Two Years On: Obamacare

You might be talking about purchasers, but the SC is talking about the government regulating the market. Not the same thing.

 

Zeke, with respect, you have the issue wrong here. The challengers aren't the providers, but those being forced to purchase.

 

No one has been forced to purchase anything, yet, so those hypothetical challengers would have no standing.

 

IMO, this needs to happen. Entirely too many seniors who, while their Medicare helps take care of the bulk of the bills, some get absolutely kneecapped by prescriptions that loophole around Medicare Part D.

A big mess within Medicare were patients who, while in the hospital's care, were officially classified on an outpatient status. Who determines the status? The physicians, not the nurses, techs, or anyone in financial or patient access. Strictly the physician's call ...

In other words, their inpatient care and most of their outpatient care was taken care of. But in too many cases, even secondary coverage ended up passing the Rx costs along to the patients. It's not that they can't take care of it, but it ends up being an excessive financial hardship. Worse, the people who end up paying for it - pun intended - are the people who painstakingly play by the rules, which amplifies the frustration. They're not gaming the system and yet they're getting pelted.

 

This is a facial challenge. Yesterday's argument was whether the AIA bars a suit before the law goes into effect. This is definitely about the purchasers.

 

Would love to see someone like Nate Silver analyze the correlation between questions from the justices and how they ultimately rule in cases. Because my impression has been that predicting votes based off lines of questioning has a poor track record.

 

Where does this all end? I don't have kids but I have to pay school taxes. Can I get out of that? How about Social Security? If the mandate is overturned watch for the Republicans to go after Social Security.

 

That doesn't tip Kennedy's hand because he prefaced it with "assuming." He's asking the solicitor general: "We will decide whether this is actually unprecedented. If there is precedent, you win. But, IF we find this is unprecedented, is there still a way for this to survive?"

It's an example of Kennedy asking the SG to argue in the alternative.

 

1. School Taxes? No problem with those, for several reasons. (A) Taxes are always within the tax power; (B) Those are imposed by local governments with plenary powers, not the federal government with enumerated powers.

2. Social Security? No problem with that. (A) It's the taxing (and implicit spending) power. The individual mandate arguments rest on the idea that this is not a tax — and most justices seemed to agree this was a civil penalty, not a tax.

 

It ends, very simply, with the government not having the power to force people to buy products from private companies.

The government will continue to have the power to provide services, and to collect taxes in order to pay for those services.

 

No, and that's why a single-payer health insurance system would pass legal muster. As others have mentioned, the government can tax. The government can regulate. But the government, assuming the Court rules this way, can't force you to buy a specific product merely because you draw breath.