Greg Sargent notes at The Plum Line that “Brian Beutler has a good piece documenting the GOP’s “grand swindle,” in which Republicans claim to support Obamacare’s goals but still refuse to own up to the actual implications of repeal, which shows they don’t actually support those goals. As Beutler notes, it’s partly on Dems to make sure this swindle fails: ‘The good news is that it will fail if Democrats are prepared to remind the public that Obamacare created these benefits; Republicans voted against Obamacare, to a person; they are still trying to repeal it; and they have a long record of opposing its means and its ends in equal measure. But the awful truth is that if Democrats are determined to avoid thoroughgoing debates about Obamacare, and at times they appear to be, then it might just work.'”
From Noam Levy’s L.A.Times report on a new Gallup Survey showing Obamacare doing much better than expected: “President Obama’s health law has led to an even greater increase in health coverage than previously estimated, according to new Gallup survey data, which suggests that about 12 million previously uninsured Americans have gained coverage since last fall…That is millions more than Gallup found in March and suggests that as many as 4 million people have signed up for some kind of insurance in the last several weeks as the first enrollment period for the Affordable Care Act drew to a close.”
In “Defend ‘Obamacare’ Unabashedly, Some Democrats Say,”AP writers Charles Babington and Richard Alonzo-Zaldiva note, “Republicans already were pushing their luck by vowing to “repeal and replace” the health care law without having a viable replacement in mind, said Thomas Mills, a Democratic consultant and blogger in North Carolina. Now, he said, Democrats have even more reasons to rise from their defensive crouch on this topic…”Democrats need to start making the case for Obamacare,” Mills said. “They all voted for it, they all own it, so they can’t get away from it. So they’d better start defending it.”…Even some professionals who have criticized the health care law say the political climate has changed…”I think Democrats have the ability to steal the health care issue back from Republicans,” health care industry consultant said Bob Laszewski said. “The Democratic Party can become the party of fixing Obamacare.”
The wingnut threat of a “range war” in Nevada is apparently making GOP presidential contenders a little squirmy. Timothy Cama has the skinny at The Hill.
A nod to Julian Zelizer for his CNN Opinion post “Democrats, show some spine on taxes,” which includes this spicy little morsel: “Irving Berlin wrote “I Paid My Income Tax Today,” which reminded Americans: “You see those bombers in the sky? Rockefeller helped to build them — so did I!” The campaign worked and the tax system put into place remained a permanent part of the political landscape with upper level taxes reaching over 90% in the 1950s.” Do read the rest of it and share.
At The Nation Bryce Covert probes the complexities of “Why We Can’t Strip Race Out of the Gender Wage Gap Conversation.”
The Atlantic’s Ta-Nehisi Coates calls President Obama’s address on voter suppression “one of the most significant and morally grounded speeches of his presidency. I think we will eventually regard this current effort to suppress the vote through voter-ID laws, ending early voting, restricting voting hours, etc., in the same way we regard literacy tests and poll taxes. (It’s worth recalling this piece for the magazine by Mariah Blake which helps historicize voter suppression.)”
“If November’s election for Congress were held today, the Democrats would have an edge over the Republicans as far as the total national vote is concerned. Nearly half of registered voters nationally — 48% — would support the Democrat on the ballot in their district while 42% would back the Republican candidate. Four percent would vote for neither, and 6% are undecided…When McClatchy – Marist last reported this question in February, voters divided. 46% favored the Democrat while 44% were for the Republican.” (from the McClatchy-Marist Poll conducted 4/7 through 4/10.)
Would you believe it, a nod to a Daily Kos tribute to “lefty bloggers” — in a conservative e-rag?