If CBO scored the
mandate as taxes, the bill dies.
So it was written to do that. In
terms of risk-rated subsidies, if
you get a law which said
healthy people are gonna pay
in — you made explicit that
healthy people were gonna pay
in and sick people get money
— it would not have passed.

Just like, people… lack of
transparency is a huge political
advantage. And basically —you know, call it the stupidity
of the American voter or
whatever — but basically that
was really, really critical to
getting the thing to pass.