Senate Scheduled to Violate Constitution

[Alien Allen]

Do you own car insurance because you want it, or because it's the law? Try driving your car without insurance and see how far that gets you. You are required by law to carry car insurance because it's a burden on everyone if you don't have it and get into an accident, same can be said with health insurance.
Right now I pay on average $1500 extra each year in health insurance to cover the idiots that don't have it. How is that fair for all the people that do pay for health coverage?

The way the system is set up right now, you can get health coverage without paying into the system. That puts the burden on the rest of us. So I buy into the idea that everyone should have some form of coverage... But not having any sort of public plan to choose from and fining people for not having it is a pretty shitty way of accomplishing it. This is the part of the bill I'm not very happy with. Hell, if anything is unconstitutional about this bill, it's this. There is a very good chance that it will be challenged in court and I can see where it would be over turned.

There is no mandate that one has to have a car

Ask Dana

Walks away with a smirk on his face

You need a better example. :nod:

 

[retro]

I just called Barbara Boxer's office to voice my disgust, the staffer was completely disinterested in what I had to say, and ended the call by telling me that I didn't have my facts straight and then hung up the phone. :24: On the other hand, that's more than I got from Dianne Feinstein's office... who isn't picking up their phones at her DC, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, or Fresno offices.

 

[Tangerine]

There is no mandate that one has to have a car

Ask Dana

Walks away with a smirk on his face

You need a better example. :nod:

Not to mention the fact that the car insurance requirements are for LIABILITY insurance only - to cover someone ELSE you may potentially harm in an accident. There is no requirement that you insure your own vehicle for repair and replacement - so it's a very poor analogy to compare the two.

 

[Accountable]

Massive takeover and micromanagement of health care? What the hell are you smoking?
Show me any part of this proposed bill that is a take over or where it micromanages.

Every syllable, relative to what they are legally allowed.

If this bill is so terrible, then why did the AMA come out and fully support it today?

Don't know. Don't care. Totally irrelevant. It is not the purview of the federal government.

 

[Accountable]

Show me any part of this proposed bill that is a take over

Don't be naive.

washingtonpost.com

 

[nova]

Do you own car insurance because you want it, or because it's the law? Try driving your car without insurance and see how far that gets you. You are required by law to carry car insurance because it's a burden on everyone if you don't have it and get into an accident, same can be said with health insurance.

Yeah, and you can also choose not to have a car and choose not to drive on the public highways of which insurance is a pre-condition to using. The difference between that and health insurance is your "option" to not having health insurance is putting a gun to your head and pulling the trigger.

Right now I pay on average $1500 extra each year in health insurance to cover the idiots that don't have it. How is that fair for all the people that do pay for health coverage?

The way the system is set up right now, you can get health coverage without paying into the system.

And unless you plan on taxing the poorest of the poor, then even the most socialist of public systems will have people who get benefits without paying in, the only difference is it will be institutionalized in and carry the full force of law.

The solution is to get rid of providing for health care for anyone regardless of ability to pay, coupled with true medicaid reform to help those truly in need. Anyone else can either pay out of pocket if able or buy insurance and if they won't do either of those, then they're hung out to dry.

I'm banking on the belief that the AMA is an upstanding organization. And I'm not even sure how you would go about "paying" them off.

My wife the Dr. and former AMA member would argue against that belief. The AMA doesn't give a shit about what is best for patients and hasn't for quite some time, all they care about is protecting the high dollar specialists who now control the AMA.

The AMA and particularly the specialists who control it, have a vested interest in seeing another 10-15 million people "covered" because its gives them another cash cow to milk, to the detriment of the people footing the tax burden, especially considering the lobbying clout the AMA wields to make sure "acceptable" insurance plans cover just about everything said specialists do...

 

[Accountable]

The 10th amendment states:

But the constitution addresses general welfare and that taxes can be imposed. So they are in their constitutional rights to tax us for our general welfare. ie health care.

I was looking at that section mentioning general welfare again. If you'll read it, Section 8 is set up as a single sentence. the last 17 phrases start with the word "To," making a list of specific purposes defining "to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States".

• Four address their monetary responsibilities, all of which they've abdicated to the Federal Reserve (though the term they use is 'delegated').
• One addresses international commerce.
• One addresses naturalization.
• One addresses Post offices and roads.
• One addresses the promotion of the arts and scientific research (that one I wasn't aware of).
• One addresses lower federal courts.
• One addresses international law.
• Six address their responsibilities over the military and war.
• One addresses the running of the District of Columbia.
• One addresses their responsibility to make laws, but only those needed to carry out the responsibilities specified in the Constitution.

The Section ties down what "general welfare" refers to, and nary a word about healthcare.

 

[nova]

"Welfare" does not mean today what it meant in the late 1700s which is where the confusion comes in. During that period welfare had two definitions, one for individuals and one for states. For states, it was meant as "safety, security and prosperity" of the nation itself and was intended as a limit on the power of the gov't when coupled with "provide for the common defense", not a "do whatever you want" clause.

James Madison was responsible for a considerable portion of the Constitution and here's what he had to say about "general welfare."

With respect to the words "general welfare," I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.

Which goes hand in hand with what I try and tell people. These guys had just got through fighting a war to remove an oppressive overreaching gov't. The Constitution was intended to limit the powers of gov't in order to prevent that from happening again.

They would not and did not create a document full of limitations of powers, only to toss in a clause at the end that amounts to "BTW just go do WTF ever you want."