The chart above is from a new NBC News / Wall Street Journal Poll -- done between January 12th and 15th of a random national sample of 1,000 adults, and has a margin of error of 3.1 points.
The poll shows that 45% of the public now thinks Obamacare is a good idea, while only 41% say it is a bad idea. That's the highest percentage supporting Obamacare (the Affordable Care Act) since it became law -- and the first time that significantly more view it favorably than unfavorably.
It was easy to bad-mouth the program when it looked like it could not be repealed, especially since the program does have some flaws and needs to be improved. But now the Republicans have the power to repeal (or defund) the program -- either of which would kill it. Now people are starting to realize that the program is in real danger of ceasing to exist, and they are worried that we could go back to a situation like existed before Obamacare (or even worse).
It now looks more and more like the GOP's killing of Obamacare could easily come back to bite them. And with Trump's promise that everyone would have insurance (and it would be cheaper), the GOP seems to have put themselves between a rock and a hard place. Are they really going to throw many millions of people off their health insurance coverage, and put the private insurance companies back in charge of the nation's health care? Could they even survive doing that? It'll be interesting to see what happens.
