Poll: More want health law expanded than fully repealed

By Greg Sargent

Earlier this month, some on the right got very excited by a Gallup poll finding that a plurality, 46 percent, want the health law repealed, versus only 40 percent who want to keep it in place. That poll, however, only presented two options: Repeal, or let the law stand as is.

Today brings a new Marist poll that takes a more fine grained look at public attitudes towards repeal, and its results are quite different. No one should be under any illusions: The health law is unpopular. But the picture is complicated. Marist:

Which one of the following comes closest to your opinion about what Congress should do with the 2010 health care law: Let it stand: 14 Change it so it does more: 35 Change it so it does less: 13 Repeal it completely: 30

More registered voters want the law expanded than fully repealed, with the latter category amounting to less than a third. A total of 49 percent want to let it stand or change it so it does more, versus 43 percent who want to scale it back or get rid of it entirely.

The flip side of this argument, of course, is that the law isn't going to be expanded anytime soon, and the 43 percent who want it cut back or repealed is uncomfortably high -- higher than many of us thought it would be.

Again, there's no quibbling with the fact that the health law is unpopular in an overall sense. The point, though, is that the law can be unpopular for more than one reason. And it's not clear that its unpopularity translates directly into support for full repeal. If anything, public opinion about the law remains volatile and complicated, which elevates the stakes for the coming repeal battle and suggests Dems may have a second chance to sell the public on the law, even if the success of that effort is anything but assured.

