Yes, the success of the initial signup period beyond even supporters' expectations allowed President Obama to frame his remarks in a positive way. But most of his 18 minutes were a robust explanation of the value of the ACA, including how it has already helped individual Americans, and the way forward. Examples that tell the story:"that’s what the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, is all about -– making sure that all of us, and all our fellow citizens, can count on the security of health care when we get sick; that the work and dignity of every person is acknowledged and affirmed."
"Change is hard," the President said. "Fixing what’s broken is hard. Overcoming skepticism and fear of something new is hard. A lot of times folks would prefer the devil they know to the devil they don’t. But this law is doing what it’s supposed to do. It’s working. It’s helping people from coast to coast, all of which makes the lengths to which critics have gone to scare people or undermine the law, or try to repeal the law without offering any plausible alternative so hard to understand."
And then he asked the key questions. "Why are folks working so hard for people not to have health insurance? Why are they so mad about the idea of folks having health insurance?"
Another question that these signups raise (and they don't include the many more who now have healthcare through Medicaid expansion) is: why were the pundits and the major media in general so sure Obamacare would fail?
The answer seems to be that they read polls which are simply responses to particular questions with results that seem to say more than they actually do. They listened to the lavishly funded and unremittingly shrill opposition, the Washington insiders who are so inside that they believe each other instead of finding out what is really happening. And in particular the media failed to report.
But Sarah Kliff did not fail to report. Writing in the Wonkblog in December (hat tip to Jonathan Bernstein for linking to this article on Tuesday): "As a reporter who has covered the Affordable Care Act, I’ve spent a lot of time talking to uninsured Americans. Aside from the daily federal updates and traffic statistics, it’s been one of the more helpful ways to understand how the health-care law is working — and what its rocky rollout will mean. And what I've learned from all those discussions is this: The people shopping on HealthCare.gov are incredibly, unwaveringly persistent in their attempts to purchase coverage."
As one of the few to actually report on individual Americans, she was also one of the few who suggested that 7 million signups might be possible. As of Tuesday there were 7.1 million and counting.
The entire key to the Obama presidency is the 70 or so letters from Americans he reads each week. President Obama provided examples of people already helped and what that help meant to them in his remarks Tuesday, and White House.gov shows quotes from other Americans helped by ACA, with before and after numbers concerning premiums and coverage. But even beyond individuals, how about hard aggregate numbers? How many reporters were keeping track of those?
Apparently none, including all the well-paid reporter/pundits. But someone was, and he was doing it for free. His name is Charles Gaba and he blogs at Daily Kos under the name Brainwrap. According to Kos himself, he " meticulously recorded all Obamacare signup information. Then, after gaining the attention of reporters everywhere, that blogger used hard data to utterly dismantle every bogus Republican talking point."
Not everybody who signed up did so on their home computer. Many stood in long lines all over the country to get help signing up. They were helped, informed about the sign-ups etc. by volunteers. They were determined to get health care coverage. (There are many more of these photos at whitehouse.gov.)
I was part of a dialogue about all this at Jonathan Bernstein's Bloomberg blog. Here's one of the responses, from "ochospantalones":
"It has been amazing for me to watch so many people acting like there are hordes of people who are happy they don't have health insurance, and will be angered at now having access to it. When I was younger I knew plenty of people who had no health insurance or had near-useless catastrophic plans, and none of them were in that situation because they thought it was great. They didn't have health insurance because they couldn't afford a decent plan, usually because they didn't have access to employer-based plans, and almost all of them prioritized getting the sorts of jobs that would offer health insurance. Many reporters act like someone without health insurance will check the website, see it doesn't work, and just forget about the whole thing. Most people I've known without insurance will put in the effort it takes to make it happen."
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