Voters did say 'repeal health care', they did say 'reduce the size of government.' But not a single one of them from the tea party or anywhere said 'give tax breaks to the wealthiest.'
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
Liberals are wrong to think that opposition to health reform is a rejection of big government. If health reform consisted of extending Medicare to everyone, people would be delighted. There are millions of 64-year-olds out there who can hardly wait to be 65.
It is not an overstatement to say that Obamacare was the single most important catalyst leading to the tea party movement.
The president has declared that the debate over government-controlled health care is over. That will come as news to the millions of Americans who will elect Mitt Romney so we can repeal Obamacare.
The medical device tax repeal is the only proposal that had the most bipartisan votes coming out of the House and has the opportunity in the Senate to gain tractions, and it fixes a part of ObamaCare in terms of repealing an awful tax. And it's got bipartisan support.
We were elected in a wave because the people in America, if they had a single issue that troubled them the most, it was that health care vote.
When people see the budget, they're going to say, 'Oh, my God, I wanted a tax cut, but I didn't know what you were going to do to health care and to Medicare and national defense.'
Yes, Democrats can prove that America pays more for health care than other countries; yes, they have won the dispute that private health insurance is needlessly expensive. But what they've lost is the argument that we are a society.
It's not health care reform to dump more money into Medicaid.
Every time I hear a Republican talking about health care reform, they say the American people don't want it. They say it so much that I think they're beginning to try to convince themselves that it's true.
The tax issue is the most powerful issue in American politics going back to the Tea Party.