Washington watch

The Republicans have been working their partisan hearts out and the Democrats have been at the beach—and now Obama’s healthcare reforms are on the rocks. Worse still, the way the Dems have let themselves be outmanoeuvred suggests that Obama may lose control of congress in next year’s midterms, just as Bill Clinton did in 1994.

The demographics of elections are critical. The one group where John McCain outscored Obama in last year’s election was with seniors. And they are much more likely to vote than the young. In the 2006 midterm, over-50s made up just over half the voters. If Obama upsets the seniors, then the Democrats will lose the House and he can kiss goodbye to big reforms.

And the Republicans have managed to get the seniors very upset over healthcare. The latest Rasmussen polls show those over 65 are against Obama’s plans by 56 per cent to 39 per cent. The markets have noticed and the share prices of the big private health insurers have rallied sharply.

The Republican strategy was cunning. They began by asking how Obama would pay for extending coverage to the 40m-plus uninsured Americans. After hum-ing and hah-ing, the White House said they could save “hundreds of billions” from improving Medicare administration. When pressed for details, the White House specified $156bn from the Medicare Advantage programme, for which many seniors pay extra to get benefits not covered by Medicare.

The 60-Plus Association, a conservative advocacy group, pounced and started running television adverts. “Your healthcare will be rationed. You will have longer waits. Your doctor may not want to keep you on his books and all doctors will have to decide if their older patients are worth the cost.” After these ads ran repeatedly on nostalgia cable channels, the old folks began to rumble with discontent. Then the Republicans found the lethal soundbite to turn that rumbling into outrage: Obama’s “death panels” will govern your fate as those terrifying Democrats launch their new programme on euthanasia.

Of course, there are no death panels. The bill would merely allow doctors to be reimbursed for their time by Medicare when they counsel elderly patients who want to receive advice on end-of-life options, like hospices. (Some Republican congressmen campaigned for this measure to be included in the bill.) The death panel soundbite was dreamed up by former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin—proof that the Dems shouldn’t underestimate her.

Then Obama fell into a further trap, trying to debunk the myth at a New Hampshire town meeting. “The rumour that’s been circulating a lot lately is this idea that somehow the House of Representatives voted for death panels that will basically pull the plug on grandma because we’ve decided that it’s too expensive to let her live anymore,” he said, going on to stress he was against it. But that’s not how the soundbites and radio adverts are playing it. “Do you know the real implications of Obama’s secret healthcare plans?” says a concerned voice, over a background of a loop of Obama saying “pull the plug on grandma… pull the plug on grandma.”

SNITCHING FOR OBAMA

When the White House heard about the death panels, they tried to fight back via their blog. “There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform,” ran the post. “These rumours often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.”

The right-wing blogosphere raised the alarm. RedState announced “the White House wants you to report anybody publicly opposing” healthcare reform. The talk shows picked up on it, with Rush Limbaugh calling it a snitch-for-Obama campaign. Then House minority whip Eric Cantor of Virginia claimed that the White House “wants Americans to report on each other. And Texas senator John Cornyn sent Obama a public letter, pointing out that “by requesting citizens send ‘fishy’ emails to the White House, it is inevitable that the names, email, addresses, IP addresses and private speech of US citizens will be reported to the White House.”

THE REPUBLICANS RALLY

And now the Republicans are rewriting the book on how to be an effective opposition. They are using this summer’s town hall meetings to savage the Democrats on healthcare, taxes and budget deficits. Some of these militants are known as birthers, from their wacky belief that Obama is not American and his birth certificate is faked. Others are the paranoid nutters who watch for the black helicopters that will launch the UN’s military coup. But their well-planned swampings of public meetings have produced television footage of Democratic congressmen fleeing voters. The party is scrambling to respond but can’t find enough volunteers to counter the Republican foot soldiers.

The morale of Democratic volunteers may have been eroded by Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s plans for a congressional airforce of three Gulfstream jets and five Boeing 737s, which was approved by the House just before its August recess. Wiser heads may prevail in the senate, where Democrat Claire McCaskill says “this makes me sick to my stomach.” A quiet chat with Renegade on Britain’s parliamentary expenses scandal may have helped her to this view.