Thirty-five percent (35%) of American voters say passage of the bill currently working its way through Congress would be better than not passing any health care reform legislation this year. However, a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that most voters (54%) say no health care reform passed by Congress this year would be the better option.
This does not mean that most voters are opposed to health care reform. But it does highlight the level of concern about the specific proposals that Congressional Democrats have approved in a series of Committees. To this point, there has been no Republican support for the legislative effort although the Senate Finance Committee is still attempting to seek a bi-partisan solution.
The breakdown is not all that surprising with 60 percent of Democrats for Obamacare and 80 percent of Republicans against it, but the numbers associated with unaffiliated voters, those not affiliated with either political side, are are rising as opposition to Obamacare.
66 percent of unaffilated voters believe that no healthcare reform is a better option that Obamacare as it is written now.
Completely ignoring the majority of American voters, Obama continues to pitch his plan, this time via NYT.
Voters who earn less than $20,000 a year are evenly divided but a majority of all other voters would prefer no action. Middle income voters, those who earn from $40,000 to $75,000 a year, are most strongly in favor of taking no action.
With these numbers continue to rise against Obamacare, it is no surprise that Democrats are throwing out feelers, via the media, that there is a possibility that the healthcare plans that go up for a final vote will not include the most controversial part of Obamacare, the public option.
After the toughest week yet for health reform, leading Democrats are warning that the party likely will have to accept major compromises to get a bill passed this year – perhaps even dropping a proposal to create a government-run plan that is almost an article of faith among some liberals.
Related:
Keith Hennessey breaks down the 46 million number that Barack Obama keeps throwing around as the number of uninsured, to which Obama calls "vulnerable" and claims they go bankrupt if they get sick.
But of those 45.7 million people:
* 6.4 million are enrolled in Medicaid or S-CHIP and just gave the Census taker the wrong answer. I’m serious. This is called the Medicaid undercount.
* Another 4.3 million are eligible for Medicaid or S-CHIP and have not enrolled. If they need care, the hospital or clinic generally enrolls them. They are protected against risk even though they don’t show up on the rolls as insured.
* Another 9.3 million are non-citizens. Different people come to different conclusions about what portion of this group should receive taxpayer-subsidized health insurance.
* Another 10.1 million have income more than three times the poverty line.
* Leaving about 15.6 million remaining uninsured, of whom about 5 million are childless adults.
America's healthcare system is not perfect, not by a long shot and much about it could and should be improved, no one is arguing that point, but like the majority of American voters in the Rasmussen survey quoted and linked above, I would rather see nothing passed than to encourage our politicians to socialize medicine.
Until our political elite can come up with some answers and much needed improvements, without a public option and socializing our system, then nothing should get through the House and Senate.
The American people are making themselves heard, through polls across the board from multiple polling organizations and at townhalls across America and the question here is will the politicians listen?
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