ObamaCare's Threat to Free Speech

Posted by Michael F. Cannon

On Friday, I blogged about HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius’ letter to the health insurance lobby, in which she attempts to stifle political speech by using the new powers that ObamaCare grants her to threaten health insurance companies that claim ObamaCare’s coverage mandates are one cause behind rising premiums.  (Never mind that the insurers’ estimates — which project that ObamaCare will increase premiums in 2011 by as much as 9 percent — are in line with those put forward by HHS.)

Here’s a smattering of reactions from others.

• The Wall Street Journal: “The Health and Human Services secretary…warned that ‘there will be zero tolerance for this type of misinformation and unjustified rate increases.’   Zero tolerance for expressing an opinion, or offering an explanation to policyholders? They’re more subtle than this in Caracas.”
• Chicago Tribune: “President Obama’s health care reform plan, enacted in March, is not terribly popular with the American people…The administration can’t tell the public to stop grousing. It can, however, try to silence health insurers who have the nerve to say out loud what basic economic theory indicates…Apparently, harsh punishment is in store for anyone who refuses to parrot the administration line. But there is every reason to think this alleged libel is true.”
• Tyler Cowen: “Nowhere is it stated that these rate hikes are against the law (even if you think they should be), nor can this ‘misinformation’ be against the law…[The letter] is worse than I had been expecting.”
• Ed Morrissey: “Rarely have we heard a Cabinet official tell Americans to stay out of political debates at the risk of losing their businesses. It points out the danger in having government run industries and holding a position where politicians can actually destroy a business out of spite.”
• Michael Barone: “Sebelius is threatening to put health insurers out of business in a substantial portion of the market if they state that Obamacare is boosting their costs…The threat to use government regulation to destroy or harm someone’s business because they disagree with government officials is thuggery. Like the Obama administration’s transfer of money from Chrysler bondholders to its political allies in the United Auto Workers, it is a form of gangster government.”
• Eugene Volokh: “even if such action would be constitutionally permissible, it would be quite troubling, as would threats that seem to hint as such action: It would involve the Administration’s deliberately trying to suppress criticism of its policies, under a ‘misinformation’ standard that sounds highly subjective and politically contestable. (Consider [Sebelius'] reference ‘to our analysis and those of some industry and academic experts’ — what about the analysis of other industry and academic experts?) Perhaps I’m missing some important context here. But my first reaction is that this is ominous behavior on the Administration’s part, and seems to have both the intent and effect of suppressing criticism of the Administration’s policies — including criticism that simply expresses opinions the Administration dislikes, and makes estimates that it disagrees with, and not just criticism that contains objectively demonstrable ‘misinformation.’”

In The Wall Street Journal, economist Russ Roberts recently explained one of the main themes of Friedrich Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom:

When the state has the final say on the economy, the political opposition needs the permission of the state to act, speak, and write. Economic control becomes political control.

One need not agree with all of Hayek’s conclusions to see how ObamaCare is threatening political freedom.

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