The link below is to a CNN article about the Supreme Courts decision to uphold the Affordable Care Act in full, a prospect many were not counting on. Opponents of the legislation often have pointed to polls that show a number of people opposed to the legislation. But finally, this gets pointed out:
Previous surveys have indicated that some who oppose the law do so because they think it doesn’t go far enough.
Early on, I would have counted in that group. I wanted Universal Health Care, and saw the final legislation as less than what we needed.
But my point of this post is to point out more broadly, the failings of getting hung up on seeing issues or lawson a for/against mindset. This binary misses important points and viewpoints and cars as a road block in many issue debates. In everything, it is best to move past a pure “who is for or against” perspective. That type of thinking may seem plausible, given we live in a democracy where the majority rules, but except when it comes down to a real vote, such thinking impedes real dialogue.
Progressives often fall short here, every bit as much as conservatives. But often progressives fail, not by framing arguments in that way, but by failing to counter the arguments well. Somne in the media have been pointing out for a while that most Americans support the provisions of the Health Care reform when considered individually, even though the Right says people are against the bill as a whole. That means that the Far Right framing of the law is the problem, not the law itself. Yet few have used that to try and better educate the American people. And no one on the Left have sought to tease out the opposition too show that those who are opposed because they think the law goes too far are actually a minority.