Forced to Buy
I just want to make sure y’all are aware of what’s in the legislation that the House is considering:
Beginning in 2014, most Americans would be required for the first time to purchase insurance, and face penalties if they refused.
You got it. The government would FORCE you to buy health insurance - even if you don’t want it. Not only is this unconstitutional, it is tyranny.
Government forces you to pay for and buy many things. Why is this the only issue that seems to anger people to the point of using words like tyranny.
We had our chance for small government but people haven’t voted for that in decades. Enjoy the big government, it’ll be here for a while.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 1941 hrs
What does government force everyone to buy?
The government doesn’t force everyone to buy auto insurance. Only the people who want to drive and only enough to protect the other people they might harm while driving crashing their cars.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 1952 hrs
The government doesn’t force everyone to buy auto insurance.
In most states it does.
You are also required to buy permits for things on your own property. However this purchase does nothing for the buyer other than drain money from their wallet.
In most municipalities you are forced to pay for garbage service, even if you would choose to take it to the dump yourself.
You are forced to pay for a library, even if your particular town doesn’t use it and it spends most of it’s time completely empty.
I could go on and on. You are forced to pay for anything government does under the threat of intimidation and force. Refuse to pay for something? The government people will send men with guns to break into your house and lock you in a cage because of it. That is force, even if “society” decides it wants it.
ter·ror·ism
? ?/?t?r??r?z?m/ Show Spelled[ter-uh-riz-uhm]
–noun1. the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, esp. for political purposes.
2. the state of fear and submission produced by terrorism or terrorization.
3 a terroristic method of governing or of resisting a government.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2001 hrs
It gets better. What is the enforcement arm of the government in this?
The IRS!!!!
Yup - they will have the power to confiscate your refund. And they are expecting to hire over 16000 more auditors.
Yippee!
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2010 hrs
It gets better. What is the enforcement arm of the government in this?
The IRS!!!!
It depends on which level of government. The locals will just send threatening letters and then finally the armed law enforcers to make you submit to their demands.
So much freedom.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2014 hrs
How is this unconstitutional?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2023 hrs
(above is question for clarification, not a challenge to its possible truth)
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2024 hrs
You don’t have to buy auto insurance if you don’t drive. Forcing you to buy health insurance is different - there isn’t anyway to avoid it.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2057 hrs
Are income or sales taxes inherently tyrannical?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2105 hrs
You don’t have to buy auto insurance if you don’t drive.
True. The vast majority of people do drive and they are forced to buy insurance. Not the insurance of their choosing, the government people decide how much insurance you must have. Don’t want it or can’t afford it? Then you can’t drive. IT’S THE LAW!
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2107 hrs
Methinks that conscription must also be considered tyrannical, the government forcing people to serve in the military. I assume folks here are against that, too?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2107 hrs
Jay, ever you mention are optional. You don’t have to build a house and then buy a permit. As far as garbage, that is part of your taxes but in some communities, it’s called fees, but the same thing and you can take it to the extreme and say the same about cops and fire departments. The government runs the library and that is part of the government.
But to be forced to buy insurance from a private company or possible government agency is wrong and nothing like this has happened before.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2108 hrs
Are income or sales taxes inherently tyrannical?
Yup. The only way they get paid is because of intimidation and force. Admit it, if not for the threat of prison or worse, most people wouldn’t pay taxes. We like to fool ourselves and think they pay for “the public good” but the truth is they pay out of fear.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQBWGo7pef8
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2111 hrs
So, if we’re fighting the tyranny of mandatory health insurance, I sure hope everyone here also fights against ANY tax. I mean, you can’t allow only SOME kinds of tyranny, but not others, right? RIGHT?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2112 hrs
Jay, ever you mention are optional. You don’t have to build a house and then buy a permit.
Incorrect. They are not optional. If you want to build a house to live in you MUST buy a permit. IT’S THE LAW! You can’t very well live in a tent, we’re not zoned for that! Oh sure you could rent an apartment, but the guy renting out the apartment must have a license for this and a permit for that. IT’S THE LAW!
As far as garbage, that is part of your taxes but in some communities, it’s called fees, but the same thing and you can take it to the extreme and say the same about cops and fire departments.
Garbage taxes or fees are NOT optional. Go ahead, try to not pay those fees. See how long before the local popularity contest winners place a lien on your house and threaten you in some other way.
The government runs the library and that is part of the government.
...and you are required to pay for it even if you do not utilize it. Whether it’s part of government or not makes no difference, you are FORCED to pay for it under the threat of intimidation or force.
But to be forced to buy insurance from a private company or possible government agency is wrong and nothing like this has happened before.
You had 40 or 50 years to object to government forcing you to do things and you said nothing. Now all of a sudden people are up in arms and throwing tea into rivers. If you’re fine with government force and intimidation as a means to pay for something just say so. You don’t need to justify some tyranny while decrying others.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2125 hrs
How is this unconstitutional?
The Constitution specifies quite clearly the exact powers that the Federal government has. It also specifies that any powers NOT specifically granted to the Federal government are held by either the states or the people. There is no provision in the Constitution that allows the Federal government to coerce the people into purchasing insurance. It might be possible for a state to do so, depending on it’s own Constitution, but NOT the Federal government.
Therefor, the very idea behind this whole Obamacare mess is unconstitutional. Passing the plan without voting on it is also unconstitutional. If they do this, the central government will clearly be in open and flagrant violation of it’s own basic laws. That places ALL of our rights in jeopardy… we may be in for our first Constitutional crisis since 1778.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2126 hrs
The Constitution specifies quite clearly the exact powers that the Federal government has
Such as this:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
So the government has given us the FCC and speech laws in certain communities.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2129 hrs
Wait.
Jav4Liberty…are you seriously trying to make the argument that because people didn’t draw the line on “building permits” they shouldn’t draw the line on mandatory forced purchase of health insurance (or fines/jail-time)?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2134 hrs
Yes, GMan. Why is some tyranny ok, but not others?
And Family Guy, if you’re such an expert in constitutional law, and this plan is so obviously unconstitutional, why hasn’t that been the central objection voiced on the floor of the house or senate?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2143 hrs
Wait.
Jav4Liberty…are you seriously trying to make the argument that because people didn’t draw the line on “building permits” they shouldn’t draw the line on mandatory forced purchase of health insurance (or fines/jail-time)?
People accepted more and more government into their lives and now they are getting what they’ve asked for. The line should have been drawn many decades ago. It wasn’t and now people are crying about what is currently happening. You want small government? Act like it. Don’t make excuses for big government in some areas while bitching about big government in other areas or you’ll get big government in ALL areas.
I’m not saying don’t…I’m saying you may be too late. Before another supposed “conservative” yaps about liberty they best know what it means.
lib·er·ty
? ?/?l?b?rti/ [lib-er-tee]
–noun,plural-ties.
1.
freedom from arbitrary or despotic government or control.
2.
freedom from external or foreign rule; independence.
3.
freedom from control, interference, obligation, restriction, hampering conditions, etc.; power or right of doing, thinking, speaking, etc., according to choice.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2144 hrs
and this plan is so obviously unconstitutional, why hasn’t that been the central objection voiced on the floor of the house or senate?
George, can you not think for yourself? Do you need a politician to take up a line of thought for you to consider it valid?
Yes, several politicians have pointed out that this is unconstitutional, but don’t take their word for it. Read the constitution. Judge for yourself. Is there anything in there that permits the federal government to mandate the purchase of anything - much less health insurance?
Posted by Owen on March 18, 2010 at 2150 hrs
Actually income taxes and wealth redistribution are tyrannical and were left purposely out of the original Constitution.
“To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers, have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, the guarantee to everyone the free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.” — Thomas Jefferson, letter to Joseph Milligan, April 6, 1816
“A wise and frugal government… shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.” — Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801
“Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.” — Thomas Jefferson
“The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If ‘Thou shalt not covet’ and ‘Thou shalt not steal’ were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free.” — John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, 1787
“With respect to the two 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.” — James Madison in a letter to James Robertson
In 1794, when Congress appropriated $15,000 for relief of French refugees who fled from insurrection in San Domingo to Baltimore and Philadelphia, James Madison stood on the floor of the House to object saying:
“I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.” — James Madison, 4 Annals of Congress 179, 1794
“[T]he government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.” — James Madison
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2153 hrs
Owen - I’ve read, studied, and researched the constitution many times. The Commerce Clause seems to provide the necessary authority for Congress to regulate health care, just as numerous other sectors are regulated.
Where did you get your law degree?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2200 hrs
Geesh, the liberals here *looooove* straw man arguments.
George. I’m not seeing anyone saying that “some tyranny is ok.” What I *am* seeing is Jav5Liberty making the old argument. “well, if you didn’t complain about it before, you can’t complain now.”
Here’s a very distinct difference between a building permit and the health insurance scam the government is about to perpetrate on all of us (including you libs, you guys had best get ready to take it up the rear with every one else):
A building permit is not, generally speaking, life or death. Your medical care, generally speaking, will be. The government is reaching into your life to affect, quite literally, affect matters of life and death. If the government decides “that treatment is too expensive”, poof, no more of it.
Further, a government that controls access to health care (and that’s where we’ll be headed), is a government that can *order* you to do anything it likes.
“You don’t want to do morning calisthenics with everyone? Ok, but you don’t get any medical care if you get sick?” That’s a far cry from having to pay 150 bucks so you can put up a new roof.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2201 hrs
If the government decides “that treatment is too expensive”, poof, no more of it.
Show me where in the proposed bill this could happen. The government isn’t suddenly going to take over all insurance plans and make all insurance decisions.
Further, a government that controls access to health care (and that’s where we’ll be headed),
You criticize what you feel are straw man arguments, and then you base your argument on hypothetical predictions? Heh.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2208 hrs
And I repeat: if gov’t forcing something “life or death” is tyrannical, then military conscription must also be tyrannical. Someone show me otherwise?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2209 hrs
The “Commerce Clause” states simply:
To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
How you get that it means they can force people to purchase something as a requsite of citizenship? Beats the hell out of me….But, please, do tell….
And yeah - Jay, I didn’t complain much before. Probably because I used to call myself a liberal progressive who used to think the Constitution was a living, breathing document. Blame it on the public school indoctrination….
Whatever, I’m awake now.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2211 hrs
Who cares if it’s life or death, did I say anything about that? Did ya bother to read the all the comments or did you just cherry pick some parts of them?
Are you FORCED to buy a permit? Yes.
Will you be FORCED to buy health insurance? Yes.
Therefore has government been FORCING you to buy things before health insurance was even an issue? Yes.
Also, reading comprehension time. I never said you SHOULDN’T say anything. I said if you are going to complain about big government you had best complain about it in ALL areas, not just those that are important to you. Where were all these tea parties decrying government spending 4, 8, 16 or 24 years ago? I suppose big government was OK until Obama won the popularity contest then it was detestable.
Why should I pay 150 bucks to put a new roof on to a bunch of people who will do nothing but shuffle some paperwork around?
Why should I pay for health insurance I may not need or want so people can shuffle paperwork around?
Should I draw some pictures?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2212 hrs
Alright George, but let’s ask. Do we currently *have* military conscription?
I mean, yeah, if you’re a male, you have to fill out your selective service card, but, has anyone been drafted in the last, oh, 35 years?
I think a lot of people would agree with you, but we’re not discussing something that’s not going to be happening (unless hopey dopey decides he wants to, for whatever reason). What we *are* discussing is something that will eventually allow the government to dictate everything you do.
Enjoy.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2212 hrs
George - look for the Comparative Effectiveness Center…. although the page number is probably different now… this was from the version on Monday.
Update: Page 1557 has the Comparative Effectiveness Center:
(1) IN GENERAL.—The Secretary shall establish within the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality a Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research (in this section referred to as the ‘Center’) to conduct, support, and synthesize research (including research conducted or supported under section 1013 of the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003) with respect to the outcomes, effectiveness, and appropriateness of health care services and procedures in order to identify the manner in which diseases, disorders, and other health conditions can most effectively and appropriately be prevented, diagnosed, treated, and managed clinically.
Read the whole section, but pay attention to the composition of the panel, especially the last discipline:
(i) DIVERSE REPRESENTATION OF PERSPECTIVES.—The members of the Commission shall represent a broad range of perspectives and shall collectively have experience in the following areas:
(I) Epidemiology.
(II) Health services research.
(III) Bioethics.
(IV) Decision sciences.
(V) Health disparities.
(VI) Economics.
Why is an economics expert on this panel if not to do cost/benefit analysis?And drop the draft already, the country did over 30 years ago. geesh
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2216 hrs
And I repeat: if gov’t forcing something “life or death” is tyrannical, then military conscription must also be tyrannical. Someone show me otherwise?
It is. The Selective Service is unconstitutional, but young men (does it include women yet?) are FORCED to register with it when they turn 18.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2216 hrs
“The commerce clause seems to provide the necessary authority to regulate…”
How so? Regulation of interstate commerce presupposes an existing condition of interstate commerce. Congress is not proposing to regulate existing interstate commerce. It is proposing to compell a commercial action that does not exist.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2217 hrs
Interestingly, the Commerce Clause regulates interstate commerce, but it is currently illegal for health insurance companies to engage in commerce except in states in which they are licensed. Want to shop Ohio policies as a Wisconsin resident? You can’t. If anything, the current regulations that insurance companies only sell to people in a state in which they reside makes the Commerce Clause an utterly moot point.
And George, I’m not a lawyer, but I can think for myself. Can you?
Posted by Owen on March 18, 2010 at 2228 hrs
People can wish and fish for “legal” arguments all day long. In the end, the judges who decide this can find enough support for whichever position they decide to take just as the penumbra was made up to justify Roe v. Wade almost 40-years ago.
At least three Obamacare challenges should hit the courts quickly.
a) Requirement for all to buy insurance
b) Slaughter rule and whether you can sneak through a bill without voting on it, but rather voting on amendments to said bill, said amendments which most likely might never get passed by the Senate nor ever enacted into law.
c) Equal protection challenges for special deals made within the bill (apparently only one bank in the country is allowed to provide student loans in the amendment—in North Dakota where Earl Pomeroy (D) had his vote bought off tonight I guess)Again, we can wish and fish about past legal cases on all these issues. But there has not been in many many years legal cases of this magnitude and importance that will most likely end up at SCOTUS. You can’t predict how they might decide these based on any past precedents.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2250 hrs
Where in that “Comparative Effectiveness Center” section does it state coverage for somethign could be dropped? It merely talks about studying various effectiveness.
And you’ll win few arguments based on your personal suppositions (“Why is an economics expert on this panel if not to do cost/benefit analysis? “)
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 18, 2010 at 2254 hrs
George, you did know, right, that the entire point of the “comparative effectiveness panel” is to decide which treatments to allow.
I mean, that’s kind of implied in the name.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 0555 hrs
Comparative Effectiveness Research (in this section referred to as the ‘Center’) to conduct, support, and synthesize research (including research conducted or supported under section 1013 of the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003) with respect to the outcomes, effectiveness, and appropriateness of health care services and procedures in order to identify the manner in which diseases, disorders, and other health conditions can most effectively and appropriately be prevented, diagnosed, treated, and managed clinically.
Um - that section kind of screams that this “Center” will decide for the nation as a whole what tests, procedures, drugs, and treatments will be allowed for all of us.
How nice of them.
How sad for us.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 0616 hrs
Are you FORCED to buy a permit? Yes.
Will you be FORCED to buy health insurance? Yes.
Building permits are local ordinances… they don’t fall under the Federal Government. You are only forced to obtain them if you choose to build a house in that municipality. you are never forced to do so. With Obamacare, you are FORCED to buy insurance… and only insurance of the variety permitted by the central government (I’m not sure it’s really federal anymore… it seems to operating without regard to the states or the people). There is no choice… you do it, or they will come for you. FORCED.
if gov’t forcing something “life or death” is tyrannical, then military conscription must also be tyrannical.
You’d save yourself a lot of silly questions if you read the thing yourself. It’s not that long, George. Try Article I Section 8 for a description of the power of Congress to raise and support armies.
If this thing happens on Sunday… however it happens, by illegal rules changes, or open bribery for votes, the very fabric of this nation will have changed forever. It will be a VERY dark day for the America I grew up in.
Are income or sales taxes inherently tyrannical?
Income tax: 16th Amendment. State sales tax 10th Amendment… powers reserved by the states.
George, either you are starting to become a troll, or you have no clue what-so-ever about the most basic laws that govern your land. I hope you are already a citizen, because you’d have a real uphill battle passing that test.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 0808 hrs
Thanks TFG, well written as always. And I have no problem with trash fees, building permits. That is the agreed upon role of local government, and if you choose to live in that local, you should obide by those laws. (or work at the local level to change them….for example, my city does not charge a garbage fee…you have to contract for that yourself.) And that is perfectly consititutitional, and really not germane to the discussion.
The commerce clause has been stretched so far that you can see through it and it seems to trump the rest of the consititution, but there is no way to stretch it to cover mandating that everyone buy a particular product.
And Jay, I agree the tea parties should have shown up years ago. We conservatives have given up a lot of ground backing the lessor of two evils. (i.e. I thought Bush spent like a drunken sailor, but what other choice did we have…Gore??{shudder}) I really don’t get your argument though. Just because we should have pushed back years ago, we should not be complaining now? If you have been fighting the good fight without us for 40 years….you should welcome the help. I’m truly baffled as to what your point actually is.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 0950 hrs
Will you be FORCED to buy health insurance? Yes.
Actually, no. The bill does not force anyone to buy anything; it merely applies a tax penalty to people who don’t buy health insurance.
In the same way that no one is forced to get a mortgage, but people without one pay higher taxes than those with. No one is forced to have children, but people without children pay more in taxes than those without. And so on.
Posted by folkbum on March 19, 2010 at 1657 hrs
a tax penalty, or jail-time. Don’t forget the jail time
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 1701 hrs
In the same way that no one is forced to get a mortgage, but people without one pay higher taxes than those with. No one is forced to have children, but people without children pay more in taxes than those without. And so on.
So I guess folkbum is a fan of the FairTax or Flat Tax to even everything out then.
Seriously, any bill that needs an extra 16500 IRS agents as enforcers cannot be a good thing.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 1706 hrs
It’s not a good thing. In fact, it is so bad that it’s own supporters have to create shadowy rules so that people can vote for it while pretending they didn’t.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 1712 hrs
a tax penalty, or jail-time. Don’t forget the jail time
The jail time is a penalty for failure to pay taxes, not failure to buy health care. You fail to pay any tax, regardless of what it is or its origins, and the penalty is jail time.
So I guess folkbum is a fan of the FairTax or Flat Tax to even everything out then.
No. I’m actually a pretty firm believer in using the tax code to promote the common good. The nation is better off with homeowners and families, for example, so I don’t have a problem privileging those in the tax code. People need to eat, so we don’t put a sales tax on food. In Minnesota, they don’t tax clothing sales, seeing as how it’s so cold there all the time if people didn’t have sufficient clothes they’d all freeze to death.
A tax penalty for not buying insurance—assuming you don’t get it from your employer—is not that different.
Posted by folkbum on March 19, 2010 at 1753 hrs
I’m actually a pretty firm believer in using the tax code to promote the common good.
Sounds like a good place for a history lesson again. The tax code was never intended as an incentive or punishment. Nor was it intended to force charity. Neither was the Federal government intended to determine the winners and losers in society.
“To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers, have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, the guarantee to everyone the free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.” — Thomas Jefferson, letter to Joseph Milligan, April 6, 1816
“A wise and frugal government… shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.” — Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801
“Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.” — Thomas Jefferson
“The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If ‘Thou shalt not covet’ and ‘Thou shalt not steal’ were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free.” — John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, 1787
“With respect to the two 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.” — James Madison in a letter to James Robertson
In 1794, when Congress appropriated $15,000 for relief of French refugees who fled from insurrection in San Domingo to Baltimore and Philadelphia, James Madison stood on the floor of the House to object saying:
“I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.” — James Madison, 4 Annals of Congress 179, 1794
“[T]he government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.” — James Madison
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 1935 hrs
Comment 40 is utterly incorrect and a deliberately false analogy. A correct analogy would occur if this bill granted a tax deduction for purchasers of health insurance, as is done for a mortgage or children. That isn’t the case here and that is intentional. If the bill merely granted a deduction for health insurance, it wouldn’t achieve the objective of a massive confiscation of wealth and the transfer of it from the private sector to the government, from the young to the old, and from the productive to the unproductive.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 19, 2010 at 2038 hrs
All insurance models will reduce the amount of premium for an individual as the pool of policy holders increase. The goal is to get everyone to participate in the system and to assist those that can’t pay and fine those that don’t want to pay.
I can’t speak to the constitutionality of the bill although I agree with George the most.
I will say that everyone in the United States is a beneficiary of out health care system because they will be treated if the show up to an emergency room. I believe that if they are covered they should be forced to pay into the system.
If someone here is willing to say that hospital emergency rooms should be allowed to turn away critically ill people then I would be more inclined to accept the argument that people should not be forced to pay into the system.
I don’t believe such a radical position would be very popular.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 20, 2010 at 2142 hrs
I will say that everyone in the United States is a beneficiary of out health care system because they will be treated if the show up to an emergency room. I believe that if they are covered they should be forced to pay into the system.
Posted by Communication Skills on March 25, 2010 at 0815 hrs
I’m actually a pretty firm believer in using the tax code to promote the common good.
A tax penalty for not buying insurance ...is not that different.
Again, a great glimpse into the mind of socialism. Taxes are used to implement social welfare that the socialist BELIEVES is in your best interest. You are the unwashed mindless masses, and without the use of that force, you’d surely make a decision that the socialist disagrees with… a decision that is therefor wrong in the mind of the benevolent socialist. Taxes are not to keep the basics of reasonable and limited government running, they are a penalty to punish behaviors that the elites don’t care for…. they are the use of force to make you do what you are told… and that type of tax is a tyranny.
Sometime, if you let them talk enough, they’ll tell you the truth without knowing it.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 25, 2010 at 1303 hrs
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