"Yes, Obamacare Will Have Major Political Consequences, No Matter What"

[EriktheRed]

...there’s a strand of thought out there suggesting people who end up insured under the program will nonetheless have a blinkered and schizoid relationship with the ACA. The “bad stuff” — the mandate, the out of pocket costs, etc. — will be “Obamacare.” The good stuff will look like well-functioning state-level public-private partnerships. People won’t see or feel the connection to the ACA, or will quickly forget the connection and the system will blend into the background — a policy status quo of unknown provenance.

I think that’s mostly wrong. The political consequences will be substantial and they’ll be with us for a long time.

If the implementation fails, then it will be a disaster for Democrats for obvious reasons.

But let’s say it goes pretty well. In the White House’s mind, that means about 7 million people in exchanges next year, about one-third of whom will be young voters. It also means a few million more on Medicaid. That’s not very many people compared to all the folks whose insurance benefits won’t change at all. But it’s still a lot of people! Moreover, not all of these people are going to be partisan Democratic voters, and they almost certainly won’t be people who reliably vote in midterm elections. But they will come into this new benefit in an election year and suddenly be confronted with the fact that one party wants to rescind it, and quickly.

That’s why I think Republicans will dial back the repeal efforts, or maybe even change their campaign strategy more broadly. If they don’t, though, a modest but substantial number of people who might have otherwise sat out November will have a very good reason to vote. I’m no statistician, and won’t pretend I can say if the effect will be large enough to flip particular seats or party control of either chamber. But again, 7 million people is a lot of people! I bet Mitt Romney wishes he’d gotten 7 million more votes than he did. I bet Nancy Pelosi wishes 7 million more people voted for Democrats in 2010. Or even half a million people.

Looking forward from 2014 the story starts change. I think you’ll see big state-level fights in places like blue-trending Texas and king-making Florida over whether it’s time for the GOP to give up the ghost and let the law work.

Yes, Obamacare Will Have Major Political Consequences, No Matter What