Archives for March 23, 2010

The House passed the much debated health care bill 219-212 on Sunday. While this was a close vote, democracy (as Locke argued) is based on the decision of the majority and the majority (at least in the house and senate) decided in favor of the bill. What the American people think about the matter is somewhat unclear since some  polls show the majority as for it while other polls show the majority is against it.

Various positive and negative claims have been made about the bill. For example, the impact of the bill on the deficit is a matter of debate between the two parties. The Republicans’ claim is that it will be a  deficit disaster while the Democrats who support it allege that it will reduce the deficit. There are, of course, more dramatic claims about the doom that this bill will bring to America.

Since the bill has been passed, we will soon have the opportunity to get data about the impact of the bill. Naturally, the various sides will spin, massage and manipulate the data (and its interpretation) and these factors will need to be taken into account. It will be interesting to see how things play out in the upcoming elections and what impact the passage of this bill will have.

Since we know the bill has passed, we can set aside guessing about that. So the question now is this: what impact will this have on America? Doom? Salvation? Business as usual? Something else? Bonus points for using the most talking points, of course.