According to The Wall Street Journal, supporters of what now is frequently called “Obamacare” began polling focus groups years ago to determine which health care related words would successfully woo voters.
The effort began four years ago, when a center-left coalition of advocacy groups, union leaders and health-care experts teamed up to try to change the language of the health-care debate. The Herndon Alliance, named after the northern Virginia suburb where proponents first met, included the AARP, Service Employees International Union, the American Cancer Society and the liberal health-policy group Families USA, among others.
The alliance, now based in Seattle, hired the Democratic polling outfit Lake Research and California market-research firm American Environics.
The idea was to take a page from the Republican playbook, said Robert Crittenden, a physician and founder of the Herndon Alliance. Republicans had become adept at using words to seize issues, turning the estate tax into the “death tax,” for instance.
“We always had the facts on our side,” Dr. Crittenden said. “But our language hasn’t connected with what the general public actually cared about.”
HT: Wesley J. Smith at Secondhand Smoke.
