Today is Obamacare’s seventh anniversary. It is also the day House Republicans will try to pass a bill that would repeal Obamacare—a gratuitous thumb in the eye of anyone who helped write or pass the Affordable Care Act, or who has benefitted from it since. The technical term for this is a “dick move,” but it’s also a useful marker for the journalism community, where it’s fashionable to draw equivalence between both parties, and treat all partisan spin as worthy of unchallenged amplification.
For instance, Republicans have claimed for seven years now that Democrats rushed Obamacare through Congress without debate, and will use this claim as cover for doing the same.
If Hse GOPers get health care deal, few will see specifics before vote & it will emerge in dead of night. GOP criticized Dems for same thing
— Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) March 23, 2017
But it isn’t biased to point out that this is false, and today’s anniversary underscores just how dishonest the GOP’s Obamacare opposition campaign really was. Every Congress runs two years. The reason it’s the ACA’s seventh anniversary, rather than it’s eighth is that Democrats didn’t pass the law until the second year of Obama’s first term. Now that they control government, Republicans are trying to rework the entire health care system, too—but on a timeline that’s been abbreviated by a full year. So there’s no reason to treat spin that says Republicans and Democrats did the same thing as a matter that’s up for dispute. All you have to do is look at the calendar.