Pirate's Cove

Make sure to read the whole thing at Reason, here’s the gist

Jonathan Gruber, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology economist who helped design the Massachusetts health law that was the model for Obamacare, was a key influence on the creation of the federal health law. He was widely quoted in the media. During the crafting of the law, the Obama administration brought him on for consultation because of his expertise. He was paid almost $400,000 to consult with the administration on the law. And he has claimed to have written part of the legislation, the section dealing with small business tax credits. (snip)

A video of the presentation, posted on YouTube, was unearthed tonight by Ryan Radia at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a libertarian think tank which has participated in the legal challenge to the IRS rule allowing subsidies in federal exchanges. Here’s what Gruber says.

What’s important to remember politically about this is if you’re a state and you don’t set up an exchange, that means your citizens don’t get their tax credits—but your citizens still pay the taxes that support this bill. So you’re essentially saying [to] your citizens you’re going to pay all the taxes to help all the other states in the country. I hope that that’s a blatant enough political reality that states will get their act together and realize there are billions of dollars at stake here in setting up these exchanges. But, you know, once again the politics can get ugly around this. [emphasis added]

Here’s the video, which according to YouTube’s date stamp was uploaded by Noblis on January 20, 2012. The relevant passage starts around minute 31.

See the video at Reason or here.

Some courts have tied themselves in incredible knots to say that Congress, ie, the 100% of Democrats who voted for Ocare while 0% of Republicans voted for it, meant for the subsidies to be fore all exchanges, regardless of what the law actually says.

More at Power Line, Patterico’s Pontifications, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Althouse, The PJ Tatler