"Not a tax"

Flash news !!!!

An adviser to Mitt Romney, Eric Fehrnstrom, has just agreed that, if you can afford insurance but choose not to purchase it, you will be charged a penalty -- and it is not a tax.

Here's the dialogue between Fehrnstrom and Chuck Todd on MSNBC:

TODD: It sounds like Governor Romney though agrees that it’s not a tax. So what you just said is that Governor Romney agrees that it’s not a tax. You guys called it a tax?

FEHRNSTROM: The governor disagreed with the ruling of the court. He agreed with the dissent written by Justice Scalia which very clearly stated that the mandate was not a tax.

TODD: Okay. Which -- so I guess -- we're -- I think we're talking around each other. The governor does not believe the mandate is a tax? That is what you're saying?

FEHRNSTROM:  The governor believes that what we put in place in Massachusetts was a penalty and he disagrees with the court's ruling that the mandate was a tax. .

TODD: But he agrees with the president that it is not -- and he believes that you should not call the tax penalty a tax, you should call it a penalty or a fee or a fine?

FEHRNSTROM:  That's correct.

Let's wait and see how long it takes to walk this one back and try to reconcile the contradictory position Romney finds himself in.    All the other Republicans want to scream about a "huge tax increase," but that just doubles down on Romney's Massachusetts health care law that had a similar penalty, which he insisted was not a tax.

I suspect at this point Romeny would rather this just went away as a campaign issue.  It can't help him, in my view.   Although it may help some running for Congress on the platform of overturning Obamacare in convervative districts.

Ralph