I don’t have the technical wherewithal to know if the Obamacare exchange enrollment “surge” that delighted liberals with a number north of 7 million is the sort of administration achievement that should encourage hopes the White House and its allies can pull off a similar miracle in boosting turnout in November. Jonathan Chait, however, does cast some light on the matter by pointing out a similar surge occurred in the final days of the first year of enrollment for RomneyCare, and I don’t believe ol’ Mitt had a lot of outside help from celebrities and social media.
Chait goes on to cast aspersions on the media obsession with the exchange enrollment numbers, noting that it excludes Obamacare-enabled insurance obtained via Medicaid, the children-under-26 exemption, and direct applications for Obamacare plans outside the exchanges. More importantly, he argues the meme that the president and his celebrity friends “saved Obamacare” reflects the “memory-of-a-fruit-fly narrative whiplash-journalism” that insists on instant drama even if slowly emerging truths are more accurate.
In any event, I suspect Chait would agree with my own assessment that the DSCC’s $60 million campaign to combat “midterm falloff” among Democratic-leaning voter demographics is a safer route to a better November for the Donkey Party than anything Barack Obama and Hollywood are likely to pull off on November 4 or during the early voting period just prior to it.
