POLITICO: … [Jonathan] Gruber, an economist and health care adviser, apologized for his infamous “stupid voters” riff about Obamacare, got scolded by one committee member after another, said he wasn’t really the “architect” of Obamacare and even came away facing a subpoena threat…
Still, Tuesday’s House hearing never forced Gruber to admit what Republicans wanted to prove: that he was speaking from inside knowledge of the writing of the Affordable Care Act, and therefore had confirmed that Obamacare was a fraud all along.
And as much as the Republicans grilled him, Gruber never budged from his story, whether they wanted to believe it or not: He ran numbers for Obamacare, didn’t really know the political strategies he talked about so freely, and did not, in fact, confirm the premise of a lawsuit over subsidies that could give the Supreme Court a new opportunity to unravel the health care law next year… (more)
EDITOR: While driving we listened to the committee on C-SPAN and were entertained by the hypocrisy of both Gruber and the committee members.
Gruber refused to rise to the bait and showed rigid discipline by characterizing himself as a solely a numbers cruncher, politically naïve, “flippant” in his comments, and deeply apologetic.
Of course this was patent nonsense for the most part. His guilt was having using hyperbole to impress and amuse others that was suitable for private conversation but not for an open academic forum.
We were amused at the latent hostility of some of the committee members towards Harvard and MIT from which Gruber held degrees as they praised the laudable values they learned at third tier colleges.
However, the apex of hypocrisy occurred when a congressman asked Gruber whether “There was ever a reason to mislead the public.” Here was a member of the Republican Party that had been wildly distorting the Affordable Care Act and even claiming that it was establishing “death panels.”
What we would have given to have been in Gruber’s place and free to respond to the gibes from those sanctimonious hypocrites!
Nevertheless, Gruber admirably stuck to his role of repentant sinner. However, we suspect what he repented was having said half in jest at a recorded public academic forum what should have been restricted to dinner with friends.
