Krauthammer blasts Obamacare, CFPB at WANADA Annual Meeting

Krauthammer blasts Obamacare, CFPB at WANADA Annual Meeting

Im here today to talk about the craziness in Washington, Charles Krauthammer told dealers at the WANADA Annual Meeting and Lunch. But the Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist didnt talk about Congress. He focused on the administration.

I think its astonishing that there are people in the White House whove never run so much as a candy store, who make regulations with no conception of how they will affect people, Krauthammer said.

Reopening the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, he lashed out at so called consumer protection agencies telling you how to run your business and telling you youre racist, essentially, which I think is a disgrace.

Throughout his speech Krauthammer took the long view. During the Obama administration, he said, issues around health care policy, cap and trade, the budget and the environment are all subordinate to the age-old debate, namely: Whats the nature of democracy in America and the proper role of government?

We only have this kind of argument once a generation, Krauthammer said. The last time was in the early 1980s, when President Reagan, shortly after his inauguration, said that government is the problem, and so dialed-back the social policies of earlier Democrat presidents from FDRs New Deal to LBJs Great Society. After Reagan, even President Clinton– a Democrat– said the era of big government is over.

But President Obama wants to reverse that philosophy, said Krauthammer. The president is not your ordinary Democrat liberal. An ordinary liberal doesnt care what you do as long as its mandatory, he said. Obama is, rather, a liberal in the mold of the European left, advocating for a new kind of society where the emphasis is on equality.

Krauthammer cited a speech by President Obama in which he said, I came here to transform America in three areas: health care, education and energy. He tried to transform energy policy through cap and trade, but that effort failed. On health care, Krauthammer predicted that Obamacare will collapse on itself. If it does not succeed, we will see the failure of that type of radical liberalism and will go back to the Clinton-type left-of-center liberalism.

The revulsion Americans feel about Obamacare, Krauthammer said, stems from three problems with the laws rollout. First is the incompetence of an administration that presumes it can completely turn around a sector that represents 17 percent of the nations economy, then cant even run a website. Second is the paternalism of saying, You can keep your plan, but later saying, Were going to cancel it if we (the government) dont like it. The third problem with the health care law rollout is deception. The administration stated that 85 percent of Americans would be untouched by the new law and would not have to pay anything extra.

That was clearly a promise that had a catch, said Krauthammer. The government would not pay for this directly. They deliberately decided to force people off their plans into exchanges. The surplus would be used to subsidize everybody else.

Its possible but very unlikely, that the health care law will be fixed, Krauthammer said. Because of health care, Krauthammer predicted the Democrats will lose the Senate in 2014 and may lose the presidency in 2016.

The Obama agenda of the first two years is over, Krauthammer said. Now, the president is trying to govern by administrative fiat, a method Krauthammer called lawless and unconstitutional.