He didn't lie. He experienced discomfort with the lying nature of others and his own implication in it. Consider the possibility that he didn't get caught telling the truth: He felt a drive to tell the truth and he is immensely, awesomely satisfied that his truth-telling has burst out and is dominating the American consciousness.
This is just a theory. I don't know how the man really feels, and I acknowledge that my theory may conflict with what I presume is his policy preference — the success of Obamacare. This is simply a line of thought that occurred to me the moment I said: "I wonder how Jonathan Gruber feels."
Sudden fame is an interesting phenomenon. I was just reading this NYT article "Alex From Target: The Other Side of Fame," about a 16-year-old boy who got famous suddenly one day when a picture of him that had been taken without his notice got tweeted by a girl with the one word caption "YOOOOOOOOOOO." It can be surreal and upsetting to get a fame surprise.
But Gruber is not a teenager. And he wasn't just minding his own business. He's a professor who thrust himself into the political policy sphere. He got his work — Architect of Obamacare! — and he had his effect, but he had his outsider observations too, and he felt distanced and above it all, and he wanted to disclose his perspective to others. He spoke openly, in an academic setting, to others who feel distanced and above it all.* And now the whole world is listening in. Gruber didn't say it directly to us, which would have been rude. He confided to like-minded confidantes, and we overheard. The American people are the distanced observers of his sphere of activity — the professors. And I want to suggest that he's energized and alive and joyous to get his message across to the vast classroom that is all of America.
______________________
* I think Barack Obama himself is that sort of person, but he's taken that manner and repurposed it for general consumption. The manner often works for him, perhaps because it plays against a racial stereotype that Americans don't like to believe they harbor. But it doesn't always work, and it must be a very strange experience for Obama, if he has the time and disposition to notice his feelings and reflect upon them. And I think he does. That's the Obama memoir I want to read. And I bet he's writing it, and we will read it some day.
ADDED: And then there's Rich Weinstein, the "nobody... the guy who lives in his mom’s basement wearing a tinfoil hat." How does he feel?
"It’s terrifying that the guy in his mom’s basement is finding his stuff, and nobody else is," he says. "I really do find this disturbing."
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146 comments:
No more soup for him at the lefty parties.
New hashtag making the interwebs:
Keep your plan? #Grubered
Keep your doctor? #Grubered
I think Dr. Gruber (he's a PhD, right?) will feel even better after he unburdens himself under oath before Rel. Joedan's committee.
Unless the Jarrett Administration gets him into the Witness Protection Program first.
How does a snake feel?
No more than you, AA, do I know how Gruber* is feeling. But I do feel fairly certain that he wishes he weren't the one spilling the beans, letting the world in on the secret that conservatives have known for years. Viz., that if liberals, Democrats, told the truth, they would never be in office.
*Wasn't there a Gruber on McHale's Navy?
http://cache.boston.com/resize/bonzai-fba/Globe_Photo/2009/11/12/1258082511_9816/300h.jpg
"How does Jonathan Gruber feel?"
I surmise he does not feel nearly as good as Mandy Moore, and I am willing to prove this with my fingertips.
He just turned 49 - young enough to have a professional future to be concerned about. This is just the beginning of people like him who will need to wash off that Obama skank smell they acquired.
This - "He spoke openly, in an academic setting, to others who feel distanced and above it all." It's not only an indictment of Gruber but of the people in the room(s). Why did it take so long for this videos to come out? Why weren't many in the room(s) shocked by his statements and talking to the press about them?
And I think you have nailed Obama.
What I think he is likely feeling is frustration that his comments are misunderstood by stupid masses. And I am not being facetious. Gruber, like Obama, thinks that when others react against their ideas that it is just a breakdown in communication. It is one of the things I first noticed about Obama. He doesn't ever think he is substantively wrong; he may grudingly admit that he and his people have not done as well as they could have in communicating.
In this case Gruber is probably grudgingly admitting that he should have anticipated that the stupid people may have been too stupid to understand what he meant when he referred to them as stupid.
"But there was never any intention to literally withhold money, to withhold tax credits, from the states that didn’t take that step. That’s clear in the intent of the law and if you talk to anybody who worked on the law. My subsequent statement was just a speak-o—you know, like a typo." -- The ever-truthful Jonathan Gruber
He felt a drive to tell the truth and he is immensely, awesomely satisfied that his truth-telling has burst out and is dominating the American consciousness.
There are darn few people who don't want to be recognized for what we think are achievements. He sees Obamacare as a success, and assumes that everyone sees it as a success. There might be a Pauline Kael aspect where everyone he knows thinks it's a success. That a majority of the country doesn't see it that way probably feeds into his thinking that voters are stupid.
alan markus said...
He just turned 49 - young enough to have a professional future to be concerned about. This is just the beginning of people like him who will need to wash off that Obama skank smell they acquired.
Is he tenured? If he is, he probably doesn't have to worry about the future. Also, if MIT fired him, I'm sure some other academic institution will pick him up. Paul Krugman still has a job after all.
I think it is far more likely, given that he has been offering implausible excuses that he did not really say or mean what he plainly said and meant, that he feels pretty bad that cheap ubiquitous video recording equipment exists and that the videos can be widely disseminated without the cooperation of the MSM.
"He didn't lie."
He did lie. By his own admission, to the extent that he really is an architect of the bill, he purposefully obfuscated the effects of the bill for the purpose of getting it passed. He lied to the American people. And, as he said at the end of the first clip, he feels good about the fact that he got the bill.
I think he is loving life right now. He is a martyr for the cause. The left and Democrats view him as the Phil Robertson of the left. He is being attacked for no good reason.
Just look what his allies are saying about him:
The New Republic writes: the impolitic but ultimately unnewsworthy confessions of a single technocrat
The New York Times: Mr. Gruber was, in an infelicitous way, expressing frustration with that state of affairs
Also from another writer at the New York Times:
Jonathan Gruber was right, Public opinion on health care policy is just completely incoherent.
They are circling the wagons. He will be the toast of the town.
What Ralph Hyatt said. :)
He feels sheltered by the Liberal Media. I see a bright future for him as Treasury Sec in Liz Warren's Cabinet...
He didn't lie? Bullshit. He got caught, he said it was a "speak-o", and subsequent discoveries have proven that walk-back false.
He has not one ounce of regret. Garbage.
He spoke openly, in an academic setting, to others who feel distanced and above it all
That's what 'cloistered' sounds like. Some superior beings assemble, apart from hoi polloi, and reveal their candid feelings about the despised demos.
This is also what 'progressive' sounds like. The anointed elites running the show by hook & crook, just so much better than that vulgar voting stuff.
Is he tenured? If he is, he probably doesn't have to worry about the future.
I guess I was thinking more of things like $400,000 consulting gigs and other opportunities that might make him "real" money versus chump change as a professor.
He may well feel pretty good about putting one over on the rubes, but trying to armchair psychoanalyze a smug technocrat like Gruber is probably an exercise in futility. He may have well have narcissistic and psychopathic tendencies, but without knowing much about his day to day interpersonal behavior you can't say anything definitive.
He wanted to tell the truth to his peers so they could have a laugh and admire him. This was never meant for the shlubs and podunks in flyover country.
"Consider the possibility that he didn't get caught telling the truth: He felt a drive to tell the truth and he is immensely, awesomely satisfied that his truth-telling has burst out and is dominating the American consciousness"
This ought to be in Webster's under "pablum"
I don't see him as a hero to the Democrats anymore than the kid who blabbed all the NSA secrets, Edward Snowden. He is a hero to certain libertarians and anarchists but he is an outcast to many more.
Gruber spilled the beans on the lies told by Democrats to trick the American public about this huge law.
I don't think he will be invited to many think tanks.
Austin Goolsby has left academia and is a partner at an outfit called 32 Advisors which sounds like a consulting firm for lobbying government agencies.
His blabbing caused only a small embarrassment. Gruber's will be huge.
He feels regret like the toddler who gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Only that he didn't get away with it.
@ Eric @ 9:25 - thanks for saving me the time of posting those titles.
Media doing it's "job" to provide comfort to the "smart people" who functioned as useful idiots on behalf of ObamaCare (speaking of which, where is Inga?). Also, because this is such a "minor, non issue" the media was "smart" to not cover it.
Media - We Meant to Do That
I wonder how Chief Justice Roberts feels. The framers couldn't structure the mandate as a tax, but he could.
That sounds like how people who cheat say they wanted to be caught after they're caught.
Ph.D? Architect of the ACA? Did you read the original "bill" what a load of mumbo jumbo with most language referring to "family health services in under served and/or remote areas" or some such thing, with the true intent meaning "stop them from breeding" coupled with create confusion so that people will ultimately beg for a single-payor system.
He's just another elitist caught with his pants down but still smug in the knowledge that the targeted communities they wish to see population decline in will never figure this out.
On the other hand, as architect's go, he built a damn fine foundation with the occasional "as the secretary of HHS sees fit" inserted, giving that office powerful, ultimate power to enact mandates and form totalitarian committees that further their agenda and build their dream society of those that know what is best vs. the rest of us. They will have complete power over each of our lives to approve or deny care based on their carefully concocted versions of "research" "best practices" and the like.
So, Gruber's arguments for his desired outcome morphed and changed along the way always to the advantage of his goal even as his earlier statements were flatly contradicted by his later ones.
Althouse, an academic who has tasted influence and fame, intuits his emotions: "he's energized and alive and joyous to get his message across to the vast classroom that is all of America."
Feelings are interesting.
Intent is interesting.
Actions are objectively determinable.
Consequences are obviously determinable.
I'm much more concerned with consequences of the actions taken, not the intent nor the feelings of those who took those actions. Because it is reality that bites, not someone else's emotional response to reality.
I am probably mis-using the terms, but watching the clips of Mr. Gruber, social psychopath is what comes to my mind.
If Obama is writing the book "My Heart Laid Bare," then he will indeed win undying fame. (See the Edgar Allan Poe essay on this topic.) I'm skeptical that any Obama memoir will satisfy that title, however.
"I want to suggest that he's energized and alive and joyous to get his message across"
Doubt it. From the point of view of a normal, honest, and moral person, perhaps Gruber should feel that way. But he is a Progressive policy advocate, so what "energizes" him is whatever serves the cause. Exposure of this sort doesn't help.
"it must be a very strange experience for Obama, if he has the time and disposition to notice his feelings and reflect upon them"
Doubt it. From the point of view of a normal, honest, and moral person, perhaps Obama should feel and notice and reflect that way. But he is a Progressive narcissist, so he won't. In a man who fabricated his own autobiography, starting with the title, honest self-reflection seems unlikely.
Or as someone put more succinctly:
"The ACA was written to simply start government control of healthcare." [and thus control of your life]
(Apologies for the earlier rant/ramble, tough morning)
I think that, if anything, he is conflicted between pride in finally being recognized for his brilliance, and worry that the not-so-smart members of his own party may throw him out of the sled for tattling on them.
It will be interesting to see how Roberts reacts with the spotlight on this. He pulled their chestnuts out of the fire last time but this will be a bigger task.
The left will go ape but the decision will be after the new Congress is sworn in.
He intentionally lied in a professional capacity. If I did that it would be called "research fraud" and I would expect to be fired from my tenured position (whether or not the fraud committed was related to the university).
Of course, if caught, I could simply claim it was a research-o.
I have to admit a tiny thrill of satisfaction at having identified Gruber's salient characteristics some time ago.
In the novel "Earth" science fiction author and astrophysicist David Brin postulates a world where, due to ubiquitous video recording (ubiquitous in that everyone is wearing clothing that is recording video, small drones that take videos are everywhere, just complete and total surveillance at least possible anywhere at any time) privacy no longer exists.
And, due to issues such as a couple of nuclear detonations in major cities and, if I recall correctly, bio-terrorism, no one wants anyone to have any privacy. Anyone attempting to have privacy is assumed to be up to something nefarious.
Brin's twist on this is that lack of privacy doesn't just extend to private citizens. Government and businesses are also completely transparent because technology in the the hands of private citizens is equal to that available to any organization, no matter how large, and the public disdain for privacy is such that no organization that attempted to keep secrets could survive.
We are approaching that future at a rapid rate.
I think that he did lie in trying to contradict what he said in the first disclosed video, as a "speak-o". In that video, he was explaining that Congress intended that users of only those exchanges established by a state would be eligible for a subsidy. When that video was aired and deemed helpful to the most recent court challenges to ObamaCare, Gruber tried to contradict himself. I think that that attempt is enlightening into what Gruber is feeling. I suspect that Gruber does not want to reveal his true beliefs, but rather is willing to say whatever is now helpful to maintain the viability of ObamaCare.
He felt a drive to tell the truth and he is immensely, awesomely satisfied that his truth-telling has burst out and is dominating the American consciousness.
Unless Gruber is a sociopath, I find this highly implausible.
I would suggest a story arc like this (featuring a fully fictional character named Gruber):
Gruber wades into the policy meat market, helps make sausage, absorbs the idea that you have to sugarcoat the casings to sell the stuff. Feels energized. Loves the process of making sausage. Loves the game of selling sugar-coated sausage.
After the sausage is sold, controversy erupts. Gruber's friends love the sausage. Strangers seem to hate it. Gruber feels a combination of pride and frustration. He's not stupid. He knows that the sugar coating is revolting. There was this game, you see, of selling the sausage. So Gruber starts telling his friends about the game. This is his pride talking. He wants his friends to know how smart he was. Everything had a reason.
After Gruber talks, more controversy erupts. Gruber's friends give him the face palm. Strangers broadcast his explanations. Now Gruber is mortified. He wanted his peers to know how clever he was. Instead he has made himself look very very stupid. His pride in winning the game has turned into humiliation at throwing away the winnings.
If Gruber has a soul, he may actually feel remorse. The game of selling the sausage wasn't really a game after all. He lied -- and helped others to lie -- to people who really wanted to believe in sugar-coated sausage.
I knew Jon Gruber back in the day. He's smart, boisterous, and energetic. Never thought of him as weaselly.
He's right that politics and common misconceptions about economics can be used to advantage. Do you believe half of your Social Security payments are paid by you and the other half by your employer? That's what it says on paper. No economist would think it true. But it sells well that way, so there you are. Do you think your employer is paying for your health insurance? Economists don't. Your employer is paying you for your labor with a mixed basket of cash and benefits. What does he care what the actual mix is? Is there a difference between fining you $100 and raising everyone's taxes by $100 and giving everyone but you a $100 tax break? Again, laughable to an economist, but it makes all the difference politically and legally.
I think he probably feels hassled. It's fine to be doing this within your group, but when the cold light of broader public opinion hits you, the crowd is not cheering.
And for someone like this, the primary profesional impact is that now he's political death. Just think what these speeches have done to the politicians who voted for this! They are the ones who are most truly hurt by his statements.
In Gruber's world, access to the policy halls of power is what matters. He's now made himself persona non grata in those halls. I suspect he hates the guy who hunted this stuff up with a passion, or will come to do so.
As I often say about "liberals" (and by "liberals" I mean of course "tax-happy, coercion-addicted, power-tripping State-fellators")--if you can't trust people whose basic politico-economic philosophy is, essentially, legalized looting and pcket-picking, who can you trust?
On another note, let's start calling him "Hans" Gruber. They have the same basic morality.
Did he lie is the wrong question. One that permits one to equivocate. Nor did he admit ObamaCare is evil. Another currents question being answered in the negative to help Gruber.
He clearly participated in a conspiracy to defraud by obfuscation. He admitted it. He could be exposed to prosecution under 8 U.S.C. § 1001 US Code.
He acknowledges that his work made it possible to keep the actual economic truth from the American public.
Had he been selling securities, he would be going to jail.
Agree, and in my pot above, I should have said group rather than party.
I don't think Prof. Gruber is that much into "party," but his "group" would be important to him.
I agree with Henry's fictional Gruber, although I would have him selling the sausage labeled "foie gras."
Could be that the good Dr Gruber is just a Boomer. And doesn't know the difference between right and wrong. This is going to be a study for the sociologists in a century or two.
If there are any.
I think that he did lie in trying to contradict what he said in the first disclosed video, as a "speak-o". In that video, he was explaining that Congress intended that users of only those exchanges established by a state would be eligible for a subsidy. When that video was aired and deemed helpful to the most recent court challenges to ObamaCare, Gruber tried to contradict himself
Fox News: One Swedish-made Penis Enlarging Health Plan.
Dr. Jonathan Gruber: That's not mine.
Fox News: One credit card receipt for One Swedish-made Penis Enlarging Health Plan signed by Dr. Jonathan Gruber.
Dr. Jonathan Gruber: I'm telling ya baby, that's not mine.
Fox News: One warranty card for Swedish-made Penis Enlarging Health Plan, filled out by Dr. Jonathan Gruber.
Dr. Jonathan Gruber: I don't even know what this is! This sort of thing ain't my bag, baby.
Fox News: One book, "One Swedish-made Penis Enlarging Health Plan. And Me: This Sort of Thing Is My Bag Baby", by Dr. Jonathan Gruber.
He felt a drive to tell the truth and he is immensely, awesomely satisfied that his truth-telling has burst out and is dominating the American consciousness.
The essence of leftie doctrine is the 'nudge', or compelling personal sacrifice for the good of the collective. Gruber identified the political challenges of implementing that type of policy and successfully circumvented them. Why would anyone believe he regrets it?
Oh, and don't think for a second he didn't realize he was being recorded. That's no camera phone footage- there's a tripod involved. While there may be regret his words could help doom his achievement, he's proud of the deception.
C.S. Lewis. The Inner Ring.
http://www.lewissociety.org/innerring.php
Gruber doesn't want to have the public talking about him. This is who Gruber wanted to be:
People who believe themselves to be free, and indeed are free, from snobbery, and who read satires on snobbery with tranquil superiority, may be devoured by the desire in another form. It may be the very intensity of their desire to enter some quite different Ring which renders them immune from all the allurements of high life. An invitation from a duchess would be very cold comfort to a man smarting under the sense of exclusion from some artistic or communistic côterie. Poor man—it is not large, lighted rooms, or champagne, or even scandals about peers and Cabinet Ministers that he wants: it is the sacred little attic or studio, the heads bent together, the fog of tobacco smoke, and the delicious knowledge that we—we four or five all huddled beside this stove—are the people who know.
Also "That Hideous Strength", in which the first seduction of the male protagonist (in Lewis' work, perhaps it should just be agonist") is to be admitted to a policy "Inner Ring".
You're wondering why he would say such things, when he never had to. He said them because he was speaking to an insider group and flaunting his own status - in a way it was a primitive ritual.
Gruber is a man in the grip of a particular vice.
@eddie willers
Thank God I wasn't drinking coffee. You wins the internets today.
Ann Althouse said...Consider the possibility that he didn't get caught telling the truth:He felt a drive to tell the truth and he is immensely, awesomely satisfied that his truth-telling has burst out and is dominating the American consciousness.
.... He confided to like-minded confidantes, and we overheard.
I don't think it should be characterized as confiding, then. Going with your theory he was in fact bragging, albeit to a small audience. How does he feel to have his bragging exposed? Given that the media will continue to cover for him, that his peers likely share his outlook (cheering his having put one over on the stupid citizens), and that his new status as a target/victim of the Right will give him more esteem from those he cares about, I think it's safe to assume he's not too broken up about all this right now. How would hauling him before a Congressional committee change that? He's smug, and hey, remember, "we won," so why not be smug?
I knew Jon Gruber back in the day. He's smart, boisterous, and energetic. Never thought of him as weaselly.
He's right that politics and common misconceptions about economics can be used to advantage. Do you believe half of your Social Security payments are paid by you and the other half by your employer? That's what it says on paper. No economist would think it true. But it sells well that way, so there you are. Do you think your employer is paying for your health insurance? Economists don't. Your employer is paying you for your labor with a mixed basket of cash and benefits. What does he care what the actual mix is? Is there a difference between fining you $100 and raising everyone's taxes by $100 and giving everyone but you a $100 tax break? Again, laughable to an economist, but it makes all the difference politically and legally
This is the problem with most technocrats. They truly believe (foolishly, I would argue) that there are ways to construct complex human systems to benefit a majority at the expense of a minority. They also realize that the engineering of such systems in our current political enviroment requires obfuscation, misdirection, and often outright lies since the unvarnished truth wouldn't be acceptable to the masses. You can't simply flat out state that we're going to exploit a minority to benefit a majority. You can't simply state that we're taking from one group to in order to give to another.
And of course this speaks to the deeper problems with that sort of zero sum thinking.
@AA
Can a video be placed into evidence (or whatever) at the Supreme Court?
I wonder if Prof. Gruber is as amazed as Barack Obama over the amount of his "earnings" he is "allowed" to keep?
I don't being "smart" is what they think it is.
"Given that the media will continue to cover for him..."
The media is doing their usual; the only organization report this is Fox. The "stupid" public don't even know about it.
This episode reminds me of the final scenes of A Few Good Men in which Tom Cruise takes on Jack Nicholson on cross examination. Cruise said earlier to the doubter on his team, "He can't wait to tell the truth."
The extraordinary Mr Gruber wanted everyone to know how he tricks the rubes.
"Gruber didn't say it directly to us, which would have been rude. He confided to like-minded confidantes, and we overheard."
IOW. He got caught talking behind our back. Nothing new here, but it does say volumes about the "Academy" that he felt that comfortable doing so.
And it's very ugly!
I understand Gruber too well. He is always "talking over their heads," but he wants an audience worthy of his verbal skills.
And all he got was Senator Angus King who must be the dumbest human allowed to roam free in the political world.
...letting the world in on the secret that conservatives have known for years.
Yes, yes, and thus the most wonderful irony: the conservatives who protested most loudly - Tea Party activists - were the really smart ones; it was Obama supporters who were stupid, who believed the Progressive lies.
"He's right that politics and common misconceptions about economics can be used to advantage"
It's not just economics. It's decision theory and the role of "utilities" in making choices. Those of us who study this stuff know about how errors are made in medicine. The Representativeness Heuristic may be what caused the Ebola patient to be sent home from the Houston hospital.
It is not ethical to use such logic quirks to enrich your self. That's what con men do and we have a con man administration.
Ethics, of course, is a source of amusement to this crowd.
basically Gruber revealed a fraud. A fraud in which he participated with others. As he was being paid by the US government, it was his responsibility to not hide it but to come clean about it as soon as he understood it to be happening. He is culpable in defrauding the government.
this is blatant dishonesty. It is unlikely that this is the only area of dishonesty he has participated in. All his previous work should be examined to find other areas where he has been dishonest. If he has any ethics or morals he needs to come clean on these things.
"Senator Angus King who must be the dumbest human allowed to roam free in the political world."
Chuck Hagel might beat him out but it would be close.
"How does Jonathan Gruber feel?"
Like a rolling stone?
A male version of the popular/mean girls on campus?
"This is the problem with most technocrats. They truly believe (foolishly, I would argue) that there are ways to construct complex human systems to benefit a majority at the expense of a minority."
Well, you can, at least for awhile. The issue is who is going to be the exploited and who is going to be the exploiter.
However, in the case of the ACA it isn't a question of exploiting a minority for the benefit of the majority. It is just the opposite. The ACA transfers money from the healthy to the sick so that the sick can have subsidized health care.
The ACA is government rationing of healthcare. The exchanges and taxes that aren't taxes and 1000+ pages of laws and websites, etc are all just obfuscation of that fact.
And guess what, you don't have to have a Ph.d in economics and be a professor at MIT to know that.
When the government takes something from you so that it can give it to someone else that is rationing.
It would have been far cheaper and easier to simply announce that the President and the Democrats in congress felt that it was immoral to allow the poor and those with preexisting conditions to go without health care and therefore medicaid was going to be expanded and in order to do so taxes were going to be raised.
But of course they didn't think that would fly politically. So we have crony deals with health insurance companies and ridiculously expensive non-functional websites and a President who repeatedly lied.
Cause the technocratic government is so smart.
And the worst part of it?
I now find myself in agreement with Howard Dean.
The most disturbing thing about Gruber's statements isn't that he admits to lying, frankly I expect politicians (especially Leftys) to lie to me.
The thing that upsets me is the obvious contempt that Gruber feels for the American people, and the expectation that his audiences will share that contempt.
I see that all of the resident lefties have decided to sit another Gruber post out.
This is my shocked face>>> :-0
"That's the Obama memoir I want to read. And I bet he's writing it, and we will read it some day."
You may read it some day, although I cannot imagine why. The man will never say or write anything that interests me. His presidency is an illness I hope we can somehow recover from and never think of again.
And still the thing will come crashing down from its own weight, inadequate design, and shoddy construction.
It is amazing how these clever people cannot even do the wrong things right.
Just how screwed up do adults need to be to accept the excuse of a "speak-o" as serious?
The proposal is at the level of "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?"----Having no contact with reality.
EDH said...
Like a rolling stone?
I doubt it; $400k (of taxpayer $!) will buy a nice home and I don't think it can be claimed any longer that he's a complete unknown.
Mark O said...He acknowledges that his work made it possible to keep the actual economic truth from the American public.
That's true, and the conspiracy angle is interesting, but it's unfortunately common for a politician and/or gov. office to act in a way that would instantly land an equivaltent private citizen in jail (or saddle a private company with massive fines). Consider how bills are crafted for CBO scoring, or something as common as how Social Security accounting (or most Fed gov general budget accounting) is done--that shit would land me in jail, but it's business as usual for people who like to tell us how irresponsible and downright immoral the private sector is.
The funny thing is that liberals are defending Gruber -- even though THEY are the voters he means when he says voters are stupid. They are the ones who enthusiastically supported the law. They are the ones who were too dim to comprehend the economic and mathematical chicanery that makes it tick. How many liberals have happily insisted to you that the ACA is a wonderful thing because, for instance, contraceptives are now "free"? Gruber was not talking about conservatives, who were never as stupid as he hoped and have been trying to tell the truth about the law all along.
Now here we are, years later, and along comes Gruber with some truths of his own -- which liberals are still too dumb to understand. They're so used to assuming that they're the smart ones, of course, natch, not like those rethuglican neanderthals, that they've latched on to Gruber's comments as more confirmation of their comfy prejudices -- too dim to realize that they are the credulous yahoos that he looks down on.
"The ACA transfers money from the healthy to the sick so that the sick can have subsidized health care."
I don't mind subsidized healthcare. They didn't have to blow up the healthcare of 300 million people to subsidize 10 million or fewer.
This is all about being too clever by half. They thought they could do this perpetual motion machine style and fool everyone. This is just another leftist project that didn't turnout as they expected.
That's no camera phone footage- there's a tripod involved. While there may be regret his words could help doom his achievement, he's proud of the deception.
He probably had good reason to think the video would remain in the cloistered circle in which he spoke. The fact that it did for over a year is corroborative.
Thank one Rich Weinstein - who lost the insurance he'd been promised he could keep - for putting in the time to dig up the arrogant Gruber clips. So I’m watching the news, and at that time I was thinking: Hey, the administration was not telling people the truth, and the media was doing nothing!”
So Weinstein did the job the corrupt MSM would not do.
This is all about being too clever by half. They thought they could do this perpetual motion machine style and fool everyone. This is just another leftist project that didn't turnout as they expected.
Agreed. I'm pretty conservative, but getting me to support expanding subsidized health care wouldn't have been that hard. I know people who, through no fault of their own, need subsidized health care.
It is almost like creating a program to provide health care to the indigent and those with preexisting conditions via a bi-partisan effort wasn't the first priority of those crafting it.
It is almost like creating a program to provide health care to the indigent and those with preexisting conditions via a bi-partisan effort wasn't the first priority of those crafting it.
Thing is, in my state, we already had a subsidized high risk pool plan. It wasn't the greatest but it wasn't nearly as bad as Medicaid, or going without, either. Yet all the followers around here acted as if it didn't exist.
Apparently there is a 4th piece of Gruber speaking in front of a microphone that will come out soon.
Still none of this on ABCNBCCBS though.
I wait in anticipation for the next shoe to drop.
If this were an anonymous series of links, given the showmanship, I'd think it has the O'Keefe touch.
My personal opinion, and I've spent some time on health policy after I retired from practice, is that we will end up with a hybrid system with subsidies for the poor and for the uninsurable. The rest will go back to private insurance but with reforms to cut cost inflation. One of those will be to go back to a form of the health insurance we used to have 60 years ago. That was a system of flat payments for diagnoses and procedure as an indemnity-style plan.
The way to deal with this is similar to the French system where a health plan funded by payroll deductions pays a flat fee to the doctor or hospital but allows the patent and doctor to negotiate a private arrangement. That way the plan has cost control, but the patient can pay more if he/she chooses to.
The poor can be cared for in another system with an HMO-style program. One of the problems with American health care is that the politicians are determined to conceal the fact that the poor get worse care. That is a big feature of Obamacare. The Middle Class has to be forced into Medicaid.
Well, they are not having it. I fear the reform has been so botched and so many lies have been told that no real reform can happen. we will have to see.
It is almost like creating a program to provide health care to the indigent and those with preexisting conditions via a bi-partisan effort wasn't the first priority of those crafting it.
And the thing is, we basically already had a system where the ER had to treat you, and where you cannot go to jail for debts, you go into bankrupcy. We also had a piecemeal of programs for the poor (poor children in particular) to have some sort of insurance.
It sucks to go into bankrupcy for a medical debt, but at least that was some kind of tangible reason to get health insurance. just opening up all health care plans for anyone to jump on with pre-existing conditions is a terrible, terrible plan that will just break everything else. (which may have been the goal anyway).
All of this comes down to liberals having no clue about how incentives work.
White House says Gruber's wrong, attacks GOP
“The fact of the matter is, the process associated with the writing and passing and implementing of the Affordable Care Act has been extraordinarily transparent,” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said during a press briefing in Burma, according to a transcript provided by the White House.
.........................
He added, “It is Republicans who have been less than forthright and transparent about what their proposed changes to the Affordable Care Act would do in terms of the choices are available to middle class families.”
Gee, the new Senate & Congress haven't been seated yet - I suspect that when they start working on this, they won't be under the assumption that nobody, especially the media, will be paying attention.
Curious George said: I see that all of the resident lefties have decided to sit another Gruber post out.
Must be waiting for their T-shirt order to come in - the ones that say "I'm With Stupid" and have an arrow pointing to the person next to them.
"How does Jonathan Gruber feel?"
Certainly not contrite. Since he's a liberal and everything he does is with the best intentions, he's probably angry that his intentions were misunderstood.
See. To a liberal it isn't lying if you have good intentions.
It's why the usual supects have no problem telling lies and half truths,(the same as lying), is because they do it for your own good. They don't lie for personal gain. They lie to you to make you a better person.
Paco Wove-nice call!
I' m feeling a little sick that this story is going to go no where. The best hope is that the chatter will force the media to address it. The main message seems to be "this isn't news, it happened a few years ago, everyone does it, no one cares"
Prof. Althouse wrote, "That's the Obama memoir I want to read. And I bet he's writing it, and we will read it some day."
I will not read it.
I agree that a book claiming to "disclose his perspective to others" might be written and published in Obama's name someday. I think it's a certainty. But there are already two books supposedly written by him that were in print before he became POTUS, and they both pretended to "disclose his perspective to others," even though one was heavily ghostwritten by Bill Ayers (who's bragged about that) and the other was a collection of speeches Obama had read from a teleprompter (we don't know who wrote them). So I see no reason to assume that another book published in his name would be more likely to be actually written by him than those two were, and I have no reason to believe that any such book would be remotely truthful or honest even if he did write it.
But mostly I don't care anymore what Barack Obama's "perspectives" are. His goals, and his entire conception of America, are antithetical to mine.
Let me put it this way: If forced to choose between reading Obama's post-POTUS book or forced to read Lena Dunham's autobiography — I'd gnaw off my hand to escape.
What Inga said on the day of the Obamacare Website roll-out:
Blogger Inga said...
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear, whatever will they do when the sky hasn't fallen? Make another crisis so as to make it appear that every single thing that has Obama's fingerprints on it looks like a failure. It's gotten very old and it's going to be reflected in 2014 and certainly in 2016.
10/1/13, 12:39 PM
Looks like she was right about 2014, we can only hope she is right about 2016.
So Mr. Gruber helped concoct Obamacare, including a deliberate campaign of deceit to help it pass. Should he be concerned for his personal well-being now that his monstrosity is revealed?
"That's the Obama memoir I want to read. And I bet he's writing it, and we will read it some day."
We can only hope that Bill Ayres lives long enough to finish it.
Told ya it was a fuckin tax.
Meatheads.
Gahrie wrote -
"The thing that upsets me is the obvious contempt that Gruber feels for the American people, and the expectation that his audiences will share that contempt."
An expectation completely confirmed by the way. It was not the "academy" that outed him.
This approaches conspiracy. If not in the legal sense, certainly in the saying that "All professions are conspiracies against the laity." Indeed, it even explicitly includes a dismissal of the laity.
Once more a "gaffe" is simply telling the truth.
Why do we punish public figures for speaking truth?
"I don't mind subsidized healthcare. They didn't have to blow up the healthcare of 300 million people to subsidize 10 million or fewer."
This. But providing health insurance to the poor was secondary to their goal of increasing government control of the health care system.
"All of this comes down to liberals having no clue about how incentives work."
I don't know if it's an inability to understand incentives or a refusal to acknowledge their importance to human behavior, but it certainly is a defining feature of liberalism.
Liberals clearly understand incentives. That's why, in the most extreme example, they want to tax smoking and sodas, and want to give tax credits to Priusses and bike lanes.
Speaking of stupidity and liberals, this just came up - Milwaukee County:
Supervisor fundraising for dad's funeral rejected indigent burial funding
Conservative Milwaukee County Board member (and a woman, yet!) uses her personal Facebook page to link to crowd funding site for her father's funeral expenses. I smell another John Doe in the works.
Reid Magney, a spokesman for the state's Governmental Accountability Board, said he could not comment on situation. The local ethics commission and the Milwaukee County district attorney's office are responsible for enforcement of ethics issues, he said.
Where're all the defenders of the current Administration and PPACA? I mean, here on this blog? Where are all the people who call us hateful, ignorant racists??
You know, where're all those frequent commenters like garage, ARM, and their ilk?
I mean, where are all the ones Dr. Gruber calls "stupid"?
Livermoron: where're all those frequent commenters like garage,
I think he is spending some quality time with his special sock and the article I just linked at 1:39. Milwaukee County DA! Maybe ethics violations by a conservative! John Doe! This time maybe they will find some secret routers!
I doubt if he yet realizes the implications of this kind of "fame" which is really infamy. At this moment liberals are lining up to defend him and he is famous. But he has validated everything Republicans have been saying about Obamacare and liberal government. He might turn into a verb "grubering" meaning deliberate deception by twisted formulas of the stupid masses of people who(unfortunately) have the vote
Obamacare is a mess. Iraq is a mess. Why? because the policy people grubered the voters.
"I don't mind subsidized healthcare. They didn't have to blow up the healthcare of 300 million people to subsidize 10 million or fewer."
I heard Dr Ben Carson giving a speech recently (last month I think) where he said Obamacare was terrible for the United States. Then he floated his idea of individual accounts.
He didn't get into the specifics, so whether it would work or not is beyond me.
But I liked what he had to say about it. Basically, every family had an account. If Dad got sick, mom and kids could pool with Dad's money to pay.
I don't know why he stopped at the family though. What if a Church, or a large group of people wanted to pool their money? Seems like the wise choice.
He basically wants to blow up the insurance industry, though. You can tell he has a lot of anger towards the medical insurance industry.
Eric, religious groups are already doing that. The programs are advertising on radio, at least.
Eric, religious groups are already doing that. The programs are advertising on radio, at least.
"How does Jonathan Gruber feel?"
"I was only obeying orders..."
Alan, on a true liberal the arrow points UP.
Ralph Hyatt The drones will always drop at the Congress's door...
How long before Weinstein gets audited?
What Inga said on the day of the Obamacare Website roll-out:
I miss Inga. Where'd she go? I know people think she is madisonfella, but that entity's posts lack her signature run-on sentence style (wherein she uses a comma when she should use a semicolon).
Confirms Prof. Reynolds assertions the the media are Dems with bylines.
Althouse, if you were thoroughly beaten every time you posted such a stupid viewpoint, I mean with like a broomstick, beaten until the first broken bone, how long would it take you to understand what you did wrong and stop posting mendacious drivel? Do you know what you are doing, or would you have to be beaten to death to check your frothing yap?
It's a serious question. Do you know that you are talking shit or do you take yourself seriously?
"Eric, religious groups are already doing that. The programs are advertising on radio, at least."
Sort of. They are insuring one another through a cooperative.
However, his idea is that federal money goes into these accounts. Instead of having Medicaid, or the VA, or any other scheme of federal funds going to individuals to use for medical care.
Again, I'm not sure how he plans for that to work, but he supports the idea of the Federal Government subsidizes health care. Or at least, I think that's what he meant.
The ACA-allies made a choice--if their goal was to address the three biggest complaints about health care (high and rising costs, lack of coverage, and the system being overcomplicated) there were ways to do this that would have enjoyed broad support from everywhere in the political spectrum. For all the talk of bipartisanship, the right approach would likely have avoided the fate we got instead--an incredibly complex, flawed law that isn't likely to achieve any of those three goals, and may not only make the problems worse but add new problems as well (such as a negative impact on employment).
But then, the pro-ACA folks had another goal in mind--political domination. They thought they were passing the next Medicare or Social Security, and would be forever thanked at the polls for it while leaving opponents in the lurch. It didn't exactly work out that way.
Professor Gruber seems to have commented @2:47 using the name Unknown.
PB at 11:02 said:
"this is blatant dishonesty. It is unlikely that this is the only area of dishonesty he has participated in. All his previous work should be examined to find other areas where he has been dishonest. If he has any ethics or morals he needs to come clean on these things."
Gruber penned multiple op-Ed pieces touting the merits of the ACA in the run-up to the passage of the ACA . He posed as a disinterested expert -- not revealing the $400,000 he had been paid as the architect of the bill.
Dishonest. Unethical. Ends justify the means.
Nancy Pelosi says she never heard of Gruber. Wonder why she used his name in video and on her website.
Unknown said...
Althouse, if you were thoroughly beaten every time you posted such a stupid viewpoint, I mean with like a broomstick, beaten until the first broken bone, how long would it take you to understand what you did wrong and stop posting mendacious drivel? Do you know what you are doing, or would you have to be beaten to death to check your frothing yap?
It's a serious question. Do you know that you are talking shit or do you take yourself seriously?
Whoa, that escalated quickly. Seems like a threat too.
Unknown writes;
"Althouse, if you were thoroughly beaten every time you posted such a stupid viewpoint, I mean with like a broomstick, beaten until the first broken bone, how long would it take you to understand what you did wrong and stop posting mendacious drivel? Do you know what you are doing, or would you have to be beaten to death to check your frothing yap?
It's a serious question. Do you know that you are talking shit or do you take yourself seriously?"
Wow, someone is upset today.
When I hear or read that ISIS couldn't happen in our culture because they are different than we are (Not ready for Democracy and other such nonsense) I think of people like this.
I bet you this person really does think Althouse, because of her opinions, needs a good beating. Or a stoning.
They probably also believe Althouse should have free contraception.
You know, where're all those frequent commenters like garage, ARM, and their ilk?
Yea, why would I want miss all the hot takes.
Like this one:
"Althouse, if you were thoroughly beaten every time you posted such a stupid viewpoint, I mean with like a broomstick, beaten until the first broken bone, how long would it take you to understand what you did wrong and stop posting mendacious drivel? Do you know what you are doing, or would you have to be beaten to death to check your frothing yap?"
"You can tell he has a lot of anger towards the medical insurance industry."
Very few doctors like insurance companies. I have done some work for them and know they are focused on dollars and cents. That's why the Obamacare designers recruited them after seeing what they did to Hillarycare.
Hillarycare was supposed to be based on the German system which has lots of sickness funds based on employer and town of residence. It might have been a reasonable idea but Hillary, being Hillary, had the whole thing done in secret, just like Pelosi and Reid. The difference was that they cut the insurance companies in for a piece of the pie.
If you saw the movie "Casino" you saw the Mafia doling out "pieces" of the Havana casinos. Just like Pelosi.
Hillarycare also had doctors' participation mandatory, which is not the way to get cooperation.
Politicians have to realize, if possible, that this country was built on voluntary association and freedom of association. I doubt they will ever get it.
As Insty says, "Not enough graft."
Gruber is feeling awful; they found a fourth video!
Hugh Hewitt had Gruber on his show a year ago and he lied all over the place then. The transcript is interesting. He says that there was never going to be an employer mandate for large employers. That only 4% of the population would be affected by Obamacare.
Just not true.
khesanh0802,
Were you there during "the siege"?
"garage mahal said...
You know, where're all those frequent commenters like garage, ARM, and their ilk?
Yea, why would I want miss all the hot takes.
Like this one:
"Althouse, if you were thoroughly beaten every time you posted such a stupid viewpoint..."
LOL, what a tool. You take one post out of the 122 that proceeded as representative.
You beloved ObamaCare, that you have defended over and over and over. Nothing but a farce. Like you.
We get it.
"I have done some work for them and know they are focused on dollars and cents"
well...yes. It's a business. Insurance companies aren't a charity. They accept a risk of loss from someone else.
What galls me is that the citizenry don't understand that risk transferrance, and instead focus on stuff like "I only have a $15 copay!!". Most people have no idea what the actual cost of an office visit is. Health insurance is no longer a transfer of risk, but a transfer of payment. Leads to over use of services.
Well, CBS did mention Prof. Gruber on the Evening News finally; still just enough that they can say, "Yeah, we covered that," and minimizing and conflating the story as best they could, but they did mention it.
Oh man, I knew Hans Gruber didn't really die at the end of the original Die Hard and here he is back to bother the American people with a crime bigger than blowing the roof off Nakatomi Towers. Get Bruce Willis on the line, someone get a model of the American health care system to implode, this is gonna be big box office, big I tell you. No one will believe a half-black president as part of the plot. Can we get that fat cop. Reggie something, the Twinkie eater, to reprise his role? See Hans' DNA was scraped off the pavement,after his fity story fall, and like Hitler's brain, was saved to be implanted later, like Boys from Brazil.
""I have done some work for them and know they are focused on dollars and cents"
well...yes. It's a business. Insurance companies aren't a charity. They accept a risk of loss from someone else."
Fair enough. I meant to include "They are ONLY focused on dollars and cents."
I spent a year learning the methods of analyzing quality in health care on the theory that good quality was cost effective or even cost saving.
I was unable to convince any insurance company to even experiment with it. The new Medicaid program here in Orange County was switching from fee-for-service to an HMO. I drew up a proposal to study how the patients did compared to the old system (which was alleged to be worse). I had grant support, university support and all I needed was permission to use the database of the government program.
Nothing doing. The public programs are as bad as the private insurance companies. They DON'T WANT TO KNOW.
You see a nice example with Obamacare.
These people do not know what they are doing and don't want to learn.
And by the way, health insurance has not been insurance for 50 years. It is prepaid care or, the preferred model, an administrator for a self funded employer plan. The insurance companies thought that's what they would be in Obamacare but, I suspect, they were lied to also.
Unknown posts a false flag and "garage mahal" answers the call.
Fucking Leftists.
Ralph Hyatt wrote -
"I know people who, through no fault of their own, need subsidized health care."
This is where I part ways. Not saying you're wrong, just saying be careful what you say.
Someone's house is knocked down by a tornado through no fault of their own. Someone discovers that they cannot get life insurance at an advanced age through no fault of their own. Someone discovers that their car has been trashed while they were away through no fault of their own. Someone discovers any number of insurable thing's that they never thought would happen to them but that now they want to be covered.
Again, not saying that your aquaintances are wrong, just saying that health insurance in particular is one of those things where people want others to pay (ie: coverage) after the fact.
"You take one post out of the 122 that proceeded as representative. "
I've yet to read a conservative comment on Obamacare that was worth reading anywhere on the internet.
"I've yet to read a conservative comment on Obamacare that was worth reading anywhere on the internet."
With your reading comprehension, I believe it.
"I've yet to read a conservative comment on Obamacare that was worth reading anywhere on the internet."
Is it possible that your mind is that closed?
Original Mike:
The answer is "yes".
"garage maha" is a fool. A naif. A rube. And not smart enough to know his own foolishness, he lashes out at others.
I see we have "angry birkel" tonight. Probably still smarting from getting his ass handed to him/her yesterday by Robert Cook.
garage mahal said...
You know, where're all those frequent commenters like garage, ARM, and their ilk?
Yea, why would I want miss all the hot takes.
Speaking of liars.
Blogger garage mahal said...
"You take one post out of the 122 that proceeded as representative. "
I've yet to read a conservative comment on Obamacare that was worth reading anywhere on the internet.
Ahem. Speaking of stupid liars.
right on time
That's funny, "garage mahal". Robert Cook managed to make no substantive points and I was correct at every turn. You are a dull boy.
@"birkel
As a bleeding heart I almost felt sorry for you. Almost. I hope you learned something though.
@bleeding heart:
Please tell me what substantive point was made.
You learned nothing.
"garage mahal said...
I've yet to read a conservative comment on Obamacare that was worth reading anywhere on the internet."
Yet you always post...except not now.
Don't worry shortbus, we get it.
I am sorry, "garage mahal", you were lashing out at others and I may have distracted you. Please, do continue.
You were discussing how Professor Gruber, Obama-Insurance "architect", lied about the policies he wanted because Professor Gruber is an ass hole, a liar and a total douchebag. Public policy is always best, you were saying, when politicians lie to you before cumming in your mouth. Do tell.
How can he (Gruber) be famous? This is not being covered on the networks, with possibly the exception of Fox.
Obamacare is not sustainable economically in the long term so it really doesn't matter how this goober feels.
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