Dan Mitchell: The Obama Administration’s Engages in Contortions to Claim that Obamacare Is a Success

From Dan Mitchell:

I’ve observed, reported, mocked, written, and explained that Obamacare is a cluster-you-know-what.

So I’m rather bemused and frustrated by the latest pro-Obamacare spin that the law is a “success” because there are now 7 million people who have picked a plan.

There are lots of reasons for normal people to have a what-the-expletive-deleted response to this declaration of victory. For instance:

The goal of Obamacare was to insure the uninsured, yet that number has barely budged, so why is the Administration allowed to move the goalposts to something far more modest?

Obamacare also was supposed to lower premiums by $2500 and allow everyone to keep their plans and their preferred providers, so what happened to those goals?

And why should we even believe the White House spin when we have no idea whether people who have picked a plan have actually paid for that plan?

Moreover, what’s so impressive about getting some people to sign up for plans when they can get something that’s subsidized by taxpayers or other consumers?

But here’s an image put together by Senator Cruz’s office that may be the best – and certainly most amusing – look at the Administration’s supposed “achievement.”

Amen. People are being both coerced and bribed to sign up for Obamacare, in many cases after the law forced the cancellation of plans that they liked.

So why are we supposed to applaud the fact that a small fraction of the population has chosen the only possible option?

That’s the same mentality that allows politicians to brag about our “voluntary” tax system. As if any of us send our hard-earned money to the crooks in Washington for any reason other than the fact that otherwise we would get arrested.

P.S. Since I commented on our acquiescence to the IRS and our “voluntary” tax system, I will admit that I’m amused and chagrined by this poster. It’s minimized since it uses a sometimes-inappropriate synonym for wimps.

P.P.S. Since this post was about the “broken window” theory of Obamacare, let’s make sure to give ultimate credit to Bastiat, who came up with the original broken windows analogy (as captured by this cartoon mocking Keynesian economics).

http://readychimp.com/2014/04/06/dan-mitchell-the-obama-administrations-engages-in-contortions-to-claim-that-obamacare-is-a-success/