Yes, Obama’s position on health care has changed. But his embrace of the “individual mandate” represents a move to the right, not leftward as the story claims. Before that, he had been in favor of (a) single-payer coverage, in his days as an Illinois politician, and (b) the “public option” during his 2008 primary campaign against Hillary Clinton. His decision to build “ObamaCare” around the individual mandate — rather than on the public option or a single-payer concept — reflected pressure on the administration to make the plan more “centrist,” not more leftist or radical. When the switch to individual mandate was announced, by far the most heated criticism came from the left, on grounds that Obama had sold out supporters of the public option.

I’ll meet Fallows halfway and say this was a political move to the center, given that the individual mandate was a Republican idea and that the President’s base wanted something more akin to Medicare for all. But there are people out there who don’t look at public policy through a partisan lens. And if you don’t, then it’s difficult to say that the individual mandate is a move in any direction but the left.  Here’s why.

It’s at least somewhat well-established that the federal government can tax its citizens and provide a single payer healthcare plan as Medicare does today. Insofar as Medicare is constitutional, Medicare “for all” would be too. But Fallows glosses over the fact that the individual mandate claims legitimacy under an entirely separate constitutional power (namely, the Commerce Clause) in a way that no prior federal law has done. So while the ACA itself may seem less intrusive — in the sense that it forces people to buy health insurance privately rather than forcing people to pay into a single-payer system with less choice — it nevertheless expands government power by forging a new law-making tool for Congress’s arsenal: the power to compel private purchases so long as non-purchase substantially affects interstate commerce.  The fact that this system is arguably less intrusive than Medicare for all doesn’t mean that it’s not an expansion of what the federal government can reach.

Yes, Republican politicians may have flirted over the years with an individual mandate at the federal level, and even outright championed it at the state level (which is, in fact, a somewhat different inquiry).  But those of us immune from politics are free to consistently view public policy through a particular philosophical lens or logic that either embraces or rejects a stronger federal government irrespective of what the parties stand for.  To someone who thinks like this, the whole “Republicans invented the individual mandate” argument should be countered with an emphatic “Who cares?”

Partisan politics aside, the Supreme Court upholding the individual mandate would constitute an unquestionable expansion of what the federal government can reach.  And, in terms of political philosophy, this would certainly be a move to the left.

COSTELLO: I want to talk about the unemployment rate in America.

ABBOTT: Good “subject”. Terrible “times”. It’s about 9%.

COSTELLO: That many people are out of work?

ABBOTT: No, that’s 16%.

COSTELLO: You just said 9%.

ABBOTT: 9% Unemployed.

COSTELLO: Right 9% out of work.

ABBOTT: No, that’s 16%.

COSTELLO: Okay, so it’s 16% unemployed.

ABBOTT: No, that’s 9%…

COSTELLO: WAIT A MINUTE. Is it 9% or 16%?

ABBOTT: 9% are unemployed. 16% are out of work.

COSTELLO: If you are out of work you are unemployed.

ABBOTT: No, you can’t count the “Out of Work” as the unemployed.  You have to look for work to be unemployed.

COSTELLO: But … they are out of work!

ABBOTT: No, you miss my point.

COSTELLO: What point?

ABBOTT: Someone who doesn’t look for work, can’t be counted with those who look for work. It wouldn’t be fair.

COSTELLO: To who?

ABBOTT: The unemployed.

COSTELLO: But they are ALL out of work.

ABBOTT: No, the unemployed are actively looking for work…Those who are out of work stopped looking. They gave up. And, if you give up, you are no longer in the ranks of the unemployed.

COSTELLO: So if you’re off the unemployment roles, that would count as less unemployment?

ABBOTT: Unemployment would go down. Absolutely!

COSTELLO: The unemployment just goes down because you don’t look for work?

ABBOTT: Absolutely it goes down. That’s how you get to 9%. Otherwise it would be 16%.  You don’t want to read about 16% unemployment do ya?

COSTELLO: That would be frightening.

ABBOTT: Absolutely.

COSTELLO: Wait, I got a question for you. That means they’re two ways to bring down the unemployment number?

ABBOTT: Two ways is correct.

COSTELLO: Unemployment can go down if someone gets a job?

ABBOTT: Correct.

COSTELLO: And unemployment can also go down if you stop looking for a job?

ABBOTT: Bingo.

COSTELLO: So there are two ways to bring unemployment down, and the easier of the two is to just stop looking for work.

ABBOTT: Now you’re thinking like an economist.

COSTELLO: I don’t even know what the hell I just said!

Yglesias is representative of a new generation of blogger-journalists, such as Megan McArdle, Ezra Klein, and Felix Salmon, who express bold, confident opinions on all issues under the sun, without much substantive knowledge or understanding of any. These writers don’t do a lot of reporting, or investigating, but specialize in editorializing, even in what are ostensibly “news” items. Yglesias, in particular, excels in relationship reporting — which group is connected to which, who dislikes whom, what this person said about that person — but can’t take the time to learn the actual arguments under consideration.

There are plenty of technically unqualified bloggers (yours truly, in particular) hurling amateur propaganda into the blogosphere, touching on all mainstream social sciences.  But what came to mind while reading Klein’s piece was who we would be left with if these guys were somehow marginalized. For economics, we’d turn to Paul Krugman or Bryan Caplan; Jared Bernstein or Russ Roberts.  For law, maybe Jack Balkin or Eugene Volokh.  Though qualified, these guys are hardly in total agreement on the things on which they’re qualified to speak.  So how is it that so many really smart people disagree on, essentially, how to do their jobs?

It’s worth it to compare constitutional law and macroeconomics in this sense. Constitutional law is, in theory, about what the Constitution does and does not permit.  A few vague words provide ample room for scholars and judges to color their meaning with a particular ideology and cherry-picked historical “evidence”.  Economics, too, and macroeconomics in particular, is, as I understand it, the attempt to make cause-and-effect sense of large scale exchange of goods and services.  Unfortunately for us, there is historical evidence supporting the likes of both Mankiw and Krugman.  I suspect, in both law and economics, we use preferred aspects of each social science to argue for or against a particular ideology-based policy preference.

This isn’t so much a response to Klein (himself a Ron Paulian, by the way) as it is an expansion upon his point, I think.  Amateur, non-”qualified” bloggers may make mistakes that professionals in the particular field would not.  But even if they didn’t, I suspect we wouldn’t have that much more clarity on the issues…at least insofar as appealing to authority goes.

Paul’s success matters because no matter who wins in 2012 they will find their policy options tightly constrained by the movement he has helped to construct. A potential Republican President will find himself in a particular bind. Just look at what’s happened to John Boehner. And coming in Paul’s wake is Rand Paul, a far more telegenic character who has mastered the Neo-Confederate synergy of Ante-Bellum Dixie economics and old-tyme religion. The organization Ron Paul has built could reach a tipping point under Rand’s influence.

For rationalist Republicans struggling to regain some relevance in the party Ron Paul’s success is particularly instructive. Instead of engaging in the contortions that created John McCain’s 2008 “success” in the nominating campaign, we might be better off repeating the apparent failure of 2000, following such failures with carefully grassroots coalition-building. The White House is a hollow prize for anyone who can’t influence the base.

Politics is not about winning elections, it is about wielding power. Paul offers some valuable lessons in politics that rationalists could put to use.

Most people think that Mitt Romney will eventually walk away with the Republican nomination.  But compare Romney to Ron Paul — you couldn’t find a starker contrast in terms of the kind of politicians these two are.  Romney, like the vast majority of politicians, cares primarily about winning elections, and his fungibility over the years is all the proof you need.  You certainly cannot say the same thing about Ron Paul, at least at the presidential level, regardless of whether you agree with him.  I honestly don’t even think the guy wants to be President; he’d seem to be more content being the contemporary father of an old philosophy that gains more and more influence in the coming years.

Libertarians have plenty to be encouraged about these days.

None of this, of course, prevents the brainwashed masses from making an unparalleled public display of grief.