Words Matter as Much as Policies

Will Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber convince the federal government to give money back to the state because of progress here on health care reform?As a person who likes and uses words, I have noticed that the health care debate — both heading toward the U.S. Supreme Court and the 2012 Oregon Legislative session — has been marked by words apparently designed to get the attention of those involved.

Consider these examples:

• Regarding the "you-have-to-buy-health-insurance mandate" that is heading to the U.S. Supreme Court, a health economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, put it this way:  "Health reform without an individual requirement is the spinach you need to get the chocolate you want."
• On the same issue, a former health care policy advisor to President Bill Clinton was quoted last week as saying that "health reform without an individual mandate is like driving a train without tracks; you can still move, but you can't get to your destination and it will be a tougher and far more costly trip."
• Or, consider this quote used last week in an update for Oregon legislators on the Health Insurance Exchange: "Our assumption is that the exchange is being born in a political battlefield. Half of Oregon never wanted you to exist and other half wanted much more than what you are. It seems your biggest challenge will be to gain the trust from both sides that you are an honest broker of information and opportunity — not the purveyor of a political agenda."

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The Public Policy Cauldron: What's Intractable and What's not

"Intractable."

No less an important public figure than former State Senator Ryan Deckert, now president of the Oregon Business Association (OBA), used that term last week as he introduced Governor John Kitzhaber at the annual OBA Statesman dinner.

He said Kitzhaber, now in his third term as governor, has defied conventional political wisdom by taking on seemingly "intractable" problems such as education and health care reform.

Deckert's words contained a bit of irony because, at approximately the same time, police forces in Portland and Salem were removing so-called "Occupy Wall Street" demonstrators from overstaying their welcome in public parks and roads in the two cities. That group, like the right wing Tea Party, does not appear to be interested in solving intractable problems; they appear to want "their way or the highway."

Speaking of the Tea Party movement, in a column last week in the Oregonian, columnist George Will contended that, "in scale, Occupy Wall Street demonstrations-cum-encapments are to Tea Party event as Pittsburg, KA is to Pittsburgh, PA. So far, probably fewer people have participated in all of them combined than attended just one Tea Party rally, than of September 12, 2009, on the Washington Mall. In comportment, OWS is to the Tea Party as Lady Gaga is to Lord Chesterfield: Blocking the Brooklyn Bridge (or streets in Portland) was not persuasion modeled on Tea Party tactics."

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