DA BONEYARD

any legal minded types out there...

bthny:

biteofpythias: … who can tell me how the stupak amendment would stand up in court challenges? doesn’t this get into freedom of contract issues? as a supporter of labor law protections, i hate the concept of freedom of contract at some level, but how can the govn’t tell a company and me what sort of contract we can enter into for my health insurance? i don’t know a lot about this angle, so if someone works/thinks in this area I’d love your insight????

I hadn’t heard/thought about this angle…I’m sure that PPFA and other groups are starting to look into all of their options should these provisions be included in whatever bill is eventually passed. Legal people, do y’all know?

 A few things about this:

a) It’s still a little early to act as if the Stupak amendment is codified fact — historically (as the framers intended, no less!) the House of Representatives tends to pass the wild-eyed crazy legislation and the Senate chills it all out. Stupak is a pretty intense case of anti-abortion legislation and it will likely chill out a lot.

b) So let’s pretend the Stupak shit goes forward as such, without being changed, and gets codified into bona fide law. Beyond freedom of contract stuff there’s also a possibility of constitutional issues raised by this legislation, in my opinion, and whether it constitutes an ‘undue burden’ set up by the government. Several states, for example, have had their supreme courts force state medicaid programs to pay for abortions in some circumstances (rape, incest, and life of the mother), and I think one state forces medicaid to cover all circumstances. So this is a possibility, but to be frank, you can bet the farm on the current SCOTUS throwing women under the bus on this one.

c) I guess this is a shot in the dark but ‘the government cannot dictate a patient-insurer relationship, and what’s covered or not covered’ is a tough sell for me. Sure they can. They do it now in certain states, although it’s not a blanket ban like Stupak is. There’s a difference between ‘bad policy’ and ‘illegal’ and ‘unconstitutional’ and I think this pretty clearly just ‘bad policy’.

Easy way to tell if someone is pretending to be 'folksy'

If both of these conditions are met:

1. Says ‘Warshington’ with an R
2. Are not from central or southeast Michigan

This thread brought to you by a guy on NPR explaining why he thinks juvenile offenders should be sentenced to life without parole for non-murder cases.

Quick scratch on the ambulance cartoon

Turns out that was actually a good cartoon and not an idiotic right-wing cartoon — I didn’t see the paramedic with the ‘what the fuck’ look on his face. Anyway, because it wasn’t terrible and worthy of derision, I deleted it.

ANOTHER STUNNING VICTORY FOR MICHIGAN

On behalf of my state, I will recognize Michigan’s production of John Dingell, who wrote that healthcare bill. Way to go Great Lake State for saving the entire country a second time (the first time was Robocop).