Obamacare polls a little positive

By Frank Moraes 

Jonathan Bernstein has words of wisdom for us: Ignore Those Polls! Those being the recent CNN poll that show that over half of the people don't like Obamacare: 43-54. Apparently, Republicans are claiming that the poll proves them right: the people hate Obamacare! But then liberals have pushed back. Of the 54% who don't like Obamacare, 16 percentage points of them don't like it because it is not liberal enough. These are people like me who still want Medicare for all but who will take Obamacare over the Republican alternative, which is nothing at all. That means the numbers look more like this: 59-38. Liberals win, hooray!

But Bernstein points out that most people don't really know what they're talking about. It isn't until next year that Obamacare even begins its full implementation. So asking people about Obamacare now probably shows about as much as asking people who they will vote for in 2016. And he's right. The truth of the matter is after Obamacare is fully implemented, people will start to have real opinions on it -- opinions that are based upon their experiences and not the latest talking points they heard on the TV machine.

Still, I think Bernstein is wrong to pooh-pooh the poll all together. After all, a couple of years ago, Obamacare polled far worse. Two years ago, the numbers were 43-48. My guess is that the change is liberals moving from being against Obamacare to being for it. In the end, that 38% is just the Republican base. And they will be against it until they forget it was a Democratic program. We can look forward twenty years from now when Republicans carry signs that say, "Government Hands Off My Obamacare!"

So I wouldn't go as far as Jonathan Bernstein. The Republicans are kidding themselves if they think that this poll is good news for them. One thing about us liberals: we're so used to getting nothing that when we get a minor victory like Obamacare, we take it -- even if we grumble about it. Democrats do have a reason to be encouraged by this poll. However, Bernstein is right: in the final analysis, it doesn't matter. Obamacare will prove itself or it will not. But given it only has to complete with the Republican offer of nothing (not even the fee for the gaming license), it looks hopeful.

(Cross-posted at Frankly Curious.)

Loan Harry Reid your testicles

By Frank Moraes 

(Ed. note: Frank's second open letter to Sen. Boxer is here. -- MJWS)

At The Washington Post, two writers I admire, Greg Sargent and Jonathan Bernstein, are excited about the prospect of filibuster reform. First, Sargent broke the news that Harry Reid plans to go for the "nuclear option" in July if the Republicans filibuster three upcoming nominees: "Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; Thomas Perez as secretary of labor; and Gina McCarthy to head the Environmental Protection Agency." And then Bernstein argued that Reid was playing this just right by giving the Republicans a warning and an opportunity to reform themselves.

The problem, of course, is: really?! Are we really supposed to believe that (1) Republicans will respond to what they should rightly assume is an empty threat? And is it at all credible that (2) Reid will in fact do anything this time other than shake hands with Mitch McConnell? However, it is possible that I'm being unfair to the Majority Leader. According to Bernstein, Reid is constrained because (he doesn't put it this way) he is the leader of a bunch of wimps who wouldn't go to the bathroom without asking permission from the Republicans. And there is likely something to that. But if it is the case that Reid doesn't have the support of his caucus, then why is he saying anything at all?

Another problem is that we really don't know what Reid means by his test case of three nominations. The truth is that the Republicans filibuster every nominee. I know that some nominees do get through, but that is only because some Republicans vote for cloture. Let's be really clear here: Senate Republicans require 60 votes for every nominee. Requiring 60 senators before a vote can be cast is a filibuster. If they get the 60 senators, it was an unsuccessful filibuster; but it was still a filibuster.

So the question is, will Harry Reid launch the "nuclear option" if Republicans unsuccessfully filibuster these three nominees? Because they will filibuster them. And even worse, what if only one or two of the nominees are successfully filibustered? We don't know. But I have a hunch: Reid will declare victory and slink away. I would love to be proven wrong.

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About Jonathan Bernstein

By Frank Moraes

[Jonathan Bernstein writes for various parts of The Washington Post. But his name always links to Robert Samuelson's page, and regular readers will know that we don't much care for Mr. Samuelson. But we do care for Mr. Bernstein, so we've decided to make an "About Jonathan Bernstein" page for him. Including an image! - FM]

Jonathan Bernstein does not write a weekly economics column that usually runs in The Washington Post on Mondays. That would be Robert Samuelson. You can be forgiven for thinking it otherwise. Bernstein writes other stuff. But he was most likely never a columnist for Newsweek magazine from 1984 to 2011. But Robert Samuelson was. It's hard to say exactly what Bernstein was doing before he came to thePost; have you ever searched for "Jonathan Bernstein"? There are at least 26 people on Twitter named Jonathan Bernstein! [It would be totally cool if he changed his name to Jonomatopoeia Bernstein.]

He began his journalism career somewhere else. It probably wasn't where Robert Samuelson started, as a reporter on The Washington Post business desk, from 1969 to 1973. In fact, it is quite likely that Bernstein wasn't even alive in 1973! Bernstein most definitely is not the author of The Great Inflation and Its Aftermath: The Past and Future of American Affluence (2008) or The Good Life and Its Discontents (1995). He grew up somewhere, perhaps even in White Plains, N.Y., like Robert Samuelson.

Unfortunately, I can't find Robert Samuelson's email address, because I'm sure he could forward any email to Jonathan Bernstein. They are thought to be close; they even share the same web page.

(Cross-posted at Frankly Curious.)