Letters from an American - March 23, 2025
Episode Date: March 24, 2025Get full access to Letters from an American at heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/subscribe...
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March 23rd, 2025. 15 years ago today, President Barack Obama signed the Patient Protection
and Affordable Care Act, often called Obamacare, into law. In addition to making health care
more affordable, the law eliminated lifetime limits on benefits,
prohibits discrimination because of pre-existing conditions, and allows young people to stay on
their parents' health insurance policies until they are 26. In 2024, about 24 million people
signed up for Obamacare coverage for 2025, while another 21 million adults were covered by the law's expansion of Medicaid.
The ACA has increased the number of Americans covered by health insurance and slowed the rise
of health care costs across the board. Republicans immediately vowed to get rid of the ACA because
they object to government regulation of business, provision of a basic social safety net, and promotion of infrastructure.
Such a government, Republicans argue, is essentially socialism.
It prohibits individuals' ability to control their businesses without government interference,
and it redistributes wealth from the haves to the have-nots through taxes.
This is a modern-day stance, by the way.
It was actually Republican President Theodore Roosevelt who first proposed universal health care at the beginning
of the 20th century and Republican President Dwight Eisenhower who first
tried to muscle such a program into being with the help of the new
department created under him, the Department of Health, Education and
Welfare which in 1979 became the Department of Health and Human Services.
Its declared mission was improving the health, safety, and well-being of America.
In contrast to their forebears, today's Republicans do not believe the government has such a role
to play.
In 2014, Fox News Channel personality Bill O'Reilly explained Republicans' opposition
to the law, saying,
ObamaCare is a pure income redistribution play.
That means President Obama and the Democratic Party want to put as much money into the hands
of the poor and less affluent as they can, and the health care subsidies are a great
way to do just that.
And of course, the funds for those subsidies are taken from businesses and affluent Americans who have the cash.
Income redistribution is a hallmark of socialism, and we in America are now moving in that direction.
That has angered the Republican Party and many conservative Americans who do not believe our capitalistic system was set up to provide cradle to grave entitlements.
Obamacare is much more than providing medical assets to the poor.
It's about capitalism versus socialism.
In contrast, in 2022, former President Obama explained why the Democrats worked so hard
to begin the process of getting healthcare coverage
for Americans.
We're not supposed to do this just to occupy a seat
or to hang on to power, he said.
We're supposed to do this because it's making a difference
in the lives of the people who sent us here.
The ACA shows, he said, that if you are driven
by the core idea that together we can improve the lives of this generation and the next,
and if you're persistent, if you stay with it and are willing to work through the obstacles and the criticism
and continually improve where you fall short, you can make America better.
You can have an impact on millions of lives.
Letters from an American was written and read by Heather Cox Richardson.
It was produced at Soundscape Productions, Dead in Massachusetts,
recorded with music composed by Michael Moss.