JONATHAN GRUBER IS THE WORST STRAUSSIAN EVER: Jonathan Gruber loves parrots. I’ve always found this an oddly disturbing quirk about the Obamacare architect. vlt.tc/1po6 He writes with a bird that likes to repeat everything it hears looking over his shoulder, listening as he hums Van Halen to himself and remakes the American health care system with an Excel sheet and a Powerpoint deck. vlt.tc/1po7 He has eight of them – the parrots, I mean – which would be fine if he were some kind of very dedicated Jack Sparrow cosplayer, but to the best of my knowledge, he is not. What he is, in a very obvious way, is the worst Straussian ever. If one believes in the virtue of the noble lie, the untruth told to achieve some greater end – John Wayne in Liberty Valance (“You taught her how to read and write; now give her something to read and write about!”) or Christopher Nolan’s Batman (“Why’s he running dad?” “Because we have to chase him.”) – you kind of have to stick to that lie. You can’t raise your hand and say “here’s why we told you all that crap we don’t actually believe to help get a bunch of people to buy insurance or sign up for Medicaid”. But apparently that’s what Jonathan Gruber has been doing for the past year, loudly, at every event where a microphone is stuck in front of his face. Why in the world would he do this? I have no idea. Maybe it’s the parrot over his shoulder, swaying back and forth and saying over and over “if you like your plan you can keep it if you like your plan you can keep it if you like your plan you can keep it”. But whatever the motivation, the statements are inflicting some very real damage on the administration on the subject at a time when Obamacare is more vulnerable than it has been since 2012. Hill Republicans are considering hearings on the subject of his comments. vlt.tc/1pmc That Halbig/Pruitt/King v. Burwell thread of cases is headed back to the Supreme Court, and this time it may be a bridge too far for John Roberts to ride to Obamacare’s rescue. It is a very trying time, and making the case that Obamacare’s foundation is a series of intricate but well-intentioned lies is not where you want to be. vlt.tc/1pmi And those well-intentioned lies have not come cheaply. Gruber has bounced around from state to state, parroting a series of lines and Powerpoints to state officeholders on the virtues of setting up exchanges and the benefits Obamacare has to offer their citizens. vlt.tc/1po9 “Minnesota, for example, used federal Obamacare grants to pay Mr. Gruber to attend one meeting, participate in a biweekly email list and print a copy of the report, all for 329,000. Wisconsin paid Mr. Gruber 400,000 for the same material, requested by the office of then-Gov. Jim Doyle, a Democrat. When the report was presented, Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican, didn’t want Mr. Gruber at the news conference. Vermont is paying him another 400,000. Such a deal!” Essentially, what Gruber is saying is all true, in the 2009 sense of truth as opposed to the truth revealed by experience. Obamacare’s case to the public was that it would lower costs and make everything better for everyone. It wouldn’t just cover more Americans, it would also cut the deficit! It would be all things for all people. It is that essential lie that has been the project’s Achilles heel all along. The pitch on costs was undertaken because polls indicated that, overwhelmingly, Americans don’t particularly care about the coverage issue – they just care about the cost issue, which impacts their personal budgets in a more direct way. They want insurance to be cheaper, regardless whether other citizens are getting it. And Gruber understands this. vlt.tc/1poa “Barack Obamas not a stupid man, okay? He knew when he was running for president that quite frankly the American public doesnt actually care that much about the uninsured. ... What the American public cares about is costs. And thats why even though the bill that they made is 90 percent health insurance coverage and 10 percent about cost control, all you ever hear people talk about is cost control. How its going to lower the cost of health care, thats all they talk about.” Noble lies aren’t a problem when they are consistent with American biases on a host of issues. But they become a problem when the policy project undertaken with those noble lies as the basis is undone by the vagaries of reality. Obamacare is a project launched on the basis of American frustrations with the cost of health care, but it has not in any significant way addressed that issue. Indeed, the regulatory pressure has outpaced the subsidy provisions, raising the costs of products for many Americans who were happy with things the way they were. Gruber is being indicted in the public square for his taxpayer funded deceit, but the reality is that he is simply being too honest for Washington to tolerate. Let us hope the parrot comforts him in his hour of need. via The Transom
Posted on: Fri, 14 Nov 2014 13:57:04 +0000