Obamacare vs. 2009's Digital Transition: Remembering the GOP's rollout crisis, and the Dem's reaction

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Democrats show they can “work across the aisle“

Just weeks before the digital transition deadline in February 2009, it was clear that the nation wasn’t ready. Millions of Americans who had been perfectly happy with their free television were furious that they had to spend money on digital converter boxes — plus the government program to subsidize the switch had run out of money.

Democrats in Congress proposed a bill to delay the transition for four months until June 2009, but Upton and most of his fellow Republicans fought back, arguing that the kinks in the program could be worked out, and that 6.5 million people losing their television for possibly months was a small price to pay for improving communications technology.

In the end, Upton lost, the roll-out was delayed, most of the problems were worked out, and the vast majority of Americans never realized there was ever a problem. See how that works?

Democrats help out the GOP

During the heated debate over the delay, Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-W. VA) said: “The outgoing Bush administration grossly mismanaged the digital television transition and consumers are confused, households are not prepared, and the coupon program for converter boxes is broken.”

Yet, Democrats spent four months fixing the issues, even going so far as to fund the failed converter box coupon program through Obama’s stimulus package. While Fred Upton and his Republican colleagues didn’t want any delay, they knew the Democrats were delaying it in good faith.

The Democrats were trying to fix their policy in the process, not delay it as a ruse to destroy the digital transition act.

GOP returns no favors

However, this is exactly what the Republicans in the House, along with 39 Democrats, tried to do to Obamacare last Friday with their Keep Your Health Plan Act. The bill not only would allow people to keep insufficient insurance plans for a year, but would also allow insurance providers to keep selling those plans to new customers.

When it comes to rolling out healthcare programs that save lives, versus junk policies that are outdated because they no longer meet national standards for adequate coverage, a shaky roll out means shut the whole thing down to the GOP?

But when given the choice between allowing Americans to keep using inferior analog TV signals, versus allowing millions to have no service at all during the poor implementation of the digital transition policy, Upton and Republican members of Congress wanted to keep going the shift going?

What a short memory some members of the GOP have.

Calling out Republican hypocrisy

In a perfect world, President Obama and the Democrats, would have delayed parts of Obamacare and spent a few months working out the kinks with the GOP.

But the Republicans have waged the last two elections by promising to defund Obamacare no matter what, which means the president had to push through a program that wasn’t ready for primetime because the Tea Party, flip-floppers like Upton, and their ringmaster, House Speaker John Boehner, can’t be trusted to negotiate in good faith.

Representative Upton and his colleagues should drop their relentless attack on the Affordable Care Act and commit to fixing existing legislation, not gutting it. Had the Democrats acted like this in 2009, your grandma would still be staring at a blank screen, playing with tin foil rabbit ears wondering why she can’t get her stories.

You don’t use your healthcare plan everyday, but you do turn on the television. The reality is, nobody wants to see either of them disrupted by a shoddy government upgrade. However, nothing can be fixed when one half of Congress treats all legislation like a zero sum game.

Dr. Jason Johnson is a professor of Political Science at Hiram College in Ohio and an analyst for MSNBC and Al Jazeera. He can be reached at @Drjasonjohnson on Twitter and at www.drjasonjohnson.com.