“Sell the Sizzle”

When I taught marketing during my teaching career at Syosset High School, I used some of the sales techniques of a well-known guru of master salesmanship named Elmer Wheeler. One of his famous sales points and the full sentence of the above headline was; “Don't Sell the Steak, Sell the Sizzle”. This phrase referred to the sales point that people don't buy the product itself (the steak), they buy what the product will do for them (the sizzle).

That's what Obama and the Democrats tried to do in selling that monstrosity of a health plan called ObamaCare. They almost completed the sale by using the “sizzle” to claim that ObamaCare would do great things for millions of people. Through manipulation, bribes, cajoling, and backroom deals, they got a willing Democrat Congress to pass it. No Republicans voted for it.

Meanwhile, as more and more information came out (no one actually knew what was in it because no one read the 2,700 page bill - Speaker Pelosi even said that we will know what is in the bill after we pass it, the people turned against it as over 60% of the people now think that it should be repealed. The “sizzle” points of lower medical costs and lower premiums, the claim that you could keep your own doctor regardless, and that Medicare wouldn't be affected etc. were all found to be not true. So after the people were sold on the “wonderful” benefits of this health care proposal, the people decided the product didn't meet the standards they were told was in the bill.

I guess the old adage of “You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time” really applies to this boondoggle.

The representatives in Congress are now in the process of trying to repeal the bill in total even though it does contain some worthwhile provisions. The Republicans, knowing that we need some reform of health care, want to repeal it and start over from scratch, and craft a new bill with true bi-partisan input, which was totally lacking in the legislation that was passed by the Democrats.

The efforts by the present Congress might become moot if the courts, as predicted, shoot down this legislation as being unconstitutional, which most constitutional scholars seem to think will happen. No where in the Constitution does it say that a person must buy a product or service directed by the federal government. Obama and the Democrats will argue that the Commerce Clause of the Constitution lets the federal government mandate coverage. I predict that this legislation will finally be shot down by the U.S. Supreme Court as being unconstitutional.

So, many people were sold the “sizzle” of ObamaCare, but later on found that the “steak” was unfit for consumption, and they demanded their money back. I think they'll get a refund.

Conservative commentary by Chuck Lehmann