Lies, Damned Lies, and Obamacare

Expert political pundit Lewis Black loved to hate on the Bush administration. Still does, as far as I can tell. He was particularly concerned about the lack of weapons of mass destruction, or more specifically the lack of falsified documentation regarding such weapons. “If they couldn’t find the weapons, which was the reason we went to war, then why didn’t they make something up? Why did they stop lying? My government has always lied to me. I’m comfortable with that. Son of a…”

The Obama administration got its knickers in quite a twist with the recent revelation that, despite assurances from the president himself, some individuals who already have insurance will be kicked off their plans. “If you like your health care plan, you’ll be able to keep your health care plan. Period. No one will take it away, no matter what.” Meanwhile, upwards of 50 percent of the 14 million Americans who buy health insurance individually will lose coverage because of the Affordable Care Act, according to an NBC News investigation. So was Obama lying?

Of course he was. “Obama’s quote is being taken out of context,” some of my friends protest half-heartedly. I might be inclined to agree, at least for the first dozen or two times Obama trotted out his now infamous line, but after a certain point the context stopped mattering so much. “Mr. President, what can you tell us about the IRS scandal?” a reporter might ask. His answer would likely include, “Well, uh, it’s important to remember, uh, if you like your health care plan, you’ll be able to keep it.”

Some unnamed sources close to the matter have acknowledged the mistake and point to a number of “technical glitches” plaguing Obama’s speeches and interviews for the past several years. “There were a series of typos on the teleprompter,” I was told by a news anchorman who wishes to remain anonymous but has a name that rhymes with Bon Rurgundy.

Others maintain that Obama’s lie was, in fact, not a lie. Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Shultz was interviewed by Bill Maher and maintained that Obama’s assertion was not a lie. “It was not a lie, let’s just be very clear. So let me knock that down right away.… That was referring to the overwhelming majority of Americans who have health care.” I tried using a similar line on my parole officer, but he politely informed me that abstaining from theft an “overwhelming majority” of the time is not sufficient to keep me out of jail.

In an interview with Piers Morgan, Democratic Rep. Frank Pallone explained: “People can keep their plans. Plans are grandfathered.” Unsurprisingly, those two sentences are filled with more asterisks than Barry Bonds’ home run record. The Department of Health and Human Services wrote regulations restricting the qualifications of grandfathered insurance plans, including a gem specifying that if a plan increased copayments by more than $5 plus inflation, it would not be eligible to be grandfathered. As far back as 2010, the administration predicted that “40 to 67 percent” of Americans who purchased their own insurance would lose coverage.

Many must have been wondering why on Earth the government would let us know that it was lying. Of course, people are bound to find out at some point that their health care got yanked. Ideally, they will realize it prior to actually needing their insurance and have a chance to test out the new website HealthCare.gov before it spontaneously combusts and needs to be rushed to the emergency room. This means, naturally, that Obama’s lie was not going to stay any more secret than Angela Merkel’s private telephone calls.

Which brings me to what, best as I can tell, is my point. How could the president tell us such a lousy lie? He couldn’t find anything better to lie about? Like Lewis Black, you see, I am completely comfortable with my president lying to me. I would just prefer he lie to me about something less easily exposed, or at least remotely more interesting. (The whole debate is “arguing over minutiae,” Wasserman-Shultz assures us, which is, in classic fashion, a lie, and not a particularly interesting one at that.) Obama’s fib is not even remotely close to good enough to make the pantheon of best presidential lies.

“I am not a crook.”

“Read my lips, no new taxes.”

“I did not have sexual relations with that woman.”

“Happy birthday, Mr. President.”

I expect better lies from my commander-in-chief.

Jacob R. Drucker ’15, a Crimson editorial writer, is an economics concentrator in Mather House.