A right to healthcare? And what about that loss of our freedoms.
If a dozen constitutional lawyers weighed in on whether the people have a constitutional right to healthcare, there would be two six-packs of opinions whether the founding fathers thought the government could require a license to drive a car.
Which is why we have only odd Supreme Court justices. Odd number, I mean.
But while we’re arguing about driver’s licenses, why are we still arguing whether the Affordable Care Act establishes a right to healthcare. It does not. It instead sets out rules for insurance companies to follow when selling insurance, such as rules that say insurance companies can’t discriminate against the sick and disabled.
(In the background, some silly civil rights attorney is muttering “equal protection under the law…can’t remember where I saw that, but I know it’s there.” Another attorney yells, “Promote the general welfare, yeah, that’s it.” Still another attorney screams, “Abolish the Federal Reserve.”)
But back to the argument. The “right” to healthcare was legislatively established in an earlier federal law: The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA). This law was passed in 1986 as part of the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA).
I guess this law must be constitutional because it has stood since 1986, though Justice Scalia may have said once in a speech that the Constitution can’t regulate hospitals because the word “hospital” does not appear in the Federalist Papers.
Not only does the EMTALA establish a legislatively defined “right” to treatment, but in so doing it establishes a federal mandate that requires health care professionals to provide uncompensated care regardless of the patient’s immigration status or ability to pay. Kobach to the rescue, please.
So, apparently, it’s constitutional for the government to order doctors into activity but not constitutional to order citizens into activity by requiring them to be responsible and buy insurance so they won’t end up in emergency rooms where the government orders doctors to treat them. Tennis anyone?
Of course, the millions of people who already have insurance and wouldn’t for a second take the risk of going without it then get to scream that their freedoms are being violated by being required to buy something they already have and want to keep. Even though their insurance premiums are being jacked up when hospitals raise charges to insurance companies to cover the costs of uncompensated care.
Meanwhile, Justice Scalia and President H.W. Bush have entered therapy to get over being forced to eat broccoli when they were kids. They’ve started a support group and believe Justice Kennedy will soon join them.
The theme of the support group is simple: My right not to eat broccoli is greater than the right of others to have access to health insurance so they won’t die from not eating enough broccoli.
Or something like that.
Mark Hastert
10 months, 2 weeks agoIf health care is not a right but rather a privileged then, like car insurance, conditions can be placed upon the granting of that privilege e.g insurance.
If it’s a right then bring on single payer.
Kent Mueller
10 months, 2 weeks agoI guess Mark wants to, in effect, nationalize 16% of our economy. Eliminate all competition and monopolize. Now, that’s the ticket.
George Hunsucker
Northland
10 months, 2 weeks agoHe speaks the “progresssssssssssssssssssive” story line Kent… Govt. knows all and can do all—of course when the producers stop producing or, as is increasingly happening, leave the country, these “progressssssssssssssssssives” won’t have anyone left to screw—that’s their definition of nirvana….
Mark Hastert
10 months, 2 weeks agothe piece raises a valid question. I see that there are no conservative answers.
It appears that the conservative view is that aside from emergency treatment, no one has a right to health care unless they can pay, so it’s perfectly legitimate to insist that they either have insurance or a pot-o-gold. Reagan muddied the water because, as the piece points out, EMTALA forces a private business/provider to give emergency treatment essentially for free suggesting that at least that much is a right. I’m not seeing any protests against that probably because even the the most coldhearted no-good very bad conservatives would deny that sort of treatment to someone in need. Of course someday all of us will need care.
So, is it a right of a privilege? Either answer has implications conservatives apparently do not want to deal with.
George Harris
Kansas City
10 months, 2 weeks agoKay, I think you can comment that the piece is silly, or you can decide to decline to comment and then not comment. But you can’t comment that you decided not to comment and then opine that the piece is silly and say that’s why you’re not commenting (even though you are.)
Or, I guess you can. It’s a bit like people saying, “This goes without saying…” then they say it. :)
Kent Mueller
10 months, 2 weeks agoMark, If you no absolutely nothing of conservative, more market based solutions, then you must be the one who only watches msnbc, as you accuse others of only watching fox. Do you really not know anything but a single payer plan? Really? How can you know your position is right without knowing the other?
George, thank you. You and I don’t agree on a lot, but I agree with your response to Kay. Kay is unique, lol. It’s hard to know from where she is coming. But you described her well.