Sen. Hatch: The GOP is Opposing Healthcare Reform Because People Will like It

Last updated on August 10th, 2014 at 05:06 pm

In an interview with CNS News Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch admitted the real reason why the Republican Party is opposed to healthcare reform is that they are worried that people will like it and vote Democrat in future elections.

Here is the video:

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At about the 20 minute mark, Hatch talked about this healthcare reform as a step towards socialized medicine, “That’s their goal. Move people into government that way. Do it in increments. They’ve actually said it. They’ve said it out loud…A step-by-step approach to socialized medicine. And if they get there, of course, you’re going to have a very rough time having a two-party system in this country, because almost everybody’s going to say, “All we ever were, all we ever are, all we ever hope to be depends on the Democratic Party.”

As Think Progress pointed out Hatch’s concern about the fate of the two party system is an old argument first advanced by Ronald Reagan back in 1961. In reference to Medicare, Reagan said, “If you don’t [stop Medicare] and I don’t do it, one of these days you and I are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it once was like in America when men were free.

Orrin Hatch accidentally let the truth slip out. Republicans are terrified that people will like healthcare reform, so much that they will reward Democrats at the polls. Their opposition has nothing to do with the issue of healthcare, and everything to do with the fact that the GOP is worried about their future as a party.

The argument Hatch is advancing is just as illogical and nonsensical as the one Reagan used in 1961. In the decades since the passage of Medicare, Republicans have no trouble getting elected, and have enjoyed periods when they have flourished, and I am certain that healthcare reform would not equal the end of the GOP.



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