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But wait, there’s more: Fifth video shows Gruber mocking Vermonters
Watch Dog ^ | Bruce Parker

Posted on 11/14/2014 3:42:28 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife

".....In the 2011 video shot by TrueNorthReports.com and sent to Watchdog.org on Thursday, Gruber appears before the Vermont House Health Care Committee to present recommendations for a universal, publicly financed health care program. The recommendations were part of the 2011 “Hsiao Report” submitted to the Legislature by economist William C. Hsiao and co-written by Gruber.

As Gruber sits listening, the committee chair reads a comment from a Vermonter who expresses concern that the economist’s plan might lead to “ballooning costs, increased taxes and bureaucratic outrages,” among other things.

After hearing the Vermonter’s worries, Gruber responds, “Was this written by my adolescent children by any chance?”

The remark was met with uproarious laughter.

The video is the fifth in string of videos to surface this week in which Gruber publicly mocks citizens or boasts of his use of deception in crafting health care policies. Gruber is being paid $400,000 by the state of Vermont to advise Gov. Peter Shumlin on how to finance Act 48, Vermont’s single-payer health care law. His recommendations will be presented to the Vermont Legislature in January.

Contrary to Gruber’s snarky insult, the comment was not written by an adolescent.

“It was actually written by a former senior policy adviser in the White House who knew something about health care systems,” said John McClaughry, a two-term Vermont state senator and adviser to President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s.

McClaughry, who wrote the comment in an op-ed weeks before the 2011 committee meeting, told Vermont Watchdog he did not know Gruber made the condescending insult. However, he was aware of other videos discovered this week in which Gruber boasted of writing deceptive policies to trick “stupid” American voters.

“No one should trust this man. … Based on the rest of the stuff that’s come out on the videos, nobody can trust this guy. He has no use for transparency, he thinks people are stupid, and he’ll do anything to get this thing through and pocket his $400,000. That’s not in the interest of the people of Vermont,” McClaughry said.........


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Government; Health/Medicine; Politics
KEYWORDS: aca; condescending; gruber; grubergate; grubervideo; obamacare; stupidvoters
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To: USS Alaska

“....Not all of the contracts could be found on public Web sites, but here are a sampling. In some cases, Gruber worked with other consultants, so the fees were shared. These figures also might not represent the final payout. But it’s safe to say that about $400,000 appears to be the standard rate for gaining access to the Gruber Microsimulation Model.

Michigan: $481,050

Minnesota: $329,000

Vermont: $400,000

Gruber has also earned more than $2 million over the last seven years for an on-going contract with HHS to assess choices made by the elderly in Medicare’s prescription-drug plan.....”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/wp/2014/11/14/did-jonathan-gruber-earn-almost-400000-from-the-obama-administration/


21 posted on 11/14/2014 4:21:19 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

Whom does the smug character on the left hand side of the cover represent, dja think?


22 posted on 11/14/2014 4:21:29 AM PST by Lonesome in Massachussets (This is known as "bad luck". - Robert A. Heinlein)
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To: DainBramage

>>” while it may be true that there was an attempt to deceive the intent was to provide a better way for those who stay uninformed and less educated on the issue. Smart isn’t always popular”

This whole episode is more vindication for Thomas Sowell and his excellent book The Vision of the Anointed: Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy, which came out in 1996.

“Sowell presents a devastating critique of the mind-set behind the failed social policies of the past thirty years. Sowell sees what has happened during that time not as a series of isolated mistakes but as a logical consequence of a tainted vision whose defects have led to crises in education, crime, and family dynamics, and to other social pathologies. In this book, he describes how elites—the anointed—have replaced facts and rational thinking with rhetorical assertions, thereby altering the course of our social policy.”

http://www.amazon.com/Vision-Anointed-Self-Congratulation-Social-Policy/dp/046508995X/

Leftist leaders as exemplified by Gruber (and Obama!) are arrogantly sure they know what is best for all others, and work to give it to them good and hard. They are the (self-) anointed.


23 posted on 11/14/2014 4:22:00 AM PST by FreedomPoster (Islam delenda est)
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To: DainBramage
"..............Ever since abandoning the utopian illusions of the progressive cause, I have been struck by how little the world outside the left seems to actually understand it. How little those who have not inhabited the progressive mind are able to grasp the ruthless cynicism behind its idealistic mask or the fervent malice that drives its hypocritical passion for "social justice."

No matter how great the crimes progressives commit, no matter how terrible the future they labor to create, no matter how devastating the catastrophes they leave behind, the world outside the faith seems ever ready to forgive them their "mistakes" and to grant them the grace of "good intentions.".....

.....No matter how opportunistically the left's agendas have been modified, however, no matter how circumspectly its goals have been set, no matter how generous its concessions to political reality, the faithful have not given up their self-justifying belief that they can bring about a social redemption. In other words, a world in which human consciousness is changed, human relations refashioned, social institutions transformed, and in which "social justice" prevails.

Because the transformation progressives seek is ultimately total, the power they seek must be total as well. In the end, the redemption they envision cannot be achieved as a political compromise, even though compromises may be struck along the way. Their brave new world can ultimately be secured only by the complete surrender of the resisting force. In short, the transformation of the world requires the permanent entrenchment of the saints in power. Therefore, everything is justified that serves to achieve the continuance of Them........

......Conservatives who think progressives are misinformed idealists will forever be blind-sided by the malice of the left—by the cynicism of those who pride themselves on principle, by the viciousness of those who champion sensitivity, by the intolerance of those who call themselves liberal, and by the ruthless disregard for the well-being of the downtrodden by those who preen themselves as social saints."......." -- David Horowitz June 22, 2000

24 posted on 11/14/2014 4:30:00 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: Lonesome in Massachussets

Good catch!


25 posted on 11/14/2014 4:30:37 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: Lonesome in Massachussets

Gruber!!!
The man is a genius (in his own mind) who knows what is best for everyone else.
He will admit to that, and mock those that disagree.

Gruber is here to improve your lot in life, via coercion where required.

If Gruber’s famed models show everyone over sixty must die, well by golly who are we to question the models.

Gotta go, gotta find my winter parka coat. Al Gore missed the timing of Gaia’s warming


26 posted on 11/14/2014 4:31:36 AM PST by Steven Tyler
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To: Gaffer
Gruber is the pinnacle of arrogant academic elitism.

There are countless other professors who are worse. My friend's self-described communist professor told my friend privately that he considered himself as "operating behind enemy lines." This was back in the '80s.

27 posted on 11/14/2014 4:36:25 AM PST by St_Thomas_Aquinas ( Isaiah 22:22, Matthew 16:19, Revelation 3:7)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

I'm shocked I tell you, shocked.

28 posted on 11/14/2014 4:39:44 AM PST by McGruff (The whole Omama Administration is a breach in protocol)
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To: St_Thomas_Aquinas

Truly evil people.


29 posted on 11/14/2014 4:43:06 AM PST by Gaffer
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

I believe “micro-simulation model” is a technical term meaning “manipulating numbers in the service of liberal politicians”.

It is capable of showing lower unemployment, despite fewer jobs and more job seekers.

It can reliably predict the weather in Boston on July 23, 2116, though it is worthless for telling you if it will rain this afternoon.

It demonstrates that a higher minimum wage and more generous unemployment benefits produce lower unemployment.

It proves that 2 + 2 = 5, or seven or the square root of -1, or any other result Comrade Obama requires.

It has a unique property: one inputs the results and it returns the results wrapped in scientism and statistical significance and authority wrapped in a neatly packaged sciency linear regression bow.

It can infallibly predict the delusions and dreams of bureaucrats and liberal politicians, unerringly foresee our common ineluctable future, but it can never explain the ever changing past.

If you are the only person who can produce a given result, regardless of your degrees or position, you are probably deluded or a charlatan.


30 posted on 11/14/2014 4:44:15 AM PST by Lonesome in Massachussets (This is known as "bad luck". - Robert A. Heinlein)
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To: RockyTx

He offered draft legislation, analysis, opinions and suggestions. He is perfectly free to do so. The elected officials who acted on that input are the ones who need to be grilled.


31 posted on 11/14/2014 4:45:07 AM PST by muir_redwoods ("He is a very shallow critic who cannot see an eternal rebel in the heart of a conservative." G.K .)
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To: RockyTx

My question— In your discussions with the President, was he a part of the deception or did he believe the things you were trying to sell? (In other words is he one of the stupid ones or one of the conspirators?) This is the perfect “have you stopped beating your wife type question”.


32 posted on 11/14/2014 4:45:40 AM PST by muskah
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To: McGruff

Is that a cattle prod up your (you know where) or are you just glad to see me?


33 posted on 11/14/2014 4:47:12 AM PST by Lonesome in Massachussets (This is known as "bad luck". - Robert A. Heinlein)
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Donate And Keep The Lights On


34 posted on 11/14/2014 4:48:57 AM PST by DJ MacWoW (The Fed Gov is not one ring to rule them all)
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To: Lonesome in Massachussets

Exacty.

You can come up with what ever result you want.

Garbage in. Garbage out.

And get paid millions for it.


35 posted on 11/14/2014 4:49:35 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: Cincinatus' Wife
WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE?
36 posted on 11/14/2014 4:49:49 AM PST by Ex-Pat in Mex
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

and his conclusion about the elderly, “surprise”, they weren’t making the “right choices”. shock!


37 posted on 11/14/2014 4:52:56 AM PST by machogirl
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

My bad. I said “character” when I should have said “bastard”.


38 posted on 11/14/2014 4:52:59 AM PST by Lonesome in Massachussets (This is known as "bad luck". - Robert A. Heinlein)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

McClaughry is the true leader of the conservative movement in VT, a smart man who for the past 20yrs has taken progressives head on. Go Green Mountain boys.


39 posted on 11/14/2014 4:53:20 AM PST by VTenigma (The Democratic party is the party of the mathematically challenged)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife
So he says Americans are stupid. So what? He's just echoing the beliefs of those who are in government! With the US Government eyeball-deep in sleazy characters, corruption, deceit, graft, blatant theft of time, property and funds from the American people it is literally impossible to say they regard us as anything more than complete and utter imbiciles!

P.S. We want a refund. And Gruber's picture burned into the minds of Americans as a constant reminder of what the American Government really thinks of its people!

40 posted on 11/14/2014 4:58:21 AM PST by W. (We won. Get over it! Or not--I don't care--because we won!)
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