United Liberty

Michael Cannon at the indispensable Cato Institute clarifies several misconceptions about Obamacare:

Myth: This isn’t a government takeover of health care.

This legislation will force all Americans to purchase health insurance coverage. Government will control what kind of insurance you purchase, where you purchase it, how much you pay and what kind of medical care you receive. Our health care sector will be “private” in name only. Once government controls those decisions, there will be nothing left to socialize. Make no mistake — this was a vote on socialized medicine.

Myth: This legislation will stop abusive insurance practices.

The Obama plan will encourage abusive insurance practices. Research by Obama adviser David Cutler shows that the plan’s price controls will force insurers who provide quality care for the sick into bankruptcy. Insurers will therefore use countless and covert means to deny care and avoid, mistreat and dump the sick. Along the way, the legislation will shower private insurance companies with half a trillion dollars in government subsidies.

Myth: The legislation will contain health care costs.

The Obama plan will increase health care costs for the simple reason that it would put millions more patients, plus doctors and insurers, in a position where they are spending the taxpayers’ money. That never produces frugality. Its command-and-control approaches to cost containment have failed over and over in Medicare and Medicaid because they don’t change the incentives that encourage cost growth.

Over at The American Spectator, conservative lawyer Stacy Cline points out that the legal challenges to ObamaCare have the odds, and the case law, against them:

Last night’s passage of the greatest expansion of the federal government since the Great Society is a sad day for our country, not only because it may bankrupt our future, but also because we have no recourse to the Constitution. Our Constitution was elegantly designed to protect individuals from too much concentration of power in any one source, but the Supreme Court has evolved into a body that has protected and even facilitated the modern regulatory state at the expense of our founding principles. The optimism of state attorneys general and others who hope to challenge the constitutionality of this legislation is admirable, but such challenges are not likely to be successful.

But what, you might ask, about what seems like it might be the most vulnerable part of the health care bill, the individual mandates ?

Well, as Cline points out, that may actually be the weakest ground of all:

Despite this patent overreach by Congress, the Supreme Court’s flawed jurisprudence on this issue probably permits it. The government will argue that it has the authority to impose the individual mandate under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, which permits Congress “to regulate Commerce … among the several States.” Supreme Court precedent has interpreted the Commerce Clause to permit Congress to regulate and prohibit all sorts of economic activities that in the aggregate substantially affect interstate commerce.

Watching the House take up ObamaCare on Sunday night was difficult. For those of you that have read my posts for the last year know that health care was a big issue for me. So to watch the Congress enact a bill that is going to impose unconstitutional mandates on individuals and job-killing regulations on businesses and spend over $1 trillion (once you include the Medicare doc fix and accounting gimmicks) and result in more budget deficits.

Democrats says opponents of ObamaCare are wrong in saying that this is a government takeover of health care. While it’s true that the government is not physcially taking over the industry, individuals will only be able to purchase government approved health insurance plans. If an individual has a policy they like, they may not be able to keep it because some bureaucrat will tell them that the government knows what is best. It is a takeover by proxy.

A good friend called me shortly after the vote was taken, telling me how he’d worked on this issue for so long. He was stressed, disappointed and dejected. I can’t blame him. I felt the same way, though he was taking it a bit harder. I had been preparing myself for this outcome for days.

This guy is a fighter. He’ll bounce back. I am concerned that others won’t be be so quick to heal.

Shortly, ObamaCare will be the law of the land, then the next round in the battle begins:

WASHINGTON — The battle over health care is poised to move swiftly from Congress back to the country as Democrats, Republicans and a battery of interest groups race to define the legislation and dig in for long-term political and legal fights.

President Obama plans to open a new campaign this week to persuade skeptical Americans that the bill holds immediate benefits for them and addresses the nation’s shaky fiscal condition. Republicans said they would seek to repeal the measure, challenge its constitutionality and coordinate efforts in statehouses to block its implementation.

The politics of health care are fragile — and far from certain — in the eight-month midterm campaign that will determine which party will control Congress next year. But both sides steeled for a fight to extend well beyond November, involving state legislative battles, court challenges and, ultimately, the next presidential race.

Even before the final vote, Republicans began relentlessly assailing lawmakers who supported the legislation, suggesting Democrats are spendthrift and proponents of big government. Democrats said they would seek to capitalize on the momentum from their success and strive to move beyond the political arguments in hopes of demystifying the complicated legislation.

“We ought to focus on not the political stakes, but the stakes for the country,” David Plouffe, an adviser to Mr. Obama, said on ABC’s “This Week.” “We’re going to go out there and not just talk about what we’re for, but what the Republicans are voting against.”

Over at American Spectator, Phillip Klein writes what many conservatives and Republicans should be acknowledging after the passage of ObamaCare:

[N]one of this would have been possible without George W. Bush — or more broadly speaking, Bush era Republicanism. While they were in power, Republicans squandered an opportunity to push free market health care solutions. When they did use their power to pass major legislation, it was for policies like the big government Medicare prescription drug plan, which was (until today) the largest expansion of entitlements since the Great Society. They took earmarks and doled out farm and energy subsidies. They earned a reputation for fiscal recklessness and corruption and incompetent governance. President Obama ultimately forced through the health care bill in spite of the political consequences to his party because he’s ultimately a true believing liberal. But it was only because of the failures of Bush-era Republicanism that an ideological liberal with little experience was able to capture the presidency on the abstract notion of change.

Absolutely dead on. Yes, they got health savings accounts (HSA), but the expansion of an already burdening entitlement is inexcusable.

By a vote of 219 to 212, the House of Representatives passed the Senate version of ObamaCare, which the president signed will law immediately. Thirty-four Democrats broke with their party to oppose the bill.

The reconciliation package, which fixes issues House Democrats had with the bill, will be voted on next. The reconciliation bill avoids a Republican filibuster.

We’ll have a full story up tomorrow.

[UPDATE] At 11:35pm, the House approved the reconciliation package by a vote of 220 to 211.