According to Gallup, which has been measuring the percentage of uninsured Americans monthly since 2008, the current rate of uninsured Americans is stuck at 16.1%.
A quick look at the trends will show you that percentage is almost the same as what it was when President Obama took office in January 2009, and nearly identical to the rate of uninsured in March 2010, when the Democrats jammed ObamaCare through Congress on a strictly party line vote.
Oh the problematic irony. The Democrat Party, from President Obama on down, repeatedly lectured us that passing their big government health care law was the only way to reduce the number of uninsured. With the enrollment deadline for ObamaCare rapidly approaching, its looking like that was another lie.
Even the nonpartisan Gallup poll, while not explicitly pointing it out, hinted that this number is not welcome news for the White House:
"Still, with only 2.1 million Americans newly enrolled in plans through the exchanges as of Dec. 28, 2013, the Obama administration and other proponents of the new healthcare law have a long way to go in hopes of reaching the goal of increasing the number of Americans who have health coverage."
During the final months of the Bush Administration and the 2008 presidential campaign, the rate of uninsured was 13.9%. Back then, Democrats insisted that rate was unacceptably high. Now they're silent. If Democrats choose to acknowledge this poll at all (which they won't), they'll point to the fact that the rate of uninsured has dropped from the all-time high of 18.6% in the middle of 2013. But much of that can be contributed to the mass confusion of cancelled plans and changing providers that millions of Americans experienced last year as a result of the ObamaCare train wreck.
The truth is that ObamaCare was never going to reduce the number of uninsured. Even the CBO warned that the law would still leave the number of uninsured Americans unacceptably high, yet Democrats charged full speed ahead anyway. It's not hard to see why voter anger with Democrats is once again boiling over. It's another broken promise, the Democrats knew they couldn't keep.
In Obama's America, its looking like even with ObamaCare, 16% uninsured is the new normal. The White House will no doubt choose to ignore this inconvenient fact, and deny that reducing the rate of uninsured was ever a crucial benchmark. The problem is that the White House can keep jumping, but at some point they'll be running out of talking points to land on.
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