It's Official: Liberals Lie To Get What They Want

[Cow Poke]

It's one comment from one consultant of the ACA, which happens to be contrary to his own prior statements (and economic analyses), to say nothing of being contrary to myriad other consultants and, more importantly, Congressional lawmakers during and after the construction of the ACA.

So, what are you saying, Sam? That this guy lied about lying?

He's CERTAINLY not for the transparency that Obama promised! (bolding mine)

This bill was written in a tortured way to make sure [the Congressional Budget Office] did not score the mandate as taxes. If CBO scored the mandate as taxes, the bill dies. OK? So it's written to do that. In terms of risk-rated subsidies, if you had a law which said healthy people are going to pay in — you made explicit that healthy people pay in and sick people get money — it would not have passed. OK? Lack of transparency is a huge political advantage. And basically, call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever, but basically that was really, really critical to get the thing to pass. Look, I wish ... we could make it all transparent, but I'd rather have this law than not.
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/politics/medic...5kQlLoCRP7w.99

[Sam]

No, you're right. You and your liberal blogs already told us that he didn't mean what he said, and now you assure us that he doesn't actually know what he's talking about. We should just ignore him and hope that he's wrong about the cluelessness of Democrat voters.In the meantime, I hear there's this great deal on a little bridge in Brooklyn.

Oh, you can freely explain why, if the law was explicitly designed and written to exclude federal exchanges from subsidies, why no one at the time clearly implied that to be the case. Or why CBO and other economic projections assumed that subsidies would be available in all states, regardless of the origin of the exchanges. Or why people using federal exchanges did, in fact, receive subsidies upon enrolling. Or why four conservative Supreme Court justices, in reviewing the constitutionality of the law, argued that the law was written to allow subsidies on federal exchanges:

Source: NFIB v. Sebelius. Dissent

If Congress had thought that States might actually refuse to go along with the expansion of Medicaid, Congress would surely have devised a backup scheme so that the most vulnerable groups in our society, those previously eligible for Medicaid, would not be left out in the cold. But nowhere in the over 900-page Act is such a scheme to be found. By contrast, because Congress thought that some States might decline federal funding for the operation ofa “health benefit exchange,” Congress provided a backup scheme; if a State declines to participate in the operation of an exchange, the Federal Government will step inand operate an exchange in that State. See 42 U. S. C. §18041(c)(1). ......In the absence of federal subsidies to purchasers, insurance companies will have little incentive to sell insurance on the exchanges. Under the ACA’s scheme, few, if any, individuals would want to buy individual insurance policies outside of an exchange, because federal subsidies would be unavailable outside of an exchange. Difficulty in attracting individuals outside of the exchange would in turn motivate insurers to enter exchanges, despite the exchanges’ onerous regulations. See 42 U. S. C. §18031. That system of incentives collapses if the federal subsidies are invalidated. Without the federal subsidies, individ-uals would lose the main incentive to purchase insurance inside the exchanges, and some insurers may be unwilling to offer insurance inside of exchanges. With fewer buyers and even fewer sellers, the exchanges would not operate as Congress intended and may not operate at all.

© Copyright Original Source

Emphasis added. In 2012, Scalia et al. argued that Congress intended federal subsidies to be available on the exchanges, as virtually everyone else was arguing. They argue, in fact, that the lack of subsidies would cause the exchanges to "not operate as Congress intended" and, indeed, probably cripple the law altogether! Now presumably the same four judges want to hear, as a serious legal challenge, the idea that Congress really didn't intend for the federal exchanges to work, even though that would cripple the law. Or, worse, these justices want to take a shot at the even more ridiculous legal theory that a small clause can be divorced from any surrounding context and declared to be clearly stating something directly at odds with the surrounding context and be authoritative. No matter what else, that makes these justices and other peddlers of this legal nonsense laughingstocks.

[Cow Poke]

Sam, I'm trying to find any left or liberal source that denies, as you do, that Gruber was the architect (or a MAIN architect) of Obamacare. You seem to want to downplay his role as only a consultant.

Even NPR leads with "One of the main architects of the Affordable Care Act is being criticized for comments made last year in which he said the "stupidity of the American voter" was critical in getting the law to pass...

[Sam]

So, what are you saying, Sam? That this guy lied about lying?

He's CERTAINLY not for the transparency that Obama promised! (bolding mine)

This bill was written in a tortured way to make sure [the Congressional Budget Office] did not score the mandate as taxes. If CBO scored the mandate as taxes, the bill dies. OK? So it's written to do that. In terms of risk-rated subsidies, if you had a law which said healthy people are going to pay in — you made explicit that healthy people pay in and sick people get money — it would not have passed. OK? Lack of transparency is a huge political advantage. And basically, call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever, but basically that was really, really critical to get the thing to pass. Look, I wish ... we could make it all transparent, but I'd rather have this law than not.
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/politics/medic...5kQlLoCRP7w.99

I don't have any particular insight to the workings of Gruber's mind. It is notable, though, that y'all are willing to argue in one case that Gruber is a liar and can't be trusted and in another case that he's telling the truth — and, importantly, you're not making this determination based on actual facts regarding the law or its construction but simply because it's useful for him to be a liar in one place and telling the truth in another. This kind of argument is an exercise in post-modern relativism. Truth is whatever is useful at the moment, regardless of historical or factual correspondence.

[Cow Poke]

Even WIKI calls him "a key architect"....

Source: Wiki

Jonathan Holmes Gruber is a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he has taught since 1992. He is also the director of the Health Care Program at the National Bureau of Economic Research, where he is a research associate. He is an associate editor of both the Journal of Public Economics and the Journal of Health Economics. Gruber has been heavily involved in crafting public health policy. He was a key architect of both the 2006 Massachusetts health care reform, sometimes referred to as "Romneycare", and the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, sometimes referred to as "Obamacare".

© Copyright Original Source

[Cow Poke]

I don't have any particular insight to the workings of Gruber's mind. It is notable, though, that y'all are willing to argue in one case that Gruber is a liar and can't be trusted and in another case that he's telling the truth

No, Sam, I was asking YOU. Either way, it doesn't play so well for your team... either a LIAR was a key architect of Obamacare, and was LYING, or he's telling the truth about obfuscation... he's YOUR guy, not mine! But there appears to be unanimity that AT LEAST he was a "key" or "main" architect, if not THE architect.

— and, importantly, you're not making this determination based on actual facts regarding the law or its construction but simply because it's useful for him to be a liar in one place and telling the truth in another. This kind of argument is an exercise in post-modern relativism. Truth is whatever is useful at the moment, regardless of historical or factual correspondence.

Spin Spin Spin Don't you get really dizzy doing that, Sam? Or are you just used to it.

[Sam]

Sam, I'm trying to find any left or liberal source that denies, as you do, that Gruber was the architect (or a MAIN architect) of Obamacare. You seem to want to downplay his role as only a consultant.Even NPR leads with "One of the main architects of the Affordable Care Act is being criticized for comments made last year in which he said the "stupidity of the American voter" was critical in getting the law to pass...

As your own source notes, Gruber was one of the architects of the law — not, as MM alleged, THE architect. No one else has claimed at any point that federal subsidies would be limited to exchanges that were set up by states. Even Gruber's contemporaneous analyses assume that subsidies would be available on all exchanges. As I wrote earlier, this is finding a cherry skin among 1000 apple trees and declaring that you must be standing in a cherry orchard. An embarrassing example of just how far from reality motivated reasoning can take a person.

[Cow Poke]

As your own source notes, Gruber was one of the architects of the law — not, as MM alleged, THE architect.

No, Sam... you're undershooting the runway --- IF we agree that he wasn't "THE" Architect, you can't hide from even the liberal sources that call him "the MAIN" or "a KEY" or "One of the MAIN"... he wasn't, as you seem to wish to portray him, just a consultant. That's dishonest* and borders on sinful uncharity.




*CP does not really believe Sam is dishonest -- just misled.

[Sam]

No, Sam... you're undershooting the runway --- IF we agree that he wasn't "THE" Architect, you can't hide from even the liberal sources that call him "the MAIN" or "a KEY" or "One of the MAIN"... he wasn't just, as you wish to portray him, just a consultant. That's dishonest and borders on sinful uncharity.

You really need to learn how to better sling your arrows, especially if you keep trying to use my material. Sloppy.

I've never argued that Gruber wasn't a very important consultant or wasn't one of the main architects of both Romneycare and Obamacare; I've explicitly mentioned that previously and so there's no way you can accuse me of being dishonest (or, more precisely, disingenuous). What I have argued and continue to argue is that Gruber was not THE architect, as MM claims, nor was he the authoritative voice on how Obamacare would work, let alone how the exchanges were designed to work in drafts of the Senate and House bills. And as the interpretation of the Senate draft is what is being argued, the interpretation of the lawmakers writing the bill are more germane to accurate context than anything Gruber would say years later. And those lawmakers have all publicly said, and their contemporaneous communications support this, that they intended federal subsidies to be available regardless of whether the exchange was federal or state based. Journalists covering the ACA also uniformly believed this to be the case. Through judicial review found this to be the case even among the dissenters.

And if you really, really want to focus on Gruber, his own economic analyses assumed that subsidies would be available to all 50 states. If you really want to harp on me not cherry-picking regarding Gruber's importance, you have to also not cherry-pick regarding Gruber's working assumptions.

[phank]

So I guess the new Republican narrative is that Gruber, unbeknownst to any of the lesser architects, and in glorious inconsistency with the remainder of the act and the stated goal of the act, carefully inserted a sentence fragment that could, if you squint just right, be interpreted as disabling basically the entire program. And he did this, without mentioning it and nobody else noticing it for years, for the purpose of getting unnecessary logistical support from some Republican governors.

I should think even those most fanatically opposed to the act would be uncomfortable with such a nonsensical narrative. It even makes the birthers look rational by comparison.

[Cow Poke]

From Jonathanturley.org: (bolding mine)

Source: jonathanturley.org

We previously discussed the statements of Jonathan Gruber, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology economist who played a major role the ACA, or “Obamacare,” where he repeatedly endorsed the theory at the heart of the recent decisions in Halbig and King by challengers to the ACA: to wit, that the federal funding provision was a quid pro quo device to reward states with their own exchanges and to punish those that force the creation of federal exchanges. That issue will now be decided by the United States Supreme Court. Gruber caused a considerable controversy when, after he had denounced the theory as “nutty” during the arguments in Halbig and King, he was shown later to have embraced that same interpretation. Having been paid almost $400,000 as an architect of the ACA, Gruber has become a major liability in the litigation. Now Gruber is back in the news with an equally startling admission that the Obama Administration (and Gruber) succeeded in passing the ACA only by engineering a “lack of transparency” on the details and relying on “the stupidity of the American voter.”

© Copyright Original Source

It seems he's no stranger to changing his mind on key issues.

[Cow Poke]

And if you really, really want to focus on Gruber, his own economic analyses assumed that subsidies would be available to all 50 states. If you really want to harp on me not cherry-picking regarding Gruber's importance, you have to also not cherry-pick regarding Gruber's working assumptions.

Well, now, hold your horses, big fella... seems he changes his mind on those kinds of things.

[Mountain Man]

No, Sam... you're undershooting the runway --- IF we agree that he wasn't "THE" Architect, you can't hide from even the liberal sources that call him "the MAIN" or "a KEY" or "One of the MAIN"... he wasn't, as you seem to wish to portray him, just a consultant. That's dishonest* and borders on sinful uncharity.

*CP does not really believe Sam is dishonest -- just misled.

Thing is, other "consultants" said similiar things.

Source: Breitbart

Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel: "Vague promises of savings from cutting waste, enhancing prevention and wellness, installing electronic medical records and improving quality of care are merely 'lipstick' cost control, more for show and public relations than for true change."

Robert Reich: "...if you're very old, we're not going to give you all that technology and all those drugs for the last couple of years of your life to keep you maybe going for another couple of months. It's too expensive...so we're going to let you die."

So are those who worry about healthcare rationing simply paranoid? Of course not. Everyone with a shred of brainpower understands that government cannot create independent supply of medical care, but can merely redistribute what is already present. That means redistributing cost from old to young, and care from the elderly to everyone else. Anyone who argues to the contrary is merely mimicking the strategy of Jonathan Gruber: lying to the “stupid” American people.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm...-Obamacare-Lie

© Copyright Original Source

But don't worry, they're just more lone wolves like Gruber. We can trust Sam when he tells us they're not authoritative. Or they didn't mean what they said. Or they don't know what they're talking about. Or are they lying about lying? I forget.

[Mountain Man]

So I guess the new Republican narrative is that Gruber, unbeknownst to any of the lesser architects, and in glorious inconsistency with the remainder of the act and the stated goal of the act, carefully inserted a sentence fragment that could, if you squint just right, be interpreted as disabling basically the entire program. And he did this, without mentioning it and nobody else noticing it for years, for the purpose of getting unnecessary logistical support from some Republican governors.

I should think even those most fanatically opposed to the act would be uncomfortable with such a nonsensical narrative. It even makes the birthers look rational by comparison.

The idea was to punish those states which did not set up Obamacare exchanges (and I'm sure this clause had the support of other "consultants"), but since the law is so massive and unwieldy, there's nobody even now who fully understands it or its implications, so it's not surprising that something like this might have slipped by the notice of all the congressmen and senators who didn't bother reading it before casting their vote.

But wouldn't it be deliciously ironic if this little clause became this monster's undoing?

[seer]

But wouldn't it be deliciously ironic if this little clause became this monster's undoing?

Yes and amen!