Is there a open position on Obama’s staff for a “Gruber denier”? Because it looks like MSNBC host Ari Melber really wants that job.
Melber described Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber as “some dude” who “didn’t work directly” on the health care law during an episode of “The Cycle” Tuesday, fuming about the fact that people have made a big deal about Gruber’s past remarks that have gone viral recently.
Of course, Gruber, an MIT professor and consultant on Obamacare, is now infamous for alleging that the law’s “lack of transparency” coupled with the “stupidity of the American voter” allowed it to pass.
“He’s some dude who said that,” Melber shrugged. “Who cares?”
“A dude who worked on [Obamacare]!” exclaimed co-host Abby Huntsman.
“Who cares?” Melber continued. “He didn’t work directly on it, although he worked on the Massachusetts model. He wrote some policy. I hope this is what Republicans continue to do because it is pathetic. And, the fact that they’re so excited about this, trying to go do oppo research on some dude that no one ever cared about, no one ever heard of.”
“‘Oh my god, Barack Obama hasn’t heard of Jonathan Gruber?'” mocked Melber. “Neither has the American voter, which doesn’t implicate their intelligence at all. No one cares about Jonathan Gruber, I swear to you!”
What Melber missed there, however, is the fact that Americans — and not only Republicans — are concerned not about Obama implying that he doesn’t know Gruber but rather that Obama appears to be lying by making such an implication.
Though Obama dismissed Gruber Sunday as “an adviser who was never on our staff,” the president appears in video from 2006 mentioning Gruber by name and praising him as someone he has “stolen ideas from liberally.”
After, if Obama can lie to the American people about his knowledge of Gruber, what else could he be lying to them about?
