The NYT is flexing every one of its muscles to help pass Obamacare. The latest example is a softball Q and A from the always biased Deborah Solomon in the Magazine of Tom Daschle. From the interview:
Q:...do you get the sense that the Republicans have dropped out of the health care debate? That is the sense I’m getting. I’m incredibly disappointed. Several years ago I worked with George Mitchell and Bob Dole and Howard Baker to create a bipartisan policy center. I was very optimistic last spring when we issued our proposal that this could be bipartisan, but clearly that’s not the way it’s trending.
Well, that’s because the Democrats insist on the public option. Indeed, Democrat leftists have repeatedly insisted, no government plan, no bill. So, I guess bipartisanship is when Republicans do what Democrats want.
Do you think President Obama has done a good job of selling health care reform to the general public? I think we have to do better at making this issue a moral imperative. I don’t think we’ve succeeded at that yet. I think the more we can bring everybody to an understanding about how this in many respects is the civil rights battle of the early part of this century — it’s a fight for the disabled, it’s a fight for the sick, it’s a fight for equal rights when it comes to health.
The elderly and people with disabilities are the ones who have the most to fear because of the cost cutting imperative and potential rationing boards. Also, it is to be paid for with cuts of hundreds of billions from Medicare, meaning it will come out of the medical hides of the elderly and people with disabilities who currently are on Medicare.
With all of his eloquence, why can’t the president convey that message? I think in part because the organizational strength of the other side has once again surfaced. The other side has socialism, they have fear of government, they have rationing and all these — Scare phrases. The Democrats need better phrases. We do.
Repeat after me: It’s not the slogans, it’s the bill!
Solomon even helpfully suggests a sales slogan!
What about Better Care? Medicare to Better Care? We’ve got to boil it down to those themes that really motivate and have emotional value.
Yea, that’ll do it. Interestingly, Solomon never got into Daschle’s previous endorsements of centralized cost-cutting rationing boards and a centralized control to health care access. But we have here at SHS. Overall, a continuing very poor showing for the putative paper of record.
