'Rid the country of Obamacare': Other views

David Bozell, The Daily Caller: "Republicans took control of the Senate and made gains in the GOP-controlled House. ... Americans just repudiated the colossal disaster that is Barack Obama. At the center of his failed presidency — Obamacare. Mitch McConnell knows this. It's why he campaigned so hard against the Affordable Care Act. In radio and television ads, in speech after speech, McConnell promised to repeal Obamacare. The Republicans hung this monstrosity around Democrats' necks. It is the primary reason the GOP prevailed Tuesday. … Now that conservatives have delivered fresh faces who pledged to rid the country of Obamacare, it is up to (Republican leaders) to author the plan that will be executed successfully to accomplish that goal."

Jonathan Chait, New York:"John Boehner and McConnell celebrate their midterm victory in customary style, by writing a Wall Street Journal op-edexplaining their vision. In it, they promise to work to address 'a national debt that has Americans stealing from their children and grandchildren' … Oddly, only a few of the legislative items they propose have any relation to this burdensome debt that troubles them so. Even more oddly, all of those proposals would increase the debt. … The Congressional Budget Office confirmed last yearthat repealing Obamacare would increase the budget deficit by $109 billion over a decade. … The GOP's Obamacare conundrum in a nutshell is that they have condemned the law for its fiscal irresponsibility, but its political weakness stems precisely from its fiscal responsibility. The law made a lot of enemies because it had to make the numbers add up."

Byron York, Washington Examiner : "President Obama did something extraordinary, perhaps unprecedented, in his post-election news conference Wednesday: He claimed a mandate on behalf of voters who didn't vote … Remember that a month before the midterms, Obama declared that his policies 'are on the ballot, every single one of them.' Then Americans actually cast those ballots, and Obama's party lost decisively. A reasonable interpretation would be that voters broadly rejected the president's policies. So Obama looked for another way to read the results. Mentally, the president appears stuck in 2012, when he won re-election and had a chance to enact a second-term agenda. ... But he got very little done."