If you were paying attention to the news this week you know a video of MIT professor Jonathan Gruber, one of the most important authors of tha Affordable Care Act openly admitted in a video recorded in 2013 that the passage of ACA was dependent upon fooling both the CBO and Congress and the inherent stupidity of the American voter. While the deception and politicizing of the law by Congress and the CBO is to be expected, the "Buyer Beware" philosophy, it is the sheer arrogance of the latter phrase about the American voter which raises the most concern. We at CRI have always stated the commonly understood and openly admitted goal of the ACA was a socialist single-payer government healthcare plan. Dr. Ezequiel Emanuel and Dr. Arnold Berwick, two other co-authors of ACA, have stated this repeatedly as has every major "progressive" political figure. This leads us to question how on in the world could the American population have been so easily deceived? The contention of those whose single minded drive to pass a national health care plan in which the ends justify the means is that the American voter is just stupid enough to believe a colossal lie. I disagree, the voters are not stupid, but many are naive enough and think its going to be someone else who will get burned. Obamacares selling points played to the basest instincts of human nature in a cold and calculating, devious way. All subgroups of people were told they would benefit at a cost to others. Thus there was buy-in from the Insurance companies, The American Medical Association, the unions, the Medicare population, the hospitals, the Medicaid population, and of course the uninsured, the uninsurable, the unemployed and the sick. Each of these entities was offered something for nothing and they all succumbed to their basic greed and envy. Should I be surprised at the deception? No. Should I have higher expectations of our politics? Probably not. Should I expect better character from those who bought in? Absolutely! FYI. The entity which had the power to protect itself from the assault was and is the health insurance industry and it did include several safeguards. The industry made sure a reimbursement mechanism was built into the ACA to get the government to give the insurance companies taxpayer dollars if too many sick people signed up for insurance policies_OLD without the needed number of healthy people signing up. They also inserted into the law the ability to "Claw Back" payments to doctors and hospitals at a later date if the patient was actually in default of their premium. The Insurance company is allowed to essentially lie to the provider about the policy being good and then authorize treatment and either refuse to pay for it or pay and then "Claw Back" the funds at a later date. At the end of the day, the health insurance industry will cease to exist but they will have managed to guarantee themselves a few more profitable quarters before that happens. Chris Casscells, MD, Director *see the video where Gruber calls voters "stupid" by clicking here   Not insulting enough? Gruber said it two more times. Click here to see the other two.