Jonah Goldberg takes on the true believers who, now that the ends have justified the means and the lies Obama and the Dems sold us created “settled law”, are “puzzled” by Republicans’ refusal to “engage in policy debate” — as if the GOP was given a chance to do so to begin with, having been shut out of any discussion of ObamaCare. Writes Goldberg:
Ross Douthat is right when he tweets:
“Furor over ‘if you like your plan …’ is a reminder to everyone in Wonkland (where everyone knew it was BS) that most ppl don’t live here.”
I agree that everyone in wonkland knew it was BS. But what does it say about the liberal wonks that they either never said so when the legislation was being debated or said so very quietly under their breaths. I’m genuinely curious, did Sargent or his colleagues at the Washington Post report that what Obama was saying — never mind the impression he was leaving — was a lie, or even “narrowly untrue”? I mean did they report it when it might have hurt the law’s chances of passage, not afterwards when all lies are retroactively absolved as the price for social progress.
Indeed, what is so infuriating to many of us is that is that now that it’s the law of the land, Obamacare supporters act as if all of the lies were no big deal and no serious person believed them anyway. But as anyone can tell you, if Obama had been honest about the trade-offs in his signature piece of legislation, it would never have become his signature piece of legislation. So please, don’t tell me the lies don’t matter.
Indeed, this might help unravel the mystery for Sargent. Republicans (or at least a great, great many of them) know that this law glided to passage with tracks greased with b.s. And not just about the ability to keep your plan and lowered premiums, but endless balderdash about extending life-expectancy, bending the cost curve, etc. When they pointed out that what the president was saying was flatly untrue, even impossible, they were called fools or racists. The liberal wonks who knew — or should have known — just how much b.s. was involved in the sales job, nevertheless kept their canons fixed on opponents of the law. And so did the “objective” journalists. I remember when the Supreme Court okayed Obamacare, NPR’s healthcare correspondent Julie Rovner said the only losers were the states that didn’t sign on to the Medicaid expansion and the insurance company executives who wanted a stiffer penalty under the mandate. And that was it. Really, no other losers? None?
And now, when the Democrats’ lies are proving politically inconvenient, we’re told that if Republicans were smart, they’d accept the law and engage in a sober conversation about the very real trade-offs in the law liberals lied about for years.
I’m not arguing that the GOP shouldn’t capitulate to the law simply out of spite (though spite is underrated in this circumstance if you ask me). But I fail to see why Republicans should simply accept that the law is here to stay and get into wonky discussions about how to improve it at the margins at the exact moment the wheels are coming off the bus. The president and the Democrats lied us into a bad law. The right opposed the law on principle. A single party — the Democrats — own this law in a way that no party has had complete ownership of any major social legislation in a century. They bought this legislation with deceit and the GOP said so. Now that it is going into effect, the facts on the ground are confirming that deceit. Moreover, the same haughty condescending bureaucrats and politicians who told us they were smart enough and tech-savvy enough to do just about anything are being exposed as incompetent political hacks. And this is the moment when Sargent thinks the GOP should simply throw in the towel and work with the Democrats to make Obamacare bipartisan?
I find that puzzling.
Now, I recognize that Goldberg is engaging in a bit of ironic counter punching there at the conclusion, but sometimes I really do think that people like Sargent believe it is incumbent upon the GOP to make just those kind of concessions — the reason being that progressives are, by their nature, inherently correct, and conservatives by theirs, inherently wrong. Making the only real discussion — and so the only real function of Republicans — an exercise in how the wingers can help the left get what is demonstrably good and right to work in the way that makes it good and right in practice, not just in theory, and gives it the imprimatur of bipartisan agreement. And this gambit involves their agreeing not to stir up the masses by pointing out the failures of the program, or the lies used to sell it (that’s all water under the bridge, when dealing with settled law!) when what they could be doing — and for Sargent, should be doing — is helping the left fix the mess they’ve made in practice of what in theory is the only policy trajectory that lays claim to social justice.
That is to say, the GOP should shut up and help the left bring about Utopia rather than obstructing such a grand end game. Because.
Some I suppose may find that a compelling argument. But then, not all of us are John McCain.
Thank God.
“We’re not hurtling toward a cliff — we’re stretching our wings to fly! Now will you recalcitrant teatards please stop trying to turn the wheel or hit the brakes? UNHELPFUL!”
Indeed, this might help unravel the mystery for Sargent.
Even though the citation of a “mystery” be only for the purposes of a rhetorical tweek, isn’t it better to recognize that liars don’t act as liars in a darkness of mystery, but choose from among a number of known possibilities to pursue a path of deception? That is, the liar isn’t an innocent, merely ignorant of the means he has chosen. Fuck all with the play acting.
That’s not flying!..that’s just falling with style
The best part is that the rest of you won’t hit bottom ’til long after we’ve retired to our just rewards. Enjoy the landing, kids!
Keep fighting until the abomination is gone. Do not give an inch.
“If you have to fall, let them see how you turned it into a dive…”
Bumbles is starting to panic flail, and I just bought more popcorn.
darn it drum, don’t you know Bumbles bounce?
The comment thread over there has a guy who claims that even if you lost the insurance that you liked, you’ll be getting one that’s *better*.
Yeah. Pull the other one.
If you like your plan that means you’re just stupid and need to be re-educated.
If you like your plan that means you’re just stupid and need to be re-educated.
Yes! And there’s the relevant distinction McG. Namely, that what “you like” in ClownDisaster’s formulation was never a criteria of the law as intended, but hardly spoken.
You’ll like what they force on you, and that’s that.
–Jack Handy (mostly)
I just learned this afternoon that John F’ing McCain has a Distinguished Flying Cross. Why?????????????????
What a revolting development that is.
Obama was NOT lying, from a certain point of view.
We keep forgetting the first part of the phrase, “IF YOU LIKE YOUR PLAN, you can keep it”.
If you have a “sub-standard” insurance plan, you may THINK you like it, but you actually don’t, for if you’re satisfied with substandard coverage, you’ve been tricked and deluded by the GOP and the big banks.
The only plans being changed are those that people don’t really like way deep down. They’ve been exploited and know it, and Obama’s simply helping them realize that.
So, it’s not Obama that’s the liar, it’s those of you who wanted to keep them oppressed.
– At todays WH presser Carneys tack was to reformulate what the Bastard in chief meant by “keep your plan”. Hes now saying that the distinction is trhat your plan, if extant prior to ACA passage then it will be grandfathered in if you want to keep it. In other words the Muslim lied, because I don’t see anyone saying they just bought all these policies that are being cancelled or the forced dropping bt the gov is tied to any dates. So then, more lies to pile on top of the original lies.
– Carneys last comment was “Well if you want to focus on this minor difference then you are free to, but what the president said was accurate.
– These fuckers are never going to get anywhere near honesty.
– They knowingly lied to sell the crap and now they’re lying about lying.
Fake but accurate has such a fine pedigree.
This is what happens to people who have rejected the very notion of objective truth. If truth is contingent, then they never have to admit to their lies.
That way lies madness.
“you’ll be getting one that’s *better*.”
Bigger premium, higher deductible.
Bigger is always better. Everyone knows that.
You got to love a bunch of pointy heads who all think they’re all Col. Nathan R. Jessups, when what they really are is a bunch of Eric Strattons.
Bless their hearts as they say.
That way lies madness.
– And eventually civil war if they don’t back off, and theres not a shred of evidence their arrogance and narcissism will let them do that. At some point people are going to openly rebel and if Bumblefuck and company move against the people it will be their last mistake.
You can’t handle the Truth is the quintessence of gnosticism, by the way.
Just to flog my hobby horse.
Agreed about the civil war, BBH. I don’t recall ever felling so much unrest/unease in the air and in people’s conversations.
(No, steve. I’m not sewing battle flags in my spare time.)
felling = feeling
Why won’t you idiots compromise with our plans? Then people would like you more! This car was meant to fly! History is on our side! We can’t be stopped! Let’s sing! Oh you pretty chitty bang bang! Chitty chitty bang bang we love (FIERY EXPLOSION AT BASE OF CLIFF)
A god of the copy-book heading variety is seen walking away shaking its head as a burning steering wheel rolls by.
Those Gods of the Copy-Book Headings are big on the justice and not so much with the mercy. But they also know their place, unlike Terry Pratchett’s Auditors of Everything.
Also unlike the current crop of progfascists…
Those same “Secretary Shalls” and their allied “Obama Wills” are also part of what has led to the “Healthcare.gov’s Fails.
Tommy Christopher agrees.
At least 2 million losing coverage:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505263_162-57609737/obamacare-more-than-2-million-people-getting-booted-from-existing-health-insurance-plans/
[…] – See more … […]
There are a lot of people who swallowed this bullshit who are now aghast at what is happening to them. The better part of me says to console and tell them it’s okay that they were fooled. At least until I bitchslapped that part of me into submission. I had to listen to a) you want this to fail because you hate the black man and b) you just don’t understand for the last few years. I’m enjoying rubbing people’s faces in it. Repeatedly. I plan to do nothing else until the SMOD comes and wipes out the planet. Oh sure, we’ll all get carted off to the gulag, but their warm salty tears will make a nice cocktail for me during the ride.
Now if you’ll pardon, I’ve got to go and give these people the finger again. I look forward to their Ross Douthat response about how skyrocketing costs and loss of coverage are a net positive. When they wake up missing a few teeth, I’ll simply tell them that I’m their new dental provider.
If they’re friends, family, co-workers, etc. get in their face about how you could have told them this is what would happen four years ago, had they bothered to ask –which they should from now on, and especially before they ever vote again.
When testilying to Congress always Obamaphone it in by teleprompter. You’ll know the committee members who are your bitches when they swallow it whole.
Obamacare puts Medicaid on full auto, belt fed.
We never said we’d permit you to act stupidly, callow hicks!
Alternate excuse: we didn’t know what was in the bill until just now.
As is always, the we’re stupid defense and the we’re evil tyrants because you’re too stupid the breathe one.
This is America. You have to the right to live your hold life like a child under the firm control of loving parents except these “parents” are demonstrably and chronically dumber than you. and don’t care about you, and want your stuff, and your unquestioning support of their whims, and hate you anytime you prove that you can do things better than they…can’t. Oh yes, these “parents” want their “children” dumbed down, frightened, and endlessly agitated into artificial tribal mobs that compete for a preference or two in the midst of their strict, “one size fits all” parenting methods that were designed by incapable, negligent, and quite possibly addled fools who think nature must and will obey politics, that growth and resource acquisition rates are immutable (except through modification of reporting), and that you can change reality by changing language instead of simply losing more and more control over what small portion of reality we had previously gained control over, before the big change, precisely by ignoring the wild schemes of utopian idiots.
FTFM.
“had they bothered to stop calling you a racist when you were trying to do so…”
Yes. I may even unblock a couple of people on Facebook.
Sebelius “takes responsibility”: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57609977/sebelius-hold-me-accountable-for-the-debacle-of-healthcare.gov/
Ah, but will she actually be held responsible?
We all know the answer to that, I’ll bet.
The next time my wife yells at me for being drunk, I can tell her with a straight face that I’m not drunk, I’m “operating with reduced reliability at reduced speeds.”
What can one say concerning the morality of a political movement which would vivisect a polity, making an unbounded experiment of said polity against the polity’s will, when nothing remotely like morality guides the experimenter?
“Hey, cut it out!”, just won’t do, since the experimenter will gladly comply, instantly hacking away at whatever organ meets his gaze.
She is using the 1993 Reno version of the word responsible. And so far she has a lower body count, at least for the time being. The “Secretary Shalls” will soon make up that difference in spades, and spades will be needed aplenty.