President Joe Biden hopped to Virginia Beach on Tuesday, Feb. 28, to blame Republicans for quarreling over raising the nation’s borrowing limit and increased medical costs. His goal was to double down on affordable healthcare in the United States and get a read on what will undoubtedly be hot-button campaign issues.
Press maven Karine Jean-Pierre warned that her boss would “highlight how Republicans are threatening default and economic catastrophe unless they can force through their agenda that would raise healthcare costs for seniors, working families, and Americans with preexisting conditions and cause millions of people to lose their coverage.” Not everyone wants to hear a stump speech on healthcare, however. Virginia’s Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin, discouraged the president’s visit and advised that Biden head to the Norfolk Southern toxic train derailment site in East Palestine, OH, instead.
Biden Takes the Stage
“Doctors allow us to live. Nurses make us want to live,” Biden began. He spoke about a nurse at Walter Reed Hospital who would blow on his ear to ensure he had a “human” connection, and he claimed the value of nurses is underestimated. The theme of his speech was clear: Dignity, healthcare, and the Affordable Care Act (ACA) are giving people self-esteem. As he often repeats, his father would say, “We want to give folks a little breathing room.”
The president went after MAGA Republicans, calling them a “different breed of cat.” Then, he remarked on how many people died from the pandemic, seeming to blame that on the former administration. Strangely, according to Biden, he turned the economy and the pandemic around, bragging that 130 million Americans were now inoculated against COVID.
Biden pivoted from diagnosis and treatment to slashed prescription costs in the Inflation Reduction Act. “One in ten Americans are diabetic,” he declared, and then he went after Big Pharma and his victory of capping the cost of insulin for seniors on Medicare. “Let’s cap the cost of insulin for everyone.”
Joe Biden (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Just before wrapping his brief address, Biden managed to implant the notion that Republicans were trying to get rid of Social Security and Medicare. Yet House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has insisted that Social Security and Medicare will be exempt from consideration for cuts in budget negotiations. Fondly, Biden recalled that during the recent SOTU, Republicans stood and clapped when he said the two programs were off-limits, weirdly quipping, “I’m all for conversion.” And then he went back to health care and MAGA, claiming Republicans were trying to gut the ACA. “Folks,” Biden said, “I will stop them.”
The Obamacare Tug-of-war
The Affordable Care Act has benefited a record number of uninsured Americans: An impressive 16.3 million have signed up, with 22% of those being new to the program this past enrollment period. In addition, the ACA assured states could increase their Medicaid system, and those that did expand reported uninsured rates for residents dropped from 35% to 17% between 2014 and 2020. But the way it came about still rankles opponents of government oversight of the industry. Now, what was once a debatable and discussable issue is simply an antagonistic flashpoint for a divided America to seize.
The dog-and-pony show covered a lot of soundbite ground: from taxing the rich, insuring the not-so-rich, and excoriating the MAGA Republicans who refuse to play ball. As Biden continues dipping his toe in the political pool, assessing his ability to regain enough diminished popularity to win in 2024, Americans should expect to hear all manner of braggadocio from Republican candidates and the White House.
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