{"id":7943,"date":"2014-11-13T21:54:19","date_gmt":"2014-11-14T02:54:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/frenchrevolution\/?p=7943"},"modified":"2014-11-13T21:54:19","modified_gmt":"2014-11-14T02:54:19","slug":"how-bad-is-obamacare-remember-the-context-for-grubers-deceptions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/frenchrevolution\/2014\/11\/13\/how-bad-is-obamacare-remember-the-context-for-grubers-deceptions\/","title":{"rendered":"How Bad Is Obamacare? Remember the Context For Gruber’s Deceptions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>
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As now the\u00a0\u00a0third video<\/a>\u00a0emerges of \u201cObamacare architect\u201d Jonathan Gruber\u00a0\u201dinsulting voters,\u201d it\u2019s important that we remember the context for Obamacare\u2019s\u00a0lies, spins, evasions, and deliberate obfuscation. <\/p>\n

Obamacare was so expansive, so unpopular, and so outside the perceived will of the voters, that Gruber\u00a0and his administration allies felt that they had to intentionally confuse and deceive the American people to pass health care reform\u00a0through a Democrat-dominated Congress<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Remember, these were the halcyon days of President Obama\u2019s alleged mandate \u2014 when mainstream pundits were heralding a potential sea change in American politics, when\u00a0Time<\/em>\u00a0declared Republicans<\/a>\u00a0an \u201cendangered species.\u201d Yet Obamacare\u2019s architects knew they were moving farther and faster than the American people wanted. They knew that if they wrote a law in plain English that even their Democratic allies in Congress would reject it. They knew that if they explained the true effects of the law \u2014 including the existence of very real trade-offs \u2014 that not even a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate could save them.<\/p>\n

For years, conservatives have been arguing that the divisiveness and anger of the last several years are exactly what happens when major social legislation is passed on a purely partisan basis. The reality, however, was much worse. The administration passed major social legislation not just by strong-arming Republicans but also by deceiving its own allies. That\u2019s not just partisan, it\u2019s deceitfully partisan, and as Democratic politicians\u00a0survey the charred remnants of their 2009 \u201cmandate\u201d and polish up their CVs,\u00a0they can shake their now-unemployed fists at the White House that cost them their jobs.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to imagine a number of far more modest reforms that would have garnered some degree of Republican support, especially as purple-state Republicans feared for their own professional lives after President Obama\u2019s election. But this was an administration that was far more ambitious \u2014 aid for the poor and near-poor wasn\u2019t enough. It had to increase access to abortion. It had to turn employee health plans into the next front of the culture war. It had to give the IRS an even greater degree of access to Americans\u2019 private lives. It had to increase regulatory authority over myriad aspects of American health care. It had to engage in stealth redistribution of wealth.<\/p>\n

While the truly partisan pundits are unfazed by Gruber\u2019s\u00a0compulsive truth-telling, will the allegedly more mainstream media revise its own history of the Obama presidency? Is the problem with Obamacare truly Republican \u201cobstructionism,\u201d or is it administration deception \u2014 featuring a willingness to deliberately make the provision of American health care needlessly complex to accomplish hyper-partisan ideological goals?<\/p>\n

How bad was Obamacare? So bad it couldn\u2019t even pass through a Democratic supermajority on its own merits.<\/p>\n

This article first appeared on\u00a0National Review Online<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Read more on the\u00a0Patheos Faith and Family Channel<\/a>\u00a0and follow\u00a0David on Twitter<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

They knew that if they wrote a law in plain English that even their Democratic allies in Congress would reject it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1314,423],"class_list":["post-7943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-jonathan-gruber","tag-obamacare"],"yoast_head":"\nHow Bad Is Obamacare? 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