In part Babe, the answer to your question is that, unlike myself and maybe a few other Board members, who has read the Bill that passed the House last night or the one that passed the Senate last December? Who has even read a summary of those bills? If they had, they would know that most of the provisions of the bill don't become effective until 2014 and that employers with less than 50 (and in some cases 100)employees are exempt from any provisions regarding health insurance coverage. Ignorance can be bliss, but in more cases than not, it is damaging.
This issue has to be seen in two different contexts: Technocratical and political.
(1) Olivant is right, plus that this bill is pretty similar to the one Nixon proposed in the early 1970s.
Yes Nixon is a socialist now. It's rather conservative, not as apocalyptical liberal as talk radio this morning made it out to be.
A similar (if not exact clone) we can see in execution is the derided "RomneyCare" over in Massachussetts, the state healthcare system signed into law by
Mitt Romney, the supposed front-runner for the 2012 GOP Nomination. Notice how he wrote an angry pissy response about how Obama created tyranny because he passed a national variation of RomneyCare.
The premiums are highest in the nation, in the late 30s, maybe over 40 but I can't remember exactly. Because the demand overloaded the supply, alot of folks got kicked out in order to pay the insurance.
(2) But politically, unless I'm mistaken, you don't see the Massachusetts GOP actively trying to repeal and shut down RomneyCare. Not even that Scott Brown fellow who won Ted Kennedy's seat.* In fact many in that seat fear that ObamaCare will cut into their RomneyCare. They want to more "reform" or fix up that leaky boat.
Consider how the GOP talked of how problematic the healthcare systems in Canada and UK are. And they do have a point. To a degree. But notice neither nation is in a hurry to go back to a US-style healthcare apparatus. Shit even the Tories in UK would really batshit nuts if someone tried to do that with their healthcare system.
The HCR passed last night has problems and alot of bullshit. But it's a start, and I'm almost certain the Democrats will get schlacked this fall. But the HCR stays, and like Social Security and Medicare, it'll become a political liability to seriously consider dismantling or shutting it down. Optimistic I am, but in years to come as party majority comes and goes, that ship will be fixed up, loopholes filled,
Also you think some of those states those populations will get pissed they won't get healthcare denied by their capitals? I wonder that will backfire like the Stimulus "turn down" by several GOP governors, who then got bucked by their own assemblies. Some which were fellow party members.
*=I don't want to be a dick, and couldn't care less about Brown. But just the idea of Teddy rolling in his grave, maybe it was worth it.
