Posted on 11/20/2014 4:40:02 AM PST by Kaslin
Jonathan Gruber, the MIT professor currently getting a dose of media scrutiny generally reserved for conservatives, said something you can hear daily in Washington, D.C. From bars in and around Capitol Hill to cocktail parties in Georgetown, the elites roaming the halls of power think you, the American people, are stupid.
This belief is not unique to Democrats; its truly a bipartisan idea. In fact, the very concept of modern government in the United States is based on it.
Since the start of the progressive movement, self-appointed intellectuals, academics, the wealthy and politicians have based their actions on the conviction that they know what is best for others; their lessors, the unwashed masses. Since the turn of the 20th century, this belief has crept into governments on all levels, incrementally nudging our liberties to the side and replacing it with their coerced will.
With few exceptions, government has grown regardless of which political party held power. Faster under Democrats, on average, but growing nonetheless. As government grows, liberty shrinks.
Concepts unfathomable to our Founding Fathers, or even 100 or 50 years ago, are now accepted norms in American life. Leaps and bounds such as Obamacare we notice; the inching and chipping away we dont. But the journey is only window dressing, the destination is what matters. And we arrived a long time ago.
We didnt get to 50 million people on food stamps and 100 million people on some form of government assistance overnight; we were led there by these very progressives under the guise of caring and compassion.
Benjamin Franklin famously said, Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. We didnt go the wholesale route, we went piecemeal.
Masterfully, progressives rarely went for the long bomb. They were content to pound away at the ground game. Always under the pretense of compassion, they moved to help the poor and the elderly, because what kind of monster would oppose helping the poor or elderly? Some did, and they were painted as monsters. Meanwhile, the real monsters marched on.
When Gruber talked about the lack of transparency being a major ally in the fight to pass Obamacare, he was wrong. It wasnt a lack of transparency. There were conservatives across the country saying exactly what the law was going to do. It was his and other advocates willingness to lie for the cause. And it was the medias enthusiasm to swallow the truth and sell the lie to the people who trusted the media to tell them the truth that ensured its passage.
There were tens of thousands of Americans who took to Capitol Hill to have their objections to that monstrosity heard, but progressives were not going to deviate from their plan. For generations, theyd had their eyes on this prize control over one-sixth of the U.S. economy and they werent going to let anyone stand in their way.
Like I said, they dont often go for the bomb, but when its there for them they will take a shot. Theyd been chipping away at the edges by expanding Medicaid further and further up the income scale, biding their time. The Hail Mary had been intercepted in 1993 with Hillarycare, but they completed the pass with Obamacare.
And while hundreds of thousands of Americans took to the National Mall, and millions more contacted their members of Congress to voice their opposition, tens of millions more didnt. The government was moving to take de facto control over the most important commodity in their lives, and they sat silent.
In spite of the medias best efforts, the truth was out there. The only way to avoid exposure to the truth was through willful blindness, and many Americans were willfully blind.
To remain ignorant in the face of available information, to ignore reality because youve got other things youd rather do, is to choose to be consciously unaware. When it comes to government attacking liberty, to be consciously unaware is to willingly make yourself stupid.
So, in that sense, Jonathan Gruber was absolutely correct. Obamacare could not have passed were it not for the stupidity of the American voter. But progressives didnt have to be so coy about their desires. Had they been open, it wouldnt have made a difference to most people. You either understand the concept of liberty and care about it or you dont. This past election showed many more people have awakened to it, and the giant that is the American people is paying attention for now.
But just like the 1994 election after Hillarycare, the American public is less a sleeping giant than a narcoleptic one. Thomas Jefferson knew the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, but too many of us arent interested in vigilance. When presented with the opportunity to get something for themselves at the expense of someone else, they take it.
To those people, were they to overhear members of Congress, their staffs or the DC professional cocktail party set say the American people are ignorant, they would nod in agreement. Then theyd hope they remembered to set their DVR to record The Real Housewives Of Kardashianville and forget all about it.
"At the foundation of our civil liberties lies
the principle that denies to government officials
an exceptional position before the law and which
subjects them to the same rules of conduct
that are commands to the citizen."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
Ronald Reagen didn’t think Americans were stupid.
These people could not make it for one minute if their car broke down in the snow.
Good article, but I think the author was looking for the word “lesser” - a “lessor” is one who rents or leases something.
This is definitely factual! I learned this almost 50 years ago when, new to a DC assignment, my boss was quoted in the WAPO as stating "Well the people just don't know what is good for them" during an interview on a hotly contested issue. I immediately "inherited" the issue for the next 3 years!!!
I then learned that nearly all the senior officials I encountered held disdain for the "little people" that they were "helping"!!!
Psychotic, manipulative, liberal swine have always thought of non-liberals as knuckle-dragging, bible-thumping, Christian morons.
The problem is that the Christian morons always step up to rid the world the Hitlers, Ho Chi Mins, Mussolinis, Pol Pots of this world who thought of the general population as knuckle-dragging morons.
(Now the potential Pol Pots are running things.)
IMHO
There are two nations under one roof, we are a country divided with irreconcilable differences, we must split up geographically a division starting at the mason dixon and extending all the way to California works for me. Californication can be its own country.
That was another time, and that was America.
This is the Obamanation.
Jonathan Gruber was absolutely correct. Obamacare could not have passed were it not for the stupidity of the American voter.
Watch a few minutes of daytime television and you’ll find yourself starting to agree with Gruber.
“There are two nations under one roof...”
One is the United States and the other is the nation of the scu&bags, by the scu&bags and for the scu&bags.
IMHO
Dr. Ben Carson | Nov 19, 2014
http://townhall.com/columnists/drbencarson/2014/11/19/stupidity-reconsidered-election-proved-americans-arent-fooled-by-gruber-and-obama-n1920600
What is truly disturbing is the fact that our government is willing to engage in the purposeful deception of the populace in order to thrust its secretive agenda onto an unsuspecting populace and a sycophantic mainstream media. As I have said many times before, Obamacare was never about health care; it was about government control and wealth redistribution. (Ben Carson)
Not a single Republican senator or Congressman voted in favor of that monstrosity called Obamacare. It must be make perfectly clear that democrat Phd com man Gruber, called stupid not all the American voters, but just the democrat voters that put the Liar in Chief in the White House, in spite of his Marxist anti-American back ground, and all the Democrats legislators co-conspirators with the president and the MSM in the greatest deception against the American people in the history of the United States.
Obamacare Architect/ Non-Staff Member Visited The White House Quite A Bit
Matt Vespa | Nov 19, 2014
Mr. Gruber went to the White House at least six times in 2009, according to a review of visitor logs. He met with the president on July 20, 2009, and was joined by other economists. Some of the other meetings were held with Jeanne Lambrew, deputy assistant to the president for health policy, and Peter Orszag, former director of the Office of Management and Budget.
Mr. Gruber visited the White House at least twice in 2010 and met with Jason Furman, who is now chairman of the presidents Council of Economic Advisers. Mr. Gruber meet with Ms. Lambrew at least twice this year and was at the White House as recently as June, the records show. For five of the meetings, visitor records dont show when Mr. Gruber arrived or departed, making it unclear whether the appointments were kept.
Mr. Gruber wrote a 2011 cartoon book called Health Care Reform that aimed to explain the federal law. A note about the author says Mr. Gruber consulted extensively with the Obama administration and Congress during the development of the law.
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2014/11/19/obamacare-architect-nonstaff-member-visited-the-white-house-quite-a-bit-n1920697
According to Obama, the MTI professor, a frequent visitor to the White House, was just a random adviser. For his invaluable advise and services to the Obama administration professor Gruber received over 5.9 million dollars... Stupidity and corruption to the nth power.
Agree. People on this and other political sites are BY FAR the exception. The vast majority of American couldn’t care less about what happens in Washington. They are oblivious. They are far more concerned with trivial matters (bread and circuses). Gruber was dead on. He just made the mistake of saying it out loud.
Yeah, OK... so anyway, how’s your football team doing? Put your dinner pic on Facebook last night? Seen Kim’s butt?
Exactly :-)
Ain’t it the truth. Once we get rid of this preening a-hole I shudder think whats coming down the pike.
LET'S CONNECT THE DOTS---The salient point is this: Gruber acting as an independent researcher is one thing--- but Gruber consorting w/ many people in govt figuring out ways to lie in order to dupe the tax-paying public is a CONSPIRACY.
POINTS TO PONDER:
<><> (1) WH sign-in sheets show Gruber went there at least nineteen times.
<><>(2) Gruber, himself, talked about Obama being in the room when the Cadillac tax was invented.
<><> (3) Based on his Obamacare experiences, Gruber took tax dollars from several states to set up Obamacare exchanges....and earned millions of dollars doing so.
<><>(4) Nancy Pelosi is caught on-tape citing Gruber as a reliable source.
<><> (5) Gruber was there when Hillarycare was developed.
<><>(6) Another Gruber confession involved a conspiracy w/ Teddy Kennedy--- outright govt fraud by manipulating Medicare for some $500 million to secretly finance Romneycare.
<><>(7) A former adviser to then-HHS Secy Kathleen Sebelius told the NYT Gruber was on-board whie the govt was formulating the plan.
<><> (8) According BarackObama.com 2012, President Obama's official website, Jon Gruber "helped write Obamacare....w/ specific quotes from Obama tying Mitt Romney to ObamaCare...saying that "RomneyCare" was the model for Obamacare.
<><> (9) The Congressional Budget Office Effectively Used Grubers Model to Score Obamacare.
In sum, the makings of a conpiracy are documented---Gruber had influence over the CBO, the White House, and Congress alike. It's hard to overestimate his importance; Gruber's role was central to the efforts of President Obama and his Democratic allies to shove Obamacare down an unwilling citizenrys throat.
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I'M SURE VALERIE KNOWS (/SNIX)---Obama is downplaying Gruber's role, claiming he had no part in passing healthcare.
But if Gruber was NOT the Obamacare architect---then Gruber took money under false pretenses and should be prosecuted for govt fraud. He took tax dollars from the feds and state govts "posing" as an expert.
TAXPAYERS DEMAND CONGRESS GET ANSWERS WRT GRUBER'S CASHING-IN ON THE BACKS OF "STUPID" TAXPAYERS
Four U.S. states and the federal government (read taxpayers) have padded Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber's wallet to the tune of $5.9 million since 2000, including millions connected to his work on the Affordable Care Act.
We need investigations---to see how our tax dollars changed hands---and landed into Gruber's pockets. The disdainful, preening Gruber was paid tax dollars to spin his web of lies...and to reiterate his contempt for taxpayers who are footing the bills.
Even more disturbing is the massive, multi-billion-dollar slush fund the self-serving Gruber hid from "stupid" Americans in Obamacare. Gruber made dam sure it was kept hidden from us stupid taxpayers.
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The Untraceable $8 Billion ObamaCare PR Budget---truly govt fraud at its finest. Egged on by Pelosi, Democrats slavishly voted for Obamacare by an historic straignt-party line vote. But not one Democrat told Americans about Obamacare's Section 4002---which mandates an $8B untraceable fund to "promote" Obamacare (apparently b/c Boobamba had so little confidence in his signature legislation).
THE PAYOFF--WHO GETS THE MONEY? In 2010 Taxpayers are extorted $500 million, in 2011, $750 million, 2012, $1 billion, 2013, $1.25 billion, 2014, $1.5 billion, and, in 2015 and on, $2 billion
<><> Where is all that money going?
<><> Was cashing-in the incentive in getting the thing passed.
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Taxpayers demand to know ---- why Gruber/Obama/Pelosi didnt reveal that Obamacare contains a multi-billion dollar slush fund?
Exactly who is cashing in?
The sound of West Wing wire-transfers to offshore banks is almost palpable.
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