Michael Gartner: What's In A Name?

Let’s say The Des Moines Register and pollster extraordinaire Ann Selzer decide to do a poll on professional baseball in Des Moines. But let’s say, just for the heck of it, that baseball here is also known as Gartnerball. And let’s say -- and this is obviously hypothetical -- that this person Gartner himself is somewhat controversial.

And let’s say the first question on the poll asks Iowans to “describe your view of baseball, sometimes known as Gartnerball.” And let’s say this is the answer: Forty-nine percent of the people say that professional baseball in Des Moines, also known as Gartnerball, is a very bad sport and should be abolished. Thirty-six percent like some parts of the sport. Just 9% think it’s a really neat sport.

Then let’s say the next series of questions asks people what they think of the most important and basic elements of baseball (it doesn’t get into the infield fly rule), but the introduction to these questions does not mention that baseball is also known as Gartnerball. And let’s say these are the answers:

            -- 85% like the fact that baseball is a game with nine innings and with three outs per half-inning.

            -- 74% like the fact that baseball has a rule that a batter is called out on three strikes and gets to walk to first base on four balls.

           -- 70% like the fact that baseball is a sport without a clock.

           -- 56% like the fact that baseball is played in the summer and the fact that there are nine positions on a team. (The poll wisely does not ask what people think of the “designated hitter.”)

           -- 52% like the fact that when a ball is hit over the fence the batter gets to trot around the bases unimpeded.

           -- 51% like the fact that in baseball a person can bunt and steal bases and hit sacrifice flies and -- unlike, say, in golf -- the fans have a choice and can stand and cheer or boo or go out and get a beer.

           -- But the nation is evenly split on whether you should add more cheap bleacher seats.

That’s in effect what last week’s fascinating Iowa Poll said about the Affordable Care Act, which, the poll noted in the first question, is “sometimes known as Obamacare.” Subsequent questions, in which Iowans gave high marks to the important and basic parts of the Act -- mandatory coverage of people with pre-existing conditions, mandatory coverage or penalties for companies with at least 50 employees, removal of lifetime caps on benefits, establishment of health exchanges -- were preceded by an introductory clause referring to the Affordable Care Act, but not Obamacare.

“The poll reflects highly partisan feelings about Obamacare,” reporter Tony Leys wrote in carefully dissecting the information. But, in fact, that is not what the poll shows at all. It shows that Iowans have highly partisan feelings about President Obama, not about the Affordable Care Act. (This summer, an Iowa Poll put Obama's disapproval rating at 54% in the state.) In fact, as you read through to the party breakdowns, there is quite a bit of bipartisan support for the Affordable Care Act.

The Iowa Poll is not unique. Poll after poll across the country shows the same thing -- people like the key provisions of the Affordable Care Act; they simply don’t like “Obamacare.” The “Obamacare” numbers are dragged down by Republicans, many of whom simply can’t stand the man.
  
All of this suggests a simple solution to the stalemate in Washington, where Republican House members keep insisting -- incorrectly, the polls would suggest -- that their constituents don’t want anything to do with the Affordable Care Act. Simply start calling the Affordable Care Act by something other than Obamacare.
 
Romneycare is taken.
    
So how about, say, Boehnercare?