In a post awarding Sen. Ted Cruz three Pinocchios, Washington Post fact checker Glenn Kessler broke the first two rules of fact checking:

1. Think before you call someone a liar.

2. Don't level an attack on someone's veracity because you doubt his sincerity or question his motives.

Here is the tweet from Cruz that led Kessler to go on the attack:

"If Gang of 8 bill passes, those newly legalized are exempted from ObamaCare. HUGE incentive for employers to hire them instead of Americans."

Kessler, in his first published draft, said no such incentive exists in the Senate bill to hire provisional immigrants over U.S. citizens. Then, informed of his error by commenters , he acknowledged that this incentive does exist. But Kessler argues it is of little importance and — by failing to retract his Pinocchios — implies that raising concern about it equals a lie.

Before detailing many of Kessler's mistakes — factual and analytical — here is a disclaimer and a bit of perspective so that readers bring an open mind to the facts.

In truth, my work is under attack as much as Cruz's comment. Kessler links to three of my articles and blog posts and writes that I have "aggressively pushed" the same line of reasoning articulated here by Catherine Frazier, Cruz's press secretary:

"The Gang of 8 bill in conjunction with ObamaCare creates de facto affirmative action for illegal immigrants. It's reflective of how out of touch and broken Washington is, and how important it is that we defund and repeal ObamaCare."

First of all, I am with Sen. Rand Paul (and pretty much everyone else): Let's say "undocumented," not illegal.

Second, I have never called for repeal of ObamaCare. In fact, just a few months ago, I was first to debunk a new anti-ObamaCare conservative talking point that had gone viral.

Third, and most important, one of the principal reasons I keep writing about this issue is because I have come up with a proposal that would allow immigration legislation and ObamaCare to work together in an acceptable way. I won't go into details here, but please read it: It's important to get this right.

It's also worth noting that Roll Call's Taegan Goddard has noted the "perverse incentives" created by the interaction of immigration legislation and ObamaCare.

And here's a snippet from the New Republic's John Judis, who covered this ground in a powerful and principled piece with the subtitle "The immigration bill's disturbing fine print":

"Even an advocate for low-income immigrants sees the language as a potential problem: 'We don't want them to hire immigrants over citizens because of that loophole,' says Sonal Ambegaokar, who analyzes health policy for the National Immigration Law Center. 'We want a level playing field.'"

Now to Kessler's errors, which might have been avoided if he had carefully read those articles of mine he linked to:

First, he is shaky on the details of ObamaCare's employer mandate. He writes: "Some employers with too skimpy or unaffordable insurance coverage will likely have to pay a penalty of about $2,000 for each employee eligible for health care exchange subsidies, excluding the first 30 employees."

This accurately describes the penalty that would be paid by employers who don't offer any coverage to workers. But companies that provide "skimpy or unaffordable insurance" are virtually certain to pay a penalty of $3,000 per worker who gets ObamaCare subsidies. That's because employers will pay the lesser of the two ways of calculating the fine, and the $3,000-per-subsidized-worker penalty will add up to a lot less for firms with a typical level of covered workers and exempt part timers.

It's worth noting that this $3,000 fine will be nondeductible. That means, for a profit-making firm that pays a combined 40% federal and state tax rate, it will be the equivalent of $5,000 in annual wages. When you are talking about a low-skill worker who makes $15,000 or $20,000 a year, that is, to borrow Cruz's word, huge.

Because legalized immigrants (officially, registered provisional immigrants in the Senate bill) won't be eligible for subsidies for a decade or more, employers could be sure of escaping such a fine. While many citizens (and green card holders) will opt to go without coverage and pay an individual tax penalty, it's unlikely that very low-wage workers would make such a decision. That's because the penalty will be far greater than their out-of-pocket payment for a bronze plan, as detailed here.

Next, Kessler bizarrely says that ObamaCare's employer penalties will be "almost too minuscule to be noticed — only 0.2% (about 10,000 businesses out of 6 million) would be affected by the employee shared responsibility provision. That's because it only affects companies that employ more than 50 people — and 96% of companies have less than 50 people."

Here is the reality: CBO projects employers will pay $140 billion in nondeductible fines over nine years. And, according to ADP, 92 million private-sector workers, or two-thirds of the total, work at companies with at least 50 employees.

Kessler says, "Most companies that employ more than 50 people already offer health insurance."

Yes, but that doesn't strengthen his argument, because those that don't offer insurance will pay based on the size of their workforce, without regard to citizenship status. Visa status will matter for only employers who do offer coverage.

Kessler then says CBO estimates show that "about 1 million people, including immigrants, will receive an unaffordable offer from their employer."

Not exactly. CBO says companies will owe fines for 1 million workers who get ObamaCare subsidies because of an unaffordable offer of care. That number excludes people who are offered coverage that is too pricey or skimpy but don't sign up for ObamaCare.

But here is the really important point that Kessler ignores: Companies that offer insurance can dodge ObamaCare fines if they reduce worker hours below 30 per week. A growing number have said they will do just that to minimize the fines they will pay under ObamaCare.

In this context, it seems pretty relevant to point out that employers deciding whether to cut a citizen or immigrant to part time would have a big incentive to tilt against the citizen.

Who knows how many will do so? But whether it is a large number or small, there is nothing wrong with standing up for the principle of a fair playing field when it comes to getting a job — or keeping a full-time job.

Lastly, Kessler runs on and on about employment law and whether employers will know a worker's immigration status before hiring a potential employee.

This, again, misses the point. Most provisional immigrants presumably have jobs already, and Kessler notes that employers are able to check on the immigration status of employees. Further, if provisional immigrants get a new Social Security card, they will surely tell their employers.

While Cruz used the word "hire," it was a tweet, for goodness' sake, and "hire" is just fine as shorthand for "employ full time."

That surely doesn't stand up as an excuse for Kessler to hand out three Pinocchios. The only thing he should hand out is an apology.

 djones520 wrote:
The entire frame work of our government was hand written on 12 pages. What the hell do we need bills this large for?

 d-usa wrote:
Maybe if the president had some solid line item veto powers this kind of crap would stop and we would have single subject bills.

 djones520 wrote:
The entire frame work of our government was hand written on 12 pages. What the hell do we need bills this large for?

 Ouze wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
Maybe if the president had some solid line item veto powers this kind of crap would stop and we would have single subject bills.

The line item veto is unconstitutional, and rightly so. It's an utter abdication of the responsibilities of the legislative to the executive.

As the Washington Examiner’s Philip Klein recently reported: “Under Obamacare, businesses with over 50 workers that employ American citizens without offering them qualifying health insurance could be subject to fines of up to $3,000 per worker. But because newly legalized immigrants wouldn’t be eligible for subsidies on the Obamacare exchanges until after they become citizens – at least 13 years under the Senate bill – businesses could avoid such fines by hiring the new immigrants instead.”

On Tuesday afternoon, THE WEEKLY STANDARD asked five different U.S. Senators about this problem. These five senators, all Democrats, voted to cut off debate Monday night on the revised immigration bill, but none of them knew if the bill would create a financial incentive for some employers to hire amnestied immigrants instead of American citizens.

“We’re trying to solve that right now. I don’t know if that’s been solved,” Senator Max Baucus of Montana (chief author of Obamacare) told THE WEEKLY STANDARD.

 djones520 wrote:
I'm tired of this crap. I saw how "large" this bill was. The stack of papers was as tall as the man standing next to it it seemed like.

 dogma wrote:

 djones520 wrote:
I'm tired of this crap. I saw how "large" this bill was. The stack of papers was as tall as the man standing next to it it seemed like.

The bill itself is a little less than 2000 pages which is roughly 8 inches, depending on the quality of the paper.

 d-usa wrote:

 dogma wrote:

 djones520 wrote:
I'm tired of this crap. I saw how "large" this bill was. The stack of papers was as tall as the man standing next to it it seemed like.

The bill itself is a little less than 2000 pages which is roughly 8 inches, depending on the quality of the paper.

T'was a short man...

 djones520 wrote:
I'm tired of this crap. I saw how "large" this bill was. The stack of papers was as tall as the man standing next to it it seemed like.

The entire frame work of our government was hand written on 12 pages. What the hell do we need bills this large for?

 daedalus wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 dogma wrote:

 djones520 wrote:
I'm tired of this crap. I saw how "large" this bill was. The stack of papers was as tall as the man standing next to it it seemed like.

The bill itself is a little less than 2000 pages which is roughly 8 inches, depending on the quality of the paper.

T'was a short man...

I'm sure it was real nice paper too.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
I could use some good paper where I work. In my little corner of the government, we only get the cheapest stuff Office Depot or Staples has.