There are areas of the country where the president is unpopular and may well remain so for years after he leaves office. In those places, voters tend to say that they are opposed to “ObamaCare,” sometimes by large margins. But, in Kentucky at least, a plurality of the people polled say that they approve of “kynect.” But kynect is ObamaCare. Specifically, kynect is the Bluegrass State’s state-run health insurance exchange. What’s clear from this is that a huge part of the opposition to ObamaCare is really nothing more than guilt by association.
So, what happens when President Obama is no longer the president? Presumably, the exchanges and the reforms that go along with them will still be known as ObamaCare, but I assume the partisan opposition to Barack Obama will wither on the vine, much as it did with Bill Clinton.
It will turn out that there just isn’t that much substantive opposition to the Affordable Care Act. Yes, there are people on the left (including me) who would prefer to put the health insurance companies out of business, and there are people from the whole spectrum of ideological thought who don’t like the mandate. But that group is small, and the single-payer advocates are mostly supportive of doing something rather than nothing at all.
I think opposition to ObamaCare is artificially inflated and many of the people who are benefiting will become protective of the law once it no longer is associated with the president.
