinking, a lot of Democrats I spoke to THOUGHT that Obama was advocating a single payer system.

Bad, bad PR. Accurate information ("This plan was devised by the Heritage Foundation, and a variant of it was implemented in Massachusetts by then-Governor Mitt Romney&quot would have defused the Republicans' plan of demonization.

[deutsey]

6. That drives me crazy

The only time I remember Democrats aggressively countering GOP smears and lies was during Clinton's '92 campaign. Can't say I'm a big fan of James Carville, but I loved it back then when he hit GOP lies fast and hard. They even had something called a "Truth Squad," I believe, that immediately addressed Bush-league propaganda.

There might be other instances, but that's really the only time I remember a concerted, prolonged effort to go toe-to-toe with the GOP in a PR war.

Kerry did next to nothing during the swiftboat smears, and Obama remained largely silent as the Tea Party rose up with all kinds of batshit crazy lies about death panels, etc.

I can understand taking the high road, but sometimes that only leaves you open to strafing. You also have to know how to fight in the trench warfare of public opinion, imo.

[kentuck]

9. The next election will be a PR election..

PR is all that the Republican Party has. That is where we have to fight them.

[tortie]

11. exactly

This recent poll done by CNBC illustrates that

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101064954

I heard FOX conducted a poll and got similar results.

[mindwalker_i]

2. They don't care - they don't work for the people

The sooner the people realize that, the sooner we can pull this country out of the looney bin.

[NCTraveler]

4. I support single payer and also think Obamacare has some serious flaws.

If I were polled and asked if I support Obamacare I would say yes. If they added levels of support I would say strongly.

[CTyankee]

7. Me, too. Altho I am deeply disappointed that we didn't at least TRY for single payer, I think the

ACA is a step in the right direction.

[kentuck]

5. They seem to want this as a political issue in 2014?

They believe they can repeat their historic turnout of 2010 and take back the Senate and keep the House.

Their intent is to fire up their base with hatred of Obamacare to the point that they will jump on their swords in opposition to it.

It's all political for them. They don't have to convince Democrats they are doing the right thing. They don't give a crap what Democrats think. They are only concerned with their own troops.

[grahamhgreen]

8. Dems should fillibuster for single payer.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

10. Many polls show people support the constituent parts of Obamacare

Just not "Obamacare". The RW has so thoroughly demonized "Obamacare" as a concept, that many people say they don't support it. However, when questioned about specifics, they DO support young people staying on parents' policy til 26. They do support no denial of coverage or revision by insurance companies.

When the reality hits--poll numbers will move into 60-70% support, IMO.

[hlthe2b]

12. Being a BIG proponent of single payer/minimally, public option, I'd have a hard time answering

that poll as well--even though I certainly hope Obamacare works as a FIRST step to a rapid move to single payer.

Am I happy with ACA legilation--not on your life, but that does not equate with not supporting...


So, I think you have a big point.

[Rene]

13. those 'many calls against' are recorded ROBO calls......bet the repubs don't know what those are.

give false impression of actual facts.

[rhett o rick]

14. The Republican behavior has nothing to do with what the American people want, just what the 1%

wants.

[SomethingFishy]

15. As usual they ask the wrong questions..

Yeah 44% of the people don't like Obamacare. But about 15% of them think it doesn't go far enough. Leaving the standard 25-30% right wing wackos who are actually against better health care.

Mark my words, in two years when the plan is actually working Republicans will try to take credit for it. Probably just in time for the 2016 election.