Apparently some on the right hate her for “not being an American citizen”. Yes, folks; Birtherisim is back. Well, it never left.
It didn’t even skip the 2016 cycle. Between Obama and Harris there was another target for it - Ted Cruz.
Is Ted Cruz eligible to be President?
CNN wasn’t wrong. There were court cases questioning whether Cruz was eligible to be on the ballot in some places.
I’ll say about Harris what I’ve said from the beginning: she’s a strong candidate on paper who will lose all her support when she has to debate. Her townhall where she called for an end to private insurance is just the first of many statements that will sink her, and that’s before we’ve even delved into her record as California AG.
After much discussion and back-and-forthing, California finally decided to move their primaries to March so that we can have more input into who are actually the candidates. This is going to have a very strong impact on Harris’s chances to be the candidate.
As I mentioned before, she will play well to the traditional/current base of the Democrats, but unless she attains some crossover appeal, she cannot win against Trump. I tend to think the voters will be automatic 40% D and 40% R, with the remaining 20% up for grabs. Trying to understand the 20% and what would sway their vote may be hard to do, but looking at the last election, you can get a picture of who is in that 20% - and I have concern about their interest in getting behind someone like Harris.
Hopefully, as her positions become more public and widely known, it will become more clear her potential.
Do you think there is a large constituency that likes private medical insurance?
There *is *a large constituency that *hates *anything they can be told is a “government takeover of health care”. So it amounts to the same thing.
But don’t take away their medicare.
A disturbing number of images of “KEEP YOUR GOVERNMENT HANDS OFF MY MEDICARE” signs at rallies.
The Republicans are trying to spin her answer that way, but watch the actual video. While her answer clearly signals to progressive voters that she wants to eliminate private insurance, it also gives her plausible deniability if she gets called out on it later. Truly a Hillary-worthy answer.
(Of course Medicare for everyone would not eliminate private insurance. Medicare has not eliminated private insurance for old people. Has she ever heard of a Medicare Supplement Plan? But I digress.)
I’m in Virginia and I’m all out for Harris ::high five::
That’s true if it’s a delegate race to the end. In terms of momentum it can only hurt. Home state candidates have to win their primaries and it gives them no momentum when they do. If they don’t win their home state, the race is over. But if it does come down to just numbers of delegates, California is a delegate rich state.
Jonathan Chait thinks an answer she gave, vague as it was, was a sign that she would outlaw private health insurance. He thinks that’s too extreme.
Isn’t it more likely that she’ll try to make private insurance no longer necessary, letting supplemental insurance exist as it can?
Anyway, if she is trying to replace private insurance, that makes me like her more.
80% of Americans like their insurance. There’s a reason Obama had to promise no one would lose their insurance.
Support for Medicare for All drops to 37% once people are told they lose their private insurance:
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/medicare-for-all-poll/
But when the Kaiser poll told them that “Medicare for all” would eliminate private insurance companies, support collapsed. Just 37% said they back it knowing it would mean getting rid of their existing health plans.
Wow. If true, that shows why I could never get elected. I don’t have my finger on the pulse of the American electorate. On the other hand, it seems like a number that could shift dramatically with a little education.
I wonder how many will back it once they know it also involves attaching venomous snakes to their genitals.
Medicare for All wouldn’t necessarily eliminate private insurance companies. After all, Medicare supplemental plans exist.
It depends on the proposal. The most-discussed bill, AFAIK, is the one introduced by Bernie Sanders (which I think Senator Harris has co-sponsored), which would eliminate private insurance as well as repeal and replace Medicare. “Medicare For All”, in that case, does not mean putting the entire population on Medicare, it means creating a new program called “Medicare” and hoping that people’s good feelings for the current program extend to a whole new thing just because it would share the name. (I actually support the ends, but I’m incredibly pessimistic about the means.)
80% of Americans don’t like the insurance they have now, because the vast majority of Americans have no idea what their insurance is like.
valid argument but also just as true of Medicare and foreign health care systems. Politicians don’t know what it is either, or they just lie about it, because they say Medicare ‘covers everything medically necessary’, which is absolutely false unless you define ‘medically necessary’ exactly how Blue Cross and Aetna define it.