Democrats will soon accuse Republicans against increased premium subsidy-spending under Obamacare, as indifferent to Americans with policies were cancelled by the (un)Affordable (Obama Crack Corn and he don’t) Care Act that Dems enacted into law with zero GOP votes.
But this week former Clinton and Obama Administration cabinet member Lawrence Summers joined HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius in blaming Republicans for HealthCare.gov website glitches and other failures of President Barack Obama’s signature legislation that Democrats exclusively drafted, passed into law, promulgated regulations for and altered by executive fiat:
…fairness requires recognizing the equally important, and in some ways more fundamental, factor behind the problems implementing Obamacare: the systematic effort of the president’s opponents to delegitimize and undermine the project.
Large-scale information technology projects in the private sector are hard enough without an organized constituency for failure. It is no exaggeration to say that the failure of Obamacare has been the prophecy and the hope of many of those responsible for funding implementation of the Affordable Care Act, confirming the appointments of those who will do the job and overseeing the results. They have been eager to seize on any problems and highlight any controversial judgments. All serve to create an environment in which failure becomes the expectation.
It is disingenuous for those who stood ready to turn any regulatory detail into an attack ad to profess outrage when guidance was not provided during an election campaign. It is hypocritical for those who held up confirmations of key officials with responsibility for managing federal health-care programs and whose behavior deterred many people from coming into government to lash out at the incompetence of government management. And it is indefensible to refuse to appropriate money to carry out a program and then attack it for being under-resourced.
There is a line that must be respected between political opposition and conscious subversion. Everyone understands that when the country is at war, even a war a person may oppose, vigorous oversight is essential, but, in the end, there is an obligation to support American troops. In the same way, history will not judge kindly those who, having lost political debates over policy, go beyond vigorous oversight and seek to subvert enacted programs. (emphasis added)
Who knew that in order for Liberal Democrat website-builders to competently do their jobs behind executive branch office doors, free speech in America had to be suspended outside those doors? Yes, The GOP organized to de-legitimize, undermine, and outright defeat the passage of the ACA. They failed! Obamacare became the law, after which the GOP prophesied and hoped that Americans would elect enough Republicans, or insist that Democrats, save them from the ongoing and impending debacle.
Republicans failed in all those efforts (except for the restoration of premium-subsidy income-verification requirements that Secretary Sebelius had waived by executive fiat) as the price for ending the recent 18-day government shutdown. Ironically, Obamacare “navigators” were recently caught on film counseling applicants for those subsidies to submit fraudulent income verifications.
Summers disingenuously implies that Republicans refused to appropriate money, but the link in his original article refers only to the previously-mentioned Cruz effort aimed at next year’s funding. Obamacare has been fully funded by the GOP-controlled House of Representatives (as defined by funding bills passed by the Democrat-controlled Senate and the absence of any complaints or excuses by the Obama Administration before the October 1, 2013 website roll-out) since its 2010 enactment.
And we missed the non-existent warnings from the Obama Administration of impending website or other failures caused by untimely confirmations of political appointees, a bad political climate or competent employees somehow deterred by said climate. The executive branch executes laws. No Republican saboteurs have been spotted sneaking into HHS offices and shouting Boo! at computer geeks trying to write code.
But by far the most instructive of Summer’s apologia for Obamacare’s epic fail is his bemoaning of “guidance not provided” by Republicans. Where was Larry?
Republicans first attempted to guide Democrats by unanimously arguing and voting against the passage of the law; and then offered so much guidance in 2010 that Americans voted in landslide margins to return control of the House to the GOP based primarily upon tea partier opposition to Obamacare. Democrats refused the guidance offered.
Finally, what to make of the former Treasury Secretary’s non sequitur juxtaposition of GOP opposition to Obamacare to the obligation to support America troops when the country is at war. Again, where was Larry?
Did he miss the BushLied Era initiated 72 hours after Americans invaded Iraq and when it didn’t yet resemble Connecticut? Did he miss the votes of Democratic senators, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton (a majority of whom had voted to authorize the invasion), to de-fund American troops in both the Iraq and Afghanistan theaters of war? Did he miss the campaign promises of Democrats, including John Kerry and Barack Hussein Obama while running for president, heard by our terrorist enemies that if only Americans would elect them to the White House and/or Congress, America would bug out?
Summers would search in vain for an IT guy or gal deterred from applying for an executive branch position because Republicans opposed Obamacare. But the number of Taliban, al Qaeda and Baathist terrorists that decided to fight on and kill more Americans confident that Democrats would surrender if elected, are legion.
The fact is that President George W. Bush (nor President Clinton to justify bombing Iraq in Operation Desert Fox) never “lied” about WMD to lie us into war. But it is obvious to all sentient human beings that President Obama and every supportive Democrat lied us into Obamacare and the health insurance policy-cancellations it requires.
Mike DeVine‘s Right.com @ Joe For America.com
“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson
