Media Matters for America

Media revive Clinton-era smear, dub White House health care plan "ObamaCare"

June 18, 2009 4:05 pm ET

SUMMARY: Many media figures have dubbed President Obama's health care reform proposal "ObamaCare," reinventing the terms "HillaryCare" and "ClintonCare" that were used by opponents of the Clintons' reform proposal. In doing so, these media are often seeking to frame the debate in negative terms.

Many in the media have dubbed President Obama's health care reform proposal "ObamaCare," reinventing the terms "HillaryCare" and "ClintonCare" that were cooked up by opponents of the Clintons' reform proposal in the 1990s. In doing so, these media are often seeking to frame the debate in negative terms. For example, the "Number One voice for conservativism" Rush Limbaugh described the administration's health reform plan as "Obama care" and equated it with the conservative bogeyman of "socialized medicine" during the May 13 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show.

The terms "ClintonCare" and "HillaryCare" were conceived and repeated by opponents of the Clinton health care reform proposal. As Haynes Johnson and David S. Broder documented in The System (Little, Brown and Co., 1996), during the battle over President Clinton's reform plan, "a loose confederation of special-interest groups nationwide ... united for one purpose -- to kill what they termed derisively 'Clintoncare.' " Johnson and Broder also reported that " 'Clintoncare' " became the "shorthand ... used everywhere by opponents of their plan." From Johnson and Broder's book:

Hours later, in its coverage of the speech, the New York Times reported [health economist for Citizens for a Sound Economy and former aide to President Bush Michele] Davis's critical reaction to the plan Bill Clinton had just presented to Congress and the American people. It would, she charged, "force insurance companies and HMOs to ration care in order to survive under federally established premium caps." Within days, the conservative lobbying group she worked for became the first to label the Clinton health approach government-run health care, a term that became a mantra of reform opponents, repeated again and again in the months to come. Soon that seventh-floor conference room, located three blocks from the White House, became the nerve center for strategy sessions with a loose confederation of special-interest groups nationwide. They united for one purpose -- to kill what they termed derisively "Clintoncare." (p. 52)

[...]

For the First Lady, the most alarming sign of hatred came the next day in Seattle, on Saturday morning, July 23, hours after her husband had made his emotional midnight phone call to Ira Magaziner. For days before she arrived in Seattle, anti-Hillary rhetoric had filled the talk shows. People were urged to demonstrate against her, against the President, and against "Clintoncare," the shorthand now used everywhere by opponents of their plan. (p. 461)

Similarly, in a July 12, 2006, New York Times article, Raymond Hernandez and Robert Pear reported that the recommendations from President Clinton's Task Force on National Health Care Reform, which Hillary Clinton led, "were derided as 'Hillarycare' by opponents and arguably cost Democrats control of the House of Representatives in the 1994 midterm elections." And in a June 10, 2006, Times article, Robin Toner and Anne E. Kornblut reported that "conservatives scornfully called" the Clinton's health care plan " 'Hillarycare.' "

One example of a conservative using the term "Hillarycare" in this way is the following passage from The Truth About Hillary (Sentinel, 2005), Edward Klein's book devoted to smearing Hillary Clinton:

The Health-Care Debacle: In 1993, President Bill Clinton launched his new administration's major domestic program -- health-care reform -- and appointed his wife to head the task force. With typical arrogance, Hillary proceeded to hold secret meetings, keep powerful figures in Congress in the dark, and create a comically complex and hugely expensive plan that came to be known as Hillarycare. As a result, the program was killed, the Republican won both houses of Congress in the next midterm election, and Hillary was politically discredited for the next four years. (p. 38)

In reporting on the first major Democratic health reform proposal since the Clintons' plan, many media figures and outlets have reverted to the same negative language, referring to the Obama administration's health care plan as ObamaCare. The term is widespread in the conservative media, used by the likes of Limbaugh and the National Review to attack the president's health reform proposal; since May 13, Fox News host Sean Hannity has referred to the administration's health care reform efforts as ObamaCare at least five times. The term has also occasionally popped up in places like the Politico and MSNBC.

Examples of media referring to the White House's health care reform plan as ObamaCare include the following (transcripts not provided or linked to were accessed using the Nexis database):

From the June 16 edition of Fox Business Network's Cavuto:

CAVUTO: Well, if this national health care end justifies the tax hike means, will the American taxpayer go along? Well, a lot depends on this administration not repeating the roughshod approach many say the Clinton administration took with something called HillaryCare 16 years ago.

From the June 16 edition Fox Business' Bulls & Bears:

ASMAN: Let's talk about the entire system, because, after all, we have to pay for it somehow. We've put out so much in spending already. We just don't have the money. How do we do it without just completely leveraging our future?"

SMITH: I don't see that you can, and I want to be included on the A-list of naysayers. So -- but, you know, here's the problem. You know, all the extrapolations, all the budgeting is being done based on, you know, current, you know, form and speed, you know, that 1 trillion number. But, you know, there's two issues with that. One is, give me the government program where the actual costs equaled the forecasted cost. It doesn't. It's normally 100 percent more.

ASMAN: Well, hold on. I can give you one example. You asked the question. The prescription drug program; it was supposed to cost, I think, 55 billion a year. It's now costing about half of that, because there are incentives worked into it.

SMITH: Well, all right, I'll give you that, and then I'll counter with, you know, General Motors, the post office, Amtrak, the Defense Department, et cetera. But --

LIZ CLAMAN (co-host): OK. And then, I can counter with Safeway and Whole Foods; they've got ideas that are working.

ASMAN: Sure.

SMITH: Yeah, but that's not a government program. And, in fact, we have a case study in Massachusetts, which essentially is a -- kind of a mini-version of what ObamaCare would be. They started with a budget of 1.6 billion a year; it's now at 1.9 billion a year. So, you know, right there's a government entity not able to meet its budget projections.

From the June 16 edition of MSNBC Live:

SHUSTER: And from HillaryCare to ObamaCare, what really has changed in the 16 years since 1993? Anything? That's coming up next on MSNBC.

&mdash M.W.

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