posted March 19, 2015 08:59 AM            

There have been no where near 16 million NEW signups for the crap sandwich O'BomberCare.

Further, most of those who signed up for Medicaid were already eligible for subsidized medical insurance and just hadn't applied.

posted March 24, 2015 01:16 PM            

Ever since it was exposed that MIT professor Jonathan Gruber admitted Obamacare was “written in a tortured way” to pass muster with “stupid” American voters, he’s been having problems.

Gruber then was fired from the Massachusetts Obamacare board, the auditor in Vermont found he may have “padded his bills to the state” and Conservative HQ said he may be “heading for jail.”

“Gruber’s billing practices have been under scrutiny in several states where he has contracted to perform an economic analysis for the creation of a state healthcare system,” the report said. In one state, “there’s so little back-up the auditor can’t decide who did what, if any, work.”

Now it’s getting even worse.

Judicial Watch, the Washington watchdog, has announced a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the Department of Health and Human Services for records concerning contracts and consultancy agreements with Gruber.

The organization is targeting a 2009 deal with Gruber in which he was the only person considered for the work and was paid nearly $400,000.

Judicial Watch said it filed the lawsuit after HHS refused to respond to a November 2014 FOIA request.

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Sought are records regarding the deal in which Clint Druk of the HHS Program Support Center reported: “The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE), intends to negotiate with Jonathan Gruber, Ph.D. on a sole sources basis for technical assistance in evaluating options for national healthcare reform. The basis for restricting competition is the authority 13.106-1(b) because only one source is reasonably available to satisfy agency requirements. The anticipated contract period will be for one year.”

Druk had written: “Dr. Gruber’s ongoing advisory role with the Office of Health Reform strongly positions him to meet HHS’ requirements the most efficiently, which is a key requirement in order for well-developed legislative proposals to be put forth for congressional consideration as soon as possible.”

Gruber himself confirmed the first part of the contract was for $95,000 and federal documents reveal an extension for $297,600.

Judicial Watch said there are reports Gruber was paid “at least” $5.9 million after joining forces with President Obama to assemble a national health care law.

According to the Daily Caller’s Chuck Ross, the federal government has paid Gruber at least $4 million since 2000 for his work as an expert witness, a legal consultant and for his consultation on Obamacare.

“That comes on top of at least $1.6 million the MIT economist has been paid by several states to consult on their health care bills,’” Judicial Watch said.

Last year, a video surfaced on the American Commitment website showing Gruber talking about how hiding information from the American public is a huge political advantage.

Obamacare, he said, “was written in a tortured way to make sure that CBO (the Congressional Budget Office) did not score the mandate as taxes.”

“If CBO scores the mandate as taxes, the bill dies. OK. So it’s written to do that. In terms of risk-rated subsidies, if you had a law that made it explicit that the healthy people pay in and sick people get money, it would not have passed,” he said.

“Lack of transparency is a huge political advantage. Call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever, but basically that was really, really critical to getting the thing to pass,” said Gruber.

Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said the Obama HHS is “flouting FOIA law to keep the truth about Gruber from the American public and, it seems, the Supreme Court.”

“HHS doesn’t want to disclose Mr. Gruber’s key role in Obamacare because his statements could be used by the high court to upend Obama’s illegal tax subsidies,” Fitton said. “Why else would HHS go into full cover-up mode about contracts with one man?”

Fitton said that from the beginning, “lack of transparency” has been essential to keeping Obamacare alive.

“President Obama’s knowing lies about how Americans could keep their doctors and insurance under Obamacare show that he is no better than Gruber in his contempt for ‘stupid’ American voters.”

The Supreme Court now is deciding whether subsidies designated solely for those who get their policies from state exchanges can also be granted to people who use the national exchange.

Judicial Watch said it has sued the Obama administration nearly a dozen times since 2013 to get basic information about the health care takeover.

WND previously reported that while the Obama administration tried to distance itself from Gruber and his comments, the professor’s official bio at a university project known to be close to the White House boasted that Gruber helped to craft Obamacare.

Gruber’s bio at the Hamilton Project, an economic initiative launched by the Brookings Institution in 2006, reads: “During 2009-2010 he served as a technical consultant to the Obama Administration and worked with both the Administration and Congress to help craft the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.”

And Obama himself spoke at the 2006 launch of the Hamilton Project, where he stated he had stolen ideas “liberally” from Gruber.

Galen Institute President Grace-Marie Turner said Gruber not only confirmed many of the conservative Obamacare criticisms but revealed the ugly side of how the administration pursued its signature legislative priority.

“This kind of validation from Jonathan Gruber, the architect of this law, is really shocking; that he would admit that the only way they would possibly be able to get this passed was basically to lie to the American people,” said Turner in a recent interview.

She added that those fears have been confirmed by the rising disapproval numbers for the law as more details become known.

“The more people find out about the law, the more they were realized how they were duped with all of the promises,” she said. “The thing I think is really telling is that this is the guy who really helped shape and craft this law. For him to say the only way they could get it passed was through trickery is astonishing.

Turner also believes Gruber’s attitude is indicative of the entire administration’s approach to health care and other policies.

posted June 22, 2015 10:06 AM            

Grubby Gruber was the architect of O'BomberCare.

Leftists, including the Marxist Messiah O'Bomber and Grubby Gruber himself have been caught lying through their teeth to America about lots of things...including Grubby Gruber's role in shaping O'BomberCare.

The US Supreme Court is set to deliver a ruling on O'BomberCare subsidies for states which didn't establish their own O'BomberCare Collectives.

June 22, 2015
20,000 pages of emails released showing MIT economist Gruber played key role in Obamacare
Thomas Lifson

As the Supreme Court prepares to issue its decision in King v. Burwell, whether or not the rewriting of the law’s explicit language on state exchanges only being eligible for subsidies is constitutional, embarrassing revelations indicate that deception was indeed part of the strategy of the law’s writers.

When videos of Jonathan Gruber boasting to academic audiences that Obamacare passed because of the “huge political advantage” of its lack of transparency and the “stupidity of the American voter,” the White House claimed that he was just a minor consultant, not, as some had previously claimed, the “architect” of Obamacare.

President Barack Obama in 2014 said Mr. Gruber was “some adviser who never worked on our staff.” Mr. Gruber told Congress last year he disagreed with the widespread characterization of his role as the “architect” of Mr. Obama’s health-care plan.

Those contentions now looks a lot like lies, thanks to a trove of 20,000 pages of emails released to the Wall Street Journal by the House Oversight Committee. Stephanie Armour writes:

The emails show frequent consultations between Mr. Gruber and top Obama administration staffers and advisers in the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services on the Affordable Care Act. They show he informed HHS about interviews with reporters and discussions with lawmakers, and he consulted with HHS about how to publicly describe his role. (snip)

The White House has described Mr. Gruber as having a limited role in crafting the law. President Barack Obama in 2014 said Mr. Gruber was “some adviser who never worked on our staff.” Mr. Gruber told Congress last year he disagreed with the widespread characterization of his role as the “architect” of Mr. Obama’s health-care plan.

“His proximity to HHS and the White House was a whole lot tighter than they admitted,” said Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R., Utah), chairman of the House oversight committee. “There’s no doubt he was a much more integral part of this than they’ve said. He put up this facade he was an arm’s length away. It was a farce.” (snip)

The emails show Mr. Gruber was in touch with key advisers such as Peter Orszag, who was director of the Office of Management and Budget, an arm of the White House that oversaw federal programs.

He was also in contact with Jason Furman, an economic adviser to the president, and Ezekiel Emanuel, who was then a special adviser for health policy at OMB.

One email indicates Mr. Gruber was invited to meet with Mr. Obama. In a July 2009 email, he wrote that Mr. Orszag had “invited me to meet with the head honcho to talk about cost control.”

“Thank you for being an integral part of getting us to this historic moment,” according to Sept. 9, 2009 email to Mr. Gruber from Jeanne Lambrew, a top Obama administration health adviser who worked at HHS and the White House. In a November 2009 email, she called Mr. Gruber “our hero.”

In an August 2009 email, Lawrence Summers —then a top economic adviser in the administration—emailed Mr. Gruber and asked “if you were POTUS, what would u do now?” Mr. Gruber responded that Mr. Obama should hold out for enough money to do universal coverage.

Keep in mind that the administration has basically cast his role as merely a provider of an econometric model, a wonk with equations. But he was such a key actor that even managed media:

Mr. Gruber also informed HHS about interviews he had with health policy reporters such as Ezra Klein, previously of the Washington Post and now with Vox Media. In a November 2009 email, Mr. Gruber let a top HHS official know the conversation went well and the story would post soon.

And he was involved in arm-twisting Congress:

In a November 2009 email, he apprised HHS of his conversations with former Sen. Mary Landrieu (D., La.) She had been opposed to the health law but came to support it.

He was, in fact, such a political operative that he apparently got involved in either political fundraising or the structuring of the law’s taxes:

posted June 24, 2015 09:35 AM            

Spike It! When the Media Kill a Story for Political Reasons
Charles Lipson
June 23, 2015

What happens when the news media catch the White House in a demonstrable lie? That depends entirely on whether they like the administration. If they loathe the administration, it’s front-page news. If they like it, they spike the story. As Momma used to remind us, if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all. What a great motto for reporters.

That is exactly what the national media have done to an important story about the White House’s intimate working relationship with MIT professor Jonathan Gruber, who helped craft the Affordable Care Act. You may remember Gruber from his infamous videotapes, the ones in which he called the American public too stupid to understand the law. He added their stupidity was helpful to Obama, Pelosi, and Reid in passing the law.
The Obama administration snapped into action. At a press conference, the president noted that Gruber was not employed by the White House and said flatly that he had not played an important role in drafting the law. Nancy Pelosi said the same thing. On background, senior White House officials reinforced the story. They vaguely remembered somebody named Gruber or Goober or something but, fortunately, he played only a marginal role in health care. Thanks for asking. Next question?

Now, this may surprise you, but it turns out the White House knew Gruber very well and knew he played a crucial role in the health care bill. The White House simply decided to lie about it. Perhaps they agree with Gruber’s judgment about your intelligence.

How do we know about Gruber’s role? Not because the White House released any documents, not because the media dug into it, but because the House Oversight Committee, chaired by Utah Republican Jason Chaffetz, got MIT to turn over the relevant emails. There were 20,000 pages of emails back-and-forth between Gruber and the White House in the crucial months when the bill was being crafted and passed.

The Wall Street Journal just revealed the news about the Oversight Committee getting these emails in a major story. The key points are that Gruber was deeply involved in crafting the health care law, he worked very closely with the White House, and, when he became a political liability, the president and his senior aides simply lied about it.

Is that a big story? Not if you are a national TV network or major U.S. newspaper. Except for the Wall Street Journal, they maintained radio silence. Not a peep.

A search of the New York Times shows zero hits for “Gruber” this week. All the News That’s Fit to Print? The Washington Post has one hit, a brief comment by an online opinion columnist. Regional newspapers like the Chicago Tribune: zero. It was covered on Fox’s morning show and, in a very revealing exchange, on MSNBC’s Morning Joe. The network shows – Good Morning America, the Today Show, and CBS This Morning – have eight hours of air time but did not mention it at all. Zilch. They could have squeezed it in without shortchanging the Kardashians or Brian Williams’ landing on the moon.

What happened on Morning Joe was fascinating. One of the hosts, Mika Brzezinski, called attention to the Journal story. Her co-host, former GOP Rep. Joe Scarborough, followed up. Turning to Mark Halperin, who is the co-managing editor of Bloomberg Politics and a former senior reporter at Time, Scarborough asked if the story was inconsistent with White House statements. “I owe my Republican sources an apology,” Halperin said, “because they kept telling me he [Gruber] was hugely involved, and the White House played it down.”

Then Scarborough asked the money question: “Did the White House lie about that?”

“I think they were not fully forthcoming.”

That answer did not come from a White House official or a Democratic operative. It came from a big-time reporter. And not just any reporter. It came from a reporter to whom the White House had deliberately lied in background briefings. Does he call them out? Nope. He spins for them.

Halperin’s circumlocution shows the rot that pervades America’s mainstream media. He cannot bring himself to say more than “they were not fully forthcoming.” Morning Joe’s panel of Democratic stalwarts, including Howard Dean, actually laughed out loud. When they were asked the same question—did the White House lie?—they kept laughing and said “they were not fully forthcoming.” I guess the joke’s on us.

As lies go, it’s not a huge one. It’s not like saying, “If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. If you like your health insurance, you can keep your health insurance. Period.” That wasn’t just fraud; it was fraud that played an essential role in passing Obamacare. The president knew it was false when he said it, and he said it repeatedly.

posted June 25, 2015 08:14 AM            

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was pitched and eventually sold to the American public on a foundation of lies. Many of the most egregious examples of the calculated mendacity of ObamaCare’s designers were exposed by the law’s very implementation, but a few of its more subtle deceptions and the duplicity of the law’s authors was revealed in a series of videos featuring the refreshingly honest Massachusetts Institute of Technology economist and health care policy advisor Jonathan Gruber. It is fitting that, just days before the Supreme Court issues what might be its most far-reaching verdict regarding the ACA’s fraudulence, Gruber is again in the news.

As soon as the Affordable Care Act was implemented and revealed its hideous, multifarious visage to the public, the lies at the heart of the law became apparent even to observers committed to ensuring its success.

Premiums rose both for those on and off Affordable Care Act-related plans. Patients began losing their cherished and long-patronized doctors. The Supreme Court virtually rewrote the law when it ignored the administration and the solicitor general when it determined that the government had no right to penalize the public for failing to purchase health insurance. None of this would have come as a surprise to anyone who attended one of Gruber’s many lectures.

“This bill was written in a tortured way to make sure CBO did not score the mandate as taxes,” the health care policy advisor conceded, because “if CBO scored the mandate as taxes, the bill dies.”

As for the substance of the case the Court will rule on before the end of the month in King v. Burwell, Gruber appeared to validate the claims of those who believe the law was intentionally crafted to deny states the subsidies they presently enjoy if they did not set up a state-run insurance exchange. “There’s a lot of responsibilities on the states to set up these exchanges, like we did in Massachusetts, to regulate them and run them,” Gruber insisted in 2011. “Will people understand that, gee, if your governor doesn’t set up an exchange, you’re losing hundreds of millions of dollars of tax credits to be delivered to your citizens?”

Later that year, Gruber expanded on his frustrations with those Republicans who opposed this monstrous social engineering scheme that had taken the form of a health care reform bill. “If you’re a state and you don’t set up an exchange, that means your citizens doesn’t get their tax credits,” he noted.

Most infamously, Gruber insisted that none of this would have been possible if not for him and his fellows’ faith in the “stupidity of the American voter.” He added “lack of transparency is a huge political advantage.”

Perhaps fearing the obvious political fallout that would eventually result from these acerbic statements, those who invested their futures in the ACA rushed to insist that they had never heard of the man once praised by Democrats as the most accomplished man in his field. “I don’t know who he is,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said of Gruber. “He didn’t help write our bill.”

“I just heard about this,” President Barack Obama insisted amid growing national scandal. “The fact that some adviser who never worked on our staff expressed an opinion that I completely disagree with in terms of the voters is no reflection on the actual process that was run.”

According to emails belatedly obtained by House Oversight Committee investigators, however, Gruber had more fingerprints on the bill than its crafters would have preferred to admit. “The emails show frequent consultations between Mr. Gruber and top Obama administration staffers and advisers in the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services on the Affordable Care Act,” the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday. “They show he informed HHS about interviews with reporters and discussions with lawmakers, and he consulted with HHS about how to publicly describe his role.”

The emails show Mr. Gruber was in touch with key advisers such as Peter Orszag, who was director of the Office of Management and Budget, an arm of the White House that oversaw federal programs.

He was also in contact with Jason Furman, an economic adviser to the president, and Ezekiel Emanuel, who was then a special adviser for health policy at OMB.

One email indicates Mr. Gruber was invited to meet with Mr. Obama. In a July 2009 email, he wrote that Mr. Orszag had “invited me to meet with the head honcho to talk about cost control.”

“Thank you for being an integral part of getting us to this historic moment,” according to Sept. 9, 2009 email to Mr. Gruber from Jeanne Lambrew, a top Obama administration health adviser who worked at HHS and the White House. In a November 2009 email, she called Mr. Gruber “our hero.”

The report quotes a Health and Human Services spokeswoman who adopted the supremely cynical tactic of insisting that all these new revelations contained in emails that the administration sought to keep secret amounted to “old news.” The transition from the Obama to Clinton White House appears to be proceeding apace.

It’s appropriate that Gruber would again become the focus of national controversy with just days to go before the Court decides whether it will again rewrite this hastily crafted law passed only as a result of parliamentary trickery. With just hours to go before that fateful moment, the nation was again reminded of the dishonesty that taints this law. Every step of the way, this White House has tried to foist onto the public legislation that would have long ago been scrapped had they been honest about its designs and effects. This latest bit of compulsive mendacity from the administration is sadly all too familiar.

posted June 25, 2015 01:19 PM            

What should follow immediately thereafter is impeachment charges against 6 Supreme Court justices, followed by conviction of the charges in the US Senate and removal from the Supreme Court.