Press Secretary Says Contention that Obamacare Is Tax “Idiotic”

Press Secretary Jay Carney sought to get out ahead of the GOP's campaign rhetoric alleging that Obamacare is a huge tax imposed on the middle class.

“There's no way this is a tax,” Carney insisted. “The President doesn't call it a tax. The legislation doesn't say it's a tax. Calling it a tax is idiotic. The President has made it quite clear that the $2,000 a person has to pay for refusing to buy health insurance is a punishment for disobedience, not a tax.”

The fact that the Supreme Court decision upholding Obamacare was founded on Chief Justice John Roberts' finding that the so-called penalty is a tax is irrelevant, according to Carney. “Roberts' convoluted logic isn't binding on anything,” Carney said. “All that matters is that the Court voted to sustain the law. Whatever reasons he or any other Justice might give are irrelevant.”

To further bolster his case against Obamacare being a tax, Carney cited the waivers granted by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. “Secretary Sebelius has no authority to waive taxes,” Carney pointed out. “She does, however, have the authority to excuse persons from complying with the mandate. Those who think the mandate is oppressive ought to be trying to get on her good side. I don't think that castigating the Affordable Care Act for political advantage is a course likely to achieve that.”

Thus far, Sebelius has issued over 1,000 waivers—most of them to organizations and businesses supporting the Administration's political agenda.

In related news, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal (R) suggested that, based on the Court's decision, the government might mandate the consumption of tofu or the purchase of a Chevy Volt under threat of being assessed a penalty for noncompliance. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) dismissed such fears as “misplaced. It is the government's job to promote the general welfare. If eating healthier food and driving non-polluting vehicles is deemed the appropriate way of promoting that welfare who is Mr. Jindal to say that the government shouldn't penalize those who won't cooperate?"