Congress, Constitutional Law, Justice, Media, Politics, Society

Health Care: Turns Out To Be A Tax After All

If you recall, one of the most steadfast public positions of the Democrats and the Obama White House during the health care debate was that the legislation did not constitute a tax. President Barach Obama expressly denied that the legislation was a tax in pushing for its approval. Now, however, his administration is seeking to defend the law on the basis that it is . . . you guessed it . . . a tax.

The Obama Administration has been repeatedly criticized for saying things to the public and then saying different things in court. Civil libertarians have denounced the Administration for not only fighting to preserve Bush-era doctrines but actually expanding on those doctrines in court in the areas of surveillance, torture, and terrorism.

The Administration is defending the new law as part of the government’s “power to lay and collect taxes.” It is the strongest possible basis for defending the law (and was used to justify the social security law), but it happens to contradict what both Democratic leaders, including President Obama, told the public.

Just last September, George Stephanopoulos specifically challenged the President on his denial that the legislation was a tax on ABC News program “This Week.” Stephanopoulos observed that the legislation seemed to be clearly a tax by any definition. Obama replied strongly “I absolutely reject that notion.”

Here is the exchange:

STEPHANOPOULOS: I — I don’t think I’m making it up. Merriam Webster’s Dictionary: Tax — “a charge, usually of money, imposed by authority on persons or property for public purposes.”

OBAMA: George, the fact that you looked up Merriam’s Dictionary, the definition of tax increase, indicates to me that you’re stretching a little bit right now. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have gone to the dictionary to check on the definition. I mean what…

STEPHANOPOULOS: Well, no, but…

OBAMA: …what you’re saying is…

STEPHANOPOULOS: I wanted to check for myself. But your critics say it is a tax increase.

OBAMA: My critics say everything is a tax increase. My critics say that I’m taking over every sector of the economy. You know that. Look, we can have a legitimate debate about whether or not we’re going to have an individual mandate or not, but…

STEPHANOPOULOS: But you reject that it’s a tax increase?

OBAMA: I absolutely reject that notion.

I remain a bit unclear why the President believes that looking up a term in a dictionary must mean “you’re stretching a little bit right now.” Now, of course, you can simply look it up in the Administration’s brief.

While once defined as a “penalty,” the cost of being uninsured is now embraced as a tax that is expected to raise $4 billion a year by 2017, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

I previously wrote this prior column on the serious federalism concerns raised by the new legislation.

Source: NY Times

181 thoughts on “Health Care: Turns Out To Be A Tax After All”

  4. Tootie,

    Buddha did a good job of explaining exactly why Jesus was very much a socialist, but I’m sure your denialism is up to ignoring the inconvenient facts he presented so I’ll just leave you with a thought:

    “…I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”

    Since I’m sure this comment, attributed to Jesus by the gospels of Matthew (19:23-24), Mark (10:24-25), and Luke (18:24-25), doesn’t mean that capitalists are going to hell, perhaps you can explain to me what it does mean and how the man who said it wasn’t a socialist.

  6. Let’s see there Tootles.

    He owned no property.

    He argued for treating all like they were your family – a form of communal living. He did so because he thought we were all of one body and one flesh and that his kingdom was in the heart, not of Earthly substance.

    He healed the sick, cared for the poor and practiced forgiveness.

    He threw the moneychangers out of the Temple and railed against usury and imperial oppression – a kind of class warfare.

    He was a laborer (carpenter) and a teacher who taught that you can’t be an oppressor and a disciple of a loving God at the same time.

    Socialist?

    You bet Jesus was a socialist. The most liberal of the liberal socialists.

    Hell, he was almost a communist except he didn’t buy into the atheism thing.

    Not only have you once again proven you don’t know shit about politics ‘lil Tooter, but that you’re not much more knowledgeable about the life and modus operandi of your proclaimed savior – a son of God you think has singled you out as one of his special people despite the fact you regularly spew a theocratic zeal to be an oppressor in “the name of God” by evidenced by your zealous desire to usurp our secular legal system with your theocratic nonsense, bigotry and homophobic hatred on a fairly regular basis.

    You’re special alright. Just not how you think.

  8. Byron,

    Jill’s question on libertarianism and government is a legitimate one, and she has earned a carefully considered answer if I am able. We go way back, after all. Let me think about the clearest way to approach it.

  10. Buddha,

    Do you think that Tootie even knows that Jesus was a socialist?

  11. Tootles,

    Who knew you were a comedienne? Not a good one, but ridiculous nonetheless. Now come on, tell us how Jesus wants people to not have health care insurance.

  12. Starti wrote:

    … the big drug companies were focusing on finding new uses for drugs they had already discovered rather than doing research to find new drugs because it was a cheaper way to make money

    The reason drug companies often seek new indicated uses – or minor reformulations like extended or controlled-release versions of existing drugs – is the extraordinary cost to bring new drugs to market and patent protection. It seems like FDA regulatory hurdles are designed to crush competition by novel drugs as much as they are to “keep the public safe”. The FDA has also politicized drug approvals by refusing to approve long-proven compounds like the emergency contraceptive components of Plan B.

  13. The Manhattan project is authorized by the Constitution.

    Obamacare and a myriad other programs are not.

  14. There is only one way to justify the fascist seizure of the health care system: the usurpatious supreme court decision justifying Social Security.

    I have said this since Obamacare was first proposed.

    Knuckleheads on the left first claimed the General Welfare clause allowed the heist. When that lie didn’t work, it was the Commerce Clause.

    Now it is the power to tax. (this won’t work either)

    I’m looking forward for this case going to the high court. You would have to be a nincompoop to think the Constitution as it is written supports S.S., Medicare, Obamacare or a myriad other assaults to its meaning.

  15. FFLEO:

    thank you kind sir.

    If I was a boxer I would be the training partner 🙂

  16. Yes, Byron adds a lot to discussions and therefore is valuable to this blawg.

  17. Slarti:

    “If you would like a specific example – you’re using it right now! (That would be the internet.)”

    from this web site:

    http://www.isoc.org/internet/history/brief.shtml

    “In late 1966 Roberts went to DARPA to develop the computer network concept and quickly put together his plan for the “ARPANET”, publishing it in 1967. At the conference where he presented the paper, there was also a paper on a packet network concept from the UK by Donald Davies and Roger Scantlebury of NPL. Scantlebury told Roberts about the NPL work as well as that of Paul Baran and others at RAND. The RAND group had written a paper on packet switching networks for secure voice in the military in 1964. It happened that the work at MIT (1961-1967), at RAND (1962-1965), and at NPL (1964-1967) had all proceeded in parallel without any of the researchers knowing about the other work. The word “packet” was adopted from the work at NPL and the proposed line speed to be used in the ARPANET design was upgraded from 2.4 kbps to 50 kbps. 5″

  20. Gyges,

    I had already mentioned the internet, but it’s definitely an example worthy of some repetition (both for its power as an example and its irony). You never answered if MLB was the anti-trust exempt industry that you were thinking of (I’m too lazy to go for the extra credit right now).

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