Gruber

Yesterday, we discussed a controversy involving Jonathan Gruber, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology economist who played a major role the ACA, or “Obamacare.” He told MSNBC recently that “It is unambiguous this is a typo. Literally every single person involved in the crafting of this law has said that it`s a typo, that they had no intention of excluding the federal states.” However, a libertarian group uncovered a video showing Gruber saying quite clearly after the passage of the law that this provision was a quid pro quo device: state exchanges for tax credits. Conservative sites have lit up over the video below showing Gruber essentially describing the very tradeoff identified in Halbig. He told MSNBC recently that “It is unambiguous this is a typo. Literally every single person involved in the crafting of this law has said that it`s a typo, that they had no intention of excluding the federal states.” However, a libertarian group just uncovered a video showing Gruber saying quite clearly after the passage of the law that this provision was a quid pro quo device: state exchanges for tax credits. Conservative sites have lit up over the video below showing Gruber essentially describing the very tradeoff identified in Halbig. Indeed, Gruber later signed on amicus briefs supporting the White House interpretation and even joined the counter spin from the White House and denouncing that very interpretation as “nutty.” Gruber responded to critics showing the video below by that “I was speaking off-the-cuff. It was just a mistake.” However, now another response has been raised in which Gruber gave the same interpretation during this presentation. In my view, the point is again to ask why both sides have to denounce each other as nuts or extremists when there are good-faith arguments can be made on both sides.