Pelosi’s ObamaCare Regret: We Needed Better Messaging
On the bright side: Democrats’ refusal to move past “narrative” and “messaging” bodes well for America
Her party decimated, newly-reelected Democrat minority leader Nancy Pelosi shared her one ObamaCare regret with Vox: messaging!
Even Democrats, she says, were inept at handling the messaging required to really sell America on ObamaCare. Alas, she was so busy not reading the ObamaCare legislation to worry about messaging, so it just wasn’t done correctly.
Nancy Pelosi cannot think of a single part of the Affordable Care Act that has underperformed her expectations.
Not the lack of competition in the marketplaces that has worried President Obama — or the double-digit rate hikes this past fall. Nothing.
“I can’t think of anything like that,” the House minority leader said about 40 minutes into an interview this week, when I asked her to name a part of the health law that had gone worse than expected.
Her only regret about the law? That other Democrats didn’t step up to the plate to defend it — leading to what she called a sea of misinformation about her signature legislative achievement.
“If I had to fault myself, I would say I should not have trusted that other people were going to be the message piece while we were doing policy. We were in the foxhole; we were in the trenches fighting the fight,” she said.
It’s actually quite stunning that after the party’s historic losses over the past eight years, the House minority leader is still blaming messaging for the failure of ObamaCare.
This is the same “messaging problem” that prompted Obama to hit the road bolstering this monstrosity, promising again and again that “if you like your plan, you can keep your plan,” “if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor,” and the “typical” American family will save $2,500 per year.
In his 2009 State of the Union address, Obama infamously declared that illegal aliens would not be covered (they are), that abortion would not be covered (it is), and that the ObamaCare monstrosity would “add not one dime” to the national deficit (it’s added trucks-full of dimes).
Yet even this “messaging” couldn’t boost ObamaCare approval above 50%.
As deadlines loomed for the more onerous and destructive parts of ObamaCare to kick in, Obama chose to, with his pen and his phone, kick those unpleasant aspects down the road.
Yet even as he hid the worst horrors of ObamaCare from the American people, ObamaCare approval has always been disappointing to the left. Americans just don’t like it, even if we like some parts of it, the parts do not equal the whole.
Americans, when polled on other parts of ObamaCare, hate the mandate, hate the requirements for health insurance that include things that could never apply to them as individuals (prenatal care for men or post-menopausal women?), hate the high premiums and high deductibles that make using their “health insurance” improbable barring some catastrophic event.
Ask Americans if they are willing to trade keeping their “children” on their own policies until they are 26 for buying an affordable policy that meets their actual needs or for eliminating the federal mandate. That’s the question that needs to be asked. My guess is that “support” for the typically-espoused favorite parts of ObamaCare would dwindle to single digits in a flash when put up against the individual mandate or the onerous and illogical coverage requirements or ever-increasing premiums and shrinking health care options.
What more can they possibly “message” about this law that would make people think that they aren’t really paying an exorbitant sum for coverage they don’t need, can’t use, and amounts to a pre-ObamaCare catastrophic plan?
Yet Pelosi preposterously ponders: if only she hadn’t been so busy passing the bill so we could see what’s in it and had time to devote to proper messaging . . . well, obviously, the American people would be thrilled with ObamaCare.
Personally, I’m happy to hear this. Yes, Nancy, that’s right. It was just poor messaging. Keep thinking that. Oh, and while you’re at it, please go ahead and make Keith Ellison chair of the DNC, run Elizabeth Warren in 2020, and encourage Obama to help you rebuild the party you—and he—decimated.
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Comments
Gee Nance do you think “We have to pass it to see what’s in it.” might have sent the wrong message?
I remember that photo from the time. It was one of the most disgusting images ever to come out of American government. It still excels in that regard.
THAT was and is the “messaging” that ObamaDoggle needs to be remembered for.
They are wishing for more lies? Bigger lies?
And I was convinced the DT voters were living in an alternate universe!!!!
Who knew the dems were wishing for their own space in a fictional universe.
Don’t forget, they said it absolutely wasn’t a tax, until it needed to be a tax to be constitutional.
They blame the “messaging” because it gives them a way to acknowledge obvious failure while at the same time denying that they ever really did anything wrong.
In other words, it’s a paradigm that guarantees continued failure on their part.
The plebians are so stupid we must educate them on what is best for them. If only our messaging had been more effective in that regard.
Fuck you Pelosi, you arrogant witch. Your ideas and policies suck and you failed.
Paul, your spellchecker has tripped you up once again. It has changed the obvious word to “witch”. I’m not sure how to keep this from happening again, but I suggest a careful proofreading in the future to avoid offending witches.
Userpen…??? Concern troll needed…stat…
If I had to fault myself, I would say: IT WAS SOMEBODY ELSE’S FAULT!
The arrogance of the picture above was the beginning.Then the lies about racial slurs being hurled at that disgusting parade.Then the horrible roll-out that was put together by amateurs…yeah, it was the messaging in some ways.
It’s the progressive costs. It’s your twilight faith. It’s your Pro-Choice (i.e. selective, opportunistic) quasi-religion. You have ulterior motives. People don’t trust you.
Revitalization. Rehabilitation. Reconciliation.
Tell me Nance, what message is sent by double and triple digit rate hikes? By making nuns sue for the right to practice their religion? By canceling policies people were content with and telling them policy terms they didn’t want were more important? By telling people lies like, “If you like your doctor …” etc?
Do real world consequences not send messages too? Oh, that’s right. YOU didn’t experience any of those consequences, so what do you care anyway? YOU even got re-elected, so I guess what happened to the rest of your party is just some weird fluke, too, huh?
Imbecile!
That explosion of debt during the Obamic Decline…???
Bush. There is nothing he cannot do…
Pelosi’s regret: insufficient Planning, and hammer envy.
It’s time for someone else to take up the hammer and mold society in their image. As should be self-evident, principles matter.
Is Steny Hoyer actually holding John Lewis’s hand?
A thank you message to Crazy Pelosi: most of America wants to grab that giant gavel and smack you over the head with it. Please continue holding office.
My vote for the Iconic Image of the Obama Dark Ages would go to one of these three—
— any shot of Bammie giving us his favored Benito Mussolini pose, with the camera focussed on his nostrils;
— Lois Lerner’s dumb “banality of evil” face while being grilled by Congress;
— or this action shot of Pelosi and her Big Hammer—probably as close as America will ever get to the image of a boot stamping on a human face, forever.
How did you forget the one of Obama picking his nose at a press conference??
http://thefinereport.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Nose-close-flipped.jpg
Google is working hard to scrub it.
The full shot, with a clever satirist’s insert of a teleprompter:
http://thefinereport.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Obama-teleprompter-pick-your-nose-trimmed1.jpg
I think we got the message.