Huffington Magazine Issue 87 | Page 12

Enter law will make it “easier for people to retire before age 65, quit a fulltime job to start a business, or shift to part-time work and spend more time raising children or attending school.” (In a separate post, Barro points out that the “buried lede” of this report is that the law will “drive wages up,” “strengthening workers’ hands in negotiation,” and “reduce income inequality.”) Politico contends that the CBO report “will put the White House, and especially red-state Democrats, in an even more awkward position heading into November.” I don’t know about that! Seems to me that people like higher wages and increased labor mobility and less income inequality. Taken as a whole, those ads that the Democrats will be running suddenly sound pretty competitive. And it probably won’t be too hard for Democrats to find living examples of the virtuous effect of the Affordable Care Act. It only took The Huffington Post a few hours to find Claudia and Joseph Schulz, an Arizona couple who finally achieved their dream of starting a business together, thanks to the Affordable Care Act. The truth is, this CBO isn’t so much a “huge gift” for Republicans. It actually confirms that the ACA is LOOKING FORWARD IN ANGST HUFFINGTON 02.09.14 poised to do some things they really, really hate — like strengthen the bargaining position of middleclass job seekers and force employers to raise wages to compete for low-wage, service-sector workers. It means a less cowed workforce with more options in front of it. It means more sad business lobbyists, which is always good for America. So, Y Kant Politico Reed? Is it not smart enough to understand Are we here to work as much as we can until the day we die, or is there more to life?” the CBO’s big word? Actually, it’s more like Politico just doesn’t care, one way or the other, about what the CBO actually said. Rather, Politico is signaling that it plans to be an unconcerned observer in the coming ad wars over this issue. It possesses the knowledge to properly inform people, and shut down the malformed spin before it gets started. But it is choosing to not be virtuous or decent or honest. The political freakshow is probably good for business, but the Affordable Care Act might be the thing that helps you s х