Big majority support health care public option in latest New York Times poll! 65 to 25 percent

[Better Believe It]

Those Socialist Americans
By Harold Meyerson
September 25, 2009

A quarter of the American people (26 percent, to be exact), according to Friday morning’s New York Times/CBS News poll, believe that the health-care reform bills floating around Congress will create governmental death panels, while just 23 percent say they won’t. Another 30 percent believe that the bills will allow federal tax dollars to go towards the purchase of insurance by illegal immigrants, while just 22 percent say they won’t. The right-wing noise machine has evidently reached many right-wing ears.

But here’s the stunner: In the very same poll, respondents were asked whether they favored a Medicare-like public option for everyone. The right-wingers were out there in roughly the same numbers that they registered in answering the other questions: 26 percent of respondents said they opposed the public option. But a whopping 65 supported it.

Think about that. The public option has been demonized non-stop for the past half-year; it’s the key to the Republican charge that instituting such a program is tantamount to bringing socialism to America. They have clearly rallied the Republican base to this position, just as they rallied the base to fear the coming of death panels and publicly-subsidized immigrant care. But whereas pluralities of Americans simply said they didn’t know enough to believe one thing or the other about death panels and immigrant care, virtually all Americans not in the Republican base support the public option.

Is the intensity of the support for the public option as great as that of the opposition? Apparently not, at least, not yet. Does a 65-percent-to-26-percent margin nonetheless give the Democrats the ability to defend the public option and actually win support for doing so? It does if they’re any good at their chosen trade.

The American people have just told the Democrats, If you vote for the public option, we’ve got your back. Of course, if Democrats are utterly spineless, having their back yields nothing.

Please read the complete article at:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postpartisan/2009/09/those_socialist_americans.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

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September 25, 2009
Times Poll: Americans Strongly Favor Public Option
By The New York Times

By a margin of 52 percent to 27 percent, Americans believe President Obama has better ideas about overhauling health care than Republicans do, according to a national poll conducted by The New York Times and CBS News. And nearly two-thirds of the country supports creation of a government-run insurance plan, or public option.

http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/25/times-poll-americans-strongly-favor-public-option/

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Popularity of 'public option' complicates health debate
Government plan gets high marks in poll; Democrats at war with themselves
By Robert Schroeder
September 25, 2009

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Republicans are dead-set against it. Some Democrats pan it. President Barack Obama says it's not the only option. But when it comes to a government-run insurance plan, a new poll released Friday suggests all may have to think twice about whether to support it -- just as lawmakers move into a critical stage in the health-care debate.

Contrary to the impression given by this summer's contentious town hall meetings where angry and vocal opponents to the public option grabbed the spotlight, nearly two-thirds of Americans favor a government-run health insurance plan as an alternative to private insurers, the latest New York Times/CBS News poll found.

Granted, poll results vary and depend heavily on how a question is asked, but the so-called "public option" garnered 65% support in the closely-watched poll, versus opposition of 26% of respondents. Support was down from 72% in mid-June, but remained at a level high enough to give lawmakers pause about rejecting it as part of the health-care overhaul that Obama and Democrats are seeking this year.

Or did it? This week, the Senate Finance Committee began debating Chairman Max Baucus's nearly $900 billion, 10-year bill, a measure that leaves out the public option, to the chagrin of liberals like Sens. Jay Rockefeller, Democrat of West Virginia and Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/public-option-complicates-health-debate-anew-2009-09-25

[Sarah Ibarruri]

1. Why do Blue Dogs have as much power as they do?

That's all I want to know. This issue shouldn't even BE an issue. We have a Democrat in the WH, we are the majority in Congress. What on earth is wrong with Democrats, that even with the majority, we can't get rid of the influence of the brownshirt GOPers?

[midnight]

4. Your right. This should not be an issue. We want the same

access to quality health care is our elected officials. End of discussion.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

6. Exactly! End of discussion! If it's an issue, it's because Obama and we are allowing it to be nt

[Selatius]

2. Yet, for some reason, the federal government appears extremely unresponsive to that fact.

Would it take 90 percent support to ensure even a strong public option passes?

[CTLawGuy]

8. 4 of the 5 bills in Congress have a public option

and there is a pending amendment to add it to the 5th. To say the federal government is "unresponsive" is plain incorrect.

[msongs]

3. doncha wish democrats controlled congress & the white house? oh wait......lol nt

[Better Believe It]

5. Will the Republicans maintain their political control after the 2010/2012 elections?

[CTLawGuy]

9. yeah but liberals don't have a majority.

there's a liberal in the white house waiting to sign a public option. But he can only sign bills that come to his desk. We have a slight liberal majority in the house, but we don't have a liberal majority in the senate.

Here is the list of 15 members of a "moderate" senator group led by Evan Bayh: Carper, Lincoln, Bennet, Begich, Hagan, Kohl, Landrieu, Lieberman, McCaskill, Nelson (NE), Nelson (FL), Shaheen, Udall (CO) and Warner. Also in the mix as "not liberal" is Sen. Specter. Add in Feinstein, Baucus, Pryor, Conrad - who are less than true blue liberals and you have maybe 40 liberals in the senate.

A Democratic majority means the possibility of blocking an R filibuster. Right now the Dems strategy, which is a good one, is the "commit to cloture" strategy where they tell the moderates and conservatives that they can vote however they like on the final bill, but vote to squash a Republican filibuster. The true value of 60 seats is that power--the power to create an actual opportunity to pass a reform bill.

[Better Believe It]

7. For weekend DU'ers