Backed by more than $600 billion, there appears to be genuine health reform momentum.
Much of the focus has been on covering the 15 percent of Americans who are uninsured, but as Ezra Klein points out, that also means that 85 percent of the country have health insurance. In fact, 95 percent of the people who voted for Obama are insured, and as Mr. Klein quotes one of the President’s senior health advisers, “We need to think about what we’re doing for them.”
That’s a good point, since in the long run, that majority will end up paying to cover the uninsured, likely in the form of higher taxes of some kind.
So begins a huge public relations war to sway the opinion of the majority of Americans who have health insurance. If they feel they’ll be worse off after health reform, the legislation will fail. If health reform will better what they already have, the President will likely be successful.
Lost in the process are the uninsured themselves, whose minority voice likely won’t influence the outcome either way.
