Even Obama himself doesn’t call it Obamacare. It is the Affordable Care Act. Why does the media and GOP always call it Obamacare?
Note: I am asking how it got the nickname, not looking for a debate on its merits or effectiveness.
Because it’s Obama’s health insurance system. It’s a take off “Hilarycare” from the 1990s. Both were meant to be derogatory. Obama has said he rather likes the term, because he does care.
An attempt by the Republicans to ridicule a health care very close to one they proposed that was in turn, as the one they might enact, proposed by (gasp!) a Black Democrat.
Back when Bill Clinton was President, he had Hillary working on his health care plan (nothing ever came of it). Right-wing talk radio started decrying it as “Hillarycare.” That just sounded like the sort of corporate branding that was becoming the rage at the time. (Sorry, I can’t think of an example.)
When Obama became President, they revived the name and just replaced the “Hillary” with “Obama.”
Edit: Just like garygnu said!
There was also “Romneycare”, a term which Romney himself uses.
Of course, Governor Romney would never say anything like that on the campaign trail in 2012. :rolleyes:
Help people.
“Get those tables out of here!”
:dubious:
Is this really the forum to discuss how Republicans are racist?
The part I find puzzling about it is that the ACA isn’t the plan that Obama was pushing. Obamacare included the public option, which he pushed as opening up to the entire citizenry the (government-provided) health care plan that he and his family got. Which of course got criticized as “Well, I bet that he isn’t going to be using Obamacare!”, despite the fact that he already was.
When you are criticizing something, you hardly want to call it “The Affordable _____” Affordable is a good word.
It’s part of a series of naming policies, pro and con, after the president who proposed them. Reaganomics is a good example.
I agree with the others that it was meant to be derogatory, whether to make sure ‘when’ it failed it people knew that it was his failure. However, didn’t Reagan float the idea first and if so, was it called Reagancare then?
Having said that, and I know this is damage control/owning the statement, Obama has said he likes it. In one of his address to the country he said [paraphrasing] ‘people call it ‘obamacare’ and they’re right Obama Care’s’. If it falls apart it *might be remembered as his failure. OTOH, if it succeeds, it should forever have his name attached to it…unless the people who meant to make it derogatory suddenly start calling ACA.
@boffking, I’m truly not sure where the confusing comes in. It’s an insurance plan created under Obama’s administration, there for Obamacare. It’s also a play on words based on Medicare.
How many other laws created under Obama’s administration his name on them?
He had a fungus named after him, that’s kind of close.
Yeah, it was intended as a negative and to avoid try to slam something titled ‘Affordable’.
Unfortunately for the right, Obama accepted it with grace, pointing out he didn’t mind because he IS Obama and he DOES care! What’s not to be proud of?
I just saw an interview with him where he did call it that. He doesn’t often call it that, but he does accept it.
Actually he does, from time to time.
“The Republicans” never proposes such a thing. It might have been close to something floated by some very small subset of Republicans, but that’s not the same thing. But, as a party, The Republicans did not put that out as a proposed piece of legislation.
That’s hardly a fair question. There’s been a few [name]-care nicknames out there, they’re “reserved” for huge insurance programs, not for random ‘laws’. Besides he didn’t put his name on it, other people did. He just embraced it.
In fact, just quickly thinking (and no, I don’t want a wiki link to a page of all of them) I don’t know of any laws with presidential names attached to them.
Also, don’t forget, Obamacare, isn’t the name, it’s just what someone else called it to make fun of it.
There was a sad but funny thread copied from Facebook that was going around Twitter, where some fellow said he was glad the Republicans got in, so that they could repeal that abomination Obamacare. Someone asked him what he used for health insurance, and he said no problem, he was covered by the ACA. Then a hilarious back and forth ensues until it becomes apparent that he did not realize Obamacare was the ACA. (He thought ACA was introduced to fix Obamacare’s website problems).