By Sam Foster

 

With repeal on the table this week, the left will be shrill with claims that people will be harmed by repeal. Thus the following two polls will not get much coverage.

 

The first comes from Zogby and it puts to bed all the hoopla about strong support against repeal.  In fact, 54% of voters want Republicans to repeal the bill.  The reason why the poll stands in stark contrast to the earlier AP poll is because Zogby polled likely voters.  You know, the one’s that put Republicans into office.

Slightly more than 50% of likely voters favor repealing the healthcare reform bill passed in 2010, but by nearly identical percentages, they say the upcoming Republican plan to repeal is a political gimmick to satisfy opponents of the bill, and do not believe it will succeed, a new Zogby Interactive Survey finds.

The poll, conducted from January 7 – 10, also finds that 59% of voters favor new House of Representatives' rules implemented by the Republican majority that generally allow more amendments and debate, and that a plurality (47%) agree with the Republican majority decision not to allow amendments to the bill to repeal healthcare reform.

Do you favor or oppose repealing the healthcare reform bill passed last year by Congress?

Responses	All Voters	Democrats	Republicans	Independents
Favor	54%	15%	94%	54%
Oppose	43%	82%	4%	42%
Not sure	3%	4%	2%	4%

The second poll comes from Reuters and found that two thirds of US doctors believe health care reform will worsen care for patients.

"Our present survey suggests that greater attention should be paid to understanding the present opinions of the health care provider constituency before proceeding down a path of reform. Without the physicians supporting change it will be difficult to accomplish," the report concludes.

Now there really isn’t anything more germane to the argument.  Yet, the left is trying to put up all sorts of smoke and mirrors about how Republicans won’t give away their government paid health care, dishonestly glossing over the fact that repeal will not cost a single government employee’s health care.  Another popular meme is that repeal will force people off all their great and wonderful new benefits, failing to point out that in 2014, when the law takes effect, they will be covered, but be unable to access health care. This renders the fact that they have funding irrelevant. 

 

Doctors and voters want repeal and in opposition the left can only muster scandLESS scandles and annecdotes.  Voters and Doctors want repeal, thus repeal should be a no brainer for those in Washington. 

Update: Jim Hoft has the scoop: 200 top economists support health care repeal