Affordable Care Act: D-Day

davidtrios

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ef0JqH67V8

Cosmo

To those concerned, look at the bright side... at least House Speaker Boehner's prediction was correct... there was no 'spiking of the ball' today.
...
Counts for something, right?

mikepegg44

NewJPage wrote:

mikepegg44 wrote:

NewJPage wrote:

so why is it commerce if i am a sailor, but not if I work on a farm?

...insurance companies cannot sell insurance across state lines. If you work on a farm, you aren't engaging in interstate commerce, the farm owner is if it is selling those grains across state lines I suppose...but that would be regulating business, not individuals. I don't know how corporations worked back then

I couldn't tell you why sailors were required to buy their own insurance back then. Could have been the nature of the specific business and their organizations. Notice they didn't require all individuals in the country to buy it.

I don't know the specs of the law back then either, but to me it doesn't seem that different than a sailor shipping cotton to a different state then by boat, and a truck driver shipping gmo corn to a different state today.

plus insurance is still accepted across state lines, so isn't that interstate? I know that this is not what the decision today was made on, but still a good topic.

The insurance is the one's involved in paying companies across state lines. Not the people purchasing it from the insurance company...make sense?

And the truck driver shipping interstate corn would still purchase their own insurance if they chose to or not...but the company that does interstate shipping could be told to provide insurance to all employees. Contractors are individuals who cannot be forced to go into commerce, which would still be purchasing insurance simply in the state they live in. That is my interpretation though. It is all very confusing and is the reason that the clause has been so widely interpreted and used(sometimes abused) by the Federal Government. But ultimately it was rejected as an argument not because it wasn't deemed interstate commerce, which they may have very well thought it was, but that you cannot require a private citizen to engage in commerce.

I also think the standard they applied and the precedent left is huge.

"He said that Supreme Court precedent is that “every reasonable construction” of a law passed by Congress “must be resorted to, in order to save a statute from unconstitutionality.”

I take this to mean that no matter the grounds for challenge or arguments made for saving a statute...the supreme court will look at all possible arguments, whether they were made or not in the case. Interesting. I would have thought this was already done

Cosmo

Hey... When does the 'Death Panel' kick in?
I vote that we start with the cast from 'Jersey Shore'.

Jason P

Cosmo wrote:

Hey... When does the 'Death Panel' kick in?
I vote that we start with the cast from 'Jersey Shore'.

My vote is to round up all the meter maids.

Jason P

Hospital stocks shot up while insurance stocks went down. More customers for the hospitals and the insurance companies can't reject as many claims anymore.

mikepegg44

Cosmo wrote:

Hey... When does the 'Death Panel' kick in?
I vote that we start with the cast from 'Jersey Shore'.

snookie is about to have a baby. Maybe they can save the child and deny the mother the stitches to close the c-section...

too far?

Johnny Abruzzo

I live in Pennsylvania, have insurance from Blue Cross of Illinois, and we drove to Delaware to have surgery performed on son. I don't understand how that is not interstate commerce.


I'm looking forward to seeing the death panels.

Cosmo

mikepegg44 wrote:

Cosmo wrote:

Hey... When does the 'Death Panel' kick in?
I vote that we start with the cast from 'Jersey Shore'.

snookie is about to have a baby. Maybe they can save the child and deny the mother the stitches to close the c-section...

too far?

...
Aren't the odds 1 to 1 that Snooki's baby is going to be the Anti-Christ?

cincybearcat

You know, I'm still not sure the government should be able to mandate people buy something, but the one thing I never understood was you would think most republicans would be for this mandate portion at least. So that everyone is having to pay in and their are no free rides. What am I missing?

Of all the things I dislike about Obama's first term and even that I don't really like about Obamacare, that certainly isn't one of them. Plus, I think it's silly to think that everything is ok the way it is. We should always try and do better and it is ridiculous that a family could be going along just fine and then WHAM!!! major health issue and now they have all sorts of financial issues. That could happen to anyone.

fife

cincybearcat wrote:

You know, I'm still not sure the government should be able to mandate people buy something, but the one thing I never understood was you would think most republicans would be for this mandate portion at least. So that everyone is having to pay in and their are no free rides. What am I missing?

Of all the things I dislike about Obama's first term and even that I don't really like about Obamacare, that certainly isn't one of them. Plus, I think it's silly to think that everything is ok the way it is. We should always try and do better and it is ridiculous that a family could be going along just fine and then WHAM!!! major health issue and now they have all sorts of financial issues. That could happen to anyone.

I think that Republicans are not against this law at all. I think they just want to make people angry so that they will get the vote.

I also think that Obama is not happy about how it was passed cause he didn't want the SC to call it a tax.

mikepegg44

cincybearcat wrote:

You know, I'm still not sure the government should be able to mandate people buy something, but the one thing I never understood was you would think most republicans would be for this mandate portion at least. So that everyone is having to pay in and their are no free rides. What am I missing?

Of all the things I dislike about Obama's first term and even that I don't really like about Obamacare, that certainly isn't one of them. Plus, I think it's silly to think that everything is ok the way it is. We should always try and do better and it is ridiculous that a family could be going along just fine and then WHAM!!! major health issue and now they have all sorts of financial issues. That could happen to anyone.

I don't know anyone who thinks that is the case.

Republicans were initially for it, the heritage foundation promoted it in the 80's I think. I think the change is probably a function of the return of the convenient importance of the constitution to them to appease a new base of voters that seem to be wanting us to conveniently follow said document.

As much as I hate the idea, I am pretty sure that a single payer system is the only one that will truly keep costs down. The payer of last resort option has caused a huge increase in fees for service I think.

Cosmo

cincybearcat wrote:

You know, I'm still not sure the government should be able to mandate people buy something, but the one thing I never understood was you would think most republicans would be for this mandate portion at least. So that everyone is having to pay in and their are no free rides. What am I missing?

Of all the things I dislike about Obama's first term and even that I don't really like about Obamacare, that certainly isn't one of them. Plus, I think it's silly to think that everything is ok the way it is. We should always try and do better and it is ridiculous that a family could be going along just fine and then WHAM!!! major health issue and now they have all sorts of financial issues. That could happen to anyone.

...
Exactly. If someone refuses to pay... and they get a monster health care issue... who pays? Those whom have been paying.
And I do not take my health nor my coverage for granted. I know I am one pink slip away from losing my heath care coverage... just like EVERY OTHER American that has employer provided group coverage... and I am one accident away from financially crippling health issues.

FrankieG

Coming from a 21 year old, who has a pre-existing condition and would have been kicked of of my parent's health care soon, I like this Act.

Health Insurance paid for more than a million dollars worth of medical coverage for me when I got sick, so this Act really hits home how important good health insurance is.

fife

mikepegg44 wrote:

cincybearcat wrote:

You know, I'm still not sure the government should be able to mandate people buy something, but the one thing I never understood was you would think most republicans would be for this mandate portion at least. So that everyone is having to pay in and their are no free rides. What am I missing?

Of all the things I dislike about Obama's first term and even that I don't really like about Obamacare, that certainly isn't one of them. Plus, I think it's silly to think that everything is ok the way it is. We should always try and do better and it is ridiculous that a family could be going along just fine and then WHAM!!! major health issue and now they have all sorts of financial issues. That could happen to anyone.

I don't know anyone who thinks that is the case.

Republicans were initially for it, the heritage foundation promoted it in the 80's I think. I think the change is probably a function of the return of the convenient importance of the constitution to them to appease a new base of voters that seem to be wanting us to conveniently follow said document.

As much as I hate the idea, I am pretty sure that a single payer system is the only one that will truly keep costs down. The payer of last resort option has caused a huge increase in fees for service I think.

just to let you know, single payer is not a bad thing. many countries have it. there are some problems but all systems do.

EdsonNascimento

It's getting more Shakespearean by the minute. I did not recall the reason for Obama's objection.


http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_ ... care_.html

Obama Wins the Battle, Roberts Wins the War
The chief justice’s canny move to uphold the Affordable Care Act while gutting the Commerce Clause.
By Tom Scocca|Posted Thursday, June 28, 2012, at 11:59 AM ET

There were two battles being fought in the Supreme Court over the Affordable Care Act. Chief Justice John Roberts—and Justice Anthony Kennedy—delivered victory to the right in the one that mattered.

Yes, Roberts voted to uphold the individual mandate, joining the court's liberal wing to give President Obama a 5-4 victory on his signature piece of legislation. Right-wing partisans are crying treason; left-wing partisans saw their predictions of a bitter, party-line defeat undone.

But the health care law was, ultimately, a pretext. This was a test case for the long-standing—but previously fringe—campaign to rewrite Congress' regulatory powers under the Commerce Clause.

This is why the challenge to the ACA, and its progress through the courts, came as a surprise to Democrats and to mainstream constitutional scholars: Three years ago, there was no serious doubt that Congress had the power to impose the individual mandate.

A Bloomberg story last week nicely captured the stakes: "Obama Health Law Seen Valid, Scholars Expect Rejection":

The U.S. Supreme Court should uphold a law requiring most Americans to have health insurance if the justices follow legal precedent, according to 19 of 21 constitutional law professors who ventured an opinion on the most-anticipated ruling in years.

Only eight of them predicted the court would do so.

The scholars expected to see the court gut existing Commerce Clause precedent and overturn the individual mandate in a partisan decision: Five Republican-appointed justices voting to rewrite doctrine and reject Obamacare; four Democratic-appointed justices dissenting.

Roberts was smarter than that. By ruling that the individual mandate was permissible as a tax, he joined the Democratic appointees to uphold the law—while joining the Republican wing to gut the Commerce Clause (and push back against the necessary-and-proper clause as well). Here's the Chief Justice's opinion (italics in original):

Construing the Commerce Clause to permit Congress to regulate individuals precisely because they are doing nothing would open a new and potentially vast domain to congressional authority. Congress already possesses expansive power to regulate what people do. Upholding the Affordable Care Act under the Commerce Clause would give Congress the same license to regulate what people do not do. The Framers knew the difference between doing something and doing nothing. They gave Congress the power to regulate commerce, not to compel it. Ignoring that distinction would undermine the principle that the Federal Government is a government of limited and enumerated powers. The individual mandate thus cannot be sustained under Congress’s power to “regulate Commerce.”

The business about "new and potentially vast" authority is a fig leaf. This is a substantial rollback of Congress' regulatory powers, and the chief justice knows it. It is what Roberts has been pursuing ever since he signed up with the Federalist Society. In 2005, Sen. Barack Obama spoke in opposition to Roberts' nomination, saying he did not trust his political philosophy on tough questions such as "whether the Commerce Clause empowers Congress to speak on those issues of broad national concern that may be only tangentially related to what is easily defined as interstate commerce." Today, Roberts did what Obama predicted he would do.

Roberts' genius was in pushing this health care decision through without attaching it to the coattails of an ugly, narrow partisan victory. Obama wins on policy, this time. And Roberts rewrites Congress' power to regulate, opening the door for countless future challenges. In the long term, supporters of curtailing the federal government should be glad to have made that trade.

EvilClosetMonkey

how many seats do the reps pick up in House/Senate in Nov?

EdsonNascimento

EvilClosetMonkey wrote:

how many seats do the reps pick up in House/Senate in Nov?

House of Reps is everyone. They go every 2 years.

Senate is 33 (almost a 3rd as they are every 6 years).

EdsonNascimento

EdsonNascimento wrote:

EvilClosetMonkey wrote:

how many seats do the reps pick up in House/Senate in Nov?

House of Reps is everyone. They go every 2 years.

Senate is 33 (almost a 3rd as they are every 6 years).

Senate seats up for grabs:

23 Dems/independent seats either retiring or seeking re-election
10 Republicans

Johnny Abruzzo

cincybearcat wrote:

You know, I'm still not sure the government should be able to mandate people buy something, but the one thing I never understood was you would think most republicans would be for this mandate portion at least. So that everyone is having to pay in and their are no free rides. What am I missing?

They were for it before they were against it.