Is Health Care Reform Unconstitutional?

David Cole

Can Republicans defeat Obamas health care bill by persuading the courts that mandatory health insurance is unconstitutional? On December 13, 2010, Henry Hudson, a federal judge in Virginia, declared unconstitutional the central provision of the health care reform law. Judge Hudson reasoned that the laws command that citizens purchase health care insurance extended beyond Congresss authority to legislate. It has long been established that Congress may regulate citizens economic activities, such as entering into contracts, producing or purchasing goods and services, or shipping goods across state lines. But it is entirely unprecedented, Judge Hudson said, for Congress to regulate inactivitya failure to buy insurance.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

WikiLeaks: Strained relations, accusations and crucial revelations

Extract from WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange's War on Secrecy reveals twists and turns in the fraught lead-up to the publication of US embassy cables Buy WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange's War on Secrecy here Three men were in the Belgian hotel courtyard cafe, ordering coffee after coffee. They had been arguing for six hours through the summer afternoon, with a break to eat a little pasta, and evening had fallen. Eventually, the tallest of the three picked up a cheap yellow napkin, laid it on the flimsy modern cafe table and started to scribble. Ian Traynor, the Guardian's European editor, recalls: "Julian [Assange] whipped out this mini-laptop, opened it up and did something on his computer. He picked up a napkin and said, 'OK you've got it.' "We said: 'Got what?' "He said: 'You've got the whole file. The password is this napkin.'" Traynor adds: "I was stunned. We were expecting further, very long negotiations and ...
Keep reading

Britains first celebrity stalker revealed

Image
A copy of a 19th century cartoon shows Boy Jones (L), the stalker of Britains Queen Victoria, spying on he. Reuters file picLONDON, Feb 3 A 19th Century intruder sat on Queen Victorias throne, slept in one of her servants beds, hid under her sofa, read her private letters and even stole a pair of her voluminous silk knickers.Yet he was just an ordinary 14-year-old boy one of Britains first celebrity stalkers.The story of Edward Jones, known to Londons Victorian police as Boy Jones, has been pieced together using contemporary newspaper reports of the monarchs early reign.According to Jan Bondeson of Cardiff University, who spent five years writing a book on the lads fascination with the Royal Family, he broke into Buckingham Palace at least three times between 1838 and 1841.Jones, who, according to Bondesons book Queen Victoria and the Stalker, managed to get within a few feet of the young monarch, alarmed authorities who tried to keep accounts of his break-ins secret.On one occasion...
Keep reading

The Fighters Cruel Art

Image
Joyce Carol Oates Paramount Pictures A still from The Fighter (2010) The Fighter might more accurately have been titled The Fighter and His Family : its a boisterous, brilliantly orchestrated ensemble piece at the paradoxically near-still center of which is an Irish-American boxer (Mark Wahlberg), whose once-promising career, like his grim hometown, Lowell, Massachusetts, is on what appears to be an inevitable downward spiral. Just nominated for seven Academy Awardsincluding best picture and Christian Bale as supporting actor, the current favorite in that categorythe film is based on the life and career of former junior welterweight champion Micky Ward, most famous for his three brutally hard-fought bouts with Arturo Gatti in 20022003. It is also a group portrait of working-class Irish-Americans in a blighted, postindustrial landscape: the brawling, clannish, emotionally combustible Ward-Eklund family for whom Micky is the great hope and from whom, if he wants to survive, let ...
Keep reading