Administration seeks help from librarians, NFL to promote ObamaCare

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Administration amping up efforts to promote ObamaCare

Jim Angle reports

The administration has launched a full court press, seeking help from any and everyone to promote ObamaCare.

"I think they're between a rock and a hard place here," says Jim Capretta of the American Enterprise Institute. "The time is very short, they're trying to take the health care law, ObamaCare, mainstream by any means possible."

This past weekend, the American Library Association agreed to help the administration inform people about their options.

Jackie Garner, the ranking official from the Health and Human Services Department in Chicago, says "Libraries are where everyone goes to ask questions and find answers."

Ruth Holst, with the National Network of Libraries of Medicine, adds "We know that libraries have become the hub in many communities for people who need info about the Affordable Care Act," which is the official name of the health care law.

The administration also tried to get sports leagues such as the NFL and Major League Baseball to join the enrollment campaign, but that went nowhere.

Rich Galen, a Republican analyst,  says sports leagues are better off focusing on team loyalties rather than political loyalties ---  especially with the new law remaining widely unpopular.

"This is a highly charged politcal subject," he says, "and I think everybody needs to stay in their lane. And the NFL agreed that that was a good idea."

In fact, The NFL made clear they would not be promoting the health care law, saying in a statement that "we currently have no plans to engage in this area and have had no substantive contact with the administration"  about the law's implementation.

Major League baseball and the National Hockey League said the White House scheduled and later cancelled meetings with them.

The Obama administration is also trying to use its formidable social media skills -- and is spending a million dollars in Los Angeles alone to get young people to try to sign up their  friends and family, just as it did voters in the last two elections.

"If you're using social media to try to say get out and vote for the president, they can do that without costing them a lot of money," says Jim Capretta of the American Enterprise Institute.

"But in this particular case, they're saying, hey, come out and sign up for health insurance and by the way it's going to cost you $100 dollars a month, it's a different story altogether."

The rules in the law mean young people will have to spend a lot more on insurance than they do now.

And if they don't sign up, the insured population will be older and sicker -- and Obamacare will be much more expensive.