This is some very interesting video, passed along by the Dem-allied American Bridge, of GOP Rep. Joe Heck of Nevada, getting grilled by a constituent who knows the Affordable Care Act very well and wants to know why Heck would take its benefits away from people:
American Bridge says the constituent isn’t a plant, and Heck’s office tells me they don’t think it’s a plant, either.
The constituent, a self-described “business person,” says the law has already saved him money and will save him more in the future, adding that it has already bent the cost curve. “Why would you oppose the ACA at every turn?” the man asks. “Why would you oppose something that’s helping me now?”
What this sort of encounter confirms, as another similar moment with GOP Rep. Patrick McHenry of North Carolina did recently, is that we may now be heading into new political territory when it comes to Obamacare. Polls continue to show the law remains unpopular and that public confusion about it remains rampant. But now that the law’s concrete benefits are kicking in, it may be harder for Republicans to explain their continuing drive to repeal it, particularly to constituents who understand what repeal would take away from them.
We’re a long way from the anti-Obamacare town halls of the magical Summer of ’09.
