Wow. Really?

By Carl

This is a rather startling survey:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Americans appear split over President Barack Obama's health care proposals, according to a new national poll.

Fifty percent of those questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey released Wednesday morning say they support the president's plans, with 45 percent opposed.

The results indicate a generational divide.

"Obama's plan is most popular among younger Americans and least popular among senior citizens," CNN Polling Director Keating Holland said. "A majority of Americans over the age of 50 oppose Obama's plan; a majority of those under 50 support it."

And the children shall lead them.

Instinctively, I would have expected the opposite. After all, a big portion of the population of un- and underinsured Americans is comprised of young adults who, in their arrogance of assumed immortality, simply decline health insurance since it would crimp their disposable income better utilized for drinking, smoking and driving fast on the highways.

And people over 50, like me, would be more inclined to want some form of relief from the burden of ever-increasing premiums to cover an ever shrinking pool of participants. Single payer or at least national health care reform seems to me to fit that bill nicely, if nowhere near perfectly.

There is a bright spot to the survey, one that bodes well for healthcare reform:

The poll indicates that only three in 10 of all Americans think the president's health care proposals will help their families. Another 44 percent feel they won't benefit but that other families will be helped by the president's plans, and one in five say no one will be helped.

So roughly 80% of Americans feel that the reform would assist someone who needs it, which means that the vast majority of Americans feel healthcare in this nation is out of whack.

Good. That's a good sign and it bodes better for the future that younger people are taking such a practical and pragmatic view about what a government owes its people.

(Cross-posted to Simply Left Behind.)