His impolitic remarks now have some Obama supporters suggesting that Gruber — one of the most influential health-care wonks in the country, who was integral to crafting the Massachusetts precursor to Obamacare and then Obamacare itself — is just some random, poorly spoken guy.
This denies Gruber his due. He has done us all a favor by affording us an unvarnished look into the progressive mind, which values complexity over simplicity, favors indirect taxes and impositions on the American public so their costs can be hidden, and has a dim view of the average American.
Complexity is a staple of liberal policymaking. It is a product of its scale and reach, but also of the imperative to hide the ball. Taxing and spending and redistributive schemes tend to be unpopular, so clever ways have to be found to deny that they are happening. This is what Gruber was getting at. One reason Obamacare was so convoluted is that its supporters didn’t want to straightforwardly admit how much the law was raising taxes and using the young and healthy to subsidize everyone else.
Gruber crowed about the exertions undertaken to make an unpopular tax on expensive health-insurance plans, the so-called Cadillac tax, more palatable. It was levied on employers instead of employees. No one realized, Gruber explained, that the tax would be functionally the same even if not directly imposed on workers. This wasn’t a one-off deception. This kind of sleight of hand is crucial to the progressive project, which always involves imposing taxes, regulations, and mandates at one remove from the average person so he or she won’t realize that the costs are passed down regardless.
Most liberals would never come out and call Americans stupid in a public forum, as Gruber did. But the debate between conservatives and liberals on health-care policy and much else comes down to how much average Americans can be trusted to make decisions on their own without the guiding, correcting hand of government. An assumption that Americans are incompetent is woven into the Left’s worldview. It is reluctant to entrust individuals with free choice for fear they will exercise it poorly and irresponsibly.
So Gruber deserves to be listened to, even if he ultimately got it wrong.
◼ 'Dumbstruck' Bob Schieffer Says Gruber Should Repay $400K Obamacare Lucre - Jack Coleman/MRC
Liberals like Pelosi are strenuously distancing themselves from the loose cannon they once touted as the smartest guy in the room. But the more we hear from Gruber (the hits keep coming!), the more obvious it becomes that he's not peripheral, he's an exemplar.
