Usa Thread

[Hugh_Hoy]

Yeah...buy insurance or post a bond in CA. But it was a STATE mandate, not a federal mandate. Plus, you had the option of not to be a licensed driver. Same with fishing licenses. State issued. Don't wanna fish, you don't need to pay for it. Pretty simple, but important differences. Apples and oranges.

 

HH

[Flashermac]

State mandates? I remember them. Do we still have states?

[Hugh_Hoy]

Well, as the saying goes, "shit flows down hill". The people in D.C. shit and it flows all the way down to cities and school districts.

 

HH

[LizardKing]

Yeah...buy insurance or post a bond in CA. But it was a STATE mandate, not a federal mandate. Plus, you had the option of not to be a licensed driver. Same with fishing licenses. State issued. Don't wanna fish, you don't need to pay for it. Pretty simple, but important differences. Apples and oranges.

State or Federal mandate, what's the fucking difference? You still gotta do it, so it is for all intents, the same thing. Every state has the auto insurance mandate, and the fishing license thing, so it may as well be federal. Heck, we'd save a lot of money by removing the redundancies if it were.

 

OK, don't wanna buy health insurance? Then don't get sick. Oh, well, that's not possible, is it? Hence the mandate. But I'd be fine if they had a say, $5M bond option in there in lieu of insurance. That should cover a major organ transplant, aka worst case scenario.

 

BTW, I personally have never understood this obsession with State stuff. Why the redundancy? Are you not an American? Are you not proud to be? Then why the extra layers of government? Seems silly and archaic to me.

[cavanami]

Then you get into, "I don't want to have the operation or whatever, just let me die".

 

So, no insurance, don't want to live, is this OK?

 

Isn't it the Dutch that will allow people to determine if they want to die? Maybe the USA needs to lighten up and allow people to have "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" which may be that the person will find his happiness in death

[LizardKing]

But then there will be many, many more who want the operation but have no insurance. The law states that they must be treated, and the taxpayers and insurance holders (thru higher rates) pay for that. Hence our high rates now.

 

Are you advocating rescinding that law?

 

I am all for youth in Asia, errr, euthanasia as a viable choice.

[LizardKing]

HH, Cav and others against the health insurance mandate, let me ask your opinion of the previously proposed privatizing social security schemes?

[Hugh_Hoy]

I have read that if one were to contribute the same amount to a private fund(s), you would receive significant multiples of what you get from SS.

 

There may be equally arguable opinions both pro and con.

 

HH

[LizardKing]

So the burning question is: how do you reconcile that forcing people to buy retirement annuities is OK but forcing them to buy healthcare insurance isn't?

[Hugh_Hoy]

No mention was made of forcing anybody to invest in an annuity.

 

Interesting exchange between DOJ attorney's and Judge Vinson today as alluded to in news report.

Vinson noted that the mandate provided by Obamacare is an "over-reach" of the Commerce clause and asked the attorney's if the federal government could force people to buy broccoli because it is good for them and everybody else. Vinson also asked for the Gov. position on the severability of the various provisions of the legislative mandates. Judge apparently noted the reliance upon many of the provisions dependent upon other provisions, much like a watch; that is, if you take out one part (the mandate)which is critical, does it make sense that the watch will not function.

 

Judge seems to be leaning toward the opinion rendered earlier this week in VA...that Congress has overstepped it's Constitutional authority.

 

HH