March 25, 2017

Trump, 1999: "I'm quite liberal, and getting much more liberal, on healthcare"

For the past week here we've seen that Trump's big-picture vision for healthcare has always been single-payer. To appreciate just how deeply committed he is to this form of healthcare, watch this interview with Larry King from 1999, when he was forming an exploratory committee about running for President under the Reform Party that Ross Perot founded earlier in the decade.

The entire interview shows how little he has changed, so we can be sure what he's expressing right before potentially running for President is what he has totally committed himself to. Although most of it will sound uncannily familiar, listen to this exchange on healthcare:


Larry King: Patient's Bill of Rights. You mention healthcare as one of the social issues. You for it?

Donald Trump: I think you have to have -- and again, I said I'm conservative, generally speaking I'm conservative, and even very conservative. But I'm quite liberal and getting much more liberal on healthcare and other things. I really say, What's the purpose of a country if you're not going to have defense and healthcare? If you can't take care of your sick in the country, forget it, it's all over, I mean it's no good. So I'm very liberal when it comes to healthcare. I believe in universal healthcare. I believe in whatever it takes to make people well and better.

LK: So you believe, then, it's an entitlement of birth.

DT: I think it is. It's an entitlement to this country, and too bad the world can't be, y'know, in this country. But the fact is it's an entitlement to this country if we're going to have a great country.

LT: So you are for this measure?

DT: I am for whatever it takes. We have the money, the fact is that the world is ripping off this country. Germany is ripping us off big-league, Saudi Arabia is ripping us off big-league, France -- I mean, they're the worst team player I've ever seen in my life. You look at what's happened -- Japan for years, I mean we're like a whipping post for Japan.

He goes on to say that if we negotiate fair trade deals, we'll have more than enough money pouring into our economy that we can lower taxes and still provide goodies like universal healthcare.

If everything else he says has stayed the same, we have to conclude that he still feels this way on healthcare. Trump the impulsive flip-flopper is just a media fabrication (a projection of their own temperament). From these ancient interviews, we know he is strategic, cautious (won't run unless he could win), and committed to where he stands on what he thinks are the most important issues facing the nation.

Populists will breathe a sigh of relief that Trump has always had his sights set on single-payer, while conservatives will have to "trust Trump" as he pitches the system that every other rich country enjoys, with far better health outcomes at far lower prices.

Corporate propaganda has so thoroughly brainwashed conservatives about healthcare, where single-payer is the apocalypse, so admittedly the Trump team has their work cut out for them. On the other hand, he will easily draw in moderates and liberals who have been crying for single-payer for decades.

With the Congressional Republicans forever torn between moderate vs. high levels of sociopathy on entitlements, this provides Trump with the first real opportunity to "pivot" toward the center.

Hopefully Pelosi and Schumer vote against single-payer, putting them on the record as phony sell-outs, and allowing Trump to rake in even more former Obama voters during his re-election. Although perhaps they will vote for, and try to spin it as having won over even a Republican President on healthcare, and from a minority party position.

2 comments:

  1. I'm noticing a lot of mainstream Dems starting to concede that Obamacare needs "improvement" or "reform" etc., and would be open to "improving" or "reforming" the system along with Trump and other non-crazy Republicans.

    Chuck Schumer even floating the "public option" option again.

    They know the system is headed toward failure, and don't want to be the last ones to have built it, and have to take the blame.

    It'll probably start with negotiation of prices for prescription drugs from Medicare Part D, perhaps a public option, then once that works its way through, go full single-payer. Even Bernie is not pushing for an immediate switch to single-payer, but a gradual transition.

    Bear this in mind over the weekend. As the Dems try to gloat over the failure of Ryancare, they move without skipping a beat into "but that's not to say that Obamacare is perfect, and we're more than willing to make improvements to it".

    What a ringing endorsement of their "signature piece of legislation".

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  2. With the Congressional Republicans forever torn between moderate vs. high levels of sociopathy on entitlements

    They worry there'll be a slippery slope over time, gradually progressing toward communism. I am sure entitlements do have unnoticed costs, not just obvious financial ones.

    Although perhaps they will vote for [single-payer]

    Nah. They have oppositional-defiant disorder, so to speak. They are easily trolled, that's how they lost to Trump's weak but aggressive campaign. They're not going to be reasonable or "compromise their values." Their votes aren't needed once the ACA crashes. That'll probably happen next year, not even as long away as 2019. It'll start state by state, not all at once, I think. Then Trump likely wins by a landslide in 2020, using his incumbency, new allies, developed campaign apparatus, and lack of opposition from the government and normal Americans. Thinking he can lose the second time around is bizarre, that would be like McCain or Romney beating Obama, or Jim Webb winning the nomination.

    By the way, when if ever will those who promised to move to Canada, out of the U.S., finally leave? They're annoying. I think many will leave when their selfish business interests are violated by enforcement of laws such as a border wall (I think CA's existing population will halve, because both triggered liberals and other exploiters of labor will leave, so maybe I can eventually buy an apartment), and legal censorship (the media pretends the 1st Amendment is all the law there is on their industry, but no, there really are limits on speech in inherited British common law, not invalid French Revolutionary law).


    Finally, check out gotnews.com for occasional, good journalism.

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