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View Full Version : People Have Never Heard Of Obamacare Exist... (My Thoughts)



AmazonTania
09-30-2013, 08:41 AM
I've watched this video over at CNN, and it was about Obamacare 'experts' going door to door and explaining what the new law entails. Through the video, it cites a survey conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation explaining that 43% of Americans are unaware about Obamacare. Let that sink in for a moment: There are people who have never heard of Obamacare. Very difficult to believe that citizens are this ignorant, but it's true. If you thought 73% of Americans being ignorant about Quantitative Easing was bad (http://thepoliticalforums.com/threads/16750-What-The-Average-American-Knows-About-Quantitative-Easing), imagine what this lack of knowledge means about the American citizenry. Either way, I really need to get the fuck out of here...


Jose Menendez: I have a question. Who created this affordable health care plan that you’re speaking of?

Reporter: This was passed by Congress.


JM: Oh, Congress! And I’m just wondering, as a citizen of America, how come I did not hear of this? Is Obama forcing Americans to get this insurance? Because it sounds that way.

http://yourmoney.blogs.cnn.com/2013/09/27/obamacare-at-your-door/?hpt=ym_mid (http://yourmoney.blogs.cnn.com/2013/09/27/obamacare-at-your-door/?hpt=ym_mid)

I know it's perfectly rational to be ignorant about politics, but I really don't understand how anyone could have possibly missed this. Let alone 43% of Americans. Obama care has been talked about for several years. There have been major political battles specifically about Obamacare. You've seen commercials about it on the telly. You hear about it on the radio. There have been Supreme Court decisions on Obamacare. There have been congressional votes, over and over and over again, on Obamacare. Hell, there was even a movie based around the new Health Care law. Every time you turn your head, you're going to have at least some mention about the new Healthcare law.

So, what can we learn from this:

1. All Public Opinion Polls (http://thepoliticalforums.com/threads/17088-CNN-Poll-GOP-would-bear-the-brunt-of-shutdown-blame?p=379978#post379978) Should Usually be Taken With a Grain of Salt.There is a concentrated knowledge among the public and the way you convey the message matters. The way you explain your message determines the amount of support or opposition you can drum up for anything. Don't believe me, just look at the amount of blokes Penn & Teller got to sign their petition to ban water by referring to it as 'Di-Hydrogen Monoxide.' The same thing applies in this particular instance. If you refer to a bill or law as 'Obamacare' you may not gain enough support for it, or find people who are pretty skeptical about the new law. On the other hand, if you refer to it as 'The Affordable HealthCare Act,' then you're more likely to drum up support for it. After all, who could be against affordable health care?


2. You Shouldn't Use The Government To Dictate Many Aspects Of Our Lives. You're inevitably going to have people who are uninformed about particular issues, compared to others, dictating the decisions of other lives. As I have said the first point, politicians and policy makes know that simply changing the wording of a particular bill or law you can get people to support it when they otherwise wouldn't have (i.e. Patriot Act, Jobs Bill, Violence Against Women, etc). You can create a bill which will increase taxes on Middle and Low income households, but if you call it 'The Get America Out Of Debt Act' you're bound to find many of these low information voters who will support such an initiative.

As F.A Hayek once brought up (http://www.econlib.org/library/Essays/hykKnw1.html), there is decentrailised knowledge all over the world, and it is impossible to centralise that knowledge all in one location, especially when you have these low information voters. These people are particularly knowledgable on other things and it's perfectly fine if they make their own decisions according to what is best for their life, but I don't want these types of people making decisions about my life or their neighbor's life. These people exist, they vote and the give opinions on particular issues, regardless of one's own aptitude.But I guess only in America, people are actually encouraged to give an opinion or have an opinion, even when you don't know enough about a particular topic.

Cigar
09-30-2013, 08:46 AM
So what can we learn from this ...

ObamaCares was a Political Platform in each of the last two Elections and the People Voted for the Political Platform by majority.
Elections have consequences
ObamaCares was unhealed by Federal Law
Repealing 40x times didn't and won't work

Stop your whining ... :wink:

AmazonTania
09-30-2013, 08:49 AM
And in what way does this change the fact that we have low information voters who are very ignorant about the new law and how it effects them?

And you're still determining what is right based on elections, again? I guess I can't get away from all low information voters...

Paperback Writer
09-30-2013, 09:05 AM
So what can we learn from this ...

ObamaCares was a Political Platform in each of the last two Elections and the People Voted for the Political Platform by majority.
Elections have consequences
ObamaCares was unhealed by Federal Law
Repealing 40x times didn't and won't work

Stop your whining ... :wink:

I don't even think this is a real person but a computer program's automated response. Real people have a capacity to absorb information and tailor a response accordingly.

Libhater
09-30-2013, 09:11 AM
And in what way does this change the fact that we have low information voters who are very ignorant about the new law and how it effects them?

And you're still determining what is right based on elections, again? I guess I can't get away from all low information voters...

That ignorance of the danger of something like obamascare is being exposed on a daily basis by low information voters like cigar. Interesting but not surprising of the way cigar walked into another slap in the face. :embarrassed:

Chris
09-30-2013, 09:15 AM
Hoppe, The Great Fiction, writes about the dogmatic slumber of the masses. It's not necessary to know what government's doing if you've already accepted the statist position it knows best. The kindergarten version of the statist argument goes like this: Government provides some goods, road, schools, healthcare, and if there were no state, we would not have these goods. At the university level the argument is more sophisticated: Sure markets are best at providing most things, but some goods can only be provided by government, public goods that benefit people that are un-produced or under-produced. A third argument follows Hobbes in that the state is needed because without it we'd bee in a constant state of conflict. These easily defeated arguments are fed the masses through education and MSM. People don't have to think about it, just trust the government for security--but who watches the watchmen? Even politicians are brainwashed by government propoganda, Pelosi argued just pass it to see what's in it.

Hayek was right, no centralized authority can solve the economic coordination problem. The knowledge is too dispersed and too dynamic.

AmazonTania
09-30-2013, 09:24 AM
I don't even think this is a real person but a computer program's automated response. Real people have a capacity to absorb information and tailor a response accordingly.

I thought the word for that was a 'troll.' Hm...

AmazonTania
09-30-2013, 10:54 AM
That ignorance of the danger of something like obamascare is being exposed on a daily basis by low information voters like cigar. Interesting but not surprising of the way cigar walked into another slap in the face. :embarrassed:

The best argument against democracy is a 5 minute conversation with the average voter - Winston Churchill

jillian
09-30-2013, 10:58 AM
I don't even think this is a real person but a computer program's automated response. Real people have a capacity to absorb information and tailor a response accordingly.

funny.... i don't think i've ever seen a purported leftie spending so much time feeding the rightwingers.

Chris
09-30-2013, 11:00 AM
funny.... i don't think i've ever seen a purported leftie spending so much time feeding the rightwingers.


He recognizes the difference between being a principled liberal and being a petty partisan.

Cigar
09-30-2013, 11:41 AM
Anyone here notice the lack of factual data being displayed?

just fear fear fear

Chris
09-30-2013, 11:57 AM
Anyone here notice the lack of factual data being displayed?

just fear fear fear

What do you think "the Kaiser Family Foundation explaining that 43% of Americans are unaware about Obamacare" is? Didn't your read the OP?

AmazonTania
09-30-2013, 11:58 AM
Anyone here notice the lack of factual data being displayed?

just fear fear fear

Oh, it's data you want. Why didn't you say so...

http://kff.org/health-reform/poll-finding/kaiser-health-tracking-poll-august-2013/

How exactly does it change anything? We have a ton of low/no information voters who have no clue how the new law will effect them. We have low/no information voters like who perpetuating nonsense about a law and it's effects on the marketplace.

Chris
09-30-2013, 04:08 PM
Here's some more data for what Obama claims the American people voted for:

@ http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/30/politics/cnn-poll-shutdown-blame/?hpt=hp_t1: "The poll indicates that Obamacare is not popular, with 57% saying they oppose the law, up 3 points from May, and 38% saying they support the measure, down five points from May."

Not sure what that means when "43% of Americans are unaware about Obamacare".

Adelaide
09-30-2013, 05:18 PM
I don't think this is very surprising. Disappointing? Absolutely. People take the government for granted and assume things are fine or unimportant, I think, without realising the seriousness of what actually happens and is currently going on. And unlike us, who frequent a forum to discuss politics, I'm sure there are plenty of people who work an 8 (or more) hour day, come home and make dinner or care for kids and then watch TV or read a book - they might not frequently check the news or discuss it. Many people just don't care much for politics, or not enough to go out of their way to stay current especially if they're busy. No excuse to be so ignorant as to not know Obamacare exists, but I can see how and why a lot of people simply aren't informed on much of what happens.

Ethereal
09-30-2013, 09:30 PM
Hayek was right, no centralized authority can solve the economic coordination problem. The knowledge is too dispersed and too dynamic.

Yea, but being wrong never stopped the marxists before, it certainly isn't going to stop them now.

Codename Section
09-30-2013, 09:35 PM
Yea, but being wrong never stopped the marxists before, it certainly isn't going to stop them now.

LOL, I just blew warm cocoa out my nose you bastid.

Chris
09-30-2013, 09:39 PM
Yea, but being wrong never stopped the marxists before, it certainly isn't going to stop them now.



Well, damn, they're never wrong, they just didn't throw smart enough intellectuals at it or enough of other people's money at it...or both, yea, that's the ticket!

Codename Section
09-30-2013, 09:41 PM
Well, damn, they just didn't throw smart enough intellectuals at it or enough of other people's money at it...or both, yea, that's the ticket!

You know, every once in a while I meet a progressive like jillian, who I like on a personal level and I want to rescue them from the machine. Mostly because I think jillian has a good heart and I think she believes somehow that not everyone in government is an evil piece of shit or something. I dunno.

Then I will mention this to certain Russian types whose name I won't mention and she tells me not to be stupid and that they are like those people walking around in the Matrix that can have a "Smith" possess them at any moment.

~warm cocoa musings

jillian
10-01-2013, 08:32 AM
You know, every once in a while I meet a progressive like @jillian (http://thepoliticalforums.com/member.php?u=719), who I like on a personal level and I want to rescue them from the machine. Mostly because I think jillian has a good heart and I think she believes somehow that not everyone in government is an evil piece of shit or something. I dunno.

Then I will mention this to certain Russian types whose name I won't mention and she tells me not to be stupid and that they are like those people walking around in the Matrix that can have a "Smith" possess them at any moment.

~warm cocoa musings

i'm not particularly a progressive. a progressive would think it's peachy keen that the little pissant snowden gave four laptops worth of our classified info to putin. i do have liberal values, though, because that is what our constitution sets forth. so the whole gubmint-hating thing... is anti-constitutional.

and i don't need saving, sweet thing... and i don't hate government. that doesn't mean i don't think most politicians are self-serving. but feel free to let me know when a politician who claims to care about our budget (from my side of the aisle) agrees to a government shutdown which will cost our government an anticipated two billion dollars.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57605387/government-shutdown-whats-the-cost-to-the-taxpayers/

but i'll try to save you from the whole gubmint hating thing. government isn't the problem... BAD government is.

Ransom
10-01-2013, 08:36 AM
Anyone here notice the lack of factual data being displayed?

just fear fear fear

I posted a link yesterday to many of the government-funded employees hired to inform the public about Obamacare.....were complaining they still didn't know about it 24 hours before this Oct 1 start date. Factual data can be given you all day long, Cigar, you're in denial mode here.

You'd be taken seriously if not for all your previous posts. Most members here consider your arguments a joke, your President and his policies as well.

Ransom
10-01-2013, 08:50 AM
What do you think "the Kaiser Family Foundation explaining that 43% of Americans are unaware about Obamacare" is? Didn't your read the OP?

I started a thread yesterday showing these marketplaces or exchanges kept having technical problems....meanwhile government-funded field workers across the country say they aren't fully prepared to help Americans enroll in the program because they don't know enough about it.

These are the insurance agents and 'navigators' who know the insurance business....but can't make heads or tails of this law that Obama has opted many out of including Congress.