At Common Dreams, Cenk Uygur explains how bad the mainstream media is using the example of the individual mandate:
The individual mandate in the health care law was originally proposed by the Heritage Foundation, the most conservative think tank in the country. It was supported by almost every Republican in the country, including the first President Bush, Mitt Romney and conservative stalwarts like Orrin Hatch. Simply put, it was a conservative idea. There is no question about that; it is a fact.
Let me immediately digress to point out how terrible our media is since about 2% of the country knows that fact. If you asked the average American now, I’m sure they would say it was a liberal idea originally proposed by Barack Obama. Another fact — Barack Obama was originally opposed to the mandate during his campaign for president.
Uygur also uses this example to illustrate that Obama’s strategy of trying to work with the Republicans was wrongheaded.
It’s true that the mandate was part of the GOP health care plan until recently, but if you’ve also read about the evolution of conservative legal thinking in the last few years, then you’ve seen that libertarian law professors like Randy Barnett changed the way GOP politicians and think tankers viewed the mandate. And once those constitutional issues were raised, Democrats should have rethought it as well.
Adam: Not sure to what constitutional issues you refer. Even a casual reading of the Interstate Commerce clause makes it clear that Congress was within its constitutional powers in passing the AHCA. It’s apparent that most opposition to health insurance reform, even among Republican leaders and thinkers, centers upon their childishly obsessive need to oppose any/everything President Obama supports and their desire to burnish their right wing bona fides in the eyes of the tea partiers and wing nuts who dominate the GOP’s nominating process.