Earlier this month my colleague Josh Pugh wrote a piece which talked about a questionable political Ad aimed at Democratic Senate hopeful Gary Peters. Josh believes that Gary Peters' opponent Terri Lynn Land should denounce the Ad given that it included an attack on Peters' daughters.
Anytime the media is going to give a politician a platform you can expect to see some poll tested talking points. For Terri Lynn Land that meant suggesting "This campaign is going to be about the issues that matter most in Michigan - creating jobs, providing workers and struggling students with a fair shot, and making sure that our elected officials don’t make promises that they can’t keep, such as ‘if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.’"
Yes, number three on the list of most important things that Terri Lynn Land wants to accomplish if elected to the most powerful legislative body in the United States of America is to make sure elected officials don't make promises they can't keep.
You have to wonder if Terri gets irony of this statement. If you follow Terri on Facebook or Twitter you would see that repealing the Affordable Care Act (affectionately known as Obamacare) has been a goal for hers for many years. It turns out this has also been a goal of many other Republicans as well. They have tried and failed numerous times to repeal this legislation. No political promise has been broken more often than this one yet it appears to be the basis for her campaign.
If elected Terri Lynn Land would end up reneging on this promise because unlike the House, the Senate is more than a dog and pony show so a vote like this requires way more thought then 'giving new members a chance to put their vote on record'. While repeal may be an easy applause line among low information voters, the ACA contains a lot of good things that people like. This means Terri needs more than just a talking point to address the problems with the ACA and unfortunately, four years in, Republicans have put far less time into fixing the law then they have in opposing it.
Having said that if the Terri Lynn Land for Senate campaign believes that a line like "if you like your doctor" represents "issues that matter" then they should be prepared to explain why Terri supported shutting down the government as a way to address government spending. A move that cost tax payers $24 billion.
It would also be interesting to find out why Michigan was one of the easiest places to get a fraudulent ID under Terri Lynn Land.
Perhaps they would rather talk about how their candidate went from wanting a full repeal of the ACA to later stating "we're past that". Seems like that could be seen as someone making a promise they realize they can't keep.
Maybe the campaign would like to discuss their literature and others suggesting Terri is a small businesswoman. Clearly they believe this plays well with their base but if you read Terri's own words you will see that the business was a family thing and that her passion was for public service. She even touts that "she was one of the youngest attendees at the Republican State Convention in Michigan." She began running for office just after college at age 23, choosing to focus on education instead of business. In fact her business roots are apparently so important to her that they don't even appear on her LinkedIn page.
And what would her campaign think if the opposition made an Ad using Terri's words from 2005 when discussing a possible run for Senate or Governor saying at the time "I have to do what's best for the party". Does Terri actually believe that the desires of her party are more important than the wishes of her constituents? If not shouldn't the statement be "I have to do what's best for the people of Michigan"?
Of course, Gary Peters never said you could keep your doctor. He voted for the law but those are not his words. So if Terri Lynn Land is being honest when she says "Michigan families deserve a spirited campaign focused on the issues....not these silly sideshows" then what is her plan to address the problem of people losing their doctor? Does she have a plan to help the 5 million Americans that have no health insurance because Republican governors refuse to expand Medicare? Do the people who lost their health insurance at the whim of the insurance companies under the old system matter less than the people who are left to find new insurance now? Does she have a plan that cuts into the 131 percent increase in the cost of health care that we experienced the decade before the ACA?
If Terri Lynn Land wants to rise above the "silly sideshows" she can start by eliminating "if you like your doctor", "we have to pass the bill", and "the bill is 2,700 pages" from all future arguments because as a legislator she's going to have to do a lot more than just complain about what doesn't work and fringe rhetoric. She'll have to work with individuals who have different opinions to create policies.
Josh Pugh asked Terri Lynn Land if she would disavow any peripheral hyperbole and focus on what makes her the best candidate for the job. Her response suggests the answer is no.
No comments:
Post a Comment