Thanks to decades of government action that has muddled the health-care marketplace, health-care reform is one of the most confusing policy debates known to American politics.
 
In the name of helping or improving health care, tax laws have created odd incentives. Regulation has become a mind-numbing patchwork of state and federal level rules that sometimes makes sense but pretty much always increase costs.
 
And while government has made health-care increasingly complicated, the issue has remained utterly simple on an emotional level.
 
Our innate desire to survive and thrive – and our interest in having our family members, loved ones and neighbors do the same – means that the issue quickly boils down to the gut-level for most people. If we are sick, we want good care that we can afford… or that someone else pays for.. If it’s our parent, spouse or child that’s sick – well, multiply that desire exponentially.
 
Which is why liberals have the rhetorical advantage when it comes to health-care reform. Their answers respond to basic human desires on health care in a way that is simple: “Affordable, accessible health care for all Americans.” Their words are the message equivalent of a warm blanket to a person with the chills. It’s soothing.
 
It’s an effective message strategy – just look at a successful ad campaign to compare. For example, the recent Tylenol ad campaign – two simple words dominate the entire campaign, and it works: “Feel better.” That’s nice, right? Soothing. Comforting.
 
Meanwhile, conservatives want to explain the problems with health care, show why it’s complicated, deconstruct and reconstruct it, piece-by-piece.. Their words? “Costs, regulation, deregulation, incentives, disincentives, markets, tax treatment, employer-based system, etc.”
 
Brrr. I miss my blanket already. Even though I disagree with what the blanket really represents (more taxpayer expense and less consumer choice/control)!
 
This is the age-old challenge for conservatives in its most difficult test ever: how to simplify the explanation of why smaller government and free markets actually work better, even on matters of, literally, life and death.
 
If conservatives can come up with the mirror image of socialized medicine – something that is comforting in its reassuring simplicity while quietly allowing the incentives of a free market to keep health-care prices and quality competitive – then we’ve got a fighting chance. Universal tax credits for health insurance come to mind, but we should agree to call them “vouchers” or maybe even “free health-care vouchers for everyone” – something that shows that it is a government giveaway, albeit one that encourages competition (think school vouchers for health care).
 
Sure, liberals will anger a multitude of health-care interests with their plan, but we conservatives need to accept the bracing reality that their populist message will likely win.
 
Those of us who want government to play a smaller role in our lives can either boil our plan down and get populist in our messaging – and accept the fact that we may anger certain segments of the health-care industry – or get in a long line for our next physical, Canada-style.