The Government forcing citizens to buy corporate product or service is unconstitutional. There truly is a big difference between Government Medicare/Medicaid and Corporate (for-profit) insurance. The later is completely without public elected representatives. If they do this once, it will never end. Especially now that there are no limits to Corporate Person-hood bribes.

If the individual mandate survives, the next big project for the assholes in DC will be to replace Social Security with an individual mandate requiring workers to purchase annuities from private insurance companies.

In fact, I’d be surpised if the insurance company whores in DC haven’t already started working on this.

Single Payer. The math is on our side.

The individual mandate is nothing more than an insurance industry bailout.
The same was done in MA. Fail!

I am glad they shut it down. Maybe something rational can now be implemented? Ya, I know, but one can dream.

Mandates for single payer are useful. In Canada, my friends pay like $60 per month. That’s $720 PER YEAR!!!
They also have different price ranges for low incomes. And mostly it comes down to 0 per month for low incomes. So they go to the doctor. They get preventative care. And they don’t get serious problems that left unchecked cost 100s of thousands of dollars in meds and specialists. Also, if they don’t get serious medical issues, ie. they are treated early or prevented, then they can have a better quality of life, function and contribute to society, and get jobs and maybe get out of the low income status.
My point is that those “pinko-commie socialist bastards” take care of their own and have more productive people.

Bloody hell.
The math.
Logic.
Decency.
It’s all on our side.

Hmm. I wonder how this will impact my states mandate that I buy car insurance?

require guaranteed issue,

What does this mean?

Exactly right.

Individual mandates was not only wrong from liberty, our constitution and free choice perspective it would have destroyed our economic system long term since it would not have had any escape valves if the systemic greed with for-profit AHIP and Pharma goes out of bounds. In that scenario how will other sectors react to these mandates. They now will see the easy path. Instead of innovation in the market place they will wine and dine policy makers with new grass-roots $1M per plate dinners for post-electoral legislation and get individual mandates for their businesses. It will literally become a race to the bottom with the customers being hit with federal mandates to eat at certain Fast Food restaurants, buy certain furniture, go to certain movies, fly certain planes or else pay a IRS enforced penalty. What happens to the customers. They will lose strive for innovation which is nothing but pursuit of happiness enshrined in our declaration of independenceand our economic system enters dark age.

Instead of Innovation Mandates become the norm and society as a whole will dis-integrate long term. I am glad that we are at a stage that we recognize this intuitively and are correcting it.

There should be little doubt now that the issue will end up before the Supreme Court.

man, the supreme court is going to have a tough one here, first they can’t stand the president so they would love to rule against him

but second, the individual mandate is a corporate gift, something they are salavating in anticipation so the scotus should rule on behalf of the mandate

would love to watch them holding their heads wondering what they are going to do

The “health care” law was always a big lie. It was intended as a PR device for politicians under pressure from an unsophisticated public and media to “do something about health care” that in reality prioritized ensconcing the health insurance and pharmaceutical corporations formally into the US, effectively as part of the national government.

For my part, I believe that the “law” requiring me to buy a product sold by private corporations, with no viable public alternative, and no meaningful regulation that heavily protects my interest, is un-Constitutional and morally repugnant without further consideration.

I have no problem with one of our doubtless corrupt and ideological appointee-packed courts dumping the odious provision.

Ronald Reagan would have been brought to his knees with tears of joy in eyes at the prospect of Obama’s (Romney’s) “health care plan”.

While many would argue that you would get a better overall outcome by including an individual mandate, it is not the role of the courts to strike down whole laws because one change might modestly change policy outcomes.

there aren’t too many sane people who would make that claim and believe it.

unless there is a public option to compete against, a mandate is the recipe for increasing prices, the corporate machine will have an absolute captive audience and it is their object, their sole object to increase profit.

now, if there were a public option the case could be legitimately made but without it, even making the claim is rediculous

I agree with everything you said, however the scotus was brought to you and is owned an operated by corporate agenda, they are going to have a really tough time striking down something as lucrative as the mandate

Obama’s goal was to pass the weakest, most industry-friendly version of “reform” he could, so he made backroom deals to not pursue single-payer and to scuttle the public option.

And the idiots who watch Fox News think he is a socialist.

Considering the entire HCR as passed was opposed by both sides of the issue, it might be a blessing in disguise to have the mandate buried.

Let’s have a real reform, done in the light of day, with plenty of open hearings.

Who really cares? This was a very unpopular provision. I’ve heard it said that without this provision only the sick or older people will buy it. That will make it even more expensive?? Maybe the next pres can salvage it or not. The next pres can now repeal it and start over – - with another mandate like Pres Romney will like. I’m pretty sure then the supremes will approve of it.

Why do people keep looking for the PO? Any chance this will happen in the next, oh I don’t know, 30 years or so?

Well, health care, like driving, is a state sanctioned “privilege.”

alan. You must not have seen the debates last night. According to Mitt, the FEDERAL government can’t MAKE you buy something like health insurance, But the STATE can and should to protect itself from “free riders”.

THis should be interesting because that IS what MA has currently inplace. So, is this unconny or just unconny for the feds.

Let me tweet Mitt and see what he thinks.

Yeah, and he did a triple Salcow double Lutz talking his way around actually answering the question.

well, his real goal was to satisfy his corporate puppeteers, he is their marionette after all

“Guaranteed issuance” means that you have a guaranteed right to the actual issuance of a policy of insurance by the insurance company. I.e., not blanket refusal to recover you because of some “pre-existing” condition, whether or not disclosed on your application for insurance coverage that otherwise could be used as an excuse to deny you coverage for anything, forever. Just as in the horror stories of people whose prior MDs failed to mention a tiny rash or acne, and then they wind up being denied coverage for cancer decades later.

Or are you focusing on something else more sinister?

but there is the point, health care should be a right, forcing someone to buy a product to go with a privilege is completely different

Yes the strict constitution guys Scalia and Thomas are also Corporate Hacks of the first order but they hate Obama.
Big money will want them to bailout the insurance companies but they risk their political lives Thomas’s wife is a Tea bagger and if he votes for big money her career is over as well as Thomas and Scalia getting invited to give paid speeches for GOP groups.
it will be interesting to see how this plays out they might stall and send the case back for review.

But the STATE can and should to protect itself from “free riders”.

Mitt can’t seem to stop putting his foot in his mouth that statement will not fool the Tea Baggers and not win him any friends among Moderate voters you have to stand for something if you want to be President you can be a waffle after you become President like Obama did but you can’t be a waffle and get elected the first time.
Just who is giving Mitt political advice?

this was purely a political decision as there is ample historical precedent
from the earliest days of the Republic when John Adams signed such a law requiring sailors to buy retirement insurance

http://www.scribd.com/doc/29099806/Act-for-the-Relief-of-Sick-DisabledSeamen-July-1798

No argument from me there. See my post “Public Optional”

“…How can we say that people have an “intrinsic right” to military defense, or to police and fire protection, (or to safe food and water, or to otherwise safe products that won’t electrocute us when we plug them in)? Well, we simply say it. And then we codify it. And, then, having codified it, we don’t lie awake nights worrying that everyone will demand a Special Forces FOB dug into his or her front yard, or an occupied Metro PD Black & White, an ambulance, and a hook & ladder truck parked at the curb 24/7.”

“Just who is giving Mitt political advice?”
___

Corporations that are “people.”

Other countries are offering better deals by restricting healthcare and drug costs forcing us to buy insurance when healthcare and drug costs are not restricted is like saying steak is good for you the Feds force you to buy it but the only steak they let you buy is priced more than steak in other countries.

Corporations that unlike people don’t pay much if any taxes.

The Fed was using the Commerce Clause to say that it had the right regulate interstate commerce in the form of an individual mandate. The appeals court ruled that such a mandate is outside the powers of the Fed and that the Commerce Clause cannot be used to justify it.

Your stat’es insurance requirements are not impacted whatsoever.

I want to be an American Corporation being an American Citizen sucks I want to pay no taxes! I want politicians to listen to my ideas. I want the Media to repeat my ideas and never ask me tough questions or for facts to back up what I say.
I want other people to pay taxes and for them to bail me out when I get into trouble even if it means they lose their SS and Medicare!/s

So, what are we waiting for? Let’s give it to the Super Cat-food Commission and let them run with it.

Exactly. I’m not entirely certain given the corporate interest controlling this court, they’ll rule against the individual mandate.

“I want to be an American Corporation being an American Citizen sucks I want to pay no taxes”

51% of your fellow citizens are already doing that……

Here’s why you should care about the individual mandate. There is a provision in the health care law that says insurance companies must accept whoever applies for insurance. That means an individual can wait until they actually get sick and then apply for insurance. After he is okay, he can drop the insurance again. The only people who will have insurance are those who are sick. So the premiums will be enormous and you’ll have many more uninsured. Which means you’ll have many more using the emergency rooms as their primary source of care. Medical costs will skyrocket and we’re going to be in a worse mess than we are today.

If the mandate goes down, I think that the requirement that insurance has to cover everyone will be removed by congress and insurance companies will be able to drop individuals that cost too much.

Blame this on Obama and his craving for bipartianship. They could have resolved this with a 1 line bill that changed the eligibility age of Medicare from 65 to 0.

“….Peeeee…eeple, C-Corps that are Peeeee…ple…

Are the LU-U-UCKIEST Peeeeeeple in the world…”

Work with me here.

Anything “given” to them is bad for us.

Flat out wrong.

Everybody pays some sort of tax; withholding, gas, sales, etc.

In the case of a low income family, who already pays these taxes, and by the way economic policies benefiting corporations alone have made more and more families low income, qualify for EITCs.

And since Corporations are People, I’m telling you Citizen Person General Electric paid no taxes in 2010 as well as 2/3rds of such Corporate People.

That analogy fails. You have a choice to be a sailor and thus all the requirements that follow.
The very fact that you are alive shouldn’t force you to be indebted to private industry!

you have a point but the counter point is stronger;

a mandate gives the insurance companies a captive audience and premiums MUST rise because of that

the real answer was to provide a public option, that would have solved all questions, however obama promised away the public option

I think I might agree, if the mandate is removed they have to remove the guaranteed issue

however here is the clear compromise;

“for whatever companies refuse guaranteed issue there will be a public option”

bing

I want to be rich and pay no taxes and have other people bail me out when I lose money I want people to be forced to buy crappy insurance from me no matter what the cost/s

(this is sarcasm but this does seem to be the world Obama and Mitt want)

In a “free” market that won’t happen. Having a lot of new healthy people buying insurance should bring the price of insurance down. Secondly, less people should be visting the emergency room because disease will be diagnosed earlier.

Of course, you’d have to believe that health insurance industry is a “free” market.

and low income pay more over all taxes then even the wealthy;

suppose I make 500 dollars a week and have to travel to manhatten for my job

there is the tunnel tax, this costs 10 dollars a day, if I work 5 days a week I have paid 50 dollars to this tax or ten percent

the man making 5000 dollars a week pays one percent for the same tax.

that’s a clear representation but it goes even further, most wealthy only spend a small portion of their income on re-taxable goods (sales and local taxes) lowering their effective tax rate… while most lower income families spend their entire income on retaxable goods, raising their effective tax rate

this is the original reason a “progressive income tax” was devised, to make some kind of compensation for all other taxes which happen to be regressive.

THIS is the point ALL politicians do not make and they need to, and we here on the intertubes MUST point it out at every wake and call, to which I have just done

*takes a bow*

Uh All people are equal but Some People are more more Equal than others?

Of course, you’d have to believe that health insurance industry is a “free” market.

even believing there is such a thing at all, that there ever was such a thing or that there ever will be such a thing makes a person more gullable then kids who believe in a tooth fairy

All markets RELY on regulation, they could not even own their product if not for regulations and even a monetary system is a set of them, in a “free market” whoever could take your stuff would own your stuff since there would be no regulations to stop them

a “free marketeer” REALLY means “the regulations that help me acquire wealth are good, those that force me into paying my own bills are bad”

I imagine that it will have no more effect on car insurance than it has on the mandate to have a safety inspection sticker or a drivers test. If you can’t or won’t get any of those things you can park your car and walk. On the other hand if you can’t buy health insurance, what are you supposed to do? Jump in the freezer and go into suspended animation?

I have stopped using equal, I have heard it burns out your stomack

I didn’t mean “free” in terms of regulation. I meant “free” in terms of each insurer is competing in the market place. Kind of difficult because insurance companies have cut up the market and there is just a couple or in some case 1 insurance company in each market.

Pity you’re not perceptive enough to tell the difference.

“free market” isn’t the term then, what you meant was a market where others are allowed to compete and their are valid anti trust laws in place

that was given away long long time ago

The whole stinking rotten corrupt edifice of Obamacare should be torn out from its roots.

And then we start over.

His “magic underwear”.

BTW if this goes to the Supreme Court I have no doubt the law gets gutted so that it becomes completely ineffective. Definitey a 5-4 party line vote. Republicans complain about activist judges. This court has been the most activist court ever.

This is a great decision. The mandate was what made the whole thing a piece of crap. Probably now the dogs will tear it apart.

But maybe the Tea Party can be persuaded to go for Medicare for all. They love their Medicare.

I read the entire text of the Senate bill, the House bill, and the Senate bill that was reconciled. There was an explicit severability clause in all of those.

Who took it out before final passage, when, and why?

It looks a lot like the Graham-Leach-Bliley shenanigans. Except a critical piece is taken out rather than inserted.

Silly posters. Take it to the Supreme Court. Obama wins? HUH!!!!!! Lest you forget..money trumps ideology AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL , every time.The Healthcare industry loves them some Obamycare…..You doubt it? Book it….Dano…………

Did we skip out on a few civics classes in junior high? States are sovereign and can do things like that. The federal government is limited in power and can’t.

That’s the entire… umm… point of this debate.

Sorry, I’ve been busy. I love it. I don’t sing but perhaps I can choreograph something to go along with that.

Supreme Court will strike down the individual mandate. It is common sense unconstitutional and do not need smart thinking, aligns with thinking and rulings of the conservative side of the bench. It is too controversial, one party is totally against it, tons of states are against it and lot of people are upset with it. Our political and economic system will never adjust to the concept of paying mandated money to the private entities if they like it or not. The issue to look for is how many judges in the minority will set aside their constitutional knowledge, throw away common sense and think mandates is a good idea.

BTW this will open up the window for medicare for all. This will be the only way our economic system can be set stable long term and everybody can get good health care.

That auto insurance mandate has an escape value. If a customer cannot afford payments because of his life-style choice, personal obligations to his family all that he has to do is avoid driving a car. Take a bicycle, walk to job, public transportation etc.

I see lot of people doing thing, the reason is straight-forward. Some cannot afford payments, they make their own free decision and their penalty is ZERO with this choice. So this for-profit companies have to cost-cut, lower their premiums and entice those customers back into their fold.

In the HCR mandate there is no such escape clause or a FREE freedom of choice. Here they will neither provide Health Care services nor reduce premiums even though everybody can sign up unaffordable premiums but will collect more and more mandated money to show more and more profits to the share holders. That is the real issue with Massachusetts bill or Federal bill why it is totally wrong for our economic system besides being totally against the spirit of why we fought for independence.

Congress has no authority to command how you spend your non-taxable income.

That’s why Congress’ power over your purse is constitutionally limited to taxing and spending tax money.

The Commerce Clause provides for so-called “plenary” power of Congress over commerce. (In fact, Congress’ authority over commerce is far from “plenary”, for instance, it is expressly limited by the First Amendment. There are other limitations on Congress’ commercial authority however, it is sufficient to note that “plenary” doesn’t necessarily mean “plenary” here)

However, Congress only has the authority to regulate commercial transactions — it has no authority to create them out of thin air. Accordingly, Congress cannot require YOU to enter into a commercial transaction and then regulate it under commerce.

Heaven forbid it is ever ruled that congress has the right to command you how to spend your disposable income. I can already imagine the long line of lobbyists pandering to our bought congress for legislation mandating the purchase of their products and services.

Whoopie.

The Mandate is unconstitutional.

The rest of the health care package aint so great either.

You know what would really work? If people’s tax dollars were used to provide a universal health care plan for all! You know, like they have in civilized countries!!!!

Oh and before you come back with how everyone needs health care bla bla bla the other side of that coin is, in recognition that health care is a universal need, it should be publicly provided and regulated like utilities instead of run as a FOR PROFIT enterprise that necessarily excludes anyone who can’t afford it.

Sheesh.

This is pretty basic stuff.

The auto indemnity issue is one of third party liability and the legal requirement that everyone who drives a car must demonstrate FINANCIAL RESPONSIBILITY. Toward that end the law requires either the purchase of a minimum limits auto insurance policy (you can also purchase more and better insurance) OR individuals may elect to self-insure, which requires posting of a bond in the event of an accident.

Accordingly, the health insurance mandate and the financial responsibility laws are simply not analagous and are as comparable as apples and nuns.

“. . .leaves the rest of the law intact. . .”

RIP? A single ACA mandate challenge passing muster at SCOTUS will be all it takes.

When that mandate rung is knocked out, the rest of ACA could only tap into a single payer framework going forward, no?. I hope so. The better parts of ACA should migrate that way.

Exactly single payer. Our Economic system, Political system and Constitution can work with that model and everybody can get health care coverage.
Tons and Tons of time FDL bloggers wrote about single payer but we also read that people who are supposed to vote on it attending $35K a plate dinner to get elected. So chances of single payer are pretty slim till individual mandate goes off. Then hopefully some body will take the single payer torch and make it a reality.

Freedom means Gov can’t tell you how to spend your assets, income, or time.

Single payer – good

Mandate – very bad

Single payer is not a perfect solution but okay solution. Not for profit entity i..e Government runs and we are the stakeholders i.e. we elect the representatives who oversee it. So premiums never go out of bounds because we have scope to complain and get services improved. Please note that Founding Fathers considered Government as a necessary evil and instituted it since they could not figure out a way for arbitration between individuals and for safe-guard of our shared resources.

Please remember Taxation without Representation is why independence cause started. In that context single payer is palatable.

If one give citizens of America equal voting rights in AHIP & Pharma then it is close to Single Payer too. There will be responsible premium increases in that scenario.

With Individual Mandates our economic system is ripe for exploitation by AHIP and Pharma and soon other economic sectors will follow on the slippery slope. If this individual mandates is allowed expect to see airlines, cars, furniture, fast food etc demanding similar stuff citing this as precedent and we will have a collapsing economic system. There will be no end till the whole economic system simply collapses and individual and his concept of personal liberty is totally broken down at the hands of the corporation.

Probably not, because the TeaKKKluxers only love THEIR Medicare, they just don’t want those freeloading Black “gangstas” and “welfare queens” and Brown “illegal aliens” to mooch off them.

They probably would prefer Medical Savings Accounts so that they could “play the market”, and vouchers for the poorest. The rest?? Well, if they didn’t live right by (their) God, then they get what they deserve. Plus, they need to work harder and longer for less, anyway, so that the “free market” system can flourish.

Anthony

That may be true…but given the overreliance on cars for our well being and our “just-in-time” society, it would be a major inconvenience for most workers to shift away from cars…especially if where they work is further away from where they live.

Plus…auto insurance serves a vital purpose: it allows for quick payment and resolution of auto accidents by creating a pool of money from insurees. The more people insured, the bigger the pool, and the easier to replace and repair cars destroyed in accidents. Asking car owners to pay a bit extra for auto insurance is not even close to being a huge burden.

Removing the forced mandate for health insurance would make the health pool that much smaller, since insurers would simply bump up their premiums to make up for the loss of people getting insurance, and/or reinstate “preexisting condition” clauses in order to keep from paying out claims to to the insured.

Private insurance providers, like all other private firms, exist first and foremost to make a profit for themselves, and that would ultimately take precedent over providing quality health care or expanding the base of the insured.

There really is no substitute for single payer, backed by a national public health system. The private for-profit system of “health insurance” is the problem, not the solution.

Not to mention that getting rid of the greedheads and middlemen would really do a number on the debt and deficit….as in $7 TRILLLION over the next 10 years ALONE.

Anthony

As far as I know, you won’t get an IRS penalty if you don’t buy car insurance. Under Obamacare, you will be penalised by the IRS if you don’t buy health insurance.

If you get pulled over and don’t have car insurance, you’ll get a citation, not be fined as much under Obamacare.

As a progressive minded person, I hate the individual mandate.

Candidate Obama hated it, too, until he got elected.

Even in Auto Insurance stuff I have seen people changing multiple buses & train to come to work because they simply could not balance their budgets by driving their cars to work. Everybody’s family condition is different and they should make their own determination. This thing of people dropping out simply forces the prices to come down. This is how free market and its innovation concept works.

If this thing would have passed through it would have opened flood gates of mandates on people with Republicans too bringing their favorite companies and their stories on why mandates is good for us. Innovation and competition to create a better product for the market place would have been a thing of past and getting mandates on American people after treating $1M+ a plate dinners would have become the norm. For people living in here it would have become a too crappy place long term.

National Public Health System model would have sailed through even though it has its share of drawbacks and would have been palatable to almost everyone I saw posting on this blog site. To my knowledge as far as I can remember I never saw anyone complaining about it and all the civilized, industrialized nations are happy with that model.

For quite awhile I thought Ginsburg needed to retire from SCOTUS for health reasons.

But now there is the prospect of sundry ACA mandate challenges heading for SCOTUS. Any one of those challenges, if successful, will effectively scotch ACA as we know it regardless of the disposition of the others.

I think that prospect will keep Ginsburg trying to hold on. She has to stick it out for quite awhile. If she were to leave Obama would likely not be able to fill that seat. Then a subsequent four-four split on such a challenge, which had been supported by any circuit court (such as yesterday) — that would be it.

Am I misreading something here? It seems they must be holding their breath in the WH now.

Good point. I never considered that repulsive scenario(privatization gone wild). Good analogy.

4-4, who would vote for it?

Exactly.

It will be voted down for sure. Conservative side of the bench will vote it out of the park and will have a field day making other side uncomfortable and speaking on the side of American Public. Only question is whether it will be Land-slide 9-0 or something like 8-1.

They are on the spot-light and people would notice which Jurist is thinking chaining Americans to AHIP & Pharma is a good idea followed by chaining other companies Republicans and Democrats would come up with after attending $35K a plate dinners.

BTW if this thing passed through it would have collapsed our economic system long term stifling innovation which comes with freedom of free choice.
I am glad we are still at the stage in Society where it is not too late and where we recognize the harm individual mandate without any escape valves would have done to our society long term intuitively.

A Victory for the people, and for good govt. The mandate is what groups like 3′d way have always meant by euphemisms such as “public – private partnership”…thier idea of “public – private partnership” is taking bribes from big money to enact laws and regulations that big money wants. The best example of dishonest, misleading understatement since Don Corleone was making offers that you couldnt refuse