![Bernie Sanders to complicate CNN health care debate? [Image via official Senate portrait image/Wikimedia commons]](https://staticr1.blastingcdn.com/media/photogallery/2017/9/22/660x290/b_502x220x82/sen-bernie-sanders-official-senate-portrait-wikimedia-commons_1586311.jpg "Bernie Sanders to complicate CNN health care debate? [Image via official Senate portrait image/Wikimedia commons]")
CNN has announced that it intends to hold a live debate about health care reform on September 25. In one corner will be Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, and Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana, the co-sponsors of a bill that proposes to take Obamacare spending and send it as block grants to the states. In the other corner are Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn and Sen Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont. The inclusion of Sanders, who is pushing a single payer, government health care bill has mainstream Democrats riled, according to the Washington Free Beacon.
Democrats don’t want Sanders
The strategy that Democrats are pursuing to try to stop Graham Cassidy is to fill the airways and social media with claims that it will cause a catastrophe, throwing millions of people off of their healthcare insurance policies and causing thousands of deaths. The scare tactics are somewhat undermined by the inclusion of Sanders in the debate. Republicans hope to set up a choice between Graham Cassidy, which would give states the option of crafting their own health care systems, and government health care, which has proven to be dysfunctional in countries where it is practiced such as Canada and Great Britain. CNN, mainstream Democrats insist, have given Republicans a gift by including Sanders.
Sanders will try to defend the indefensible
Republicans hope that Graham and Cassidy will be able to take apart the case for single-payer healthcare in a public forum while at the same time buttress the case for their version of Obamacare Repeal and Replace. Single payer has a superficial appeal to some Americans because it is being sold as free healthcare.
Support collapses when it is pointed out that government health care is not only expensive, costing $32 trillion by one estimate, but would give to the government the power to determine life and death for Americans. The dirty secret about the healthcare debate is that most Americans are happy with their private health insurance.
Berniecare would force 100 million Americans to give it up in favor of an inferior, government-run system.
What Democrats prefer
Mainstream Democrats would prefer the healthcare debate to consist of whether and how much Graham Cassidy will hurt Americans. They will throw out claim after unsupported claim and try to force Graham and Cassidy to deny them, a tried and true political strategy. However, Sanders will complicate that approach by providing a ready and vulnerable target for Republicans. Given that scenario, the chances of passing Graham Cassidy Obamacare repeal and replace will be enhanced.
