Supreme Court's Verdict on ObamaCare will be a winner- Regardless the Outcome

[HistoryNotHisStory]

if health care costs can really be brought under control instead of continually spiralling upward faster than the economy can keep up, then the cost of the program will start to come into better focus. After all, we have unlimited funding to spend killing our young folks and the young folks in other countries. We ought to be able to figure out how to keep the ones we have left reasonably healthy.

i concur. This country uses our young people as collateral damage for profit.

[oladub]

If the Health Care Bill is unconstitutional then Social Security, Medicare, and the Federal Reserve unconstitutional.

The 16th Amendment was added to allow the federal income tax of which the IRS is an administrative expression. Otherwise I would agree with your take being consistent with the wording of the usually ignored 10th Amendment. However, "Constitutional", in the real world, is whatever the courts determine and will be backed up by guns if necessary. If the Court determines that corporations are people, then corporations are people until another court looks at the issue regardless of whether or not the Constitution says so.

Also, under contract law, the government should honor it's promises to pay off on Social Security to everyone who has paid into it. I would be more worried about phony cost of living reports reducing the buying power of SS recipients than having anyone dismantling SS.

[HistoryNotHisStory]

The 16th Amendment was added to allow the federal income tax of which the IRS is an administrative expression. Otherwise I would agree with your take being consistent with the wording of the usually ignored 10th Amendment. However, "Constitutional", in the real world, is whatever the courts determine and will be backed up by guns if necessary. If the Court determines that corporations are people, then corporations are people until another court looks at the issue regardless of whether or not the Constitution says so.

Also, under contract law, the government should honor it's promises to pay off on Social Security to everyone who has paid into it. I would be more worried about phony cost of living reports reducing the buying power of SS recipients than having anyone dismantling SS.

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." - 16TH Amendment.

This allows a tax for Healthcare.

However during the 18th century income was for businesses and corporations.

The workers get wages and not income.

[jiminnm]

Your statements validate my argument. If they find it unconstitutional then the Supreme Court ruling of 1937 will be reversed. There is no gray area in the constitutionalism of a national health care plan or Social Security Tax and Medicare Tax. It is one and the same.

If the Supreme Court strikes down the National Health Care Law, the Lawyers from the extreme right and left will attack the courts to revoke Social Security Taxes.

I don't think you understand the issues, because they are vastly different.

The issue of whether or not a mandate to purchase a product or service in the market from a private provider was not an issue in determining the constitutionality of s/s, because that was and is not the process. The issue of funding s/s was an issue, but found constitutional because it is a tax related to income [[as allowed by the 16th amdt).

Actually, there would be a constitutional argument in favor of a single payer national health care plan. But that is not what we have.

[jiminnm]

It's not a theory...

If the constitution does not not express certain scenarios then it is allowed or permitted.

For example, our state laws permits the carry of concealed weapons with a permit. However, it does not state anything about openly carrying a weapon. Therefore, Michigan citizens has a right to carry a weapon openly.

Our Founding Fathers saw that certain issues will arise. This is why the constitution allocate for Amendment. If you don't like it, then change the Amend the Constitution.

Otherwise deal with it.

You missed the last couple of hundred years of Federal constitutional jurisprudence if you think that that federal actions do not have to have a constitutional basis. It's not the other way around. In fact, the Constitution might well have to be amended to have it be interpreted the way you suggest.

What the states can or cannot do is not relevant to the Obamacare case. The US Constitution governs the actions of the Federal govt in those areas where the Feds are granted powers. In all other areas, the states are free to exercise any powers so long as they do not contravene Fed power or constitutionally protected rights of individuals, and co not violate their own state constitution. Looking at how a state applies it's statutory law in your example is an entirely different situation, and not at all comparable, to how the use of federal power is evaluated under the US Constitution.

BTW, the SupCt recently held that gun ownership is a fundamental right protected by the 2nd Amendment. There will likely now be a series of cases, as happened with abortion, to determine how much local regulation of that right can be applied by the states before that constitutional right is violated.

You deal with it.

[jiminnm]

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." - 16TH Amendment.

This allows a tax for Healthcare.

However during the 18th century income was for businesses and corporations.

The workers get wages and not income.

The 16th Amdt was passed in the 20th Century [[1913). It would allow a tax related to income, but the fine or penalty is not at all related to income. It is related to whether or not one purchases health insurance. The budget director, in fact, recently testified before Congress that it was not a tax.

Also, our tax code has always referred to income [[as in taxable income, adjusted gross income, etc.). Wages are just one subset of income.

[Mikeg]

Having to pay for auto insurance, drivers license, SS and Medicare can be all be legally avoided: don't own a car, don't drive someone else's car and don't work.

Instead of trying to convince us that these are equivalents to the individual mandate and that they are all around us, please tell us exactly how someone can legally avoid having to pay for health care insurance under Obamacare's individual mandate ?

Speaking of Obama, what planet is he living on when he says something this absurd?

"I’m confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress."

The "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act" [[aka Obamacare) passed by a vote of 60 to 39 in the Senate [[hacing barely avoided a filibuster) and by a slim, 219 to 212 majority in the House, where 34 Democrats joined their Republican colleagues in bipartisan opposition to the Act.

BTW, 32 of those House Democrats who voted for Obamacare were democratically "unelected" in Nov. 2010.

[ghettopalmetto]

Instead of trying to convince us that these are equivalents to the individual mandate and that they are all around us, please tell us exactly how someone can legally avoid having to pay for health care insurance under Obamacare's individual mandate ?

Don't get sick and don't die. Otherwise, you're a consumer of healthcare, and will thus, need health insurance at some point.

For an interesting perspective, read the Second Militia Act, which posed an individual mandate for all males of a certain age to purchase firearms from a private-sector manufacturer. This Act has remained unchallenged in the courts for over 200 years, giving further credence to the thought that this AHA lawsuit is nothing more than pure politics on behalf of the right-wing.

Still waiting for the "replace" portion of the GOP's "repeal and replace" to be germinated....

[HistoryNotHisStory]

The 16th Amdt was passed in the 20th Century [[1913). It would allow a tax related to income, but the fine or penalty is not at all related to income. It is related to whether or not one purchases health insurance. The budget director, in fact, recently testified before Congress that it was not a tax.

Also, our tax code has always referred to income [[as in taxable income, adjusted gross income, etc.). Wages are just one subset of income.

Social Security is an insurance program.

[firstandten]

Don't get sick and don't die. Otherwise, you're a consumer of healthcare, and will thus, need health insurance at some point.
Still waiting for the "replace" portion of the GOP's "repeal and replace" to be germinated....

Great comment ! For those of you that hate Obamacare I'm also waiting for the replace part of repeal and replace

We could look at Singapore's model, the right kind of likes this. Everyone has a health care account [[the rightwing is into the vouchers's and saving accounts). However its mandated that everyone who works pays into the account, that amount is matched by the companies. Routine health care like doctor's visits, prescriptions are out of pocket. This would cover only the large health care cost. And they have separate plan for nursing home care if needed. The indigent get gov't health care. So in effect Singapore has universal health care.

However at least in America the out of pocket expenses for health care especially for prescriptions can clean your pocket.

I'm sure one could find other models of health care coverage that is universal or nearly universal but they are going to require some type of mandate.

I'm betting that SCOTUS will uphold the individual mandate after the political theatre dies down.

[JBMcB]

For an interesting perspective, read the Second Militia Act, which posed an individual mandate for all males of a certain age to purchase firearms from a private-sector manufacturer. This Act has remained unchallenged in the courts for over 200 years, giving further credence to the thought that this AHA lawsuit is nothing more than pure politics on behalf of the right-wing.

That power is limited to times of national emergencies and/or insurrections. It's been generally held that the president can set aside constitutional protections during these times, it's not a perpetual arrangement.

Apples and oranges, in other words.

[ghettopalmetto]

That power is limited to times of national emergencies and/or insurrections. It's been generally held that the president can set aside constitutional protections during these times, it's not a perpetual arrangement.

Apples and oranges, in other words.

The portion I have referenced is the first paragraph of the 2nd Militia Act, passed 8 May 1792.

The "times of national emergencies and insurrections" qualifier applies to the 1st Militia Act, passed 2 May 1792, which gives the President power to mobilize militias.

Regardless, the 2nd Militia Act imposes an individual mandate. Apples and oranges, indeed.

http://www.constitution.org/mil/mil_act_1792.htm

[jiminnm]

Social Security is an insurance program.

Actually, it isn't. It was sold to people as an insurance program, but defended before the SupCt in 1937 as a tax and benefit program. The Railroad Retirement Act, which was enacted before s/s, was an insurance program and was determined to be unconstitutional.