That is not the issue

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Watch [Chris] Wallace try four times in less than three minutes to get McConnell to say how Republicans would provide coverage for 30 million people currently uninsured.

WALLACE: One of the keys to ObamaCare is that it will extend insurance access to 30 million people who are now uninsured. In your replacement, how would you provide universal coverage?

MCCONNELL: Well first let me say the first single thing we can do for the American system is get rid of ObamaCare. … The single biggest direction we can take in terms of improving health care is to get rid of this monstrosity. [...]

WALLACE: But you’re talking about repealing and replace, how would you provide universal coverage?

MCCONNELL: I’ll get to it in a minute. [...]

WALLACE: I just want to ask, what specifically are you going to do to provide universal coverage to the 30 million people who are uninsured?

MCCONNELL: That is not the issue. The question is, how can you go step by step to improve the American health care system. … We’re not going to turn the American health care system into a Western European system.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/07/02/1105184/-30-Million-Uninsured-Americans-Are-Not-An-Issue-According-to-Mitch-McConnell

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Did you see his previous guest, on this and every other show on Sunday?

WALLACE: Question -- didn't the president break that promise?

LEW: Well, Chris, you know, if you go back and you look at the laws that have been enacted since the president has taken office, we have cut taxes for those families. We have reduced their taxes.

(CROSSTALK)

WALLACE: But according to the (inaudible) this is going raise taxes for the families.

LEW: No, that is not what the Supreme Court said. What the Supreme Court said was this was constitutional. They said it didn't matter what Congress called it. It was a penalty for 1 percent.

WALLACE: Wait a minute, sir.

(CROSSTALK)

LEW: -- choose not to buy insurance.

WALLACE: Mr. Lew, they called it a tax.

LEW: No, actually, technically what they said is the Congress has many powers. There is the commerce clause, there's taxing powers and it was constitutional. That's what they said. It doesn't matter what they call it.

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[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

WALLACE: I can't let you go there. It specifically said that it is not constitutional under the commerce clause; they said it is constitutional under the tax. And as to the question about raising taxes for the middle class, if I may, sir, let's just look at the record.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that in 2016, 4 million Americans will pay the mandate penalty or tax; 75 percent of those people will make less than $120,000 a year. And the CBO says between 2012 and 2021, those folks will pay $27 billion in additional taxes.

So --

LEW: Chris --

(CROSSTALK) WALLACE: -- finish my question and then I promise I will let you talk. The middle class is taking quite a hit by what the Supreme Court said is a tax.

LEW: I think if you look at all of the laws enacted in the last three and a half years you would see that those families have a tax cut. That say -- all of the independent analysts, whether it is the Congressional Budget Office or others, would validate that there has been a tax cut for middle class --

WALLACE: I'm not arguing that. All I'm saying is that this is a tax increase on the middle class of $27 billion over the next 10 years.

LEW: No, what this is, this is a law that says if you can afford insurance and you choose not to buy it and you choose to have your health costs be a burden to others, you will pay a penalty so that you will pay your fair share. That is what this law says.

For the 99 percent of the people who buy insurance or get it through the tax cuts that are in this act, they are not going to be affected. You keep your insurance, you don't pay any kind of penalty. For the very few people who decide to be free riders and not have insurance, but still have their costs go into the system so the rest of us pay it, there is a penalty. It is not a burden on the middle class.

WALLACE: Well, again, the nonpartisan CBO says 4 million Americans will be paying that tax by 2016. And let's look at why Chief Justice Roberts called it a tax. It will be collected and enforced by the Internal Revenue Service. What you pay is calculated as a percentage of your income, and here is what the president's lawyer, the solicitor general, Donald Verrilli, told the court in defending the mandate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD VERRILLI, SOLICITOR GENERAL: Not only is it fair to read this as an exercise of the tax power but this court has an obligation to construe it as an exercise of the tax power if it can be upheld on that (inaudible).

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Mr. Lew, if it walks, looks and quacks like a duck, it's a duck.

LEW: Well, you know, Chris, it's been a long time since I've practiced laws. But one of the things about our judicial system is that you can make arguments to the court on multiple grounds. That is what Don was doing. He was saying there were a lot of ways to look at this. It was set up and it was not called a tax.

But there are powers that Congress has and you can justify a law under multiple ways. The court took that route. It is a penalty. It was defined as a penalty in the law. And it is something people choose, whether or not, to be subject to.

Most Americans want health insurance. Ninety-nine percent of people will take advantage of the fact that they have affordable coverage that can protect their families.

For the 1 percent that choose not to have insurance, they don't control whether they are going to be in an accident or be struck by illness. If they end up in a hospital and they have to have expensive treatment, those costs will be borne by other people who pay for insurance.

This penalty says that you cannot be a free rider. You cannot go without any payment. And the penalty is that payment. Very few people will choose it. In Massachusetts, 1 percent of people chose to pay the penalty instead of have insurance. People want health insurance.

WALLACE: I want to move on to something else, but I just have to ask one last time, I mean, there are lots of taxes, sir, that people either choose to pay or not, depending on their actions. The cigarette tax, I don't pay, because I don't smoke. Maybe somebody else pays because they do smoke. So there are plenty of taxes that are discretionary in terms of what your behavior is.

WALLACE: Would you agree that in Chief Justice Roberts' ruling, he said that this is constitutional only as a tax?

LEW: I would say that the opinion said is that there are multiple powers that Congress has to make law and this law is constitutional.

WALLACE: That is not what he said, sir. But, well, I'm going to move ahead.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/fox-news-sunday/2012/07/02/white-house-ready-move-and-implement-health-care-law-mcconnell-we-can-defeat-obamacare-no?page=2#ixzz1zTUD4vxz