Have the Democrats chickens come home to roost?

Scott Brown won a seat to the US Senate in a state that President Obama won by 26%. So just how does a Republican win in a state where there are seven Democrats for every two Republicans?

Two things turned this race around allowing Scott Brown to come back from a 30 point deficit in early December and win by 5%. The key factors become clear once you look at the day by day polling. A comfortable democrat lead started to dive the week of Christmas. The first was the result of the terrorist attack on Christmas Eve followed by the Obama Justice Department stepping in to give the terrorist an attorney and effectively stopping any interrogation that could shed light on other threats the terrorists have planned for us.

But the second and key item was health care. We finally reached a tipping point where a majority of Americans became fed up with the attempt to force health care plan on Americans they they clearly don't want.

This particularly resonated with Massachusetts voters who have lived with ObamaCare since 2006. What, you say? Yes, most of America doesn't realize that ObamaCare was modeled after the health care plan that was implemented in Massachusetts in 2006. Reform that has failed miserably.

Here are some facts about health care in Massachusetts since 2006.

• 97% of the population has insurance compared to 85% for America as a whole.
  
• There is a public option.
• Government subsidies are provided based on income
  
• Citizens are required to have insurance or pay a penalty
• Employers are required to provide insurance for workers or pay a penalty
• There are government imposed price controls insuring everyone pays the same regardless of health or pre-existing conditions

Sounding familiar yet? Here are the results after 3 years;

• The big cost savings projected going in have not materialized
• The annual cost to the state to fund this is over $2 billion a year.
• Insurance costs are the highest of all 50 states
• Cost of insurance is climbing. In 2009 the increase was two and half time the national rate.
  
• While Massachusetts has more doctors per capita then any other state, the wait time to see a doctor is longer than any of the 50 states.
• Prior to the reform, wait times were the shortest of all 50 states.
  
• The state recently has discussed the need to bump legal, tax paying, immigrants from the system leaving them to fend for themselves.
• While 75% of Americans are happy with the insurance coverage they have, in Massachusetts the figure is 22%
• The largest rate of dissatisfaction is among those earning $25,000-$50,000. In other words, the middle class
  
• The solution for reducing the out of control costs? Plans to ration various procedures.

Knowing all this, why would Democrats meet behind closed doors late at night to try and force this kind of health care on the American public? I'll let you reach your own conclusions. For me, I'm just thankful the people of Massachusetts had the decency to make sure this train wreak called ObamaCare will not be forced on America anytime soon.

For two excellent articles about healthcare in Massachusetts go here and here. The video interview with the government official responsible for writing the checks is rather telling.