[ISiddiqui]

Originally Posted by flere-imsaho

If the white working class poor are as smart as Rensin argues, then they should have no problem recognizing that Medicaid expansion helps them, despite how it was sold. You can't have it both ways. Either the poor white working class are too dumb to recognize which programs and policies demonstrably aid them, or they are smart and absolutely can and reject those programs for other issues at the ballot box (as JPhillips provides the example).

As if Democratic voters don't have difficulty identifying programs that help them when offered by the "other side" (as in free trade... granted, I may have in the past indicated that people who oppose free trade are dumb, but that wasn't exactly the best way to win those people over - I try not to do that anymore). We know of plenty of examples where people will support things when done by their party, but will oppose them when the exact same thing is proposed by the opposite party. Part of that is no doubt tribalism, but part of that may be lack of trust for the intentions of the other side...

If only we had an example of white working class people whose state granted Medicaid expansion and then had to deal with a future Governor who proposed taking it away to see if the experience changed their minds on the issue... Oh wait... we do!

Poll: Majority in Kentucky want to keep Medicaid expansion | TheHill

A poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation finds that 72 percent of Kentucky residents want to leave the Medicaid expansion unchanged. Just 20 percent want to scale it back so that fewer people are covered.

I can guarantee you the numbers were not close to as high as when Gov. Beshear and the Kentucky legislature expanded Medicaid.

Smugness is just the final result of the exasperation of those on the other side of the dialogue that isn't happening.

Think about the last time you were having a dialogue with someone who frustrated you because you think they weren't getting it or weren't interested in dialogue. Did being smug over that person do anything positive? Did it help matters at all?

I pointed it out before, but we have people on FOFC who seemingly don't "[engage] in an actual dialogue on realistic policy and ways to achieve it". Does being smug to them actually result in anything worthwhile. Heck, I find when I step away from things for a second, I can sometimes have a worth while conversation with some of those folks and we can even agree on certain things.

You're conflating Medicare with Medicaid. As you know, it was the latter that was expanded under the ACA. To the people we're talking about Medicare is "earned" while Medicaid is "welfare".

You're right. My mistake - was probably responding very quickly and didn't think it through well enough.