Seriously.. enough of the "its not in the constitution" meme on health insurance pay.

[Peacetrain]

I do NOT like mandates.

But this meme on tv and here and everywhere else that we have never been forced to buy anything before.. that we are becoming communists.. that has the tea party types and libertarians literally foaming at the mouth.

What do you think Social Security is? The government is not giving you a free retirement supplemental. The money is taken out of your paycheck, and buisness are FORCED to match payments.

Social security is not a freebie from the gov., we pay for it, our employers pay for it.

So while not the biggest fan of mandates, it is hardly a new thing that sprung up in the head of Hillary and Bill.

[slackmaster]

1. Social Security is a tax on income

That's covered by the 13th Amendment.

Correction - 16th Amendment.

[Peacetrain]

2. Its forced payment.. all taxes are..

I am up to my eyebrows with libertarian angst. A tax is a mandate. Edit to add.. that is not an attack on you.. just a statement of mine.

[dflprincess]

34. A tax is a mandate paid to the government to pay for services that benefit society

(with the exception of a good part of the "defense" budget).

The mandate in the insurance bill is a forced payment to private companies that will mainly benefit the companies' bottom lines.

[dragonlady]

9. I believe the HCR mandate will be enforced by a tax penalty

No one would be actually forced to buy the health insurance. There would be a surcharge on one's income tax that would be a small percentage of what the insurance would have cost if you had bought it. So it is just another of many sections in the income tax law. That's my understanding anyway.

[slackmaster]

22. That could be seen as skirting around the Constitution, OTOH it might hold up in court

I guess we'll see.

[jdlh8894]

15. Then how come

our Congresscritters or any Fed employee do not pay into SS? Don't they have income? Sure they do! They get it from WE the People!

[LiberalFighter]

17. That's not true.

Federal employees are covered by FERS after 1983. Federal employees are required to pay their share of Social Security under FERS.

Previously, Congress and federal employees were covered under the Civil Service Retirement Service. It was replaced by the FERS after 1983 for new employees. Congress members were all required to be in FERS. Even under CSRS Congress members had to pay into the system in order to benefit.


You need to check Snopes to get your facts right if anything at all.

By the way members of Congress cannot receive more than 80% of their salary at time of retirement.

[jdlh8894]

20. My bad ,sorry.

I was referencing my father,who retired in 1980.Haven't paid much attention since then.Thanks for correcting me.

[dkf]

3. We've never been forced to pay private corporations for a product we don't want c

Which is why it is necessary to have a public option. Without it a bad precedent is established where we are forced to buy things we don't want from corporate America. How is that not a scary thing?

[Peacetrain]

4. No one is asking my permission to take a tax out on a new jailhouse

we do not need as far as I am concerned. We just replaced that thing 8 years ago. But guess what, they are taking it. Oh and guess who is building it.. a private corporation.

[dkf]

10. You do not have discretion over how your tax money is spent.

But you should have discretion on how you use your disposable income that is not taxed.

[Peacetrain]

12. Anyway you want to cut it dkf.. you are paying.. if through a

fully government plan, you are paying with taxes.. aka social security.. You are going to pay for it. Now again, I am not a fan or taxes or mandates, but if you are using the model, of choice on what you pay for, then private insurance mandates will give you more choice.

Mandates and taxes are the same thing my friend. That is the point I am trying to make here. The money has to come out of our pockets.

[dkf]

13. Then they should make it a uniform progressive tax. But they won't.

That is exactly the difference between a tax and a mandate.

Costs and benefits are too variable and depend on things unrelated to levels of income. It has to do with region, employer, previous history, marital status, negotiations of the particular carrier, differing policies regarding what is covered and what isn't, declinations by random individuals. Etc.

All of that ensures disparate treatment.

Whereas the government treats people similarly.

[Peacetrain]

14. dkf, I have to go to work now.. to pay my taxes for the new jailhouse.

I will check in with this later. see ya

[damonm]

25. BUZZ! Incorrect.

Auto insurance.

[JVS]

31. Buzz incorrect. Car ownership is optional.

[damonm]

32. But if you own one, you are MANDATED to buy a private company's product.

And in many areas of the country, just try living without a car.

[JVS]

36. I think the word "if" is a very important part of that sentence.

[damonm]

39. And I don't. Therein lies the difference

with about 90% of the American population owning cars, and thus under mandate to buy auto insurance from private companies whether they want it or not, I see no pracitcal difference between this and a health insurance mandate.

[JVS]

40. Only the matter of people making a decision.

[JaneQPublic]

5. I overheard a couple of teabaggers talking at the pharmacy...

...while we were all waiting for our prescriptions to be filled. They were both ranting about the Dems' "Socialist" health care bill. One claimed that he heard that "the Constitution lists the specific things that laws can be passed on, and Health Care ain't on the list!" I had to bite my tongue to keep from getting into an argument with these idiots.

Ironically, this comment came directly before each man got up to pay for his meds with "Socialist" insurance coverage received as a military veteran (and about 20 minutes after one of the fellows commented that the reasons we had to wait so long for our pills was that most of the pharmicists were "blacks and foreigners," which suggested the real cause of their hatred of Obama.)

[Peacetrain]

7. Its amazing isn't it..

You have these same numbskulls.. railing at tea partys.. shouting at speakers.." keep your hands off of my Soc Sec."

You just want to shake them

[Clio the Leo]

8. Were they dressed like Paul Revere and Betsy Ross?

(I like to pretend they dress like that everywhere they go.)

Funny story btw and so true.

[HughMoran]

30. Tea Klux Klan

That's about it.

[Clio the Leo]

6. SERIOUSLY! I'm healthy! My premiums are cheap!!!

... why should I care about anyone else!!?

The nerve.

Keep chugging Peacey!

[Peacetrain]

11. Yep!

And as if you would not pay for it any other way. Taxes are mandates. Plain and simple ..Chugging away

[Bluenorthwest]

27. If mandates are taxes, are burglaries shopping sprees?

I guess for the one getting the loot is is. For the looted, not so much.

[Igel]

29. That's backwards.

Taxes are mandates. But not all mandates are taxes.

Hence the problem. I've never considered that relationship to be very subtle, at least not since about 5th grade.

Congress can tax, i.e., impose a special kind of mandate. Is that generalizable to any kind of mandate? Depends on exactly how "living" your Constitution is and what kinds of new, never-before-thought-of meanings can be crammed into its language.

But if it permissible, then any mandate is Constitutional. The lobbyist makes a big enough donation to enough Congressfolk folk and the next thing you know you need to buy EverWhite Roofing for your house (or pay a surcharge on your taxes), you must buy GM vehicles (or pay a surcharge for Fords), etc. Intel needs to sell more CPUs, there's a $700/year "tax" on the possession of outdated computers--or for not owning one. The sky's the limit. Sucky, but if that's what they want to argue for, well, it seems that warrantless wiretaps overseas is a trivial change.

[dkf]

16. People who are healthy now know they won't be forever.

They want a plan that will work properly when they do get sick. People who are sick now are desperate for crumbs and will take anything.

[dave29]

18. sweeping generalizations on both ends.

Most people are ignorant of all this. Some people who are sick now (myself included) avoid using their available insurance unless they get *very* sick, because they just don't have the money to meet the ridiculous deductibles. I'm not looking for crumbs, I am hoarding them.

[dkf]

19. Well I'd say that is my view vs someone like frenchiecat.

We both know the bill decently well.

[dave29]

21. well, your view is myopic, maybe you should go get your eyes checked.

. Oh wait, do you want me to pay for that?

[harun]

23. Then call it a tax and make everyone pay it. If not it is exactly what they are saying.

[Ikonoklast]

24. Yep. Neither is having an Air Force anywhere in that document.

It is not specifically enumerated, but yet, we do have one.

[Bluenorthwest]

26. You are obscessed with the notion that other people think

things are free. You flung that at me in another thread. It is more offensive than I said at that time. I've been paying income taxes since I turned 18, I've had health insurance constantly, and yet you think that somehow, after paying tens of thousands for those things, that I might have forgotten that or missed the part where I wrote a huge check to the IRS once a year.
Just as you insisted on discussing 'private vs public' when the question was about profit vs non profit, now you are claiming that a forced purchase of Untied Health Care products, or Nike products I suppose, is the same as a tax. You claim that Humana is the equal of the people's government. That is in fact your claim. That both can levy with force of law, and collect accordingly.
The fact is this is the first time in our history when anyone has proposed forcing the citizens to buy products of any kind. It is also not done in any of our 'peer Democracies'. This is a first, a new thing, and pretending that money paid to Humana is a tax is not going to change the facts.
Silly word games will not win this one. This is about people we love, and money we earn. You will have to try much, much harder. Non profit does not mean 'public ownership' and a forced purchase of private products is not a tax, no matter how you might demand that it be so.

[dave29]

28. Why do you have insurance?

Serious question

[Sebastian Doyle]

33. Social Security is not paid to a private corporation

At least not yet. It is on the DLC's agenda, and since they're trying to privatize everything else, they'll get around to it eventually. :evilfrown:

[The Straight Story]

35. If you don't work you don't pay into SS/etc - A mandate is different

just by existing you are forced to pay a private company for a service.

Wrong. Period.

[Prism]

37. So wrong in so many ways

Social Security is a public program administered by government. It can compel citizens to pay into it via taxation. The government can also use your tax dollars to pay for a prison. As long as the monies are for government use, your tax dollars are reasonably fair game.

Mandates are not a public program, and the insurance is not administered by the government.

This is a vital light and day distinction that, for whatever reason, people are pretending they do not see nor understand.

Private insurance is just that - private. The government is compelling citizens to buy a product from a corporation.

It is not the same as auto insurance. Auto insurance is a contingency based on a privilege of use. No one must pay for auto insurance. Only those who choose to own cars are burdened with the requirement.

There is no option for citizens when it comes to mandates. The compulsion to buy private corporate product is based solely on one's mere existence.

This should be absolute anathema to anyone's ideas on American liberties.

The federal government compelling citizens to purchase corporate products - with no public alternative - would have all of us rioting in the streets if the Republicans proposed it. Candidate Obama was right to condemn the idea as strongly as he did before he took into his hands the reigns of ever-corrupting power.

That so many "Democrats" are defending this abortion only serves to show just how corrupting and anti-liberal people can be once they get a whiff of power.

I would guaran-damn-tee that no one here would be all on board or defending this away if Bush had proposed it. Now that Obama is, oh me, oh my, how the principles do vanish.

The lust for political victory at any cost is sickening, dishonest, and transparent. And it is not in the slightest concerned with the well-being of the average citizen. The full-throated defense of burdening the working and middle classes with this mandate is about the biggest middle finger it is possible to give. And here are all these so-called, self-described liberals, right on board, because a charismatic leader told them to.

So here we are, saddled with the Democratic version of Bush's backwash. Just lovely.

[Gravel Democrat]

38. Kick for your fantastic post-you nailed it

"This should be absolute anathema to anyone's ideas on American liberties"

"I would guaran-damn-tee that no one here would be all on board or defending this away if Bush had proposed it. Now that Obama is, oh me, oh my, how the principles do vanish"

+1,000,000,000

I think if Bush or McCain had proposed this there would be threads calling for marches on DC.

[Thothmes]

43. What you are being saddled with is a Democratic

Presidents creation with the aid of a Democratically controlled Congress. Dont believe ever seeing a bill introduce in the last republican controlled congress to force citizens to buy health insurance from health corporations.

[Orangepeel]

41. The mandate isn't a mandate. It is a tax, which is constitutional

I understand why Congress doesn't want to call it a tax, but it is going to be collected by the IRS, so it's a tax. People who do not meet a certain income level and/or have private insurance are exempt from that tax. The government gives tax breaks for other privately sold products, like houses, hybrid cars, a college education.

Personally, I think mandates suck and think we should have medicare for all. But I don't see how mandates are unconstitutional. I certainly don't get the argument that mandates with no public option are unconstitutional but become constitutional if a public option is offered.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

42. We should have Medicare for all under the general welfare clause.