Rep. Miller: Healthcare could have waited

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WASHINGTON, April 20 (UPI) -- Some Democrats in the U.S. Congress are criticizing the Obama administration for dealing with healthcare ahead of the nation's economic problems.

Rep. Brad Miller of North Carolina told The Hill the administration wasted both time and political capital on healthcare reform.

The constitutionality of the law's mandate that every American purchase health insurance is before the U.S. Supreme Court.

"I think we would all have been better off -- Democrats in Congress politically, and the nation would have been better off -- if we had dealt first with the financial system and other related economic issues and them come back to healthcare," Miller said.

He said economic problems would continue to plague President Barack Obama's 2012 re-election chances.

Rep. Dennis Cardoza of California also criticized his party's handling of the healthcare issue and said he repeatedly called on leaders to figure out how they were going to pay for the measure.

Most of the second-guessing on the healthcare issue has come from Democrats retiring from Congress, The Hill said.

Rep. Barney Frank of Massachusetts told an interviewer Democrats "paid a terrible price for healthcare."

The party lost 63 seats and control of the House of Representatives in 2010, a little more than six months after Obama signed the bill into law. Republicans picked up six seats in the Senate.