Everyone knows about Apple's iPad, but how about the Affordable Care Act's IPAB?

That's the acronym for the Independent Payment Advisory Board, which will oversee Medicare spending. During the debate last week, President Obama disputed Mitt Romney's statement that an appointed board will decide the medical treatment people can have. If Obama really thinks that, he needs a crash course on IPAB also.

An appointed panel will impose Medicare spending cuts if costs are growing faster than desired. Different cuts could be substituted, but the House, Senate and president would all have to agree. Fat chance.

The law says that IPAB's decisions cannot be challenged in court. And if the panel is not repealed during seven-month window in 2017, Congresses after that could not alter IPAB proposals.

Small wonder the respected Cato Institute calls IPAB an "anti-constitutional and authoritarian super-legislature."