The Supreme Court began three days of oral arguments Monday on President Obama's sweeping health care law that requires Americans to buy health insurance. First item on the agenda: whether the court even has the right to make a decision now.
An obscure 19th century law, the Anti-Injunction Act, says no federal tax can be challenged before it goes into effect. So that means, if they find it to be a tax, the justices may decide they can't make any call now (ie. talk to us in 2015).
Basically, is it really a tax if it's only enforced with a tax penalty on individual tax returns?
After hearing Monday's proceedings, NBC's Pete Williams reported "there didn’t seem to be a single member of the Supreme Court that bought that argument" that it's a tax. He said, "we're obviously going to go on to the main event which is the individual mandate which will be argued tomorrow."
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Mr. O'Donnell, I've watched your show a couple times and I must admit... I think you're one of the dumbest "news correspondents" I've ever seen and heard. How does a person so out of touch with reality get his own program? Don't paint my rant as a "pro-fox news" tirade either, cause I think they're just as ignorant as you are. How about you shift your focus away from politics and aim your excellent journalism skills toward topics that matter.
The American people understand, well most I hope, that President Obama is not completely to blame for the national issues impacting our economy. The American people understand that the U.S. Government has become a playground for money hungry baby boomers and bottle-popping lobbyists. Hey, I just thought about a great story, and you can take full credit and maybe pull up your ratings and get more hits on this crappy blog. Title it "Natural Gas - Now you can heat your home by lighting your faucet on fire cause Halliburton f***** up your drinking water", or is that too sarcastic for your character?
While I'm on a roll I'd like to point out how well designed your blog and the rest of MSNBC's website is. Seriously, fire whoever you have now and hire some high school kids. It's a win-win because you'll get a great, user friendly, functional site AND you can help the kids save money for college so they can take your job and report some relevant news.
Finally, drop the sarcastic tough guy attitude and talk to your viewers like a normal person.
Sincerely,
A Concerned College Student
"Guns are like condoms... I'd rather have one and not need it than need one and not have it."
Lawrence O,Donnell has forgotten more than you have learned
Normal people worry me.
A Concerned Citizen
Progressives need the SCOTUS to throw out the Republican mandates so that we can get on to real healthcare reform. The only way to get healthcare costs in line in this country is to cut out for-profit health insurance. That's the only practical way to save the hundreds of billions of dollars a year needed to get out healthcare sector back under 15% of GDP, where the U.S. can be competitive with Europe and other countries with sensible systems.
The Republican mandates are unconstitutional on their face. Congress does not have the power to force you to pay a third-party entity for anything. But they can easily and constitutionally simply raise the revenue necessary for healthcare and pay for all essential healthcare out of tax revenues.
That would not just be good for the American people, it would be good for the vast majority of huge corporations, which currently pay for healthcare themselves and get essentially nothing in return for it. Healthcare costs make their products more expensive than those of our competitors. It's baffling why companies like Exxon Mobile are willing to continue to pay for healthcare when they could offload those costs on the federal government and make their products that much cheaper.
I'm sure that we'll see argued before the Court that the Commerce Clause applies. That's pure hooey, but it might fly if there are enough corporate conservatives on the Court. Someone's going to dredge up a poor Ohio farmer who was fined for growing a crop in violation of federal restrictions. But that person took a positive action to enter the commerce system by producing a product that could (at least in theory) be sold. The Court could reasonably hold that even if the farmer said he wasn't going to sell his crop that he could change his mind.
This is far different from someone that has not taken any action to enter the commerce system. By what right do we force them to take part? You can't use the Commerce Clause to force them into the system because they aren't participating in commerce.
If the SCOTUS rules that the Republican mandates are constitutional, they will setting the country back in multiple ways. They will expand the power of the federal government (which, heaven knows is too great as it is), they will violate what the Constitution actually says, they will set back the cause of getting to a publicly-funded healthcare system, they will be holding back our competitive position in the world, and (probably most thrilling) some of them will have to violate their own principles to get there.
Pop corn on standby.
The health insurance mandates were originally a republican idea from 1993, that was under similar criticism then as it is now. How come when it's an idea presented by a white republican man it's the best thing since sliced bread, but let the black guy in the white house present the same idea it is socialistic and anti freedom to the same gang who loved it in 1993. I think Mr Obama needs to take his plan back to square one and make it a true single payer play that covers all Americans and all of their healthcare needs. Medicare for all. The system is already set up, just needs to be tweaked and streamlined to cover 100% of the human body, no parts left out. No American left out either. Without the greedy bastards in the wealth insurance industry ripping us off and cutting our coverage. That would also kill all this noise the right wing is making about religious freedoms and birth control access. We can nationalize all our nations natural resources that are currently bought and sold on the futures markets to pay for it all. OR. They can tax all of the war profiteers an additional 10% of gross and cut aid to israel to fund it. I consider the speculators in the futures markets to be war profiteers as well as all of the corporations of the military industrial complex, because they are always jacking up the prices on oil and other goods whenever a a car back fires in a small town in Idaho or gun goes off anywhere in the world. And the way I see it we are at war and have been since we opened our first foreign military base, that is an act of war, an occupation is the same as a war. No matter the reason or excuse that is used for our troops being there. We need more regulations to keep our water, land and air clean there isn't a company in the world that will truly self-regulate at their own expense all for the greater good of all humanity. If self-regulation is the way to go then we can do away with traffic laws too, people are corporations too. If corporations are to be considered individuals they can pay the same tax rates as the rest of us individuals. With all the same deductions as well. When is all of this non-issue BS going to end?