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It’s not exactly the Ems Dispatch (the diplomatic cable Bismarck doctored to provoke the 1870 Franco-Prussian War). But what the just-resurfaced Gruber Confession lacks in world-historical consequence, it makes up for in world-class cynicism. This October 2013 video shows MIT Professor Jonathan Gruber, a principal architect of Obamacare, admitting that, in order to get it passed, the law was made deliberately obscure and deceptive. It constitutes the ultimate vindication of the charge that Obamacare was sold on a pack of lies. (Charles Krauthammer, 11/13)

Everyone is writing about GruberGate. Ugh. For those who don’t follow every tempest in a teapot that obsesses political yakkers, this is about old comments that surfaced in which Jonathan Gruber, who helped design the Affordable Care Act, said things that ranged from being stupid (calling voters stupid) to simply impolitic. ... What Gruber’s comments do is give Republicans new language to make the same points they were going to make anyway in the speeches they were going to give anyway in support of the repeal they were going to advocate for anyway. It will change nobody’s mind about a law that is now almost five years old. ( Jonathan Bernstein, 11/13)

Mr. Gruber was not, as many claim, the architect of the health-care law. He is an MIT economist who, as a consultant to the Department of Health and Human Services, modeled the impact of various subsidy levels and rules. He did not make policy, nor did he work for the White House, HHS, or any congressional committee. Earlier, he advised the Massachusetts legislature when it created the health-care reforms that were a model for the ACA. And Mr. Gruber’s comments in 2013 that the law passed only because of “the stupidity of the American voter” and a “lack of transparency” by the Obama administration are simply incorrect. (Neera Tanden, 11/13)

Americans are frustrated, and rightly so, by Washington’s lack of progress in spurring job creation and economic growth. While the economy is slowly climbing back from the 2008 recession, the president and Democratic-controlled Senate have failed to get our economy moving again .... Republicans now have a chance to show Americans that the party has ideas and can get things done. Here’s a great way to start: Repeal ObamaCare’s medical-device tax. (Erik Paulsen, 11/13)

Several million Americans could find their health insurance becoming vastly more expensive if the Supreme Court rules against the Obama administration in a pending case. That's what the court should do -- see here for a longer argument on that point -- but the elected branches of government need to develop contingency plans to deal with the affected people. (Ramesh Ponnuru, 11/13)

I did have an alternative plan for the Affordable Care Act, one that I was very fond of. It preserved the basic market mechanisms in health care while protecting people from catastrophic risks. It was so simple it could be explained in a couple of sentences. And it wouldn't cost that much. Ready? Here we go: The government picks up 100 percent of health-care costs above 15 to 20 percent of adjusted gross income. For people below 150 percent of the poverty line, there's Medicaid, which picks up basically all your costs. Hard to game, preserves consumer incentives to shop for prices and keeps people out of bankruptcy. (Megan McArdle, 11/13)

ObamaCare is a failure. For anyone who thinks this is a misprint because no Democratic activist would make such a comment, let me add that it is too big, too complicated and too expensive. Without a public option within its network of exchanges, ObamaCare is a giant blank check to the insurance companies that pushed it through Congress. It punishes responsible consumers like me and treats younger individuals as fools who are expected to pay the bills while not paying attention. (Burke Beu, 11/13)

Gary Wood, of Glenview, had a heart attack when he was 37. His insurance would not pay for his care because he told the ER doctors that he’d had chest pains for a month. The insurance company called that a pre-existing condition. ... This year, at age 55, Gary was again up against it, in desperate need of a quintuple bypass. However, he was uninsured and unable to access the care he needed. My office was able to direct him toward coverage through Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, which enabled him to get the surgery he needed. Obamacare literally saved his life. ... In my congressional district alone, more than 20,000 people who were uninsured now have coverage, and seniors and people with disabilities have saved $13.8 million in drug costs. (Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., 11/13)

For House Republicans, their guiding fiscal and economic lodestar remains — and will forever remain — the hallowed Paul Ryan budget. In its various iterations, it would repeal Obamacare, radically restructure Medicare to the detriment of beneficiaries, block-grant Medicaid, and aim most of its draconian budget cuts at programs benefiting people with lower incomes. Robert Greenstein of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has said earlier versions would result in “the largest redistribution of income from bottom to top in modern U.S. history.” (Greg Sargent, 11/13)

Terminally ill brain cancer patient Brittany Maynard's death by prescribed lethal overdose — legal in Oregon — made headlines. Her campaign to legalize assisted suicide — or as some prefer, "aid in dying" — sparked increased debate of the best ways to care for the terminally ill. ... Rather than shout at each other, both sides of the assisted suicide divide should get enthusiastically behind this health care change: Allow the terminally ill to enter hospice care without having to give up life-extending or curative treatments.(Arthur Caplan and Wesley J. Smith, 11/13)

Many women report losing their desire for sex, some temporarily, some permanently. Is this a relationship problem, a normal aspect of life changes or, as the pharmaceutical industry maintains, an “unmet medical need”? That was the question under consideration for two days of meetings in late October, during which the Food and Drug Administration heard from sexual medicine experts and women with sexual complaints. (Ellen Laan and Leonore Tiefer, 11/13)