Two Years On: Obamacare

And the other side would rather give the government dangerous, unprecedented powers and ignore all the
unintended consequences because their intentions are good.

That's not evil, but it's willfully ignorant.

 

The sad thing is, this was not brought to the Supremes to fight that point that you seem to see as cataclysmic, Rick. It was brought to the Supremes to strike a blow against Obama and against government doing anything.

 

You *still* dodged the question. It wasn't "Can the government control what people purchase to eat?" The question was, "Can the government force the general public to eat certain things?"

 

Because the way insurance is unique requires more participation in order for the government to exercise its power to regulate the market.

 

As per usual, Dools gets it.

This is about doing anything. And anyone who purports to be liberal who doesn't get that needs to think on it some more.

 

I agere. Both sides have ended up completely on the wrong side of this argument, based on their ideologies. Conservatives have fluked themselves into being right, for once. Liberals have sold out their ideals in a self-delusional attempt to believe that something positive is happening.

Of course, the only reason Obama tried to push through this turd sandwich, Gingrich-inspired legislation was to score the political points of being able to say he passed a health-care reform bill.

 

Rick, the government has the power to throw you in a prison on foreign soil on its own say-so and hold you there forever. It has the power, claimed by Presidents of both parties, to murder you if it thinks you're dangerous. And you're worried being made to buy an insurance policy is tyranny? That's just nuts. Or rather, just Republican.

 

Huge difference. Homeowners insurance is mandated by the state and not the Federal goverment

 

That's a valiant effort, I'll grant. You can get there, but it tortures the definitions of a lot of words and requires lots of "special cases," but you can get there.

The simpler, more correct, and more prudent answer would be to accept that you can't mandate activity and pass a real health-care reform law, but the government is doing a great job trying to come up with legal justifications.

 

That's just lazy on your part. Why are you assuming I'm not upset about all of those things and then some?

 

But there is still homeless that we all pay for. We should compel everyone to own a home.

 

That's insane. Yes, it was a political reality that they needed to pass a bill. Yes, not getting a single GOP vote for it meant that it got held hostage, and was far from ideal.

But it's far from a conservative bill. Far.

It dramatically increases access to Medicare and Medicaid. It imposes regulations on the industry that have been needed for generations.

Teddy Kennedy called his biggest regret in politics not taking a similar bill he negotiated with Nixon. With NIXON.

You take half a loaf in American politics. You come back for a quarter. It's the way it has always been. You lose, you pass nothing? You get nothing.

If this gets thrown out, how long will it be before another Democratic administration takes a chance on it? 20 years? 30?

The millions of people who need insurance -- and the millions upon millions who will go bankrupt without it between, not to mention those who will die from preventable illness -- probably can't afford your sureness of purpose on a fundamental right you can only seem to elucidate through interpretive dance.