Health Care Bill: More enduring than our Constitution?

[Warrior-Mentor]

Even our Constitution allows for future generations to change it through Amendments.

Not so for the Health Care bill as currently written! :eek:



Reid Bill Says Future Congresses Cannot Repeal Parts of Reid Bill
Weekly Standard
John McCormack
December 21, 2009

Senator Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) pointed out some rather astounding language in the Senate health care bill during floor remarks tonight. First, he noted that there are a number of changes to Senate rules in the bill--and it's supposed to take a 2/3 vote to change the rules. And then he pointed out that the Reid bill declares on page 1020 that the Independent Medicare Advisory Board cannot be repealed by future Congresses:


there's one provision that i found particularly troubling and it's under section c, titled "limitations on changes to this subsection."

and i quote -- "it shall not be in order in the senate or the house of representatives to consider any bill, resolution, amendment, or conference report that would repeal or otherwise change this subsection."

this is not legislation. it's not law. this is a rule change. it's a pretty big deal. we will be passing a new law and at the same time creating a senate rule that makes it out of order to amend or even repeal the law.

i'm not even sure that it's constitutional, but if it is, it most certainly is a senate rule. i don't see why the majority party wouldn't put this in every bill. if you like your law, you most certainly would want it to have force for future senates.

i mean, we want to bind future congresses. this goes to the fundamental purpose of senate rules: to prevent a tyrannical majority from trampling the rights of the minority or of future co congresses.


According to page 1001 of the Reid bill, the purpose of the Independent Medical Advisory Board is to "reduce the per capita rate of growth in Medicare spending." For any fearmongers out there tempted to call an unelected body that recommends Medicare cuts a "Death Panel," let me be clear. According to page 1004, IMAB proposals "shall not include any recommendation to ration health care"--you know, just like the bill says there's no funding for abortion.

Paging Sarah Palin: the death panel is unkillable.

Update: A friend suggests that Congress could kill IMAB by refusing to fund it. So much for zombie death panels, I guess, for now. Also, the Senate could change the rules to rule repealing or amending IMAB in order. But that would take a 2/3 majority. The Democrats aren't playing by the rules; they may be violating the Constitution.

Posted by John McCormack on December 21, 2009 11:40 PM | Permalink


VIDEO AT LINK:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2009/12/reid_bill_declares_future_cong_1.asp

[lindy]

The Democrats aren't playing by the rules; they may be violating the Constitution.

Below is a different slant on the unconstitutionality of the bill but nevertheless along the same vein. Here's part of the paper but the rest is here (http://www.pointoflaw.com/columns/archives/2009/12/impermissible-ratemaking-in-he.php):

(From pointoflaw.com)

Impermissible Ratemaking in Health-Insurance Reform: Why the Reid Bill is Unconstitutional

By Richard A. Epstein

Right now, the Senate is anxiously considering HR-SA 3590, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act—a.k.a. the Reid Bill—which builds on earlier efforts in the Senate and House to reach a new consensus on health-care reform.[1] Many legislative uncertainties remain, but its key characteristics seem fixed in stone, and they highlight the radical nature of this legislation.

Senator Orrin Hatch has long urged that the legislation is unconstitutional for its overreaching on individual choice. This paper focuses on the constitutional question in the ratemaking context, by comparison to analogous regulations in the context of public-utility regulation.
One telling sign of the relevance of this analysis comes from the Congressional Budget Office ("CBO"). In a recent release, it has treated the proposal as if it nationalizes much of the private health insurance industry, most specifically because it may well require that rebates to customers kick in whenever, in its words, "medical loss ratios are less than 90 percent."[2] In plain English, the Reid Bill assumes that health-care administration, which is always costly, can be done cheaply even in the new legal environment, so cheaply in fact that these health-insurance rebates kick in whenever insurers' administrative expenses exceed 10 percent of their premium dollar. As the CBO has concluded, "this further expansion of the federal government's role in the health insurance market would make such insurance an essentially governmental program ..."

In effect, the onerous obligations under the Reid Bill would convert private health insurance companies into virtual public utilities. This action is not only a source of real anxiety but also a decision of constitutional proportions, for it systematically strips the regulated health-insurance issuers of their constitutional entitlement to earn a reasonable rate of return on the massive amounts of capital that they have already invested in building out their businesses.

In order to make out this argument, let me proceed as follows. In part I, I shall give a general overview in order to place in context the system of health-care regulation that shall be operated through the State Exchanges that would be formed under the Reid Bill. In part II, I shall give a detailed analysis of some of the major provisions of the Reid Bill. In part III, I shall give a brief analysis of the economic assumptions that underlie the Reid Bill, and the way in which they are likely to lead to extensive price fixing. In part IV, I shall flesh out the constitutional implications of the above analysis. I shall then close with a brief conclusion, which recommends that the Reid Bill be scrapped.

[Paslode]

It could be changed, all it takes is thinking outside the their box and formalities.

My .02

[afchic]

I certainly hope the Constiutionality of this bill gets tested before the SCOTUS, while the SCOTUS is still 5-4 in the conservatives' favor.

[FCWood]

While it seems within their power to make any amendment to the bill a 2/3rds vote; it does not seem constitutional to remove the ability for future congresses to enact any changes.

If this stays, which it may not after the conference committee, I give it less than a year before this section's constitutionality is challenged by the conservatives.

[Richard]

Pure hyperbolic political theater - no codified law is unchangeable.

Richard's $.02 :munchin

[alright4u]

Pure hyperbolic political theater - no codified law is unchangeable.

Richard's $.02 :munchin


http://www.aipnews.com/talk/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=11121&posts=3

Ray Stevens has it right. Check the link and song.

Jon

[Dusty]

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/01/02/upton-predicts-significant-bipartisan-support-health-care-law-repeal/

A top House Republican said Sunday that he expects "significant" bipartisan support for a proposed repeal of the health care overhaul -- a vote he said would be held before President Obama's State of the Union address.

Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., who will take the helm of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, would not go so far as to say Congress can muster enough votes to override a presidential veto. But he predicted Republican leaders would not "be that far off" from the two-thirds majority necessary to do so.

"Watch what happens," Upton said on "Fox News Sunday." "There will be a significant number of Democrats, I think, that will join us."

The Republicans' pledge to hold an early vote to repeal the health care law is widely seen as symbolic. Republicans reason that the voters who gave them the House majority in November expect them to at least go on record against the health law in the next session, though congressional rules make it highly unlikely that they'll be able to overturn it while a Democratic president is in office.

Though it would be a steep climb for Congress to override a presidential veto in any climate, House Republicans bent on unraveling the bill face a more immediate challenge in getting the repeal to the president's desk in the first place. To get the ball rolling, they would have to convince the Senate, where Democrats hold a narrow majority, to follow their lead.
"If we pass this bill with a sizable vote, and I think that we will, it'll put enormous pressure on the Senate to do perhaps the same thing," he said.

But Upton seemed to acknowledge the obvious roadblocks and explained the Republican game plan should the repeal fall through. As other GOP lawmakers have promised, he said Congress will comb through the law "piece by piece" to try to challenge provisions with questionable merit -- such as the individual mandate that's already being challenged in the courts and a controversial provision that would require businesses to issue 1099 tax forms for purchases that exceed $600. Obama has said he's willing to give the latter provision a second look as well, though his administration is vigorously defending the requirement that Americans buy health insurance.

Another challenge Republicans face is that the early provisions of the health care law -- like several new restrictions on insurance companies -- are considered more popular than provisions like the individual mandate, which is not expected to go into effect until 2014.