President Obama Avoids Waterloo; GOP Delares Armageddon Has Ensued

It's time to Break It Down!

In July, 2009, Senator Jim DeMint, SC declared that if Republicans could defeat Healthcare Reform, it would be President Obama’s Waterloo…it would in fact break him. Fast forward eight months to March 2010, after the President adroitly managed to avert a nightmare of Napoleonic proportion. House Minority Leader John Boehner upped the ante, asserting, with Republican Party Chairman Michael Steele cosigning, that the newly passed Healthcare Reform law has created Armageddon in America; “it will ruin the nation,” they contended.

Of course the tone of the debate centering on the initiative to reform Healthcare has been fractious for some time. In an frequently uncivil discourse that has lingered for more than a year, it has often appeared that the GOP has substituted, enthusiastically, increasingly course rhetoric for any semblance of earnest negotiations to produce a bill that reflected a reasonable mix of ideas, based on their relative share of the representational split. Democrats control 233 of 435 seat in the House, and 59 of 100 seats in the Senate. In spite of that, it is fair to say the GOP has fiercely set out to execute a strategy to embarrass, minimize, and defeat this President, at almost every turn.

The media, long alleged to be among Mr. Obama’s biggest boosters during the 2008 Presidential campaign, at one point declared the Healthcare proposal dead. After the GOP emerged victorious in the Massachusetts Senatorial election, following Gubernatorial wins in Virginia and New Jersey, the President was deemed to have lost his mojo, that mid-term elections would return Republicans to power as a majority was considered fait accompli, and oh yeah, Healthcare; no chance!

From the emergence of the Tea Party protests, depictions of the President as the Grim Reaper, the world’s most famous shock jock openly exulting in his expression of hope for the President’s failure, a phalanx of opponents excoriated President Obama unceasingly, in an effort to defeat Healthcare reform, and exile President Obama to his political Elba.

Interestingly, in the wake of the House's approval of the Health Care bill, David Frum, a prominent conservative opines that the GOP miscalculated in formulationg a strategy of defeating Healthcare Reform at all costs.  In doing so, Frum contends that Republicans took it upon themselves to forfeit a seat a the table.  By going "all-in" on creating President Obama's Waterloo, they underserved their constituents.  It remains to be seen how that gambit plays out.

Laying to the side all the drama associated with efforts to demonize the President, or anyone else who supported Healthcare Reform, the truth of the matter, as is the case with most legislative sausage-making, is that there are plusses and minuses. First on the plus side:

• The CBO and other nonpartisan studies show the new law will curb the deficit by billions of dollars
• The law will cover 32 million additional Americans

• Children may be covered by their parents insurance for longer periods than in the past

• Insurance companies may no longer drop coverage due to preexisting conditions

• Maximum coverage provisions will be eliminated

• Wasteful spending in Medicare will be reduced or eliminated

It is worth noting that opposition to the law is split among conservatives who believe it costs too much, and liberals who believe the initiative stops short of what is needed to truly reform healthcare. So in a strange bedfellows sort of way, the downside includes:

• Costs; Congress will be required to enact the increases necessary to fund the law

• Single-payer System not a part of the law

• No Public Option; a key principle of Mr. Obama’s campaign-version of reform

To be sure there are other items that could be added to both sides of the ledger. But for the moment, the 219 members of the House of Representatives in the 111th Congress who stepped forward to vote yea for this measure, and the President who refused to go quietly into that good night, deserve a moment of silence for their commitment to do what they believed to be the right thing, in the face of relentless opposition by a GOP in lockstep. For many this was a courageous act; one that may tip the scales unfavorably in a tight November race.

In the weeks and months leading to the election, it is already clear that Healthcare Reform was not President Obama’s Waterloo. It remains to be seen whether it is the Democrats’ Armageddon.

I have a good friend who frequently reminds me, politics is not a spectator sport. To that end, you have the final say. After getting an earful several times over between now and November, you will have an opportunity to exercise your citizenship-authorized right to the ballot. In effect it is you who will decide whether 2011 and beyond looks and feels more like Armageddon…or Camelot, for those patriots who opted to look forward by providing better healthcare options to all Americans, rather than look backward and trade in slurs, epithets, and played-out stereotypes.

It’s your call. I’m done; holla back!

Read my blog anytime by clicking the link: http://thesphinxofcharlotte.blogspot.com. A new post is published each Wednesday. For more detailed information on a variety of aspects relating to this post, consult the links below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Waterloo

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_DeMint

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/president-obama/audio-of-jim-demint-saying-health-care-will-be-obamas-waterloo/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon_I

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armageddon

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Boehner

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Steele

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party_(United_States)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Party_(United_States)

http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/03/steele-yes-health-care-reform-is-armageddon.php

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/34727.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Frum

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_protests

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elba

http://celebrifi.com/gossip/Protesters-said-to-use-slurs-spit-on-Rep-1915393.html

http://www.nbcactionnews.com/news/local/story/Cleaver-Claims-He-Was-Spit-On-During-Debate/x1dqZlDu4UaJ3IkKIkfKwQ.cspx?rss=764

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emanuel_Cleaver

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lewis_(U.S._politician)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20100322/ts_csm/289415

http://www.rr.com/news/topic/article/rr/9000/10751863/FACT_CHECK_Spinning_the_new_health_care_law/3

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2010/03/17/catholic_nuns_urge_passage_of_obamas_health_bill/