Success!?!? 29 Percent of Kentuckians Have Favorable View of Obamacare
Via NBC News comes a writeup of a new poll in Kentucky, where Obamacare goes by the name Kynect.
Kynect itself is one of the new law's state success stories; more than 413,000 residents signed up for health coverage under the new law before March's enrollment deadline. Last month, Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear called the implementation of the Affordable Care Act in the state an "indisputable success" and noted that 75 percent of the applicants were previously uninsured.
So what does success look like in terms of polls? Marist polling asked half of the respondents about "Obamacare" and the other half about Kynect. Fully 57 percent of Kentuckians had an unfavorable feeling toward Obamacare, with just 33 percent reporting a favorable response.
The headline of the story is "In Polling Obamacare, A Label Makes a Big Difference" and quotes the pollster saying "call [Obamacare] something else and the negatives drop." Yeah, sort of:
When Kentucky voters were asked to give their impression of "kynect," the state exchange created as a result of the health care law, the picture was quite different.
A plurality – 29 percent – said they have a favorable impression of kynect, compared to 22 percent who said they view the system unfavorably. Twenty-seven percent said they hadn't heard of kynect, and an additional 21 percent said they were unsure.
So that's what success looks like? Under 30 percent digging the system? And remember the Kentucky plan is "one of the new law's state success stories." Even more stunning to me is that fully 27 percent of Bluegrass residents hadn't even heard of the program?
Batting .300 is good for baseball, but it really doesn't seem like a very strong indicator of success for transformative health-care legislation.
