Experts: Health reform anger stems from racism, partisanship

For Janelle Miller, 23, of Riverview, the anger in the national debate over health care isn't manufactured by the health insurance industry, it's real.

"Government has bankrupted Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid," she wrote recently in response to a Tampa Tribune survey. "There is no way I trust them with my health."

Mac McLaughlin of Tampa, an Army infantry veteran and retiree, says he means it, too -- "I'm sick and tired of the way my government's acting," he said while waiting for the start of a town hall forum on the issue that turned ugly in Tampa recently.

But to Adora Obi Nweze of Miami, president of the state NAACP and a volunteer adviser to Gov. Charlie Crist, not all that anger is what it appears.

"People are suspicious of government to begin with," she said, "but because [Obama] is black he gets it more. There are people in this country who cannot accept a black man as president."

And to some Republicans, it's a way to get back at Democrats who have won the last two national elections.

"If we're able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him," South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint said in widely reported comments to conservative backers last month.

The explanations are as varied as the result is shocking: Average, middle-class Americans screaming at members of Congress in public meetings, shoving and shouting in each other's faces, sending threatening emails.

And all of it over the dry, complicated subject of federal health care policy.

A number of political experts of different political stripes came up with various explanations for the phenomenon when contacted by the Tribune.

But a few themes came up repeatedly.

Several said the partisan battle is stoking the issue as Republicans seek to recoup electoral losses.

While some cited evidence that those with a political or business interests are churning up opposition, nearly all said some or most of the anger is an expression of real grass-roots opposition.

Nonetheless, they also said the distortions and outright falsehoods being spread by opponents - that the plan will result in euthanasia, "death panels," forced abortions or trillions spent on health care for illegal immigrants - are evidence that the issue is being used for political gain.

Racism, usually submerged and not overt, is part of the picture, affecting the level of trust in Obama's presidency in general and the health care proposal in particular.

While federal health care policy may seem a dry subject, the argument goes to the heart of the conservative-liberal argument over the role of government, and at the same time affects an intimate area of American life.

Some other explanations had to do with the changing nature of society itself.

"Clearly we get our information in lots of different ways today, which can prevent us from coming together and forming consensus," said David Colburn, a historian who teaches on the presidency at the University of Florida, and says he's politically neutral.

When Franklin Roosevelt confronted the Great Depression, "There were a couple of sources of information -- the newspaper and the radio," he said.

"Today we get it from all over, and we can select sources that reflect our own biases. That's helping play up the ideological battle."

Some experts cited the groups of Republican political operatives and health care industry magnates behind the advocacy groups that, for example, are promoting the Aug. 22 "Recess Rally" against the proposal.

"It's not a question of people rising up out of genuine anger - it's highly manipulated from what I can see," said Susan Tolchin, a George Mason University political scientist and author of the 1999 book "The Angry American - How Voter Rage is Changing the Nation."

But most said at least some is real.

"There's a big difference between partly manufactured and all manufactured," said Darryl Paulson, a University of South Florida political scientist.

The most controversial idea is that racism is part of the picture.

"There is an inherent mistrust of Obama that goes back to the fact that he is not born of 100 percent white Americans, didn't grow up on the mainland," said John Belohlavek, a political historian at the University of South Florida and a Democrat.

"That manifests itself in the birthers" - those who question whether Obama was born in the U.S. - "and in the mistrust of 'government healthcare.' "

Belohlavek cited racist jokes circulating about Obama, the small percentages of Deep South whites who voted for him, and the scorning references from white critics to "the messiah." That grew from Oprah Winfrey's emotional endorsement of Obama as "the one."

Paulson, a Republican, agreed that "clearly there is some of that element," meaning racism, also citing the birthers.

But, he said, "That distorts the fundamental fact that this is not about race - it's a dispute about federal policy and the role of the federal government vs. the individual."

"You're talking about the heart of the political division between Republicans and Democrats - the extent of government power," he said.

Citing comments by Newt Gingrich, Colburn said Republicans fear that if Obama succeeds in either repairing the national economy or instituting health care reform, they could lose political power for several election cycles to come.

But the issue isn't just politics, Colburn said.

"Republicans are finding an audience in part because there are a lot of people who have good health care and fear it could be jeopardized."

That idea was clear in many responses to the Tribune survey.

"I'm afraid if it is passed I would ... lose my work provided insurance," wrote Jacqueline Raby of Brooksville. "I have a pace maker-defibrillator. ... It has already saved my life once. With Obama's plan I would be dead."

Others, who don't have insurance, voiced the opposite opinion.

"My insurance now will not pay for my meds for MS, and I can't afford almost $2,500 a month for them," wrote Linda Scott of Brooksville.

Tony LaColla of Tampa said he'd like to start his own business, "but one of the factors keeping me from doing that is the cost of health care ... If I take the risk without health care and get sick I could go into bankruptcy."

But even mainstream Republicans are stretching the limits of political debate to encourage fear of the plan - not just Sarah Palin talking about imaginary "death panels."

Florida GOP Chairman Jim Greer recently sent an email to party supporters repeating the suggestion that the health care proposal would include forcing women to have abortions.

That's based on a section of the act that regulates what kind of medical services may be provided by states to the poor under the Social Security Act. It says nurse visits to expectant families qualify if the visits are effective at improving maternal or child health, reducing child abuse or "increasing birth intervals between pregnancies."

Greer stood by his statement when questioned, but didn't explain how allowing states to provide home nurse visits to those who want them would force women to have abortions.