The Benghazi-fication of Obamacare

By Ryan Cooper, WashPost, Updated: January 6 at 12:12 pm

Senator Ron Johnson has announced he is going to file suit in Federal court to force Congress to cut the pay of its members and staff. I’ll explain why below, but that is quite literally his intention. This bizarre action is indicative of the state of Obamacare acceptance on the right.

Back in October, conservatives had convinced themselves that the law was going down in flames. But now that it looks to be basically functional (if far from perfect) conservatives are fumbling for any reason at hand to delegitimize the law. Going by past history, the answer will be to turn it into a conservative pet rock: like Benghazi and the IRS stories, an initially suspicious happening which turns out to be a non-scandal or an example of run-of-the-mill governing incompetence, but lives on forever as a Watergate level episode in the conservative fever swamps.

Here’s Senator Johnson:

In truth, many members of Congress feel entitled to an exemption from the harsh realities of the law they helped jam down Americans’ throats in 2010. Unlike millions of their countrymen who have lost coverage and must now purchase insurance through an exchange, members and their staffs will receive an employer contribution to help pay for their new plans. 

It is clear that this special treatment, via a ruling by the president’s Office of Personnel Management, was deliberately excluded in the law.... Even a cursory reading of the legislative history clearly shows the intent of Congress was to ensure that members and staff would no longer be eligible for their current coverage under the Federal Employee Health Benefit Plan.

(More here.)