Why did people start calling the ACA “Obamacare” anyway?

You can trace its roots back to the earlier healthcare debate in the early 1990s. In President Bill Clinton's first year in office, he appointed First Lady Hillary Clinton to lead a task force charged with putting together a healthcare reform solution for the country. read more

People on the Right started calling ACA by the nickname “Obamacare” for the above reasons. They did it in lock step, in every interview, on every channel, and they got their allies on talk radio and Fox News to do the same. read more

Many of those people would have been helped if Democrats had been able to pass some of their original ideas for the ACA, including a “public option” plan run by the government, or a “Medicare buy-in” that would have given people age 55 and older the option of purchasing Medicare coverage before the normal eligibility age of 65. read more

While the refrain that the ACA represented a “government takeover” of health care was a significant exaggeration, the law did insinuate the government significantly further in its funding and oversight of health care. Adding to that was the unhappiness with the ACA’s individual mandate. read more