This morning I decided to catch up on the tempest in a tea pot surrounding Jonathan Gruber and his comments on the Affordable Care Act (ACA). As far as I can tell, the controversy is about old videos where Gruber laments the fact that political gamesmanship was required in negotiating the wording of the ACA so that it fit the conventions mandated by the Congressional Budget Office to avoid being classified as a tax increase. I'm not sure why this gamesmanship is a surprise to anyone because determining how to phrase a bill is part of the negotiating process that leads to its creation. Legislators know phrasing is critical because as the New York Times points out the difference between a law being labeled a tax increase or something else eventually comes down to how it's worded. Phrase it one way and it's a tax increase, phrase it differently and it's a penalty. The thing is, at the time the ACA was created both Democrats and the Republicans passed the bill fully aware of its wording and how important that was.
It's too bad Gruber didn't realize how important his own words were when he commented "people are too stupid to understand the difference" but I guess we'll just have to live with it. Nothing has really changed - the ACA is in place, it's withstood some very withering attacks and it's finally starting to do some good. Now is the time to build on that success, not search for conspiracies that don't exist.
Duane Harkness
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