Death By Memo

It's funny. I have been hearing about how Democrats have the wind at their backs RE: health care reform. They have a handsome charismatic president, wide congressional majorities, the firm backing of the intellectual, economic, and media elite. The GOP, we are told, is in disarray and from my vantage point that certainly is the case. What else could they have to worry about? Well, they seem to be worried about "Republican attacks" that have already caused alarm among Senate Dems. Huh? Democrats to Develop Plan to Sell Health Care

Alarmed at Republican attacks on President Obama’s health care proposals, Senate Democrats huddled Wednesday with White House officials to formulate a response.

Democrats said they felt an urgent need to devise a “message” to answer Republicans assertions that Mr. Obama’s proposals could lead to “a Washington takeover of health care.”

Senator Evan Bayh, Democrat of Indiana, said many Democrats felt “unease that we did not have a strategy” to answer the criticism coming from Republican members of Congress and Republican consultants like Frank I. Luntz, an expert on the language of politics.

Watch out! It's Frank I. Luntz! His "language of politics" factory is on-line and busy Manufacturing Consent!

Honestly, most GOP and conservative writers I've seen have been bemoaning the scattershot, unfocused nature of the Republican response to health care reform. I was afraid we would need to call the Swift Boat Veterans back for one final mission. Now, the likes of Chuck Schumer and Evan Bayh - about as steady as you can get among Dems - are growing worried about Frank Luntz's Flying Memos of Death

In the memorandum, Mr. Luntz said his polling and analysis had identified this as “the best anti-Democrat message”: “No Washington bureaucrat or health care lobbyist should stand between your family and your doctor. The Democrats want to put Washington politicians in charge of your health care.”

Mr. Luntz advised Republicans to show they “understand and empathize” with voters’ concerns about soaring health costs. “You simply must be vocally and passionately on the side of reform,” he wrote.

He urged Republicans to argue that the Democratic plan would “deny people treatments they need and make them wait to get the treatments they are allowed to receive.”

Mr. Luntz recommended this language: “If you have to wait weeks for tests and months for treatment, that’s a health care crisis.”

Progressives have been moaning about "Harry & Louise" since 1994, as if this was what killed ClintonCare. ClintonCare didn't pass because the voters didn't support it at the time it mattered: when it was being debated and voted on in Congress. Oh, sure, there were plenty of polls saying otherwise, and there was even that PA governor's race that supposedly "turned on" the issue of health care reform. But, when it came time to actually pass something, Democrats themselves (who had control of both houses of Congress!) couldn't bring themselves to pull the trigger. All the Paul Krugman columns in creation about the "47 million uninsured," don't take into account the 250 million who ARE insured and may not want to make any drastic changes. Now, they're even better positioned than back then, and it still might not be enough.