Yes, but the amendment is just that…an amendment that allows subsidies for these states that receive a waiver from ACA and set up their own systems. This is quite different from a state that just chose not to set up a state-run exchange and let the feds do it for them. I don’t see how this has anything to do with the discussion at hand.
I’m not talking about one sentence. Section 1311 is referenced over and over in other sections that provide for tax subsidies. Section 1321 is not referenced in any of them. Even section 1321 doesn’t state that federal exchanges are to be treated as state exchanges. I don’t know if that was a drafting error or not but it does not seem obvious enough for the IRS to establish a rule that the federal and state exchanges are identical under ACA
I would argue the opposite. This amendment is basically asking for benefits under a state plan while waiving certain requirements. In effect they asked for permission and permission was granted. I don’t see how this is remotely related to the question at hand.
I’m sure you would, but if we’re talking about arguments that makes sense rather than ones that just barely hang together if you squint…
Could you explain to me how the Wyden amendment has anything to do with whether federal exchanges are eligible for subsidies? Your cute one-liners aside it seems that this amendment allows deviation from the rules of ACA while still obtaining subsidies. So what? It would seem to imply the opposite of what you are arguing…specifically that these states would not have been eligible for subsidies in the absence of an amendment. I don’t see how this in any way advances the argument that the states that opted out of forming their own exchanges are eligible for subsidies. Care to connect the dots for me?
I already did. I’m not sure what else there is to say about it. Here’s Wyden (in a PDF) summarizing his idea:
I’m still not seeing it. My question is what, if any, bearing this amendment has on whether or not federal exchanges are eligible for subsidies. As I already mentioned this amendment allows these states to deviate from ACA and still receive subsidies. As far as I can tell this has absolutely nothing to do with the current discussion…whether people in states that did nothing and let the Feds set up an exchange for them are eligible for subsidies.
It backs the comment I quoted before.
Other key aides and advisers offer their opinions. None of them take the subsidy-as-threat position.
Of course I have, but they have never held a gun to my head and told me how to vote. They may flood politicians with money and allow them to flood the airwaves with garbage, but they cannot force my hand to darken the oval next to a candidate. I am in charge of that.
Some of the right-wing lies are so outrageous, I wonder how anyone can believe them. It is up to those of us who are sane to speak the truth.
Still, election outcomes are painfully highly correlated with campaign advertising expenditures.
We all, as individuals, are independent of the lies and blandishments of the ad spots…but collectively, money buys elections.
Not really, so long as candidates have a certain amount. sure, if one candidate has $2 million and the other $20,000, no contest. But if one has $2 million and the other has $1 million, the outcome isn’t as easy to predict.
Might as well say that money buys baseball pennants. Sometimes it does. Often it doesn’t.
Jonathan “Oops I did it Again” Gruber must have made another speak-o.
The video has been talked about. Now there is audio from a separate speech.
[emphasis added]
Gruber’s the worst liar of all time:
Gruber told The New Republic that he had made a mistake.
“I was speaking off-the-cuff. It was just a mistake. People make mistakes. Congress made a mistake drafting the law and I made a mistake talking about it,” Gruber told The New Republic’s Jonathan Cohn. “But there was never any intention to literally withhold money, to withhold tax credits, from the states that didn’t take that step. That’s clear in the intent of the law and if you talk to anybody who worked on the law. My subsequent statement was just a speak-o—you know, like a typo.”
A second recording has surfaced showing Gruber making similar statements about subsidies not being available on federally run exchanges. Asked over email whether those remarks were a mistake, too, Gruber wrote back, “same answer.”
I don’t know about that. You’re forgetting about Baghdad Bob. And Obama. As it stands now, Gruber’s running third.
NAh. Obama’s seasoned, he’s an experienced politician. Gruber’s a professor who isn’t used to having to backtrack. If it was Obama that had said that, it would go something like this:
“Well, what I said was, (gobbledygook), But let me be clear, (flim flam).”
Gruber apparently just “misspoke” twice, in a very detailed fashion. And probably more than twice. If it had just been captured on film once, you could buy it. But if he’s been caught on film two times, then he probably said it on more occasions.
What’s most offensive is yet again, a supporter of the health care law covers up his own dishonesty by accusing others of dishonesty. And in this case not even Republican partisans, but federal judges.
If you like your assessment, you can keep to your assessment.
You are missing the point. Wyden-Brown allows states to go their own way (as long as certain outcomes are achieved) AND still qualify for federal subsidies. States that did not set up their own exchanges have not “waived” out of anything. The same rules apply to them. But, due to the wording of the law, they may not be eligible for subsidies.
The difference here is that doing nothing, as your quote says, does not mean that a state doesn’t have to abide by the law (i.e. a state can’t say “we didn’t set up an exchange so we are not part of the ACA”) Your quote, and the Wyden amendment, has nothing to do with the current discussion concerning subsidies in states that did not set up their own exchanges.
C’mon guys, if you’re going to coalesce around Jon Gruber’s remarks here as some sort of smoking gun for your argument, then you’d also have to ignore the cascading amounts of evidence (even from Gruber himself) that obviously points to the opposite direction. That’s called cherrypicking.
But look, I say this as somebody who believes that this entire lawsuit is the textbook definition of “desperate” & “stupid:” Gruber’s remarks here are important & I’m glad that we’re debating them. Still, however, they don’t discount all of the statements to the contrary that he made before & after the ones linked to upthread, nor do they negate his own work with the administration that always assumed subsidies in every state regardless of the entity which established the given exchange.